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PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  PAPERS 


OF 


THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 


GOVERNOR  OF  NORTH  CAROLINA 
1917-1921 


COMPILED  BY 

SANTFORD  MARTIN 

private  secretary  to  the  governor 

Edited  by 
R.  B.  HOUSE 

ARCHIVIST,  NORTH  CAROLINA  HISTORICAL  COMMISSION 


RALEIGH 

EDWARDS  &  EROUGHTON  PRINTING  COMPANY 

STATE  PRINTERS 

1923 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2011  with  funding  from 

Ensuring  Democracy  through  Digital  Access  (NC-LSTA) 


http://www.archive.org/details/publicletpap191721bick 


o 


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PREFACE 

This  volume  was  compiled  for  the  most  part  by  Mr.  Santford  Martin,  Private 
Secretary  to  Governor  Bickett,  in  fulfillment  of  the  duty  of  the  Governor's  secre- 
tary to  keep  an  official  letter-hook.  Mr.  Martin,  however,  resigned  his  office  before 
the  expiration  of  Governor  Bickett's  term.  The  North  Carolina  Historical  Com- 
mission was  then  requested  by  Governor  Bickett  to  complete  the  compilation, 
editing,  and  publishing  of  his  letter-book.  Authority  was  granted  by  the  Council 
of  State  and  funds  for  printing  were  provided  by  the  Printing  Commission.  This 
work,  in  addition  to  preserving  the  official  papers  of  Governor  Bickett,  fulfills  part 
of  the  task  of  publishing  records  of  North  Carolina  in  the  World  War. 

The  editor  is  indebted  to  Mrs.  T.  W.  Bickett,  Mrs.  George  W.  Alston,  Mr. 
Lawrence  E.  Nichols,  Mr.  Frank  Smethurst,  and  Mr.  T.  B.  Eldridge  for  invaluable 
assistance. 

B.  B.  House. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  December  4,  1923. 


to 


•* 


INTRODUCTION 


Thomas  Walter  Bickett 

Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  War  Governor  of  Worth  Carolina,  was  born  in 
Monroe,  1ST.  C,  February  28,  1869,  the  son  of  Thomas  Winchester  and  Mary- 
Covington  Bickett  from  whom  he  inherited  the  wit  and  sentiment  of  the  Irish  and 
the  sturdy  stability  of  the  English. 

He  spent  four  years  at  Wake  Forest,  receiving  the  A.B.  degree  in  1890.  After 
two  years  of  teaching  in  Winston-Salem,  he  entered  the  law  school  of  the  University 
of  Worth  Carolina  and  in  February,  1893,  received  his  license  to  practice  law. 
Two  years  later,  he  settled  in  Louisburg  and  in  1898  married  Miss  Fannie  Yar- 
borough,  daughter  of  Col.  William  H.  Yarborough.  Three  children  were  born  to 
them  and  of  these  one,  William  Yarborough  Bickett,  survives. 

Serving  his  first  public  office  as  a  representative  from  Franklin  County  in  the 
General  Assembly  of  1907,  he  introduced  and  piloted  to  passage  a  bill  appropriating 
a  half  million  dollars  for  the  care  of  the  insane.  It  was  the  largest  appropriation 
made  by  Worth  Carolina  for  such  a  cause  up  to  that  time  and  was  the  beginning 
of  an  increasing  interest  on  the  part  of  the  State  in  behalf  of  its  defectives. 

The  Democratic  State  Convention,  meeting  in  Charlotte,  nominated  him  for 
Attorney  General  in  1907  after  his  brilliant  speech  offering  Col.  Ashley  Home, 
of  Clayton,  for  the  gubernatorial  nomination.  During  his  eight  years  in  this 
office,  he  won  all  the  five  cases  for  the  State  in  the  United  States  Supreme  Court 
and  made  sure  his  elevation  to  the  Governorship. 

He  was  nominated  for  Governor  in  the  first  Statewide  Primary  in  1916  and 
in  1917  was  inaugurated.  The  World  War,  though  it  shattered  many  of  his  plans 
for  domestic  reform,  gave  opportunity  for  new  tasks  of  leadership  which  brought 
to  him  and  the  State  unqualified  commendation  and  praise. 

At  the  close  of  his  term  he  gave  this  estimate  of  his  administration : 

Lest  we  forget,  I  write  it  down  in  this  last  chapter  and  certify  to  all  the 
generations  that  the  one  stupendous,  immortal  thing  connected  with  this 
administration  is  the  part  North  Carolina  played  in  the  World  War. 

Yet,  the  record  of  two  regular  sessions  and  a  special  session  of  the  General 
Assembly  show  forty  measures  enacted  into  law  out  of  forty-eight  he  recommended. 
They  embrace  provisions  for  sis-months  school  and  increased  salaries  for  teachers ; 
for  broader  agricultural  education  and  a  richer  rural  life;  for  expansion  of  public 
health  and  the  creation  of  a  public  welfare  system ;  for  more  liberal  support  of  all 
State  institutions;  for  a  humane  prison  administration;  for  the  foundation  of  an 
elaborate  chain  of  State  highways;  for  tax  reforms  including  revaluation,  the 
income  tax,  and  a  start  on  the  segregation  of  State  and  local  taxation. 


vi  INTRODUCTION 

Extending  beyond  the  limitations  of  his  office,  his  moral  influence  turned  con- 
sistently toward  improving  the  lot  of  the  tenant  farmer,  encouraging  home  owner- 
ship, increasing  the  advantages  of  life  and  education  for  the  negro,  establishing 
morally  fair  and  economically  sound  relations  between  capital  and  labor,  and 
setting  patriotism  ablaze  from  the  mountains  to  the  sea. 

Recognized  and  honored  at  home  and  abroad  as  a  thinker  whose  judgment  was 
worthy  to  be  followed  and  as  a  speaker  of  excelling  ability,  his  opinion  and  presence 
were  sought  by  the  press  and  organizations  of  many  states.  His  statements  on 
public  issues  were  quoted  widely  and  his  addresses  comprise  a  distinct  contribution 
to  Southern  Oratory. 

On  December  27,  1921,  less  than  a  year  after  he  had  returned  to  the  practice  of 
the  law  in  Raleigh,  he  was  stricken  with  apoplexy  and  died  the  following  morning. 
He  was  buried  in  Louisburg. 

He  served  his  day  and  generation  according  to  God's  will  and  fell  on  sleep. 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

Page 

Portbait  of  Goveenoe  Bickett Frontispiece 

Preface iii 

Inteodtjction v 

Messages  to  the  Geneeal  Assembly 1 

Proclamations  by  the  Goveenoe 79 

Appeals  to  the  Public 117 

Public  Addeesses 159 

Statements  and  Inteeviews  foe  the  Peess 267 

Public  Lettees  and  Telegeams 321 

Index 391 


(I) 

MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY 

1917 

1.  Inaugural  Address. 

2.  Exemption  of  Homestead  Notes  and  Mortgages. 

3.  Crop  Lien  Bill. 

4.  Transmitting  Letter  from  Commissioner  of  Labor  and  Printing 

Concerning  Federal  Inspection  of  Child  Labor. 

5.  Law  Library  Fund. 

6.  Ashing  Recognition  of  the  Services  of  W.  D.  J  ones  in  the 

Settlement  of  the  North  Carolina-Tennessee  Boundary  Line. 

7.  Appointments  and  Nominations  Submitted  to  the  Senate,  Feb- 

ruary 28, 1917. 

8.  Bonds  for  State  Institutions. 

9.  Appointments   and    Nominations    Submitted   to    the    Senate, 

March  5, 1917. 

1919 

10.  Biennial  Message  to  the  General  Assembly. 

11.  Federal  Prohibition  Amendment. 

12.  Rebuilding  Dormitory  at  Caswell  Training  School. 

13.  Telegram  of  General  Growder  on  Draft  Evasion. 

14.  State  Income  Tax  Amendment. 

15.  Department  of  Agriculture  and  State  A.  &  E.  College. 

16.  Highways. 

17.  Appointments  and  Nominations  Submitted  to  the  Senate. 

1920 

18.  Revaluation  Act. 

19.  Woman  Suffrage. 

20.  State  Salaries. 

21.  Transmitting  Report  of  Legislative  Committee  of  Board  of 

Agriculture  on  Taxation. 

22.  Workmen's  Compensation  Act. 

23.  Highways. 

24.  Legislation  for  Negroes. 

25.  Increased  Appropriation  in  State  Departments. 

1921 

26.  Final  Message  to  the  General  Assembly  of  1921. 

27.  Transmitting  Report  of  Budget  Commission. 


(1) 

INAUGURAL  ADDRESS  OF  GOVERNOR 
THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

DELIVERED  AT  THE  RALEIGH  AUDITORIUM,  JANUARY  II,  1917 


Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

I  have  no  genius  for  destruction.  Sense  and  poetry  agree  that  a  man  must 
follow  his  natural  bent.  It  results  that  the  activities  of  this  administration  must 
be  exerted  along  constructive  lines.  If  there  be  a  man  in  North  Carolina  who 
desires  to  drain  a  swamp  or  terrace  a  hillside ;  if  there  be  a  farmer  who  is 
struggling  to  escape  from  the  crop  lien's  deadly  clutch;  if  there  be  a  tenant  who 
hungers  for  a  vine  and  fig  tree  he  may  call  his  own,  I  want  all  such  to  know  that 
the  Governor  of  the  State  will  count  it  honor  and  joy  to  rise  up  at  midnight  and 
lend  a  helping  hand. 

If  there  be  men  or  combinations  of  men  who  want  to  build  factories  that  will 
multiply  the  value  of  our  raw  products;  to  harness  our  streams  and  redeem  the 
sad  waste  of  the  waters ;  to  construct  or  equip  railroads  that  will  insure  adequate 
transportation  for  our  growing  commerce;  to  form  or  maintain  insurance  com- 
panies that  will  keep  at  home  the  Niagara  of  gold  that  has  been  flowing  out  of 
the  State,  I  want  these  men  to  feel  that  the  State  recognizes  their  wisdom  and 
their  worth,  and  places  no  discount  on  their  patriotism. 

If  there  be  physicians  who,  with  that  divine  self-forgetfulness  that  is  the 
birthmark  of  their  calling,  are  willing  to  trace  disease  to  its  most  hidden  lair,  and 
plant  the  banners  of  Life  in  the  very  strongholds  of  Death,  I  want  them  to  know 
that  the  State  sees  a  new  salvation  in  their  sacrificial  labors,  and  stands  ready  to 
clothe  them  with  all  needful  authority,  and  place  an  unlimited  armamentarium  at 
their  command. 

For  four  years  I  want  labor  and  capital,  learning  and  art,  and  the  life  and 
letter  of  the  law  to  be  devoted  to  making  every  acre  and  every  stream,  every  human 
and  every  mechanical  unit  in  the  Commonwealth  be  and  do  its  level  best. 

I  doubt  not  that  with  the  wheat  will  spring  up  the  tares,  and  to  some  suc- 
cessor of  mine  who  glories  in  cremation  I  shall  bequeath  the  joy  of  gathering  the 
tares  into  bundles  and  burning  them  in  unquenchable  fire.  To  me  the  call  is 
definite  and  despotic,  to  toil  and  tire  not,  that  all  the  fields  may  come  white  to  the 
harvest. 

Such  are  my  hopes  and  high  resolves.  But  in  civic  life  aspirations  and  ideals 
are  without  value  save  as  they  inspire  measures  that  make  for  the  common  good. 
Living  problems  confront  us.  Ills  that  hurt  require  remedies  that  heal.  The  hour 
calls  for  action,  and  "Faith  without  works  is  dead." 

I 

THE  TRANSLATION  OF  A  TENANT  INTO   A   LANDLORD 

The  first  and  dearest  work  of  this  administration  will  be  a  supreme  effort  to 
translate  the  tenants  of  the  State  into  landlords.  Here  and  now,  in  the  presence 
of  God  and  these  witnesses,  I  consecrate  myself,  and  all  the  power  and  prestige 


4  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

of  my  office,  to  this  endeavor.  I  shall  neither  rest  nor  permit  the  State  to  rest 
until  every  honest,  industrious,  and  frugal  man  who  tills  the  soil  has  a  decent 
chance  to  own  it.  I  am  driven  to  this  undertaking  by  the  tyranny  of  a  conviction 
that  such  a  work  is  essential,  not  alone  to  the  wholesome  development,  but  to  the 
enduring  safety  of  the  State.  That  wizard  of  the  Northwest,  James  J.  Hill,  once 
said :  "Land  without  population  is  a  wilderness ;  population  without  land  is  a 
mob."  Today  84  per  cent  of  the  people  of  Mexico  are  without  land,  and  riots  and 
revolutions  result  as  the  sparks  fly  upward.  There  can  be  no  government  for  the 
many  while  the  lands  belong  to  the  few,  for  the  history  of  the  world  teaches  that 
the  men  who  own  the  land  will  rule  it. 

The  homesteader  is  the  most  conservative  and  at  the  same  time  most  militant 
force  in  our  civilization.  He  is  a  lover  of  peace,  a  pioneer  in  progress,  but  a  very 
demon  in  battle  when  danger  threatens  the  land  he  loves.  The  small  farm,  owned 
by  the  man  who  tills  it,  is  the  best  plant-bed  in  the  world  in  which  to  grow  a 
patriot.  Such  a  condition  brings  wealth  to  the  soil  and  health  to  the  souls  of  men. 
On  such  a  farm  it  is  possible  to  produce  anything  from  two  pecks  of  potatoes  to 
the  hill  to  a  President  of  the  United  States.  Every  consideration  of  progress  and 
of  safety  urges  us  to  employ  all  wise  and  just  measures  to  get  our  lands  into  the 
hands  of  the  many,  and  forestall  that  most  destructive  of  all  monopolies,  the 
monopoly  of  the  soil. 

To  this  end  I  earnestly  urge  a  constitutional  amendment  granting  to  the  Gen- 
eral Assembly  the  power  to  exempt  from  taxation  notes  and  mortgages  given  in 
good  faith  for  the  purchase  price  of  a  home  in  an  amount  not  exceeding  $3,000 
and  running  not  more  than  twenty  years.  Such  an  exemption  would  bring  the 
necessary  money  to  every  honest  and  industrious  man  who  desires  to  own  his  own 
home.  It  would  mean  a  premium  of  40  per  cent  on  the  income  from  such  a  loan, 
and  the  money  lender,  tempted  by  this  premium,  would  seek  out  worthy  tenants 
and  encourage  them  to  climb  to  a  higher  level  by  becoming  owTners  of  the  soil. 
Such  a  law  would  be  a  twofold  blessing.  It  would  be  a  blessing  to  our  widows  and 
orphans  by  enabling  them  to  derive  a  reasonable  income  from  the  savings  left 
them  by  husband  and  father.  Today  the  average  tax  on  solvent  credits  in  the 
towns  is  $2.40  on  the  $100.  Tho  income  fixed  by  law  is  $6,  leaving  to  the  widows 
and  orphans  only  $3.60.  None  but  widows  and  orphans,  and  a  few  ultra  honest 
men,  pay  this  confiscatory  tax.  It  is  the  essence  of  tyranny,  imposed  upon  the 
most  innocent  and  helpless  class  of  our  citizens,  and  cannot  be  defended  in  any 
forum  of  common  justice  or  common  sense.  The  proposed  amendment  would  open 
a  door  of  hope  to  the  tenants,  and  the  women  and  children  would  rise  up  and  call 
us  blessed.  Such  a  law  would  be  in  line  with  the  Federal  Farm  Loan  Act,  which 
exempts  from  taxation  of  every  kind  notes  and  mortgages  given  to  the  land  banks, 
and  worthy  tenants  would  have  extended  to  them  both  State  and  Federal  aid  in 
their  efforts  to  better  their  condition. 

II 

THE  REGENERATION    OF   THE   SOIL 

To  be  of  permanent  value  the  conversion  of  the  tenant  into  a  landlord  must  be 
followed  by  a  constant  regeneration  of  the  soil.  To  insure  everlasting  life,  not 
only  a  man,  but  the  dust  from  which  he  sprung,  "must  be  born  again."  There 
can  be  no  enduring  prosperity  for  the  men  who  till  the  land  until  the  basic  prin- 
ciples of  good  farming  are  universally  understood  and  universally  applied. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  5 

The  defect  in  our  agricultural  development  is  that  it  has  been  "in  spots." 
Under  the  present  system  the  people  who  are  in  the  sorest  need  of  instruction  are 
the  very  last  to  receive  it.  It  is  my  purpose  to  make  every  rural  school  a  farm-life 
school.  A  simple  manual  of  good  farming,  applicable  to  actual  North  Carolina 
conditions,  should  be  prepared  by  the  Commissioner  of  Agriculture,  the  President 
of  the  Agricultural  and  Mechanical  College,  and  the  State  Superintendent  of 
Public  Instruction.  This  book  ought  to  be  printed  by  the  State,  and  furnished  to 
the  people  —  children  and  adults  —  at  prime  cost.  The  teacher  in  every  rural 
school  should  be  required  to  study  the  book  and  pass  an  examination  upon  it. 
It  should  be  made  a  part  of  every  public  school  course,  and  no  warrant  should 
issue  for  the  salary  of  any  teacher  save  iipon  certificate  that  the  prescribed  course 
in  agriculture  had  been  fully  and  faithfully  taught. 

Every  country  boy  who  can  spell  "baker"  ought  to  have  hammered  into  him 
the  great  and  simple  truths  about  humus,  seed  selection,  deep  plowing,  rotation  of 
crops.  The  Ten  Commandments  of  Agriculture  laid  down  by  Dr.  S.  A.  Knapp 
ought  to  be  written  in  letters  of  gold,  framed  and  hung  on  the  walls  of  every 
schoolroom.  The  pupils  should  be  required  to  commit  these  commandments  to 
memory,  recite  them  in  concert  every  day  until  they  become  a  part  and  parcel  of 
the  intellectual  and  moral  constitution  of  the  country  boy,  so  that  he  would  be  as 
greatly  shocked  to  see  his  neighbor  violating  the  commandment,  "Use  seed  of  the 
best  variety  intelligently  selected  and  carefully  stored,"  as  he  would  to  see  him 
violate  the  commandment,  "Thou  shalt  not  steal." 

THE   MODEL   ACRE 

As  a  part  of  this  eternal  drilling  in  the  fundamentals  of  good  farming,  there 
should  be  cultivated  a  model  acre  in  connection  with  every  rural  school.  This  acre 
ought  to  be  the  blackboard  on  which  should  be  demonstrated  the  theories  taught 
in  class.  I  believe  that  in  every  district  can  be  found  a  patriot  who  would  grant 
or  lease  for  a  nominal  sum  from  one  to  five  acres  of  land  for  the  use  of  the  public 
school.  On  this  land  could  be  carried  on  demonstration  work  now  done  by  the 
State  and  Federal  governments,  and  all  the  people  in  the  district  would  benefit 
thereby.  Various  ways  for  cultivating  the  land  could  be  devised,  so  that  it  would 
not  only  yield  invaluable  instruction,  but  would  be  a  source  of  substantial  revenue 
to  the  school.  I  am  convinced  that  in  this  way  funds  could  be  raised  to  buy  books, 
maps,  musical  instruments,  and  a  complete  equipment  for  a  modern  school. 

If  the  theories  of  good  farming  are  correct  they  ought  to  pay  handsome 
dividends  on  the  school  farm.  If  they  are  theories  only,  and  are  not  adapted  to 
the  actual  conditions  of  farming  in  the  district,  then  it  would  be  worth  much  to 
the  people  to  have  this  made  plain.  Such  a  school  farm  would  become  not  only 
the  agricultural  but  the  social  center  of  the  district,  and  would  enrich  the  entire 
life  of  the  community. 

And  the  girls  should  be  trained  as  faithfully  in  the  science  of  the  kitchen  as 
the  boys  are  in  that  of  the  cornfield.  How  to  plan  and  how  to  prepare  a  well- 
balanced  meal  out  of  the  food  that  is  produced  on  the  average  farm  ought  to  be 
taught  to  every  girl  in  every  school  in  the  State.  To  this  end  the  General 
Assembly  should  by  all  means  take  steps  to  multiply  the  number  of  home  demon- 
stration agents  in  every  county  in  the  State.  The  blessings  of  the  tireless  cooker 
and  the  iceless  refrigerator  ought  to  be  brought  to  the  attention  of  every  house- 


6  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  PICKETT 

liold,  and  every  woman  ought  to  be  given  an  opportunity  to  know  how  to  save  all 
the  surplus  fruits  and  vegetables  for  winter  use,  and  thereby  conserve  the  family 
health  and  the  family  wealth. 

Ill 

A  CRUSADE  AGAINST  THE  CROP  LIEN 

The  crop  lien  is  the  boll  weevil  of  North  Carolina.  It  is  "the  pestilence  that 
walketh  in  darkness."  It  is  "the  destruction  that  wasteth  at  noonday."  How  a 
man  can  carry  a  crop  lien  and  escape  both  the  poorhouse  and  the  penitentiary 
"passeth  all  understanding." 

The  merchant  is  no  more  to  blame  for  this  evil  than  the  farmer.  Both  are 
victims  of  a  system  that  rewards  laziness  and  extravagance  and  punishes  industry 
and  economy.  The  man  who  pays  at  all  pays  twice,  for  himself  and  for  his 
neighbor  who  does  not  pay.  The  moment  this  ceases  to  be  true  the  time  merchant 
goes  into  bankruptcy.  Time  prices  are  not  fixed  with  reference  to  a  reasonable 
profit  on  the  article  sold,  but  are  based  upon  a  speculation  as  to  how  many 
customers  will  fail  to  pay  up.  There  is  in  the  system  more  of  the  elements  of  a 
lottery  than  of  a  legitimate  business. 

I  fully  recognize  the  evil,  but  I  am  not  persuaded  that  a  statute  making  it 
unlawful  to  give  a  mortgage  on  a  growing  crop  is  the  appropriate  remedy.  Such 
a  statute  might  prove  a  "beautiful  operation,"  but  I  fear  that  many  of  the 
patients  would  die  on  the  table.  Under  this  treatment,  instead  of  lifting  a  worthy 
tenant  to  the  place  of  a  landlord,  we  might  reduce  him  to  the  position  of  a  hire- 
ling. The  man  who  gives  a  crop  lien  is  a  prisoner ;  of  this  there  can  be  no  doubt. 
But  instead  of  burning  the  jail  down  over  the  prisoner's  head,  would  it  not  be  a 
saner  and  safer  course  to  give  him  a  chance  to  break  out  ?  Several  avenues  of 
escape  are  suggested : 

1.  The  one  sure  way  to  kill  a  crop  lien  is  to  starve  it  to  death.  And  the  sure 
way  for  a  farmer  to  starve  a  crop  lien  is  to  feed  himself.  Bread,  bacon,  and 
buttermilk,  all  produced  on  the  farm,  are  as  fatal  to  a  crop  lien  as  quinine  is  to 
malaria.  This  treatment  reaches  the  cause  of  the  disease ;  all  others  deal  simply 
with  the  effects.  We  need  to  hammer  home  the  everlasting  truth  that  for  the 
farmer  there  is  no  way  to  financial  independence  save  through  full  cribs,  smoke- 
houses, and  pastures. 

If  I  were  the  Czar  of  North  Carolina,  instead  of  the  Governor,  I  would  issue 
an  edict  declaring  that  from  and  after  five  years  from  date  any  man  who  imported 
into  North  Carolina  any  corn  or  meal,  wheat  or  flour,  beef  or  bacon,  should  forth- 
with be  hanged  without  trial  by  jury,  and  without  benefit  of  clergy.  Of  course,  in 
the  beginning,  I  would  be  denounced  as  an  infamous  tyrant ;  but  after  the  law 
had  been  in  effect  for  ten  years  the  richest  State  in  the  Union  would  build  a 
monument  to  me  as  the  financial  redeemer  of  my  people. 

2.  But  there  are  some  ways  in  which  the  General  Assembly  can  lend  a  helping 
hand  while  the  farmer  is  working  out  his  perfect  salvation.  The  formation  of 
credit  unions,  under  existing  laws,  should  be  encouraged  in  a  substantial  way. 
Today  it  is  nobody's  particular  business  to  organize  these  unions,  and  although  the 
law  has  been  on  the  books  for  several  years,  comparatively  none  have  been 
organized.  The  Agricultural  Department  should  be  equipped  with  two  field  men 
whose  sole  business  it  should  be  to  explain  these  credit  unions  to  the  people  and 
assist  in  their  organization. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  7 

The  same  force  could  explain  to  the  people  the  operation  of  the  State  law 
exempting  from  taxation  notes  and  mortgages  given  for  the  purchase  price  of  a 
home,  and  could  organize  local  homestead  associations  for  the  purpose  of  aiding  and 
encouraging  worthy  tenants  to  become  landlords.  In  this  way  the  maximum  of 
good  possible  under  these  laws  would  be  secured  to  the  people. 

A  powerful  stimulus  to  the  formation,  and  a  guaranty  of  the  success  of  these 
credit  unions  would  be  a  law  permitting  the  unions  to  charge  a  commission  not 
exceeding  ten  per  cent  for  negotiating  loans  for  members.  This  commission  should 
be  used  to  cover  any  losses  sustained  by  the  union  on  account  of  loans  secured  for 
members.  A  crop  lien  is  essentially  a  precarious  security.  Though  the  best  of  judg- 
ment may  be  exercised,  some  losses  are  bound  to  occur.  The  union  should  have  a 
fund  to  cover  these  losses,  and  at  the  end  of  the  year  so  much  of  the  fund  as  is  not 
required  to  save  the  union  harmless  on  account  of  loans  should  be  returned  to  the 
borrowers.    In  this  way  borrowers  would  carry  the  risk  at  actual  cost. 

I  am  of  opinion  that  it  would  be  wise  to  allow  banks  and  individuals  to  charge, 
in  lieu  of  interest,  a  commission  not  exceeding  ten  per  cent  on  money  advanced  to 
make  a  crop  to  farmers  who,  according  to  the  tax  books,  are  worth  less  than  the 
exemptions  allowed  by  law.  As  I  have  said,  there  is  an  element  of  risk  in  money 
so  advanced,  and  no  man  is  going  to  assume  this  risk  unless  he  is  paid  for  it. 
To  expect  a  man  who  is  insolvent,  and  who  has  no  security  to  offer  save  an 
unplanted  crop,  to  obtain  money  on  the  same  terms  accorded  high-class  invest- 
ments is  an  idle  dream.  If  we  are  to  give  practical  help  to  the  farmer  who  wants 
to  get  rid  of  the  crop  lien,  we  must  apply  to  his  case  the  principles  of  business, 
and  not  the  instincts  of  benevolence. 

It  is  susceptible  of  mathematical  demonstration  that  if  a  farmer  could  get 
the  cash  with  which  to  buy  his  supplies  on  a  basis  of  ten  per  cent,  the  savings 
between  that  rate  and  the  time  price  would  in  four  years  put  the  farmer  on  an 
absolute  cash  basis,  and  free  him  from  the  crop  lien  forever.  With  a  campaign 
insistent  and  eternal  in  favor  of  homegrown  bread,  beef,  and  bacon;  with  our 
small  farmers  given  an  opportunity  to  obtain  cash  for  a  reasonable  premium  on 
the  risk  incurred,  instead  of  being  forced  to  buy  commodities  at  unconscionable 
profits,  the  faith  is  justified  that  in  a  few  years  a  crop  lien  would  be  a  curiosity 
in  ]STorth  Carolina. 

IV 

THE  BEIDLING   OF  THE  WATEES 

An  idle  stream  is  just  as  inexcusable  as  an  idle  man.  Every  running  brook  in 
North  Carolina  ought  to  be  bridled  and  made  to  do  its  duty.  Nothing  adds  more 
to  the  comfort  and  the  health  of  the  home  than  running  water.  At  comparatively 
small  expense  running  water  and  electric  lights  can  be  installed  in  thousands  of 
country  homes.  To  encourage  the  use  of  the  water  and  the  power  it  carries, 
I  recommend  that  the  State  Highway  Commission  be  provided  with  a  force  of 
hydraulic  and  electrical  engineers,  whose  duty  it  will  be  upon  request  to  examine 
water-powers,  and  submit  plans  and  specifications  to  citizens  who  desire  to  install 
water  and  lights  in  their  homes.  Expert  knowledge  is  required  to  pass  on  these 
propositions,  and  our  people  ought  to  be  protected  from  those  whose  only  interest  is 
that  they  have  something  to  sell. 


PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 


RURAL    TELEPHONES 

Every  farm  home  should  have  a  telephone  in  it.  It  makes  for  safety,  economy, 
and  the  enrichment  of  the  social  life  of  the  community.  It  brings  a  community 
close  together,  and  keeps  it  in  contact  with  the  big  currents  of  life. 

Rural  telephone  systems  can  be  installed  at  a  low  cost.  Union  County  affords 
an  example  of  what  can  be  done  in  this  respect.  But  here  again  expert  knowledge 
is  necessary.  Promoters  and  speculators  sometimes  take  advantage  of  the  desire 
of  a  country  community  for  a  telephone  service  to  victimize  the  people.  The 
State  Highway  Commission  should  be  required  to  furnish  to  any  rural  community, 
desiring  to  establish  a  telephone  service,  plans  and  specifications  showing  the 
reasonable  cost  of  the  construction  and  maintenance  of  such  a  system. 

VI 

THE   SCHOOLHOUSE    THE.  SOCIAL   CENTER 

The  pathos  of  rural  life  is  its  loneliness.  Thousands  of  boys  and  girls  are 
literally  driven  from  country  life  because  of  lack  of  wholesome  diversions.  The 
wives  of  many  farmers  are  found  in  hospitals  for  the  insane  because  their  lives 
are  the  same  yesterday,  today  and  forever.  By  making  the  schoolhouse  the  social 
as  well  as  the  educational  center  of  the  district  much  of  this  monotony  can  be 
relieved ;  and  this  can  be  done  by  a  series  of  entertainments  as  helpful  as  they  are 
diverting.  To  this  end  moving  picture  entertainments  could  be  given  at  stated  in- 
tervals in  the  schoolhouses.  There  is  a  moving  picture  service  conceived  and  per- 
fected by  high-grade  men  to  do  this  very  kind  of  work.  It  has  been  well  said  of  this 
service,  "It  offers  real  education,  visualized  in  gripping  and  entertaining  form; 
clear  instruction  in  those  subjects  most  vital  to  the  success  of  the  country  family, 
great  moral  and  religious  truths  made  brilliantly  convincing,  and  the  broadest 
outlook  upon  all  life  definitely  focused  upon  a  complete  country  life." 

I  earnestly  advocate  the  enactment  of  a  law  authorizing  the  county  boards  of 
education,  by  and  with  the  approval  of  the  State  Department  of  Education,  to 
arrange  for  a  service  of  this  kind  in  such  districts  as  it  is  found  practicable  to  do 
so.  To  this  end  I  urge  the  appropriation  by  the  State,  out  of  the  general  fund,  of 
the  sum  of  $50,000  per  annum,  with  the  proviso  that  not  more  than  one-third  of  the 
cost  of  the  service  may  be  paid  by  the  State,  the  other  two-thirds  to  be  paid  by  the 
county  boards  of  education  and  the  people  of  the  districts  on  terms  fixed  by  the 
board. 

I  am  profoundly  convinced  that  no  $50,000  appropriated  by  the  State  for 
educational  purposes  could  yield  larger  dividends.  Such  a  service  would  not  only 
bring  before  the  people  in  impressive  form  the  latest  and  finest  achievements  in 
farm  life,  but  it  would  in  a  large  measure  eliminate  one  of  the  moving  causes  of 
the  flow  of  population  from  the  country  to  the  town. 

VII 

THE  UPKEEP   OF  THE   ROADS 

In  every  county  or  road  district  where  bonds  have  been  issued  for  the  con- 
struction of   roads,   the   county   commissioners   should   be   compelled   to    levy   an 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  9 

annual  maintenance  tax  bearing  a  certain  per  cent  to  the  amount  of  the  bonds 
issued,  such  per  cent  to  be  worked  out  by  the  State  Highway  Commission.  To 
spend  $100,000  to  build  roads  and  then  leave  them  without  any  provision  for 
maintenance  is  folly  equal  to  that  indulged  in  by  the  farmer  who  buys  $1,000 
worth  of  farm  machinery  and  then  refuses  to  build  a  shed  under  which  to  keep  it. 

All  the  license  fees  paid  by  the  owners  of  automobiles  ought  to  be  paid  to  the 
State  and  disbursed  by  the  State  Highway  Commission  in  the  maintenance  of 
State  roads,  so  as  to  comply  with  the  requirements  of  the  Federal  Government 
for  the  upkeep  of  roads  built  under  the  Federal  Good  Roads  act. 

The  powers  of  the  State  Highway  Commission  should  be  enlarged  so  as  to 
give  it  supervision  over  all  contracts  made  for  road  or  bridge  building,  and  it 
should  be  supplied  with  an  adequate  force  of  engineers  for  this  purpose. 

VHI 

ANOTHER  CHANCE  FOR  THE   CHILDREN 

The  Constitutional  Amendment  requiring  a  six-months  school  for  every  child 
in  the  State  ought  to  he  resubmitted  to  the  people  on  its  own  merits  unassociated 
with  any  other  amendment.  The  children  are  entitled  to  have  the  voter  cast  a  single 
ballot  declaring  whether  he  is  or  is  not  in  favor  of  a  larger  opportunity  for  the 
child.  Every  town  child  has  this  much  schooling  already,  and  no  man  can  look  a 
country  boy  in  the  face  and  deny  him  the  right  of  an  equal  start. 

IX 

INCORPORATION    OE   RURAL    COMMUNITIES 

Rural  communities  should  be  given  the  right  to  incorporate  by  a  vote  of  the 
people  of  the  community.  Such  corporations,  wisely  and  conservatively  formed, 
will  make  it  possible  to  do  many  things  for  the  upbuilding  of  country  life  that  are 
impossible  so  long  as  the  community  has  no  legal  entity. 

I  have  suggested  nine  measures,  all  designed  to  serve  one  end,  that  is,  to  make 
life  on  the  farm  just  as  profitable,  and  just  as  attractive,  as  life  in  the  town. 
I  believe  in  the  justice  and  efficacy  of  these  measures,  but  I  do  not  bow  down  to 
them  or  worship  them.  If  any  one  can  point  out  a  more  excellent  way  of  attaining 
the  desired  end  I  shall  greatly  rejoice.  What  I  am  trying  to  do  is  to  focus  the 
thought  of  the  State  on  the  subject,  for  I  know  that  if  I  can  get  two  million 
people  to  think  on  these  things  with  the  intensity  and  constancy  their  superlative 
importance  demands,  some  mind  among  the  millions  will  find  the  best  remedy  for 
every  evil  and  the  best  path  to  every  good. 

Every  suggestion  made  carries  with  it  the  initial  and  never  to  be  forgotten 
requirement  that  the  people  themselves  must  be  willing  to  pursue  knowledge,  and 
practice  the  homely  virtues  of  industry  and  economy.  ISTo  legislation  can  guarantee 
to  ignorance  the  dividends  of  intelligence.  Justice,  equal  and  exact,  can  never 
deliver  to  idleness  the  fruits  of  industry.  It  would  be  a  mistaken  charity  that 
would  give  to  extravagance  and  frugality  the  same  reward. 

A  LOGICAL  PUBLIC  SCHOOL  SYSTEM 

It  is  possible  to  justify  a  uniform  system  of  appointing  the  members  of  the 
county  boards  of  education  and  the  county  superintendents  of  public  instruction. 


10  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

It  is  possible  to  justify  a  uniform  system  system  of  electing  these  officials  by  a 
vote  of  the  people.  The  present  mongrel  system,  whereby  in  twenty  counties  these 
officials  are  elected  by  a  vote  of  the  people,  and  in  eighty  counties  by  the  General 
Assembly,  cannot  be  justified  in  any  forum  of  common  justice  or  common  sense. 

The  avowed  object  in  having  the  boards  of  education  elected  by  the  General 
Assembly  is  to  keep  the  schools  out  of  politics.  But  the  plain  truth  is,  to  make  the 
naming  of  the  county  boards  of  education  a  perquisite  of  a  member  of  the  General 
Assembly  often  puts  the  schools  in  the  very  worst  kind  of  politics. 

I  am  profoundly  convinced  that  the  welfare  of  the  children  of  the  State  would 
be  promoted  by  the  appointment  of  a  General  Educational  Commission  of  not 
more  than  seven  men,  chosen  by  reason  of  their  known  interest  in  the  cause  of 
public  education,  and  clothing  this  commission  with  power  to  name  the  county 
boards  of  education  in  all  the  counties  in  the  State,  and  clothing  the  county  boards 
with  power  to  name  the  superintendent  and  committeemen.  Both  on  the  central 
commission  and  the  county  boards  the  minority  party  should  be  given  reasonable 
representation,  and  each  member  of  the  central  commission  and  each  member  of 
the  county  board  of  education  should,  upon  assuming  office,  be  required  to  sub- 
scribe to  an  oath  that  in  all  cases  he  would  vote  for  the  men  best  qualified  to  serve 
the  educational  interests  of  the  State  and  county,  without  regard  to  political 
considerations. 

MANUFACTURING 

Next  in  importance  to  agriculture  is  the  manufacturing  industry  of  the  State. 
This  industry  affords  employment  to  thousands  of  our  citizens,  and  creates  more 
than  $300,000,000  of  wealth  every  year.  An  industry  of  such  gigantic  proportions 
is  deserving  of  the  State's  fostering  care.  Our  manufacturers  ask  for  no  subsidies 
and  no  special  privileges  of  any  kind.  They  do  ask  and  deserve  to  be  treated  with 
sympathetic  consideration.  As  a  class  they  are  humane,  forward-looking  men, 
earnestly  desirous  of  making  the  most  of  our  natural  resources,  and  they  rightly 
resent  being  thought  of  as  cannibals  who  delight  to  feast  on  the  flesh  of  women 
and  children. 

I  am  persuaded  that  practical  regulations  that  make  for  health  and  safety,  and 
for  the  proper  conservation  of  womanhood  and  childhood,  will  meet  with  no 
opposition  at  the  hands  of  these  men.  I  insist  that  legislation  with  respect  to  our 
mills  and  factories  should  be  made  with  reference  to  the  living  conditions  that 
confront  us,  and  not  with  reference  to  the  theories  of  the  professional  agitator. 
I  insist  that  our  legislation  shall  reflect  the  conscience  of  North  Carolina,  and  not 
the  covetousness  of  New  England. 

I  am  convinced  that  in  North  Carolina  there  is  less  of  friction  between  labor 
and  capital  than  in  any  state  in  the  American  Union  where  so  large  a  number  of 
operatives  are  employed.  And  this  sympathetic  relation  between  employer  and 
employee  ought  to  be  fostered  by  laws  that  will  appeal  to  the  judgment  and 
conscience  of  those  most  vitally  concerned. 

I  offer  these  suggestions : 

1.  The  owner  of  every  mill  located  within  reasonable  reach  of  a  public  water 
supply  ought  to  be  required  to  install  running  water  in  The  homes  leased  to 
operatives.  No  one  convenience  would  do  more  to  lighten  the  labors  of  the  women, 
and  preserve  the  health  of  the  entire  family  and  community. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  11 

2.  Our  State  anti-trust  law  should  be  amended  so  as  to  permit  the  same  com- 
binations for  the  advancement  of  our  trade  with  foreign  lands  as  are  proposed  in 
the  Webb  bill  now  pending  before  Congress.  Given  the  proper  encouragement 
from  National  and  State  authorities,  our  mills  are  ready  and  able  to  secure  trade 
in  every  corner  of  the  world.  I  long  to  see  the  day  when  every  bale  of  cotton 
grown  in  the  South  will  be  spun  and  woven  in  the  South,  and  when  this  day  comes 
the  South  will  be  the  greatest  lender  instead  of  the  greatest  borrower  on  earth. 

3.  My  third  suggestion  is  that  a  committee  composed  of  representatives  appointed 
by  the  North  Carolina  Manufacturers'  Association,  the  Commissioner  of  Labor, 
and  the  State  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction  should  prepare  a  plain,  simple 
course  dealing  with  the  science  of  manufacturing,  and  this  course  should  be  made 
a  part  of  the  public  school  curriculum  in  every  industrial  center.  The  boys  and 
girls  who  are  already  at  work  in  our  mills,  and  those  who  expect  to  become 
operatives,  ought  to  be  taught  the  underlying  principles  of  the  business  in  which 
they  are  to  engage.  The  mill  worker  is  entitled  to  know,  not  only  what  to  do, 
but  why  he  does  it.  In  this  way  the  head  will  acquire  knowledge  while  the  hand 
increases  its  cunning,  and  the  final  result  will  be  a  man  instead  of  a  machine. 
This  process  will  enable  our  mills  to  produce  their  own  experts,  and  every  mill 
worker  can  enjoy  a  well-grounded  hope  of  rising  to  a  higher  and  more  lucrative 
position.  I  am  persuaded  that  if  invited  to  do  so,  our  manufacturers  would  be 
glad  to  send,  at  stated  periods,  trained,  practical  men  into  the  schools  in  their 
communities  to  give  the  children  instruction  in  the  underlying  principles  of  the 
particular  work  in  which  they  are  engaged. 

The  Textile  Department  of  our  Agricultural  and  Mechanical  College  is  doing 
a  most  excellent  work  with  the  force  and  equipment  at  its  command.  But  North 
Carolina  ranks  next  to  Massachusetts  in  its  textile  industry,  and  promises  soon  to 
stand  at  the  very  head  of  the  column,  and  I  insist  that  the  Textile  Department  of 
the  College  be  enlarged  both  with  respect  to  teachers  and  equipment,  to  such  an 
extent  that  it  will  be  recognized  that  North  Carolina  affords  the  very  best  textile 
training  to  be  found  in  the  United  States. 


TAXATION 

My  views  in  regard  to  taxation  were  embodied  in  a  pamphlet  submitted  to  the 
Constitutional  Commission  in  1913,  and  in  a  paper  read  before  the  North  Carolina 
Press  Association  in  1914.  Since  the  taxation  amendment  was  rejected  by  the 
people,  I  have  had  no  opportunity  to  make  such  further  study  of  the  subject  as 
would  justify  the  submission  of  any  particular  plan  at  this  time.  It  is  my  purpose 
to  thoroughly  investigate  the  subject  within  the  next  two  years,  and  I  suggest  that 
the  General  Assembly  direct  the  Governor,  the  Chairman  of  the  State  Tax  Com- 
mission, and  the  State  Treasurer  to  make  an  extensive  investigation,  and  submit 
a  comprehensive  plan  of  taxation  to  the  next  General  Assembly. 

In  the  meantime,  I  desire  to  say,  in  order  that  our  people  may  be  giving  the 
matter  thought,  that  in  my  opinion  any  plan  of  taxation  that  will  raise  sufficient 
revenues,  and  be  at  all  acceptable  to  our  people,  must  involve  the  separation  of 
the  sources  of  State  and  local  revenues.  If  this  fundamental  principle  can  once 
be  agreed  upon,  its  application  will  become  a  matter  of  detail. 

I  earnestly  urge  this  General  Assembly,  through  its  appropriate  committees, 
to  at  once  take  an  account  of  what  the  fixed  charges  of  the  State  Government  will 


12  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

amount  to  within  the  next  two  years  and  what  the  income  of  the  State  will  be 
from  all  known  sources,  and  I  insist  that  appropriations  shall  not  be  made  until 
the  means  for  meeting  such  appropriations  are  devised. 

HEALTH 

The  State  Board  of  Health  should  be  given  ample  funds  to  continue  and  en- 
large its  work.  The  law  should  require  a  careful  examination  of  every  child  who 
enters  a  public  school,  at  least  twice  a  year.  This  can  be  done  by  whole-time 
county  health  officers,  or  by  representatives  of  the  State  Board,  as  the  conditions 
may  warrant ;  but  the  law  should  compel  it  to  be  done. 

"The  riches  of  a  commonwealth 
Are  free,  strong  minds,  and  hearts  of  health." 

To  insure  such  riches  intelligent  examination  of  the  children  at  stated  intervals 
is  absolutely  necessary. 

The  State  Board  deserves  the  unqualified  support  of  the  General  Assembly  in 
its  campaign  against  quacks  and  quackery.  The  law  requires  a  man  to  have  a 
diploma  from  a  first-class  medical  college,  and  to  stand  a  rigid  examination  before 
the  North  Carolina  Board  of  Medical  Examiners,  before  be  is  allowed  to  write 
a  single  prescription  for  a  patient  in  North  Carolina.  And  yet  we  permit  the 
sale  of  nostrums  to  our  people  without  any  adequate  knowledge  of  whether  or  not 
they  are  injurious  to  health  or  have  any  medicinal  value  whatever. 

I  am  in  favor  of  a  law  making  it  a  felony  for  any  man  to  sell,  offer  for  sale, 
or  advertise  for  sale  in  North  Carolina  any  proprietary  or  patent  medicine  pur- 
porting to  cure  cancer,  consumption,  diabetes,  paralysis,  epilepsy,  Bright's  disease, 
or  any  other  disease  for  which  the  North  Carolina  Medical  Society  and  the 
American  Medical  Association  declare  that  no  cure  has  been  discovered. 

I  am  earnestly  in  favor  of  a  law  requiring  all  venders  of  proprietary  medicines 
to  file  with  the  State  Board  of  Health  a  statement  showing  the  exact  composition  of 
such  medicines,  and  that  the  State  Board  be  empowered  to  forbid  the  sale  of  such 
proprietary  medicines  in  the  State  of  North  Carolina  if  in  its  opinion  they  are 
without  curative  value  in  the  treatment  of  the  disease  they  purport  to  cure. 

A  bill  is  being  prepared  by  our  Health  Department  that  will  deal  fully  and 
adequately  with  this  subject,  and  I  give  to  this  bill  by  most  emphatic  indorsement. 

ABSENTEE  VOTING 

The  General  Assembly  should,  without  fail,  make  provision  for  our  citizens 
whose  work  keeps  or  carries  them  away  from  home,  to  participate  in  our  elections. 
There  is  no  constitutional  difficulty  in  the  way  of  such  a  law,  and  every  considera- 
tion of  justice  and  expediency  favors  it. 

ROTATION   IN   OFFICE 

The  genius  of  Democracy  is  as  much  opposed  to  monopoly  of  office  as  to  any 
other  kind  of  monopoly.  In  order  to  have  a  government  by  the  people  there  should 
be  occasional  changes  in  the  individuals  who  administer  jnublic  affairs.  It  is 
written  in  our  State  Constitution  that  the  Governor  cannot  succeed  himself,  and 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  13 

the  refusal  of  Washington  to  serve  as  President  more  than  two  terms  so  appealed 
to  the  judgment  of  the  American  people  that  it  has  become  an  unwritten  law. 
It  is  not  wholesome  for  the  public,  nor  for  the  men  who  hold  the  offices,  for 
our  officials  to  have  an  indefinite  tenure.  Young  men  justly  demand  that  they  be 
given  opportunity  to  show  what  they  can  do  in  the  public  service,  without  having 
to  oppose  men  whose  long  possession  of  an  office  has  well-nigh  ripened  into  a  fee- 
simple  title.  New  blood  will  make  for  wholesome  growth.  I  am  satisfied  that  a 
constitutional  amendment  limiting  State  officers  to  two  successive  terms  and 
county  officers  to  three  successive  terms  would  result  in  increased  efficiency  and 
diminished  strife.  Of  course,  such  an  amendment  ought  not  to  apply  to  officers 
in  the  judicial,  educational,  and  health  departments. 

THE    SHORT   BALLOT 

I  am  thoroughly  converted  to  the  wisdom  of  the  short  ballot.  When  Woodrow 
Wilson,  while  he  was  Governor  of  New  Jersey,  spoke  in  the  Capitol  Square  at 
Raleigh,  he  said  that  the  old  admonition,  "Not  to  put  all  your  eggs  in  one 
basket,"  was  not  political  wisdom.  Said  he,  "The  thing  for  the  public  to  do  is 
to  put  all  of  its  eggs  in  one  basket  and  then  watch  that  basket." 

It  is  simply  impossible  for  the  average  man  in  North  Carolina  who  reads  and 
takes  a  live  interest  in  public  affairs  to  acquaint  himself  sufficiently  with  all  of 
the  men  who  run  for  State  administrative  offices  to  pass  upon  them  with  any 
satisfaction  to  himself.  Moreover,  experience  and  observation  teach  that  it  is 
well-nigh  impossible  to  induce  men  who  are  best  qualified  to  hold  administrative 
offices  to  run  for  them  in  State-wide  primaries  and  in  general  elections.  The 
Governor  and  the  Lieutenant-Governor  of  the  State  should  be  elected  by  the 
people,  and  all  administrative  officers  should  be  appointed.  I  feel  no  embarrass- 
ment in  taking  this  position,  for  the  reason  that  the  change  in  the  law  would 
require  a  constitutional  amendment,  and  could  not  possibly  be  effective  during 
the  present  administration. 

THE  STATE  HOSPITALS 

The  saying  of  Wilson,  "Put  your  eggs  in  one  basket  and  watch  that  basket," 
applies  to  the  management  of  our  State  hospitals  for  the  insane.  Under  the 
present  arrangement,  with  a  different  board  of  directors  for  each  hospital,  no 
director  feels  that  any  great  responsibility  rests  on  him.  Some  of  the  very  wisest 
and  best  men  who  are  now  serving  on  these  boards,  and  have  served  heretofore, 
have  told  me  that  it  was  impossible  in  the  limited  time  given  by  the  directors  to 
the  supervision  of  the  institutions  to  acquire  any  adequate  knowledge  of  their 
conduct.  One  director  stated  to  me  that  he  refused  to  further  serve  on  a  board 
because  he  was  not  willing  to  be  held  responsible  for  the  management  of  an  institu- 
tion about  whose  management  he  did  not  know  and  could  not  know  enough  to 
form  an  intelligent  opinion. 

I  am  of  opinion  that  the  three  hospitals  for  the  insane  ought  to  be  under  the 
management  of  a  single  board  of  not  more  than  seven  men.  These  hospitals  do  a 
common  work,  and  are  supported  from  a  common  fund,  and  I  can  see  no  good 
reason  for  a  divided  management.  Under  the  new  system  the  directors  would 
give  a  sufficient  amount  of  time  to  the  supervision  of  the  institutions  to  acquire 
accurate  information  concerning  them.    By  the  constant  comparison  of  the  work  of 


c/ 


14  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  B1CKETT 

one  institution  with  that  of  another,  the  best  in  each  could  be  used  to  the  advantage 
of  all,  and  the  worst  in  all  could  be  eliminated.  Moreover,  in  the  reports  to  the 
General  Assembly  the  needs  of  the  insane  would  be  treated  as  a  whole,  and  all 
jealousies  between  the  several  institutions  would  necessarily  disappear. 

This  consolidated  board  of  directors  should  consist  of  not  more  than  seven, 
who,  in  addition  to  their  expenses,  should  be  paid  a  reasonable  per  diem  for  their 
services.  The  chairman  of  the  consolidated  board  and  the  superintendent  of  each 
hospital  should  be  made  a  purchasing  committee,  and  this  committee  should  buy 
all  the  supplies  for  all  the  institutions. 

I  am  deeply  convinced  that  under  this  sort  of  management  the  efficiency  of 
the  institutions  would  be  increased,  and  many  thousands  of  dollars  would  be  saved 
to  the  State. 

