USA > North Carolina > History of North Carolina: North Carolina since 1860, Volume III > Part 28
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Just before the close of his term the governor had to settle a very vexing question,-that of the Atlantic and North Carolina Railroad. It was a valuable property, two-thirds of which was owned by the state, and undoubtedly had not been developed to its full capacity although it had been improved under new management during Aycock's administration. In the winter of 1903-1904 several prop- ositions to lease the road were made, one of them by V. E. McBee, who had been prominent in the affairs of the Seaboard Air Line, and K. S. Finch. They proposed to pay 3 per cent on the stock. Governor Russell in 1901 had recom- mended that the North Carolina and the Atlantic and North Carolina roads be sold, and a number of different interests were thought to be seeking control of the latter. It was a
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time for careful consideration and the governor, who had the decision of the matter, was giving much thought to it when Finch, who had never been a stockholder in the road, suc- ceeded in making a contract for a sale to him of forty-five shares whenever a lease to him should be made. He then ap- plied to Judge Purnell of the United States District Court for the appointment of a receiver, alleging mismanagement of the road. Judge Purnell, who was at the time out of the state, ap- pointed McBee receiver without giving notice to the state or to the other stockholders. In his petition Finch asked that the road be leased. At the same time he and McBee with- drew their bid for a lease. The state was in an uproar im- mediately. Judge Purnell returned to the state and, aware that he had exceeded his power, signed a new order. An ef- fort was at once made to reach Judge Simonton of the Cir- cuit Court and after some delay he ordered a hearing. The governor then had the attorney-general and the officers of the road secure a bench warrant from Chief Justice Clark for the arrest of Finch and McBee. Upon investigation the case was seen to be clearly one of conspiracy, and on March 17th, Judge Simonton and Judge Purnell signed a decree dismissing the receiver.
But the matter was not ended. On May 3d, John P. Cuy- ler, of New York, a stockholder of the road to the extent of thirty-seven shares, applied to Judge Purnell for the appoint- ment of a receiver and on May 28th T. D. Meares was ap- pointed and a few days later McBee was made co-receiver. An appeal to the Circuit Court was made immediately after Judge Purnell's order.
The morning after, the News and Observer contained a sharp and entirely deserved criticism of Judge Purnell's con- duct in the whole matter with particular reference to the action of the preceding day. The judge at once had a rule for contempt served upon Josephus Daniels, the editor, and, refusing any extension of time or argument, fined him $2,000 and ordered him jailed until the fine was paid, at the same time denying an appeal from his decision. This action was of course entirely without justification either in law or morals.
In the meantime the receivership case had been laid be-
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fore Chief Justice Fuller who at once issued an order allow- ing the officers of the road to give bonds and retain posses- sion until the case was heard on appeal. When this order was presented to Purnell, he questioned the right of the chief justice to issue it but of course ended by obeying it. The re- ceivers then declined to recognize the demand of the superin- tendent of the road to yield possession, upon which Governor Aycock ordered them dispossessed by force, even if necessary with the use of the militia, whereupon they surrendered.
Judge Simonton had died in April and Senator Pritchard had been appointed by President Roosevelt to succeed him. Application was at once made to him in the contempt case for a writ of habeas corpus and on June 3d, he granted it. Judge Purnell at the news of this hurriedly decided to allow appeal. Judge Pritchard, however, took jurisdiction and held an investigation on the writ of habeas corpus and dis- missed the case, delivering an opinion which cut the ground from under Purnell who, after having been made a tool of by the conspirators, had yielded to bad temper, probably under the spur of a guilty conscience.
The Cuyler suit was finally dismissed and the attorneys claimed liberal allowances. These were refused and the state was completely triumphant in the discomfiture of those who had planned to loot the road. There had been much popular . opposition to a lease, but this experience converted many and when in September, 1904, the road was leased to the Howland Improvement Company for a long term of years, there was little objection. A committee of investigation, appointed by the governor at the time of the first suit, had reported honest and economical management but had frankly advised against further control by the state, and this influenced many.
