USA > Georgia > The history of the State of Georgia from 1850 to 1881, embracing the three important epochs: the decade before the war of 1861-5; the war; the period of Reconstruction, v. 2 > Part 21
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548
THE END OF THE IMPEACHMENT.
It was a right curious matter, that the able Chief Justice, so long accustomed to preside over a judicial tribunal, did not successfully gov- ern the deliberations of the Senate as a court of impeachment. He was little acquainted with parliamentary law, and his decisions were con- stantly over-ruled by the Senate. The taking of the testimony began on the 8th of September, 1879, and continued until the 13th, when in the beginning of the defense, the counsel of Mr. Goldsmith asked an adjournment of the court. Mr. Goldsmith tendered his resignation to the Governor, who declined to receive it, pending the impeachment trial. On the 15th of September the counsel of Mr. Goldsmith an- nounced that they would introduce no more testimony, and had nothing more to say. The defense thus breaking down, Mr. Turner made a brief speech, and the trial ended by taking the vote on the 17th of Sep- tember, 1879. Mr. Goldsmith was found guilty of illegally receiving $4,582.50 as costs on tax executions; illegally extorting costs; illegally refusing to receive tax; illegally issuing and transferring 228 wild land executions; illegally retaining $9,720.46 of insurance fees and tax; making false returns of $6,134.45 of insurance tax; and establishing a disgraceful precedent. It was a curious feature of this conviction that though the accused had abandoned defense, and thus stood unresisting a condemnation on every charge, the Senate critically tested every count in the impeachment, and acquitted Mr. Goldsmith upon a number of them. Mr. Lumpkin offered an order that the punishment should be removal from, and life disqualification to hold office. Mr. Howell moved to strike out the disqualification feature of the penalty. This motion received fourteen yeas and twenty-five nays. Mr. Lumpkin's order then passed by thirty-seven yeas to two nays, Senators Head and Pres- ton voting against.
The sentence was declared on the 19th of September, 1879, and its enforcement was a touching spectacle. Judge Hopkins made an im- pressive statement for Mr. Goldsmith. The Senate chamber was filled, and there was a deep feeling pervading the large assemblage, as this solemn and irreversible fiat of out-lawry was officially announced against this citizen. The incident lost none of its significance, from the fact that in the whole population of a million and a half of this large com- monwealth he was the single individual that was thus deprived of the political privileges of a freeman. It was a tragic isolation for any man to occupy, and it carried with it a sympathy that strangely tinged the stern justice of the act.
Of the other investigations several were lengthy and elicited deep
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549
THE ACQUITTAL OF THE TREASURER.
feeling and warm discussion. The Treasurer, Col. J. W. Renfroe, had conducted the affairs of his office with unsurpassable ability. The majority of the committee reported articles of impeachment against him for taking interest on the public deposits. Hon. J. E. Redwine made a minority report against impeachment, quoting the resolution of the General Assembly, of December 8, 1871, relieving Treasurer N. L. Angier from liability for interest on the State deposits, and dismissing suits against him for $7,000 of such interest. He urged that if Mr. Renfroe had accepted moneys that should have gone into the State Treasury he could be made to pay them over; but to prosecute so faithful an officer by costly impeachment would be unjust to him and contrary to sound policy. Col. Renfroe offered to the House his resig- nation and the money taken as interest.
The House declined to receive this reparation. Messrs. A. H. Cox, T. W. Milner, Allen Fort, Reese Crawford, R. A. Nisbet, N. L. Hutchins, and W. A. Turner were elected Impeachment Managers. Col. Renfroe had, as counsel, Gen. Henry R. Jackson of Savannah, and Capt. Harry Jackson of Atlanta, father and son. The prosecution was ably con- ducted. The defense was a consummate piece of legal management. Renfroe's counsel offered to admit all the facts, and required none of them to be proven. Every effort was made to expedite the trial, and get a hearing on the merits. Much raillery was indulged in at the time, that the young and talented managers were unmercifully deprived of the opportunity to make some great speeches, prepared in anticipation of dilatory pleas and demurrers, which were not filed. The facts being promptly admitted, the argument came on swiftly, and was very able.' Allen Fort and A. H. Cox spoke for the managers, and did it well. The speech of Mr. Cox was a remarkable one. Harsh in voice, awkward in gesture, full of grimaces and shrieking, the speech was a master-effort, powerful, striking and eloquent. Its argument, sarcasm and eloquence were extraordinary. It was sustained from beginning to end. It cov- ered the whole ground. It held the immense audience electrically. It showed deep study, exhaustive thought and vividness of expression.