AGRICULTURAL   DEPARTMENT 

After  a  most  careful  study  of  the  situation,  I  am  convinced  that  in  the  interest 
of  economy  and  intelligent  work,  the  Agricultural  Department  and  the  North 
Carolina  College  of  Agriculture  and  Mechanic  Arts  ought  to  be  under  the  same 
management.  The  College  ought  to  be  simply  a  division  of  the  Department. 
Under  the  present  system  it  is  impossible  to  avoid  duplication  of  work.  There 
cannot  be  perfect  cooperation  between  the  two  when  each  has  only  a  vague  knowl- 
edge of  what  the  other  is  doing,  and  each  is  endeavoring  to  cover  the  widest 
possible  field.  I  earnestly  urge  that  the  members  of  the  Board  of  Agriculture  be 
made  ex  officio  directors  of  the  College,  and  that  the  Department  of  Agriculture 
be  transferred  to  the  College  grounds,  and  a  suitable  building  costing  not  less  than 
$250,000  be  erected  for  its  accommodation.  This  building  should  be  paid  for  by 
the  State,  and  not  out  of  the  funds  of  the  Department. 

The  young  men  in  attendance  upon  the  College  could  do  a  considerable  part  of 
the  work  of  the  Department,  and  in  this  way  numbers  of  worthy  young  men  could 
obtain  substantial  assistance  in  getting  an  education,  while  the  entire  student 
body  would  acquire  considerable  knowledge  of  the  work  done  by  the  Department 
and  diffuse  this  knowledge  throughout  the  State. 

THE    STATE   PRISON 

I  am  convinced  that  the  only  justification  for  the  punishment  of  crime  is  the 
protection  of  the  public  and  the  reformation  of  the  criminal.  Anything  that 
savors  of  vindictiveness  is  indefensible  in  the  administration  of  the  law. 

When  the  State  sends  a  citizen  to  prison  he  ought  to  be  made  to  feel  that  his 
punishment  is  a  just  measure  imposed  for  the  purpose  of  preventing  himself  and 
others  from  committing  further  crimes,  and  that  pending  his  imprisonment  the 
State  desires  to  afford  him  every  opportunity  to  become  a  good  citizen//' 

To  this  end  quarters  comfortable  and  sanitary  ought  to  be  provided  for  all 
prisoners.  Experience  has  demonstrated  that  it  is  impossible  to  provide  such 
quarters  for  the  average  county  chain-gang.  To  send  a  man  to  a  county  chain-gang 
for  more  than  two  years  is  cruel  and  excessive  punishment.  ISTo  man  can  serve 
on  a  county  chain-gang  more  than  two  years  without  permanent  injury  to  his 
health.  Moreover,  the  guarding  is  inefficient  and  the  temptation  to  escape  is  so 
great  to  a  long-time  prisoner  that  many  make  the  attempt  and  succeed.     Again, 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  15 

the  work  is  done  without  skillful  supervision,  and  there  is  a  great  economic  loss 
of  labor. 

For  these  reasons  I  urge  the  enactment  of  a  general  law  strictly  limiting  the 
time  a  man  can  be  sent  to  a  county  chain-gang  to  two  years.  All  other  convicts 
should  be  sent  to  the  State  Prison. 

The  prison  at  Ealeigh  represents  an  inexcusable  waste  of  capital.  A  million 
dollar  plant  is  maintained  in  which  to  transact  a  business  that  could  be  carried 
on  more  economically  in  a  plant  costing  not  more  than  $100,000.  It  is  absolutely 
necessary  to  build  new  quarters  for  the  convicts  on  the  State  farm.  The  present 
quarters  are  neither  safe  nor  sanitary,  nor  can  they  be  made  so. 

I  recommend  that  quarters  be  built  on  the  State  farm  amply  sufficient  to  take 
care  of  all  convicts,  and  that  the  entire  administration  of  the  State  Prison  be 
conducted  from  the  State  farm  and  that  the  prison  at  Ealeigh  be  converted  into 
a  hospital  for  the  insane,  reserving  for  the  use  of  the  State  Prison  a  few  cells 
for  the  reception  of  prisoners,  and  for  the  execution  of  those  upon  whom  the  death 
sentence  is  imposed. 

At  present  many  unfortunate  people  bereft  of  reason  are  knocking  at  the  doors 
of  our  hospitals  for  the  insane  and  are  turned  away  because  there  is  no  room. 
The  worst  type  of  patients,  both  at  Ealeigh  and  Morganton,  could  be  transferred 
to  the  new  building  at  Ealeigh,  thereby  releasing  many  rooms  in  the  hospitals  at 
Ealeigh  and  Morganton. 

The  prison  authorities  ought  to  be  directed  to  make  a  careful  study  of  the 
subject,  and  report  to  the  next  General  Assembly  an  estimate  of  the  net  earnings 
of  the  convicts  after  paying  all  expenses  incurred  by  the  State,  and  submit  a  plan 
for  disbursing  these  net  earnings  to  the  dependent  families  of  convicts. 

Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly,  ladies  and  gentlemen,  I  have  endeavored 
to  visualize  my  dream  of  a  fairer  and  finer  State.  I  have  outlined  the  means  by 
which  I  hope  to  make  the  dream  come  true.  And  the  means  all  reach  out  to  a 
single  end  —  a  larger  hope,  a  wider  door  for  the  average  man  than  he  has  ever 
known. 

With  a  six-months  school  guaranteed  to  every  child ;  with  the  forces  of  disease 
routed  from  their  ancient  strongholds;  with  the  curse  of  rum  lifted  from  every 
home;  with  our  fields  tilled  by  the  men  who  own  and  therefore  love  them;  with 
our  harvests  free  from  the  crop  lien's  deadly  blight ;  with  modern  conveniences 
and  wholesome  diversions  within  reach  of  every  country  home,  our  dear  old  State, 
released  from  her  bondage  to  the  blood-kin  tyrants  of  ignorance,  poverty,  disease, 
and  crime,  will  begin  to  realize  her  finest  possibilities  in  riches  and  grace;  will 
assume  her  rightful  place  in  the  march  of  civilization,  and  from  the  blue  of  the 
mountains  to  the  blue  of  the  sea  there  will  spring  up  a  hardier,  holier  race,  not 
unlike  the  giants  that  walked  the  earth  when  the  sons  of  God  mated  with  the 
daughters  of  men. 


16  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

(2) 

EXEMPTION  FROM  TAXATION  OF  NOTES  AND  MORTGAGES 
Gr^EN  FOR  PURCHASE  PRICE  OF  A  HOME 

SPECIAL  MESSAGE 

Raleigh,  February  14,  1917. 
Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

Upon  assuming  the  obligations  of  the  office  of  Governor  I  felt  constrained  to 
say: 

The  first  and  dearest  work  of  this  administration  will  be  a  supreme 
effort  to  translate  the  tenants  of  the  State  into  landlords.  Here  and  now, 
in  the  presence  of  God  and  these  witnesses,  I  consecrate  myself  and  all  the 
power  and  prestige  of  my  office  to  this  endeavor.  I  shall  neither  rest  nor 
permit  the  State  to  rest  until  every  honest,  industrious  and  frugal  man  who 
tills  the  soil  has  a  decent  chance  to  own  it.  I  am  driven  to  this  undertaking 
by  the  tyranny  of  a  conviction  that  such  a  work  is  essential,  not  alone  to  the 
wholesome  development,  but  to  the  enduring  safety  of  the  State. 

The  first  step  in  the  redemption  of  this  solemn  pledge  was  the  preparation  of 
an  amendment  to  the  Constitution  providing  for  the  exemption  from  taxation  of 
notes  and  mortgages  given  in  good  faith  for  the  purchase  price  of  a  home  where 
the  purchase  price  does  not  exceed  $3,000. 

This  bill  was  introduced  by  Mr.  Beasley  and  the  Committee  on  Constitutional 
Amendments  has  given  it  a  favorable  report.  The  bill  is  so  eminently  just,  and  is 
so  plainly  adapted  to  serve  the  ends  sought,  that  I  have  heard  of  no  serious 
opposition.  The  amendment  will,  without  doubt,  enable  every  honest  and  in- 
dustrious man  who  desires  to  own  his  own  home  to  borrow  the  money  with  which 
to  buy  it.  Instead  of  such  a  man  having  to  run  down  the  money  lender  and  pay 
all  sorts  of  commissions  and  fees  to  procure  a  loan,  the  money  lender  will  run 
down  the  man  who  desires  to  become  a  homesteader,  and  do  everything  in  his 
power  to  aid  him  in  purchasing  a  home.  I  earnestly  urge  that  this  bill  be  passed 
at  once.  The  submission  of  this  amendment  should  by  no  means  be  delayed  by  the 
fact  that  a  call  for  a  Constitutional  Convention  may  be  submitted  to  the  people. 
There  is  urgent  need  for  this  measure,  and  it  can  and  should  be  ratified  by  the 
people  before  a  Constitutional  Convention  could  assemble.  I  trust  that  no  member 
of  the  General  Assembly  will  offer  any  objection  to  the  immediate  consideration 
and  passage  of  this  bill.  Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  ~W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(3) 
SPECIAL  MESSAGE  ON  CROP  LIEN  BILL 

Raleigh,  February  20,  1917. 
Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

"The  Crop  Lien  is  a  curse  to  the  landlord,  a  curse  to  the  tenant,  and  a  curse 
to  the  merchant." 

So  said  a  member  of  the  State  Board  of  Agriculture  and  one  of  the  largest 
and  most  successful  farmers  in  the  State  the  other  day.     In  so  saying  he  voiced 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  17 

the  registered  judgment  of  the  State  Department  of  Agriculture,  the  Farmers 
Union,  the  Farmers  Alliance,  and  the  Bureau  of  Home  and  Farm  Economics. 
In  so  saying  he  verified  the  declaration  in  my  inaugural  address,  that  "the  crop 
lien  is  the  boll  weevil  of  North  Carolina,  the  pestilence  that  walketh  in  darkness, 
the  destruction  that  wasteth  at  noonday." 

A  bill  designed  to  relieve  this  evil  was  prepared  by  the  State  Council  of  the 
Farmers  Union  and  myself  and  introduced  in  the  Senate  by  Senator  Person  and 
in  the  House  by  Representative  McCrackan.  The  bill  is  no  half-baked  measure, 
but  is  the  result  of  years  of  study  and  a  most  intimate  knowledge  of  actual  con- 
ditions. I  know  the  crop  lien  system  at  both  ends  and  in  the  middle,  and  I  know 
that  the  bill  now  before  the  Senate  on  a  favorable  report  will  ultimately  free  our 
harvests  from  the  crop  lien's  deadly  blight  and  prove  a  blessing  to  the  landlord, 
the  tenant  and  the  merchant. 

It  is  urged  that  the  enforcement  of  this  law  will  be  attended  with  some  un- 
certainty. Probably  so.  Again,  it  is  urged  that  the  law  may  work  an  occasional 
hardship.  This  is  possible.  The  processes  of  healing  and  adjustment  are  ever 
attended  with  a  measure  of  pain.  But  the  uncertainties  and  the  hardships  possible 
under  the  bill,  compared  with  the  burdens  of  the  present  system,  are  as  the  little 
finger  to  the  loin. 

The  bill  makes  no  attempt  to  fix  the  cash  price  at  which  articles  may  be  sold. 
This  is  left  entirely  to  competition  and  trade  conditions.  But  the  bill  provides 
that  when  the  cash  price  is  fixed,  the  merchant,  the  landlord,  the  money  lender, 
may  add  ten  per  cent  for  time,  and  no  more.    Is  it  not  enough? 

A  gentleman  said  to  me,  "How  about  the  negro  tenants  all  over  Eastern  North 
Carolina?"  I  answered,  "Ten  per  cent  for  six  months  is  enough  bonus  for  a 
'nigger'  to  pay." 

Another  critic  of  the  bill  said  to  me,  "The  cash  price  does  not  represent  a 
reasonable  profit  on  the  goods  sold."  I  answered,  "Then  the  man  who  buys  on  time 
pays  for  himself  and  also  for  the  man  who  buys  for  cash."  He  said,  "That  is 
true."  Then  said  I,  "The  poor  farmer  puts  his  toil  and  his  chattels  in  bond  to 
pay: 

"1.  His  own  debts. 

"2.  The  losses  sustained  by  the  merchant  on  the  shiftless  and  unworthy  debtor. 

"3.  The  losses  sustained  by  the  merchant  on  sales  to  the  rich  for  cash." 

The  critic  admitted  that  this  is  true. 

Can  the  General  Assembly  permit  such  an  iniquity  to  continue  and  expect  me 
to  tell  the  tenant  and  small  farmer  that  he  has  a  decent  chance  to  better  his 
condition  ?  I  tell  you,  gentlemen,  that  the  order  of  Egypt's  Eing  compelling  the 
children  of  Israel  to  make  bricks  without  straw  was  a  study  in  justice  and  gen- 
erosity compared  with  the  artistic  cruelty  that  saddles  upon  the  one  honest, 
industrious  tenant  his  own  necessities  and  the  losses  sustained  by  the  merchant 
in  charging  the  rich  too  little  and  the  poor  too  much. 

The  task  this  administration  has  assigned  itself  is  to  do  for  the  agricultural 
development  of  the  State  a  work  that  will  at  least  resemble  the  work  done  by  the 
beloved  Aycock  for  our  educational  development.  I  am  irrevocably  committed  and 
consecrated  to  the  work  of  securing  for  the  men  and  women  on  the  farms,  whose 


18  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

lives  have  been  hard  and  empty,  a  measure  of  joy  and  of  hope  they  have  never 
known.  Their  faces,  pale  as  picked  cotton,  are  before  me  always,  and  as  I  write 
I  feel  the  pleading  touch  of  cold,  thin  hands. 

Pass  this  measure !  Pass  it  just  as  it  is  written ;  and  I  can  go  to  these  little 
ones  and  tell  them  to  thank  God  and  take  courage.  Their  lot  will  still  be  hard, 
but  not  without  hope.  Deny  them  this  relief,  and  their  most  frantic  efforts  to  gain 
financial  freedom  will  only  leave  them  bruised  against  an  iron  door. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  "W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(4) 

TRANSMITTING  LETTER  FROM  THE  COMMISSIONER  OF  LABOR 

AND  PRINTING  CONCERNING  FEDERAL  INSPECTION 

OF  CHILD  LABOR 

Raleigh,  February  20,  1917. 
Gentlemen,  of  the  General  Assembly: 

I  transmit  herewith  a  communication  from  the  Commissioner  of  Labor  and 
Printing  which  is  entitled  to  your  serious  consideration. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  "W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


To  His  Excellency,  Hon.  Thomas  W.  Bickett, 
Governor  of  North  Carolina, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

My  dear  Governor: — I  desire  to  impart  to  the  members  of  the  General 
Assembly,  through  your  Excellency,  information  in  my  possession  touching 
a  subject  which  I  consider  of  vital  interest  to  the  people  of  North  Carolina, 
in  that  it  points  the  way  to  the  enforcement  of  a  Federal  statute  touching 
our  industrial  life,  by  the  State  itself. 

You  are  doubtless  aware  that  an  act  of  Congress  entitled  "An  Act  to 
prevent  interstate  commerce  in  the  products  of  child  labor,  and  for  other 
purposes,"  becomes  effective  throughout  the  country  on  September  1,  1917, 
and  that  the  power  of  the  Government  will  be  behind  the  enforcement  of 
this  law.  The  subject  of  its  enforcement  is  one  which  comes  directly  under 
the  purview  of  the  Secretary  of  Labor,  except  that  the  Secretary  of 
Commerce  with  the  Attorney-General  and  the  Secretary  of  Labor  constitute 
a  board  for  making  rules  and  regulations.  The  executive  officer  in  charge, 
however,  for  the  United  States  in  the  administration  of  its  child  labor  law 
is  the  Secretary  of  Labor,  and  with  that  official  I  have  been  endeavoring 
to  arrange  a  system  of  cooperation  which  would  enable  the  State  of  North 
Carolina  to  manage  its  affairs  without  Federal  interference. 

The  Federal  law  provides  that  "in  any  state  designated  by  the  board 
an  employment  certificate  or  other  similar  paper  as  to  the  age  of  the  child, 
issued  under  the  laws  of  that  state  and  not  inconsistent  with  the  provisions 
of  this  act,  shall  have  the  same  force  and  effect  as  a  certificate  herein 
provided    for."      The    essential    part    of    the    certificate    is,    of    course,    the 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  19 

method  by  which  age  can  be  proved,  and  I  am  assured  by  the  Secretary  of 
Labor  that  if  the  State  of  North  Carolina  should  provide  means  of  enforce- 
ment of  the  National  child  labor  law,  the  reports  of  her  officials  will  be 
accepted,  and  thus  the  necessity  of  sending  Federal  inspectors  into  the 
State  would  be  obviated. 

I  took  the  matter  up  with  Secretary  Wilson,  in  person,  while  in  Washing- 
ton a  few  weeks  ago,  at  which  time  a  tentative  measure  for  consideration 
by  our  General  Assembly  was  filed  for  examination  and  approved  by  the 
Federal  board.  This  bill  is  now  in  my  possession,  having  passed  the  censor- 
ship of  both  Secretary  Wilson  and  Secretary  Redfield.  I  have  practically 
been  assured  that  if  this  proposed  measure  shall  be  enacted  into  a  law  there 
will  be  no  dual  inspection  of  industrial  concerns  in  North  Carolina  when  the 
national  law  becomes  effective  on  the  first  day  of  next  September,  and  I  feel 
it  my  duty,  both  as  an  official  and  a  citizen  of  this  good  State,  to  convey 
this  information  to  the  members  of  the  General  Assembly,  who  alone  have 
the  authority  to  say  whether  our  wage-earners  shall  obtain  certificates  of 
employment  from  Raleigh  or  Washington.  The  bill,  submitted  by  the  writer 
to  the  Secretary  of  Labor  and  partly  redrafted  by  that  official,  is  at  their 
disposal.  I  have  neither  the  time  nor  the  inclination  to  "button-hole" 
legislators  in  the  interest  of  this  or  any  other  proposition.  The  information 
in  my  possession  will  be  cheerfully  communicated  to  any  members  who 
may  be  interested  in  the  State's  supervision  of  its  own  affairs.  We  hear  a 
good  deal  of  talk  about  State's  rights.  Here  is  an  opportunity  to  show  the 
extent  of  our   convictions   upon   that  question. 

Some  of  our  citizens  may  be  deluding  themselves  with  the  idea  that  the 
Federal  law,  regulating  the  employment  of  children,  will  be  declared  un- 
constitutional. I  am  not  a  lawyer,  but  the  Webb-Kenyon  decision  and  the 
opinion  of  the  Supreme  Court  in  the  case  brought  under  the  Mann  White 
Slave  Act  preclude  the  probability,  at  least,  of  an  adverse  decision  to  the 
provisions  of  the  national  child  labor  law.  Even  if  it  should  be  unfavorable, 
North  Carolina  would  have  nothing  more,  in  the  matter  of  labor  legislation, 
than  she  has  needed  a  good  many  years,  in  the  event  the  bill  in  my  posses- 
sion should  become  a  law.  It  would  be  a  protection  both  to  the  employer 
and  employee  and  an  injury  to  neither. 

Frankly,  I  do  not  fancy  the  idea  of  Federal  inspection  of  the  industries 
of  my  State,  for  with  it  may  come  agitation  that  would  be  hurtful  to  many 
of  our  institutions.  But  we  are  facing  a  condition  and  not  a  theory.  It 
is  my  honest  opinion  that  the  affairs  of  this  State  should  remain  in  the 
hands  of  those  who  are  in  a  measure  aware  of  existing  conditions,  and  not 
be  allowed  to  pass  into  the  hands  of  strangers  who  may  know  nothing  of 
them.  And  this  conviction  has  prompted  me  to  try  to  devise,  if  possible, 
some  means  of  escape  from  a  situation  which  may  be  neither  pleasant  nor 
profitable  to  our  people. 

The  action  I  have  taken  was  prompted  by  a  sense  of  justice  I  feel  for  my 
own  people  and  a  personal  pride  in  the  affairs  of  the  State  I  am  endeavoring 
to  serve.  This  matter  has  been  uppermost  in  my  mind  ever  since  President 
Wilson  approved  the  Federal  child  labor  law  during  the  summer  of  1916,  and 
I  cannot,  in  good  conscience,  let  the  matter  pass  without  giving  the  General 
Assembly  an  opportunity  to  consider,  if  it  desires,  the  plans  of  cooperation 
I  have  succeeded  in  arranging  with  the  Federal  authorities. 

Having  thus  discharged  a  duty  incumbent  upon  me  as  an  official  of  the 


20  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

State,   I   herewith   transfer   the   responsibility   of  providing   means  for   the 
execution  of  the  same  upon  other  shoulders. 

With  great  respect  for  your  Excellency  and  the  members  of  the  General 
Assembly,  I  am  Sincerely  yours, 

M.  L.  Shipman, 

Commissioner. 


(5) 

LAW  LIBRARY  FUND 

Raleigh,  February  21,  1917. 

Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

I  transmit  herewith  a  message  from  the  Trustees  of  the  Law  Library  Fund, 
with  the  bill  attached,  in  which  they  ask  permission  to  turn  over  $9,000  to  the 
State  Treasury.     I  take  it  that  there  will  be  no  opposition  to  this  bill. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


AN  ACT  TO  AUTHORIZE  THE  JUSTICES  OP  THE  SUPREME  COURT  TO 
PAY  INTO  THE  STATE  TREASURY  A  PORTION  OP  THE  SUPREME 
COURT  LAW  LIBRARY  FUND. 

The  General  Assembly  of  North  Carolina  to  enact: 

Section    1.     That   the   Justices    of   the    Supreme    Court,   as   Trustees    of 

the  Law  Library  Fund,  are  hereby  authorized  and  empowered  to  pay  into 

the   State   Treasury   the  sum  of  nine  thousand   dollars    ($9,000),  being  so 

much  of  said  fund  on  hand  as  is  necessary  for  the  purposes  provided  by  law. 

Sec.  2.   That  this  act  shall  be  in  force  from  and  after  its  ratification. 

Note. — The  message  accompanying  this  act  could   not  be  found.— Editor. 


(6) 

ASKING  RECOGNITION  OF  THE  SERVICE  OF  W.  D.  JONES  IN 

THE  SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  NORTH  CAROLINA- 

TENNESSEE  BOUNDARY  LINE 

Raleigh,  February  24,  1917. 
Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

In  the  trial  of  the  case  of  The  State  of  North  Carolina  vs.  The  State  of 
Tennessee,  the  evidence  that  probably  determined  the  case  in  favor  of  the  State  of 
North  Carolina  was  a  little  book  containing  the  field  notes  of  Colonel  "William 
Davenport,  who  was  one  of  the  surveyors  that  ran  the  original  line  between  the 
two  states.    This  little  book  was  found  by  Mr.  W.  D.  Jones,  a  grandson  of  Colonel 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  21 

Davenport,  after  the  suit  had  commenced.  Mr.  Jones  at  once  reported  the  dis- 
covery of  the  book  to  the  Attorney-General  of  North  Carolina,  who  took  steps  to 
have  the  same  produced  in  evidence.  The  book  is  now  on  file  in  the  Supreme  Court 
of  the  United  States. 

Mr.  "W.  D.  Jones  died  several  years  ago,  and  his  widow,  Mrs.  "W.  D.  Jones, 
feels  that  the  State  of  North  Carolina  ought  to  make  some  recognition  of  the 
services  of  Mr.  Jones  in  the  discovery  and  production  of  this  book,  and  has  asked 
me  to  lay  this  matter  before  the  General  Assembly.  I  trust,  therefore,  that  the 
General  Asembly  will  pass  a  resolution  expressing  the  appreciation  of  the  State 
of  the  services  of  Mr.  Jones,  and  make  such  appropriation  to  his  widow  as  it,  in 
its  judgment,  may  deem  proper.  Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  "W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(V) 

NOMINATIONS  AND  APPOINTMENTS  SUBMITTED  TO 
THE  SENATE,  FEBRUARY  28,  1917 

Raleigh,  K  C,  February  28,  1917. 
Gentlemen  of  the  Senate: 

I  am  transmitting  herewith,  in  a  sealed  envelope,  according  to  custom  and  re- 
quest, my  nominations  for  certain  directors  and  trustees  for  State  institutions. 
I  regret  I  have  not  been  able  to  send  in  these  nominations  at  an  earlier  date, 
but  the  unusual  pressure  of  business  in  the  office  has  made  it  impossible  for  me 
to  do  so. 

I  am  not  at  this  time  making  any  nominations  for  the  State  hospitals  at 
Raleigh,  Morganton  and  Goldsboro  for  the  reason  that  a  bill  consolidating  the 
management  of  these  three  hospitals  is  now  pending  before  the  General  Assembly. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  "W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


Raleigh,  N.  C,  February  27,  1917. 
Gentlemen  of  the  Senate: 

I  respectfully  make  the  following  nominations,  and  trust  that  they  will 
meet  with  your  approval: 

DIRECTORS  OF  THE  STATE  PRISON 

H.  B.  Varner,  Chairman Davidson  County 

A.  E.  Smith Surry  County 

"W.  B.  Armstrong Gaston  County 

W.  M.  Sanders Johnston  County 

Benjamin  F.  Shelton Edgecombe  County 

all  for  a  term  of  four  years,  beginning  March  14,  1917. 


PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

TRUSTEES  OF  THE  N.  C.  COLLEGE  OF  AGRICULTURE 
AND    MECHANIC    ARTS 

R.  H.  Ricks Nash  County 

D.  R.  Noland Haywood  County 

W.  R.  Bonsai Richmond  County 

Everett.  Thompson Pasquotank  County 

all  for  a  term  of  six  years,  beginning  March  20,  1917. 

I  also  nominate  Mr.  A.  M.  Dixon,  of  Gaston  County,  to  fill  the  unexpired 

term  of  Hon.  R.  R.  Ray,  who  has  resigned  and  whose  term  expires  March 

20,  1921. 

DIRECTORS  OF  THE  STATE  SCHOOL  FOR  THE  DEAF  AND  BLIND 

AT  RALEIGH 

Joseph  E.  Pogue Wake  County 

H.  H.  McLendon Anson  County 

Richard  R.  Boyd Warren  County 

Miss  Mary  0.  Graham Wake  County 

all    for   a   term   of   six  years,   beginning   March   6,    1917. 

DIRECTORS  OF  THE  N.  C.  STATE  SCHOOL  FOR  THE  DEAF 
AT  MORGANTON 

A.  C.  Miller Cleveland  County 

Mrs.  I.  P.  Jeter Burke  County 

each  for  a  term  of  six  years,  beginning  March  12,  1917. 

MEMBERS  OF  THE  STATE  BOARD  OF  AGRICULTURE 

R.  L.  Woodard Pamlico  County 

H.  Q.  Alexander Mecklenburg  County 

A.  T.  McCallum Robeson  County 

all  for  a  term  of  six  years,  beginning  March  11,  1917. 

BOARD  OF  INTERNAL  IMPROVEMENTS 

R.  S.  Busbee Wake  County 

R.  L.  Burns Moore  County 

each  for  a  term  of  two  years,  beginning  March  10,  1917. 

TRUSTEES  CASWELL  TRAINING  SCHOOL 

C.  Dewey Wayne  County 

A.  B.  Justice Mecklenburg  County 

Miss  Elizabeth  Kelly Johnston  County 

all  for  a  term  of  six  years,  beginning  March  4,  1917. 

STATE  GEOLOGICAL  BOARD 

John  Sprunt  Hill Durham  County 

C.  C.  Smoot Wilkes  County 

each  for  a  term  of  four  years,  beginning  March  1,  1917. 

I  am  not  making  any  nominations  for  the  directors  of  the  State  hospitals 
at  Raleigh,  Morganton  and  Goldsboro,  at  this  time,  for  the  reason  that  a 
bill  is  pending  before  the  General  Asembly  consolidating  the  management  of 
these  three  hospitals.  Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY 

Raeeigh,  N.  C,  February  28,  1917. 
Gentlemen   of  the   Senate: 

The  State  Board  of  Education  respectfully  submits  the  following  nomina- 
tions, as  required  by  law,  for  Directors  of  the  State  Normal  and  Industrial 
College  at  Greensboro: 

Mrs.  Minnie  Mclver  Brown Columbus  County 

J.  D.  Murphy Buncombe  County 

C.  H.  Mebane Catawba  County 

all  for  a  term   of  six  years,  beginning  March  1,   1918. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

State  Board  of  Education, 
By  T.  W.  Bickett,  President. 


(8) 
BONDS  FOR  STATE  INSTITUTIONS 

Ealeigh,  1ST.  0.,  March  1,  1917. 
Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

We  have  reached  a  crucial  hour  in  the  civic  life  of  our  people.  Youth  is  denied 
its  birthright  of  opportunity  and  the  helpless  cry  in  vain  for  help.  A  careful 
estimate  of  receipts  and  disbursements  discloses  that  there  is  not  a  single  dollar 
available  from  current  revenues  for  making  permanent  improvements  in  any 
State  institution.  Indeed,  under  the  increased  cost  of  all  necessary  commodities 
the  maintenance  of  our  institutions  on  our  income  during  the  next  two  years  will 
require  a  miracle  in  economy. 

We  are  therefore  called  upon  to  decide  whether  it  is  our  duty  to  close  the  doors 
of  the  educational  and  charitable  institutions  to  all  newcomers  and  mark  time  for 
two  years,  or  to  bond  the  future  that  we  may  bless  it.  My  counsel  is  that  we  go 
forward.  And  the  purpose  should  embrace  a  plan — a  plan  for  a  balanced,  com- 
prehensive enlargement  of  facilities  so  that  when  the  work  is  done  it  will  be 
adequate,  harmonious  and  complete. 

Such  a  plan  is  embodied  in  the  bill  framed  by  the  joint  subcommittee  on 
appropriations  which  provides  for  a  complete  program  extending  through  a  period 
of  six  years,  and  authorizes  bonds  to  be  issued  in  the  sum  of  $500,000  for  each 
year  during  this  period,  the  bonds  at  the  end  of  the  seventh  year  to  be  retired  at 
the  rate  of  $100,000  a  year. 

I  am  convinced  that  the  people  will  approve  this  well  considered  plan,  and  the 
completed  work  will  be  an  enduring  monument  to  a  General  Assembly  that  took 
counsel  of  faith  and  not  of  fear. 

My  endorsement  of  the  proposed  plan  carries  with  it  a  specific  condition,  and 
that  is  that  the  program  for  the  betterment  of  living  conditions  in  our  rural 
communities  as  expressed  in  the  several  bills  hereinafter  mentioned  shall  be  like- 
wise carried  out.  No  mortal  man  can  satisfactorily  explain  to  the  people  how 
a  state  could  spend  $1,200,000  on  these  higher  institutions  of  learning  and  then 


24  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

enter  a  plea  of  poverty  to  the  cry  of  the  unnumbered  multitude  who  can  never  hope 
to  enter  a  college  door.  The  hope  and  the  resolve  of  this  administration  is  to  bring 
to  bleak  and  lonely  lives  a  new  breath  of  fragrance,  a  new  touch  of  color,  a  new 
baptism  of  hope.  To  this  end  sundry  bills  have  been  introduced,  and  I  urge  that 
these  be  enacted  as  a  part  and  parcel  of  the  big  movement  for  better  living  con- 
ditions in  North  Carolina. 

1.  This  bill  calls  for  the  teaching  of  the  a  b  c  's  of  good  farming  in  every 
country  school.  The  bill  has  been  carefully  prepared,  approved  by  everybody 
interested  in  the  subject,  was  introduced  by  Mr.  Swain  in  the  House,  has  been 
favorably  reported  by  the  Committee  on  Education,  and  should  by  all  means  be 
enacted.  The  bill  guarantees  that  the  country  boy  who  never  rises  above  the  fourth 
grade  will  know  something  of  the  mysteries  of  seeds  and  soils  and  in  the  cultivation 
of  a  one-horse  crop  will  be  able  to  mix  brains  with  dirt. 

2.  This  bill  provides  for  the  physical  examination  of  children  who  attend  the 
public  schools.  It  proposes  to  detect  and  arrest  defects  in  the  growing  child  before 
it  is  everlastingly  too  late.  A  defect  treated  in  its  incipiency  will  in  many  cases 
keep  the  child  from  becoming  a  permanent  charge  upon  the  State.  Considerations 
of  economy  and  humanity  alike  call  for  the  passage  of  this  bill.  The  bill  carries 
a  small  appropriation  of  $15,000,  and  I  am  persuaded  that  the  administration  of 
this  law  will  pay  marvelous  dividends  upon  the  investment.  The  bill  was  intro- 
duced in  the  House  by  Dr.  Crowson,  has  been  favorably  reported  by  the  Com- 
mittee on  Education  and  Health,  and  I  earnestly  beg  the  General  Assembly  to 
make  it  a  law. 

3.  This  bill  was  introduced  in  the  House  by  Mr.  McLendon,  and  is  designed  to 
make  the  country  schoolhouse  the  social  center.  I  said  in  my  inaugural  address 
that  the  pathos  of  country  life  is  its  loneliness.  The  bill  under  consideration  is 
designed  to  relieve  that  loneliness  and  at  the  same  time  afford  invaluable  in- 
struction upon  every  phase  of  farm  life.  JSTo  bill  before  the  General  Assembly  is 
calculated  to  more  surely  stop  the  flow  of  population  from  the  country  to  the  town. 
This  bill  carries  an  appropriation  of  $50,000  per  annum,  and  that  much  ought  to 
be  appropriated,  but  the  work  can  be  started  on  something  less.  I  sincerely  trust 
that  not  a  single  man  in  the  General  Assembly  will  oppose  this  bill. 

4.  This  bill  was  introduced  in  the  Senate  by  Mr.  Bennett  and  is  designed  to 
encourage  the  installation  of  running  water,  lights  and  telephones  in  country 
homes  and  communities.  There  are  thousands  of  country  homes  and  communities 
that  could  be  supplied  with  these  modern  conveniences  if  the  people  knew  how  to 
take  advantage  of  the  natural  resources  at  hand.  They  need  disinterested,  expert 
advice,  and  such  advice  the  bill  proposes  to  supply  without  cost  to  the  people.  At 
present  the  man  or  the  community  in  the  country  interested  in  these  matters  is 
forced  to  buy  advice,  and  possibly  gets  it  from  an  expert  who  has  something  to 
sell.  The  original  bill  asks  for  an  appropriation  of  $10,000,  but  I  think  the  work 
can  be  started  with  half  that  amount.  This  bill  ought  by  all  means  to  be  made 
a  part  of  the  big  program  involved  in  the  bond  issue  proposition. 

5.  The  full  amount  asked  for  traveling  libraries  should  be  appropriated,  as 
these  libraries  are  doing  a  great  work  for  the  enrichment  of  the  social  and  in- 
tellectual life  of  our  country  communities.  The  appropriation  asked  for  moon- 
light schools  and  high  schools  should  also  be  made. 

These  measures  added  to  the  $500,000  loan  fund  to  aid  in  the  building  of 
better    schoolhouses    make    a    well    balanced,    well    rounded    plan.      The    General 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  25 

Assembly  cannot  afford  to  neglect  any  part  of  this  program.  You  cannot  in  good 
conscience  issue  these  bonds  and  then  refuse  to  adopt  these  just  measures  in  the 
interest  of  the  men  and  women  on  whose  labor  and  in  whose  blood  rest  the 
enduring  progress  and  safety  of  the  State. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(9) 

NOMINATIONS  AND  APPOINTMENTS  SUBMITTED  TO 

THE  SENATE 

Raleigh,  K  G,  March  5,  1917. 
Gentlemen  of  the  Senate: 

In  compliance  with  the  requirements  of  the  act  to  consolidate  the  management 
of  the  State  hospitals  for  the  insane,  which  has  just  passed,  I  make  the  following 
nominations  for  directors : 

For   a   term   of   two   years,   expiring  April   1,   1919: 

A.  E.  Tate High  Point Morganton  District 

C.  A.  Woodard Durham Raleigh  District 

W.  H.  Williams Washington State-at-large 

For  a  term  of  four  years,  expiring  April  1,  1921: 
C.  P.  Matheson Taylorsville Morganton  District 

B.  B.  Adams Four  Oaks Raleigh  District 

F.  B.  McKinne Louisburg State-at-large 

For  a  term  of  six  years,  expiring  April  1,  1923: 

R.  R.  Clark Statesville Morganton  District 

Joseph  G.  Brown Raleigh Raleigh  District 

J.  W.  Thompson Goldsboro State-at-large 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


Raleigh,  N".  C,  March  5,  1917. 

Gentlemen  of  the  Senate: 

In  compliance  with  the  terms  of  the  act  to  create  the  State  Board  of  Charities 
and  Public  "Welfare,  I  make  the  following  nominations  for  membership  on  said 
board : 

For  a  term  of  two  years,  expiring  April  1,  1919: 

Charles  W.  Home Clayton 

J.  A.  McAulay Mount  Gilead 

Mrs.  I.  F.  Hill Durham 

For  a  term  of  four  years,  expiring  April  1,  1921: 

Carey  J.  Hunter Raleigh 

Mrs.  Walter  Woodard Wilson 


26  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

For  a  term   of  six  years,   expiring  April  1,  1923: 

A.  W.  McAlister Greensboro 

W.  A.  Blair Winston-Salem 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(10) 

BIENNIAL  MESSAGE  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY, 

SESSION  1919 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  January  9,  1919. 

The  General  Assembly  of  1917  adjourned  on  the  7th  day  of  March,  and  on  the 
6th  day  of  April  the  United  States  entered  the  World  War.  The  ensuing  period 
taxed  the  strength  of  our  Government  and  tested  the  character  of  our  people.  It 
is  cause  for  profound  gratitude  that  the  Government  and  people  have  emerged 
from  the  great  ordeal  as  "gold  tried  in  the  fire." 

Hot  with  righteous  indignation,  the  country  unleashed  its  pent-up  powers  and 
rushed  to  the  fray  with  a  fury  and  efficiency  that  brought  confusion  and  terror 
to  our  enemies  and  wonder  and  joy  to  our  friends.  The  world  was  first  dazed  and 
then  delighted  at  the  spectacle  of  a  mighty  nation  going  to  war,  desiring  nothing 
but  good  and  fearing  nothing  but  God. 

In  this  inspiring  drama  of  ideals  in  arms,  North  Carolina  played  a  noble  part. 
To  the  Army  and  the  Navy  she  contributed  79,863  men.  And  what  men  they  were! 
Cradled  in  a  State  where  disloyalty  is  a  monstrosity  and  cowardice  a  crime,  stirred 
by  memories  of  valiant  sires,  exalted  by  the  consciousness  that  at  home  every  man 
was  accounted  a  hero,  and  goaded  by  a  long  series  of  insults  and  injuries,  they 
hurled  themselves  at  the  foe  with  a  divine  scorn  of  costs  and  consequences,  and 
the  Hindenburg  line  was  not ! 

But  money  power  is  necessary  to  the  effective  use  of  man  power,  and  to  the 
call  of  the  Nation  for  this  vital  sinew  of  war  our  people  responded  in  heroic 
fashion. 

We  invested — 

In  Liberty   Bonds $110,208,950 

In  War  Stamps 37,000,000 

In  Federal  taxes 100,574,417 

For  the  support  of  the  war  we  gave — 

To  the  Red  Cross 1,750,000 

To  the  Y.  M.  C.  A 323,870 

To  the  United  War  Work  Fund 1,422,485 

To  the  Jewish  War  Relief  Fund 154,000 

Making  a  grand  total  of $251,433,722 

These  are  eloquent  figures,  and  bear  immortal  testimony  to  the  courage  and 
patriotism  of  our  people. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  27 

And  the  people  not  only  gave  their  sons  and  their  money,  but  with  these  they 
gave  themselves  to  the  winning  of  the  war.  All  the  moral  and  spiritual  forces  of 
the  State  were  mobilized  in  magnificent  array.  Before  their  resolute  advance  no 
slackerism  could  stand,  and  in  their  shining  presence  no  selfish  thought  could  live. 

It  would  ill  become  the  exalted  dignity  of  their  character  to  cheapen  the  women 
of  the  State  with  fulsome  praise.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  once  again  they  exem- 
plified and  glorified  the  genius  of  woman  for  sacrificial  service.  They  gave  their 
sons  to  the  Nation  and  to  humanity,  while  their  eyes  flashed  and  their  hearts  bled. 
They  worked  as  hard  as  the  men  worked,  and  prayed  more.  In  a  hundred  ways 
they  contributed  to  the  physical  comfort  of  the  soldiers  and  then  broke  for  them 
the  alabaster  box  of  immeasurable  love,  whose  fragrance  fills  the  earth. 

It  would  be  unjust  to  close  this  review  of  the  war  without  making  special 
mention  of  the  men  who  administered  the  Selective  Service  Law.  These  men  have 
been  the  shock  absorbers  in  the  engine  of  war.  They  stood  between  the  Govern- 
ment and  the  people  and  got  hard  kicks  from  both.  Theirs  was  the  hardest,  most 
thankless,  and,  at  the  same  time,  the  most  necessary  work  of  the  war.  They  did 
it  miraculously  well,  and  in  the  presence  of  this  assembly  I  want  to  voice  acknowl- 
edgement of  the  debt  the  State  can  never  pay. 

WHAT    SHALL    THE   HAKVEST    BE? 

But  why  did  we  fight,  and  for  what?  To  shift  Prussianism  from  Potsdam  to 
Washington?  To  transfer  militarism  from  Germany  to  France?  To  dethrone 
autocracy  in  Berlin  and  set  it  up  in  London  ?  It  is  not  so  written  in  the  call  to 
arms.  The  President  proclaimed  that  we  are  going  to  war  to  destroy  autocracy 
wherever  found,  to  send  militarism  to  the  scrap-heap  of  civilization,  and  to  secure 
blessings  of  liberty  under  laws  of  righteousness  for  all  the  children  of  men.  Amid 
the  clamor  and  confusion  of  social  and  political  strife,  above  the  tread  of  hostile 
armies,  his  voice  rang  out  like  the  prophet  in  the  wilderness  proclaiming  a  new 
dispensation  in  the  life  of  nations.  The  whole  world  was  fascinated  by  the  celestial 
note  in  that  high,  clear  call.  Ministers  of  the  Gospel  stood  behind  the  sacred  desk 
and  in  the  name  of  the  Prince  of  Peace  urged  men  to  go  forth  to  war.  Teachers 
gathered  children  about  them  and  fired  their  young  hearts  with  the  story  that 
America  was  fighting  that  every  child  in  all  the  earth  might  enter  into  its  birth- 
right of  happiness  and  hope.  Gentle  women  thrust  guns  into  the  hands  of  their 
sons  and  sped  them  forth  to  battle  for  a  civilization  that  would  forever  guard  the 
weak  from  the  rapacity  of  the  strong.  All  classes  and  conditions  of  men  stood 
upon  a  hundred  thousand  platforms  and  burned  into  the  hearts  of  the  people  that 
we  were  pouring  out  our  blood  and  treasure  in  order  to  dig  up  militarism  root  and 
branch,  and  burn  it  in  the  unquenchable  fire  of  humanity's  righteous  wrath.  The 
press  in  ten  million  flaming  headlines  proclaimed  that  we  were  in  a  death-grapple 
with  the  very  soul  of  war,  and  that  the  Nation  must  never  lower  its  arms  until 
Prussianism  and  all  its  preachments  should  be  swept  from  the  earth  forever  and 
forever. 

In  such  fashion  and  for  such  purpose  this  Nation  went  to  war;  but  now  when 
victory  has  come  we  find  in  certain  quarters  a  sudden  change  of  front.  Envy  is 
spreading  its  deadly  poison  and  avarice  would  capitalize  the  blood  of  the  slain. 
In  high  quarters  we  hear  the  insidious  suggestion  that  it  was  well  to  kneel  before 
our  altars  while  men  were  dying  for  the  faith,  but  now  practical  men  will  consign 


28  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

their  altars  to  the  cellar  and  set  up  their  bargain  counters.  Some  men  of  note  and 
others  of  notoriety  sneer  at  the  simple  faith  of  folks  who  still  believe  that  we  are 
going  to  get  out  of  this  war  precisely  what  we  went  in  for.  These  men  today  view 
with  alarm  the  program  of  righteousness  and  enduring  peace,  to  which  in  the  days 
that  tried  men's  souls  they  pointed  with  passionate  pride. 

And  when  the  President  of  the  United  States  crossed  the  seas  to  translate  our 
ideals  into  a  peace  pact  that  will  for  a  thousand  years  deliver  humanity  from  the 
burdens  and  horrors  of  war,  the  high  priests  of  profit  and  privilege  launched  their 
anathemas  against  him,  and  sought  to  discount  and  dishonor  the  man  whom  the 
ends  of  the  earth  hail  as  the  prophet  and  builder  of  a  better  day. 

Such  men  are  a  fearful  menace  to  the  safety  of  this  Nation  and  the  peace  of 
all  mankind.  They  undermine  the  faith  of  the  people  in  the  integrity  of  the 
Government,  in  the  sanctity  of  its  promises  and  the  beneficence  of  its  purposes. 
They  are  piling  up  inflammable  material  for  the  torch  of  Bolshevism.  We  might 
as  well  look  the  facts  squarely  in  the  face.  This  world  must  accept  the  wholesome, 
constructive  idealism  of  Woodrow  Wilson  and  Lloyd  George,  or  welter  in  the 
morbid,  destructive  fanaticism  of  Liebknecht  and  Lenine. 

Therefore,  in  order  that  we  may  reap  where  we  have  sown,  that  our  dead  may 
not  have  died  in  vain,  I  urge  this  General  Assembly  to  send  a  memorial  to  the 
American  Peace  Commission  in  France,  beseeching  them  to  incorporate  into  the 
Treaty  of  Peace  such  a  League  of  Nations  as  will  in  every  practicable  way  make 
war  between  enlightened  nations  forever  impossible. 

A   WORTHY   MEMORIAL 

In  camp  and  field  our  soldiers  made  the  supreme  sacrifice  to  save  the  ideals  of 
this  republic.  It  now  behooves  us  to  make  every  needful  sacrifice  to  perpetuate 
these  ideals  in  increased  purity  and  power.  The  finest  memorial  we  can  build  to 
our  brave  is  a  State  that  will  rank  as  high  over  here  as  they  did  "over  there." 

Our  first  thought  in  the  building  of  this  State  should  be  the  welfare  of  the 
children,  for  "the  child  is  father  to  the  man."  Every  child  has  a  natural  right  to 
his  father's  protecting  care.  Neither  the  sins  of  the  father  nor  the  weakness  of 
the  mother  can  abridge  in  any  degree  this  inherent  right.  It  follows  that  every 
child  has  a  right  to  know  who  his  father  is.  The  black  letter  law  that  a  child  may 
be  a  nullius  filius,  a  son  of  nobody,  is  as  base  in  morals  as  it  is  false  in  biology. 
Our  whole  law  on  this  subject  is  antiquated  and  inadequate  and  should  be  wiped 
from  the  books.  A  new  law  should  provide  that  when  a  child  is  born  out  of  wed- 
lock, it  shall  be  the  duty  of  the  local  representative  of  the  State  Board  of  Public 
Welfare  to  bring  a  civil  action  in  the  name  of  the  State  of  North  Carolina  upon 
the  relation  of  the  child  for  the  purpose  of  locating  and  identifying  the  father. 
The  action  should  be  brought  in  the  Superior  Court,  tried  in  solemn  form  before 
a  judge  and  jury,  and  the  findings  should  be  made  a  permanent  record  in  the 
archives  of  the  court.  The  father  thus  located  and  identified  should  be  charged 
with  the  maintenance  and  education  of  such  child  in  precisely  the  same  degree  as 
if  the  child  had  been  born  in  lawful  wedlock.  Such  a  child  should  not  be  made 
the  heir  of  such  a  father,  as  this  might  lead  to  fraud  and  would  be  an  injustice  to 
the  lawful  mother  and  wife,  but  in  all  other  respects  the  father  should  be  made 
to  carry  the  responsibilities  of  paternity  and  be  indictable  if  he  fails  to  do  so. 
Such  a  law  would  not  only  be  just  to  these  sinless  children  of  sin,  but  would  have 
a  wholesome  tendency  to  reduce  their  number. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  29 


EVERY  CHILD  HAS  A  NATURAL  RIGHT  TO  A   FAIR  START 

The  State  is  a  party  to  an  awful  crime  against  childhood  when  it  permits 
idiots  and  imheciles  to  perpetuate  their  species.  The  law  very  properly  forbids  the 
marriage  of  these  unfortunate  creatures,  and  it  should  be  equally  diligent  in  pre- 
venting their  illicit  increase.  The  State  should  take  steps  to  render  it  impossible 
for  any  person  adjudged  hy  a  competent  board  to  be  an  incurahle  mental  defective 
to  transmit  that  infirmity  to  generations  unborn ;  such  a  law  would  he  the  essence 
of  humanity  and  common  sense. 

Again,  the  State  is  a  party  to  a  crime  against  childhood  and  against  woman- 
hood when  it  permits  a  marriage  license  to  be  issued  to  a  man  afflicted  with  a 
contagious  disease  due  to  vice.  The  law  should  require  a  health  certificate  to  he 
presented  hy  every  man  who  applies  for  a  marriage  license.  The  population  in 
our  hospitals  for  the  insane  is  increasing  so  rapidly  that  it  seems  to  be  impossible 
for  the  State  to  erect  buildings  in  which  to  keep  them.  A  large  percentage  of 
these  unfortunate  creatures  are  the  children  of  people  who  are  themselves  mental 
defectives  or  whose  blood  has  been  tainted  by  vice.  The  only  place  to  stop  this 
muddy,  murky  current  is  at  its  source. 

Every  child  has  a  natural  right  to  have  any  mental  or  physical  defect  corrected, 
if  it  be  in  the  power  of  medical  or  surgical  skill.  The  incidental  fact  that  the 
parents  may  not  be  able  to  pay  for  the  necessary  treatment  in  no  way  affects  the 
rights  of  the  child.  The  General  Assembly  of  1917  made  a  wholesome  start  in 
this  direction  by  the  enactment  of  chapter  244,  Public  Laws  of  1917,  but  the 
scope  of  that  chapter  should  be  greatly  enlarged  and  the  appropriation  increased 
from  ten  to  at  least  fifty  thousand  dollars  per  annum.  We  cannot  claim  to  main- 
tain an  intelligent,  much  less  a  Christian  civilization,  if  a  child  be  allowed  to 
stagger  through  life  under  the  handicap  of  a  mental  or  physical  infirmity  for  the 
want  of  a  few  dollars.  Indeed,  it  is  an  economical  blunder  for  society  to  permit 
an  adult  to  become  a  mental  or  physical  derelict  for  want  of  proper  surgical  or 
medical  treatment.  It  is  cheaper  to  correct  these  infirmities  than  to  pay  for  the 
upkeep  of  these  derelicts  in  charitable  institutions. 

In  addition  to  the  physical  examinations  of  public  school  children,  there  should 
be  a  compulsory  course  in  physical  culture  maintained  in  every  public  school. 
Setting-up  exercises  should  be  required  every  day  just  as  they  are  in  the  training 
camps  for  the  soldiers. 

LONGER  AND  BETTER   SCHOOLS 

The  right  of  every  child  to  an  education  is  now  universally  conceded.  It  is 
also  conceded  that  the  duty  to  provide  educational  facilities  up  to  a  certain  point 
rests  upon  the  State.  The  old  argument  that  one  man  ought  not  to  be  taxed  to 
educate  the  child  of  another  has  gone  into  the  discard,  and  any  man  who  cherishes 
this  once  popular  notion  is  ashamed  to  admit  it. 