In 1907 there was another and more exciting contest in relation to railroad conditions in the state. The legislature of 1907 passed a law prescribing a lower passenger rate and setting heavy penalties upon any railroad or employe violat- ing it. The law was argued before the corporation commis- sion in May and the railroads not obtaining relief applied to Judge Pritchard who issued a restraining order against the corporation commission and the attorney-general, enjoining
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from putting the law into effect. He also appointed a com- mission to inquire into the rates to ascertain if they were confiscatory and ordered the original rate maintained with rebate coupons attached to the tickets for use in the event that the new rate was upheld. The rate law went into effect with- out action of the corporation commission or attorney-general on August 8th, and agents in Asheville and Raleigh were ar- rested for its violation. In the Asheville cases, Judge Pritch- ard declared the penalty clause unconstitutional and released the agents. In the Raleigh case, the agent was arrested, tried before Judge Long, of the Superior Court, and sentenced, and the Southern Railway was fined $30,000. He was released by Judge Pritchard, and Governor Glenn replied to this by an order for the execution of the law by the state authorities. Another agent was arrested, tried, and convicted only to be released by Judge Pritchard. Application was made to him for the arrest of Judge Long and Governor Glenn announced his intention of protecting the latter, if necessary by the use of force. Judge Pritchard then declared, "This court is con- fronted with open and avowed opposition by the powers of the state," and laid the matter before President Roosevelt who sent down Assistant Attorney-General Sanford to effect a compromise. Governor Glenn demanded as a preliminary condition that the roads obey the law and on August 27th, the Southern Railway accepted the proposition. It was then agreed as part of the compromise to expedite the injunction suit and the habeas corpus cases, to have the Wake County case carried at once to the Supreme Court and then on writ of error to the Supreme Court of the United States, and that all other proceedings under the law be suspended until the courts should act.
In October Governor Glenn held a conference with Gov- ernor Comer of Alabama and Governor Smith of Georgia at which it was agreed that the states must control traffic within their borders. In November the governor held a conference with a large number of citizens of the state on the same sub- ject.
The state Supreme Court upheld Judge Long except as to the $30,000 fine imposed on the Southern Railway. The Vol. III-22
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case then went to the United States Supreme Court which in the next year declared the law unconstitutional. But in the meantime a compromise with the railroads had been arranged and a special session of the legislature had been held to put it into effect.
The special session was notable not only for the settlement of the railroad question; it also marked a climax in the pro- hibition movement.
Mention has been made already of the growing sentiment in the state for prohibition. By 1903 more than half the state was "dry" territory through local laws. In the same year the Watts law was passed which forbade the manufac- ture and sale of liquor elsewhere than in incorporated towns. It also provided for local option elections. This was a great step forward and led to a more rapid progress of prohibition, but it was rendered less effective by the incorporation of towns purely for the purpose of traffic in liquor. So in 1905 the Ward bill was introduced which produced great excite- ment and caused gloomy predictions as to the certain defeat of the democratic party at the next election. This proposed law provided that no liquor could be manufactured or sold in towns of less than 1,000 population. Freedom of shipment from "wet" towns in the state had already almost nullified prohibition in some sections of the state and so in another act it was provided that the place of delivery was under the law to be regarded as the place of sale. There was so much opposition that a meeting of the democratic executive com- mittee was called to consider what course should be pursued. Wisely, the committee declared liquor legislation not a party matter and declined to take any action. Both bills were passed and became laws.
