The Charlotte News

Saturday, July 16, 1938

SIX EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: "Two Little Confederates" discloses that which we have long suspected about some of the editorials.

And, we are relieved to read the urgent news below anent the prudential repositioning of our troops from Gettysburg; our heretofore belabored suspiration over the whole troubling matter is now considerably put to rest by this most momentous and propitious report demonstrating that our country is not after all a mere rampike, as was at first thought from the initial intercepts; therefore, finding in it a most grimly satiate state of the thing, we may return at once now to our more pleasurable, equanimous ferment upon the veranda, to await more of such fulsome reports from our front as it smacks hard against the enemy's running dervish tail.

July 16, 1863

75 Years Ago

The President received a letter from General Lee on Saturday which puts to rest all anxieties in relation to the situation of our army in Maryland, and confirms the statements which have been made that our army has been uniformly victorious in its encounters with the enemy in Pennsylvania. The letter states in effect that the engagement at Gettysburg resulted in defeating the enemy completely, in killing and wounding a number far exceeding our own and the capture of a large number of prisoners; that the falling back of our army to Hagerstown was a prudential move, not occasioned by any success on the part of the enemy, and not through any apprehension of contingencies arising which might insure his success at any point.

--Fayetteville Observer.

July 16, 1838

100 Years Ago

Smart Retort

Some of the Loco Poco papers and some who will not own that name recommended that we should go back to the financial plans of Dr. Franklin, and they quote from his letters of 1774.

In return we advise our contemporaries to dismiss their Adams and Napier presses--double cylinders and single cylinders--and go back to the good old up-and-down wooden cheeck single poll press--each editor taking a pull at the devil's tail during the night and relieving the laborer by carrying his journal in the morning.

--Fayetteville Observer.

 

The Astonished Judge

The judge sat there amazed. It was only a routine question he had asked.

"Do you use intoxicating liquors?"

"No, sir."

"Eh? What did you say?"

"No, sir, not at all."

There was silence in the courtroom while the judge digested that, and stared at the prisoner. That, he knew, was not the appointed answer. Fifty-seven times he had asked it already, and 57 times the answer had been yes. Fifty-seven times prisoners had stood up in the dock before him, 57 times in a row, and 57 times liquor had figured in the case. That was the flower of 30 years of prohibition in Mecklenburg County--30 years of pretending, in the face of ever-growing evidence, that the county could be made temperate by statute. The hardest drinking county in the state, the judge himself had already called it. Fifty-seven defendants, debauched by liquor or the sneaking illegality of the trade in liquor. And now here was a 58th one who was neither charged with dealing in the stuff nor, according to his own claim, addicted to drinking it. One defendant out of 58 after 30 years of "dryness."

No wonder the judge was startled. It was as though a giant panda or a diplodocus had suddenly turned up in the dock.

Traction Expert

Old Jim Ham Lewis, he of the no longer quite so pink whiskers, has got himself a new job. No, he hasn't quit as a Senator in the Congress of the United States. He has no notion of quitting and won't quit unless the snide people in Chicago who don't like the fact that he has a new job with the City of Chicago, at $1,000 a month, turn out to be too numerous, which they probably won't. These people are unreasonable people. They say that Jim Ham is already on the public payroll, and that if the thing he is hired to do for Chicago is on the up-and-up, he ought to do it free gratis, seeing that Chicago is a part of the state of Illinois which has honored itself by putting Ham in the Senate, and seeing that the taxpayers in Chicago already help pay his salary as a Senator.

But that is really unreasonable. It takes no account of Jim Ham's special abilities. The new job he has got with Chicago is that of traction adviser. Nobody had ever suspected before, to be sure, that he was a great authority in that field. But William H. Sexton, special traction counsel for Chicago, says that he is. And lest anybody should still be skeptical Mr. Sexton goes on to prove it beyond cavil by saying:

"I have no doubt the good offices of the Senator will be valuable in securing the WPA grant of $14,500,000 asked for subways."

Call Out the Guard!

To a Greensboro textile workers delegation who sought assurance of the State's protection if they should have any trouble going back to work at a struck mill, Governor Hoey yesterday promised that protection. He told them that if local authorities were unable to protect them, the State would step in without hesitation.

Fortunately, that isn't going to be necessary, since the Greensboro strike has been settled. But in nearby Lexington there is a serial fracas going on which hasn't been settled. Far from it. Local authorities seem unable or unwilling to give adequate protection to strangers there on the important business of investigating alleged voting frauds, and no warrant has been sworn out by the police or the State's prosecutor in spite of the fact that highway robbery, not to say assault, appears to have taken place, and in spite of the further fact that the identity of some of the assailants is known publicly.