Capt. Harry Jackson made a clear, concise, strong legal argument. Gen. Henry R. Jackson is a fervid orator, fluent, imaginative and im- passioned, and he made a powerful and thrilling speech. The Senators consumed four days in discussion. Senators Cummings, Cabaniss, Harrison, Preston, Bryan, and others, advocated acquittal. Senators McDaniel, Clarke, Bower and Lester, spoke for conviction. Upon the vote being taken, Treasurer Renfroe was acquitted. A resolution was
550
THE BATTLE OVER JOHN W. NELMS.
passed instructing the Governor to issue execution against him and his . sureties for the interest. This was done, but the courts decided in favor of Renfroe, and he thus stood exonerated. His conduct through the whole painful ordeal was manly, open, frank and courageous.
The committees investigating Prof. Orr, the School Commissioner, and Col. Barnett, the Secretary of State, found nothing to condemn and everything to approve in their departments. It was jocularly declared that Col. Barnett had used several cents' worth of wax in putting the great seal of State to public documents, and Prof. Orr had paid his own expenses in traveling around in the interest of the public schools. Dr. Janes, the Commissioner of Agriculture, had made some errors of judgment in establishing his valuable department, that, in any other time than an epoch of diseased suspicion, would have passed unnoticed. Dr. Janes resigned his position on the ground that the opposition to the Bureau was personal opposition to him, and he was unwilling that the Department should suffer on his account.
One of the most interesting battles was over the administration of Capt. John W. Nelms, the principal keeper of the penitentiary. This gentleman, in many respects, is a very uncommon character. Having only moderate education, he is one of the most untiring and effective political managers in the State. A devoted friend and an unsparing opponent, an open-handed, free-hearted, out-spoken, fearless character, affectionate in his attachments, wielding a remarkable influence, shrewd and enterprising, he has shown himself a valuable political ally in any contest. He moved to Campbell county when a set of fighting men held a pretty strong political rule. He not only held his own, but administered some severe punishment in several tough encounters forced upon him, and obtained a firm grip on the men of that county. His administration of the penitentiary was careful, conscientious and capable. He had kept up a custom inaugurated by his predecessor, Col. John T. Brown, of removing convicts for the lessees at so much a head. This was an open arrangement between him and the lessees, in no way affecting the State. This was the point of attack against him. The committee was divided. Four members, Chambers, Walters, Gar- rard and Tarver, condemned the Principal Keeper, but suggested no action. Four members, Ivy, Tatum, Butt and Patterson, entirely justi- fied Capt. Nelms. Mr. Anderson made a third report, not altogether exonerating the Principal Keeper, but leaving the matter to the Governor.
The Legislature referred the subject to the Governor, who did not
551
GOVERNOR COLQUITT'S ENEMIES MAKE A BAD BLUNDER.
remove a faithful officer. Growing out of the method of the investiga- tion with closed doors, a sharp controversy ensued between ex-Gov. Joseph E. Brown and Hon. L. F. Garrard, in which the prosecution of the Columbus prisoners, charged with the killing of Ashburn, was re-opened, discussed, and placed in a new light, as has been stated before in this volume.
An attempt was made to throw the responsibility of Nelms' conduct. on Gov. Colquitt. Col. C. D. Phillips, of Cobb, boldly charged that the Governor was as guilty as Nelins, and if Nelms went the Governor should go. The utterance fired the House like an electric shock. R. C. Humber endorsed Phillips. Du Bose, of Hancock, replied that the Governor was not under investigation. Turner, of Brooks, followed on the same line. Humber offered a resolution censuring Gov. Colquitt for Nelins' conduct. This was like putting a torch to a powder maga- zine. In all of the investigations of the State House officers, there had been a large, decided under-current of hostility to the Executive, and it was hoped, through them, to reach him. The issue was clearly made by Humber's resolution. It would be difficult to convey the excite- ment created. The House adjourned, and a lively night of agitation followed. For once and at last Gov. Colquitt's friends became aroused. The idea of attacking the Executive in a matter that did not concern him, and without even a hearing, evoked a whirlwind of disapproval. The Governor was cool and placid. He seemed glad that the issue had come, and welcomed the chance to meet squarely the secret and unrea- soning warfare that was ever threatening him. The fight had to come, and could not present itself in better shape.