Under these laws prohibition had a chance to prove its possibilities. Everywhere the results were good and senti- ment for prohibition grew fast. State-wide prohibition, how- ever, was regarded as a thing to be achieved in the distant future. But when the special session of 1908 was called, a wave of interest and enthusiasm on the subject appeared and rose steadily. When the legislature assembled it was flooded with petitions and sentiment became so strong that a bill was
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passed submitting the question of state prohibition to the voters, for decision at a special election. A campaign fol- lowed which was without political significance, leaders of both parties taking part. Nor did it have any special interest although bitterly contested. Prohibition was carried by a majority of more than 44,000, only twenty counties voting against it and the western counties giving it heavy majorities. The law was effective and highly beneficial from the begin- ning. From time to time, in accordance with public senti- ment it has been supplemented by other laws designed to check the traffic across state lines, such as limiting the amount that might be received within a given period.
In the years following 1900 there was such a vast increase of local and special legislation that the legislative machinery was clogged by it at every session. Many of those who served in the legislature recognized the evil clearly, but the pres- sure of the system was too great to be overcome. In his message of 1911 Governor Kitchin recommended the amend- ment of the constitution in several respects but chiefly in the direction of limiting special legislation. At the same ses- sion a bill for submitting the question of a constitutional con- vention to the people was introduced, but received little con- sideration. Two years later there was considerable interest in the subject and quite extended discussion in the state press before the legislature met. When the session began there were before the members numerous proposals for amendment and a bill for a convention. The legislature admitted the necessity for amendment, but decided against a convention and created a commission on constitutional amendments com- posed of five persons chosen by the Senate from its own members, cight chosen similarly by the House, and five others appointed by the governor. The commission was charged with the consideration of all proposals for amendment, and the recommendation of such as it decided upon to a special session of the legislature. The commission was appointed and in July submitted fourteen amendments which were laid before the special session held in September. Ten were adopted which proposed (1) to substitute the phrase "War Between the States" for the words "insurrection and rebel-
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lion against the United States"; (2), to increase the com- pensation of members of the General Assembly; (3), to re- strict local, private, and special legislation; (4), to fix the day of inauguration of the governor; (5), to prevent delays in trials by providing emergency judges; (6), to remove cer- tain obsolete sections from the constitution; (7), to reform the system of taxation; (8) to prohibit special charters of corporations by the General Assembly ; (9), to prohibit special charters of towns, cities, and incorporated villages by the General Assembly; and (10) to require a six months term in the public schools.
While these amendments were pending the democratic convention of 1914 met and refused to endorse the amend- ments or to consider them in any way, and omitted all men- tion of them from the platform. The republican convention endorsed them but with no particular enthusiasm and the party as a whole was opposed. An attempt to rouse enthu- siasm and to carry on a campaign for ratification was made by a small group who were favorable, but the action of the democratic convention had been fatal and all the amend- ments were defeated, the slaughter of the taxation clause being particularly complete. The legislature of 1915, how- ever, which met immediately afterwards, promptly re-submit- ted the third, fifth, eighth, and ninth amendments which were ratified in 1916. The discussion of the subject performed an educational service of value. One result was seen in 1917 when the legislature, by overwhelming majorities in each House, submitted the question of a convention to the vote of the people.
The politics of the period since 1900 has been in the main uninteresting. The democrats have been completely and se- curely in power in branches of the state government and in a large majority of the counties. Within the party there have been exciting contests but the campaigns between the two parties have been rather uninterested as well as uninterest- ing. The republican party is strong enough in the state to threaten uninterrupted tenure of power, and there is a grow- ing independent element, so democratic control cannot be said to be irresponsible in a party sense, but the threat of defeat
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is not serious and there have in consequence been tendencies, apparent at times, towards a disregard by a certain element of political leaders of what the masses desired and even de- manded, and conservatism has been entirely in control. The primary, adopted in 1915, has had no fair trial, but is likely sometime to become a powerful instrument in the hands of the people.