But  our  works  have  not  kept  pace  with  our  faith,  and  this  General  Assembly 
should  resolutely  set  its  face  to  execute  the  mandate  of  the  people,  who,  by  a 
majority  of  more  than  one  hundred  thousand,  have  decreed  that  every  child  in 
North  Carolina  must  have  the  opportunity  to  go  to  school  at  least  six  months  in 
the  year.  To  provide  the  machinery  and  the  money  for  carrying  out  this  con- 
stitutional mandate  is  at  once  the  plain  duty  and  the  high  privilege  of  this  General 
Assembly. 


30  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

A.  bill  in  the  nature  of  a  suggestion  will  be  submitted  in  due  time  to  your 
appropriate  committees.  Tbis  administration  is  not  wedded  to  the  details  of  any 
particular  bill,  but  the  six-months  school  must  be  maintained.  Therefore,  I  urge 
you  gentlemen  not  to  indulge  in  destructive  criticisms  of  the  bill,  but  to  point  out 
how  the  thing  can  be  done  in  a  better  way.  Such  information  will  be  received  with 
joy  by  the  very  people  who  have  taxed  their  energies  in  framing  the  best  bill 
possible  under  the  circumstances. 

One  principle  I  desire  to  emphasize,  the  child  is  the  ivard  of  the  State.  The 
organic  law  of  the  State  requires  that  every  child  shall  have  the  benefit  of  a  six- 
months  school,  no  matter  where  the  child  may  live.  While  it  is  the  duty  of 
counties  and  communities  to  do  all  they  reasonably  can,  this  in  no  way  relieves 
the  State  of  its  supreme  obligation  to  the  child.  Therefore,  it  is  the  duty  of  this 
General  Assembly  to  make  it  absolutely  certain  that  the  schoolhouse  door  shall  be 
open  to  every  child  in  our  borders  for  six  months  in  the  year. 

HOW  CAN  THEY  BE  TAUGHT  EXCEPT  THERE  BE  A  TEACHER  ? 

For  some  years  the  salaries  paid  the  teachers  in  our  public  schools  have  been 
inadequate.  During  the  last  two  years  school  teachers  would  have  starved  but  for 
the  assistance  of  relatives  and  friends.  It  is  simply  impossible  to  keep  schools 
open  under  these  conditions,  and  the  State  is  confronted  with  the  necessity  of 
increasing  the  wages  paid  teachers  in  our  public  schools  at  least  50  per  cent. 
The  average  salary  paid  these  teachers  last  year  was  $45.72  per  month.  This 
General  Assembly  should,  without  a  dissenting  vote,  enact  a  law  making  the 
minimum  salary  for  a  teacher  who  holds  a  first-grade  certificate,  $65.  Such  a 
law  would  in  no  way  prevent  the  payment  of  higher  salaries  in  special-tax  districts 
and  in  our  cities  and  towns. 

A  COMPULSORY  SCHOOL  ATTENDANCE  AND  CHILD-LABOK  LAW 

The  right  of  the  child  to  an  education  at  the  hands  of  the  State  carries  with 
it  the  right  of  the  State  to  compel  the  child  to  take  advantage  of  the  facilities 
provided.  In  duty  bound  the  State  erects  the  buildings  and  employs  the  teachers, 
and  having  thus  done  its  part,  a  binding  obligation  rests  upon  the  parent  and  the 
child  to  do  their  part.  This  General  Assembly  should  in  short  order  enact  a  law 
compelling  every  child  between  the  ages  of  eight  and  fourteen  to  attend  school 
during  the  entire  term  of  the  public  school  in  the  district  in  which  the  chfld 
resides.  Appropriate  machinery  should  be  provided  for  the  strict  enforcement  of 
this  law. 

Coupled  with  and  as  a  part  of  the  compulsory  school  law  should  be  a  child- 
labor  law.  The  first  sections  of  the  act  should  provide  for  compulsory  attendance 
upon  school ;  the  latter  sections  should  make  it  unlawful  for  any  mill  or  factory  to 
employ  any  child  between  the  ages  of  eight  and  fourteen  during  the  public  school 
term.     Of  course  no  child  under  seventeen  can  be  employed  under  existing  laws. 

The  weakness  of  child-labor  legislation  has  been  that  it  has  dealt>l|||h  the 
subject  only  in  a  negative  way.  It  has  declared  that  the  child  shall  not  work,  but 
has  not  concerned  itself  with  what  the  child  shall  do.  The  treatment  of  the  problem 
has  been  not  unlike  that  of  the  mother  who  told  the  servant  to  go  out  in  the  yard 
and  see  what  the  children  were  doing  and  make  them  stop  it.  A  law  that  takes  the 
child  out  of  the  factory  and  dumps  it  into  the  street  is  hurtful  both  to  the  child 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  31 

and  to  society.  The  law  should  say  the  child  shall  not  work  and,  furthermore,  that 
he  shall  go  to  school.  In  fact,  the  law  should  be  primarily  a  part  of  the  educa- 
tional policy  of  the  State  and  only  in  an  incidental  way  a  child-labor  law.  The 
law  should  be  enforced  by  the  officers  of  the  educational  department,  and  it  should 
be  the  duty  of  the  truant  officer  to  go  out  and  find  the  child,  whether  in  a  factory 
or  in  the  street,  and  place  him  in  school. 

Provision  might  be  made  with  proper  safeguards  for  permitting  a  child  be- 
tween twelve  and  fourteen  to  work  in  a  factory  after  the  public  school  term  has 
expired,  provided  a  certificate  can  be  obtained  showing  that  the  child  had  actually 
attended  the  school  during  the  entire  term. 

SANITARY   CLOSETS 

As  a  part  of  the  general  welfare  scheme,  I  make  the  following  additional 
recommendations.  A  general  law  should  be  enacted  making  it  compulsory  for  the 
owner  of  property  on  which  a  closet  is  located  within  three  hundred  feet  of  the 
dwelling-house  of  any  other  person  to  maintain  a  sanitary  closet  in  accordance 
with  plans  and  specifications  approved  by  the  State  Board  of  Health.  Such 
sanitary  closets  would  prevent  the  undue  spread  of  typhoid  fever,  hookworm, 
intestinal  tuberculosis,  and  other  intestinal  diseases.  Besides,  many  diseases  are 
brought  on  by  the  absence  of  commodious,  sanitary  and  convenient  toilet  facilities. 
Especial  attention  should  be  given  to  toilets  for  use  in  schools  and  all  places  where 
people  assemble  in  large  numbers. 

I  make  a  special  recommendation  that  the  General  Assembly  at  once  order  the 
State  Committee  on  Public  Buildings  and  Grounds  to  provide  on  or  near  the 
Capitol  grounds  commodious  and  sanitary  toilet  facilities  for  both  sexes  and  both 
races.     The  necessity  for  such  facilities  is  apparent  and  imperative. 

THE  UPKEEP   OF   ROADS 

The  failure  to  provide  for  the  upkeep  of  roads,  where  bonds  have  been  issued 
to  build  them,  is  the  acme  of  unwisdom.  Such  a  policy  is  on  a  par  with  that  of 
the  man  who  plants  a  crop  and  then  refuses  to  cultivate  it.  This  General  Assembly 
should  immediately  pass  a  law  compelling  every  county  in  the  State  where  bonds 
have  been  issued  or  may  hereafter  be  issued,  for  the  construction  of  roads,  to  levy 
an  annual  upkeep  tax  of  not  less  than  3  and  not  more  than  5  per  cent  of  the 
amount  of  bonds  issued  for  their  construction. 

THE  FEDERAL  ROAD  ACT 

There  seems  to  be  a  probability  that  Congress  will  appropriate  a  hundred 
million  dollars  annually  to  build  good  roads.  North  Carolina's  part  of  this  appro- 
priation will  be  about  two  million  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  dollars  annually, 
and  in  order  to  obtain  this  sum  the  State  will  have  to  make  provision  for  tjafe1 
expenditure  of  a  similar  amount.  The  vital  question  is,  Where  can  the  moneylpe 
found  ?  I  have  been  urged  to  recommend  that  the  State  issue  bonds  to  this  amount 
annually  for  ten  years,  making  a  total  bond  issue  of  twenty-two  million  dollars. 
I  regret  that  I  cannot  endorse  such  a  measure.  It  is  doubtful  that  the  State  could 
market  bonds  in  this  amount.  Even  if  we  could  sell  the  bonds  it  would  be  unwise 
to  clothe  a  central  board  with  power  to  say  where  the  roads  should  be  located. 


1/ 


32  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Every  county  in  the  State  would  demand  that  the  roads  he  run  through  that 
county,  and  the  several  townships  in  the  counties  would  contend  among  them- 
selves for  the  location.  This  always  happens  when  the  communities  that  get  the 
roads  pay  no  more  than  those  that  do  not.  The  wise  course  would  seem  to  be  to 
leave  it  to  the  several  counties  to  say  whether  or  not  they  both  desire  and  are 
willing  to  pay  for  these  roads. 

With  respect  to  sand-clay  and  gravel  roads,  the  general  road  law  now  in  force 
would  seem  to  be  adequate  to  meet  the  situation.  But  with  respect  to  great 
macadamized  or  asphalt  highways,  new  provisions  would  have  to  be  made.  The 
new  law  should  provide  for  establishing  these  great  highways  on  the  basis  of  the 
Federal  Government  paying  one-half  the  cost,  the  county  one-fourth,  and  the 
abutting  landowners  on  either  side  one-eighth.  This  is  the  principle  followed  in 
paving  the  streets  in  our  cities,  and  there  is  no  reason  why  it  should  not  be  applied 
to  these  permanent  highways.  The  land  abutting  on  the  highway  would  be 
doubled  and  quadrupled  in  value.  The  time  would  soon  come  when  water  mains 
and  electric  light  lines  would  be  established  along  these  highways  and  the  abutting 
lands  would  sell  by  the  front-foot  instead  of  by  the  acre.  People  living  along 
these  highways  would  enjoy  practically  all  the  advantages  of  town  and  city  life. 
Such  a  scheme  would  prevent  unseemly  scrambles  among  the  people,  and  com- 
munities obtaining  the  roads  would  pay  for  what  they  got. 

THE  SHOKT  BALLOT 

At  the  expense  of  repetition  I  am  constrained  to  again  insist  that  the  principle 
of  the  short  ballot  should  be  applied  to  all  State  administrative  offices.  There  is 
something  attractive  to  the  popular  mind  in  the  theory  that  all  the  people  select 
these  officials,  but  the  truth  is  that  the  people  do  no  such  thing.  A  few  men,  an 
average  of  not  more  than  three,  select  themselves  as  candidates,  and  then  the 
people  are  accorded  the  privilege  of  saying  in  the  primaries  which  of  these  three 
is  least  objectionable.  There  never  was  a  more  tragic  delusion  than  that  the 
people  select  these  officials. 

But  if  the  people  should  be  actually  consulted  it  is  plain  that  all  the  people 
cannot  secure  sufficient  information  about  the  qualifications  of  a  man  for  these 
administrative  offices  to  enable  them  to  arrive  at  a  conclusion  satisfactory  to 
themselves. 

There  is  no  more  reason  for  electing  the  Governor's  Council  than  there  is  for 
electing  the  President's  Cabinet.  I  take  it  that  no  one  would  favor  electing  the 
President  of  the  University  by  a  vote  of  all  the  people,  and  yet  the  people  can 
pass  upon  his  qualifications  quite  as  well  as  they  can  on  those  of  the  State  Superin- 
tendent of  Public  Instruction.  The  Commissioner  of  Agriculture  is  elected 
by  the  people,  the  President  of  the  Agricultural  College  is  elected  by  a  board  of 
trustees,  and  yet  the  people  can  pass  upon  the  qualifications  of  the  President  of 
the  College  quite  as  intelligently  as  they  can  upon  the  qualifications  of  the  Com- 
missioner. Presidents  of  railroads  and  other  corporations  are  selected  by  small 
boards  of  directors.  Railroad  commissioners  and  corporation  commissioners  are 
elected  by  all  the  people.    Who  are  most  efficiently  served  by  their  chosen  officials  ? 

I  have  supreme  faith  in  the  judgment  of  all  the  people  when  they  know  the 
facts.  They  can  know  the  facts  about  a  few  men  on  a  ticket.  They  should  vote 
for  these  few,  and  then  hold  them  rigidly  responsible  for  results. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  33 

Only  the  Governor  and  the  Lieutenant-Governor  should  be  elected,  but  a  com- 
plete change  would  require  a  constitutional  amendment,  and  hence  as  a  start  in  the 
right  direction,  I  urge  this  General  Assembly  to  enact  a  law  that  all  State  ad- 
ministrative officers  whose  election  by  the  people  is  not  required  by  the  Constitu- 
tion shall  hereafter  be  appointed  by  the  Governor.  Of  course  the  Commissioner 
of  Agriculture  should  be  elected  by  the  Board  of  Agriculture,  and  the  heads  of  our 
several  institutions  by  boards  of  directors  or  trustees. 

A  HOUSE  FOE  THE  FAEMEE 

When  any  citizen,  or  a  stranger  within  the  gates,  comes  into  my  office  and  asks 
where  the  Department  of  Agriculture  is  located  I  am  ashamed  to  tell  him.  The 
quarters  of  the  Agricultural  Department  would  do  no  credit  to  a  county  agricul- 
tural society.  They  are  a  disgrace  to  the  imperial  State  of  North  Carolina.  I 
beseech  this  General  Assembly  to  authorize  the  Department  of  Agriculture  to 
erect  for  its  own  use  a  building  in  keeping  with  the  dignity  of  our  greatest 
industry.  The  building  ought  to  be  the  very  handsomest  one  in  the  State.  Worth 
Carolina  today  ranks  seventh  in  the  value  of  her  agricultural  products.  The 
Department  is  doing  a  great  work  and  deserves  to  be  properly  housed. 

THE  STATE   PEISON 

I  renew  the  recommendation  made  in  my  inaugural  address  that  the  entire 
administration  of  the  State  Prison  should  be  conducted  from  the  State  Farm. 
I  have  consulted  the  board  of  directors  of  the  prison,  who  are  men  of  the  very 
finest  business  judgment,  and  they  are  all  of  opinion  that  such  a  change  would 
make  for  efficiency  and  economy  in  the  administration  of  the  prison.  The  board 
should  be  directed  to  erect  upon  the  State  Farm  suitable  administration  buildings, 
to  establish  a  heating  and  lighting  plant,  and  to  run  a  branch  railroad  from  the 
Atlantic  Coast  Line  to  the  center  of  the  farm. 

I  deem  it  my  duty  to  take  notice  of  the  popular  delusion  that  the  State  Prison 
is  a  great  reservoir  from  which  labor  for  any  and  all  purposes  may  be  drawn. 
There  are  at  present  writing  in  the  State  Prison,  including  the  department  for 
the  criminal  insane,  778  convicts.  Of  these  120  are  kept  in  the  Central  Prison 
and  are  unable  to  do  any  regular  work.  At  the  State  Farm  there  are  344  prisoners, 
23  of  these  being  women.  At  Badin  and  at  Bridgewater  there  are  256.  The 
strongest  prisoners  are  at  Badin  and  at  Bridgewater.  Not  more  than  half  of  the 
prisoners  at  the  State  Farm  are  capable  of  doing  regular  hard  work  on  the  public 
roads.  Two  years  ago  there  were  in  the  prison  967,  and  although  the  last  General 
Assembly  enacted  two  laws  calculated  to  increase  the  number  of  prisoners,  to  wit. 
the  law  requiring  men  convicted  of  manufacturing  whiskey  to  be  sent  to  the  prison 
for  at  least  one  year,  and  the  law  not  permitting  any  one  to  be  sent  to  the  public 
roads  for  more  than  five  years,  there  has  been  a  reduction  in  the  prison  population 
of  189  prisoners,  or,  approximately,  20  per  cent.  If  the  bone-dry  laws,  the  in- 
creased and  improved  educational  facilities,  and  the  whole  program  for  better 
social  and  industrial  conditions  are  worth  what  we  confidently  believe  they  are, 
then  there  is  a  reasonable  hope  that  the  number  of  convicts  in  the  State  Prison  will 
steadily  decrease.  Hence  it  is  idle  for  the  State  to  embark  in  any  work  in  the 
expectation  of  doing  it  with  convict  labor. 

3 


34  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Propositions  come  to  my  office  asking  for  convict  labor  for  every  sort  of  work 
under  the  sun,  based  upon  the  delusion  that  the  supply  of  labor  is  inexhaustible, 
that  the  State  pays  the  expenses  of  the  prison  and  that  the  available  labor  can 
be  used  without  any  regard  for  business  considerations. 

The  State  does  not  appropriate  one  penny  for  the  support  of  the  prison.  The 
able-bodied  prisoners,  who  do  not  represent  more  than  two-thirds  of  the  population, 
must  earn  their  own  living  and  the  living  of  those  unable  to  work,  the  salaries  of 
all  the  officials  and  employees  of  the  prison,  the  equipment,  improvements  and 
repairs,  and  also  the  per  diem  allowed  the  prisoners  themselves  under  the  law. 

Considerations  of  humanity  are  against  working  the  convicts  on  the  public 
roads.  The  quarters  of  convicts  must  be  safe  and  they  must  be  sanitary.  It  is 
well-nigh  impossible  to  comply  with  both  of  these  requirements  in  building  tem- 
porary quarters  save  at  prohibitive  expense.  I  understand  that  there  is  one,  and 
there  may  be  more,  safe  and  sanitary  county  convict  camp  in  the  State;  but 
personally  I  never  saw  one  that  was  fit  for  the  abode  of  any  human  being. 

If  we  be  sincere  in  our  loud  protests  against  inhumanity  to  those  "behind 
closed  doors,"  if  we  really  desire  to  do  them  good  and  not  evil  during  the  period 
of  their  imprisonment,  if  we  want  to  make  them  prisoners  of  hope  and  not  of 
despair,  and  send  them  out  into  the  world  better  citizens  than  they  entered  the 
prison  walls,  then  we  will  place  them  in  quarters  and  surround  them  with  con- 
ditions that  will  preserve  their  health,  improve  their  minds  and  morals,  and 
build  up  their  self-respect. 

These  conditions  can  be  found  on  a  farm  better  than  anywhere  else,  and  if  we 
really  desire  a  model  prison,  the  place  to  build  it  up  is  on  the  State  Farm. 

The  suggestion  that  the  convicts  compete  with  the  farmers  is  not  well  founded. 
In  making  their  own  feed  and  food  supplies  the  convicts  certainly  do  not  compete 
with  the  farmers,  for  the  farmers  of  North  Carolina  do  not  produce  enough  of 
these  commodities  for  their  own  uses,  and  the  amount  of  cotton  produced  on  the 
farm  could  not  possibly  affect  the  price  of  cotton  to  the  extent  of  a  dollar  on  a 
thousand  bales. 

I  renew  the  recommendation  made  in  my  inaugural  address  that  the  State 
Prison  be  remodeled  and  converted  into  a  hospital  for  the  insane.  The  building 
cannot  be  made  suitable  for  patients  who  can  be  cured  by  scientific  treatment, 
but  there  are  in  our  hospitals,  both  at  Kaleigh  and  at  Morganton,  many  patients 
for  whom  the  greatest  alienists  can  do  nothing.  All  that  can  be  done  for  these 
poor  creatures  is  to  keep  them  in  a  place  where  they  cannot  hurt  themselves  or 
others,  and  where  they  will  be  physically  comfortable.  The  State  Prison  building 
can  be  arranged  to  take  care  of  this  class  of  patients  and  make  room  in  the  other 
hospitals  for  patients  for  whom  there  is  some  ray  of  hope. 

A    CHANCE    FOE   THE    SHEEP 

The  sheep  industry  ought  to  be  fostered  in  North  Carolina,  and  I  recommend 
that  a  law  be  enacted  forbidding  owners  of  dogs  to  allow  them  to  run  at  large  at 
night.  Such  a  law  would  entail  no  expense  upon  the  owners,  and  would  afford 
a  large  measure  of  protection  to  the  sheep. 

FEDERAL  PROHIBITION 

I  shall  lay  before  the  General  Assembly  at  once  the  proposed  amendment  to 
the  Federal  Constitution  making  it  unlawful  to  manufacture  or  sell  intoxicating 


MESSAGES  TO  TEE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  35 

liquors  in  the  United  States.     The  mind  of  North  Carolina  is  already  made  up  on 
this  subject,  and  I  assume  that  the  amendment  will  be  promptly  ratified. 

LAW    ENFORCEMENT 

There  is  nothing  so  demoralizing  as  the  nonenforeement  of  the  law.  It  makes 
a  good  citizen  lose  faith  in  the  law  and  the  bad  citizen  lose  respect  for  the  law. 
If  a  law  cannot  be  enforced  it  ought  to  be  repealed.  The  greatest  hindrance  to 
the  due  enforcement  of  the  general  law  is  local  prejudice  or  indifference.  In  a 
government  by  the  people  this  will  always  be  so.  The  natural  remedy  for  this 
evil  is  officials  who  will  not  be  subject  to  local  influences.  This  is  the  principal 
reason  why  Federal  laws  are  generally  enforced  better  than  State  laws. 

I  recommend  the  enactment  of  a  law  along  the  following  lines :  Make  it  the 
duty  of  all  sheriffs,  deputies,  constables,  and  police  officials  to  cooperate  with  all 
Federal  officials  and  with  each  other  in  the  enforcement  of  the  law.  Clothe  the 
Governor  with  power  to  send  any  of  the  county  or  city  officials  above  mentioned 
into  any  part  of  the  State,  and  pay  their  per  diem  and  expenses  while  on  duty 
outside  of  their  own  county.  Upon  complaint  made  in  writing  by  as  many  as 
five  reputable  citizens  that  any  official  in  North  Carolina  is  not  enforcing  the 
law,  authorize  the  Governor  to  direct  the  Attorney-General  to  investigate  the 
complaint,  and,  if  he  finds  it  well  grounded,  to  bring  an  ouster  proceeding  against 
the  delinquent  official  in  any  county  in  the  State  which  the  Attorney-General  may 
designate.  Make  it  the  duty  of  the  solicitor  to  prosecute  the  ouster  proceeding 
under  the  direction  of  the  Attorney-General.  The  bill  I  am  suggesting  creates  no 
office,  but  simply  enables  the  State  to  use,  to  the  best  advantage,  the  officials  we 
already  have. 

THE  PRIMARY  LAW 

The  primary  law  should  be  radically  strengthened  or  repealed.  I  prefer  to 
strengthen  it.  The  undue  use  of  money  in  the  primary  is  a  debauchery  of  the 
people  and  a  fraud  on  good  citizens  who  desire  to  obey  the  law.  The  law  should 
forbid  any  candidate  to  employ  any  one  to  work  for  him  in  the  primary,  save  in 
a  purely  clerical  capacity.  No  mortal  man  can  run  and  mark  the  line  between 
paying  a  field  worker  for  his  legitimate  services  and  buying  his  influence.  Because 
of  this  the  primary  has  bred  a  race  of  political  heelers  who  stand  around  all  the 
day  idle  "because  no  man  hath  hired  them,"  and  are  ready,  at  the  first  or  the 
eleventh  hour,  to  go  into  the  vineyard  and  work  valiantly  for  any  man  until 
another  comes  along  and  raises  the  price. 

If  a  man  has  not  impressed  himself  with  his  fitness  for  an  office  on  his  friends 
to  the  extent  that  they  will  be  willing  to  do  a  reasonable  amount  of  work  for  his 
nomination  without  money  and  without  price,  he  ought  not  to  be  allowed  to 
develop  a  wholly  artificial  following  by  the  employment  of  a  host  of  professional 
boosters. 

Lending  money  to  or  endorsing  the  notes  of  insolvent  persons  or  lending  money 
to  solvent  persons  with  no  intention  of  ever  collecting  it  is  a  favorite  device  for 
evading  the  law  against  the  excessive  use  of  money  in  the  primaries.  This  ought 
to  be  stopped,  and  every  candidate  should  be  required  to  publish  at  the  end  of 
each  week  with  his  expense  account  a  list  of  all  loans  or  endorsements  made 
by  him. 


36  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Every  newspaper  and  moving-picture  show  or  other  advertising  agency  should 
he  required  to  publish  at  the  end  of  each  week  the  amount  of  all  sums  of  money 
paid  or  contracted  to  be  paid  by  candidates  or  friends  of  candidates  during  the 
preceding  week. 

The  law  should  further  contain  a  provision  that  if  any  candidate  shall  expend 
or  knowingly  permit  others  to  expend  for  him  a  larger  sum  of  money  than  allowed 
by  law,  he  shall  forfeit  the  nomination,  and  it  shall  go  to  the  candidate  receiving 
the  next  highest  vote. 

Adequate  provision  should  be  made  for  the  proper  canvassing  board  to  find  the 
facts  and  declare  null  and  void  the  nomination  of  any  candidate  where  it  appears 
that  the  same  was  obtained  by  fraud,  or  that  the  candidate  has  expended  a  greater 
sum  of  money  than  allowed  by  law.  To  allow  a  candidate  to  defy  the  law  and  to 
practice  all  manner  of  frauds  and  provide  no  adequate  remedy  is  a  mockery  and 
a  crime.  In  the  very  nature  of  the  case  the  courts  cannot  afford  relief  in  time 
to  be  of  any  practical  value.  The  jurisdiction  to  hear  and  determine  the  facts 
should  reside  in  the  canvassing  boards  and  their  findings  should  be  made  final. 
The  primary  ought  to  be  made  the  unbribed  expression  of  the  popular  will,  or  it 
ought  to  be  sent  to  the  scrap-heap. 

TAXATION 

Every  citizen  of  North  Carolina  is  entitled  to  take  pride  in  the  wonderful 
growth  of  our  State.  This  growth  calls  for  larger  revenues  to  meet  the  just 
demands  of  a  progressive  civilization.  It  is  as  foolish  to  complain  about  increased 
State  expenses  as  for  the  father  of  a  growing  family  to  complain  about  increased 
family  expenses.  If  a  man  will  consult  his  own  family  expense  account  he  will 
be  prepared  to  view  with  sympathy  and  intelligence  the  situation  that  today  con- 
fronts the  State  of  North  Carolina.  The  State  is  simply  a  big  family,  and  must 
buy  the  same  commodities  that  other  families  buy,  and  the  high  cost  of  these 
commodities  makes  it  imperative  to  increase  the  salaries  of  all  those  who  serve 
the  State.  It  also  follows  that  the  appropriations  for  the  maintenance  of  our 
charitable  and  educational  institutions  must  be  substantially  larger  than  hereto- 
fore. During  the  last  two  years  these  institutions  have  practiced  economy  to  the 
point  of  cruelty,  and  yet  today  they  are  in  debt  to  the  amount  of  $183,478.13. 
This  deficit  will  have  to  be  wiped  out,  and  provision  made,  not  only  for  the  in- 
creased cost  of  commodities,  hut  for  the  ever-growing  numbers  that  are  clamoring 
for  admittance  to  all  our  State  institutions.  The  lengthening  of  the  public  school 
term  from  four  months  to  six,  the  increase  in  the  salaries  of  teachers  from  $45 
to  $65  per  month  will,  in  themselves,  make  necessary  additional  annual  revenue 
to  the  amount  of  two  and  a  half  millions  of  dollars. 

These  are  large  figures,  but  they  are  not  appalling.  Last  year  the  State  of 
North  Carolina  paid  in  taxes  for  the  support  of  the  Federal  Government  seventy 
millions  of  dollars,  a  sum  greater  than  has  been  expended  on  the  State  Government 
for  State  purposes  during  the  entire  period  since  the  Civil  War,  and  we  are  not 
paupers  yet.  The  truth  is,  gentlemen,  North  Carolina  is  entirely  too  poor  to  mis- 
spend a  dollar,  but  she  is  abundantly  rich  enough  to  spend  whatever  sum  may  be 
necessary  to  maintain  within  her  borders  a  wholesome  and  enlightened  civilization. 

IMMEDIATE   AND   IMPERATIVE   DEMANDS 

In  order  to  meet  the  present  and  imperative  demands  of  the  Treasury,  I  recom- 
mend the  following  privilege  taxes : 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  37 

1.  On  the  operation  of  automobiles  double  the  present  license  tax,  the  increase 
to  go  to  the  general  fund  for  the  support  of  schools  or  any  other  object  the  General 
Assembly  may  determine.  This  automobile  tax  will  hurt  no  one.  If  a  man  feels 
that  he  is  not  able  to  pay  this  additional  amount  on  his  automobile  in  order  to 
keep  the  children  of  the  State  out  of  ignorance,  then  let  him  walk  and  improve  his 
health. 

2.  A  tax  of  10  per  cent  on  the  sale  price  of  all  patented  and  proprietary 
medicines.  This  will  be  no  burden  on  the  manufacturer  of  these  nostrums,  for 
it  is  well  known  that  the  average  compound  that  sells  for  $1  a  bottle  does  not  cost 
more  than  25  cents.  If  by  this  tax  the  people  are  led  to  consume  less  of  these 
drugs,  so  much  the  better,  for  I  heartily  agree  with  the  distinguished  physician 
in  Massachusetts  who  said  that  if  every  drug  known  to  the  pharmacopeia  should 
be  dumped  into  the  Atlantic  Ocean  no  one  would  be  hurt  except  the  fishes. 

3.  A  tax  of  5  per  cent  on  all  syrups  used  in  soft  drinks  and  sold  at  fountains 
or  in  bottles.  The  manufacturer  can  reduce  the  amount  of  syrup  per  glass  or 
bottle  one-twentieth,  and  whatever  he  takes  out  will  be  a  blessing  to  the  consumer. 

4.  A  tax  of  not  less  than  3  nor  more  than  5  per  cent  on  the  purchase  price  of 
tobacco  in  every  form. 

The  principle  adopted  in  this  schedule  is  to  raise  necessary  revenue  in  a  way 
that  will  entail  the  least  hardships  on  the  citizen.  The  taxes  above  mentioned  will 
compel  no  one  to  go  without  anything  that  is  essential  to  clean,  wholesome,  com- 
fortable living.  All  these  taxes  are  approved  by  the  Special  Tax  Commission  and 
by  the  State  Tax  Commission,  and  machinery  for  their  enforcement  can  be  easily 
devised. 

CONSTITUTIONAL  AMENDMENTS 

In  order  to  give  the  State  a  better  permanent  system  of  taxation,  certain  con- 
stitutional amendments  are  necessary. 

1.  The  poll  tax  should  be  strictly  limited  to  $2,  all  payable  to  the  State  for  the 
benefit  of  the  public  schools,  and  no  county,  town  or  special  district  should  be 
allowed  to  levy  any  poll  tax  whatever.  In  some  of  our  cities  the  poll  tax  ranges 
from  $6  to  $S.    This  is  an  outrageous  burden  on  the  head  of  the  poor  man. 

2.  Wearing  apparel,  household  and  kitchen  furniture,  the  working  implements 
of  the  farmer  and  the  mechanic,  the  books  and  scientific  instruments  of  the  student, 
to  the  aggregate  amount  of  $300,  should  be  made  absolutely  exempt  from  taxation. 
The  present  Constitution  authorizes  the  General  Assembly  to  make  such  an  ex- 
emption, and  the  Constitution  should  be  amended  so  as  to  make  the  exemption 
absolute.  2v~orth  Carolina  can  get  along  without  taxing  these  comforts  and  con- 
veniences of  the  home,  and  they  should  not  cumber  the  tax  books. 

3.  Incomes  above  $1,000  for  an  unmarried  person  and  $1,500  for  a  married 
person  should  be  taxed,  no  matter  from  what  source  derived,  except  income  from 
State  and  Government  bonds.  Under  the  present  income  law  wage-earners  are  the 
only  class  of  people  who  pay  an  income  tax.  There  are  numerous  cases  where  the 
head  of  the  business  receives  an  income  of  $10,000  to  $100,000  a  year  and  pays  no 
income  tax,  while  every  person  in  his  employ  who  receives  a  salary  of  over  $1,250 
is  compelled  to  pay  the  tax.  The  Federal  law  makes  no  such  discrimination,  and 
there  is  no  reason  why  the  State  law  should  do  so. 

4.  The  proviso  in  the  present  Constitution  requiring  the  payment  of  a  poll 
tax  as  a  prerequisite  to  voting  should  be  repealed.  It  breeds  corruption  in  politics 
and  serves  no  useful  purpose. 


38  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

5.  The  requirements  as  to  residence  in  the  State  before  being  eligible  to  vote 
should  be  reduced  to  one  year,  and  corresponding  reductions  made  as  to  residence 
in  counties  and  townships. 

It  is  believed  that  with  these  constitutional  amendments  the  State  will  be  able 
to  raise  all  revenues  for  State  purposes  without  resorting  to  any  property  tax. 
This  would  leave  all  the  real  and  personal  property  to  the  counties  and  towns,  and 
would  wonderfully  help  in  bringing  about  a  fair  valuation  of  property  for  pur- 
poses of  taxation,  and  would  also  tend  to  solve  the  vexing  problem  of  equalization. 

FINDING   AND  FIXING  LIABILITIES 

]STo  General  Assembly  can  levy  taxes  intelligently  in  the  absence  of  a  reasonably 
accurate  knowledge  of  what  the  State's  liabilities  will  be  for  the  ensuing  two 
years.  It  is  practically  impossible  for  the  finance  committees  to  obtain  this 
knowledge  during  the  session  of  the  General  Assembly.  North  Carolina  ought  to 
adopt  a  modern  budget  system.  I  commend  to  your  careful  consideration  the 
following  extract  from  the  report  of  the  Special  Tax  Commission: 

We  earnestly  recommend  to  the  early  consideration  of  the  General 
Assembly  the  creation  of  some  authority,  clothed  with  ample  power  of  in- 
vestigation, whose  duty  it  shall  be  to  scrutinize  every  avenue  of  expenditure 
of  public  funds,  to  make  diligent  investigation  of  future  necessities,  and 
to  have  prepared  for  the  General  Assembly,  when  it  meets,  a  budget  of 
proposed  appropriations  combined  into  one  bill.  With  its  work  thus  blocked 
out  in  advance,  the  appropriation  committees  would  have  time  to  make  such 
ample  investigations  as  would  be  satisfactory  to  the  General  Assembly  and 
the  people  of  the  State.  Budget  commissions  have  been  created  in  many 
states  and  composed  in  a  wide  variety  of  ways.  While  the  work  of  such  a 
commission  is  recommendatory,  its  work  is  highly  important,  and  it  should 
be  constituted  in  close  touch  with  the  people.  The  expenditure  of  public 
money  is  preeminently  the  function  of  the  direct  representatives  of  the 
people.  As  a  suggestion  for  consideration  we  recommend  that  such  a  com- 
mission be  created  by  this  General  Assembly  on  the  opening  day  of  its 
session,  and  that  the  chairmen  of  the  committees  on  Finance  and  Appropria- 
tions at  each  session  of  the  General  Assembly,  together  with  the  Governor 
of  the  State,  constitute  the  Budget  Commission  to  report  to  the  succeeding 
General  Assembly,  and  with  provision  that  no  bill  carrying  appropriation 
from  the  State  Treasury  shall  be  considered  by  the  General  Assembly  until 
the  general  budget  bill  shall  have  been  passed,  and  that  no  appropriation 
afterwards  made  shall  be  valid  unless  the  money  to  pay  same  is  in  the 
Treasury,  or  unless  the  bill  carrying  the  appropriation  levies  a  special  tax 
to  pay  same. 

TAKING  STOCK 

When  the  General  Assembly  knows  the  liabilities  of  the  State  for  two  years, 
it  knows  just  half  enough.  Unless  it  prefer  to  leap  in  the  dark  rather  than  to 
walk  in  the  light,  the  General  Assembly  should  have  before  it  an  inventory  of  the 
assets  of  the  State  as  well  as  its  liabilities.  This  inventory  should  be  taken  as 
thoroughly  and  as  honestly  as  the  merchant  takes  stock  when  he  desires  to  ascer- 
tain exactly  how  his  business  stands.  There  has  never  been  a  conscientious  effort 
to  take  such  an  inventory  of  the  assets  of  North  Carolina.  The  present  Machinery 
Act  tends  to  conceal  rather  than  reveal  the  true  value  of  property.     The  excuse  for 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  39 

such  machinery  is  that  if  property  should  be  placed  upon  the  books  at  its  true 
value  the  tax  rates  would  be  confiscatory.  Such  a  fear  is  not  well  founded.  It 
may  be  considered  a  childish  faith,  but  I  believe  that  in  the  long  run  it  pays  to 
tell  the  truth  about  anything.  We  may  not  hope  to  be  a  great  people  so  long  as 
we  condone  falsehood  and  deception  in  our  relations  to  the  government  under 
which  we  live.  The  principles  and  practices  that  are  tolerated  in  the  listing  or 
nonlisting  of  property  for  taxation  constitute  a  school  of  immorality  that  will,  if 
allowed  to  continue,  destroy  the  moral  fiber  of  our  people. 

I  devoutly  believe  that  if  we  shall  resolve  to  about-face  and  tell  the  exact  truth 
about  our  property,  we  will  not  only  shame  the  devil,  but  we  will  decrease  rather 
than  increase  the  burdens  of  taxation. 

To  this  end  I  urge  you  to  clothe  the  Tax  Commission  with  ample  powers,  and 
equip  it  with  ample  forces  and  direct  it  to  find  and  place  on  the  tax  books  at  its 
real  value  every  piece  of  property,  tangible  and  intangible,  in  the  State  of  North 
Carolina.  It  will  not  be  difficult  to  frame  machinery  that  will  accomplish  this 
result  if  we  be  in  deadly  earnest  about  it.  It  is  not  necessary  to  discuss  the  details 
of  such  machinery,  but  I  will  mention  just  one  vital  feature  entirely  absent  from 
the  present  act.  A  questionnaire  should  be  carefully  prepared  and  submitted  to 
every  taxpayer,  and  he  should  be  required  to  answer  under  oath  a  series  of  very 
searching  questions.    For  example  : 

1.  Did  you  acquire  this  property  by  purchase  or  inheritance,  and  when? 

2.  If  by  purchase,  what  did  you  pay  for  it? 

3.  Have  you  sold,  or  offered  to  sell,  any  part  of  this  property  within  the  last 
four  years,  and  if  so,  what  did  you  get  or  offer  to  take  per  acre  or  front  foot? 

4.  Has  any  one  proposed  to  buy  this  property,  or  any  part  of  it,  within  the 
last  four  years,  and  if  so,  what  was  the  offer  per  acre  or  front  foot  ? 

5.  Has  any  property  been  sold  in  your  section  of  the  town  or  county  within  the 
last  four  years,  and  if  so,  what  did  it  bring  per  acre  or  front  foot? 

6.  State  in  full  the  difference  between  the  general  character  of  your  property 
and  the  property  so  sold. 

7.  What  are  the  buildings  on  the  property  worth  independent  of  the  land,  and 
how  much  insurance  do  you  carry  on  such  buildings  ? 

8.  Have  you  ever  obtained  a  loan  or  applied  for  a  loan  of  money  on  this 
property,  and  if  so,  for  how  much  did  you  apply,  and  what  did  you  state  was  the 
value  of  the  property  in  your  application  for  the  loan? 

9.  What  do  you  honestly  think  this  property  would  bring  if  sold  for  one-fourth 
cash,  the  balance  of  the  purchase  price  to  be  paid  in  one,  two  and  three  years? 

The  above  questions  are  simply  suggestive;  others  may  be  inserted  in  the 
questionnaire  in  regard  to  intangible  property.  The  law  should  make  it  perjury 
for  any  taxpayer  to  knowingly  make  a  statement  materially  false.  The  law  can 
be  so  framed  that  any  person  who  endeavors  to  conceal  his  property  or  the  real 
value  of  the  same  will  be  in  very  grave  danger  of  going  to  jail  in  this  world  and 
to  hell  in  the  world  to  come. 

If  all  property  should  be  placed  on  the  books  at  its  true  value  the  problems  of 
equalization  would  at  once  disappear.  True  values  are  equal  values,  and  just  in 
proportion  as  we  depart  from  the  truth  we  make  room  for  discrimination. 


40  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

THE  HIGHER   THE  VALUE  THE  LOWER   THE   TAX 

I  am  convinced  that  a  conscientious  effort,  backed  by  proper  machinery,  would 
result  in  more  than  doubling  the  tax  value  of  the  property  on  the  books.  I  believe 
that  the  true  value  is  treble  the  assessed  value,  taking  the  State  as  a  whole.  If  I 
did  not  believe  this  I  would  not  be  interested  in  the  subject.  But  if  we  expect  the 
people  to  deal  fairly  with  the  Government,  then  the  Government  must  deal  fairly 
with  the  people.  It  would  not  be  fair  to  double  or  treble  valuations  and  to  allow 
current  rates  of  taxation  to  continue.  In  order  to  keep  faith  with  the  people  I 
recommend  that  this  General  Assembly  cut  the  property  tax  half  in  two,  except 
the  tax  levied  for  the  benefit  of  the  schools,  and  I  recommend  that  this  be  reduced 
one-fourth.  In  addition  to  this  action  on  the  part  of  the  State,  the  General 
Assembly  should  require  counties  and  towns  and  special  districts  to  cut  all  their 
ad  valorem  taxes  half  in  two,  except  the  taxes  levied  for  the  support  of  the 
schools,  and  these  should  be  reduced  one-fourth.  The  results  of  such  a  law  would 
be  fourfold. 

1.  We  would  put  an  end  to  the  debauchery  of  the  people  by  winking  at  false- 
hood and  fraud  in  the  matter  of  taxation. 

2.  We  would  get  rid  of  unequal  valuations. 

3.  We  would  more  than  double  the  value  of  property  on  the  books,  and  secure 
increased  revenues. 

4.  We  would  appear  before  the  world  as  a  wealthy  state  with  a  reasonable  tax 
rate,  instead  of  a  poor  state  with  an  exceedingly  high  rate. 

There  is  a  reasonable  difference  of  opinion  as  to  just  when  this  work  should 
be  undertaken.  I  think  we  ought  to  do  it  now.  We  could  extend  the  time  for  the 
work,  let  the  taxes  fall  due  on  the  first  of  December  instead  of  the  first  day  of 
October,  and  make  such  other  and  further  extensions  as  would  give  time  in  which 
to  do  the  work  thoroughly.  However,  time  is  not  of  the  essence,  but  I  do  insist 
that  this  General  Assembly  shall  require  the  work  to  be  done. 

The  foregoing  recommendations  are  not  deemed  by  myself  to  be  the  last  word 
on  the  subject.  They  are  merely  intended  to  give  direction  to  your  own  thinking. 
I  have  in  them  no  pride  of  paternity,  and  if  you  shall  find  a  more  excellent  way 
to  reach  the  desired  ends  I  shall  be  very  happy.  Your  one  tragic  blunder,  your 
one  unpardonable  sin  would  be  to  go  to  sleep  on  duty  and  do  nothing. 

While  this  concludes  my  recommendations  to  you,  I  trust  that  it  may  be  merely 
the  beginning  of  my  labors  with  you.  During  these  sixty  days  I  want  every,  one 
of  you  to  feel  that  you  have  the  right  of  way  in  my  office  and  in  my  home.  I  very 
earnestly  desire  to  be  your  fellow-servant,  and  to  help  you  in  every  possible  way 
to  dress  and  to  keep  this  Garden  of  the  Lord  that  men  call  Carolina.  My  prayer 
to  God  is,  and  my  faith  is,  that  when  the  General  Assembly  of  1919  shall  pass  into 
history  its  record  will  declare  its  glory. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


MESSAGES  TO  TEE  GE FERAL  ASSEMBLY  41 

(11) 
FEDERAL  PROHIBITION  AMENDMENT 

SPECIAL  MESSAGE 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  January  11,  1919. 
To  the  General  Assembly  of  North  Carolina: 

I  hereby  transmit  to  you  a  copy  of  the  joint  resolution  proposing  an  amendment 
to  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  relative  to  the  manufacture  and  sale  of 
intoxicating  liquors  as  certified  to  me  by  the  Secretary  of  State  under  the  seal  of 
the  Department  of  State. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  "W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


S.  J.  Res.  17. 

SIXTY-FIFTH  CONGRESS  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES  OF  AMERICA 
AT  THE  SECOND  SESSION 

Begun  and  held  at  the  City  of  Washington  on  Monday,  the  third  day  of 
December,  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  seventeen. 

JOINT  RESOLUTION 

Proposing  an  amendment  to  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States. 

Resolved  by  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United 
States  of  America  in  Congress  assembled  (two-thirds  of  each  House  concur- 
ring therein),  That  the  following  amendment  to  the  Constitution  be,  and 
hereby  is,  proposed  to  the  states  to  become  valid  as  a  part  of  the  Constitu- 
tion when  ratified  by  the  legislatures  of  the  several  states  as  provided  by  the 
Constitution: 

Article 

"Section  1.  After  one  year  from  the  ratification  of  this  article  the 
manufacture,  sale  or  transportation  of  intoxicating  liquors  within,  the 
importation  thereof  into,  or  the  exportation  thereof  from  the  United  States 
and  all  territory  subject  to  the  jurisdiction  thereof  for  beverage  pur- 
poses is  hereby  prohibited. 

"Sec  2.  The  Congress  and  the  several  states  shall  have  concurrent  power 
to  enforce  this  article  by  appropriate  legislation. 

"Sec  3.  This  article  shall  be  inoperative  unless  it  shall  have  been  ratified 
as  an  amendment  to  the  Constitution  by  the  legislatures  of  the  several  states 
as  provided  in  the  Constitution,  within  seven  years  from  the  date  of  the 
submission  hereof  to  the  states  by  the  Congress." 

Champ  Clark, 
Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representatives. 
Thos.  R.  Marshall, 
Vice-President  of  the  United  States  and  President  of  the  Senate. 

I  certify  that  this  Joint  Resolution  originated  in  the  Senate. 

James  M.  Baker,  Secretary. 


42  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(12) 

REBUILDING  CASWELL  TRAINING  SCHOOL  DORMITORY 

SPECIAL  MESSAGE 

Ealeigh,  N".  C,  January  13,  1919. 
To  the  General  Assembly: 

On  the  8th  day  of  December  one  of  the  girls'  dormitory  buildings  at  the  Caswell 
Training  School  was  destroyed  by  fire,  and  on  the  5th  day  of  January  another 
dormitory  building  at  the  school  used  by  the  girls  was  also  destroyed  by  fire. 
About  one  hundred  girls  occupied  these  two  dormitories.  Fortunately  none  of 
them  were  injured. 

The  girls  are  now  sleeping  in  halls  and  dining-rooms,  and  have  to  be  kept  under 
constant  care.  The  necessity  for  erecting  dormitories  to  take  the  place  of  those 
destroyed  is  immediate  and  imperative.  It  will  take  seventy-five  thousand  dollars 
to  erect  these  buildings,  and  I  earnestly  urge  the  General  Assembly  to  make  a 
special  appropriation  for  these  purposes  at  once. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(13) 

TELEGRAM  OF  GENERAL  CROWDER  ON  DRAFT  EVASION 

Raleigh,  K  C,  February  26,  1919. 
To  the  General  Assembly: 

I  transmit  herewith  letter  and  telegram  received  by  me  from  General  Crowder. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


WAR   DEPARTMENT 

Office  of  the  Provost  Marshai^General 

Washington 

Honorable  Thomas  W.  Bickett,  February  23,  1919. 

State  Capitol. 

Raleigh,  North  Carolina. 
My  deak  Governor: — I  am  inexpressibly  shocked,  this  morning,  to  find  in 
the  copy  of  the  Raleigh  News  and  Observer  of  February  19,  1919,  just 
come  to  hand,  an  account  of  the  dissatisfaction  publicly  expressed  by  mem- 
bers of  the  North  Carolina  Legislature,  and  other  prominent  officials,  with 
the  passage  of  my  printed  report  dealing  with  resistance  to  the  Draft  in  that 
State.  Needless  to  say  it  is  a  matter  of  the  deepest  concern  to  myself  to 
discover  that  the  statements  in  any  part  of  that  report  are  not  consonant 
with  the  facts  as  understood  by  those  who  know  them,  that  I  regret  pro- 
foundly that  anything  contained  therein  has  given  just  ground  for  the  senti- 
ments in  the  interviews  printed  in  the  Raleigh  News  and  Observer. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  43 

Let  me  say  at  the  outset  that  you  will  do  me  a  great  favor  if  you  will 
take  the  earliest  opportunity  to  convey  to  those  members  of  the  Legislature 
who  have  noticed  the  matter,  my  expressions  of  sincere  regret  that  anything 
was  found  in  the  report  reflecting  unjustly  upon  the  honor  of  the  State  in 
respect  to  the  attitude  of  any  portion  of  its  population  towards  the  Draft.  It 
has  been  a  matter  of  constant  observation  in  this  office  that  the  Draft  was 
administered  in  the  State  of  North  Carolina  in  a  manner  to  reflect  the 
greatest  pride  upon  both  the  Government  and  citizens  of  that  State;  and  at 
various  parts  of  my  printed  report  you  will  find  ample  data  testifying 
to  North  Carolina's  splendid  record  in  the  raising  of  America's  greatest 
army.  In  the  administration  of  this  office,  it  has  been  my  assiduous 
effort,  and  I  believe  with  a  success  virtually  universal  in  every  state,  to 
maintain  the  most  harmonious  relations  between  the  Federal  and  the  State 
authorities  in  the  administration  of  the  Selective  Draft.  And  I  take  this 
opportunity  to  place  on  record  my  personal  appreciation  of  your  whole- 
hearted cooperation  with  the  Federal  Government  and  of  the  splendid  results 
achieved  under  your  direction  by  the  entire  Selective  Service  administration 
in  the  State  of  North  Carolina,  and  especially  for  the  admirable  solution 
by  you  of  the  unusual  difficulties  connected  with  draft  resistance.  In  this 
connection  I  must  especially  add  my  satisfaction  at  the  admirable  solution 
by  you  in  handling  the  particular  situation  which  arose  at  the  time  re- 
ferred to  in  the  above  cited  instance. 