The excitement kept up during the night. Men rallied to the Gov- ernor, who had never been allied with him. It was recognized that the time had come to rebuke the personal crusade against the Executive. The reaction was overwhelming. The issue was whipped by the mere force of public opinion. In the morning the vote stood 119 against, and 16 for the Humber resolution, and of the sixteen, three voted under a misapprehension, and recalled their vote.
Persistent effort was made to throw upon Gov. Colquitt the respon- sibility of all the matters evolved from these investigations. But it was in vain. Wholly unconnected with any transgression of any sort, or any lapse of any official; assailed rancorously in every conceivable way, and yet standing pure and unstainable in a very pestilence of accusation; the object of an enmity, ruthless and implacable, but so panoplied in integrity that the most unsparing dissection of motive or
552
AN EPIDEMIC OF SUSPICION.
conduct could find nothing in him to visit with a shadow of disap. proval, Gov. Colquitt went through such an ordeal as falls to few public servants, and he emerged from it with an unfading crown of honor.
There has never been such a fierce fever of suspicion and groping, wide-spread inquisition. It was a sort of morbid plethora of public virtue, a riot of harsh inquiry, that in its furious sweep suspected all men, no matter how pure and exalted, and doubted all transactions, even though faultless. It was a curious phase of public sentiment, and strangely blended honesty and malice, a proper public spirit and very censurable motives of private, personal dislike and interest. There was much good done, and much injustice threatened. There was a fair measure of evil corrected, a good deal of injustice done and some wrong barely escaped. The matter forms an interesting and exceptional chap- ter of Georgia history, that has a rich instruction and a vivid interest.
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CHAPTER XLVIII.
THE POWERFUL HISTORIC GEORGIA TRIUMVIRATE COLQUITT, GORDON AND BROWN.
The Railroad Commission .- Ex-Gov. James M. Smith .- Maj. Campbell Wallace .- Col. Samuel Barnett .- Gov. Colquitt Vilified into the Gubernatorial Race .- A Flaming Contest .- The Most Violent Political Struggle of State Annals .- Slander and Calumny .- The Candidates .- Rufus E. Lester .- L. J. Gartrell .- liiram Warner .- Thomas Hardeman,-An Event that Turned the State Wild .- The Resignation of United States Senator John B. Gordon .- Appointment of ex-Gov. J. E. Brown. -Bargain and Sale Charged .- Gordon's Fine Senatorial Career .- Great and Bril- liant Services .- Thorough Vindication .- Gen. Gordon's Eloquent Speech .- The Value of the Tender to ex-Gov. Brown .-- The Alliance of Colquitt, Gordon and Brown, a Union of Ponderous Agencies .- Gov. Colquitt as a Political Fighter .- Gordon's Power .- Senator Brown's Valuable Three Weeks' Service in the United States Senate .- His Success .- Personal Disappointments at not Getting this Ap- pointment .- A Brewing Stormn.
ONE of the most important things done by the Constitutional Con- vention of 1877 was the passage of Gen. Toombs' pet idea that it was the duty of the General Assembly to regulate freight and passenger tariffs, and prevent discriminations. It was a vast measure for the State to take the regulation of fifty millions of private property, upon which rests the whole commercial fabric of the commonwealth, and is its largest single element of power. The discussion in the Convention over it was protracted and befitting its importance. In the General Assembly the bill to carry out this provision of the Constitution was introduced by Hon. W. R. Rankin of Gordon county, a gentleman who had been for several years one of the best journalists of the State. He is a member of the present legislature and chairman of the railroad committee. He is a person of ability, and a clear, forcible speaker. Hon. Allen Fort also introduced a bill forbidding railroads making unjust discriminations. Substitutes, amendments and long discussions marked every step of the measure through House and Senate, demon- strating the great interest it excited. But it finally passed, and was approved October 14, 1859.
Under this act Gov. Colquitt, with the advice of the Senate, appointed three Commissioners: ex-Gov. James M. Smith, lawyer, for six years; Maj. Campbell Wallace, railroader, four years; Samuel Barnett, two
554
THE RAILROAD COMMISSION.
years. The Commissioner's salary is $2,500, and he must not own railroad stocks or bonds, or be in the employ of any railroad company. Gov. Smith's appointment created much commentary. He had supported Gov. Colquitt for Governor. When he was defeated for United States Sena- tor, he had made a breach of friendship with Gov. Colquitt, and had become very hostile against him. When the North-Eastern bond slander was started against Gov. Colquitt, ex-Gov. Smith promptly condemned it, and amicable relations were restored. Gov. Colquitt, under that high sense of official duty that elevated him above personal considerations in his public acts, appointed Gov. Smith on account of his estimated fit- ness for the place. And it was said that Gov. Smith, who had suffered denunciation from men whom he had favored, declared that he would lay down the commission of Gov. Colquitt whenever he antagonized him.
