A Letter to the Editor of the Union Republican, September, 1910
Mr. Editor—It is the rottenest sort of folly for the News and Observer and other Democratic
papers to attempt to deceive the people by asserting that Senator Butler is an
element of weakness to the Republican party.
Everybody who knows anything about the political history of
the State knows that Butler is a broadminded, sagacious statesman who sees into
the future and guides popular will instead of supinely following temporary
drifts of public opinion; and foe as well as friend credits him with equal if
not superior political cunning to Senator Simmons.
What has he accomplished in the political arena? Sampson
county was once a hard and fast Democratic county, now gives a steady
Republican majority of 1,000. This does not weaken the Republican cause.
In 1894, Butler alone practically wrested the State from
Democratic control, and turned it over to the Republicans. Was he a source of
weakness then?
In 1898 section of the Democratic party made a desperate
effort to take the party over to Butler. Josephus Daniels was on the committee
of conference, and led the fight to throw the party at Butler’s feet! But for
the earnest effort of Jarvis, Simmons, and the brave old Buck Kitchin, Butler
might have been made the high muck-a-muck of the Danielites.
This was only 12 years ago that Butler was sufficiently
great to be worshipped by Josephus Daniels!
What has now caused the change of attitude, wherein Daniels
affects to belittle the influence of Butler?
Everybody knows that it never has been the policy of the
News and Observer to throw rocks at sparrows. The great brain and adroit hand
of Butler is more feared than any other Republican, and it is now attempted to
discount such power through artful deception. That game cannot be worked,
however, because the people have taken Senator Butler’s measure and they know
what a big and successful man he is.
His one term in the U.S. Senate gained for him a nationwide
reputation that no other Southerner ever attained in so short a time.
While not assuming a lead this year, he is willingly lending
his ability towards wrenching North Carolina from the thralldom of a democratic
official dynasty that has become officious in its tenacity of power.
This is a bad year for big bosses, and Josephus Daniels’
hour has struck when his whip-crack shall no longer make its smart felt.
The people are in unrest. They are more intelligent, are
able to decide what they need, and are determined to assert their rights
without question or direction.
The aristocratic oligarchy which controls this State is
doomed; it must give place to younger folks, to men fresh from the fields, the
offices, and the workshops.
Officialism can no longer signify the divine right to rule
by inheritance nor a wholesale family connection with the pie-counter.
--A.V. Dockery
P.S. Butler is the father of the rural delivery system,
having advocated it before E.W. Pou went to Congress.
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