The  explanation  of  the  unfortunate  quotation  in  my  report  of  the  news- 
paper account  which  has  been  criticized  is  as  follows: 

During  the  year  and  a  half  before  the  Armistice  this  office  had  received 
notice  both  from  official  correspondence  and  otherwise  of  the  existence  of 
a  few  scattered  instances  of  disturbance  in  five  states,  viz.,  Michigan,  Mon- 
tana, North  Carolina,  Oklahoma  and  Texas.  Not  having  received  any 
official  statement  of  the  scope  and  meaning  of  those  disturbances  and  being 
desirous  to  present  a  concise,  but  accurate  record  of  them  in  my  Report  to 
the  Secretary  of  War,  I  sent  out  on  November  27,  1918,  a  letter,  identical  in 
form,  to  the  Military  Aides  of  the  Governors  in  charge  of  the  Draft  in  these 
five  states.  In  this  letter  I  stated  that  "I  want  to  know  with  entire  accuracy 
all  the  incidents  of  the  draft  disturbances  that  have  occurred,"  and  I  re- 
quested the  officers  to  "collect  the  salient  facts  and  send  them  to  me,"  re- 
questing an  early  reply.  Within  the  next  two  weeks  I  received  replies  from 
the  Military  Aides  in  Montana,  Oklahoma  and  Texas.  None,  however,  was 
received  from  North  Carolina.  I  have  no  doubt  that  in  some  unfortunate 
manner  not  understood  by  me,  my  letter  miscarried.  However,  my  annual 
report  was  due,  and  I  was  therefore  obliged  to  prepare  a  short  account  from 
such  unofficial  information  as  was  available.  In  my  office  had  been  collected 
a  large  number  of  newspaper  clippings,  all  of  which  agreed  substantially 
in  their  account  of  the  incidents.  With  the  desire  of  using  the  account 
that  would  substantially  portray  the  facts  and  retain  at  the  same  time  the 
human  interest  features,  the  one  selected  was  the  one  that  appears  in  the 
Report.  This  clipping  had  long  been  on  file  in  this  office,  and  there  was 
nothing  in  the  remainder  of  our  files  to  throw  doubt  upon  its  correctness. 
It  was  considerably  cut  down  from  its  original  form  and  as  was  sup- 
posed there  was  eliminated  any  journalistic  expressions  which  might  be 
interpreted  as  unfair  or  exaggerated.  A  comparison  of  the  text  as  printed  in 
my  Report  with  the  original  account  by  the  journalist  will  exhibit  this. 
Printed  as  it  was,  and  not  as  any  part  of  the  text  of  the  Report,  but  as  a 
quotation  from  a  journalist's  account,  it  was  supposed  that  its  chief  value 


44  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  PICKETT 

lay  in  its  presentation  of  the  human  interest  of  the  incident  and  in  its 
revelation  of  the  splendid  faith  in  human  nature  shown  by  the  Local 
Boards  in  those  districts,  and  in  the  manly  and  unique  response  to  that 
faith  which  was  evoked  from  the  recalcitrant  selectives.  The  incident 
does,  when  judged  in  its  large  aspects,  serve  as  a  lesson  to  the  people  of 
the  United  States  that  the  heartless  and  unsympathetic  enforcement  of  the 
rigid  letter  of  the  law  was  a  method  not  chosen  by  the  Selective  Service 
officials  of  North  Carolina,  and  serves  as  a  testimony  to  the  efficacy  of  tact 
and  humanity  in  the  administration  of  a  drastic  law.  Your  own  conduct  in 
applying  similar  methods  in  Ashe  County  has  always  seemed  to  me  a 
splendid  instance  of  the  way  in  which  the  State  authorities,  by  the  use 
of  fine  tact  and  judgment,  demonstrated  that  it  was  possible  when  a  com- 
munity was  treated  reasonably  and  humanely,  to  secure  results  which  would 
have  been  impossible  under  tactless  and  unsympathetic  methods  of  admin- 
istration. 

It  was,  in  fact,  with  the  view  of  illustrating  to  the  people  of  the  United 
States  the  wisdom  of  employing  such  methods  in  the  enforcement  of  that 
law  that  the  incident  in  North  Carolina  was  deemed  to  be  of  value  for  gen- 
eral observation  and  imitation  of  its  lessons.  That  the  specific  account 
printed  contained  errors  of  fact  is  a  matter  of  the  deepest  regret.  But  I 
believe  that  the  general  result  of  the  whole  incident  as  a  lesson  in  govern- 
ment administration  is  not  thereby  impaired.  Read  in  this  light,  I  feel  that 
the  incident,  in  its  final  results,  will  be  interpreted  by  all  readers  as 
adding  to  the  credit  of  the  administration  of  the  Draft  in  that  State  of  the 
character  of  its  people.  A  comparison  with  some  of  the  more  extensive  dis- 
turbances which  took  place  in  other  states  will  indicate,  not  perhaps  that 
the  same  methods  would  necessarily  have  succeeded  there,  but  that  at  any 
rate  North  Carolina's  method  stands  out  as  a  particular  success.  Judged  by 
the  result,  the  handling  of  the  few  recalcitrant  selectives  in  North  Caro- 
lina is  one  of  the  real  successes  of  the  Draft  and  is  typical  of  the  frank  and 
American  method  of  meeting  difficulties. 

With  the  view  to  correcting  inaccuracies  of  fact  and  expression  occur- 
ring in  the  account  quoted,  I  am  now  going  to  ask  you  at  your  earliest 
convenience  to  furnish  me  with  an  account  which  will  stand  as  the  per- 
manent official  record — such  an  account,  I  mean,  as  I  should  have  been  glad 
to  receive  to  my  letter  of  November  27,  which  unfortunately  miscarried.  I 
shall  see  that  the  account  as  furnished  by  yourself  or  under  your  direc- 
tion is  substituted  in  the  official  report  to  the  Secretary  of  War,  and  I  shall 
take  all  possible  measures  to  give  the  proper  corrective  publicity.  Trusting 
that  in  view  of  the  explanations  that  have  been  made,  this  will  render  the 
satisfaction  which  is  justly  due,  I  am 

Yours  faithfully, 

E.  H.  Ceowdee, 
Provost  Marshal-General. 

P.  S. — I  am  enclosing  herewith  copy  of  my  letter  of  November  27,  1918, 
and  am  sending,  by  messenger,  copies  of  this  letter  and  my  telegram  of  even 
date   to   Senators   Overman   and   Simmons. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  45 

[Telegram] 

Washington,  D.  C,  February  23,  1919. 
The   Governor,  Raleigh,  N.   C. 

Reference  Raleigh  Neivs  and  Observer's  account  of  criticism  expressed  on 
passage  of  my  report  quoting  a  newspaper  account  of  draft  resistance,  I 
am  mailing  tonight  a  full  letter  of  explanation  which  I  trust  will  be  satis- 
factory. Express  to  members  of  Legislature  my  deep  regret  that  such  news- 
paper account  was  incorporated  in  my  report.  The  administration  of  the 
draft  in  North  Carolina  has  been  one  of  the  brightest  spots  of  the  Selective 
Service  system.  I  am  handing  copies  of  my  letter  to  Senators  Overman  and 
Simmons.  Crowder. 


(14) 
STATE  INCOME  TAX  AMENDMENT 

Kaxeigh,  K  C,  February  28,  1919. 
The  Gentlemen  of  the  Senate: 

The  income  tax  amendment  is  the  most  vital  measure  before  this  General 
Assembly.  The  proposed  amendment  is  the  essence  of  equity  and  opens  the  door 
to  a  model  system  of  taxation  in  North  Carolina.  Worth  Carolina  is  the  only  state 
in  the  American  Union  where  the  General  Assembly  is  denied  the  right  to  levy 
such  a  tax  if  it  is  deemed  wise  and  just  to  do  so. 

The  proposed  amendment  levies  no  tax.  It  simply  gives  the  General  Assembly 
the  power  to  levy  it  whenever  in  its  wisdom  it  may  see  fit  to  do  so.  The  Senate 
is  not  called  upon  to  say  whether  or  not  the  General  Assembly  should  have  such 
power,  but  you  are  called  upon  to  say  whether  or  not  the  people  of  Worth  Carolina 
shall  be  given  an  opportunity  to  register  their  opinion  on  this  question. 

A  Senator  may  be  conscientiously  opposed  to  an  income  tax,  but  it  does  not 
follow  that  he  should  deny  to  the  people  the  same  opportunity  to  express  their 
conscientious  convictions  as  he  claims  for  himself. 

The  Special  Tax  Commission  was  composed  of  Mr.  Frank  Linney,  Chairman 
of  the  Republican  Executive  Committee,  Mr.  J.  Z.  Green,  State  Lecturer  and 
Organizer  of  the  Farmers'  Union,  Mr.  Henry  A.  Page,  State  Food  Administrator, 
a  legislator  of  large  experience,  and  a  man  with  wide  business  connections,  the 
Chairman  of  the  Corporation  Commission,  intimately  acquainted  with  tax  con- 
ditions in  every  state  in  the  Union,  Mr.  James  H.  Pou,  known  throughout  the 
State  for  his  broad  sympathies  with  the  business  life  of  the  State,  Mr.  W.  Vance 
Brown  of  Asheville,  a  man  of  large  property  interests,  and  who  has  taken  a  great 
interest  in  all  questions  of  taxation,  and  the  Governor  of  the  State. 

This  Commission,  with  the  exception  of  Mr.  Brown,  who  did  not  object  to  the 
income  tax,  but  to  other  features  of  the  report,  unanimously  recommended  the 
submission  of  this  amendment.  The  bill  was  introduced  in  the  House  by  Hon. 
R.  A.  Doughton,  Ex-Lieutenant  Governor  and  Ex-Speaker  of  the  House,  a  legis- 
lator of  wide  experience  and  conservative  patriotism;  was  referred  to  the  com- 
mittee, and  after  a  full  and  thorough  discussion  was  reported  favorably  by  a 


46  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

unanimous  vote  and  passed  the  House  by  a  unanimous  vote,  one  hundred  and  four 
members  voting  for  it  and  not  one  against  it. 

So  far  as  I  am  advised  not  a  single  newspaper  in  the  State  has  written  an 
editorial  against  it,  and  very  many  of  them  have  written  strong  editorials  in  its 
favor.  The  Governor  of  the  State,  who,  however  violent  the  supposition  may  be, 
is  at  least  in  touch  with  the  thought  of  the  State,  earnestly  insisted  upon  the 
submission  of  this  amendment  in  his  Biennial  Message. 

This  is  an  array  of  public  opinion  almost  without  parallel  in  the  history  of 
legislation  in  North  Carolina.  And  in  view  of  this  public  opinion  I  earnestly 
desire  every  Senator  to  put  to  himself  this  question :  Although  I  personally  may 
believe  that  taxes  ought  not  to  be  levied  on  incomes,  still  in  the  face  of  the 
universal  demand  for  this  amendment,  can  I  conscientiously  say  by  my  vote  that 
the  people  of  North  Carolina  shall  not  be  allowed  to  register  their  opinions  on 
this  question? 

A  refusal  to  allow  the  people  to  be  heard  on  this  question  could  not  be  inter- 
preted in  any  other  light  than  that  the  Senate  of  North  Carolina  is  afraid  to 
trust  the  people  on  this  vital  question.  Such  a  refusal  would  be  a  blunder  that  no 
mortal  man  could  defend  on  the  stump,  and  I  earnestly  beg  the  Assembly  not  to 
commit  that  blunder. 

The  men  who  are  so  deeply  in  earnest  about  this  matter  are  not  red-headed 
revolutionists,  they  are  not  wild-eyed  reformers,  they  are  not  Utopian  dreamers. 
They  are  sane,  conservative  men  who  frankly  recognize  that  new  conditions 
demand  new  remedies.  If  the  Senate  of  North  Carolina  shall  turn  a  deaf  ear 
to  these  quiet,  thoughtful  men,  I  greatly  fear  that  a  reaction  will  take  place  in 
North  Carolina  that  will  land  extremists  in  the  saddle.  All  I  ask,  gentlemen,  is 
that  you  allow  the  people  to  pass  upon  this  vital  question,  and  I  am  always  con- 
tent to  abide  their  judgment.  Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(15) 

DEPARTMENT  OF  AGRICULTURE  AND  STATE  A.  &  E.  COLLEGE 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  March  1,  1919. 
To  the  General  Assembly: 

In  my  Biennial  Message  I  recommended  that  the  Department  of  Agriculture 
be  authorized  to  erect  for  its  own  use  a  building  in  keeping  with  the  magnitude 
and  the  dignity  of  the  industry  it  represents. 

A  bill  providing  for  such  a  building  has  been  introduced.  After  the  intro- 
duction of  this  bill  it  appeared  that  the  authorities  of  the  North  Carolina  College 
of  Agriculture  and  Engineering  needed  a  building  for  taking  care  of  the  extension 
workers  who  have  headquarters  at  the  College.  This  Agricultural  Extension  work, 
which  is  most  vital,  is  done  under  the  auspices  of  a  joint  committee  composed  of 
five  representatives  of  the  Department  of  Agriculture  and  five  representatives  of 
the  College.    The  Governor  is  ex  officio  chairman  of  this  joint  committee. 

On  last  Friday  there  was  a  meeting  of  the  joint  committee,  and  after  a  con- 
ference that  lasted  for  three  hours,  the  Governor  was  unanimously  requested  by 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  47 

the  committee  to  submit  to  the  General  Assembly  his  own  views.  In  submitting 
these  views  I  am  not  speaking  as  the  representative  of  the  College,  or  the  Depart- 
ment, or  the  joint  committee,  but  as  the  representative  of  all  the  people  of  North 
Carolina. 

I  recommend : 

1.  That  only  one  building  be  authorized. 

2.  That  this  building  be  erected  on  the  grounds  of  the  A.  and  E.  College. 

3.  That  the  Home  Demonstration  work,  which  is  done  by  women  and  with 
women,  be  concentrated  at  the  State  Normal  and  Industrial  College  at  Greensboro, 
and  that  all  workers  in  this  Department  be  quartered  there. 

The  argument  in  favor  of  a  single  building  is  the  saving  of  $150,000,  and  this 
is  an  argument  that  we  are  not  in  a  position  to  ignore.  The  entire  forces  of  the 
Agricultural  Department  and  of  the  Extension  Workers  located  at  Raleigh  can  be 
taken  care  of  in  a  single  building  costing  $250,000,  and  to  spend  an  additional 
$150,000  to  provide  quarters  for  only  a  portion  of  these  workers  would  be  a  waste- 
ful expenditure  of  the  people's  money. 

This  one  building  ought  to  be  located  on  the  College  grounds  for  the  following 
reasons : 

1.  It  would  be  practically  impossible  for  some  of  these  Extension  "Workers  to 
work  elsewhere.  Their  work  is  so  vitally  related  to  the  College  that  it  cannot  be 
done  efficiently  at  any  other  place  than  on  the  College  grounds. 

2.  It  would  be  helpful  to  the  Department  of  Agriculture  to  be  located  on  the 
College  grounds.  The  presence  of  the  large  body  of  young  men  earnestly  en- 
deavoring to  master  the  science  of  good  farming  would  be  a  constant  inspiration 
to  every  official  in  the  Department.  The  College  is  the  mill  from  which  the  De- 
partment must  draw  its  office  experts  and  its  trained  field  workers  unless  it  goes 
outside  the  State  of  North  Carolina  to  get  them.  It  would  be  immensely  helpful 
to  the  Department  to  be  able  to  see  every  day  the  processes  of  this  mill. 

3.  In  my  opinion  a  much  larger  number  of  farmers  would  visit  the  Department 
in  the  course  of  the  year  if  it  should  be  located  on  the  College  grounds  than  visit 
it  at  the  present  time.  Every  State  meeting  of  an  agricultural  kind  that  is  held 
in  Raleigh  is  always  held  at  the  College.  The  farmers  who  come  for  the  short 
course  during  the  winter,  the  farmers  and  their  wives  who  come  to  the  Farmers 
Congress,  the  farmers  who  come  to  the  State  Fair  would  necessarily  be  thrown  in 
contact  with  the  work  of  the  Department. 

The  presence  of  the  Department  would  be  immensely  helpful  to  the  College, 
and  I  earnestly  submit  that  the  Department  should  take  precisely  the  same  interest 
in  the  work  of  the  College  as  any  normal  farmer  takes  in  the  work  of  his  son. 
The  College  is  the  natural  child  of  the  Department.  It  would  be  an  inspiration 
to  the  young  men  to  have  ever  before  their  eyes  the  great  work  the  Department 
of  Agriculture  is  doing  for  the  farm  life  of  the  State,  and  to  see  the  emphasis  the 
State  is  placing  on  the  importance  of  this  work.  Again,  the  students  could  fill 
minor  positions  in  the  Department,  and  many  a  poor  boy  could  in  this  way  be 
helped  along  in  his  agricultural  course. 

Again,  the  very  bigness  of  the  thing  would  be  helpful.  We  would  have  out 
there  a  great  agricultural  power  plant  sending  its  forces  to  every  part  of  the 
State,  and  touching  farm  life  at  every  point.  The  companionship,  the  constant 
elbow  touch  would  be  helpful  both  to  the  College  and  to  the  Department.     Every 


48  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

student  who  left  there  would  know  and  tell  about  the  work  of  the  Department. 
Every  field  worker  of  the  Department  would  know  and  tell  about  the  College. 
Under  this  plan  it  is  my  belief  that  the  number  of  students  at  the  College  that 
take  the  agricultural  course  would  in  a  very  short  time  be  more  than  doubled. 

The  Home  Demonstration  Work  should  be  concentrated  at  the  State  Normal 
and  Industrial  College  for  the  same  reason  that  the  work  for  the  men  and  boys 
is  concentrated  at  Raleigh. 

This  plan  would  release  to  the  State  the  lot  now  occupied  by  the  Department 
of  Agriculture.  On  this  lot  there  could  be  erected  a  great  memorial  building  in 
honor  of  the  soldiers  who  represented  North  Carolina  in  the  World  War.  In  this 
building  could  be  preserved  all  the  records  and  relics  and  souvenirs  of  the  War, 
and  all  the  material  now  preserved  and  collected  in  the  Hall  of  History.  It  would 
be  a  part  of  and  connected  with  the  Museum,  so  that  the  exhibitions  in  the 
Museum  and  those  in  the  Memorial  Building  could  be  seen  at  the  same  time. 

In  this  building  there  could  be  and  should  be  provided  not  less  than  twenty 
first-class  committee  rooms  for  the  use  of  the  General  Assembly.  Nothing  would 
do  more  to  enable  the  members  to  do  their  work  with  intelligence  and  dispatch 
than  convenient  and  commodious  rooms. 

The  Department  of  the  Adjutant-General  that  is  now  crowding  the  Health 
Department  out  of  rooms  that  it  sorely  needs  could  also  be  taken  care  of  in  this 
memorial  building.  It  would  be  a  very  suitable  and  proper  place  for  the  housing 
of  the  Department  that  was  the  clearing  house  for  the  State's  work  in  the  war. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bjckett,  Governor. 


(16) 

HIGHWAYS 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  March  3,  1919. 
Gentlemen  of  the  Assembly: 

If  the  General  Assembly  were  not  in  session,  and  some  stranger  should  appear 
in  any  county  in  North  Carolina  and  say,  "I  see  that  your  county  has  no  good 
road  connecting  it  with  the  surrounding  counties.  This  is  a  serious  disadvantage 
to  the  people  of  your  county,  and  if  you  would  like  to  link  up  with  the  outside 
world  and  become  a  part  of  the  system  of  roads  that  would  connect  you  with  every 
county  in  North  Carolina,  I  will  put  up  three-fourths  of  the  cost  of  such  road  or 
roads,  if  you  will  put  up  one-fourth,"  I  am  satisfied  that  the  attitude  of  any  county 
in  North  Carolina  to  such  a  proposition  would  be  the  same  as  the  attitude  of 
Zeb  Vance  on  a  certain  occasion.  The  story  runs  that  while  Vance  was  a  member 
of  the  General  Assembly  some  member  arose  one  day  and  said  that  there  was  a 
man  in  Raleigh  who  proposed  to  build  the  Western  North  Carolina  Railroad  from 
Old  Fort  to  Asheville.  Vance  immediately  arose  from  his  seat  and  exclaimed: 
"Mr.  Speaker,  I  move  that  we  do  now  adjourn  and  go  out  and  catch  that  man." 

It  is  passing  strange  that  because  this  identical  proposition  is  made  by  the 
State  instead  of  an  individual  there  is  a  disposition  on  the  part  of  some  members 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  49 

from  counties  who  would  reap  the  largest  benefits  to  reject  the  proposition  because 
the  offer  is  not  made  to  put  up  all  the  money  instead  of  three-fourths.  This 
attitude  is  not  unlike  that  of  the  pauper  who  was  being  carried  to  the  poorhouse. 
A  kind-hearted  stranger  said  to  the  driver  of  the  wagon,  "Why  are  you  carrying 
this  man  to  the  poorhouse?"  Said  the  driver,  "Because  he  is  so  poor  that  he  has 
not  got  a  bushel  of  corn."  "This  is  without  good  reason,"  replied  the  stranger, 
"as  I  have  corn  to  give  the  man."  The  pauper  looked  up  and  inquired,  "Is  it 
shelled?"    "No,"  said  the  stranger,  "it  is  in  the  ear."    Said  the  pauper,  "Drive  on." 

God  Almighty  will  not  help  a  man  who  refuses  to  make  a  reasonable  effort  to 
help  himself,  and  if  there  be  a  county  in  North  Carolina  so  dead  to  the  desirability 
of  a  good  road  that  will  link  it  up  with  the  balance  of  the  State  as  to  be  unwilling 
to  pay  one-fourth  of  the  cost  of  such  road,  then  that  county  ought  to  be  recom- 
mended to  the  kindly  ministrations  of  some  foreign  missionary  board. 

Gentlemen,  I  know  North  Carolina.  I  have  been  in  every  county  in  it,  and  I 
speak  as  one  having  authority  when  I  say  there  is  not  a  county  in  all  our  borders, 
not  one,  that  will  refuse  such  an  offer  if  the  county  really  needs  the  road.  If  it 
does  not  need  it,  then  it  would  fall  outside  the  scope  and  purpose  of  this  legisla- 
tion. I  know  North  Carolina  so  well  that  I  am  willing  to  absolutely  guarantee 
that  under  the  Mull-McCoin  bill  there  will  be  at  once  claims  for  more  money  than 
any  highway  commission  can  wisely  and  economically  expend  within  the  next  two 
years.  We  cannot  afford  to  waste  money  even  though  we  raise  one-half  of  it 
through  taxes  paid  to  the  Federal  Government. 

North  Carolina  is  in  no  financial  condition  to  build  a  State-wide  system  of 
roads  costing  from  twenty  to  forty  thousand  dollars  a  mile.  We  do  not  need  such 
a  system,  and  what  we  do  not  need  is  costly  at,  any  price.  We  need  a  State  system 
that  will  link  up  every  county  with  roads  that  are  reasonably  good.  The  first 
duty  of  the  State  is  to  provide  a  fairly  satisfactory  road  service  to  all  of  the 
people,  and  when  this  has  been  done  we  can  consider  the  building  of  high  priced 
roads.  I  am  unwilling  to  endorse  any  system  that  will  enable  a  small  fraction  of 
our  people  to  glide  over  concrete  or  asphalt,  while  the  ninety  and  nine  flounder 
in  mud.  There  may  be  here  and  there  a  section  where  there  is  such  a  congestion 
of  wealth  and  population  and  such  a  density  of  traffic  as  to  justify  these  high 
priced,  hard-surfaced  roads,  but  there  are  not  enough  of  them  to  be  seriously  con- 
sidered in  framing  a  State-wide  policy. 

If  the  selection  of  the  commissioners  shall  be  left  to  the  Governor,  I  want 
the  General  Assembly  to  understand  that  I  shall  take  pains  to  select  men  in 
sympathy  with  these  views.  I  deem  it  fair  to  you  to  say  this  much  to  the  end 
that  if  you  are  not  in  sympathy  with  these  views,  you  may  lodge  the  appointive 
power  elsewhere. 

I  also  desire  to  say  that  I  hope  the  Governor  will  not  be  made  a  member  of 
any  commission  that  may  be  created.  I  know  nothing  about  practical  road 
building,  and  the  members  of  the  road  commission  should  be  men  who  can  get 
right  down  to  brass  tacks  and  see  to  it  that  the  State  gets  in  labor  and  material 
one  hundred  cents  in  value  for  every  dollar  expended.  I  deem  it  proper  to  add 
that  if  you  shall  see  fit  to  clothe  the  Governor  with  the  responsibility  of  appointing 
the  members  of  the  commission,  I  shall  not  feel  under  any  sort  of  obligation  to 
name  any  member  of  the  present  commission.  I  shall  conscientiously  endeavor  to 
find  the  men  who  are  best  qualified  to  discharge  the  duties  of  the  office,  and  the 
fact  that  a  man  is  on  the  present  commission  will  not  militate  either  in  favor  of 


50  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

or  against  his  appointment.  I  say  this  much  to  the  end  that  if  the  General 
Assembly  does  not  endorse  this  attitude,  the  appointive  power  may  be  lodged 
elsewhere. 

The  Mull-McCoin  bill  is,  in  my  judgment,  just  and  fair  in  itself,  and  it 
eliminates  any  necessity  for  a  bond  issue.  I  am  emphatically  and  eternally 
opposed  to  a  bond  issue,  and  for  several  reasons : 

1.  It  is  not  a  supreme  necessity,  and  only  such  a  necessity  could  justify  such 
a  course.  The  proponents  of  the  bond  policy  themselves  confess  that  it  is  not 
intended  to  be  permanent.  Gentlemen,  North  Carolina  cannot  afford  to  make  a 
four  million  dollar  experiment.  If  the  bond  plan  is  to  be  permanent,  it  will  pile 
up  a  State  debt  that  we  cannot  afford  to  carry.  If  it  is  not  to  be  a  permanent  plan, 
then  a  great  injustice  will  have  been  done  those  sections  of  the  State  that  have 
not  been  reached  when  the  plan  shall  be  abandoned. 

2.  Again,  no  member  of  this  body  was  sent  here  on  a  platform  proposition  to 
pile  up  the  bonded  indebtedness  of  this  State  to  many  times  its  present  total.  The 
folks  at  home  are  entitled  to  be  heard  before  we  can  embark  upon  such  a  policy. 
Representing  no  particular  county,  thinking  of  no  particular  locality,  but  earnestly 
desiring  to  serve  the  State  in  its  entirety,  I  file  a  solemn  protest  against  the 
issuance  of  these  bonds.  Some  member  said  to  me  the  other  day  that  it  looked 
like  somebody  would  have  to  be  held  responsible  for  the  present  road  situation. 
I  do  not  for  one  moment  shrink  from  the  responsibility  that  rests  upon  me  in  the 
premises.  I  assume  entire  responsibility  for  the  refusal  of  the  General  Assembly 
to  burden  the  State  with  a  four  million  dollar  bond  issue  to  build  these  roads. 
I  assume  entire  responsibility  for  a  refusal  to  embark  upon  such  a  policy  until 
the  people  can  be  heard  from.  But,  gentlemen,  if  you  refuse  to  pass  any  law  that 
does  not  carry  a  bond  issue,  then  you  assume  responsibility  for  such  a  course. 

It  is  freely  admitted  that  anything  we  do  will  be  in  the  nature  of  an  experi- 
ment. Defects  in  any  law  that  we  adopt  will  doubtless  appear.  Mistakes  in  its 
administration  will  doubtless  be  made.  We  are  entering  an  untried  field,  and  I 
/beg  you,  gentlemen,  to  adopt  a  policy  that  will  render  our  mistakes  as  inexpensive 
as  possible.  Let's  not  make  a  four  million  dollar  mistake  in  the  very  beginning. 
This  General  Assembly  has  already  made  a  record  for  constructive  work  of 
a  high  order.  It  has  proceeded  along  progressive  lines,  but  it  has  proceeded  with 
sanity  and  with  safety.  It  has  not  been  stampeded  on  any  measure,  and  I  earnestly 
beg  you  to  round  out  this  record  with  a  reasonable  road  law  suited  to  the  financial 
condition  of  the  State,  guarded  from  waste  and  extravagance,  and  bottomed  on 
the  principle,  defensible  in  any  forum  of  justice  and  common  sense,  that  from  him 
to  whom  much  is  given  something  shall  be  required. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

(17) 

APPOINTMENTS  AND  NOMINATIONS  SUBMITTED  TO  THE 
SENATE,  MARCH  7  AND  10,  1919 

Raleigh,  N".  C,  March  7,  1919. 
Gentlemen  of  the  Senate: 

I  respectfully  make  the  following  nominations,  and  trust  that  they  will  meet 
with  your  approval: 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  51 

DIRECTORS  OF  THE  STATE  BOARD  OF  AGRICULTURE 

A.  Cannon Henderson  County 

F.  P.  Latham Beaufort  County 

Clarence  Poe Wake  County 

C.  C.  Wright Wilkes  County 

W.  C.  Greer Ashe  County 

all  for  a  term  of  six  years,  beginning  March  11,   1919,  except  Mr.  W.   C. 

Greer,  who  was  appointed  to  fill  the  unexpired  term  of  Mr.  W.  M.  Bledsoe, 

deceased. 

DIRECTORS  OF  THE  NORTH  CAROLINA  COLLEGE  OF  AGRICULTURE 

AND  ENGINEERING 

C.  W.  Gold Guilford  County 

T.  E.  Vann Hertford  County 

for  a  term  of  six  years,  beginning  March  20,  1919. 

DIRECTORS  FOR  THE  STATE  SCHOOL  FOR  THE  BLIND 
AND    DEAF,    RALEIGH 

J.  T.  Rowland Wake  County 

C.  M.  Wilson Johnston  County 

J.  T.  Alderman Vance  County 

all  for  a  term  of  six  years,  beginning  March  6,  1919. 

MEMBERS  OF  THE  STATE  BOARD  OF  CHARITIES  AND 
PUBLIC  WELFARE 

M.  L.  Kesler Davidson  County 

Mrs.  T.  W.  Lingle Mecklenburg  County 

Mrs.  J.  W.  Pless McDowell  County 

all  for  a  term  of  six  years,  beginning  April  1,  1919. 

DIRECTORS  FOR  THE  NORTH  CAROLINA  SCHOOL  FOR  THE 
DEAF,  MORGANTON 

W.  W.  Neal McDowell  County 

J.  L.  Scott,  Jr Alamance  County 

W.  R.  Whitson Buncombe  County 

all  for  a  term  of  six  years,  beginning  March  12,  1919. 

MEMBERS  OF  THE  STATE  GEOLOGICAL  BOARD 

F.  R.  Hewett Buncombe  County 

R.  G.  Lassiter Granville  County 

for  a  term  of  four  years,  beginning  March  1,  1919. 

DIRECTORS  FOR  THE  STATE  HOSPITAL  FOR  THE  INSANE 

A.  E.  Tate Guilford  County 

W.  H.  Williams Beaufort  County 

C.  A.  Woodard Durham  County 

all  for  terms  of  six  years,  beginning  April  1,  1919. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


52  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

Ealeigh,  1ST.  C,  March  7,  1919. 
Gentlemen  of  the  Senate: 

The  State  Board  of  Education  respectfully  submits  the  following  nominations, 
as  required  by  law,  for  Directors  of  the  State  Normal  and  Industrial  College  at 
Greensboro : 

Joseph  Rosenthal Wayne  County 

J.  L.  Nelson Caldwell  County 

A.  J.  Conner Northampton  County 

E.  E.  Britton Wake  County 

H.  G.  Chatham Forsyth  County 

all  for  term  of  six  years,  beginning  March  1,  1920,  except  the  last  named,  who 
is  appointed  to  fill  the  unexpired  term  of  the  late  George  W.  Hinshaw. 

Eespectfully  submitted, 

State  Board  of  Education, 
By  T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


Ealeigh,  1ST.  C,  March  10,  1919. 
Gentlemen  of  the  Senate: 

I    respectfully    make    the   following    nominations    which    were    inadvertently 
omitted  in  the  list  submitted  on  March  7th : 

DIRECTORS   OF   THE   NORTH   CAROLINA   COLLEGE   OF 
AGRICULTURE   AND   ENGINEERING 

T.  T.  Thorne Nash  County 

T.  S.  Boyd Iredell  County 

H.  L.  Stevens Duplin  County 

for  a  term  of  eight  years,  beginning  March  20,  1919. 

Eespectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(18) 
REVALUATION  ACT 

FIRST  MESSAGE  OF  GOVERNOR  T.  W.  BICKETT  TO  THE  SPECIAL  SESSION 
OF  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  OF  1920 

Ealeigh,  1ST.  C,  August  10,  1920. 
Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

Eor  many  years  the  tax  books  of  North  Carolina  presented  comedies  of  error 
and  tragedies  of  injustice.  These  unlovely  exhibitions  were  not  due  to  any  vicious 
principle  in  our  organic  law,  nor  to  any  moral  perversion  of  our  people.  The 
Constitution  has  always  required  property  to  be  listed  for  taxation  at  its  true 
value.  The  average  citizen  has  always  desired  to  speak  the  truth  and  to  do  equity. 
The  errors  and  inequalities  that  have  made  our  tax  books  look  like  the  minutes 
of  an  Ananias  Club  were  born  of  machinery  acts  utterly  unsuited  to  modern  con- 
ditions, and  hopelessly  inadequate  to  execute  the  virtuous  wishes  of  the  people  as 
declared  in  the  plain  language  of  the  Constitution. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  53 

The  General  Assembly,  at  the  regular  session  of  1919,  consecrated  itself  to  the 
task  of  devising  a  machinery  act  that  would  find  all  the  property  in  the  State  and 
determine  its  true  value.  I  am  grateful  to  report  that  this  high  purpose  has  been 
accomplished  with  remarkable  completeness  and  precision.  For  the  first  time  in 
our  history  tax  values  are  true  values.  For  the  first  time  the  citizens  and  the 
stranger  within  the  gates  may  go  to  the  tax  books  and  find  a  fairly  accurate 
inventory  of  the  property  of  the  State,  and  a  fairly  accurate  appraisement  of  its 
value.  In  the  new  machinery  act  the  people  were  for  the  first  time  seriously  asked 
to  tell  the  truth,  and  they  have  responded  to  this  appeal  in  noble  fashion.  From 
every  quarter  of  the  State  word  has  come  that  the  people  are  happy  to  get  away 
from  the  old  system  of  concealments  and  evasions,  and  to  let  the  exact  truth  about 
their  property  stand  forth.  No  such  august  array  of  witnesses  has  ever  been 
assembled  as  appeared  in  the  high  inquest  that  has  just  been  completed.  For  in 
the  diligent  and  devout  search  for  the  ultimate  facts  every  property  owner  in  the 
State  was  put  upon  the  stand  and  solemnly  sworn  to  tell  the  truth,  the  whole 
truth,  and  nothing  but  the  truth.  The  findings  follow  the  testimony.  The  values 
fixed  are  the  crystallization  of  the  sworn  evidence  of  all  the  people. 

Taking  the  State  as  a  whole,  75  per  cent  of  the  assessments  were  made  at  sub- 
stantially the  values  sworn  to  by  the  owners  of  the  property;  20  per  cent  were 
substantially  increased,  and  5  per  cent  were  decreased. 

The  law  gives  to  every  property  owner  the  right  to  appeal  from  the  judgment 
of  the  county  board  to  the  State  Tax  Commission.  The  local  authorities  approx- 
imated true  values  so  closely  that  not  one  person  in  a  thousand  appealed  from 
their  judgment.  This  is  a  record  without  parallel  in  the  history  of  judicial 
tribunals.  The  real  grievance  voiced  by  a  few  people  is  not  against  the  failure 
of  the  act,  but  is  against  its  success.  The  complaint  is  not  that  we  missed  the 
mark,  but  that  we  hit  it. 

The  high  objective  of  the  act  is  to  equalize  the  burdens  of  taxation  and  to 
wipe  out  discriminations.  And  just  in  proportion  as  true  values  have  appeared 
on  the  tax  books,  errors  and  inequalities  have  vanished.  True  values  are  always 
equal  values ;  but  neither  wisdom  nor  virtue,  nor  principalities  nor  powers,  nor 
length  nor  breadth,  nor  height  nor  depth,  nor  things  present  nor  things  to  come, 
nor  any  other  creature  can  equalize  a  kettle  of  lies !  Truth  is  the  only  door  that 
opens  on  equality. 

Illustrations  are  always  better  than  arguments.  By  their  fruits  ye  shall  know 
them.  Therefore  I  give  to  you  four  typical  illustrations  of  what  has  been  done 
in  every  nook  and  corner  of  the  State. 

1.  In  one  of  our  county-seats  there  lives  upon  the  same  street  a  lawyer 
and  a  widow.  The  lawyer  owns  a  valuable  piece  of  property  in  a  desirable 
portion  of  the  town,  and  this,  under  the  old  system,  was  assessed  at 
$3,850.  The  widow  had  $10,000  that  she  had  received  from  life  insurance 
policies  on  her  husband.  This  money  was  loaned  on  real  estate  mortgages 
which  were  listed  at  their  par  value  of  $10,000.  Under  the  Revaluation  Act 
the  property  of  the  lawyer  was  valued  at  $15,000,  and  he  can  get  this  amount 
of  money  for  it  any  morning  before  breakfast.  Under  the  old  law  the  widow, 
in  proportion  to  her  real  worth,  was  paying  four  times  as  much  taxes  as 
the  lawyer.  Under  the  new  law  this  wickedness  is  wiped  out,  and  both  the 
lawyer  and  the  widow  are  paying  according  to  what  they  are  really  worth. 


54  PAPERS  OP  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

The  result  is  that  the  lawyer  is  cursing  the  Revaluation  Act  and  swearing  that 
he  is  going  to  repeal  it,  while  the  widow  is  praising  God  and  the  General  Assembly 
of  1919  for  its  enactment. 

Gentlemen,  what  are  you  going  to  do  about  it?  Are  you  going  to  mate  the 
lawyer  chuckle  with  satanic  glee  or  strengthen  the  faith  of  the  widow  in  God  and 
in  man? 

2.  In  one  of  our  Piedmont  counties  the  experts  of  the  Tax  Commission 
examined  two  cotton  mills.  They  found  that  one  mill  was  on  the  tax 
books  at  17  per  cent  of  its  real  value,  while  the  other  mill  was  on  the 
books  at  65  per  cent  of  its  real  value. 

Under  the  Revaluation  Act  this  vicious  inequality  disappears.  Both  mills  are 
placed  on  the  books  at  their  true  value,  and  this  year  the  17-per-cent  mill  will  pay 
a  great  deal  more  taxes  than  it  has  heretofore  paid,  while  the  65-per-cent  mill  will 
pay  a  great  deal  less. 

3.  In  a  certain  county,  and  in  the  same  neighborhood,  there  lived  two 
farmers,  one  on  a  twelve-acre  and  the  other  on  a  fifty-acre  farm.  Under 
the  old  law  the  twelve-acre  farm  was  assessed  at  $600  and  the  fifty-acre  farm 
likewise  at  $600.  Now  when  these  farmers  received  their  questionnaires 
the  twelve-acre  farmer  swore  that  his  land  was  worth  $650.  The  fifty-acre 
farmer  swore  that  his  land  was  worth  $4,000. 

Under  the  Revaluation  Act  the  two  honest  citizens,  when  they  had  an  oppor- 
tunity to  do  so,  corrected  a  rank  injustice. 

4.  In  another  county  a  man  had  a  son  and  a  daughter.  In  his  will  he 
stated  that  he  desired  to  give  them  an  equal  amount  of  property.  He  had  a 
farm  which,  in  his  will,  he  said  was  worth  $10,000,  and  it  is  worth  it.  It 
will  bring  that  amount  on  the  market  any  morning.  He  gave  this  farm  to  his 
son,  and  then  he  gave  to  his  daughter  $10,000  in  money.  When  the  sheriff 
came  around  he  collected  from  the  daughter  five  times  as  much  in  taxes 
as  he  did  from  the  son.  The  daughter  naturally  complained  about  it,  and 
asked  the  sheriff  why  she  should  have  to  pay  five  times  as  much  taxes  as  her 
brother,  when  their  father  had  given  them,  as  stated  in  his  will,  exactly  the 
same  amount  of  property.  The  sheriff  explained  to  her  that  the  land  was 
assessed  at  only  $2,000,  though  he  admitted  that  it  was  worth  $10,000,  while 
the  money  was  assessed  at  $10,000,  and  that  he  (the  sheriff)  had  no  power  to 
change  it. 

The  Revaluation  Act  does  change  it.  It  carries  out  the  will  of  the  dead  father 
and  makes  the  son  and  daughter  equal  before  the  law. 

Inequalities  like  those  just  cited  (and  there  are  tens  of  thousands  of  them  in 
the  State)  have  been  tolerated  because  they  were  not  known.  All  that  was  necessary 
to  kill  them  was  to  uncover  them,  and  the  Revaluation  Act  is  exposing  them  in  all 
their  ugly  nakedness.  Who  wants  to  throw  over  these  inequalities  the  mantle  of 
an  old  machinery  act  that  always  went  blind  when  the  true  value  of  property 
appeared?     The  Revaluation  Act  is  a  searchlight.    Who  wants  to  hide? 

HID    TEEASUEES 

The  beloved  and  lamented  John  Charles  McNeill,  in  one  of  his  juiciest  poems, 
writes : 

"I  knowed  a'  ol'  'ooman  wut  scrubbed  en  hoed, 
En  never  didn'  go  nowhar, 
En  when  she  died  de  people  knowed 
Dat  she  had  supp'n  hid  'bout  dar." 


MESSAGES  TO  TEE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  55 

For  some  time  there  has  been  a  growing  suspicion  that  many  men  when  the 
tax  listers  came  around  "had  supp'n  hid  'bout  dar."  One  of  the  chief  objectives  of 
the  new  law  was  to  uncover  these  hid  treasures.  There  is  no  claim  that  in  this 
respect  the  machinery  of  the  act  has  functioned  with  perfect  efficiency.  What 
piece  of  machinery,  mechanical  or  governmental,  ever  did  perfect  work  the  first 
time  it  was  tried?  For  two  years  the  "Wright  brothers  tested  their  flying  machine 
on  Kill  Devil  Hill  in  this  State.  Compared  with  present-day  performances  it  was 
crude  work,  but  none  the  less  it  was  a  miracle,  for  they  left  the  ground  —  they 
actually  did  fly,  and  the  mighty  airships  of  the  present  day  are  the  logical  develop- 
ment of  their  earnest  endeavors. 

And  so,  while  the  machinery  of  the  Eevaluation  Act  has  not  at  its  first  trial 
uncovered  all  the  property  that  has  heretofore  been  kept  off  the  tax  books,  what  it 
has  done  in  this  respect  constitutes  a  miraculous  book  of  revelations. 

ILI/USTBATIONS 

In  Mecklenburg  County  the  total  valuation  of  personal  property  in  1919  was 
fifteen  million  dollars;  in  1920  it  is  $30,445,605 — an  increase  of  fifteen  million 
dollars. 

In  Gaston  County  the  total  valuation  of  personal  property  in  1919  was  eight 
million  dollars ;  in  1920  it  is  twenty-two  millions — an  increase  of  fourteen  million 
dollars. 

In  Guilford  County  the  total  valuation  of  personal  property  in  1919  was 
twelve  million  dollars;  in  1920  it  is  twenty-nine  millions — an  increase  of  seven- 
teen million  dollars. 

In  Durham  County  the  total  valuation  of  personal  property  in  1919  was 
twenty  million  dollars ;  in  1920  it  is  fifty-three  millions — an  increase  of  thirty- 
three  million  dollars. 

In  this  county  three  corporations  this  year  listed  personal  property  to  the 
amount  of  forty-two  millions  of  dollars — a  sum  twice  as  much  as  the  whole 
county  listed  two  years  ago. 

In  Forsyth  County  the  total  valuation  of  the  personal  property  in  1919  was 
twenty-two  millions  of  dollars;  this  year  it  is  sixty-seven  millions — an  increase  of 
forty-five  millions.  In  Forsyth  County  a  single  corporation  this  year  listed  per- 
sonal property  to  the  amount  of  forty-seven  millions.  Last  year  all  the  property 
listed  in  Forsyth  County — real,  personal,  individual,  and  corporate — amounted 
to  forty  millions.  It  will  be  seen  that  this  year  a  single  corporation  listed  seven 
millions  of  dollars  more  in  personal  property  than  the  whole  county,  including  this 
corporation,  listed  last  year. 

The  total  personal  property  listed  in  the  State  in  1919  was  four  hundred  and 
twenty-six  million  dollars;  the  total  this  year  is  eight  hundred  and  thirteen 
millions — an  increase  of  three  hundred  and  eighty-seven  millions. 

The  Revaluation  Act  also  found  and  put  on  the  tax  books  a  large  amount  of 
solvent  credits  not  heretofore  listed.  The  solvent  credits  listed  for  taxation  in 
1919  amounted  to  ninety  millions  of  dollars;  in  1920  to  two  hundred  and  thirteen 
millions — an  increase  of  one  hundred  and  twenty-three  millions. 

The  incomes  listed  for  taxation  in  1919  amounted  to  thirteen  millions  of 
dollars;  in  1920  to  thirty-three  millions — an  increase  of  twenty  million  dollars. 


56  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

The  machinery  of  the  act  also  found  and  put  on  the  tax  books  1,034,790  acres 
of  land  not  heretofore  taxed.  The  average  value  per  acre  of  land  on  the  books 
this  year  is  $40  per  acre.  This  makes  a  vast  area  of  No  Man's  Land  worth  forty- 
one  million  dollars.  The  average  county  in  North  Carolina  contains  279,000  acres 
of  land.  It  will  be  seen,  therefore,  that  the  Revaluation  Act  found  and  placed 
on  the  tax  books  of  the  State  four  counties  of  average  size.  It  is  plain  that  as  a 
finder  of  the  bacon  the  Revaluation  Act  is  a  remarkable  success. 

The  total  value  of  all  real  estate  listed  for  taxation  last  year  amounted  to 
five  hundred  and  six  millions  of  dollars;  the  total  value  this  year  was  one  billion 
nine  hundred  and  eighty-one  million  dollars. 

The  total  value  of  all  corporate  property  listed  in  1919  was  two  hundred  and 
ninety-eight  millions  of  dollars;  the  total  value  this  year  is  six  hundred  and 
seventy-one  millions — an  increase  of  three  hundred  and  seventy-three  millions  of 
dollars. 

The  value  of  the  cotton  mills  listed  in  1919  was  fifty-eight  million  dollars;  in 
1920,  two  hundred  and  five  millions. 

The  value  of  knitting  mills  listed  in  1919  was  seven  million  dollars;  in  1920, 
nineteen  millions. 

The  value  of  furniture  and  woodworking  plants  listed  in  1919  was  eight 
millions  of  dollars;  in  1920,  twenty-four  millions. 

The  value  of  public-service  companies  listed  in  1919  was  one  hundred  and 
thirty-eight  millions  of  dollars ;  in  1920,  three  hundred  and  fifteen  millions. 

An  analysis  of  the  values  placed  on  real  estate  in  some  of  the  large  counties 
will  be  interesting. 

For  convenience,  I  give  below  a  summary  of  the  returns. 

SUMMARY 

The  total   value   of  all   property   of  every  kind   listed   in   the 

year  1920  was $3,139,000,000 

The  total   value   of   all   property   of  every  kind   listed   in   the 

year  1919  was 1,099,000,000 

An  increase  of $2,040,000,000 

The  total  value  of  all  real  estate  listed  in  1920  was $1,981,000,000 

The  total  value  of  all  real  estate  listed  in  1919  was 506,000,000 

An  increase  of $1,475,000,000 

The  total  value  of  personal  property  in  1920  was %    813,000,000 

The  Machinery  Act  this  year  allows  an  exemption  on  personal  property  of 
$275  for  each  taxpayer.  Upon  a  fair  estimate  this  takes  off  the  tax  books 
$101,000,000.  For  purposes  of  a  comparison,  this  should  be  added  to  the  amount 
actually  on  the  tax  books,  making  the  personal  property  found  this  year  amount 
to  $914,000,000.  It  should  be  remembered,  also,  that  the  personal  property  is 
listed  every  year  and  there  is  a  gradual  increase,  while  the  real  estate  is  listed  only 
once  in  four  years.  The  last  year  the  real  estate  was  listed  the  personal  property 
amounted  to  $210,000,000  as  against  $914,000,000  this  year.  As  stated  heretofore, 
the  personal  property  for  1919  was  $426,000,000. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  57 

Total  value  of  corporate  property  in  1920   was $671,000,000 

Total  value  in   1919 298,000,000 

Increase    $373,000,000 

Total  solvent  credits  for  1920  was $213,000,000 

Total  solvent  credits  for  1919  was 90,000,000 

Increase    $123,000,000 

Total  value  of  all  public  utilities  in  1920  was $315,000,000 

Total  value  of  all  public  utilities  in  1919  was 138,000,000 

Increase    $177,000,000 

These  are  inspiring  figures.  To  them  every  Worth  Carolinian  can  point  with 
pardonable  pride.  They  demonstrate  that  N"orth  Carolina  is  per  capita  the  very 
richest  state  in  the  South.  When  this  Legislature  adjourns  we  will  have  the 
lowest  tax  rate  of  any  state  in  the  American  Union. 

But  it  has  been  suggested  that  these  are  inflated  values,  that  money  is  cheap 
and  labor  and  property  are  high.     To  this  criticism  there  are  two  answers : 

1.  While  lands  and  houses  and  lots  have,  in  a  good  many  communities,  sold 
at  aerial  figures,  these  fancy  prices  are  not  reflected  on  the  tax  books.  The 
appraisers  had  before  them  the  sworn  testimony  of  all  the  property  owners.  They 
considered  the  number  of  witnesses,  their  character,  their  bias,  their  conduct  under 
examination,  and  then  reached  their  conclusions.  Taken  as  a  whole,  tax  values 
throughout  the  State  are  conservative  values.  The  average  value  placed  on  land 
is  only  $40  per  acre.  Last  year  this  land  produced  crops  greater  in  value  per 
acre  than  any  other  lands  in  the  United  States,  according  to  Government  reports. 

I  make  this  direct  challenge  to  the  critics  of  the  act :  For  every  piece  of 
property  that  they  show  me  that  will  sell  for  less  than  its  tax  value  I  will  show 
them  one  hundred  pieces  that  will  sell  for  more. 

2.  The  cheap  dollar  that  inflates  the  values  of  property  is  the  same  dollar  with 
which  we  pay  our  taxes.  We  all  readily  understand  when  we  sell  our  labor  and 
products,  and  when  we  buy  the  necessities  of  life,  that  the  dollar  we  receive  and 
the  dollar  we  pay  is  relatively  worth  about  forty  cents.  But  when  we  go  to  pay 
our  taxes  we  insist  that  a  dollar  is  worth  one  hundred  cents,  yesterday,  today,  and 
forever.  Any  material  falling  off  in  values  can  be  taken  care  of  by  an  amendment 
to  the  Revaluation  Act  providing  that  any  property  owner  may  have  his  property 
revalued  by  showing  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  authorities  that  its  value  has  sub- 
stantially decreased  since  May  1,  1919.  I  urge  the  adoption  of  such  an  amend- 
ment. 

SAFEGUARDING   THE   FUTURE 

In  order  to  meet  the  fears  of  the  timid — for  I,  myself,  do  not  fear  the  people 
nor  their  representatives — I  recommend  that  the  present  constitutional  limitation 
of  66%  cents  on  the  one  hundred  dollars  worth  of  property  be  reduced  to  15  cents. 
This  limitation  does  not  apply  to  tax  levied  for  the  support  of  the  schools.  The 
people  of  the  State  in  ninety-nine  counties  have  voted  that  the  public  schools 
must  be  maintained  for  six  months  and  that  no  constitutional  limitation  must 
stand  in  the  way  of  this  supreme  mandate.  The  income  tax  amendment  and  the 
amendment  reducing  the  limitation  from  (56%  cents  to  15  cents  are  to  be  treated 


58  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

as  one.  This  amendment  will  bring  to  the  State,  by  levying  a  graduated  tax  from 
1  to  2%  per  cent  on  all  incomes,  an  additional  revenue  of  two  and  a  quarter 
millions  of  dollars. 

After  going  into  the  matter  thoroughly,  and  considering  every  possible  phase 
of  the  question,  I  am  satisfied  that  the  reduction  to  15  cents  is  a  wise  and  safe  one. 

The  present  income  tax  levied  on  earned  incomes  is  graduated  from  1  to  2% 
per  cent.  For  the  immediate  future  a  similar  graduated  tax  on  unearned  incomes 
would  produce  a  revenue,  sufficient  to  enable  the  State  to  refrain  from  levying  any 
tax  on  real  and  personal  property  for  State  purposes,  and  leave  all  this  property 
to  the  counties  and  towns. 