Maj. Campbell- Wallace has been a marked character in Georgia for many years. He was one of that large body of influential and enter- prising citizens that came to Georgia from East Tennessee, and that have become leaders among the business princes of middle Georgia and especially Atlanta. Among these desirable Tennessee immigrants, men of brain, energy and leadership, may be mentioned Judge John L. Hop- kins, the Inmans, P. L. Mynatt, the Lowrys, Wm. T. Newman, the Parrotts, the Fains, J. J. Williams, Reuben Arnold, S. R. McCamy, John G. Dunn, Wm. H. Tibbs, and the members of that strong firm of Moore and Marsh. W. M. Lowry was United States Marshal for East Tennessee under Pierce and Buchanan. Mr. Triplett, of the Thomasville press, was one of these valuable East Tennesseeans. Major Wallace had been President of the East Tennessee and Georgia railroad. He had performed wonders of service during the war in moving Con- federate troops and supplies. After the war he was made superintendent of the Western and Atlantic railroad in 1866, by Gov. Jenkins, and did a rare work in restoring that ruined railway. He managed the road during Ruger's and Meade's régimes, and resigned when Bullock was elected Governor. He is now President of the Merchants' Bank, and was tendered, unsolicited, a place as Railroad Commissioner. To an unusually strong common sense, Major Wallace adds a fine humor, a perennial amiability, tireless energy, an unbending positiveness and high Executive capacity.
Col. Samuel Barnett is a gentleman of a hearty turn for statistics and scientific investigation, and an unwearied power of clear-cut, vivid writing, who has tackled the stupendous and inexhaustible subject of railroad facts and figures with the keen relish of an
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555
GOVERNOR COLQUITT FOR A SECOND TERM.
enthusiast. The only apprehension is, that he will give us a railway literature as voluminous as our Supreme Court decisions. The com- mission has a congenial and efficient clerk in Maj. R. A. Bacon. The Commissioners have handled the big subject boldly, cutting down and making uniform rates and fares. The Savannah, Florida and Western Railroad, the old Atlantic and Gulf Railroad, under that strong and rising young lawyer, Judge Walter S. Chisholm, of Savannah, made a vigorous effort, in the United States Court, to strike down the commis- sion, but the court sustained it unqualifiedly. An attempt is being made, under the lead of ex-Gov. Joseph E. Brown, to get the present Legislature to restrict the autocratic powers of the commission. The endeavor is being stoutly resisted. The success remains to be seen, but however it results, there is the prospect of an endless agitation of the matter, superinduced by the inevitable rebelliousness of so vast a body of strong capital over its arbitrary regulation by a power, not directly interested in its profitable management.
It is doubtful if Gov. Colquitt would have permitted the use of his name for a second term as Governor, but for the unremitting and ran- corous onslaught upon him. The Convention had cut the term from four to two years, and the salary from $4,000 to $3,000 a year. His private affairs needed his attention, while the salary did not pay the expenses of the station. But the assaults upon him had been so fierce and rankly unjust that it was but a question of self-respect to submit the issues of his administration to the popular judgment, and he determined to do so. The result was the most bitter political battle, the longest campaign and the most crushing personal victory, that have ever happened in the State's history. For nearly six long months did the extraordinary conflict rage, with a gathering heat every week and month. The battle became violent beyond description, and yet, strange to say, there was not in it a single direct, legitimate political question. It was all personal, and in its ultimate analysis, involved several very large moral and social considerations and a sentimental matter of national effect. The distant and philosophical reader of the extraordi- nary incidents and phases of this roaring and flaming contest will wonder at its desperation, brutality and causelessness.