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In 1903 there was a long contest in the democratic caucus of the legislature for the nomination for United States sen- ator between J. S. Carr, Locke Craig, R. B. Glenn, Lee S. Overman, and C. B. Watson, resulting finally in the choice of Overman who was elected. Pritchard retired from the Sen- ate with the friendship and liking of the state, even so stal- wart and partisan an opponent as the News and Observer paying him a tribute as a broad-minded public servant. His later appointment to the bench was popular with democrats as well as republicans and he has steadily grown in public estimation. In 1912 there was another bitter senatorial con- test between Senator Simmons and Governor Kitchin with Chief Justice Clark running far behind. Aycock had an- nounced his candidacy just before his death. The result in the primary was a majority for Simmons over both his oppo- nents of more than twenty thousand. In 1914 Overman was without opposition in his own party and in the first popular election of senator defeated A. A. Whitener by thirty-four thousand votes.
Three of the four gubernatorial contests in the democratic party have been intense. In 1904 there was an excited pre- convention campaign between R. B. Glenn, Charles M. Sted- man, W. D. Turner, and T. F. Davidson, but with only the first two really having a chance. Glenn was nominated on the fifth ballot and in November carried the state by forty-nine thousand, defeating Charles J. Harris, the republican candi- date. In 1908 there was an intense contest between Locke Craig, W. W. Kitchin, and Ashley Horne. The convention which met in Charlotte was deadlocked for almost a week, but Kitchin was finally nominated on the sixty-first ballot and in the election defeated J. Elwood Cox by thirty-eight thousand majority. Locke Craig was nominated without opposition in
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1912 and ran against Thomas Settle on the republican ticket and Iredell Meares on the progressive ticket, defeating both with a majority of more than fifty-six thousand. Meares led Settle by more than six thousand. In 1916 Thomas W. Bick- . ett, who had leaped to state-wide reputation by his nominat- ing speech in behalf of Ashley Horne in 1908, and had been nominated for attorney-general when he was not a candidate for the office, defeated Lieutenant-Governor E. B. Daught- ridge in the primary by twenty-six thousand. The republicans nominated Frank A. Linney, and a spirited campaign fol- lowed in which the two candidates carried on a joint canvass, marked by debate of a high order and fine spirit. Bickett received a majority of forty-seven thousand.
Since 1901 there has been a marked tendency towards long terms for members of Congress. But few republicans have been elected. E. Spencer Blackburn was elected in the eighth district in 1900 and. 1904. John M. Morehead in the fifth, and Charles H. Cowles in the eighth were elected in 1908 and served each one term; and James J. Britt was elected in the tenth district in 1914. Of the democratic members in the period, John H. Small has served since 1899; E. W. Pou and Claude Kitchin since 1901; E. Y. Webb since 1903, H. L. Godwin since 1909; and Charles M. Stedman and R. L. Dough- ton since 1911. During the same time, W. W. Kitchin, who had been clected in 1896, served until his resignation in 1908; Charles R. Thomas from 1899 until his voluntary retirement in 1911; and Robert N. Page from 1903 until his voluntary retirement in 1917. As a consequence, when the democrats came into power in the country in 1913, North Carolinians were in a position of greater influence than ever before. Dur- ing the period since 1913 Simmons has been chairman of the finance committee and Overman chairman of the rules com- mittee and acting chairman of the judiciary committee in the Senate. In the House Claude Kitchin was first majority leader and since then chairman of the ways and means com- mittee. E. W. Pou is chairman of the rules committee, and E. Y. Webb chairman of the judiciary committee, while Hannibal Godwin and R. L. Doughton hold chairmanships of lesser importance. These, with Josephus Daniels, the Secre-
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tary of the Navy, and a number of other important officials, have put the state in a remarkably prominent position.
As yet the republican party has not grown in strength and power as might have been expected with the negro vote elimi- nated. Three things serve to explain this failure to gain more. One is the fact that the party has never openly ac- cepted and pledged its support to the suffrage amendment, although no one doubts that the great majority of the party rejoice at the exclusion of the negro. In 1906 the party plat- form demanded an extension of the grandfather clause to 1920, but that was capable of a double interpretation and the rank and file of the people in the state, remembering the negro in politics, demand a more definite pledge. Another cause is a widespread fear that republican success might mean the re-opening of the question of the special tax bonds and possibly their payment. This is highly unlikely but it is nevertheless widely believed with much political effect. The third and most important reason is the leadership of the party.