THE   TEN    PEE  CENT   PLEDGE 

The  pledge  made  by  this  General  Assembly  not  to  collect  from  property  this 
year  an  amount  greater  than  ten  per  cent  in  excess  of  what  was  collected  last  year 
was  made  in  the  utmost  good  faith,  and  I  am  sure  there  is  no  disposition  on  the 
part  of  any  member  of  the  General  Assembly  to  ignore  this  binding  contract  made 
with  the  people.  At  one  time  it  was  hoped  that  the  State  would  be  able  to  get 
along  without  taking  advantage  of  the  ten  per  cent  increase  allowed  under  the 
statute,  but  the  costs  of  labor  and  material  necessary  for  the  operation  of  our 
State  institutions  have  so  tremendously  increased  since  the  General  Assembly  of 
1919  made  its  appropriations  that  practically  every  one  of  these  institutions  faces 
a  deficit.  Moreover,  the  ten  per  cent  increase  that  would  go  for  the  maintenance 
of  the  public  schools  will  not  be  sufficient  to  pay  the  increased  salaries  to  which 
the  teachers  are  so  justly  entitled.  If  the  entire  ten  per  cent  that  goes  to  the 
State  should  not  be  needed,  then  it  could  well  be  used  to  make  up  the  amount 
necessary  to  pay  the  teachers. 

TOWNS    AND    CITIES 

Some  practical  provision  will  also  have  to  be  made  to  meet  the  distressing 
conditions  that  confront  the  most  of  our  cities  and  towns.  Since  the  Revaluation 
Act  was  written  the  cost  of  everything  a  city  has  to  buy  in  order  to  maintain  a 
decent  city  government,  including  wages  and  salaries,  has  greatly  increased.  It 
appears  that  a  number  of  cities  cannot  live  on  the  ten  per  cent  increase  fixed  by 
the  act  of  1919.  I  suggest  that  a  bill  be  drawn  providing  that  whenever  the 
governing  authorities  of  a  city  shall,  by  a  unanimous  vote,  find  as  a  fact  that  it 
is  impossible  for  the  city  to  maintain  its  government  on  the  ten  per  cent  increase 
allowed  by  the  act  of  1919,  that  they  shall  publish  this  fact,  together  with  a  state- 
ment of  the  actual  increase  of  revenues  necessary,  and  if  within  ten  days  after 
this  publication  ten  per  cent  of  the  voters  of  the  city  shall  ask  for  an  election  on 
the  question,  one  shall  be  ordered  to  determine  whether  or  not  such  increased  taxes 
shall  be  levied.  If  such  a  petition  shall  not  be  filed,  then  the  governing  authorities 
shall  be  authorized  to  levy  the  taxes  without  an  election. 

THE  TAX  TEAK 

The  tax  year  ought  to  be  the  same  as  the  calendar  year.  Such  a  year  avoids 
confusion  and  makes  for  efficiency.  It  is  practically  impossible  to  do  efficient 
work  in  getting  property  on  the  tax  books  when  you  do  not  begin  the  work  until 
May  1st.  It  is  as  plain  as  day  that  by  requiring  all  property  to  be  listed  as  of 
January   1st  the   State  gets  the  benefit  of  many  millions   of   dollars   worth   of 


MESSAGES  TO  TEE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  59 

property  belonging  to  foreign  corporations  that  is  shipped  out  of  the  State  be- 
tween January  and  May.  I  am  profoundly  certain  that  the  change  is  to  the 
advantage  of  the  agricultural  interest  of  the  State,  that  in  the  long  run  it  reduces 
their  taxes. 

This  year  we  have  not  done  a  perfect  job  in  respect  to  personal  property, 
because  of  the  colossal  work  that  had  to  be  done  in  the  revaluation  of  the  real 
estate.  But  the  returns  this  year  show  that  the  change  from  May  to  January  has 
operated  to  the  benefit  of  the  rural  sections.  There  are  in  the  State  411  distinctly 
rural  townships,  that  is,  townships  in  which  there  are  no  town  lots.  In  these 
townships  the  personal  property  listed  for  taxation  in  1919  amounted  to  sixty-six 
million  dollars;  in  1920,  to  eighty-nine  millions — an  increase  of  33.7  per  cent. 
As  against  this  we  have  the  showing  of  130  distinctly  urban  townships,  which  in 
1919  listed  personal  property  for  taxation  to  the  amount  of  one  hundred  and 
twenty-nine  million  dollars,  and  in  1920  to  the  amount  of  two  hundred  and 
sixty-six  millions,  showing  an  increase  of  105  per  cent  of  personal  property 
listed  in  city  townships  as  against  33.7  per  cent  listed  in  rural  townships.  I  refer 
the  General  Assembly  to  the  very  able  report  of  the  Tax  Commission  that  deals 
with  this  phase  of  the  situation. 

I  know  that  there  is  considerable  sentiment  among  the  farmers  in  favor  of 
the  change  from  January  to  May.  For  this  sentiment  I  have  vast  respect.  It 
would  be  a  personal  joy  to  me  to  meet  the  views  of  the  farmers  on  this  question; 
but,  gentlemen,  we  are  here  to  serve,  and  I  believe  in  doing  the  people  good  even 
though  they  stone  me  for  doing  so. 

CONCLUSION 

The  Revaluation  Act  was  not  intended  to  cure  all  the  tax  evils  to  which  the 
human  race  is  heir.  From  the  day  that  Augustus  Cassar  issued  his  immortal 
edict  that  the  whole  world  should  be  taxed,  all  the  nations  of  the  earth  have  been 
wrestling  with  tax  problems,  and  I  doubt  not  that  a  thousand  years  from  today 
the  General  Assembly  of  Worth  Carolina  will  be  exerting  all  its  energies  of  mind 
and  soul  and  body  to  devise  a  tax  system  that  will  provide  adequate  revenues  to 
maintain  a  decent  civilization  and  at  the  same  time  convince  their  constituents 
that  the  legislators  are  not  a  band  of  highwaymen  bent  on  confiscating  all  the 
property  of  the  people. 

The  Revaluation  Act  was  designed  to  do  three  things : 

1.  To  make  the  tax  books  of  North  Carolina  speak  the  truth. 

2.  To  wipe  out  discriminations  and  inequalities  between  different  classes  of 
people  and  property,  and 

3.  To  find  and  place  on  the  tax  books  property  that  has  heretofore  escaped 
taxation. 

Gentlemen,  the  record  is  before  you,  and  it  demonstrates  with  the  convincing 
certainty  of  mathematics  that  the  first  two  objects  have  been  attained  with  re- 
markable accuracy  and  completeness,  and  that  while  the  third  object  has  not 
been  fully  reached,  we  are  traveling  fast  in  that  direction. 

The  Revaluation  Act  is  not  a  perfect  piece  of  machinery,  but  it  is  headed 
straight  towards  truth  and  justice — a  goodly  government  in  a  goodly  land.  Egypt 
lies  behind. 


/ 


60  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Gentlemen,  I  trust  I  do  not  unduly  reverence  the  office  I  hold,  but  to  me  it 
is  a  sacred  thing.  It  would  be  as  impossible  for  me  to  stand  in  this  high  presence 
with  deception  on  my  lips  or  injustice  in  my  heart  as  it  would  be  for  me  to  stand 
before  the  Great  "White  Throne  and  lie  to  the  Lord  God  Almighty. 

On  the  hustings  I  am  a  robust  partisan,  but  in  this  chamber  and  in  the  office 
downstairs  I  am  the  representative  of  precisely  one  hundred  per  cent  of  the 
people  of  Worth  Carolina.  No  man  can  read  my  Inaugural  Address  and  my 
several  messages  to  the  General  Assembly  and  say  that  there  is  in  any  one  of 
them  a  trace  or  taint  of  partisanship.  No  member  of  the  minority  party  can  say 
that  during  these  years  he  has  ever  been  discriminated  against  by  word  or  deed 
on  account  of  his  political  affiliations. 

I  am  deeply  grateful  that  every  big  measure  I  have  advocated  has  been  sup- 
ported with  equal  enthusiasm  by  Democrats  and  Republicans  in  the  Legislature 
and  out  of  it.  In  my  resumes  of  the  work  of  the  General  Assemblies  of  1917  and 
1919  I  was  careful  to  give  to  the  representatives  of  the  minority  party  full  credit 
for  their  patriotic  record  in  these  halls. 

I  deeply  regret  that  there  is  a  disposition  on  the  part  of  some  people  to  drag 
this  great  reform,  essentially  nonpartisan  and  potent  with  blessings  for  all  the 
people,  down  into  the  smoke  and  dust  of  a  political  campaign.  Gentlemen,  I 
beseech  you,  by  the  memories  of  a  great  record,  to  yield  not  to  temptation.  Last 
year  you  fought  a  good  fight  for  truth  and  righteousness.  This  year,  keep  the 
faith. 

In  the  beginning,  when  the  earth  was  without  form  and  void,  and  darkness 
was  upon  the  face  of  the  deep,  God  said,  "Let  there  be  light."  The  true  valuation 
act  is  a  conscientious  effort  to  execute  that  high  command.  Let  there  be  light ! 
Let  the  white  light  of  truth  beat  and  blaze  on  the  tax  books  of  North  Carolina, 
and  in  its  shining  presence  no  injustice  will  live. 

"The  glory  born  of  justice  never  dies! 
Its  flag  is  not  half-masted  in  the  skies." 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  "W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(19) 
WOMAN  SUFFRAGE 

SECOND  MESSAGE  OF  GOVERNOR  T.  W.  BICKETT  TO  THE  SPECIAL  SESSION 
OF  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  OF  1920 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  August  13,  1920. 
Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

I  hereby  transmit  to  you  a  copy  of  the  Nineteenth  Amendment  to  the  Con- 
stitution of  the  United  States  duly  certified  to  my  office  by  the  Secretary  of  State 
of  the  United  States. 

From  reports  in  the  public  press  it  seems  that  sentiment  in  the  General 
Assembly  is  decidedly  against  the  ratification  of  the  Amendment.  With  this 
sentiment  I  am  in  deepest  sympathy,  and  for  the  gentlemen  who  entertain  it  I 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  61 

cherish  the  profoundest  respect.  But  this  does  not  lessen  my  obligation  to  lay 
before  you  a  photographic  copy  of  my  mind  on  this  important  subject. 

It  is  well  known  that  I  have  never  been  impressed  with  the  wisdom  or  of  the 
necessity  for  Woman  Suffrage  in  ISTorth  Carolina.  There  has  never  been  laid 
before  me  evidence  tending  to  show  that  a  majority  of  the  women  in  this  State 
desire  to  go  to  the  polls.  I  greatly  fear  that  the  women  who  desire  to  go  are  all 
unconsciously  offering  to  barter  a  very  precious  birthright  for  a  very  sorry  mess 
of  pottage. 

It  has  never  occurred  to  me  that  woman  would  hurt  politics,  but  I  have  been 
profoundly  disturbed  about  what  politics  might  do  to  woman.  My  attitude  has 
been  that  of  the  cowboy  to  whom  a  woman  suffragist  said,  "We  want  to  be  equal 
to  the  men."  The  cowboy  lifted  his  sombrero,  bowed  low  and  said :  "And  why 
does  my  lady  wish  to  come  down?" 

Again,  I  have  been  fearful  that  the  entrance  of  women  into  politics  would 
have  an  unfortunate  effect  on  race  relations  in  Worth  Carolina.  For  thirty-five 
years  after  the  Civil  War  all  the  political  energies  of  our  people  were  absorbed 
in  the  struggle  to  maintain  in  our  borders  a  white  government.  For  this  we 
fought  with  our  backs  to  the  wall  because  we  believed  such  a  government  essential 
to  the  integrity  of  the  white  race,  and  the  survival  of  a  white  civilization.  The 
result  was  that  during  this  long  struggle  the  line  of  demarcation  between  the 
two  political  parties  was  largely  one  of  color.  Such  a  situation  tended  to  dwarf 
the  political  development  of  our  people.  For  twenty  years  we  have  been  free  from 
this  handicap,  and  under  the  new  order  both  races  have  prospered  as  never  before. 
While  there  is  much  room  for  improvement,  I  believe  that  today  the  relations 
between  the  races  are  more  sympathetic  in  North  Carolina  than  in  any  other 
state  in  the  American  Union.  I  greatly  fear  that  Woman  Suffrage  would  reopen 
these  old  questions,  and  force  us  to  fight  the  battle  for  white  government  in  North 
Carolina  over  again. 

When  I  think  of  these  things  I  am  haunted  by  the  lines  of  the  Scotch  bard— 

"But,  Och!    I  backward  cast  my  e'e, 

On  prospects  drear; 
An'  forward,  though  I  canna  see, 
I  guess  an'  fear." 

No  man  in  North  Carolina  sees  more  clearly  the  vexed  problems  Woman 
Suffrage  is  likely  to  bring  upon  us,  and  no  man  sympathizes  more  deeply  with 
the  feeling  that  exists  in  the  State  against  making  this  experiment.  I  confess 
that  I  am  not  impressed  with  the  suggestion  that  the  Amendment  would  be  an 
invasion  of  states'  rights.  North  Carolina  and,  for  that  matter,  all  the  states 
are  estopped  from  making  any  such  contention.  Recently  Congress  has  enacted 
laws  supported  by  nearly  all  the  Northern  and  Western  states  that  lay  down  the 
principle  that  the  fishermen  on  Puget  Sound  have  the  right  to  say  who  shall  work 
in  the  cotton  fields  and  factories  of  North  Carolina.  Recently,  North  Carolina 
and  nearly  all  the  Southern  states  voted,  practically  without  division,  in  favor 
of  an  amendment  to  the  Federal  Constitution  which  lays  down  the  principle  that 
the  cotton  growers  of  North  Carolina  have  a  right  to  say  that  a  farmer  on  the 
Pacific  slope  shall  not  gather  grapes  from  his  own  vineyard  and  out  of  them  make 
a  little  wine  for  the  use  of  his  own  family  on  his  own  table. 


62  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Always  in  Congress,  if  a  member  wants  to  defeat  a  measure  he  raises  the  cry 
of  states'  rights,  and  the  very  next  day  the  same  member,  who  is  trying  to  pass 
some  pet  measure  of  his  own,  treats  with  quiet  scorn  the  cry  of  states'  rights 
raised  by  the  opposition. 

Gentlemen,  we  may  just  as  well  realize  that  this  country  is  no  longer  an 
association  of  states,  but  a  Nation,  and  whatever  a  majority  of  the  people  of  the 
Nation  want  is  going  to  be  the  supreme  law  of  the  land.  "Whenever  I  really  want 
to  think  seriously  about  states'  rights  I  go  and  muse  for  an  hour  over  the  grave 
of  my  Confederate  father,  for  I  realize  now,  more  keenly  than  ever  before,  that 
states'  rights  passed  away  with 

"The  deadly  calm  of  Stonewall's  face, 
The  iron  front  of  Lee." 

But,  gentlemen,  in  the  famous  words  of  Grover  Cleveland,  "A  condition,  and 
not  a  theory,  confronts  us." 

"Woman  Suffrage  is  at  hand.  It  is  an  absolute  moral  certainty  that  inside  of 
six  months  some  state  will  open  the  door,  and  the  women  will  enter  the  political 
forum.  No  great  movement  in  all  history  has  ever  gone  so  near  the  top  and  then 
failed  to  go  over.  The  very  most  that  this  General  Assembly  can  do  is  to  delay 
for  six  months  a  movement  it  is  powerless  to  defeat. 

This  being  true,  I  am  profoundly  convinced  that  it  would  be  the  part  of 
wisdom  and  of  grace  for  North  Carolina  to  accept  the  inevitable  and  ratify  the 
amendment. 

In  other  days,  when  I  was  a  private  citizen  in  Louisburg,  I  would  sometimes 
be  sitting  in  a  cozy  corner  on  my  porch  deeply  engrossed  in  some  tale  of  Dickens 
or  Scott,  when  I  would  hear  the  front  gate  click,  and,  looking  up,  would  see  a 
lady  coming  up  the  walk.  Now,  while  chivalry  shrinks  from  it,  candor  forces  the 
confession  that  I  did  not  want  her  to  come  in.  Just  then  I  greatly  preferred  the 
society  of  Dickens  or  Scott.  But  there  she  was,  coming  up  the  walk!  And  every 
instinct  of  Southern  chivalry  forced  me  to  walk  down  the  steps,  give  her  a  glad 
hand,  and  say,  "My  dear  madam,  walk  right  in;  we  are  delighted  to  see  you." 

Gentlemen,  the  front  gate  has  clicked.  The  women  are  coming  up  the  walk. 
They  are  going  to  enter  our  home.  Shall  we  receive  them  with  a  smile  or  with  a 
frown  ? 

But  there  is  another  and  far  deeper  reason  for  not  delaying  a  movement  we 
are  powerless  to  defeat.  The  big  question  that  is  going  to  be  settled  in  the  next 
six  months  is  whether  or  not  the  United  States  shall  enter  into  an  alliance  with 
twenty-nine  of  the  most  powerful  nations  of  the  earth  for  the  purpose  of  forever 
delivering  humanity  from  the  burdens  and  horrors  of  war.  On  that  question  the 
women  have  a  sacred  right  to  be  heard,  for  when  cannon  roar  the  women  furnish 
the  fodder.  With  the  utmost  deference  to  all  who  may  hold  a  contrary  opinion, 
I  am  driven  by  the  tyranny  of  my  own  conscience  to  say  that  judgment  and 
justice,  mercy  and  humanity,  all  cry  out  that  women  have  the  first  right  to  speak 
when  the  issue  is  whether  or  not  the  world  shall  henceforth  be  ruled  by  reason 
and  righteousness  or  by  blood  and  iron. 

Gentlemen,  the  wise  man  is  he  who  gets  the  most  and  the  best  out  of  a  given 
situation.  If  in  the  face  of  this  supreme  crisis  we  shall  take  counsel  of  our 
prejudice  and  our  fears,  and  shall  turn  a  deaf  ear  to  the  pleadings  of  humanity, 
next  year  we  may  be  aroused  to  a  tragic  realization  that  in  order  to  gain  a  local 
battle  we  have  lost  a  world  war. 


MESSAGES  TO  TEE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  63 

Dear,  dear  friends  of  the  opposition,  I  put  to  your  sense  and  to  your  souls 

the  question — 

"What  win  you  if  you  gain  the  thing  you  seek, 

A  dream,  a  breath  of  frothy,  fleeting  joy; 
Who  buys  a  moment's  mirth  to  wail  a  week, 
Or  sells  eternity  to  get  a  toy?" 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(20) 
STATE  SALARIES 

THIRD  MESSAGE  OF  GOVERNOR  T.  W.  BICKETT  TO  THE  SPECIAL  SESSION 
OF  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  OF  1920 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  August  18,  1920. 
Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

"The  laborer  is  worthy  of  his  hire."  This  divine  law  of  compensation  applies 
to  those  who  labor  for  the  State  as  well  as  those  who  labor  for  private  individuals. 
The  public  servant  is  entitled  to  a  living  wage.  In  North  Carolina  he  has  not 
been  receiving  such  a  wage  during  the  last  two  years,  but  he  has  been  daily 

"Doomed  to  that  sorest  task  of  man  alive, 
To  make  three  guineas  do  the  work  of  five." 

Such  a  policy  is  as  unwise  as  it  is  unjust.  It  is  simply  impossible  for  a 
public  servant  to  work  with  maximum  efficiency  when  his  mind  is  constantly 
disturbed  and  distressed  by  the  struggle  to  "make  buckle  and  tongue  meet." 

I  believe  in  the  most  careful  expenditure  of  the  public  funds.  In  public  and 
in  private  life  extravagance  is  folly  and  waste  is  a  crime,  but  fair  wages  for 
honest  work  is  the  essence  of  economy. 

Therefore  I  make  the  following  recommendations : 

1.  That  the  Committee  on  Public  Buildings  and  Grounds  be  authorized  to 
equalize  and  adjust  the  wages  of  all  janitors,  watchmen  and  caretakers  of  public 
buildings  and  grounds  and  allow  such  increases  as  may  be  found  to  be  necessary 
and  just,  provided  that  the  maximum  wage  paid  shall  not  exceed  $21  per  week. 

2.  That  the  salary  of  the  keeper  of  Public  Buildings  and  Grounds  be  in- 
creased from  $100  per  month  to  $150  per  month. 

3.  That  the  Governor  and  Council  of  State  be  authorized  to  equalize  and 
adjust  the  salaries  of  clerks  and  stenographers  in  the  several  State  departments 
and  allow  such  increases  as  may  be  necessary  and  just,  provided  that  the  maximum 
salary  allowed  shall  not  exceed  $150  per  month.  I  deem  it  my  duty  to  the  State 
to  say  that  it  is  simply  impossible  to  retain  the  present  efficient  clerks  and  sten- 
ographers unless  this  adjustment  is  authorized. 

4.  That  the  Committee  on  Salaries  and  Fees  take  under  consideration  the 
salaries  paid  clerks  in  the  several  departments  whose  present  salaries  exceed  $150 
per  month,  and  recommend  such  increases  as  they  may  find  wise  and  just. 


64  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

5.  That  the  salaries  of  all  the  heads  of  the  State  departments,  the  Justices 
of  the  Supreme  Court,  the  Judges  of  the  Superior  Court,  the  Adjutant  General 
and  the  Secretary  of  the  State  Board  of  Health  be  very  substantially  increased. 
I  speak  with  rigid  accuracy  and  from  a  most  intimate  knowledge  of  the  facts 
when  I  say  it  is  simply  impossible  for  these  officials  to  live  decently  on  the 
salaries  they  now  receive. 

The  utmost  candor  compels  me  to  add,  that  while  the  salary  of  the  Governor 
is  certainly  none  too  large,  it  is  out  of  proportion  to  the  salaries  paid  the  other 
officials.  The  Governor  can  live  on  his  salary,  for  in  addition  to  the  money  paid 
him,  he  is  given  a  furnished  house  and  supplied  with  water,  fuel,  lights  and 
servants.  A  small  increase  in  the  allowance  made  for  servants  would  be  proper, 
but  this  is  a  detail  that  can  well  wait. 

The  items  above  named  would  more  than  absorb  half  the  salary  paid  any 
regular  State  official. 

I  think  the  increases  made  in  the  salaries  of  State  officials  should  be  made  to 
begin  December  30,  1920,  as  the  constitutional  officers  can  receive  no  increase 
prior  to  that  time. 

I  think  that  the  increases  allowed  to  clerks  and  stenographers  should  be  made 
retroactive,  and  to  begin  January  1,  1920.  The  State  is  finding  it  increasingly 
difficult  to  retain  in  its  employ  efficient  help,  as  private  individuals  and  corpora- 
tions are  everywhere  offering  larger  salaries  than  the  State  pays. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(21) 

REPORT  OF  LEGISLATIVE  COMMITTEE  OF  BOARD  OF 
AGRICULTURE  ON  TAXATION 

FOURTH  MESSAGE  OF  GOVERNOR  T.  W.  BICKETT  TO  THE  SPECIAL  SESSION 
OF  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  OF  1920 

Raleigh,  K  C,  August  18,  1920. 
Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

The  members  of  the  Legislative  Committee  of  the  North  Carolina  State  Board 
of  Agriculture  have  made  a  profound  study  of  the  present  taxation  system  in 
North  Carolina,  and  have  filed  with  me  a  report  giving  the  results  of  their  in- 
vestigations. I  am  requested  by  the  committee  to  submit  this  report  to  the 
General  Assembly,  and  I  send  the  same  herewith. 

The  report  is  one  of  the  most  interesting  papers  ever  written  on  this  all- 
important  subject.  It  deals  with  the  simple  truth  in  a  straightforward  manner, 
and  is  the  very  essence  of  patriotism  and  statesmanship. 

I  ask  that  the  report  be  read  in  full  to  your  body,  and  each  member  of  the 
General  Assembly  give  to  it  most  careful  consideration. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  65 

Hon.  T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor,  Raleigh,  N.  C,  August  18,  1920. 

Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Dear  Sie: — The  undersigned  persons,  members  of  the  Legislative  Com- 
mittee of  the  North  Carolina  State  Board  of  Agriculture,  meeting  in  session 
here  last  week,  decided  to  make  a  thoroughgoing  study  of  the  present 
taxation  system  in  North  Carolina,  with  special  reference  to  its  effect  on  the 
farmers  of  the  State.  We  took  this  action  solely  on  our  own  initiative,  with- 
out suggestion  from  any  outside  person  and  with  no  desire  except  to  find  the 
real  facts  and  report  these  facts  to  the  people  we  are  endeavoring  to  serve. 
Our  committee  has  now  completed  its  investigation  and  formulated  a 
report  to  the  farmers  of  the  State. 

Inasmuch  as  this  report  suggests  certain  improvements  in  the  law,  we 
think  it  fitting  that  it  be  brought  to  the  attention  of  the  General  Assembly. 
We  are  therefore  sending  you  a  copy  for  that  purpose. 

Respectfully  yours, 

W.  A.  Graham, 
R.  W.  Scott, 
C.  C.  Wright, 
I.  N.  Paine, 
R.  F.  Woodard, 
Clarence  Poe, 

Legislative  Committee. 


THE  RELATION  OF  NORTH  CAROLINA'S  TAX  POLICY 
TO  THE  FARMERS  OF  THE  STATE 

A  Report  of  the  Legislative  Committee  of  the  North 
Carolina  State  Board  of  AGRiCTJLTtrRE 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  August  18,  1920. 
To  the  Farmers  of  North  Carolina: 

The  members  of  the  North  Carolina  State  Board  of  Agriculture  consider 
themselves  commissioned  to  look  out  for  the  interests  of  the  North  Carolina 
farmers.  We  know  the  farmers  of  North  Carolina  well  enough,  however,  to 
know  that  all  they  want  is  truth  and  justice  and  honesty.  The  North  Caro- 
lina farmer  wants  no  special  favors,  no  special  privileges.  He  asks  only  that 
he  be  fed  out  of  the  same  spoon  as  other  citizens.  As  he  opposes  giving 
special  privileges  to  other  classes,  so  he  asks  none  for  himself. 

These  reflections  are  impressed  upon  us  as  we  consider  the  questions 
that  come  to  us  from  many  North  Carolina  farmers  asking  for  the  exact 
facts  as  to  North  Carolina's  taxation  policy  with  regard  to  its  fairness  and 
with  regard  to  its  effect  upon  the  State's  agricultural  interests.  As  members 
of  the  Legislative  Committee  of  the  North  Carolina  Board  of  Agriculture, 
the  undersigned  persons  meeting  in  Raleigh  and  after  earnest  investigation 
of  the  facts,  desire  to  submit  their  findings  to  their  fellow  farmers  of  the 
State.  We  present  these  facts,  we  wish  to  say  in  the  outset,  with  no  desire 
to  favor  any  man  or  set  of  men,  and  with  no  desire  to  criticize  any  man  or 
set  of  men.  We  are  moved  to  speak  only  out  of  a  desire  to  serve  the  cause 
of  truth  and  to  clarify  a  situation  now  much  muddled  through  misconception 
and  misunderstandings. 


66  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

NORTH   CAROLINA'S   NEW  TAXATION   POLICY 

After  prolonged  study  and  investigation,  the  General  Assembly  of  North 
Carolina  in  1919  decided  on  a  new  taxation  policy  for  the  State.  This  policy, 
we  are  glad  to  say,  was  approved  by  the  representatives  of  both  political 
parties,  and  appeals  to  us  still  as  distinctively  a  moral  issue,  which  should 
be  above  political  considerations.  This  new  taxation  policy  as  worked  out 
by  both  political  parties  in  1919  aimed  at  three  things: 

1.  Honesty  in  assessments. 

2.  A  reduction  in  tax  rate  to  correspond  to  the  increase  in  assessed 
values. 

3.  Provision  for  lightening  the  burdens  of  poverty  and  industry,  and 
putting  a  larger  share  of  the  burdens  of  taxation  on  men  with  large  in- 
comes. 

With  regard  to  the  latter  point  we  may  note  in  the  outset  that  the  last 
Legislature  was  the  first  one  to  take  advantage  of  the  authority  given  it  by 
the  Constitution  to  provide  a  $300  exemption  for  taxpayers. 

Now  about  the  plans  for  securing  just  assessments.  In  the  past  every- 
one understood  that  he  was  permitted  to  list  property  for  something  less 
than  its  real  value;  and  the  result  was  that  the  more  pliable  a  man's  con- 
science, the  lower  the  rate  he  named;  and  this  thing  has  grown  worse  and 
worse  year  after  year  until  it  has  amounted  to  a  State  disgrace.  For  a  man 
to  list  his  property  at  its  real  value  meant  that  he  would  have  to  pay 
practically  twice  as  much  tax  as  he  ought  to  pay.  Such  a  system  encouraged 
lying  and  corrupted  public  morals  at  the  fountain  head.  If  the  sworn 
officials  of  the  State  set  the  example  of  assessing  real  estate  at  33%  per  cent 
of  its  value,  how  could  the  State  expect  the  individual  taxpayer  to  list  his 
personal  property  at  100  per  cent? 

All  this  has  been  changed.  Hereafter  every  property  owner  in  the  State 
is  expected  to  list  every  cent's  worth  of  property  he  owns — and  list  it  at 
100  per  cent  of  its  value;  list  it  for  what  it  would  bring  if  offered  for  sale 
under  favorable  conditions. 

Of  course  if  this  plan  for  revaluing  property  for  taxation  were  offered 
without  assurance  that  the  tax  rate  would  be  correspondingly  cut,  it  would 
largely  fail.  The  law  specifically  provides,  however,  that  as  assessed  values 
increase,  the  tax  rate  must  decrease,  and  the  present  General  Assembly  pro- 
poses to  reduce  the  maximum  constitutional  rate  on  each  $100  worth  of 
property  from  66%  cents  to  15  cents. 

THE    PROPOSED    INCOME    TAX    AMENDMENT 

Now  with  regard  to  provisions  for  throwing  a  larger  part  of  the  burden 
of  taxation  on  those  most  able  to  bear  it.  The  chief  purpose  of  the  revalua- 
tion policy  is  not  to  increase  the  amount  of  taxes,  but  to  secure  justice  and 
equality  in  assessment.  Then  in  order  to  provide  larger  revenues  for  the 
State  and  give  us  the  necessary  money  for  the  many  important  tasks  which 
advanced  civilization  places  on  the  commonwealth— better  schools,  better 
roads,  better  health,  better  care  of  the  unfortunate,  etc. — the  Legislature 
submits  to  the  people  another  important  plan.  At  the  election  in  November, 
the  people  will  vote  on  a  constitutional  amendment  authorizing  the  State  to 
tax  the  incomes  of  the  wealthy,  without  regard  as  to  whether  any  particular 
income  is  derived  from  invested  wealth  or  otherwise. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  67 

We  hope  every  farmer  will  now  make  up  his  mind  to  vote  for  this  amend- 
ment and  urge  others  to  do  so.  Heretofore  we  have  had  a  shameful  system 
in  North  Carolina.  Incomes  derived  from  labor  have  been  taxable,  while 
incomes  derived  from  invested  capital  have  been  exempt  from  taxation, 
under  constitutional  provisions.  Thus  it  is  said  that  a  famous  tobacco 
manufacturer  of  this  State  had  an  income  of  a  million  dollars  a  year  from 
his  property,  and  was  not  required  to  pay  one  cent  of  income  tax  on  it,  while 
his  stenographer  or  clerk  getting  $1,250  a  year  or  more  was  required  to 
pay  an  income  tax.  In  England  for  years  it  has  been  the  plan  to  put  a 
heavier  tax  on  "unearned  incomes,"  that  is  to  say  on  those  derived  from 
invested  capital,  than  on  "earned  incomes,"  that  is  to  say,  on  those  derived 
from  one's  labor  or  profession.  Our  North  Carolina  plan  has  been  on  the 
other  extreme,  and  the  voters  of  the  State  ought  to  pile  up  100,000  majority 
for  changing  it,  just  as  they  did  for  changing  the  Constitution  so  as  to 
provide  a  six-months  school  term. 

A  great  part  of  the  State's  wealth  is  concentrated  in  the  hands  of  a 
comparatively  few  wealthy  persons,  and  it  is  only  fair  that  they  bear  a 
larger  share  of  the  burdens  of  taxation.  This  is  all  the  proposed  income 
tax  amendment  means. 

THE   RESULTS    OP   THE   NEW   TAX    POLICY 

Such  in  brief  was  the  State's  new  taxation  policy  as  approved  by  repre- 
sentatives of  both  political  parties  in  the  General  Assembly  of  1919.  What 
have  been  the  results?  We  are  profoundly  convinced,  after  a  careful  study 
of  the  question,  that  this  new  policy  has  worked  out  in  a  way  to  deserve 
the  sympathy  and  support  of  the  farmers  of  North  Carolina.  Of  course, 
the  plan  has  had  its  faults,  its  weaknesses,  its  imperfections.  Of  course, 
some  mistakes  have  been  made.  Of  course,  we  should  try  to  remedy  any 
weak  places  in  the  act.  But  on  the  whole  we  are  convinced  that  the 
majority  of  the  farmers  of  North  Carolina  feel  as  did  one  farmer  speaking 
bluntly  in  the  presence  of  some  of  the  signers  below  since  our  committee 
met  in  Raleigh,  when  he  said: 

"The  new  tax  act  would  be  worth  all  the  effort  that  has  been  put  into 
it  if  it  did  nothing  else  except  keep  a  hundred  thousand  North  Carolinians 
from  swearing  to  lies  every  tax-listing  day.  I  thank  God  for  an  act  which 
enables  me  to  sign  my  tax-sheet  with  a  clear  conscience,  knowing  that  I 
am  compelled  to  tell  the  truth  and  that  my  neighbors  are  also." 

We  believe  that  the  great  majority  of  the  farmers  of  North  Carolina  feel 
as  this  man  did.  They  want  to  know  first:  "Is  all  property  getting  on  the 
books  at  its  fair  value?  Are  the  tax  books  telling  the  truth?  Is  each  class 
of  property  honestly  listed?" 

If  each  class  of  property  is  honestly  listed  then  it  doesn't  matter  whether 
real  estate  or  personal  property  or  corporations  show  the  greatest  gain  in 
values.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  however,  we  find  that  there  is  no  reason  what- 
ever for  charging  that  the  new  taxation  policy  will  throw  a  largely  in- 
creased burden  on  the  farmer.     Here  are  the  facts: 

THE   VALUATION   OF    REAL   ESTATE 

First,  as  to  valuation  of  real  estate.  Any  thoughtful  man  who  wishes 
to  deal  honestly  is  bound  to  know  that  in  making  any  comparison  of  gains 
in  real  estate  values  with  other  property  values,  it  is  absurd  to  use  only 
the  years  1919  and  1920. 


68  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Prior  to  1919  real  estate  was  last  assessed  in  1915.  Any  so-called  "1919 
valuation"  for  real  estate  is  therefore  a  fiction  and  an  absurdity.  There  is 
absolutely  "no  such  animal."  There  is  no  1919  valuation;  there  is  only  a 
1915  valuation  which  was  carried  over  in  1916,  again  in  1917,  again  in  1918, 
and  again  in  1919.  Every  other  class  of  property  got  part  of  its  increased 
assessment  in  1916,  part  in  1917,  part  in  1918,  part  in  1919. 

Real  estate  gets  all  of  its  increase  at  once  in  1920  and  naturally  its  five- 
year  increase  now  is  more  than  the  one-year  increase  on  other  property. 
Any  man  might  have  expected  this.  To  discover  whether  or  not  real  estate 
is  being  advanced  in  values  out  of  proportion  to  other  property  there  is 
only  one  fair  thing  to  do.  For  real  estate  we  are  compelled  to  compare 
1920  values  with  1915  values  of  each  important  class  of  property  in  the 
State.  Here  are  the  figures  as  gathered  from  the  records  of  the  State  Tax 
Commission: 

192C  1915 

Real  Property   $1,981,563,494         $421,988,072 

Personal    Property    813,532,925  210,744,789 

Cotton  Mills   205,581,304  26,457,002 

Banks     35,247,693  23,748,446 

Corporation  Excess    20,832,385  7,005,821 

Power  Companies   56,484,094  10,544,239 

Railroads     250,587,158  125,836,005 

Miscellaneous  Corporations    168,795,120  43,415,947 

From  this  record  it  appears  that  values  on  each  class  of  property  here 
named  have  increased  about  as  follows: 

Real  Property  Nearly  5  times. 

Personal  Property   Nearly  4  times. 

Cotton  Mills    Nearly  8  times. 

Banks  About  50  per  cent. 

Corporation  Excess  Nearly  3  times. 

Power  Companies  Over  5  times. 

Railroads   Doubled. 

Miscellaneous  Corporations    Nearly  4  times. 

Some  classes  of  property  have  increased  more  than  real  property,  other 
classes  less.  But  for  the  new  $300  exemption,  personal  property  would 
undoubtedly  have  increased  as  much  or  more  than  real  estate.  On  the 
whole,  the  increases  are  about  what  might  have  been  expected  and  indicate 
fair  dealing,  so  far  as  we  can  see  it.  Cotton  mills,  as  everybody  knows, 
have  been  abnormally  prosperous,  and  they  lead  in  increase.  Real  estate 
values,  as  every  honest  man  is  bound  to  admit,  have  increased  tremendously, 
both  town  lots  and  farm  lands.  An  average  valuation  of  $40  per  acre 
for  all  the  farm  lands  of  the  State,  which  is  all  the  new  assessment  pro- 
vides, is  not  excessive.  As  for  the  two  classes  of  property  which  did  not 
show  large  increases,  it  is  well  known  that  railroads  the  country  over  have 
been  in  disastrous  condition  and  that  banks  have  their  property  in  money, 
and  money  is  the  one  thing  which  has  grown  cheaper  these  last  four  years. 
To  make  the  matter  still  clearer,  let  us  divide  the  various  classes  of  prop- 
erty into  four  great  groups  and  compare  the  increases  on  each: 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  69 

1920  1915 

1.  Real  Property  $1,981,563,494  $421,988,072 

2.  Personal  Property  813,552,925  210,744,789 

3.  Railroads    250,587,158  125,836,005 

4.  Corporation   Property,   including 

banks,  cotton  mills  and  power 

companies    486,940,596  113,904,316 

The  increase  in  each  class  of  property  by  percentages  in  then  seen  to  be  as 
follows:  Real  property,  369  per  cent;  personal  property,  after  the  $300 
exemption,  286  per  cent;   railroads,  99  per  cent;   corporations,  329  per  cent. 

WILL  THE   FARMER'S   BURDEN   BE   INCREASED? 

In  the  face  of  these  facts,  we  cannot  convince  ourselves  that  real  estate 
has  been  unfairly  dealt  with.  The  situation  in  a  nutshell  so  far  as  the  new 
tax  law  and  the  farmer  is  concerned  seems  to  be  as  follows: 

1.  The  farmer's  personal  property  hereafter  will  be  more  lightly  taxed 
than  ever  before,  because  for  the  first  time  other  property  will  be  listed  as 
completely  and  at  as  nearly  full  value  as  this  property  has  been  up  to  this 
time. 

2.  Even  without  the  new  constitutional  amendment  to  tax  all  incomes 
alike,  the  average  farmer's  real  estate  would  bear  only  a  slightly  larger  part 
of  the  general  tax  burden  than  in  the  last  assessment  year. 

3.  With  the  adoption  of  the  new  constitutional  amendment  to  tax  all 
large  incomes,  a  larger  share  of  the  taxes  of  the  State  will  come  from 
industries  in  which  large  wealth  is  concentrated,  as  it  is  not  in  agriculture, 
and  the  farmer's  general  tax  burden  will  be  correspondingly  reduced. 

THE   TAXATION   OF    CORPORATIONS 

Concerning  the  much-discussed  matter  of  the  taxation  of  corporations  in 
North  Carolina,  we  find  the  following  to  be  the  facts:  Every  corporation 
is  required  to  list  for  taxation  under  oath  every  item  of  property,  real  or 
personal,  it  owns,  and  to  pay  taxes  on  every  such  item  of  real  or  personal 
property  in  exactly  the  same  way  and  to  exactly  the  same  degree  and  amount 
as  if  such  property  were  owned  by  an  individual  citizen  of  the  State.  Then 
in  addition  to  this,  each  such  corporation  is  required  to  report  to  the 
State  Tax  Commission  how  much  money  it  is  making,  how  much  dividends 
it  is  paying,  etc.  The  State  Tax  Commission  then  estimates  how  much 
the  corporation  is  worth  as  a  going  concern  in  excess  of  the  property  it 
owns  and  pays  taxes  on.  The  corporation  is  then  required  also  to  pay  tax 
on  a  valuation  which  includes  this  estimated  value  on  "good  will"  or 
intangible  property  as  well  as  on  all  its  actual  property.  This  explains 
the  term  "corporation  excess."  The  theory  of  the  State  has  been  that  the 
corporation  itself  thus  pays  taxes  for  all  its  shareholders  and  that  they 
receive  "dividends  less  taxes  paid"  and  that  to  tax  a  corporation  on  its 
property  and  then  tax  each  owner  of  stock  for  his  share  of  the  corporation's 
property  would  be  like  taxing  a  man  on  his  land  and  then  taxing  him  on 
the  deed  to  that  land. 

Such  is  a  rather  comprehensive  review  of  the  taxation  situation  in 
North  Carolina  as  we  find  it.  Our  review  is  necessarily  rather  lengthy 
because  we  have  wished  to  answer  with  both  fairness  and  fullness  the 
questions  about  which  our  farmers  are  asking  for  information. 


70  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 


SOME    NEEDED    AMENDMENTS 

Our  general  conclusion  is  that  the  State  is  to  be  congratulated  on  having 
worked  out  for  the  first  time  a  system  of  taxation  scientific  and  honest  in 
principle.  We  trust  that  we  shall  hold  to  that  principle  and  change  the 
system  only  by  improving  the  details.  Speaking  only  for  ourselves  in  this 
as  well  as  other  matters  mentioned,  we  believe  the  following  improvements 
should  now  be  made: 

1.  Adequate  provision  should  be  made  for  revising  any  and  all  assess- 
ments which  can  be  shown  to  be  higher  than  the  real  value  of  the  property 
on  May  1,  1919. 

2.  A  determined  and  thoroughgoing  effort  should  be  made  to  compel 
the  listing  of  solvent  credits  and  of  all  other  forms  of  personal  property. 
The  farmer  is  willing  to  list  all  his  property;  he  demands  that  all  other 
property  be  listed. 

3.  In  spite  of  efforts  to  equalize  the  situation  for  the  farmer  by  allowing 
him  to  deduct  his  debts  on  January  1  from  value  of  crops  then  on  hand, 
we  nevertheless  believe  it  best  to  change  the  date  for  tax  listing  back  to 
May  1,  or  at  least  to  April  1. 

4.  We  renew  the  appeal,  already  sufficiently  elaborated  in  this  state- 
ment, for  the  ratification  of  the  Income  Tax  Amendment  at  the  coming 
November  election. 

Respectfully  submitted, 
R.  W.  Scott, 
C.  C.  Weight, 
I.  N.  Paine, 
R.  L.  Woodaed, 
Clarence  Poe, 
W.  A.  Graham,  Commissioner, 

Legislative  Committee. 


(22) 
WORKMEN'S  COMPENSATION  ACT 

FIFTH  MESSAGE  OF  GOVERNOR  T.  W.  BICKETT  TO  THE  SPECIAL  SESSION 
OF  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  OF  1920 

Ealeigh,  N  0.,  August  20,  1920. 
Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

There  has  never  been  a  time  when  I  was  not  in  favor  of  a  workmen's  com- 
pensation act.  The  human  breakage  in  industrial  plants  should  be  as  much  a  part 
of  the  fixed  charges  of  the  business  as  the  mechanical  breakage.  This  principle 
is  now  well-nigh  universally  recognized  in  all  enlightened  nations. 

For  a  number  of  years  the  General  Assemblies  of  North  Carolina  have  ac- 
cepted this  fundamental  principle.  Several  efforts  have  been  made  to  pass  a 
workmen's  compensation  act,  but  in  every  case  the  effort  has  failed  because  it 
was  impossible  to  agree  on  the  details  of  the  bill.  This  failure  was  largely  due 
to  a  lack  of  time  during  the  session  of  the  Assembly  to  investigate  the  facts  and 
reach  sound  conclusions. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  71 

Therefore,  I  recommend  that  this  General  Assembly  appoint  a  special  com- 
mission, fairly  representative  of  the  workmen  and  the  employers,  whose  duty  it 
shall  be  to  make  a  careful  investigation  of  this  question,  and  submit  for  the  con- 
sideration of  the  General  Assembly  of  1921  a  modern  model  workmen's  compensa- 
tion act. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


HIGHWAYS 

SIXTH  MESSAGE  OF  GOVERNOR  T.  W.  BICKETT  TO  THE  SPECIAL  SESSION 
OF  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  OF  1920 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  August  20,  1920. 
Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

This  General  Assembly  at  its  regular  session  created  a  State  Highway  Com- 
mission. 

By  virtue  of  section  13  of  Chapter  189  of  the  Public  Laws  of  1919,  I  ap- 
pointed the  following  members  of  the  Highway  Commission :  Frank  Page,  chair- 
man, for  a  term  of  six  years;  John  E.  Cameron  for  a  term  of  four  years;  James 
K.  ISTorfieet  for  a  term  of  two  years;  and  James  G.  Stikeleather  for  a  term  of 
two  years.  All  of  these  appointments  are  subject  to  the  confirmation  of  the 
Senate.  Allowing  for  the  time  necessarily  consumed  in  perfecting  an  organization, 
the  Commission  has  had  about  one  year  in  which  to  function.  During  this  time 
it  has  completed  fifteen  projects  comprising  73%  miles  at  a  cost  of  $769,297. 
It  has  now  under  construction  fifty-seven  projects  comprising  453  miles  that  will 
cost  $7,188,909.  It  has  closed  contracts  for  nine  projects  comprising  69  miles 
that  will  cost  $749,102,  making  the  total  cost  of  projects  completed,  under  con- 
struction and  under  contract  of  $8,707,308.  These  projects  cover  eighty-eight 
counties  in  the  State. 

In  addition  to  the  projects  above  named,  the  Commission  has  approved  and  in 
process  to  be  submitted  to  the  Federal  Government  sixty-one  other  projects,  and 
also  has  under  consideration  twenty  others  not  yet  approved  by  it.  The  total 
cost  of  all  these  projects  will  amount  to  $19,060,426.  The  total  appropriation 
available  from  the  Federal  Government  under  any  law  is  $6,270,690.  This  leaves 
$12,789,736  to  be  raised  by  the  State  and  the  counties  for  the  completion  of  the 
work  already  mapped  out  by  the  Highway  Commission.  North  Carolina  was  one 
of  the  first  states  to  absorb  every  dollar  in  sight  from  the  Federal  Government, 
and  js  calling  for  more. 

As  I  have  repeatedly  said,  the  blunder  that  we  have  made  in  North  Carolina 
is  not  that  we  have  failed  to  build  good  roads,  but  that  we  have  been  criminally 
negligent  in  keeping  them  up.  I  have  a  profound  conviction  that  it  would  be  an 
economic  crime  for  North  Carolina  to  issue  bonds  or  to  permit  the  counties  to  issue 
bonds  to  build  any  more  roads  in  this  State  until  we  have  devised  and  thoroughly 
tested  out  an  adequate  system  of  maintenance. 


72  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Therefore  I  recommend  that  this  General  Assembly  authorize  the  State  High- 
way Commission  to  test  out  on  a  number  of  roads  selected  by  the  Commission  the 
best  system  of  maintenance  now  in  force  in  any  of  the  states  of  the  Union,  and 
submit  the  result  of  their  experiments  to  the  General  Assembly  of  1921.  I  have 
a  very  definite  conviction  that  the  only  system  that  will  prove  to  be  worth  while 
is  the  one  now  in  force  in  the  State  of  New  Hampshire  and  possibly  in  some 
other  states,  where  the  roads  are  laid  off  in  sections  and  are  kept  under  constant 
patrol  just  like  the  railroads  are.  It  is  simply  throwing  away  money  to  build 
roads  of  any  type  until  we  provide  and  enforce  a  system  of  maintenance  that  will 
insure  the  roads  from  going  to  pieces. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(24) 
LEGISLATION  FOR  NEGROES 

SEVENTH  MESSAGE  OF  GOVERNOR  T.  W.  BICKETT  TO  THE  SPECIAL  SESSION 
OF  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  OF  1920 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  August  23,  1920. 
Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

Last  year  I  heard  a  negro  bishop  say  in  a  public  address  that  the  negro  had 
accepted  the  white  man's  God  and  knew  no  other.  "We  owe  it  to  that  God  and  to 
the  civilization  we  have  builded  on  His  will  to  deal  justly  with  a  tribe  of  His 
children  less  fortunate  than  ourselves. 

In  North  Carolina  we  have  definitely  decided  that  the  happiness  of  both  races 
requires  that  white  government  shall  be  supreme  and  unchallenged  in  our  borders. 
Power  is  inseparably  linked  with  responsibility;  and  when  we  deny  to  the  negro 
any  participation  in  the  making  of  laws,  we  saddle  upon  ourselves  a  peculiar 
obligation  to  protect  the  negro  in  his  life  and  property,  and  to  help  and  encourage 
him  in  the  pursuit  of  happiness. 

In  the  discharge  of  this  obligation  the  State  owes  it  to  the  negro  just  now  to 
provide  : 

1.  For  the  establishment  of  a  reformatory  where  delinquent  negro  boys  may 
be  sent  and  trained  in  the  same  way  that  the  white  boys  are  trained  at  the  Stone- 
wall Jackson  School  at  Concord. 

2.  For  the  establishment  of  a  sanatorium  for  the  treatment  of  tubercular 
negroes.  The  negro  is  peculiarly  susceptible  to  the  ravages  of  this  disease. 
A  consideration  of  our  own  welfare  as  well  as  that  of  the  negro  requires  the 
establishment  of  such  an  institution  where  those  afflicted  with  the  disease  may  be 
treated  and  may  also  learn  how  to  keep  from  giving  the  disease  to  others. 

3.  For  the  establishment  of  a  strictly  first-class  teacher-training  school  that 
will  compare  favorably  with  the  teacher-training  school  for  the  whites  at  Green- 
ville. Most  of  the  negroes  who  qualify  themselves  for  high  grade  teachers  go  to 
schools  outside  of  the  State.  This  is  unjust  to  them  and  is  a  blunder  from  the 
white  man's  standpoint.     If  the  negro  teachers  are  educated  in  the  North  they 


MESSAGES  TO  TEE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  73 

will  absorb  the  ideals  of  the  North,  some  of  which  have  a  tendency  to  unfit  them 
to  be  useful  citizens  in  the  South.  If  we  teach  them  in  our  own  schools  they 
will  absorb  southern  ideals,  and  will  transmit  these  ideals  to  the  youth  who  come 
under  their  charge. 

4.  For  the  amendment  of  our  transportation  laws  that  will  secure  to  the  negro 
safer  and  more  sanitary  accommodations  when  he  rides  on  the  trains.  It  is 
absolutely  necessary  to  the  peace  and  happiness  of  both  races  for  whites  and  blacks 
to  ride  in  separate  cars.  That  question  has  been  settled  in  the  South  and  no 
amount  of  agitation  is  going  to  disturb  it.  But  we  cannot  get  away  from  the 
simple  justice  that  requires  that  when  a  negro  pays  the  same  money  for  his  trans- 
portation that  the  white  man  pays,  he  is  entitled  to  ride  in  a  car  just  as  safe  and 
just  as  sanitary  as  the  one  the  white  man  rides  in. 