Georgia has had some memorable political conflicts. The Troup and Clarke flurry from 1823 to 1827, was warm enough as far as it went. The Colquitt, Cooper and Black storm in 1840 stirred things up. But the anti-Colquitt campaign of 1880 was such a tornado of violence as to make all previous disturbanees mere child's play. And its interest
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556
GOVERNOR COLQUITT'S HOLD ON THE PEOPLE.
does not diminish from the fact that it was not a political issue, but a moral and religious civilization that stood at stake. Gov. Colquitt was the exponent and champion of temperance, religion and sectional fra- ternity. He embodied in his life, virtue and Christianity. He repre. sented a great question of a kinder practical accord between the races. Every exalted moral and social mission was enthroned in the candidacy of this gentleman. And it was a vital feature of the stern battle that Gov. Colquitt, under the strong inspiration of his Christian qualities, was immovably fixed in the homes and hearts of the popular masses. He was rooted in the public heart, and no violence could tear him from his hold.
This indissoluble clasping of the people's esteem must ever stand one of the marvels of this raging affair. For months every species of detraction and besmirchment was poured upon Gov. Colquitt. It was bred in a thousand protean forms, damaging enough, if true, to have damned his character, and killed forever the public confidence. If a tithe of what was charged had been the truth, Gov. Colquitt would have been desery- edly an outcast. Yet all this deafening crusade of defamation fell impotent upon the great, moral public thought, and when the day of verdict came, the people, with a resistless force, crushed out of existence the numberless brood of black criminations, spawned in this furious struggle.
And it was the most inexplicable feature of all of this extraordinary battle of slander, that there was a stubborn iteration of disproven scan- dals. The North-eastern bond calumny had been stamped out by the General Assembly, but it was rung and re-rung with unwearied persist- ence, just as if it had never been tried and shattered. So with other aspersions. But the clear-seeing, undeludable masses, with a cool poise held unshaken amid the boisterous fury of malice to their faith in the Christian Governor, who had the novel experience of a martyr's ordeal in the exigencies of a political strife.
There were two phases of this stirring campaign, the contest for the nomination, and then the fiercer struggle for the election. Usually the nomination in Democratic Georgia ends the tussle. In this campaign the nomination was simply the hot preface to a hotter sequence. It merely begun the battle well, and intensified its animosities.
The candidates for the nomination were five, viz., Gov. Colquitt, Hon. Thomas Hardeman of Macon, Hon. Rufus E. Lester of Savannah, Gen. Lucius J. Gartrell of Atlanta, and Chief Justice Hiram Warner of the Supreme Bench. These distinguished gentlemen have all been
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GEN. LUCIUS J. GARTRELL.
557
GOVERNOR COLQUITT'S OPPONENTS.
sketched in this volume. Hardeman and Lester proved to be the next in strength to the Governor. Lester had some strong geographical considerations to aid his candidacy, Savannah not having had an Ex- ecutive in a long time. Lester's campaign was finely organized and managed. It had some intelligent and masterly direction, and was shaped with method and strategy. His strong counties were captured early, to give him a boom. The ultimate issue was the field against Colquitt, and the strongest man would gather and focalize the oppo- sition. Lester refused to canvass, taking high grounds against it. But his friends organized consummately. He labored under one disad- vantage-one not seen at the surface, yet a substantial difficulty. His co-operation at home was not unstinted. Ile was a new man in that old place-a recent acquisition to its aristocratic ranks. A community like Savannah is wedded to its antecedents, and its blood. Lester was bright and popular, but there were older men and older citizens that the people, under their strong ideas of family reverence, would have selected as a representative of the city for gubernatorial honors. That the bold ambitious young statesman should have shoved aside the older material was a disability for him, so far as home backing was concerned.
Gen. Gartrell had no organization, and made no systematic campaign. He had strong friends in various parts of the State, and a large backing by the press. He had been before and since the war an ardent and effective political worker. He was prominent very early in his man- hood, and as Legislator, Congressman and Confederate Colonel and General, he had sustained himself ably. Ile was the author of the cele- brated " Southern Right's Resolutions " of the legislature of 1849; he met Cobb, Toombs and the Stephens brothers on the stump in the great . Union fight of 1850; he canvassed the fourth Congressional District in 1855 against Know-Nothingism, for Hiram Warner against Ben Hill; he was the Buchanan and Breckenridge elector in 1846, and canvassed the State; he went to Congress in 1837 and 1839 from the Fourth Dis- trict, by large and growing majorities. Ilis Congressional record was very bright; he was on important committees and made some notable speeches. He was Regent of the Smithsonian Institute. His career in the Confederate Congress was valuable. IIe held the high position of Chairman of the Judiciary Committee. As a Confederate officer he ranked high, and did excellent service. Since the war he has been one of the leaders of the Atlanta bar, an able lawyer and an eloquent advocate.
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