All this directly involves the State itself, since the State held the primary whose dirty linen is now being hung out on the line to dry--unwashed. If Governor Hoey feels himself obliged to commit the State to the preservation of order in a purely private disagreement, how much more incumbent upon him is it to preserve order in a disagreement in which the State is the most interested party! Without another day's delay he should dispatch the State Board of Elections to Davidson County and any other affected counties in the Eighth Congressional District accompanied by the whole Highway Patrol if necessary.

Two Little Confederates*

From time to time, when the spirit moves them, the boys out of the city room, which is only a stone's throw from our ivory tower, sit down and do themselves an editorial. This is a very good thing for them, since it gives them an opportunity to essay a change of style. That is, instead of saying, "It is reliably reported..." they may say confidently, "It is interesting to note..." Also, it is a very good thing for the editorial page, since fresh approaches and fresh phrases add variety, and variety is the spice of you know what.

Anyhow, a couple of the boys contributed editorials this morning, which was a coincidence, and a further coincidence was that they addressed themselves, quite without collusion, to the same general topic. In a mean, sarcastic and uncharitable manner, they both took out after the damyankees. And gave 'em down the country. Practically told 'em where to get off. Snarled at 'em.

We think there may be some inconsistency in the two compositions but that doesn't matter. The thing to notice in the two following contributions by staff members is their unabated resentment for their Northern countrymen, and their truculence. They may prove something or not. In any case, it is interesting to note...

Keep Your Eyes Open*

The "poverty" of the South is worrying our Northern friends, who want something done about it. It is perhaps just a coincidence that this solicitude comes when our Northern friends are manifesting great concern over the flight of industry Southward. Their solicitude for us is exceeded only by their solicitude for themselves.

Our friends have waked up to the fact that the South is no longer a colony, which it was for generations after the Civil War. A colony rents money at high rates of interest from its conquerors; imports the idle capital of the overlords, furnishes raw materials for manufacture and buys back the finished product. Mighty fine, it is, for one side, but altogether too one-sided.

The colony, however, has become a competitor in manufacturing, not merely of the staple textiles, but practically everything else, and so ceases to be a colony. The days of importation of great amounts of capital at high rates have begun to wane. The red-headed stepchild has become an adult, with nice curly locks and a shave every day. Our friends are amazed, shocked, and more--

They are indignant. What the ----! So, something must be done for our poverty. Tears are shed over us, after 75 years. Nobody had before thought of crying out loud about us.

It is a wise proceeding when people begin to grieve over your hard lot to watch for the "nigger in the woodpile"--in this case the idle machine in the factory 'way up North.

Economics for Confederates*

Mr. E. F. Walker, secretary-treasurer of the Rhode Island Textile Association, is in the prints with a cry that Southern mills have cut wages fifteen or twenty per cent in order to approach down to the 25-cent-an-hour minimum set by the (Made in New England) wages and hours law. This will have a disastrous effect upon New England cotton mills, he says.

Mr. William L. O'Neill, chairman of the Trunk Lines Association's General Freight Committee, is also reported in the press. He testified before the Interstate Commerce Commission that to give the South lower freight rates would ruin Northern business. Mr. Arthur Van Meter of Pittsburgh, who is associated with Mr. O'Neill, got up to relate one amazing instance in which a Chattanooga plumbing concern had actually got some business away from the Standard Sanitary Manufacturing Company which, he said, does 63 per cent of all the plumbing business in the nation.

The Yankees are sometimes difficult to understand. Years ago, we didn't catch on quickly enough when they decided we shouldn't have slaves. Later, led by eloquent Henry W. Grady, we thought we had got the hang of the idea when Northern capital came in to build factories. We agreed with our financial betters to use leathernecks from the hills and rednecks from the fields as pitifully paid lintheads in textile mills. Now they tell us we should be ashamed.

It's confusing, even when stated simply. The Northern idea today seems to be that the South should:

1. Pay wages equal to those in the North;

2. Ship our goods and raw materials to the North at high freight rates;

3. Let the Yankees sell those goods back to us at higher prices, and over the same railroad lines at cheaper rates.

Sometimes we are sorry we didn't win that war.

 


Framed Edition
[Return to Links-Page by Subject] [Return to Links-Page by Date] [Return to News--Framed Edition]
Links-Date -- Links-Subj.