To  the  end  that  these  matters  may  be  brought  to  the  attention  of  the  next 
General  Assembly  in  an  intelligent  way,  I  recommend  that  this  General  Assembly 
appoint,  or  authorize  the  Governor  to  appoint,  a  commission  of  five  members, 
whose  duty  it  shall  be  to  make  a  careful  investigation  and  study  of  the  several 
propositions  above  outlined,  and  submit  their  conclusions  to  the  next  session  of  the 
General  Assembly. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(25) 
INCREASED  APPROPRIATIONS  IN  STATE  DEPARTMENTS 

EIGHTH  MESSAGE  OF  GOVERNOR  T.  W.  BICKETT  TO  THE  SPECIAL  SESSION 
OF  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  OF  1920 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  August  25,  1920. 
Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

I  transmit  you  herewith  a  communication  just  received  from  the  Secretary  of 
State  vital  to  the  work  of  his  Department.  I  personally  know  all  about  the 
situation  in  that  department,  and  know  that  the  additional  help  requested  by  the 
Secretary  is  absolutely  necessary  to  carry  on  the  work  of  the  Department. 

A  similar  condition  exists  in  the  office  of  the  Governor,  the  Treasurer,  and 
the  State  Auditor.  A  very  short  bill  has  been  introduced  asking  for  specific 
increases  in  these  three  departments.  The  total  of  these  increases  amounts  to 
only  $3,000.  "We  simply  cannot  do  efficient  work  in  these  departments  unless  these 
increases  shall  be  allowed.  This  bill  is  radically  different  from  the  one  upon 
which  the  House  of  Representatives  has  already  acted  favorably,  as  it  applies 
to  only  about  one-fourth  as  many  parties  as  the  former  bill  did,  and  brings  down 
the  increases  to  an  irreducible  minimum.     I  certainly  hope  this  bill  will  pass. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


74  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

(26) 
FINAL  MESSAGE  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  OF  1921 

Raleigh,  K  C,  January  6,  1921. 
Lady  and  Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

It  would  be  a  violation  of  the  proprieties  of  this  occasion  for  me  to  attempt 
any  discussion  of  the  big  problems  that  confront  this  General  Assembly.  That  is 
at  once  the  right  and  the  responsibility  of  the  Governor-elect.  I  do  not  propose 
to  review  my  own  administration.  What  is  written  is  written,  and  will,  in  the 
fullness  of  time,  be  fairly  appraised  by  the  calm  judgment  of  history.  The  sole 
claim  that  I  make  for  myself  and  for  the  woman  who  has  walked  and  worked  by 
my  side  is  that  in  peace  and  in  war  we  have  diligently  endeavored  to  use  our 
position  as  a  lever  to  lift  the  State  to  higher  levels,  and  as  a  light  to  lead  the 
people  into  more  excellent  ways. 

There  are  a  few  subjects  so  intimately  connected  with  my  administration  that 
a  last  word  from  me  with  reference  to  these  would  seem  to  be  entirely  in  order. 

THE   LABORER   IS   WORTHY    OF   HIS    HIRE 

I  think  you  will  all  agree  that  North  Carolina  is  too  big  and  too  rich  to  ask 
or  allow  men  to  work  for  the  State  for  less  than  a  living  wage.  The  standard 
salary  paid  State  officers  is  $3,500.  "We  will  assume  that  such  an  officer  has  a  wife 
and  three  children.  Certainly  it  would  be  against  public  policy  to  encourage 
him  to  have  fewer.  Such  an  officer  would  be  fortunate  if  he  could  find  a  comfort- 
able home  in  the  city  of  Raleigh  for  a  rental  of  $1,000  a  year.  His  bills  for  fuel, 
water,  lights,  and  telephone  will  easily  amount  to  $25  a  month.  He  ought  to  be 
allowed  one  servant,  and  the  minimum  sum  for  which  a  servant  can  be  employed 
is  $7.50  a  week.  The  head  of  a  State  department  is  called  on  to  pay  at  least 
$300  a  year  for  the  support  of  religion  and  charity.  He  cannot  look  his  neighbors 
or  himself  in  the  face  and  pay  less.  His  fire  and  life  insurance  will  cost  him 
$300  a  year.  To  maintain  the  health  of  himself  and  family  he  ought  to  be 
allowed  a  two  weeks  vacation,  and  this  will  cost  at  least  $200.  He  is  a  lucky  man 
if  his  political  expenses,  inherent  in  the  office,  are  not  more  than  $100  a  year. 
The  expenses  above  enumerated  amount  to  $2,590.  This  leaves  to  a  State 
officer  $910  a  year  with  which  to  pay  for  food,  clothing,  furniture,  doctors'  bills, 
and  the  education  of  his  children.  Such  a  policy  is  as  unwise  as  it  is  unjust. 
A  State  officer  cannot  do  constructive  thinking,  he  cannot  give  to  the  people  the 
most  and  the  best  there  is  in  him  when  every  morning  he  is  tormented  with  the 
problem  of  how  to  make  buckle  and  tongue  meet.  I  respectfully  submit  that  the 
salaries  of  the  heads  of  State  departments  should  be  increased  to  $5,000  a  year. 
I  have  felt  impelled  to  discuss  this  question  because  whatever  is  done  with  respect 
to  our  constitutional  officers  must  be  done  during  my  administration,  but  the 
facts  given  apply  with  equal  force  to  statutory  departments. 

THE    SHORT    BALLOT 

While  upon  the  subject  of  State  officers  I  cannot  refrain  from  reiterating  and 
emphasizing  the  views  expressed  in  my  inaugural  address,  and  in  my  message  to 


MESSAGES  TO  TEE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  75 

the  General  Assembly  of  1919,  to  the  effect  that  all  administrative  officers  should 
be  appointed  by  the  Governor.  Every  consideration  of  intelligence  and  efficiency 
is  in  favor  of  the  short  ballot.  The  men  who  have  given  thought  to  the  subject 
all  think  alike.  The  only  arguments  against  tbe  proposition  are  political  argu- 
ments, utterly  unsupported  by  any  sound  business  principle.  So  far  as  admin- 
istrative officers  are  concerned,  the  State  is  simply  a  big  business  corporation,  and 
there  is  not  a  big  business  in  the  world  where  the  heads  of  the  departments  are 
elected  by  thousands  of  stockholders.  These  are  always  appointed  by  the  pres- 
ident of  the  corporation  or  by  an  executive  board.  This  General  Assembly  would 
do  the  State  a  fine  service  if  it  should  submit  to  the  people  a  constitutional 
amendment  providing  for  the  appointment  rather  than  the  election  of  admin- 
istrative officers.  A  primary  properly  safeguarded  is  the  best  way  to  select  the 
candidate  for  Governor.  Let  the  people  have  the  fullest  opportunity  to  declare 
their  will  in  the  selection  of  the  candidate  and  in  the  subsequent  general  election 
and  then  let  the  Governor  so  selected  and  elected  use  his  own  judgment  in  the 
selection  of  his  executive  staff  and  hold  him  rigidly  responsible  for  results. 

Much  has  been  said  about  giving  the  Governor  the  veto  power.  Possibly  this 
would  be  wise,  but  the  moral  power  of  the  Governor  of  Worth  Carolina  in  shaping 
legislation  is  tremendous.  During  this  administration  I  have  submitted  forty- 
eight  specific  measures  to  the  General  Assembly.  Forty  of  these  were  acted  upon 
favorably  by  the  General  Assembly,  and  are  today  the  law  of  the  land.  The  veto 
power  is  of  minor  importance  compared  with  giving  the  Governor  the  right  to 
name  his  own  lieutenants. 

TEUE    NOBILITY 

The  special  session  of  the  General  Assembly  of  1920  authorized  me  to 
appoint  a  commission  to  investigate  and  make  report  of  what  the  State  ought  to 
do  to  better  the  physical,  moral  and  mental  status  of  the  negroes  of  the  State. 
I  appointed  Mr.  W.  N.  Everett,  Mr.  G.  V.  Cowper,  Mr.  L.  R.  Varser,  Prof.  G.  S. 
Atkins,  and  Dr.  J.  E.  Moore.  These  men  have  made  their  report,  in  which  they 
strongly  urge  the  establishment  of  a  sanatorium  for  the  treatment  of  negroes 
affected  with  tuberculosis,  a  reformatory  for  delinquent  negro  boys,  a  larger  and 
more  liberal  system  of  teacher-training  for  negroes,  and  has  called  upon  the 
Corporation  Commission  to  exercise  the  authority  it  already  has  to  require  equal 
accommodations  for  negroes  and  whites  on  the  trains. 

So  impressed  was  the  Budget  Commission  with  the  justice  and  the  sanity  of 
this  report  that  it  has  fully  endorsed  the  same  and  made  provision  for  carrying 
it  out.  In  the  name  of  the  God  and  Father  of  us  all,  I  beg  you  to  endorse  this 
act  of  true  nobility,  and  carry  out  a  program  supported  by  both  Christianity  and 
common  sense. 

THE  TRUTH  ON  THE  TAX  BOOKS 

The  sole  purpose  of  the  Revaluation  Act  was  to  make  the  tax  books  of  iSTorth 
Carolina  speak  the  truth.  If  at  any  time  the  tax  books  fail  to  tell  the  truth,  then 
the  spirit  of  the  Revaluation  Act  is  violated.  Let  it  never  be  forgotten  that  the 
Revaluation  Act  is  always  and  everywhere  seeking  after  the  truth.  The  truth 
gave  it  birth,  and  the  truth  dominated  its  administration.  This  same  spirit  of 
truth  now  calls  for  a  revision  of  the  real  estate  values  that  were  determined  as 
of  May  1,  1919.    "Worldwide  conditions  have  paralyzed  the  markets  for  our  staple 


7b  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

crops  and  this  is  of  necessity  reflected  in  the  value  of  the  lands  that  produced  these 
crops.  The  values  should  be  revised  to  meet  actual  conditions.  But  this  revision 
should  be  made  along  constructive  and  not  destructive  lines.  The  safest  and 
sanest  way  to  make  the  revision  is  to  call  upon  the  men  who  made  these  assess- 
ments to  revise  their  work  in  view  of  changed  conditions.  These  men  could  do 
the  work  with  maximum  intelligence  and  at  a  minimum  expenditure  of  time  and 
money.  In  this  connection  I  call  attention  to  the  very  able  report  of  the  State 
Tax  Commission  which  deals  with  this  subject,  and  desire  to  give  to  that  report 
my  hearty  and  unqualified  endorsement. 

A  WOKD  OF  FAREWELL 

This  concludes  my  message  and  marks  the  end  of  the  last  chapter  of  my  public 
service  to  the  State  of  North  Carolina.  Before  closing  the  book  I  desire  to  express 
to  you  and  through  you  to  the  people  whose  representatives  you  are,  my  grateful 
appreciation  of  the  innumerable  courtesies  and  kindnesses  shown  me  during  these 
four  years.  I  want  to  register  my  everlasting  gratitude  for  being  permitted  to 
serve  a  great  State  and  through  her  all  humanity  in  the  grandest  and  most  tragic 
hour  the  world  has  ever  known.  During  these  years  all  the  tides  of  life  have  been 
at  the  flood,  and  I  have  boxed  the  compass  of  human  emotions.  It  has  been  a 
rich  and  deep  experience.  It  is  today  to  me  a  benediction,  and  down  to  old  age 
will  continue  a  blessed  inspiration. 

I  shall  carry  with  me  from  the  office  many  sweet  and  glorious  memories,  but 
the  one  memory  that  will  forever  outshine  them  all  is  of  the  eighty  thousand  sons 
of  Carolina  who  at  their  country's  call  marched  forth  to  fight  and  die  for  God  and 
for  humanity.  Lest  we  forget,  I  write  it  down  in  this  last  chapter  and  certify 
to  all  the  generations  that  the  one  stupendous,  immortal  thing  connected  with 
this  administration  is  the  part  North  Carolina  played  in  the  World  War.  Every- 
thing done  in  the  field  of  taxation,  of  education,  of  agriculture,  of  mercy  to  the 
fallen,  of  the  physical  and  social  regeneration  of  our  people — all  of  it  is  but 
"a  snowflake  on  the  river"  in  the  gigantic  and  glorified  presence  of  the  eighty 
thousand  men  who  plunged  into  the  blood-red  tide  of  war.  Of  these  eighty 
thousand  men,  two  thousand  three  hundred  and  thirty-eight  "went  west" — far 
beyond  the  sunset's  radiant  glow.  I  shall  always  be  grateful  to  remember  that 
1  was  sometime  their  captain  and  always  their  comrade  in  the  Great  Adventure; 
and  my  fervent  prayer  is  that  when  my  summons  comes  and  for  me 

"The  sunset  gates  unbar, 

I  shall  see  them  waiting  stand, 
And  white  against  the  evening  star, 
The  welcome  of  their  beckoning  hand." 

And  now,  my  friends,  farewell,  good-bye,  and  may  He  give  His  angels  charge 
concerning  you  and  Carolina ! 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


MESSAGES  TO  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  77 


(27) 

TRANSMITTING  REPORT  OF  BUDGET  COMMISSION 

Raleigh,  'N.  C,  January  11,  1921. 
Gentlemen  of  the  General  Assembly: 

I  transmit  herewith  the  report  of  the  Budget  Commission  as  required  by  law. 
With  the  report  I  send  an  appropriation  hill  and  a  bond  bill  to  provide  the 
funds  for  the  permanent  improvements  recommended  by  the  Commission.     This 
is  also  in  compliance  with  the  statute. 

This  is  the  first  budget  bill  ever  reported  to  a  General  Assembly  in  North 
Carolina,  and  for  that  reason  the  Commission  has  endeavored  to  stay  strictly 
"within  the  law." 

We  have  made  the  report  as  brief  as  possible  consistent  with  thoroughness, 
and  venture  to  hope  that  it  will  prove  helpful  to  the  General  Assembly  in  the 
solution  of  the  problems  with  which  the  report  deals. 

Respectfully  submitted, 

T.  W.  Beckett,  Governor. 


(ID 
PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR 

1917 

1.  Planting  Day. 

2.  Call  for  Volunteers. 

3.  The  Call  of  the  Cross. 

4.  In  Honor  of  Our  Soldiers. 

5.  Fire  Prevention  Day. 

6.  State  Militia. 

7.  Liberty  Loan. 

8.  Y.  M.  C.  A. 

9.  Thanksgiving  Day,  1917. 

10.  Red  Cross  Week. 

1918 

11.  On  Conserving  Fuel. 

12.  Liberty  Day. 

13.  Vagrancy. 

14.  Red  Cross  Week. 

15.  Suicide  or  Salvation. 

16.  A  Call  to  Prayer. 

17.  Help  for  the  Helpless. 

18.  Registration  Day,  September  12,  1918. 

19.  The  Fourth  Liberty  Loan. 

20.  Thanksgiving  Day,  1918. 

1919 

21.  Our  Sacred  Honor. 

22.  Boy  Scouts. 

23.  The  High  Cost  of  Living. 

24.  A  Preventable  Tax. 

25.  Roosevelt  Day,  October  27th. 

26.  Remember  the  Horse  That  Pulled  the  Plow. 

27.  Armistice  Day,  November  11th. 

28.  Thanksgiving  Day,  1919. 

1920 

29.  Law  Enforcement  Day. 

30.  National  Thrift  Week  of  Y.  M.  C.  A. 

31.  Ship-by-Truck  Week. 

32.  Convening  the  General  Assembly  in  Extra  Session 

on  August  10,  1920. 

33.  Cotton  Day. 

34.  Armistice  Day  Proclamation. 

35.  Thanksgiving  Proclamation. 

36.  A  Child's  Cry  for  Help. 

37.  Keep  Boys  and  Girls  in  College. 


(1) 

PLANTING  DAY 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

Our  forefathers  established  the  noble  custom  of  setting  apart  a  day  in  autumn 
on  which  to  return  thanks  to  the  Lord  of  the  Harvest  for  having  blessed  them  with 
the  "kindly  fruits  of  the  earth." 

A  true  interpretation  of  the  Thanksgiving  spirit  comprehends  all  reasonable 
efforts  on  our  part  to  insure  celestial  bounty.  The  conditions  which  now  confront 
us  appeal  for  activity  on  our  part  with  peculiar  and  compelling  power. 

1.  The  World  War  has  drawn  to  the  battle  line  millions  of  those  who  in  times 
of  peace  "went  forth  to  sow."  China  and  the  United  States  are  about  to  swell 
the  leg'ons  who  fight  and  must  be  fed. 

2.  From  the  South  the  boll  weevil  is  marching  on  North  Carolina.  Full  cribs 
and  smokehouses  are  the  sure  and  safe  defense  against  the  coming  of  this  pest. 
In  every  state  the  destruction  of  cotton  by  the  boll  weevil  has  been  followed  by 
a  paralysis  of  the  farmer's  credit.  Being  forewarned  of  the  steady  advance  of 
this  enemy  and  the  certain  consequences  of  its  attack,  it  will  be  colossal  stupidity 
to  fail  to  meet  it  with  the  only  weapons  that  have  proved  effective,  to  wit,  broad 
acres  of  grains  and  grasses. 

3.  The  amended  crop  lien  law  was  framed  to  give  to  the  small  farmer  a  decent 
chance  to  escape  from  a  credit  system  that  levies  upon  the  right  to  live  and  labor 
the  heaviest  tribute  imposed  upon  a  helpless  people  since  Augustus  Csesar  issued 
his  decree  that  all  the  world  should  be  taxed.  But  the  farmer  who  fails  to 
increase  his  food  and  feed  crops  will  deny  to  himself  and  family  the  blessings 
of  the  law.  The  merchant  will  properly  refuse  to  make  unlimited  advances  under 
the  new  law.  Long  profits  will  no  longer  tempt  him  to  take  long  chances.  He 
will  wisely  and  justly  insist  that  the  fanner  must  produce  his  own  meat  and  meal, 
and  when  he  has  done  this  he  will  find  no  difficulty  in  obtaining  other  necessary 
supplies. 

All  these  things  make  a  substantial  increase  in  our  food  and  feed  crops  essential 
to  our  self-preservation. 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  do 
hereby  designate  and  set  apart  Thursday,  the  5th  day  of  April,  1917,  as  Planting 
Day,  and  on  that  day  I  earnestly  urge: 

1.  All  mayors  of  incorporated  towns  to  call  the  people  together  and  devise  and 
put  into  execution  practical  ways  and  means  of  having  every  vacant  lot  in  and 
adjacent  to  the  town  planted  to  grain  or  grass,  peas  or  potatoes. 

2.  All  farmers'  organizations  of  every  kind  to  meet  and  counsel  their  members 
to  heavily  increase  their  food  and  feed  crops  this  year. 


82  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

3.  All  landlords  to  insist  that  their  tenants  shall  plant  food  and  feed  crops 
ample  for  the  sustenance  of  their  families  and  their  livestock. 

4.  All  merchants  and  hankers  to  counsel  their  customers  who  are  engaged  in 
farming  to  increase  the  acreage  planted  to  food  and  feed  crops  to  such  an  extent 
that  it  will  be  unnecessary  for  them  to  purchase  any  food  supplies  next  year. 

The  times  are  troublous.  No  man  can  say  what  an  hour  may  bring  forth, 
but  if  we  shall  act  with  prudence  and  diligence  the  "meal  will  waste  not  nor  will 
the  oil  fail." 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  sixteenth  day  of  March,  in  the 
[great     year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  seventeen,  and  in  the 
seal]      one  hundred  and  forty-first  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


(2) 
CALL  FOR  VOLUNTEERS 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

The  War  Department  has  ordered  the  North  Carolina  National  Guard  to  be 
recruited  to  full  war  strength.  To  meet  this  requirement  the  following  recruits 
are  necessary : 

First  Regiment 1,000 

Second  Regiment 1,100 

Third  Regiment 1,200 

Other  Organizations 1,800 

These  other  organizations  include  the  Coast  Artillery,  Cavalry,  Engineers, 
and  Sanitary  Troops.  It  is  seen  that  over  5,000  volunteers  are  needed  to  bring 
the  National  Guard  up  to  full  war  strength.  It  is  apparent,  therefore,  that  any  one 
who  may  have  opposed  the  Selective  Draft  because  he  did  not  like  the  thought  of 
being  conscripted  is  now  given  a  chance  to  volunteer  for  military  service. 

Then,  too,  there  are  several  distinct  advantages  in  enlisting  in  the  National 
Guard : 

1.  While  those  who  enlist  in  the  National  Guard  will  be  required  to  register, 
they  will  be  exempt  from  draft. 

2.  He  who  enlists  has  the  privilege  of  selecting  the  command  and  branch  of 
service  he  desires  to  enter. 

3.  He  will  serve  under  officers  he  knows  and  among  his  own  friends  and 
acquaintances. 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR  83 

4.  A  person  volunteering  for  service  in  the  National  Guard  will  be  required 
to  enlist  only  for  the  duration  of  the  war. 

5.  A  permanent  roll  of  those  who  enlist  will  be  preserved  and  the  names  will 
be  published  daily  in  the  newspapers. 

6.  The  man  who  volunteers  for  service  in  the  National  Guard  has  a  better 
chance  for  promotion  than  he  who  is  taken  into  the  army  under  the  Selective 
Draft. 

Considering  these  advantages,  together  with  the  appeal  the  country  makes  for 
men,  I  confidently  expect  the  patriotic  young  manhood  of  North  Carolina  to 
quickly  fill  up  the  ranks  of  the  National  Guard.  History  does  not  show  where 
a  nation  has  ever  made  a  worthier  appeal  than  our  country  makes  to  its  sons 
today.  This  Eepublic  has  unsheathed  its  sword  in  defense  of  humanity  and  to 
prove  that  republics  have  a  right  to  live.  America  has  planted  the  emblem  of 
liberty  and  democracy  in  the  pathway  of  the  tyrant  and  the  autocrat.  And  she 
now  calls  upon  her  sons  to  keep  it  there.  We  like  to  sing  of  the  "sweet  land  of 
liberty"  and  "the  home  of  the  brave  and  the  free."  But  the  time  has  come  when 
it  is  not  enough  to  sing  only.  We  must  back  the  sentiment  with  action  in  order 
that  that  which  gave  birth  to  the  sentiment  shall  not  perish  from  the  earth. 

America  has  lifted  her  arm  in  defense  of  Christian  civilization  and  she  now 
calls  upon  her  sons  to  save  that  civilization.  This  is  no  ordinary  war.  It  is  a 
war  of  ideals;  for  in  it  a  civilization  that  exalts  love  and  service  is  pitted  against 
a  civilization  that  exalts  power  and  selfishness.  A  civilization  in  which  the  strong 
must  serve  the  weak  is  at  war  with  a  civilization  in  which  the  weak  must  serve 
the  strong.  It  is,  in  short,  a  war  to  determine  whether  the  ideals  of  Jesus  or  the 
ideals  of  Thor  shall  dominate  the  world.  We  like  to  pray,  "Thy  Kingdom  come," 
but  the  time  has  come  when  it  is  not  enough  to  pray  only. 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  do 
hereby  call  upon  and  urge  unmarried  men  who  are  fit  for  military  service  to 
enlist  in  the  organizations  located  in  the  communities  in  which  they  reside.  And 
the  people  of  all  communities  in  which  the  various  companies  are  located  are 
earnestly  urged  to  take  an  active  interest  in  bringing  up  the  organizations  to  their 
full  war  strength. 

No  citizen  of  the  State  should  be  content  until  this  is  done.  Never  yet  has 
the  Nation  called  and  failed  to  receive  prompt  answer  from  the  people  of  North 
Carolina.  Let  us  not  forget  that  in  every  crisis  in  the  Republic's  life,  from  Kings 
Mountain  to  the  present  momentous  hour,  the  people  of  this  Commonwealth  have 
responded  to  their  country's  call  with  a  spirit  of  self-sacrifice  and  devotion  to 
duty  worthy  of  the  best  traditions  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  race  and  with  a  courage 
that  has  challenged  the  admiration  of  mankind  in  every  land  where  people  love 
liberty  and  men  are  not  afraid  to  die  for  a  principle. 

North  Carolina  will  not  fail — must  not  fail — in  this  hour.  I  know  that  our 
people  want  the  State  to  do  its  full  share  of  the  work  that  must  be  done  by  the 
states  of  this  Union,  not  only  to  preserve  free  government  on  this  continent,  but 
in  order  that  the  whole  world  may  be  "made  safe  for  democracy."  Therefore,  1 
appeal  with  confidence  to  the  patriotic  manhood  of  the  State;  and  I  expect  a 
response  worthy  of  the  sons  of  the  fathers  who  laid  down  their  lives  in  order  that 
we  might  be  free. 


84  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  twenty-first  day  of  May,  in 
[great     the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  seventeen,  and  in 
seal]      the  one  hundred  and  forty-first  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

Santfokd  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


(3) 
THE  CALL  OF  THE  GROSS 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  hy  the  Governor 

Civilization  is  in  the  grip  of  savagery,  and  the  world  hleeds  at  every  pore. 
The  garnered  wisdom  of  the  past  and  the  inventive  genius  of  the  present  are 
devoted  to  the  processes  of  destruction.  But  in  the  midst  of  chaos  and  of  gloom 
one  light  burns  with  added  luster — the  light  of  the  Crimson  Cross.  To  this  light 
Barbarian  and  Greek,  Christian  and  Turk  look  for  mercy,  and  do  not  look  in 
vain,  for  the  light  is  born  of  the  love  that  never  faileth. 

One  hundred  million  dollars  are  necessary  to  enable  the  Red  Cross  to  fulfill 
its  benign  mission  among  the  soldiers  we  are  calling  to  service.  Can  we,  who  are 
permitted  to  remain  at  home,  deny  to  the  men  we  are  sending  to  the  front  the 
soothing  and  saving  ministrations  of  an  order  that  happily  combines  perfect  love 
with  perfect  skill  ? 

The  President  of  the  United  States  is  deeply  impressed  with  the  value  of  and 
the  necessity  for  this  work,  and  has  issued  a  special  proclamation  calling  upon 
the  people  to  dedicate  the  week  beginning  June  18th  to  the  raising  of  one  hundred 
million  dollars  for  the  Red  Cross. 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  and 
Chairman  of  the  North  Carolina.  Division  of  the  Red  Cross,  do  beseech  the 
people  of  the  State  to  hearken  to  the  call  of  the  cross  and  urge  them  to  make 
real  self-sacrificing  gifts  to  an  organization  that  by  the  might  of  its  mercies  has 
intrenched  itself  in  the  hearts  of  all  mankind,  and  that  now  proposes  to  make 
our  sons  the  object  of  its  tenderest  care. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  twelfth  day  of  June,  in  the 
[great     year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  seventeen,  and  in  the 
seal]      one  hundred  and  forty-first  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  "W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor  :  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR  85 


(4) 
IN  HONOR  OF  OUR  SOLDIERS 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

North  Carolina  is  about  to  send  twenty-five  thousand  men  into  battle.  These 
men  are  making  the  supreme  sacrifice  that  forever  hereafter  the  wisdom  of  the 
many  shall  determine  the  decrees  of  nations.  They  go  to  make  war  on  war.  They 
go  to  destroy  with  the  sword  the  government  that  maintains  that  the  sword  is,  and 
of  right  ought  to  be,  the 'final  arbiter  of  a  nation's  rights. 

When  the  government  that  deifies  war  shall  perish  in  war  then  war  will  come 
no  more  upon  the  earth. 

It  is  fit  that  these  guarantors  of  the  world's  peace  should  be  sustained  by  the 
love  and  prayers  of  all  good  men. 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  do 
request  the  people  of  the  State : 

First.  To  assemble  on  Saturday,  the  first  day  of  September,  in  township  and 
school  district  meetings,  and  hold  patriotic  exercises  in  honor  of  the  men  we  are 
sending  to  the  front. 

Second.  On  Sunday,  September  2d,  let  special  religious  services  be  held  in  all 
the  churches  in  the  State,  and  let  all  good  men  pray  for  the  safety  and  success 
of  the  men  who  are  going  into  battle  that  lasting  peace  may  come  upon  the  land. 

Third.  That  on  Labor  Day,  September  3d,  appropriate  patriotic  exercises  be 
held  in  every  county-seat  in  the  State ;  and  let  the  men  who  have  been  drafted  into 
the  public  service  be  the  guests  of  honor  at  these  exercises. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh  this  the  twenty-fifth  day  of  August,  in 

[great     the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  seventeen,  and  in 

seal]      the  one  hundred  and  forty-second  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 


86  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 


(5) 
FIRE  PREVENTION  DAY 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

.Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  hy  the  Governor 

Taxes  are  a  great  burden,  and  a  source  of  constant  irritation.  The  ingenuity 
of  statesmen  is  being  taxed  to  reduce  and  to  equalize  tbe  tax  burden,  and  yet  the 
fire  tax  annually  levied  upon  the  State  of  North  Carolina  is  practically  equal  to 
the  entire  taxes  levied  for  the  support  of  the  State  Government.  We  may  equalize 
the  governmental  taxes,  but  they  must  be  paid  to  some  one.  Two-thirds  of  the 
fire  taxes  are  wholly  unnecessary,  and  are  due  to  lack  of  reasonable  care. 

Realizing  this,  the  General  Assembly  of  North  Carolina  has  set  aside  the 
9th  day  of  October  of  each  and  every  year  as  Fire  Prevention  Day,  and  makes  it 
the  duty  of  the  Governor  to  issue  a  proclamation,  urging  the  people  to  a  proper 
observance  of  the  day. 

Now,  therefore,  I,  T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  in  accordance 
with  this  statute,  do  issue  this  my  proclamation,  and  I  do  set  aside  and  designate 
Tuesday,  the  9th  day  of  October,  1917,  as  Fire  Prevention  Day,  and  do  urge  all 
the  people  to  a  proper  observance  of  this  day  in  obedience  to  the  law  of  North 
Carolina.  I  urge  the  public  schools  of  the  State  and  the  municipal  officers  thereof 
to  give  proper  and  formal  recognition  of  the  day  and  its  meaning,  and  request 
the  citizens  generally  to  give  special  attention  on  that  day  to  the  condition  of  their 
premises,  to  the  end  that  the  waste  and  loss  of  property  and  life  may  be  reduced 
in  this  State. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  fifteenth  day  of  September. 

[great     in  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  seventeen,  and 

seal]      in  the  one  hundred  and  forty-second  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR  87 


(6) 
STATE  MILITIA 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

Whereas,  it  lias  been  made  to  appear  to  me  that  conditions  now  prevail  within 
the  State  calling  for  the  use  and  service  of  an  effective  force  for  the  maintenance 
of  peace  and  order ;  and 

Whereas,  the  companies  composing  the  organized  State  Guard  are  now  absent 
from  the  State,  having  been  duly  called  into  the  National  service ;  and 

Whereas,  by  an  act  passed  at  the  last  session  of  the  General  Assembly,  entitled 
"An  act  to  revise  the  military  laws  of  the  State  of  North  Carolina  and  to  in- 
crease the  efficiency  of  the  militia,"  ratified  the  sixth  day  of  March,  1917,  all 
able-bodied  male  citizens  of  the  State  and  all  able-bodied  male  residents  therein 
who  have  signified  their  purpose  to  become  citizens,  between  the  ages  of  eighteen 
and  forty-five,  unless  excepted  by  special  law,  are  constituted  and  declared  to  be 
the  unorganized  militia  of  the  State  and  made  subject  to  the  call  of  the  Governor 
for  the  purpose  indicated : 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor,  by  virtue  of  authority 
vested  in  me  by  the  general  laws  and  more  especially  by  the  provisions  of  said 
act,  do  make  this  my  proclamation  and  call  into  the  active  service  of  the  State 
the  said  unorganized  militia  as  described  and  designated  in  said  act,  between  the 
ages  of  thirty-one  and  forty-five,  to  the  number  of  five  thousand,  not  less  than 
twenty-five  in  any  one  county,  and  the  remainder  to  be  apportioned  to  the  larger 
counties  as  the  Governor  may  designate,  to  be  selected  by  draft  and  forthwith 
organized  and  equipped  as  provided  by  said  statute  and  the  regulations  to  be 
immediately  framed  and  published  pursuant  to  the  same. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh  this  the  twenty-third  day  of  September, 

[great     in  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  seventeen,  and  in 

seal]      the  one  hundred  and  forty-second  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


88  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(7) 

LIBERTY  LOAN 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

The  President  of  the  United  States  having  set  apart  Wednesday,  the  24th  of 
October,  as  Liberty  Bond  Day,  and  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  of  the  United 
States  having  expressed  a  desire  that  the  governors  of  the  several  states  should 
proclaim  the  24th  day  of  October  a  legal  holiday: 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  do 
hereby  set  apart  and  proclaim  Wednesday,  the  24th  day  of  October,  as  a  legal 
holiday.  I  earnestly  urge  all  classes  and  conditions  of  our  citizens  to  devote  their 
energies  on  that  day  to  the  sale  of  Liberty  Bonds.  Especially  do  I  urge  the 
mayors  of  all  incorporated  towns  to  perfect  plans  to  make  a  thorough  canvass  of 
their  communities  in  an  effort  to  sell  bonds  of  small  denominations.  The  sheriffs 
of  the  State  have  undertaken  to  canvass  the  rural  precincts,  and  I  urge  the 
mayors  to  see  to  it  that  the  matter  of  the  sale  of  Liberty  Bonds  and  their  attract- 
iveness as  an  investment  is  clearly  set  before  all  the  people  in  all  the  towns  of 
the  State. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  nineteenth  day  of  October,  in 
[great     the  year  of  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  seventeen,  and  in  the 
seal]      one  hundred  and  forty-first  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 


(3) 
Y.  M.  C.  A. 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 


The  people  of  North  Carolina  have  been  called  upon  to  contribute  $300,000 
to  the  national  fund  of  $35,000,000  for  the  support  of  the  Young  Men's  Christian 
Association  in  the  work  it  is  doing  among  our  soldiers  at  home  and  abroad. 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  TEE  GOVERNOR  89 

In  view  of  the  service  being  rendered  by  the  Army  and  Navy  "War  Work 
Council  for  the  moral  and  military  efficiency  of  the  soldiers  and  sailors  of  our 
country,  in  training  camp  and  at  the  front,  and  among  our  allies  in  the  great 
struggle  for  world-wide  democracy  : 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  do 
hereby  set  apart  and  proclaim  November  11th  to  19th,  1917,  as  Army  Y.  M.  C.  A. 
War  Work  Campaign  Week.  During  this  period  I  earnestly  urge  and  request 
that  every  citizen  do  his  duty  by  contributing  liberally  to  this  cause  of  safe- 
guarding and  giving  happiness  to  the  Nation's  youth  in  arms.  I  especially  urge 
all  pastors  and  church  leaders  and  members  of  churches  of  all  denominations  and 
of  all  creeds  to  cooperate  in  this  campaign.  I  also  earnestly  request  that  all 
people  who  are  not  members  of  any  church,  but  who  believe  in  the  cause  for 
which  America  is  fighting,  devote  their  best  energies  to  this  campaign  to  the  end 
that  North  Carolina  may  do  its  full  share  of  the  work  that  must  be  done  in  order 
that  the  national  fund  may  be  raised. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  seventh  day  of  November,  in  the 
[great     year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  seventeen,  and  in  the 
seal]      one  hundred  and  forty-second  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

Santfoed  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 


(9) 
THANKSGIVING  DAY,  1917 

State  op  North  Carolina 
Executive  Department 
•        Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

Salvation  comes  through  sacrifice. 

He  who  would  truly  save  his  life  must  be  ever  ready  to  lose  it. 

The  man  or  the  nation  that  prizes  breath  above  honor,  and  riches  above 
righteousness,  is  dust  already,  and  can  never  hope  "to  put  on  immortality." 

In  the  providence  of  God  the  world  is  today  engaged  in  blood-red  debate  to 
determine  whether  government  shall  henceforth  be  guided  by  the  love  of  justice 
or  by  lust  for  pelf  and  power. 

Not  in  rashness  nor  in  anger,  but  thoughtfully,  in  the  fear  of  God,  and  out  of 
respect  for  its  own  conscience,  this  Nation  has  consecrated  its  unlimited  resources 
and  its  unconquerable  spirit  to  the  maintenance  of  governments  that  will  guarantee 
fair  treatment  to  every  man  and  every  nation. 

It  is  cause  for  universal  thanksgiving  that  in  the  most  awful  and  most 
august  hour  of  human  history  the  conscience  of  our  people  triumphed  over  the 
counsel  of  selfishness  and  fear. 


90  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

This  is  the  blessing  of  the  year. 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  "Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  the  State  of  North 
Carolina,  in  obedience  to  the  sacred  custom  of  our  fathers,  and  in  accord  with 
the  proclamation  of  the  President  of  the  United  States,  do  hereby  set  apart 
Thursday,  the  29th  day  of  November,  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  seventeen, 
as  a  day  for  universal  Thanksgiving. 

And  I  do  call  upon  the  people  of  North  Carolina  to  assemble  on  that  day  in 
their  places  of  worship,  and  with  humble  and  contrite  hearts  give  thanks  to  the 
Lord  of  Hosts  and  the  Harvest  for  His  omniscient  care. 

And  let  us  remember  in  helpful  ways  the  widow  and  the  orphan  and  all  who 
walk  in  the  shadow  of  adversity. 

And  let  us  pray  unceasingly  that  He  who 

"Rides  the  whirlwind  and  directs  the  storm" 

may  crown  our  forces  on  sea  and  land  with  everlasting  victory,  and  that  war  may 
come  no  more  upon  the  earth. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Ealeigh  on  this  the  eighteenth  day  of  November, 

[gkeat     in  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  seventeen,  and 

seal]      in  the  one  hundred  and  forty-second  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santfohd  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 


(10) 
RED  CROSS  WEEK 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Baleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

The  American  Bed  Cross  calls  for  ten  million  new  members.  Facing  tbe 
most  stupendous  task  in  all  its  history,  this  organization  must  have  greater 
strength  in  order  to  meet  its  larger  responsibilities. 

The  Bed  Cross  follows  the  Flag  on  land  and  sea,  carrying  hope  and  healing 
to  the  millions  who  go  forth  to  fight.  It  must  stay  close  to  the  men  who  are 
bearing  the  real  burdens  of  this  World  War.  Whenever  a  soldier  falls  the  Bed 
Cross  must  be  ready  to  save  him.  Wherever  there  is  human  suffering  in  the  war- 
stricken  countries  of  our  comrades  in  arms  there  the  Bed  Cross  must  go  to  com- 
fort and  sustain. 

If  you  cannot  enlist  in  the  battalion  of  the  khaki  you  can  at  least  join  the 
army  of  the  Bed  Cross.  Bealizing  its  importance  in  the  present  world  conflict, 
President  Wilson  has  called  for  volunteers  in  this  army,  and  during  the  week 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR  91 

ending  with  Christmas  Eve,  the  Eed  Cross  will  make  a  special  appeal  for  your 
support. 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  "Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  Worth  Carolina,  in  an 
earnest  desire  to  aid  this  splendid  cause,  and  in  accord  with  the  proclamation  of 
the  President  of  the  United  States,  do  herehy  set  apart  and  proclaim  the  week  of 
December  17th  to  25th,  1917,  as  Eed  Cross  "Week,  and  urge  the  people  of  Worth 
Carolina  to  join  the  American  Eed  Cross  during  that  period. 

It  is  peculiarly  fitting  that  the  week  preceding  Christmas  should  be  selected 
as  the  time  to  offer  our  support  to  this  great  branch  of  the  National  service.  If 
there  were  no  Christmas  there  would  be  no  Eed  Cross.  The  Eed  Cross  is  the 
world's  finest  interpretation  of  the  spirit  of  Christmas.  If  you  want  to  translate 
the  Christmas  spirit  into  terms  of  action,  you  can  do  no  better  than  take  mem- 
bership in  the  American  Eed  Cross,  the  only  agency  through  which  those  who  stay 
at  home  can  send  Christmas  joy  and  good  will  to  the  men  on  the  firing  line  holding 
back  the  Hun. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Ealeigh  on  this  the  fourteenth  day  of  December. 

[great     in  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  seventeen,  and 

seal]      in  the  one  hundred  and  forty-second  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  "W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


(11) 
ON  CONSERVING  FUEL 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Ealeigh 

A  Proclamation  hy  the  Governor 

Cut  wood,  cut  wood,  and  cut  more  wood. 

This  is  my  appeal  to  the  people  of  North  Carolina.  In  time  of  sunshine 
prepare  for  blizzards.  Eternal  vigilance  is  the  price  of  warmth.  The  comfort 
of  our  people  during  the  freezes  of  next  winter  depends  upon  the  number  of  cords 
of  wood  stacked  in  North  Carolina  during  the  next  six  weeks. 

The  fuel  situation  has  been  serious  this  winter.  Schools  and  churches  were 
closed  when  they  should  have  been  open.  Factories  were  shut  down  for  a  whole 
week  when  they  ought  to  have  been  running  day  and  night.  Many  people  suffered. 
There  were  times  when  the  situation  looked  grave,  especially  for  the  poor  of 
some  of  our  towns  and  cities.  Prompt  and  energetic  action  by  the  Fuel  Admin- 
istration and  municipal  authorities  alone  prevented  fearful  consequences  in  some 
sections.  And  all  because  of  lack  of  wood.  In  the  light  of  this  experience  it 
would  be  worse  than  folly  for  the  people  of  North  Carolina  to  depend  next 
winter,  as  they  have  done  in  the  past,  on  coal  for  fuel. 


92  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  PICKETT 

The  United  States  Department  of  Agriculture  says :  "No  one  knows  how 
much  coal  there  will  be  for  general  purposes  next  year.  With  the  numerous 
demands  being  made  upon  both  coal  and  transportation  the  shortage  may  be  more 
widespread  and  severe  than  this  year.  It  is  only  a  matter  of  good  business  fore- 
sight for  those  communities  that  have  the  wood  around  them  to  see  that  some 
time  during  the  season  a  sufficient  supply  is  cut  and  hauled  where  it  could  be 
easily  available  as  a  reserve  next  winter.    The  time  to  cut  it  is  right  now." 

The  State  Fuel  Administrator  says :  "Next  winter  is  going  to  be  the  rub,  and 
we  cannot  begin  too  soon  to  prepare  for  it.  The  next  sixty  days  is  the  best  period 
of  the  year  for  cutting  cordwood." 

The  people  of  North  Carolina  can  and  should  prepare  enough  wood  during  the 
spring  months  to  supply  every  household  in  the  State  all  next  winter.  And  to 
this  end  I  earnestly  urge  them  to  go  into  the  woods  and  cut,  the  while  remembering 
that  the  man  who  chops  a  tree  in  this  cause  serves  his  country  no  less  than  he 
who  digs  a  trench. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Ealeigh,  this  the  twentieth  day  of  February,  in 
[great     the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  eighteen,  and  in  the 
seal]      one  hundred  and  forty-second  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santfokd  Maetin, 

Private  Secretary. 


(12) 

LIBERTY  DAY 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

The  President  of  the  United  States,  by  proclamation,  has  designated  Friday, 
April  26th,  as  Liberty  Day,  and  has  made  the  afternoon  of  that  day  a  holiday 
for  all  Federal  employees  whose  services  can  be  spared. 

The  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  of  the  United  States  has  expressed  a  desire  that 
the  governors  of  the  several  states  should  also  set  apart  the  26th  of  April  as 
Liberty  Day  in  each  state,  to  be  especially  devoted  to  the  Liberty  Loan  campaign, 
and  that  the  afternoon  of  that  day  be  proclaimed  a  legal  holiday. 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  "Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  do 
hereby  set  apart  Friday,  April  26th,  as  Liberty  Day,  and  proclaim  the  afternoon 
of  that  day  a  legal  holiday  throughout  the  State.  I  earnestly  request  that  all 
stores  and  public  places  be  closed  and  that  all  of  our  citizens  devote  their  best 
energies  during  this  brief  period  to  the  sale  of  liberty  bonds.  In  order  to  stimu- 
late greater  interest  in  the  campaign,  I  urge  the  people  in  the  cities,  towns  and 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR  93 

country  districts  to  join  in  appropriate  ceremonies.  Especially  do  I  urge  the 
mayors  and  other  local  governing  authorities  to  cooperate  in  the  enthusiastic 
celebration  of  Liberty  Day.  The  success  of  the  Liberty  Loan  is  so  vital  to  the 
Nation  that  it  is  the  first  duty  of  every  citizen  to  do  his  utmost  in  this  campaign. 
Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  twenty-third  day  of  April,  in 
[great  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  eighteen,  and  in  the 
seal]      one  hundred  and  forty-second  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

Santfoed  Maetin, 
Private  Secretary. 


(13) 
VAGRANCY 

State  of  Noetit  Carolina 

Executive  Depabtment 

Bat.eigh 

A  Proclamation  hy  the  Governor 

Never  before  in  the  history  of  North  Carolina  has  it  been  of  such  supreme 
importance  to  bring  together  the  jobless  man  and  the  manless  job.  The  agricul- 
tural, commercial  and  industrial  life  of  the  State  depends  on  the  utilization  to  its 
fullest  capacity  of  every  labor  unit  that  can  be  found.  At  this  time  idleness  is  a 
crime  that  savors  strongly  of  treason,  for  the  men  at  the  front  cannot  fight  unless 
the  men  at  home  work. 

To  this  end  I  call  on  every  county  in  North  Carolina  to  hold  a  meeting  on 
Wednesday,  May  29th,  for  the  purpose  of  discussing  the  best  methods  of  en- 
forcing our  vagrancy  laws,  of  establishing  employment  bureaus  and  of  appointing 
delegates  to  a  State  Convention  to  be  held  in  Raleigh  on  Tuesday,  June  4,  1918, 
for  the  purpose  of  discussing  these  subjects.  The  Federal  Government  is  vitally 
interested  in  this  matter,  and  its  representatives  are  prepared  to  give  valuable 
assistance  in  the  solution  of  the  grave  labor  problem  that  confronts  the  State. 
Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  fourteenth  day  of  May,  in  the 
[geeat  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  eighteen,  and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-second  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor  :  Governor. 

Santfoed  Maetin, 
Private  Secretary. 


94  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(14) 
RED  CROSS  WEEK 

State  of  Worth  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

The  Red  Cross  is  no  longer  an  experiment.  It  has  demonstrated  beyond  all 
question  the  necessity  for  and  value  of  its  work.  If  doubt  of  its  usefulness  ever 
existed,  that  doubt  has  been  dissipated  by  the  wonderful  service  the  Red  Cross  has 
rendered  to  humanity  since  the  war  storm  broke  upon  Europe  in  1914. 

In  modern  warfare  the  Red  Cross  is  as  essential  to  victory  as  the  aeroplane. 
If  one  is  the  army's  eyes,  the  other  is  its  heart.  Today  the  army  surgeon  and  the 
Red  Cross  nurse  stand  side  by  side  in  heroism  and  service. 

An  appeal  for  the  support  of  the  Red  Cross,  therefore,  is  an  appeal  for  the 
support  of  the  army — for  the  support  of  the  forces  that  are  fighting  for  our  homes 
and  our  honor  and  our  liberty.  It  is  such  an  appeal  that  comes  to  us  now.  If  this 
vital  arm  of  our  country's  defense  is  not  to  be  weakened,  it  must  be  sustained  by 
the  patriotism  and  the  sacrifice  of  all  true  Americans. 

During  the  last  year  the  Red  Cross  has  practically  exhausted  all  of  its  funds 
by  appropriations  for  the  welfare  of  our  naval  and  military  forces  and  those 
dependent  upon  them,  and  for  the  urgent  necessities  of  our  allies.  It  is  now 
asking  the  people  of  America  for  one  hundred  million  dollars,  and  the  President 
of  the  United  States  has  issued  a  proclamation  designating  the  week  beginning 
May  20,  1918,  as  Red  Cross  "Week,  and  calling  upon  all  the  people  "again  to  give 
generously  to  the  continuation  of  the  important  work  of  relieving  distress,  restoring 
the  waste  of  war,  and  assisting  in  maintaining  the  morale  of  our  own  troops  and 
the  troops  and  people  of  our  allies." 

ISTorth  Carolina  is  called  upon  to  contribute  six  hundred  thousand  dollais  of 
this  amount.  I  confidently  believe  that  our  people  will  cheerfully  respond  to 
this  worthy  appeal  and  that  this  State's  allotment  will  be  speedily  subscribed. 
To  that  end,  therefore,  I  hereby  set  apart  and  proclaim  the  week  beginning 
May  20,  1918,  as  Red  Cross  Week  in  North  Carolina,  during  which  I  earnestly 
urge  every  man,  woman  and  child  in  the  State  to  contribute  something  to  this 
fund,  and  not  to  rest  until  the  full  amount  is  raised. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  sixteenth  day  of  May,  in  the 
[great     year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  eighteen,  and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-second  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR  95 

(15) 

SUICIDE  OR  SALVATION 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

Charles  Dickens's  most  famous  character  is  Mr.  Micawber.  Micawber's  most 
famous  saying  is 

"Annual  income  twenty  pounds, 
Annual  expenditure  nineteen  six. 
Result:    happiness. 
Annual  income  twenty  pounds, 
Annual  expenditure  twenty  pounds  six, 
Result :    misery." 

Four  dollars  and  seventeen  cents  invested  in  a  five-dollar  War  Savings  Cer- 
tificate will  take  care  of  this  pivotal  pound,  and  place  it  on  the  right  side  of  the 
family  ledger.  To  the  ninety  and  nine  Thrift  Stamps  and  War  Savings  Cer- 
tificates afford  the  best  opportunity  to  serve  and  to  save  themselves  and  the 
Nation. 

If  our  people  will  invest  fifty  millions  of  dollars  in  these  securities  they  will 
open  for  themselves  a  new  door  of  hope,  and  for  North  Carolina  a  new  era  of 
financial  independence. 

After  the  war  there  will  be  a  tremendous  competition  for  business  between 
nations,  communities  and  individuals.  North  Carolina  may  not  hope  to  get  its 
legitimate  share  of  this  business  unless  we  shall  store  up  the  capital  with  which 
to  carry  it  on.  If  we  fail  to  do  this,  North  Carolina  soldiers  will  come,  home  to 
a  land  without  jobs,  and  will  of  necessity  be  drawn  away  from  us  into  more 
thoughtful  and  provident  communities. 

The  issue  is  vital  and  plain. 

The  purchase  of  War  Savings  Certificates  spells  industrial  salvation. 

The  failure  to  purchase  War  Savings  Certificates  spells  industrial  suicide. 

Therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  do  hereby 
set  apart  the  period  beginning  Saturday,  June  22d,  and  ending  Friday,  June  28th, 
as  War  Savings  Week,  and  during  this  week  the  people  of  North  Carolina  are 
urged  to  pledge  themselves  to  purchase  Thrift  Stamps  and  War  Savings  Cer- 
tificates of  the  face  value  of  $48,53S,314,  being  twenty  dollars  for  every  man, 
woman  and  child  in  the  State. 

To  this  end  I  urge  every  individual  and  every  organization,  religious,  educa- 
tional, social  and  industrial,  to  devote  their  thoughts  and  energies  to  this  vital 
campaign  during  the  period  named. 

And  especially  do  I  urge: 

1.  The  mayors  of  all  towns  and  cities  to  issue  War  Savings  proclamations. 

2.  All  ministers  of  the  Gospel  and  superintendents  of  Sunday  schools  to  talk 
to  their  people  on  Sunday,  June  23d,  on  the  salvation  of  thrift. 


96  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

3.  That  from  Monday,  June  24th,  to  Thursday,  June  27th,  inclusive,  a  house- 
to-house  canvass  be  made,  and  every  person  in  the  State  be  given  an  opportunity 
to  sign  a  War  Savings  pledge. 