Since 1872 the control of the republican party has been largely in the hands of Federal office-holders whose quarrels over the spoils have alienated thousands of young men whose political affiliations were still to be formed, not to mention many older men not hostilely inclined towards the political doctrines of the party. Nor has the situation met with ap- proval in the party. Judge Bynum, one of the foremost men in the state in ability and character, after the state conven- tion of 1904, thus expressed himself :
The time has come in the tide of Republican politics in North Carolina when one of two things must be done: Either the Federal office-holders must own, control and manage the affairs of the party absolutely, as they seem to be doing at this convention, or they must abdicate and allow the party to be managed and its policy shaped by those whose policies and principles are governed by other con- siderations than office-getting, greed, grab and graft. If the Federal office-holders continue in control, then no self-respecting man can or will be induced to take part in Republican politics in this statc. If they are forced to abdicate, as should be done, then there is a future for the party. This may as well be said here and now. The party seems to be drifting without a leader or any one who has the courage to speak above a whisper. Everything is subrogated to the chance of being a delegate or getting an office. The thoughtful, prudent
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people of North Carolina never will and never ought to consent to the management of the affairs of this great state by such an irre- sponsible cabal as now controls the affairs of the Republican party of this statc.
When criticised for this utterance, he replied :
"The rank and file of the Republican Party in this State constitute a band of Spartan heroes-noble men who have pronounced political principles and convictions in which they believe and on which they act for their own and their country's good. But some of those who would lead them are little more than political cutthroats and pirates. It was said of Washington that he was first in war, first in peace and first in the hearts of his countrymen. It may, with equal truth, be said of these men that they are always at war, never at peace and for- ever in the pockets of their countrymen."
The same idea was expressed by Mr. Taft in 1906, while Sec- retary of War, who said in a speech in Greensboro :
"I do not wish to seem ungracious, but I must be candid. In my judgment the Republican Party in North Carolina would be much stronger as a voting party if all the Federal offices were filled by Democrats. Of course I cannot deny that a wish to fill public office is an honorable aspiration, whether by appointment or by election, but when all hope of choice by the people is abandoned, and everything is given over to influencing a distant appointing power to choose par- ticular men to perform official functions in a community politically hostile to those men, the result is not good for the men or the com- munity. * *
* As long, however, as the Republican Party in the Southern States shall represent little save a factional chase for Federal offices in which business men and men of substance in the com- munity have no desire to enter and in the result of which they have no interest, we may expect the present political conditions of the South to continue."
The view of a more recent convert, Marion Butler, who since the disappearance of the populist party has been a repub- lican, is thus pithiily expressed :
They wanted it to grow smaller, they wanted their States to stay Democratic as to their State and local governments, and they wanted to have a small coterie of men calling themselves the Republican Party who would control and dish out the Federal patronage among them- selves.
Their constant regret has been that the party was already so large that there was not an office for each Republican. If this condi- tion could have been reached then there would have been perfect harmony for the first time in the Republican Party in certain localities and States in the South, provided they had not quarrelled over the question as to which one was entitled to the biggest office.
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These so-called leaders often made themselves offensive to the best white people so as to make it sure that no decent member of the other party would join the republican party.
So fierce became the contest that in 1906 the following state- ment was incorporated into the platform :
It is therefore now resolved, That the State Executive Committee of the Republican Party be and is hereby instructed to assemble, and each and every member thereof, in Greensboro, North Carolina, on the first day of September, 1906, and on the first days of March and September in each and every year hereafter, and shall then and there before adjournment consider applications for appointment to all Federal offices in North Carolina, the terms of which shall expire in the next six months, and to recommend to the appointing power in each instance a suitable person for each position, except in such districts as are represented by a Republican Congressman. That no application shall be considered unless the applicant shall state in his application that he will submit to the action and recommendation of the committee without further contest.
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