4.  That  on  Friday,  June  28th,  which  is  War  Savings  Day,  set  apart  by  the 
President  of  the  United  States,  every  person  to  go  to  the  schoolhouse  in  his  district 
to  attend  the  great  War  Savings  Rally  to  be  held  there,  and  to  make  sure  that  the 
quota  of  that  district,  which  is  twenty  dollars  for  every  man,  woman  and  child  in 
the  district,  is  purchased  or  pledged. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  seventh  day  of  June,   in  the 
[great     year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  eighteen,  and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-second  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santfoed  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


(16) 

A  CALL  TO  PRAYER 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

"God  of  our  fathers,  be  the  God 
Of  their  succeeding  race." 

The  people  of  North  Carolina  believe  in  God,  in  His  mercy,  and  in  His  might. 
So  believing,  it  behooves  us  to  pray  that  our  daily  offerings  of  blood  and  treasure 
may  be  acceptable  in  His  sight,  and  that  He  may  use  them  to  establish  perfect 
justice  and  perpetual  peace  among  all  the  children  of  men. 

To  this  end  I  earnestly  request  all  Christian  ministers  to  have  the  bells  of 
their  several  churches  rung  for  two  minutes  every  evening  at  seven  o'clock  from 
Sunday,  June  30,  1918,  until  the  end  of  this  war.  At  the  ringing  of  the  church 
bells  I  earnestly  beseech  every  person  in  the  State,  the  citizens  and  also  the 
strangers  within  our  gates,  to  bow  their  heads  in  fervent  prayer  to  the  God  of 
battles,  to  give  to  our  forces  on  sea  and  land  wisdom  and  foresight,  courage  and 
fortitude,  and  make  them  more  than  conquerors  of  the  powers  of  evil  arrayed 
against  them. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  twenty-seventh  day  of  June,  in 
[great     the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  eighteen,  and  in  the 
seal]      one  hundred  and  forty-second  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR  97 

(17) 

HELP  FOR  THE  HELPLESS 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  oy  the  Governor 

Last  year  the  whole  world  was  thrilled  when  the  news  flashed  over  the  wires 
that  Jerusalem  had  been  delivered  from  the  hands  of  the  Turk.  The  feeling  was 
universal  that  the  Holy  City  should  he  restored  to  the  people  who  had  builded 
it  and  with  whose  history  it  is  forever  associated.  This  is  a  fine  sentiment,  but 
finer  and  vastly  more  important  than  the  restoration  of  the  Holy  City  is  the  sal- 
vation of  millions  of  Jews  from  hunger  and  disease  and  death.  In  Turkey,  in 
Palestine,  in  Lithuania,  in  Russia,  in  Poland,  and  in  Galicia  starvation  stares  the 
children  of  Abraham  in  the  face.  Daily,  Jewish  husbands  see  their  wives  grow 
thin  and  pale  and  fade  away  into  the  Great  Silence.  Daily,  Jewish  babies  tug 
frantically  at  breasts  that  are  withered  and  dry;  and  above  the  din  of  battles  is 
heard  once  more  the  voice  of  Rachel  weeping  for  her  children  and  refusing  to  be 
comforted,  because  they  are  not. 

I  call  upon  the  good  people  of  North  Carolina  to  hearken  to  this  cry,  to  rally 
to  the  help  of  the  helpless  and  once  again  to  show  themselves  worthy  of  the  high 
service  they  are  privileged  to  render.  The  hounded,  hungering  Jew  can  well 
afford  to  die.  We  cannot  afford,  by  indifference  and  inaction,  to  have  his  blood 
on  our  hands. 

Therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  do  hereby 
set  apart  Monday,  the  19th  day  of  August,  1918,  as  Jewish  Relief  Day.  I  ask  all 
the  newspapers  to  give  wide  publicity  to  this  day,  and  especially  ask  that  on 
Sunday,  the  18th  day  of  August,  notice  be  given  in  all  the  churches  in  the  State 
that  the  following  Monday  will  be  observed  as  Jewish  Relief  Day,  and  the  people 
will  be  given  an  opportunity  to  help  this  stricken  race. 

On  Monday,  the  19th  day  of  August,  I  beg  all  our  people  to  give  to  this  most 
worthy  cause  generously  and  gladly.  Let  Jew  and  Gentile  touch  elbows,  and  work 
together  for  the  relief  of  these  millions  in  distress,  and  may  He  who  made  and 
loves  us  all  bestow  upon  every  giver  and  every  gift  His  heavenly  benediction. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  third  day  of  August,  in  the  year 
[great     of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  eighteen,  and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-third  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 


98  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(18) 

REGISTRATION  DAY,  SEPTEMBER  12,  1918 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

America  has  taken  her  place  with  the  Allies  of  humanity.  Her  ideals,  pro- 
claimed by  our  President  and  hailed  by  the  civilized  world  as  a  new  charter  of 
liberty,  have  been  hallowed  and  consecrated  by  the  blood  of  her  sons  shed  on  the 
sacred  soil  of  France.  In  order  that  those  ideals  may  be  sustained  and  the  prin- 
ciples of  liberty  and  humanity  which  we  share  with  our  Allies  made  secure,  the 
full  military  man-power  of  the  Nation  is  called  to  the  colors.  Unchallenged 
freedom  is  to  be  achieved  for  the  world  by  the  unlimited  power  of  American  man- 
hood. 

Declaring  that  we  "solemnly  purpose  a  decisive  victory  of  arms,"  the  Pres- 
ident of  the  United  States,  by  virtue  of  authority  imposed  in  him  by  Congress, 
has  by  proclamation  called  upon  all  men  of  America  between  the  ages  of  eighteen 
and  forty-five,  inclusive,  to  register  on  Thursday,  the  12th  day  of  September,  1918. 
On  that  day  all  men  who  have  reached  their  eighteenth  birthday  and  have  not 
reached  their  forty-sixth  birthday,  are  required  to  register,  unless  they  are  already 
registered  for  military  service.  The  usual  precinct  voting  places  will  be  the 
places  of  registration.  The  hours  for  registration  will  be  from  seven  o'clock,  a.  m., 
to  nine  o'clock,  p.  m. 

North  Carolina  will  not  lag  in  the  performance  of  this  duty.  Nearly  a 
hundred  thousand  of  her  sons  are  now  in  the  service,  and  back  of  these  stands  a 
loyal  and  united  Commonwealth  eager  to  serve.  When  the  first  call  for  military 
registration  was  made  fifteen  months  ago,  more  than  two  hundred  thousand  North 
Carolinians  registered  for  service.  In  the  coming  registration  it  is  estimated  that 
250,000  men  will  register  in  this  State.  In  order  to  handle  so  large  a  registration, 
more  than  3,000  men  have  cheerfully  responded  to  the  call  to  serve  as  registrars 
in  the  various  precincts  of  the  State.  The  proportion  as  well  as  the  purpose  of 
this  occasion  challenges  and  compels  the  loyal  support  and  cooperation  of  every 
citizen. 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  "Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  do 
hereby  call  upon  every  man  in  the  State  who  has  reached  the  age  of  eighteen,  and 
has  not  reached  the  age  of  forty-six,  on  Thursday,  September  12,  1918,  and  who 
has  not  heretofore  registered  for  military  service,  to  present  himself  on  that  day 
at  his  voting  precinct  for  registration  in  accordance  with  the  act  of  Congress  and 
the  proclamation  of  the  President.  I  earnestly  hope  that  not  even  by  mistake 
will  any  North  Carolinian  on  this  epoch-making  day  fail  to  do  his  full  duty. 

Upon  the  whole  citizenry  of  the  State  I  also  call  for  a  proper  recognition  and 
observance  of  this  day.  Let  every  civic,  moral  and  religious  agency  and  institution 
join  in  making  this  a  day  in  which  full  obedience  to  the  letter  and  spirit  of  the 
law  shall  be  at  once  a  duty  and  a  glory.     The  press  of  the  State,  with  its  usual 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR  99 

zeal  and  loyalty,  can  render  invaluable  assistance  in  getting  fully  and  clearly 
before  all  the  people  the  purposes  and  requirements  of  this  registration  day. 
Preachers  and  church  leaders,  teachers  and  public  officials  should  count  it  a  duty 
and  a  privilege  to  help  in  making  effective  this  registration ;  and  business  men, 
employers  of  labor,  should  offer  every  facility  for  the  registration  of  their  em- 
ployees. Red  Cross  societies  and  other  women's  organizations  will  be  able  to 
perform  innumerable  services  that  will  count  in  making  the  day  a  success. 

It  is  our  privilege  as  citizens  of  a  great  State  and  Nation  to  participate  in  the 
events  of  this  day,  which  historians  will  mark  as  epochal.  May  the  spirit  of  our 
boys  at  the  front,  the  flaming  zeal  of  those  who  flaunt  Democracy's  banner  in  the 
face  of  mankind's  common  foe,  inspire  all  of  us  to  a  glad  performance  of  a 
glorious  duty. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Ealeigh,  this  the  sixth  day  of  September,  in  the 
[great     year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  eighteen,  and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-third  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  "W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


(19) 

THE  FOURTH  LIBERTY  LOAN 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

"Whereas  six  billions  of  dollars  must  be  raised  in  these  United  States  by  the 
sale  of  Liberty  Bonds,  from  the  28th  of  September  to  the  19th  of  October ;  and  of 
this  sum  the  State  of  North  Carolina  must  subscribe  $39,900,000;  and  to  raise 
this  vast  amount  we  must  have  the  united,  heroic  and  uninterrupted  efforts  of  all 
our  people: 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  "Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  said  State,  do  hereby 
declare  and  proclaim: 

First.  That  from  Monday,  September  30th,  to  Saturday,  October  19th,  no 
Superior  Courts  be  held,  except  to  clear  the  jails;  and  the  Superior  Court  judges 
are  requested  to  adjourn  their  courts  accordingly. 

Second.  That  Sunday,  October  6th,  be  and  it  is  hereby  designated  as  Heroes' 
Day,  on  which  day  all  our  people  shall  assemble,  in  their  churches,  Sunday 
schools  and  meeting  houses,  in  cities  and  towns,  in  villages,  hamlets  and  at  cross- 
roads, and  shall  pay  tribute  and  homage  to  the  boys  who  have  laid  down  their 
lives  in  the  sacred  cause  of  liberty.  Let  this  day  be  made  memorable  and  hallowed, 
and  let  the  memory  and  spirit   of  the  neighborhood   boy,   dead   on   the   field  of 


100  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

honor,  so  move  us  that  we  shall  withhold  not  of  our  substance  in  the  cause  for 
which  he  died.  Let  committees  of  patriotic  men,  women  and  children  sell  these 
Liberty  Bonds  by  the  millions  on  that  sacred  occasion,  while  messages  from  stump 
and  pulpit  proclaim  the  purity  of  our  motives  and  the  justness  of  our  cause. 

Third.  That  Saturday,  October  12th,  be  and  it  is  hereby  designated  as  Liberty 
Bond  Day.  And  on  this  day  I  especially  enjoin  all  stores,  schools  and  all  fac- 
tories, not  engaged  in  war  work,  other  industries,  to  close  their  doors  until  four 
o'clock  in  the  afternoon.  Let  the  school  children  of  the  State,  under  the  direction 
of  Superintendent  J.  Y.  Joyner,  join  hands  in  making  this  a  great  and  glorious 
day  in  Worth  Carolina  annals  by  doing  their  utmost  in  selling  Liberty  Bonds,  and 
in  arousing  their  friends  and  neighbors  to  the  peril  and  the  necessity  of  the  hour. 

The  last  Liberty  Loan  drive  took  place  in  the  month  of  May,  and  the  bulk  of 
our  people  had  no  ready  funds  in  hand,  and  so  it  came  about  that,  while  we  over- 
subscribed our  allotment  (the  allotment  being  $18,555,000,  and  our  subscription 
being  nearly  twenty-five  million  dollars,  or  thirty-one  per  cent  over  the  top),  less 
than  four  per  cent  of  the  people  of  the  State  purchased  these  bonds.  This  was 
the  lowest  ratio  of  any  state  in  the  Union.  In  the  present  subscription  it  is 
earnestly  hoped  and  believed  that,  with  practical  unanimity  all  the  people  of  the 
State  will  participate.  Let  the  slogan  be,  "A  Bond  in  Every  Home."  Napoleon 
once  said  that  in  every  battle  five  minutes  decided  which  army  would  conquer. 
We  have  now  reached  this  moment  in  the  World  War. 

Men  of  this  Commonwealth,  which  historians  agree  is  the  freest  of  the  free, 
in  this  hour,  big  with  the  fate  of  America  and  of  Freedom,  let  us  highly  resolve 
that,  under  God,  we  will  do  our  full  duty,  withholding  nothing  from  the  cause — 
howsoever  costly  or  dear — -for 

"It  may  be  in  yon  smoke  concealed, 
Your  comrades  chase  e'en  now  the  fliers, 
And,  but  for  you,  possess  the  field." 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  twenty-sixth  day  of  September, 

[great     in  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  eighteen,  and  in 

seal]      the  one  hundred  and  forty-third  year  of  our   American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santfoed  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  TEE  GOVERNOR  101 

(20) 
THANKSGIVING  DAY,  1918 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

Thanksgiving  Proclamation 

There  has  always  been  danger  that  our  annual  Thanksgiving  Day  might  be- 
come a  mere  formality  observed  at  the  behest  of  the  State. 

But  this  year  our  hearts  forerun  all  proclamations,  and  the  grace  of  gratitude 
attunes  our  souls  for  the  universal  anthem  of  praise  on  Thanksgiving  Day. 

We  are  grateful  that  we  did  not  go  to  war  in  anger  or  in  haste,  but  soberly, 
reverently,  in  the  fear  of  God,  and  in  love  of  humanity. 

We  are  grateful  that  our  people  were  given  eyes  to  see  a  righteous  cause,  and 
ears  to  hear  a  holy  call  to  arms. 

We  are  grateful  for  the  miracle  wrought  in  the  transportation  of  our  soldiers 
through  perilous  seas  and  in  their  delivery  on  the  battle  front  in  time  to  save  the 
civilization  of  the  world. 

We  are  grateful  that  these  soldiers,  fresh  from  civil  life,  fought  with  the 
heroism  and  fortitude  of  seasoned  veterans,  and  won  for  themselves  and  their 
country  the  love  and  admiration  of  all  mankind. 

We  are  grateful  that  at  the  council  table  and  on  the  field  of  battle  American 
officers  and  men  exemplified  the  ideals  of  a  Christian  civilization. 

We  are  grateful  that  a  righteous  peace  has  come  to  all  the  war-weary  peoples 
of  the  earth. 

We  are  grateful  that  it  is  the  inflexible  purpose  of  the  victors  to  dethrone  the 
gun  and  make  the  Christianized  conscience  of  mankind  the  supreme  arbiter  of 
the  destiny  of  nations. 

We  are  grateful  for  Woodrow  Wilson — that  God  brought  him  "to  the  kingdom 
for  such  a  time  as  this,"  and  through  him  has  made  America  the  hope  of  all 
peoples  who  seek  blessings  of  liberty  under  laws  of  righteousness. 

Therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  Worth  Carolina,  do  hereby 
proclaim  Thursday,  November  28,  1918,  a  day  of  public  thanksgiving.  On  that 
day,  let  us  go  up  to  the  House  of  the  Lord  and  lift  up  our  hearts  in  a  service  of 
prayer  and  praise. 

"A  noble  army;  men  and  boys, 

The  matron  and  the  maid, 
Around  the  Saviour's  throne  rejoice, 

In  robes  of  light  arrayed. 
They  climbed  the  steep  ascent  to  heaven, 

Through  peril,  toil  and  pain. 
0  God,  to  us  may  grace  be  given 

To  follow  in  their  train." 


102  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  eighteenth  day  of  November  in 
[great     the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  eighteen,  and  in  the 
seal]      one  hundred  and  forty-third  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 


(21) 

OUR  SACRED  HONOR 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

Honor  is  finer  than  honesty,  as  sentiment  is  higher  than  thought.  There  is 
scant  virtue  in  merely  keeping  within  the  law. 

"The  fear  o'  hell 's  a  hangman's  whip, 
To  haud  the  wretch  in  order; 
But  where  ye  feel  your  honor  grip, 
Let  that  aye  be  your  border." 

In  the  call  to  buy  Victory  Bonds  honor  grips  hard.  To  achieve  the  victory 
we  pledged  our  lives,  our  property  and  our  sacred  honor.  The  pledge  of  life  has 
been  fully  redeemed.  The  blood  cost  of  victory  was  paid  with  solemn  pride.  To 
fail  or  falter  in  meeting  the  money  cost  would  immediately  brand  us  with  infamy 
and  ultimately  mark  us  for  destruction.  Our  sacred  honor  drives  us  to  offer  our 
property  as  freely  as  our  soldiers  offered  their  lives.  They  "fought  a  good  fight." 
We  must  "keep  the  faith,"  or  wither  in  fires  of  self-contempt. 

The  Imperial  German  Government  asserted  that  a  solemn  obligation  was  but  a 
scrap  of  paper,  and  that  government  has  been  consigned  to  the  scrap-heap  of 
civilization.  "God  is  not  mocked"  and  this  Nation  will  surely  become  as  Nineveh 
and  Tyre  if  we  keep  back  the  price  of  our  redemption.  No  nation  can  survive 
that  advertises  to  the  world  that  it  holds  money  dearer  than  manhood,  that  while 
it  was  willing  to  sacrifice  the  only  son  it  cannot  spare  the  firstlings  of  the  flocks. 
I  beseech  all  ministers  of  the  Gospel  and  all  men  and  women  of  every  class  and 
condition  who  have  faith  in  the  final  perseverance  of  moral  values  to  enlist  in  the 
great  Victory  Campaign  to  the  end  that  our  national  honor  may  be  redeemed  and 
our  destiny  secured. 

Done   at  our   City   of  Raleigh,   this  the   third   day   of  April   in   the 
[great     year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  nineteen,  and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-third  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR  103 

(22) 

BOY  SCOUTS 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Kaleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

Any  movement  or  organization  that  has  for  its  ohject  the  training  and  develop- 
ment of  the  boys  of  America  merits  the  support  of  our  entire  citizenship.  Such 
an  organization  is  the  Boy  Scouts  of  America,  and  the  country  does  well  to  set 
apart  a  week  in  which  this  organization  may  be  given  full  recognition  and  sub- 
stantial support. 

If  for  no  other  reason,  the  service  rendered  by  the  Boy  Scouts  of  America  in 
the  "World  "War  entitles  the  organization  to  a  place  of  honor  in  our  great  Nation. 
The  war  record  of  this  admirable  organization  is  little  short  of  amazing.  In 
every  Liberty  Loan  campaign  the  Boy  Scouts  took  a  conspicuous  and  useful  part ; 
they  were  the  right  hands  of  Red  Cross  organizations  in  every  community 
throughout  the  country;  no  reception  to  our  brave  soldiers  was  complete  without 
the  participation  and  indispensable  assistance  of  the  Boy  Scouts ;  and  in  a 
hundred  other  ways  this  unique  organization  contributed  gloriously  to  the  win- 
ning of  the  war. 

But  not  alone  for  the  services  that  have  been  rendered  by  the  Boy  Scout  move- 
ment should  we  give  it  our  support  in  this  week  of  endeavor.  The  movement  offers 
a  hopeful  solution  to  some  of  the  grave  problems  that  are  confronting  the  Nation. 
If  Americanism  is  to  maintain  its  high  integrity;  if  terrorism  and  bolshevism 
are  to  be  eradicated  from  our  national  life;  if  our  America  is  to  be  kept  true  to 
its  high  mission,  the  boys  of  today — America's  men  of  tomorrow — must  be  trained 
and  developed  for  the  great  task  of  citizenship.  The  Boy  Scouts  of  America  is 
an  organization  admirably  designed  and  equipped  for  giving  to  our  American 
boys  just  such  training. 

Therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  the  State  of  North  Carolina, 
do  hereby  commend  the  observation  of  the  period  beginning  Sunday,  June  8th, 
and  ending  Flag  Day,  June  14th,  as  Boy  Scout  "Week  throughout  the  United 
States,  for  the  purpose  of  materially  supporting  and  strengthening  the  work  of 
the  Boy  Scouts  of  America.  I  earnestly  recommend  that  in  every  community  of 
North  Carolina  a  Citizens  Committee,  whose  chairman  is  the  Hon.  William  G. 
McAdoo,  be  organized  to  cooperate  in  carrying  out  the  program  for  Boy  Scout 
Week.  I  also  call  upon  the  people  of  North  Carolina  this  week  to  give  honorable 
recognition  to  the  Boy  Scout  movement,  and  I  urge  the  citizens  of  the  State  in 
this  week  of  enlistment  to  identify  themselves  with  a  movement  so  hopeful  for 
the  future  of  America. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  tenth  day  of  June,  in  the  year 
[great     of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  nineteen,   and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-third  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor  :  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 


104  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(23) 

THE  HIGH  COST  OF  LIVING 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Ealeigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

The  high  cost  of  living  is  agitating  the  whole  world.  The  inability  to  procure 
the  necessities  of  life  at  reasonable  prices  is  a  menace  to  the  stability  of  all 
governments.  The  situation  is  not  local,  but  world-wide,  and  demands  the  best 
thought  of  all  good  men. 

In  order  to  correct  the  evils  in  the  United  States  the  President  is  calling  on  all 
State  and  County  Food  Administrators  to  seek  out  and  put  an  end  to  profiteering, 
wherever  it  may  be  found. 

I  urge  all  good  citizens,  and  all  State  and  local  officials  to  lend  their  aid  and 
influence  in  the  prosecution  of  this  work.  Every  consideration  of  wisdom  and  of 
safety  calls  for  complete  cooperation  on  the  part  of  our  people  in  the  solution  of 
the  distressing  problem  that  confronts  us. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  fourteenth  day  of  August,  in  the 
[great     year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  nineteen,  and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-fourth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor  :  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


(24) 

A  PREVENTABLE  TAX 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

It  has  been  said  that  there  are  two  things  that  no  man  can  escape — death  and 
taxes.  The  heaviest  tax  that  is  annually  levied  upon  the  people  of  North  Carolina 
can  he  easily  avoided ;  that  is,  the  fire-waste  tax.  It  amounts  to  more  than  all 
other  taxes,  and  yet  the  citizen  can  reduce  it  to  a  minimum. 

The  Insurance  Commissioner  of  North  Carolina  has  for  years  been  educating 
the  people  in  ways  and  means  of  preventing  this  tax.    The  methods  suggested  are 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR  105 

not  fanciful,  but  have  been  tested  and  found  to  be  wonderfully  efficacious  through, 
years  of  experience. 

Therefore,  in  accordance  with  section  4821  of  the  Revisal,  I  hereby  set  apart 
Thursday,  October  9th,  as  Fire  Prevention  Day;  and  on  that  day  I  urge  all  the 
people  of  the  State  to  unite  in  a  sincere  and  intelligent  effort  to  apply  the  remedies 
for  fire  prevention  prescribed  by  the  Insurance  Commissioner  of  North  Carolina, 
and  thereby  relieve  themselves  from  this  staggering  but  wholly  unnecessary 
burden. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  twenty-ninth  day  of  September, 

[great     in  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  nineteen,  and  in 

seal]      the  one  hundred  and  forty-fourth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 


(25) 

ROOSEVELT  DAY—  OCTOBER  TWENTY-SEVENTH 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

I  hereby  set  apart  October  27,  1919,  as  Roosevelt  Day.  On  this  day  the  people 
throughout  the  United  States  will  join  in  honoring  the  memory  of  this  great 
American  citizen,  and  I  ask  the  people  of  North  Carolina  to  testify  by  appro- 
priate words  and  acts  their  appreciation  of  the  sterling  qualities  of  mind  and 
heart  of  Theodore  Roosevelt. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  twenty-third  day  of  October,  in 
[great     the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  nineteen,  and  the 
seal]      one  hundred  and  forty-fourth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  "W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


106  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(26) 

REMEMBER  THE  HORSE  THAT  PULLED  THE  PLOW 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

When  folks  are  sick  and  all  things  go  awry, 
"God  and  the  doctor!"  is  the  cry. 
When  folks  are  well,  and  all  things  righted, 
God's  forgot,  and  the  doctor  slighted. 

These  homely  lines  explain  the  apparent  apathy  of  some  of  our  people  in 
regard  to  the  American  Cotton  Association.  When  the  association  was  formed 
the  cotton  market  was  desperately  sick  and  there  was  the  wildest  enthusiasm  for 
the  association.  The  condition  of  the  market  is  tremendously  improved;  indeed, 
it  is  approaching  robust  strength,  and  there  has  been  a  consequent  loss  of  interest 
in  the  "doctor." 

The  association  has  done  a  monumental  service  to  all  the  people  of  the  cotton 
states,  and  it  would  be  a  tragic  blunder  to  allow  it  to  go  into  a  decline. 

More  than  any  other  agency  the  association  demonstrated  to  buyers  from 
every  nation  at  the  World  Cotton  Conference  that  the  farmer  has  not  been  getting 
a  fair  price  for  his  product.  So  impressed  were  the  spinners  from  England  with 
the  facts  furnished  by  the  Cotton  Association  that  they  openly  said  that  they  did 
not  desire  to  buy  cotton  produced  under  the  conditions  that  have  heretofore  ob- 
tained in  the  cotton  states.  The  spinners  urged  the  farmers  to  cooperate  in  the 
matter  of  production,  of  baling,  housing,  selling  and  transporting  their  cotton. 
These  are  the  definite  aims  of  the  association ;  and  the  success  of  all  these  under- 
takings will  inure  to  the  benefit  of  the  farmer,  the  cotton  spinner,  the  merchant, 
the  banker  and  the  consumer  of  cotton  goods. 

The  association  makes  no  appeal  to  class  feeling  or  class  prejudice,  but  urges 
all  our  people  to  join  the  association  and  cooperate  in  making  our  royal  staple  a 
blessing  to  all  the  people  from  producer  to  consumer. 

From  November  10th  to  15th,  1919,  inclusive,  a  drive  for  membership  will  be 
made  in  North  Carolina.  During  that  week  I  urge  our  people  of  every  class  and 
condition  to  join  this  association.  Give  heed  to  the  admonition  of  Governor 
Vance,  and  "remember  the  horse  that  pulled  the  plow." 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  third  day  of  November,  in  the 
[great     year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  nineteen,  and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-fourth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  TEE  GOVERNOR  107 

(27) 

ARMISTICE  DAY— NOVEMBER  ELEVENTH 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

In  accordance  with  the  mandate  contained  in  Chapter  287  of  the  Public  Laws 
of  1919,  I  hereby  set  apart  Tuesday,  November  11th,  generally  known  as  Armistice 
Day,  as  a  legal  holiday,  and  call  upon  all  the  people  of  the  State  to  appropriately 
celebrate  and  observe  the  same.  I  suggest  that  the  best  way  to  celebrate  the  day 
is  to  make  substantial  contributions  to  every  movement  in  the  State  looking  to 
the  honor  of  men,  living  and  dead,  who  wrought  so  grandly  and  so  well  to  advance 
American  ideals  and  institutions  and  to  save  the  civilization  of  the  world. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  eighth  day  of  November,  in  the 
[great     year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  nineteen,  and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-fourth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 


(28) 

THANKSGIVING  DAY,  1919 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

Our  forefathers  established  the  beautiful  custom  of  setting  apart  one  day  near 
the  end  of  the  harvest  time  to  return  thanks  to  Almighty  God  for  the  blessings 
of  life. 

In  this  good  year,  1919,  how  much  have  we  for  which  to  be  grateful! 

Our  soldiers,  who  on  last  Thanksgiving  Day  were  far  away  in  foreign  lands, 
have  safely  crossed  the  seas,  and  are  at  home  again  in  happiness  and  in  peace. 

The  Lord  of  the  Harvest  has  been  good  to  us.  Our  fields  have  yielded  bounti- 
fully. Our  industries  have  thrived  wonderfully.  Prosperity  smiles  on  farm  and 
factory,  bank  and  store.  In  every  line  of  business  endeavor  we  are  prospering 
beyond  the  fondest  dreams  of  our  fathers. 


103  PAPERS  OP  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

There  has  been  also  a  mighty  triumph  of  spiritual  forces  in  our  midst,  for 
which  we  should  be  profoundly  grateful.  The  fruits  of  this  victory  are  seen  in 
the  great  forward  movements  of  all  the  churches;  in  the  finer  educational  advan- 
tages enjoyed  by  all  the  children  of  the  State ;  in  the  growing  demand  for  complete 
economic  and  social  justice  in  taxation  and  all  other  matters;  and  in  the  larger 
opportunities  offered  on  every  hand  to  the  average  man  and  the  average  woman. 

Surely  in  this  day  God  has  given  to  men  everywhere  a  bigger,  broader  con- 
ception of  Christian  service  than  they  ever  had  before. 

North  Carolina  is  singularly  blessed  in  that  in  this  time  of  turmoil  she  is 
almost  entirely  free  from  industrial  and  racial  bitterness  and  strife.  We  should 
be  deeply  thankful  for  the  spirit  of  friendship  and  good  will  that  prevails  among 
us.  Let  us  pray  for  absolute  justice  for  all,  by  which  alone  this  spirit  may  be 
strengthened  and  maintained. 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  in 
obedience  to  the  custom  established  by  our  fathers  and  in  accordance  with  the 
proclamation  of  the  President  of  the  United  States,  do  hereby  proclaim  Thursday, 
November  27th,  a  day  of  public  Thanksgiving. 

Let  this  be  a  day  of  rest  and  rejoicing,  observed  by  everybody.  Let  us  not 
forget  the  orphan,  the  poor,  and  the  unfortunate.  I  earnestly  trust  that  all  the 
people  will  assemble  in  their  places  of  worship  and  make  this  a  real  Thanks- 
giving Day. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  twelfth  day  of  November,  in  the 
[great     year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  nineteen,  and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-fourth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


(29) 

LAW  ENFORCEMENT  DAY 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

On  January  16,  1920,  according  to  the  action  of  the  citizens  of  this  Nation,  the 
fundamental  policy  of  this  Government  regarding  the  liquor  traffic  will  change 
and,  according  to  our  Federal  Constitution,  it  will  be  unlawful  to  manufacture, 
sell,  transport,  import,  or  export  intoxicating  liquors  for  beverage  purposes  in  the 
United  States.  Under  the  provisions  of  the  law-enforcement  code  passed  by 
Congress  October  28,  1919,  the  Internal  Revenue  Department  is  charged  with  the 
enforcement  of  this  law,  and  Mr.  Roper,  the  head  of  this  Department,  is  appealing 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  TEE  GOVERNOR  109 

to  citizens  and  State  officers  to  give  the  Federal  officers  full  cooperation  in  this 
work. 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  by 
virtue  of  the  authority  vested  in  me,  do  hereby  proclaim  that  Sunday,  January 
ISth,  be  set  apart  as  Law  Enforcement  Day,  and  I  request  that  the  ministers  of 
the  State,  on  that  day,  read  this  proclamation  to  their  congregations  and  call  on 
them  to  cooperate  with  the  officers  for  the  enforcement  of  our  National  and  State 
anti-liquor  laws. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  sixth  day  of  January,  in  the 
[great     year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  twenty,  and  in  the  one 
seal]     hundred  and  forty-fourth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


(30) 

NATIONAL  THRIFT  WEEK  OF  Y.  M.  C.  A. 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

Whereas,  National  Thrift  Week  of  the  Young  Men's  Christian  Association, 
January  17-24,  1920,  which  has  the  full  support  of  the  United  States  Treasury 
and  of  the  leading  financial,  commercial,  and  civic  and  educational  organizations 
throughout  the  United  States,  is  well  designed  to  promote  the  prosperity  of  our 
citizens  and  of  our  communities ;  and 

Whereas,  it  behooves  every  right-minded  citizen  to  take  serious  thought  to 
lessen  foolish  extravagance  and  waste,  to  abate  inflation  of  credit,  to  release 
through  intelligent  saving  and  investment  the  capital  needed  to  finance  production 
and  employment,  to  combat  unrest  and  to  build  up  a  more  stable,  prosperous  and 
truly  American  population;  and 

Whereas,  the  program  of  economic  education  of  National  Thrift  Week  is  well 
devised  to  foster  all  these  desirable  conditions : 

Now,  therefore,  I,  T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor  of  the  State  of  North  Carolina, 
do  call  upon  all  officers  of  the  State,  the  mayors  and  county  officials,  the  superin- 
tendents and  teachers  of  our  public  schools,  and  upon  each  and  every  citizen, 
business  establishment,  industrial  plant,  trade,  civic  or  other  organization  and  all 
employees  or  members  thereof,  to  exert  every  effort,  individually  and  through  their 
Community  Thrift  Committees,  to  make  National  Thrift  Week  a  period  of  con- 
structive thought  and  action  and  of  economic  planning  for  every  one  within  their 
several  communities. 


110  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  ninth  day  of  January,  in  the 
[great     year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  twenty,  and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-fourth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

Santfoed  Martin, 
Private  Secretary. 


(31) 

SHIP-BY-TRUCK  WEEK 

State  of  Worth  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

Whereas,  there  is  a  constant  and  growing  need  of  quick  transportation  for 
short  hauls;  and 

Whereas,  many  tons  of  perishable  produce  is  allowed  to  waste  yearly  through 
the  lack  of  adequate  transportation  facilities;  and 

Whereas,  the  modern  motor  truck,  a  "speedster"  as  regards  transportation  for 
short  distances,  brings  the  farm  near  good  markets;  and 

Whereas,  good  markets  always  encourage  increased  production ;  and 
Whereas,  increased  production  will  at  this  time  very  materially  cut  the  high 
cost  of  living : 

Now,  therefore,  I,  T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  do,  in  harmony 
with  many  executives  of  other  states,  proclaim  the  week  beginning  Monday, 
May  7,  1920,  as  Ship-by-Truck  Week  in  North  Carolina,  and  I  hereby  ask  all 
citizens  of  the  State  interested  in  transportation  and  the  best  public  welfare  to 
consider  seriously  the  problems  apparent  in  our  Commonwealth  as  to  transporta- 
tion of  produce  and  supplies  with  the  view  of  providing  eventually  a  complete, 
efficient,  and  economical  scheme  of  transportation. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  twelfth  day  of  May,  in  the 
[great     year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  twenty,  and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-fourth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

Santfoed  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR  111 


(32) 

CONVENING  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  IN  EXTRA  SESSION 

ON  AUGUST  10,  1920 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation,  by  the  Governor 

By  and  with  the  advice  of  the  Council  of  State,  I,  Thomas  "Walter  Bickett, 
Governor  of  the  State  of  North  Carolina,  in  the  exercise  of  the  power  conferred 
upon  me  by  the  Constitution,  and  as  contemplated  by  section  3  of  chapter  84  of 
the  Public  Laws  of  1919,  do  issue  this  my  proclamation  on  this  extraordinary 
occasion  convening  the  General  Assembly  in  extra  session ;  and  I  hereby  notify 
and  request  Senators  and  Members  of  the  House  of  Representatives  of  the  General 
Assembly  of  North  Carolina  to  meet  in  their  respective  halls  in  the  Capitol  in 
the  City  of  Raleigh,  on  Tuesday,  the  10th  day  of  August,  1920,  at  eleven  o'clock 
a.  m.,  for  the  following  specific  purposes : 

1.  To  prescribe  such  tax  rates  as  may  be  wise  and  just  in  view  of  the  actual 
value  of  the  property  in  the  State  as  ascertained  by  the  Revaluation  Act. 

2.  To  consider  constitutional  amendments  reducing  the  tax  rates  that  may  be 
hereafter  levied. 

3.  To  consider  such  other  matters  of  grave  importance  to  the  public  as  the 
General  Assembly  may  deem  wise. 

In  witness  whereof,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  and  Commander-in- 
Chief,  have  hereunto  set  my  hand  and  caused  the  Great  Seal  of  the  State  to  be 
affixed. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  seventh  day  of  July,  in  the  year 
[great     of  our  Lord  one  thousand   nine  hundred   and  twenty,   and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-fifth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

Thomas  Walter  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

Santford  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 


112  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(33) 

COTTON  DAY 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  hy  the  Governor 

Whereas,  North  Carolina  is  primarily  an  agricultural  State  and  the  State's 
cotton  crop  is  one  of  its  chief  sources  of  wealth;  and 

Whereas,  the  recent  astonishing  decline  in  the  price  of  cotton  presents  a 
situation  which  cannot  he  properly  dealt  with  by  individual  cotton  growers,  each 
man  acting  for  himself.  There  must  be  united  effort  on  the  part  of  the  men  who 
grow  the  cotton,  and  on  the  part  of  business  men  and  bankers  whose  prosperity 
depends  so  largely  upon  the  farmers'  prosperity;  and 

Whereas,  the  American  Cotton  Association  at  its  recent  meeting  in  Mont- 
gomery, Ala.,  asked  that  Monday,  September  20,  1920,  be  observed  in  all  the  cotton 
growing  counties  of  the  South  as  Cotton  Day,  the  farmers  and  interested  business 
men  of  each  county  to  be  asked  to  assemble  at  their  county-seats  at  eleven  o'clock 
on  the  morning  of  that  day  to  join  farmers  and  business  men  from  all  other  parts 
of  the  cotton  belt  in  a  southern  campaign  for  fair-priced  cotton  and  all  that  it 
means  to  our  people: 

Now,  therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  in 
accordance  with  the  wishes  of  the  cotton  growers  of  the  South,  and  acting  in  co- 
operation with  other  governors  of  cotton-growing  states,  do  issue  this  my  procla- 
mation calling  on  the  cotton  growers  of  each  cotton-producing  county  in  North 
Carolina,  together  with  other  citizens  interested  in  their  welfare,  to  assemble  at 
their  county-seats  at  eleven  o'clock  next  Monday,  September  20,  1920,  to  discuss 
the  following  subjects : 

1.  Plans  for  holding  the  cotton  of  the  county  until  fair  and  just  prices  can  be 
obtained,  together  with  plans  for  cooperative  marketing. 

2.  Plans  for  fully  utilizing  warehouses  and  warehouse  facilities  of  the  county, 
and  for  erecting  additional  warehouses,  with  special  emphasis  in  this  connection  on 
practicable  plans  for  financing  the  crop. 

3.  Plans  for  immediately  increasing  the  acreage  in  fall-sown  small  grains, 
as  the  one  wise  and  certain  plan  of  effecting  a  reduction  in  cotton  acreage,  pledges 
to  this  effect  to  be  taken. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  fourteenth  day  of  September, 
[great     in  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  twenty,  and  in 
seal]      the  one  hundred  and  forty-fifth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

William  Y.  Bickett, 

Private  Secretary. 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR  113 

(34) 

ARMISTICE  DAY  PROCLAMATION 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Ealeigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

On  the  eleventh  of  November,  nineteen  hundred  and  eighteen,  the  most  gigantic 
war  the  world  has  known  was  brought  to  a  righteous  conclusion  by  the  timely 
intervention  of  American  arms  and  American  statesmanship.  The  deep-laid 
schemes  of  a  sinister  autocracy  were  completely  baffled,  and  the  worshipers  of 
"blood  and  iron"  were  beaten  to  the  dust. 

In  remembrance  of  this  mighty  deliverance  the  General  Assembly  of  North 
Carolina  has  decreed  that  Armistice  Day  shall  be  a  legal  holiday  throughout  all 
our  generations. 

Therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  in  obedience 
to  the  mandate  of  the  General  Assembly,  do  hereby  proclaim  and  set  apart  Thurs- 
day, November  11,  1920,  as  a  legal  holiday. 

On  that  day  let  our  people  desist  from  their  usual  employment  and  join  in 
celebrating  the  day  of  the  world's  redemption  from  the  grip  of  fire  and  sword. 
And  especially  let  us  all  pray  that  the  God  of  peace  and  justice  may  so  overrule 
the  deliberations  and  the  decisions  of  the  Government  of  the  United  States  that 
our  high  objective  shall  not  be  defeated,  and  our  dead  shall  not  have  died  in  vain. 
Done  at  our  City  of  Ealeigh,  this  the  fourth  day  of  November,  in  the 
[great  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  twenty,  and  in  the  one 
seal]      hundred  and  forty-fifth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

"William  T.  Bickett, 

Private  Secretary. 


(35) 
THANKSGIVING  PROCLAMATION 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

A  Nation-wide  survey  discovers  on  the  surface  of  things  little  to  stimulate 
public  gratitude.  A  blight  is  on  our  material  prosperity,  and  the  faith  for  which 
we  fought  has  been  denied. 

8 


114  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

But  adversity  is  the  supreme  test  of  character.  By  way  of  the  cross  we  pass 
to  immortality.  Moreover,  it  is  somewhat  to  have  felt  the  mighty  urge  born 
of  great  humanities;  to  have  heard  the  trumpets  of  God  calling  us  to  a  great 
adventure;  to  have  battled,  albeit  in  vain,  to  set  the  nations  free  from  the  grip  of 
blood  and  iron,  and  guide  them  in  the  footsteps  of  the  Prince  of  Peace. 

In  North  Carolina  our  people  have  been  blest  with  health  and  strength.  The 
fields  have  yielded  an  abundant  harvest;  the  heads  and  hands  of  industry  have 
arrived  at  a  closer  understanding  and  sympathy;  the  public  conscience  has 
awakened  to  the  necessity  for  radical  increases  in  our  educational  facilities;  and, 
even  on  the  dread  and  dreary  field  of  taxation  the  light  has  fallen,  and  error  and 
injustice  are  passing  away. 

Therefore,  I,  Thomas  Walter  Bickett,  Governor  of  North  Carolina,  do  pro- 
claim and  set  apart  Thursday,  the  twenty-fifth  day  of  November,  one  thousand 
nine  hundred  and  twenty,  as  a  day  of  public  Thanksgiving  and  prayer. 

On  that  day  let  our  people  repair  to  their  several  places  of  worship  and  return 
thanks  to  the  Lord  for  his  enduring  mercy  and  unfailing  love;  and  especially  let 
us  remember  that  pure  religion  and  undefiled  is  to  visit  the  fatherless  and  widow 
in  their  affliction  and  to  keep  ourselves  unspotted  from  the  world. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  fifteenth  day  of  November,  in 
[great     the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  twenty,  and  in  the 
seal]      one  hundred  and  forty-fifth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

William  Y.  Bickett, 

Private  Secretary. 


(36) 

A  CHILD'S  CRY  FOR  HELP 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  by  the  Governor 

If  there  be  one  sound  that  goes  straight  to  a  man's  heart  and  rouses  all  his 
energies,  it  is  the  cry  of  a  child  for  help.  Such  a  cry  comes  to  us  from  over  the 
seas.  There  millions  of  little  children  are  literally  freezing  for  lack  of  clothing 
and  starving  for  kick  of  bread.  We  have  no  right  to  be  happy  over  here  while 
God's  little  ones  are  dying  by  the  thousands  over  there.  There  can  be  no  Christ- 
mas in  our  hearts  unless  we  show  forth  the  spirit  of  Christ. 

I  urge  our  people  to  cut  their  own  Christmas  expenses  to  the  bone  and  seek 
their  happiness  in  relieving  the  misery  of  millions  in  other  lands. 

A  great  drive  for  the  relief  of  these  people  under  the  leadership  of  Hon.  Henry 
A.  Page  of  Aberdeen  is  now  on.     Let  every  man,  woman  and  child  in  the  State 


PROCLAMATIONS  BY  THE  GOVERNOR  115 

first  make  their  gift  towards  tlie  relief  of  these  little  ones,  and  then  shout,  "Hurrah 
for  Christmas." 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the  twenty-first  day  of  December, 
[great     in  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  twenty,  and  in 
seal]      the  one  hundred  and  forty-fifth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

William  Y.  Bickett, 

Private  Secretary. 


(37) 

KEEP  BOYS  AND  GIRLS  IN  COLLEGE 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

A  Proclamation  hy  the  Governor 

As  the  time  approaches  for  the  reopening  of  the  various  colleges  of  the  State, 
I  am  constrained  to  issue  this — probably  my  last — proclamation  to  the  people  of 
North  Carolina.  I  call  upon  parents  who  have  sons  and  daughters  in  college  not 
to  allow  the  present  financial  depression,  which  we  believe  is  only  temporary,  to 
prevent  the  return  of  these  boys  and  girls  to  college.  Let  us  rather  make  any 
sacrifice  that  may  be  necessary  in  this  matter  which  so  vitally  concerns  the  future 
not  only  of  the  boys  and  girls  themselves,  but  of  our  whole  State  as  well.  We 
should  economize  in  almost  every  other  way,  but  in  God's  name  let  there  be  no 
stint  in  education  or  religion.  Even  if  it  shall  be  necessary  to  go  in  debt,  this  is 
a  small  thing  compared  with  the  future  of  your  boy  or  girl.  Few  men  who  are 
now  fifty  years  old  or  over  were  able  to  go  through  college  without  indebtedness 
on  the  part  of  themselves  or  their  parents ;  yet  in  all  my  acquaintance  with 
men  throughout  the  State,  I  have  never  found  one  who  regretted  the  money  spent, 
the  sacrifices  made,  or  the  debts  incurred,  for  his  own  or  his  children's  education. 

Done  at  our  City  of  Raleigh,  this  the day  of  December,  in 

[great     the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  twenty,  and  in  the 
seal]      one  hundred  and  forty-fifth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor:  Governor. 

William   Y.  Bickett, 

Private  Secretary. 


(Ill) 

APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC 

1917 

1.  Call  for  Volunteers  for  the  Navy. 

2.  Beginning  and  Ending  at  Jerusalem. 

3.  The  Day  and  Its  Duties. 

4.  Recruits  for  Marine  Corps. 

5.  An  Appeal  to  the  Bankers. 

6.  "That  Nothing  be  Lost." 

7.  The  Disloyalty  of  the  Reserves. 

8.  Thrift  Month. 

9.  Food  Conservation. 

1918 

10.  War  Savings  Certificates. 

11.  Soldiers'  Life  Insurance. 

12.  Insurance  for  Soldiers. 

13.  Help  for  Stricken  Town  of  Atlantic. 

14.  The  Reserves  to  the  Colors. 

1 5.  A  Call  for  a  War  Savings  Institute. 

16.  Letters  to  Soldiers. 

17.  Enforcement  of  Vagrancy  Laws. 

18.  War  Savings  Campaign. 

19.  Boys'  Working  Reserves. 

20.  All  Men  Must  Work. 

21.  Labor  Agents  and  Idlers. 

22.  A  Call  for  Nurses. 

23.  Receiving  Fees  from  Soldiers. 

24.  Teacher-training  Sunday. 

25.  Let  Not  a  Lock  be  Lost. 

26.  A  Dash  for  the  Home  Plate. 

27.  Pershing  Day. 

28.  In  Your  Own  Vineyard. 

29.  The  Home  and  the  "Child  in  the  Midst." 

30.  On  Reopening  the  Churches. 

31.  United  War  Work  Campaign. 

32.  Soldiers'  Insurance. 

1919 

33.  The  Cotton  Situation. 

34.  A  Wider  Door  for  the  Children — A  Squarer  Deal  for  the  Teachers. 

35.  The  Appointment  of  Tax  Assessors. 

36.  Help  for  the  Helpers — A  Plea  for  the  Salvation  Army. 

37.  To  the  People  of  Charlotte  and  Mecklenburg  County 

for  Cooperation  of  Labor  and  Capital. 

38.  A  Letter  from  the  Governor  to  Mr.  Average  Citizen. 

39.  North  Carolina  Traffic  Association. 

1920 

40.  Recommending  Service  in  the  Army. 

41.  Special  Letter  from  the  Governor  to  Mr.  Solvent-Credit  Owner. 

42.  America's  Gift  to  France. 

43.  The  Restoration  of  the  Holy  Land. 

44.  American  Legion  Week. 

45.  Urging  Soldiers  to  Keep  up  Their  Insurance. 

46.  The  Ghost  of  a  Lost  Opportunity. 


(1) 

CALL  FOR  VOLUNTEERS  FOR  THE  NAVY 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  April  19,  1917. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

The  Nation  has  called  upon  the  State  of  North  Carolina  to  furnish  four 
hundred  men  for  the  United  States  Navy.  This  is  a  modest  demand,  and  yet  only 
about  fifty  men  have  thus  far  volunteered.  I  am  persuaded  that  the  failure  to 
enlist  is  largely  due  to  lack  of  knowledge  of  the  work  of  the  Navy  and  of  the 
supreme  necessity  for  additional  men  at  this  time.  Therefore  I  call  on  all  the 
people  of  the  State  to  give  earnest  heed  to  the  needs  of  the  Nation,  and  urge  that 
in  every  town  in  the  State  containing  as  many  as  twenty-five  hundred  people  there 
be  commenced  an  active  campaign  for  the  Navy,  beginning  on  Monday,  the  23d, 
and  ending  on  Monday  night,  the  30th  of  April.  On  the  night  of  the  30th  let  the 
campaign  he  closed  with  a  great  patriotic  mass-meeting  in  which  the  paramount 
importance  of  the  Navy  as  our  first  line  of  defense  should  be  set  forth.  At  these 
meetings  the  actual  work  of  the  men  in  the  Navy,  with  the  chances  of  promotion, 
should  also  be  fully  explained. 

Recruiting  stations  for  the  Navy  are  now  located  at  Asheville,  Charlotte, 
Winston-Salem,  Raleigh,  Fayetteville,  Goldsboro,  and  Wilmington.  Officers  will 
be  sent  to  any  town  in  the  State  upon  request  made  to  the  nearest  recruiting 
station.  It  is  necessary  for  North  Carolina  to  raise  her  allotment  not  later  than 
May  5th.  I  cannot  conceive  it  to  be  possible  that  the  State  that  has  had  five  Sec- 
retaries of  the  Navy  will  fail  to  do  its  plain  duty  in  this  crisis  of  the  Nation's  life. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(2) 
BEGINNING  AND  ENDING  AT  JERUSALEM 

Raleigh,  N.  O,  May  13,  1917. 
To  All  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

The  World  War  is  on  and  we  are  face  to  face  with  famine.  Millions  of  men 
whose  business  in  time  of  peace  it  was  to  produce  are  now  called  upon  to  destroy. 
Unless  drastic  and  revolutionary  efforts  be  made  to  increase  our  food  supply  per 
capita  the  amount  on  hand  next  Christmas  will  be  less  than  it  has  been  for  a 
thousand  years. 

The  great  Northwest  advises  us  officially  that  it  cannot  next  year  furnish  us 
the  food  we  have  heretofore  bought  from  it,  but  that  its  surplus  must  be  sent  to 
feed  the  men  who  fight.  In  this  emergency  we  are  not  called  upon  to  feed  other 
nations,  but  simply  to  take  care  of  ourselves.  We  are  not  required  to  go  into  all 
the  earth,  but  our  work  is  both  to  begin  and  end  at  Jerusalem. 


120  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Much  time  has  been  lost,  but  there  is  still  time  left  to  provide  against  the 
coming  day  of  want.  We  still  have  six  months  of  sunshine.  We  have  abundant 
vacant  lands.  And  we  have  the  people  to  cultivate  these  lands  if  they  have  a  mind 
to  work. 

I  think  the  farmers  are  doing  what  they  can.  The  duty  rests  upon  the  people 
in  the  towns  and  cities  to  utilize  their  idle  hours  and  idle  men  in  making  food 
for  themselves.  Let  the  cities  and  towns  take  steps  to  have  vacant  lots  plowed 
and  turned  over  free  of  rent  to  people  who  will  cultivate  them.  The  teams  and 
labor  in  control  of  the  cities  might  well  be  taken  from  their  present  work  during 
the  month  of  May  and  used  in  preparing  vacant  lands  for  immediate  cultivation. 
The  towns  should  also  arrange  for  the  purchase  by  wholesale  of  containers  for  the 
use  of  canning  clubs  and  of  fertilizers  and  distribute  these  to  the  people  at  prime 
cost.  Public  funds  could  well  be  employed  in  this  way,  and  it  would  be  better 
for  the  streets  of  the  town  to  be  unswept  for  two  or  three  weeks  in  May  than  for 
our  pantries  to  be  bare  next  winter. 

I  urge  every  man  in  town  to  go  into  the  surrounding  country  and  procure  from 
one  to  five  acres  of  land  and  plant  it  in  corn,  potatoes,  peas  and  beans,  and  thus 
make  sure  provision  against  want  in  his  own  family.  Do  not  expect  your  neighbor 
to  do  this,  but  do  it  yourself.  I  earnestly  urge  every  man  in  the  State  who  has  an 
idle  acre  to  list  it  with  the  mayor  of  the  nearest  town  as  rent-free  land  for  any 
person  who  will  plant  it  in  food  and  feed  crops. 

All  forms  of  idleness  and  waste  of  time  should  be  discouraged.  I  love  a  game 
of  baseball,  but  it  seems  to  me  that  the  summer  of  1917  is  no  time  for  professional 
baseball,  and  I  think  all  professional  leagues  should  be  disbanded.  The  man  who 
is  able  to  play  professional  baseball  ought  to  be  either  in  a  trench  or  in  a  furrow. 
And  the  "fans"  and  "fannies"  who  hold  down  the  bleachers  can  find  recompense 
and  recreation  in  a  corn  field. 

Let  the  automobile  ride  be  given  up  entirely.  Surely  this  much  of  self-denial 
can  be  practiced  by  every  man  in  the  State.  If  every  man  who  owns  an  auto- 
mobile would  cut  his  gasoline  bill  half  in  two,  much  would  be  saved  to  meet  the 
necessities  of  the  people  and  a  vast  quantity  of  gasoline  would  be  made  available 
for  the  uses  of  war.  I  am  advised  that  Mr.  Rockefeller  could,  in  the  face  of  this 
economy  on  the  part  of  the  people,  manage  to  get  along. 

We  should  make  a  frolic  of  our  necessities  and  should  force  our  fads  and 
fancies  to  furnish  us  food.  As  the  children  would  say,  let's  all  play  at  farming 
this  year. 

Seriously,  men  and  brethren,  let  us  shake  off  our  fatuous  complacence  and  give 
ourselves  no  rest  until  we  know  that  we  and  our  loved  ones  are  secure  from  the 
wolf  whose  gaunt  specter  even  now  looms  large  against  the  sky-line.  Let  us  work 
while  it  is  summer.    Winter  cometh. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


APPEALS  TO  TEE  PUBLIC  121 

(3) 
THE  DAY  AND  ITS  DUTEES 

Ealeigh,  1ST.  C,  May  26,  1917. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

North  Carolinians,  the  fifth  day  of  June  draws  nigh.  It  behooves  us  to  put 
our  house  in  order  and  be  ready  for  its  coming.  All  peoples  in  all  cities  have  their 
eyes  fixed  on  that  day — the  day  whereon  a  mighty  nation  is  to  register  its  con- 
secration to  selfless  service  in  the  cause  of  universal  justice  and  abiding  peace. 
The  day  is  destined  to  loom  large  in  history,  and  will  be  forever  linked  with  a 
world-wide  acceptance  of  the  rights  of  man  first  declared  at  Philadelphia  and  made 
secure  at  Yorktown. 

Happily  in  North  Carolina  there  is  no  longer  division  or  debate.  "With  a 
faith  that  casts  out  fear  we  go  forth  to  register  a  stern  challenge  to  the  blood-red 
prestige  of  a  band  of  hereditary  autocrats  who  have  made  unto  themselves  and 
unto  their  people  an  Iron  Image  and  called  it  God. 

But  the  registration  in  a  single  day  of  all  the  men  in  the  State  between  the 
ages  of  twenty-one  and  thirty-one  calls  for  persistent  and  systematic  work.  I 
therefore  urge — 

I.  That  all  ministers  of  the  Gospel  of  every  race  and  creed  call  attention  at 
every  service  conducted  by  them  between  now  and  the  fifth  of  June  to  the  follow- 
ing duties  of  citizenship  and  commands  of  the  law : 

(1)  That  the  registration  books  will  open  at  7  a.  m.  on  Tuesday,  the  5th  of 
June,  and  close  at  9  p.  m. 

(2)  That  it  is  important  to  register  early  in  the  day  in  order  to  avoid  con- 
gestion in  the  closing  hours. 

(3)  That  the  law  applies  to  white  and  black  alike.  Ministers  and  teachers 
of  the  colored  race  are  requested  to  emphasize  the  fact  that  all  colored  men 
between  the  prescribed  ages  are  required  to  register  in  precisely  the  same  manner 
as  the  whites. 

(4)  That  no  physical  disability  will  excuse  a  man  for  failing  to  register.  If 
he  is  between  twenty-one  and  thirty-one  years  of  age  he  must  register  in  person 
or  send  his  card,  no  matter  what  his  physical  condition  may  be.  The  question  of 
exempting  him  from  service  on  account  of  physical  unfitness  will  be  determined 
at  a  later  day.     It  in  no  way  affects  the  obligation  imposed  upon  him  to  register. 

(5)  That  if  a  party  willfully  fails  to  register  he  will  forthwith  be  arrested. 
Our  people  must  be  given  to  understand  that  they  have  no  discretion  in  this  matter. 
If  their  names  do  not  appear  on  the  registration  cards  when  they  are  canvassed 
a  warrant  will  be  sworn  out  against  them  at  once.  I  sincerely  trust  that  not  a 
man  in  North  Carolina  will  be  arrested  for  failing  to  do  his  duty. 

(6)  That  of  the  men  who  register  on  the  5th  of  June  probably  not  more  than 
one  out  of  twelve  will  be  drawn  for  service  on  the  first  call.  But  if  a  man  shows 
any  disposition  to  avoid  or  evade  his  responsibility  he  will  in  all  probability  be 
the  first  man  who  will  be  sent  to  the  training  camps.  In  every  conceivable  aspect 
it  will  pay  the  citizen  to  cheerfully  comply  with  the  law. 

II.  I  urge  every  newspaper  in  the  State  to  call  attention  to  the  six  matters 
above  mentioned  in  every  issue  of  the  paper  from  now  until  registration  day. 


122  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

III.  I  urge  all  traveling  men,  rural  mail  carriers,  physicians  who  practice  in 
the  country,  all  merchants  and  bankers  and  all  employers  of  men,  and  all  land- 
lords to  call  the  attention  of  their  customers,  employees  and  tenants  to  the  re- 
quirements of  the  law. 

IV.  I  urge  every  man  who  knows  about  registration  day  to  deem  it  his 
patriotic  duty  to  see  to  it  that  every  man  in  his  precinct  is  informed  of  the  re- 
quirements of  the  law,  and  let  each  precinct  in  the  State  take  pleasure  and  pride 
in  seeing  to  it  that  no  man  in  that  precinct  shall  be  arrested  for  failure  to  do 
his  duty. 

V.  I  suggest  that  on  Sunday  afternoon,  June  3d,  or  on  the  night  of  June  4th, 
there  be  held  in  every  town  and  city  in  the  State  a  patriotic  rally.  Let  there  be 
music  and  flags,  and  a  great  outpouring  of  the  people,  and  then  let  some  one 
briefly  and  clearly  state  the  requirements  of  the  law. 

VI.  I  do  not  ask  that  June  5th  be  made  a  holiday.  That  question  may  be 
safely  left  to  the  judgment  of  each  community  and  to  those  in  charge  of  the 
industries  of  the  State.  If  a  field  needs  cultivating,  if  machinery  needs  to  be 
kept  running  in  order  to  meet  the  exigencies  of  the  times,  work  ought  not  to  be 
suspended  in  order  to  make  a  holiday.  But  I  earnestly  trust  that  throughout 
the  State  the  day  may  be  made  one  of  consecration  and  prayer.  I  do  urge  that 
every  man  who  can  spare  the  time  will  turn  out  on  registration  day  and  assist  in 
every  possible  way  in  securing  a  complete  registration  in  every  precinct. 

Let  the  women  and  the  children,  together  with  the  older  members  of  the  family, 
go  to  the  place  of  registration  with  the  boy  who  is  to  record  his  name  as  a  champion 
of  justice  to  all  men  and  of  peace  for  all  time. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(4) 
RECRUITS  FOR  MARINE  CORPS 

Raleigh,  K  C,  May  31,  1917. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

The  week  of  June  10-16  has  been  designated  as  National  Recruiting  Week  for 
United  States  Marine  Corps.  Four  thousand  enlistments  have  been  called  for 
during  that  week.  This  number  of  recruits,  I  am  informed,  is  absolutely  nec- 
essary in  order  that  this  efficient  branch  of  the  Nation's  military  service  may  do 
the  job  assigned  to  it  now  with  the  same  thoroughness  and  high  degree  of  efficiency 
as  has  marked  the  work  of  the  American  Marines  on  every  sea  and  in  every  land 
from  1798  to  this  crucial  hour. 

North  Carolina's  quota  of  recruits  needed  is  only  seventy.  Of  this  number  the 
Raleigh  recruiting  station  is  asked  to  furnish  fifteen  men;  the  Durham  recruiting 
station,  fifteen  men;  the  Winston-Salem  recruiting  station,  twenty  men;  and  the 
Charlotte  recruiting  station,  twenty  men. 

I  call  upon  the  people  of  these  four  cities  and  of  the  whole  State  to  rally  to  the 
Marine  Corps  during  the  week  designated.     Indeed,  it  ought  not  to   require   a 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  123 

week;  a  day  should  be  long  enough  to  raise  the  State's  full  quota  of  recruits  for 
this  great  arm  of  our  country's  defense. 

The  Marine  Corps  is  one  of  the  oldest  and  most  efficient  branches  of  the 
military  service,  and  any  young  man  should  count  himself  fortunate  to  be  enlisted 
in  it.  The  marine  is  a  soldier  and  a  sailor  too.  The  advantage  he  has  in  the 
variety  of  experience  and  training  are  unexcelled.  He  is  drilled  as  an  infantry- 
man ;  he  is  trained  as  naval  gunner ;  he  becomes  a  good  field  artilleryman ;  and  he 
learns  to  manipulate  the  machine  guns.  He  is  in  the  landing  party  from  war- 
ships, and  is  the  first  to  go  on  expeditionary  duty.  Surely,  the  young  man  who 
wants  to  serve  his  country  in  the  hour  of  need  cannot  find  a  better  place  to  render 
effective  service  than  in  the  United  States  Marine  Corps  among  the  soldiers  that 
go  to  sea  to  defend  the  rights  of  Americans  and  maintain  the  honor  of  the  Flag 
throughout  the  world. 

I,  therefore,  earnestly  urge  the  young  men  of  North  Carolina  to  present  them- 
selves at  the  various  recruiting  stations  in  the  State  ready  to  volunteer  for  this 
service  on  the  morning  of  June  11th.  I  sincerely  hope  that  the  young  manhood  of 
the  State  will  respond  to  this  call  so  quickly  that  North  Carolina  will  be  able  to 
report  her  full  quota  raised  in  a  single  day. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(5) 

AN  APPEAL  TO  THE  BANKERS 

Raleigh,  K  C,  June  1,  1917. 
To  the  Bankers  of  North  Carolina: 

The  bankers  of  North  Carolina  are  patriotic.  In  times  past  they  have 
heroically  come  to  the  rescue  and  saved  the  credit  of  the  State.  An  unparalleled 
opportunity  for  public  service  now  confronts  them.  They  have  already  demon- 
strated their  willingness  to  use  this  opportunity  and  are  affording  the  people 
every  reasonable  facility  for  buying  Liberty  Bonds.  In  order  to  release  their 
energies  and  give  them  time  for  further  service,  I  urge  them  to  make  Tuesday, 
June  5th,  a  banking  holiday.  On  this  day  let  there  be  a  concerted  effort  on  the 
part  of  all  banks  to  induce  the  people  to  invest  in  Liberty  Bonds.  Let  there  be 
a  dedication  of  the  money  power  as  well  as  the  men  power  of  the  State  on  this 
great  day. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


124  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(6) 
"THAT  NOTHING  BE  LOST" 

Raleigh,  K  C,  July  14,  1917. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

On  the  sixteenth  day  of  March  I  issued  my  Planting  Day  Proclamation.  The 
appeal  made  therein  reached  a  people  who  had  "ears  to  hear,"  and  a  record- 
breaking  crop  of  fruits  and  vegetables  is  at  hand.  The  plain  duty  of  the  hour  is 
to  save  all  that  has  been  made,  and  to  "gather  up  the  fragments,  that  nothing 
be  lost." 

My  information  is  that  the  United  States  Government  will,  in  all  probability, 
purchase  the  entire  output  of  all  the  commercial  canneries  in  the  country.  There- 
fore, if  our  people  are  to  have  canned  and  dried  fruits  and  vegetables  during  the 
coming  winter  they  must  put  them  up  in  their  own  homes.  I  urge  the  people  not 
to  do  this  work  spasmodically,  but  to  make  it  a  part  of  the  daily  program  in 
every  home  to  "put  something  up." 

The  press  of  the  State  has  been  generous  and  patriotic  to  the  nth  degree.  Its 
intelligent  cooperation  has  made  the  campaign  for  increased  food  production  a 
notable  success.  I  call  upon  the  press  to  now  unlimber  its  batteries  in  the  cam- 
paign for  saving  what  has  been  made.  Waste  is  always  folly ;  today  it  is  crime. 
Let  every  issue  of  every  paper  in  the  State,  during  the  next  sixty  days,  carry  this 
salutation,  "Good  morning!  Are  you  going  to  dry  today?  If  not,  what  are  you 
going  to  can?"  Some  such  daily  reminder  will  spell  the  difference  between  poverty 
and  plenty  in  many  homes.  Let  every  householder  secure  copies  of  Extension 
Circulars  Nos.  50  and  11,  issued  by  the  Agricultural  Extension  Service.  Write 
Dr.  B.  W.  Kilgore,  Director,  Raleigh,  N".  C,  for  these  circulars,  as  they  give  all 
necessary  information  about  drying  and  canning  fruits  and  vegetables. 

I  desire  to  call  special  attention  to  the  use  of  tobacco  barns  in  drying  fruits 
and  vegetables.  The  method  is  simplicity  itself.  The  only  thing  necessary  is  to 
prevent  contact  between  the  fruit  and  vegetables  and  any  of  the  old  wood  or  poles 
inside  of  the  barn.  The  fruit  or  vegetables  to  be  evaporated  are  placed  in  pans, 
dishes  or  on  clean  boards  and  placed  inside  of  the  tobacco  barns.  The  pans, 
dishes  or  boards  can  be  conveniently  rested  on  the  poles  on  which  the  tobacco  sticks 
are  hung.  Every  tier  in  the  barn  can  be  filled  with  the  fruit  or  vegetables  to  be 
evaporated  just  as  they  were  filled  with  tobacco,  except  instead  of  hanging  like 
tobacco  the  boards,  pans,  or  dishes  are  placed  on  the  poles.  Fire  is  then  built  in 
the  furnace  just  as  for  tobacco,  and  the  heat  regulated  according  to  the  rules 
required  in  evaporating  each  of  the  fruits  or  vegetables,  and  generally  one  day  is 
sufficient  to  dry  all  except  unusually  pulpy  fruits  or  vegetables,  like  blackberries 
or  peaches.  The  drying  can  be  accomplished  in  a  small  fraction  of  the  time 
required  for  air-drying.  And  evaporating  can  be  accomplished  as  quickly  as  with 
a  high-priced  evaporator,  and  a  very  much  larger  quantity  can  be  evaporated  at 
one  time  than  in  any  evaporator  sold  on  the  market  for  individual  use. 

Ordinarily  only  one  kind  of  vegetable  or  fruit  should  be  evaporated  at  one 
time,  for  the  different  kinds  require  different  degrees  of  heat,  and  the  evaporation 
of  peaches  and  berries  requires  much  longer  time  than  apples  and  some  kinds  of 
vegetables. 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  125 

There  is  a  better  way  to  preserve  cabbage  tban  putting  it  up  as  sauer  kraut. 
The  cabbage  head  should  be  quartered,  put  into  barrels  or  casks  and  covered  with 
brine,  the  water  being  so  salty  that  it  will  float  an  egg.  The  cabbage  is  weighted 
down  in  the  barrel  by  a  board  or  barrel  top  so  as  to  keep  it  submerged  in  the 
brine,  and  it  will  keep  indefinitely.  When  desired  for  use,  the  cabbage  is  soaked 
or  boiled  until  the  excess  of  salt  has  been  removed,  and  then  cooked  as  other 
cabbage.     Cabbage  so  cooked  is  difficult  to  distinguish  from  fresh  cabbage. 

Let  me  close  this  appeal  by  giving  you  the  salutation  that  I  hope  will  greet 
you  every  morning  for  sixty  days,  "Good  morning !  Are  you  going  to  dry  today  ? 
If  not,  what  are  you  going  to  can?" 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(7) 
THE  DISLOYALTY  OF  THE  RESERVES 

Raxeigh,  K  C,  July  26,  1917. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

The  men  on  the  firing  line  have  implicit  faith  in  the  Reserves.  They  could  not 
hold  the  trenches  if  they  felt  that  there  was  treachery,  cowardice,  and  incompe- 
tency in  the  rear. 

In  Worth  Carolina  there  enlisted  in  the  National  Guard  8,500  men.  There 
will  be  called  to  serve  in  the  National  Army  15,974  men.  These  men  represent 
North  Carolina  on  the  firing  line.  Every  man,  woman  and  child  left  at  home 
is  a  member  of  the  Reserve  Corps. 

Tremendous  responsibility  rests  upon  the  young  men  of  the  Reserve  Corps  who 
are  under  twenty-one  years  of  age.  For  these  men  to  fail  to  make  themselves  fit 
for  efficient  service  is  the  essence  of  disloyalty.  In  this  supreme  hour  to  run  from 
work  is  as  cowardly  as  to  run  from  war. 

The  call  will  surely  come  to  every  man  in  the  Reserves — possibly  to  war,  surely 
to  work — and  the  young  man  who  fails  to  prepare  himself  for  the  work  that  he 
knows  must  be  done,  either  in  the  midst  or  in  the  wake  of  war,  is  disloyal  to  the 
men  at  the  front  and  to  the  women  and  children  at  home. 

The  schools  will  open  soon.  Every  school  is  a  training  camp  for  the  Army 
that  is  to  determine  the  course  and  color  of  civilization  when  this  war  is  ended. 
Now  things  are  being  fought  out,  forever  hereafter  things  will  be  thought  out. 
Hence,  it  is  of  superlative  importance  for  every  boy  who  does  not  go  to  war  to 
go  to  school,  and  study  as  boys  never  studied  before.  The  schoolboy  who  fails  at 
this  time  to  do  hard,  honest  work,  is  the  worst  sort  of  a  slacker,  and  merits  the 
contempt  of  his  fellows. 

If  the  young  men  who  are  left  behind  shall  do  their  work  with  as  much  heroism 
and  self-denial  as  those  who  go  to  the  front,  the  welfare  of  the  State  will  be 
secure;  but  if  they  shall  fail  to  put  themselves  in  a  high  state  of  preparedness  for 
the  work  that  surely  lies  before  them,  then  the  saddest  chapter  in  the  history  of 
the  war  will  be  the  disloyalty  of  the  Reserves. 

Respectfully,        T.  "W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


126  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(8) 
THRIFT  MONTH 

Ealeigh,  1ST.  O,  September  15,  1917. 
To  the  Farmers  of  North  Carolina: 

"Opportunity  has  hair  in  front.  Behind  she  is  bald.  If  you  seize  her  by  the 
forelock,  you  may  hold  her,  but  once  permitted  to  pass,  not  Jupiter  himself  can 
catch  her  again." 

So  runs  an  ancient  aphorism.  This  year  Opportunity  stands  before  the 
farmers  of  North  Carolina  with  a  forelock  that  reaches  to  the  ground.  You  have 
with  superb  common  sense  increased  your  food  and  feed  crops.  You  have  with 
splendid  foresight  canned  and  dried  your  surplus  fruits  and  vegetables.  For  you 
the  high  cost  of  living  holds  few  terrors.  Empyrean  prices  are  being  paid  for 
the  products  of  your  toil.  Never  before  in  this  generation,  and  possibly  never 
again,  will  there  come  to  the  average  farmer  so  large  an  opportunity  to  lift  himself 
and  family  to  a  higher  level  of  happiness  and  hope.  Temptations  to  fritter  away 
the  proceeds  of  your  crops  will  crowd  thick  upon  you.  Improvidence  will  lure  to 
sleep,  and  pleasure  and  prodigality  will  call  to  you  with  many  voices.  The  "blue 
sky"  artists  are  already  on  your  trail.  They  have  heard  that  you  are  fat,  and  have 
marked  you  for  their  own.  All  kinds  of  get-rich-quick  schemes  will  be  dangled 
before  you,  and  the  voice  of  the  agent  will  be  heard  in  the  land.  Smooth  and 
wordy  venders  of  lightning  rods,  and  ranges,  and  organs,  and  pianolas,  and 
sewing  machines,  and  churns,  and  washing  machines,  and  patent  medicines,  and 
county  rights,  and  crayon  portraits,  and  shares  in  excessively  capitalized  stallions 
will  spring  up  around  you  as  countless  as  the  frogs  that  came  up  on  the  land  of 
Egypt,  and  seek  to  enter  into  the  reward  of  your  labors. 

In  my  Inaugural  Address  and  in  a  series  of  bills  submitted  to  the  General 
Assembly,  I  endeavored  to  make  plain  a  purpose  to  make  life  on  the  farm  just 
as  profitable  and  just  as  attractive  as  life  in  the  town.  The  intensity  of  that 
purpose  has  deepened  with  the  passing  months,  and  I  now  call  upon  the  farmers 
to  make  a  supreme  effort  in  this  direction  and  to  capitalize  the  opportunity  of 
the  hour.  To  this  end  I  earnestly  beseech  the  farmers  of  the  State  to  set  apart 
the  month  of  November  as  Thrift  Month,  and  urge  every  farmer  to  do  something 
definite  and  substantial  during  that  month  that  will  inure  to  the  permanent 
betterment  of  his  condition  in  life.  I  suggest  the  following  specific  accomplish- 
ments and  appeal  to  every  farmer  to  do  one  or  more  of  these  things : 

1.  If  he  be  a  tenant,  to  buy,  if  possible,  a  small  farm  and  make  the  first  pay- 
ment on  the  purchase  price. 

2.  To  pay  off  all  debts,  and  go  on  a  cash  basis  next  year. 

3.  To  start  a  savings  account  in  some  bank  or  credit  union. 

4.  To  buy  a  milch  cow  or  brood  sow. 

5.  To  install  home  waterworks  and  lights. 

6.  To  paint  his  house. 

7.  To  set  out  an  orchard. 

The  Agricultural  Department,  the  Joint  Committee  on  Agricultural  Work, 
and  the  State  Department  of  Education  will  generously  cooperate  with  the  farmers 


APPEALS  TO  TEE  PUBLIC  127 

in  making  Thrift  Month  a  notable  month  in  the  agricultural  life  of  the  State. 
I  call  upon  the  teachers  in  the  rural  schools  to  read  this  appeal  to  the  children. 
Complete  plans  for  taking  a  census  during  the  first  week  in  December  will  be 
arranged,  to  the  end  that  we  may  know  at  the  end  of  the  month  just  how  many 
farmers  have  redeemed  the  great  opportunity  that  now  confronts  them  and  have 
preserved  for  their  wives  and  children  some  portion  of  the  blessings  of  this  un- 
paralleled year.  Respectfully, 

T.  "W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(9) 
FOOD  CONSERVATION 

Raleigh,  K  C,  October  29,  1917. 
To  the  Women  of  North  Carolina: 

Before  the  breaking  out  of  the  World  War  a  saturnalia  of  extravagance 
threatened  to  undermine  the  foundations  of  the  character  of  our  people.  Economy 
was  a  lost  art  and  frugality  a  forgotten  virtue.  Indolence  led  to  waste,  and  pride 
to  prodigality.  Men  mortgaged  their  homes  for  automobiles  and  women  bought 
diamonds  on  the  installment  plan. 

A  valuable  by-product  of  the  war  is  that  we  have  been  forced  to  return  to 
habits  of  industry  and  self-denial,  without  which  no  man  and  no  nation  can 
achieve  enduring  power.  Thousands  of  people  are  daily  learning  how  vital  are  the 
processes  of  elimination  to  bodily  comfort  and  efficiency,  and  that  every  ounce 
of  surplus  food  taken  into  the  body  means  excess  baggage  for  blood  and  brain. 
Every  consideration  of  health  and  wealth  urges  a  program  of  simplicity  and 
frugality.  But  the  argument  comes  with  the  force  of  a  command  when  we  con- 
template the  results  of  our  personal  indulgence  upon  our  own  armies  and  the  armies 
of  our  allies  in  the  field.  The  battle  line  halts  until  the  bread  line  advances. 
Shall  we  jeopardize  the  whole  world's  birthright  for  a  mess  of  pottage? 

In  order  that  self-denial  at  the  table  may  be  universally  practiced,  and  in 
ways  that  will  accomplish  the  largest  good,  the  National  Food  Administrator  is 
calling  upon  every  woman  who  is  at  the  head  of  a  home  or  public  eating  place  to 
give  this  week  her  written  pledge  that  she  will  observe  certain  rules  and  regu- 
lations for  the  conservation  of  food.  Our  State  Food  Administrator  joins  in  this 
appeal  and  gives  to  the  regulations  prescribed  by  the  National  Administrator  his 
emphatic  approval.  I  therefore  earnestly  request  every  woman  in  the  State  to 
sign  the  Food  Pledge  Card,  and  thus  dedicate  herself  and  her  family  to  this  high 
service.  Our  women  are  patriotic  to  the  core,  and  unselfish  to  the  last  degree. 
I  register  my  faith  that  every  woman  in  North  Carolina  to  whom  the  Food  Card 
is  presented  will  cheerfully  sign  it,  and  in  this  way  secure  our  ultimate  triumph, 
and  hasten  the  end  of  the  war. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


128  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  B1CEETT 

(10) 
WAR  SAVINGS  CERTIFICATES 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  January  7,  1918. 
To  the  Ministers  of  the  Gospel  in  North  Carolina: 

In  behalf  of  the  State  of  North  Carolina,  in  behalf  of  the  Nation,  and  in  behalf 
of  all  humanity  I  thank  you  for  the  high  service  you  have  rendered  the  whole 
world  in  the  supreme  crisis  that  now  confronts  it.  With  an  insight  born  of  God 
you  have  grasped  the  true  relations  and  the  true  proportions  of  the  conflict  and 
have  wrought  mightily  for  enduring  safety  and  enduring  peace. 

The  Nation  has  just  launched  its  offensive  for  the  winning  of  the  war.  That 
offensive  is  designed  to  rally  to  the  Nation's  support  the  mind  and  heart  of  every 
man,  woman  and  child  in  all  the  land.  The  sure  way  to  reach  this  end  is  to  get 
all  the  people  to  put  some  of  their  earnings  into  the  fight.  "Where  the  treasure  is, 
there  will  the  heart  be  also."  If  every  man,  woman  and  child  would  buy  one  or 
more  War  Savings  Certificates  the  moral  and  military  value  of  these  investments 
would  multiply  their  money  value  a  hundredfold. 

I  therefore  earnestly  request  every  minister  of  the  gospel  in  the  State  to 
preach  a  sermon  to  his  people  on  this  great  movement  on  Sunday,  the  13th  of 
January,  or  at  the  earliest  date  thereafter  possible.  Literature  fully  explaining 
the  plans  and  purposes  of  the  war  savings  campaign  can  be  obtained  from  Col. 
F.  H.  Fries,  State  Director,  at  Winston-Salem,  N.  C. 

"Into  the  breach  once  more,  kind  friends,  once  more." 
Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(11) 

SOLDIER'S  LIFE  INSURANCE 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  January  17,  1918. 
To  North  Carolina  Soldiers: 

My  dear  Friend  : — Though  you  are  no  longer  under  the  authority  of  the  State 
of  North  Carolina,  the  State  has  a  deep  and  abiding  interest  in  your  welfare,  and 
in  the  happiness  of  your  loved  ones  at  home.  As  your  Governor  I  am  earnestly 
desirous  of  helping  you  and  your  people  in  all  possible  ways  while  you  are  de- 
fending the  honor  and  safety  of  us  all.  The  Government  has  with  benevolent  fore- 
sight provided  that  every  soldier  may  take  out  insurance  on  his  l:'fe  in  a  sum  of 
from  one  to  ten  thousand  dollars  at  a  rate  miraculously  low.  This  is  one  of  the 
very  finest  things  the  Government  has  done  for  the  protection  of  your  loved  ones. 
I  urge  every  one  of  you  to  take  advantage  of  this  opportunity.  Think  of  what  it 
means  to  your  loved  ones  at  home  and  apply  for  this  insurance  at  once.  Do  not 
delay  the  matter.  Delay  will  be  fatal.  You  cannot  obtain  this  insurance  after 
the  12th  day  of  February. 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  129 

If  you  find  it  impossible  to  pay  the  small  premium  out  of  your  wages,  apply 
for  the  insurance  at  once  anyway;  pay  the  first  premium  and  then  write  to  some 
member  of  your  family  or  to  some  friend  to  arrange  to  pay  this  small  premium 
for  you.  I  am  morally  certain  that  there  is  not  a  North  Carolina  soldier  who 
cannot  get  some  member  of  his  family  or  some  friend  to  carry  this  insurance  for 
him  if  the  soldier  finds  that  it  is  impossible  for  him  to  pay  the  premium  out  of 
his  own  wages.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(12) 

INSURANCE  FOR  SOLDIERS 

Ealeigh,  N.  C.,  January  18,  1918. 

To  the  Families  and  Friends  of  North  Carolina  Soldiers: 

The  civil  and  military  authorities  are  doing  everything  in  their  power  to  get 
North  Carolina  soldiers  to  apply  for  the  amazingly  cheap  insurance  the  Govern- 
ment is  offering  them.  Every  officer  and  enlisted  man  is  entitled  to  take  from  one 
to  ten  thousand  dollars  of  this  insurance,  and  it  is  the  supreme  duty  of  every 
soldier  to  take  advantage  of  this  wonderful  opportunity. 

But  despite  the  earnest  and  persistent  efforts  of  the  civil  and  military  author- 
ities, North  Carolina  soldiers  are  neglecting  to  take  advantage  of  this  great 
opportunity. 

General  S.  L.  Faison,  Commanding  General  at  Camp  Sevier,  and  himself  a 
North  Carolinian,  deeply  interested  in  the  welfare  of  her  soldiers  and  in  the 
prosperity  and  happiness  of  their  people  at  home,  writes  me  as  follows : 

I  regret  to  inform  you  that  only  about  50  per  cent  of  this  command 
have  taken  out  any  insurance  whatever.  So  far  they  have  turned  a  deaf 
ear  to  all  appeals. 

I  am  presenting  this  matter  to  you  with  the  hope  and  expectation  that 
you  will  cooperate  with  the  Government  and  my  own  efforts  in  more  effect- 
ively reaching  the  individual  soldiers  of  your  own  State  by  issuing  a 
proclamation,  or  otherwise,  as  you  may  deem  best,  to  the  people  of  your 
State  and  more  particularly  to  those  dependents  and  relatives  immediately 
concerned,  to  write  letters  to  their  soldier  friends,  urging  them  to  take  out 
all  the  insurance  they  can  carry,  up  to  $10,000. 

I  entreat  and  beseech  the  families  and  friends  of  our  soldiers  to  take  vigorous 
action  at  once  to  have  the  soldiers  apply  for  this  insurance.  Not  a  single  soldier 
should  be  overlooked.  If  a  soldier  cannot  pay  the  small  premium  charged  by  the 
Government,  then  let  the  family  and  friends  of  the  soldier  pay  it  for  him.  It  is 
the  best  investment  on  earth. 

Bear  in  mind  that  this  opportunity  expires  on  the  12th  day  of  February. 
After  that  day  no  soldier  can  obtain  this  Government  insurance.  Delay  is  fatal. 
Act  today.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

0 


130  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(13) 

HELP  FOR  STRICKEN  TOWN  OF  ATLANTIC 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  January  18,  191S. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

Citizens  of  the  town  of  Atlantic,  North  Carolina,  inform  me  that  their  com- 
munity is  in  sore  distress.  A  cyclone  swept  the  town  on  January  15th,  totally 
wrecking  one-fifth  of  all  the  buildings  and  damaging  many  others.  In  an  appeal 
to  me  the  local  Relief  Committee  says : 

The  boats  which  are  our  only  means  of  livelihood  are  wrecked  upon  the 
shores  of  the  sea;  one  man  dead  and  others  injured.  This  awful  storm 
came  just  after  a  terrible  blizzard  of  a  month's  duration,  during  which  time 
our  people  were  cut  off  from  their  only  means  of  livelihood.  Many  of  our 
people  had  exhausted  their  supplies  and  some  of  them  were  without  bread. 
Now  that  the  boats  and  houses  are  wrecked  the  people  are  without  means 
of  making  a  living  until  these  are  repaired. 

I  deeply  sympathize  with  the  people  of  Atlantic  and  regret  that  there  is  no 
provision  in  law  by  which  the  public  funds  can  be  expended  for  their  relief  with- 
out a  special  act  of  the  Legislature.  I  therefore  earnestly  appeal  to  the  people 
of  the  State  to  come  to  the  rescue  of  their  neighbors  who  are  in  distress  at 
Atlantic.  Let  me  urge  you  to  send  donations  in  money  or  supplies  quickly,  as  the 
need  for  immediate  relief  is  most  imperative.  Checks  should  be  mailed  to  J.  R. 
Morris,  Treasurer  of  Relief  Committee,  Atlantic,  North  Carolina. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(14) 
THE  RESERVES  TO  THE  COLORS 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  January  24,  1918. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

On  the  third  day  of  September,  1917,  I  issued  a  proclamation  calling  into 
active  military  service  all  men  between  the  ages  of  twenty-one  and  forty-five. 
These  men  constitute  the  Home  Guard  and  are  the  guardians  of  the  peace  and 
safety  of  the  State. 

I  now  call  to  the  Colors  all  the  women  in  the  State,  and  all  the  boys  and  girls 
between  the  ages  of  twelve  and  twenty-one. 

The  one  supreme  task  before  the  American  people  is  the  winning  of  the  war. 

The  one  supreme  necessity  for  the  winning  of  the  war  is  food. 

The  one  sure  way  to  supply  this  supreme  necessity  is  to  man  the  bread  line 
with  the  woman  power,  the  boy  and  the  girl  power  of  the  State. 

I  hereby  nominate  and  appoint  every  woman  in  the  State  a  committee  of  one 
on  garden  spots.  The  duty  of  each  committee  is  twofold — 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  131 

1.  To  take  steps  at  once  to  prepare  and  cultivate  a  garden  spot  for  herself  and 
family. 

2.  To  see  to  it  that  every  vacant  parcel  of  land  in  the  neighborhood  in  which 
she  lives  is  converted  into  a  garden  spot. 

I  urge  every  woman  in  the  State  to  join  some  active  canning  and  drying  club, 
to  the  end  that  everything  may  be  saved  and  nothing  be  lost.  Last  year  the 
women  canned  and  dried  eighteen  times  as  much  fruits  and  vegetables  as  they 
did  the  year  before.     This  is  a  glorious  record.     Double  it. 

I  call  to  the  Colors  every  boy  and  girl  between  the  ages  of  twelve  and  twenty- 
one.  I  urge  every  one  of  you  to  join  the  Corn,  the  Pig,  and  the  Poultry  Clubs. 
In  so  doing  you  will  become  an  essential  part  of  the  army  that  must  win  the  war. 

Today  we  have  only  thirty-six  hundred  Corn  Club  boys.  I  want  to  see  one 
hundred  thousand  marshaled  in  invincible  array.  Let  no  boy  be  a  slacker,  but 
let  every  one  fall  promptly  in  line. 

If  these  reserves  shall  bearken  to  this  call  we  will  surely  win  the  war,  and  the 
victory  so  achieved  will  count  as  much  for  happiness  in  the  coming  years  as  it 
will  count  for  success  in  this  supreme  crisis  in  the  world  struggle  for  enduring 
peace.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(15) 
A  CALL  FOR  A  WAR  SAVINGS  INSTITUTE 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  January  31,  1918. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

The  one  supreme  task  that  confronts  this  Nation  is  the  winning  of  the  war. 
To  this  end  the  Government  is  calling  on  the  people  of  North  Carolina  to  invest 
forty-eight  million  dollars  in  Thrift  Stamps  and  War  Savings  Certificates.  To 
the  timid  this  task  is  a  terror;  to  the  heroic  it  is  a  challenge. 

If  the  people  of  North  Carolina  respond  to  this  call  it  will  mean  two  things: 

First.  That  we  have  done,  not  our  bit,  but  our  best. 

Second.  The  habits  of  thrift  necessary  to  save  forty-eight  million  dollars  and 
the  working  capital  thereby  created  will  insure  the  financial  independence  of  our 
people. 

To  accomplish  this  gigantic  task,  plans  systematic  and  comprehensive  must  be 
laid.  To  this  end  and  at  the  request  of  Col.  F.  H.  Fries,  State  Director  of  the 
National  War  Savings  Committee,  I  hereby  call  a  War  Savings  Institute  to  be 
held  in  the  city  of  Raleigh  on  the  12th  and  13th  days  of  February,  1918.  Trained 
experts  will  conduct  the  institute,  and  on  Tuesday  night,  the  12th,  speakers  of 
international  reputation  will  address  the  public. 

All  people  interested  in  the  work  are  cordially  invited,  but  I  nominate  and 
appoint  the  following  special  delegates : 

1.  Every  county  superintendent  of  public  instruction. 

2.  Every  superintendent  of  town  and  city  schools. 

3.  Every  farm  demonstration  agent. 


132  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

4.  Every  home  demonstration  agent. 

5.  One  physician  from  each  county  in  the  State,  to  be  named  by  the  State 
Board  of  Health. 

6.  Every  county  chairman  of  a  political  party  in  the  State. 

I  earnestly  urge  the  boards  of  county  commissioners  to  pay  the  actual  expenses 
of  the  Farm  and  Home  Demonstration  Agents  and  the  physician.  I  earnestly  urge 
the  county  and  city  boards  of  education  to  pay  the  actual  expenses  of  their  repre- 
sentatives. It  would  be  impossible  for  these  boards  to  spend  money  that  will  yield 
larger  returns  to  the  public. 

Let  it  be  borne  in  mind  that  this  meeting  is  not  to  be  a  celebration ;  but,  as  its 
name  implies,  it  is  to  be  a  school,  and  all  who  attend  will  be  thoroughly  taught 
just  what  they  are  expected  to  do  and  just  how  to  do  it. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(16) 

LETTERS  TO  SOLDIERS 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Governor's  Office 

Raleigh 


February  8,  1918. 


To  All  Ministers  of  the  Gospel: 

My  dear  Sirs  : — I  am  satisfied  that  there  is  not  a  person  in  North  Carolina 
who  would  knowingly  get  a  soldier  into  trouble.  I  am  satisfied  that  the  families 
and  friends  of  the  soldiers  earnestly  desire  them  to  stand  well  in  the  esteem  of 
their  officers  and  their  comrades  in  arms. 

And  yet  soldiers  in  the  camps  are  constantly  receiving  letters  from  home  whose 
tendency  is  to  make  the  soldier  unhappy  and  to  cause  him  to  leave  camp  without 
permission.  For  a  soldier  to  do  this  is  technically  desertion,  for  which  the  ex- 
treme penalty  is  death.  I  deeply  regret  that  some  soldiers  from  North  Carolina, 
moved  by  sad  and  sorrowful  letters  from  home,  have  quit  the  camps,  have  subse- 
quently been  arrested,  and  a  few  have  been  severely  punished. 

I  have  just  returned  from  a  visit  to  Camp  Jackson  and  Camp  Sevier.  My 
judgment  is  that  the  soldiers  in  these  camps  are  better  fed,  better  clothed,  and 
lead  more  wholesome  lives  than  ninety-five  per  cent  of  the  men  of  the  same  age 
at  home.  They  are  a  husky,  handsome  lot,  with  muscles  as  hard  as  nails,  and 
with  hearts  aglow  with  a  high  purpose  to  serve  and  to  save  the  world  in  this 
supreme  crisis. 

The  most  demoralizing  feature  of  their  life  in  camp  is  letters  from  home  con- 
taining tales  of  misery  and  woe. 

On  account  of  these  things,  I  earnestly  request  you,  at  the  earliest  possible 
date,  to  preach  a  sermon  to  your  people  on  this  subject.  Beg  them  to  write  cheer- 
ful letters  to  the  boys.  The  boys  need  it.  Beg  them  to  write  letters  to  the  boys 
telling  them  how  proud  the  family  is  of  their  representative  on  the  field  of  honor. 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  133 

Such  letters  will  make  heroes  of  every  one  of  them.  I  am  not  denying  nor  dis- 
counting the  fact  that  there  is  sorrow  and  suffering  in  all  our  homes  and  all  our 
hearts,  but  I  am  insisting  that  the  boys  who  are  offering  to  sacrifice  their  lives 
should  not  be  burdened  with  tales  of  our  troubles.  And  after  all,  the  very  saddest 
thing  that  could  possibly  happen  to  any  North  Carolina  home  would  be  for  the 
soldier  who  went  out  from  that  home  to  be  shot  for  desertion. 

Not  every  one  can  buy  a  Smileage  Book,  but  every  one  can  write  a  smileage 
letter;  and  I  earnestly  trust  that  henceforward  every  letter  that  goes  from  North 
Carolina  to  any  soldier  will  carry  a  message  of  happiness  and  cheer. 

Eespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(17) 
ENFORCEMENT  OF  VAGRANCY  LAWS 

Baleigh,  N.  C,  March  4,  1918. 
To  All  Mayors  and  City  Commissioners: 

Our  country  needs  workers  as  it  has  not  needed  them  in  years.  Every  branch 
of  industry  is  suffering  for  lack  of  man  power.  "We  cannot,  during  a  great  war, 
afford  to  have  any  unproductive  consumers  of  food  in  our  State.  This  is  no  time 
for  parasites  and  idlers. 

At  the  last  meeting  of  the  State  Council  of  Defense  I  was  asked,  after  reports 
as  to  labor  needs  were  considered,  to  urge  every  executive  officer  in  the  State  to 
strictly  enforce  the  vagrancy  laws.  See  section  3740  of  the  Revisal  of  1905. 
No  able-bodied  man  in  the  commonwealth  should  be  allowed  to  dodge  his  con- 
tribution of  labor.  "Go  to  work  or  go  to  the  roads,"  should  be  our  war-time 
watchword. 

I  am,  therefore,  urging  you  to  see  that  all  vagrants  are  routed  out  in  your 
town,  and  either  set  themselves  to  work  or  be  set  to  work  by  you,  and  that  there 
be  no  relaxation  in  the  observance  of  such  men  as  are  directed  to  get  employment 
and  to  keep  employed.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(18) 

WAR  SAVINGS  CAMPAIGN 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  March  12,  1918. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

It  is  of  superlative  importance  to  devote  all  the  time  and  all  the  energy  the 
people  can  spare  from  the  prosecution  of  their  daily  business  to  the  War  Savings 
Stamps  campaign  from  now  until  the  6th  day  of  April,  when  the  campaign  for 
the  sale  of  the  Third  Liberty  Loan  bonds  begins. 


134  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

The  value  of  this  War  Savings  campaign  to  the  Government  in  the  winning 
of  the  war  and  to  the  people  in  training  them  to  lay  aside  a  working  capital  for 
use  after  the  war  cannot  be  overestimated.  I  earnestly  hope  that  all  war  workers 
will,  between  now  and  the  6th  day  of  April,  lay  aside  the  particular  work  in  which 
they  are  engaged,  and  unite  in  giving  a  grand  impetus  to  the  War  Savings 
campaign.  For  three  weeks  let  the  stamps  and  certificates  have  the  right  of  way. 
If  everybody  will  pull  together  to  secure  every  pledge  possible  to  make  a  monthly 
investment  in  these  stamps  from  now  until  the  end  of  the  year,  we  will  be  able  to 
carry  this  movement  over  the  top.  These  three  weeks  are  the  critical  period  in  this 
campaign.  They  will  determine  its  success  or  its  failure.  That  success  or  failure 
depends  upon  the  number  of  pledges  we  can  obtain  to  make  monthly  investments, 
and  I  arnestly  entreat  every  person  in  the  State  to  sign  one  of  these  pledges  for 
a  monthly  investment  during  the  next  three  weeks.  I  earnestly  urge  all  local  and 
district  officials  and  committees  connected  with  this  campaign  to  redouble  their 
efforts  during  these  three  weeks;  and  my  judgment  is  that  if  we  shall  go  forward 
with  untiring  zeal  during  this  period,  on  the  6th  day  of  April  the  goal  will  be  in 
sight.     Surely  this  is  a  challenge  worthy  of  a  supreme  effort. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(19) 

BOYS  WORKING  RESERVES 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  March  20,  1918. 
To  the  Boys  of  North  Carolina: 

Your  brothers  are  on  the  firing  line.  If  they  fight  they  must  be  fed — and 
this  is  the  job  of  the  folks  at  home.  The  food  and  feed  crops  will  constitute 
America's  great  offensive  this  year.  They  may  win  the  war  before  our  boys  are 
fully  ready  for  the  fray.  The  army  and  all  sorts  of  war  industries  have  depleted 
the  ranks  of  farm  laborers.  To  fill  up  the  ranks  President  Wilson  is  calling  on 
the  boys  between  sixteen  and  twenty-one  years  of  age  to  enlist  in  the  Boys 
Working  Reserves.  North  Carolina  is  asked  to  furnish  seven  thousand  recruits 
for  the  farm ;  and  I  earnestly  urge  every  boy  in  the  State,  white  and  colored,  who 
does  not  already  have  a  good  steady  job,  to  at  once  hand  in  his  name  to  some 
school  teacher,  the  county  superintendent  of  public  instruction,  or  the  farm  dem- 
onstration agent.  Your  name  will  then  be  enrolled  in  the  county  and  State 
headquarters,  and  you  will  soon  be  notified  that  a  good  job  on  a  farm  is  ready 
for  you. 

For  full  particulars  write  to  J.  M.  Johnson,  State  Director,  West  Raleigh, 
1ST.  C,  but  by  all  means  enlist  at  once.  Boys  in  schools  and  colleges  can  enlist 
in  their  schools,  and  their  names  will  be  duly  certified  to  county  and  State  head- 
quarters. I  trust  that  no  boy  in  North  Carolina  will  prove  a  slacker  in  this 
emergency.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  135 

(20) 

ALL  MEN  MUST  WORK 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Governor's  Office 

Raleigh 

June  11,  1918. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

I  am  profoundly  convinced  that  the  people  who  do  not  work,  or  work  only 
half  time,  do  not  understand  that  their  idleness  means  death  to  our  soldiers  in 
the  trenches ;  but  that  is  exactly  what  it  does  mean. 

I  appeal  to  all  good  citizens  to  stop  talking  about  idleness  and  to  go  straight 
to  the  man  you  know  is  an  idler  and  explain  to  him  in  a  kindly  spirit  that  his 
failure  to  work  means  the  prolongation  of  the  war,  and  this  means  death  to  the 
men  who  fight. 

To  fail  to  supply  our  soldiers  with  food  and  clothing,  munitions  and  imple- 
ments of  war,  is  both  treason  and  murder.  Please  go  to  the  idle  rich  as  well 
as  to  the  idle  poor.  Go  to  the  man  who  drives  an  eight-cylinder  as  well  as  to 
the  man  who  pushes  a  wheelbarrow.  Neither  wealth  nor  social  position  affords 
any  excuse  for  manslaughter,  and  in  this  hour  of  the  Nation's  peril  idleness  is 
manslaughter. 

If  the  idler  will  not  agree  to  take  a  job  and  stay  on  it,  then  report  that  idler 
by  name  to  the  County  Council  of  National  Defense.  The  County  Council  is 
urged  to  summon  before  it  all  parties  complained  of  and  explain  to  them  just 
what  idleness  means  to  the  Nation  at  this  time.  Let  the  Council  further  explain 
that  unless  an  idler  goes  to  work  it  will  become  the  duty  of  the  Council  to  send  his 
name  and  address  to  the  Governor  of  the  State,  who  in  turn  will  forward  all  such 
names  to  the  "War  Department  at  Washington.  The  name  of  every  idler  will 
then  be  on  file  with  the  War  Department,  and  this  will  be  used  as  the  basis  of  an 
amendment  to  the  Draft  Law,  empowering  the  local  exemption  boards  to  put  in 
Class  1  all  able-bodied  men  between  the  ages  of  eighteen  and  fifty  who  refuse  to 
do  regular  work.  There  is  no  desire  to  conscript  any  man  to  work  for  any  private 
individual  or  corporation,  but  the  people  of  this  country  have  made  up  their 
minds  that  if  a  man  won't  work  he  must  be  made  to  fight. 

I  have  instructed  all  police  officials  to  rigidly  enforce  the  vagrancy  laws. 
All  men,  rich  or  poor,  black  or  white,  who  refuse  to  work  for  five  days  in  the 
week,  after  having  been  given  notice  by  the  County  Council  of  National  Defense, 
should  be  prosecuted  for  vagrancy. 

In  some  cases  such  parties  will  be  able  to  show  that  technically,  under  existing 
laws,  they  are  not  legal  vagrants,  but  are  only  moral  vagrants.  WTien  the  court 
finds  this  to  be  true,  then  I  urge  the  courts  to  enter  a  judgment,  and  have  it  duly 
recorded,  that  the  court  finds  the  accused  guilty  of  moral  vagrancy,  but  owing  to 
the  limitations  of  the  statute  it  is  unable  to  impose  punishment.  This  will  reach 
the  idle  rich  as  well  as  the  idle  poor. 

The  defendants  so  convicted  will  then  have  their  names  listed  in  Washington 
as  slackers  and  traitors  to  our  soldiers,  and  on  the  records  in  the  community  where 
they  live  as  moral  vagrants. 


136  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Again  let  me  urge  every  citizen  not  to  indulge  in  wholesale  charges  about 
idleness  and  vagrancy,  but  let  him  go  to  or  point  out  the  individual  idler  or 
vagrant,  to  the  end  that  such  idler  or  vagrant  may  be  persuaded  to  go  to  work, 
if  possible,  and,  if  persuasion  fails,  that  he  may  be  sent  to  the  front-line  trenches 
or  to  the  county  chain-gang.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(21) 

LABOR  AGENTS  AND  IDLERS 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Governor's  Office 

Raleigh 

June  11,  1918. 

To  Mayors,  City  and  Town  Councils,  Sheriffs,  Recorders,  and  other  Officials: 

The  professional  labor  agents  who  are  continually  enticing  laborers  to  move 
from  place  to  place  inside  and  outside  of  the  State  have  become  a  menace  and 
disturbance.  They  are  crippling  industrial  and  agricultural  enterprise.  They 
must  be  suppressed.  Every  such  agent,  or  his  employee,  should  be  instantly 
arrested  on  his  appearance  unless  he  produces  a  county  license,  and  the  burden  of 
proof  put  upon  him  to  show  that  he  is  not  acting  unlawfully. 

Section  73,  chapter  231,  Laws  of  1917,  provides  that  every  labor  agent  must 
pay  a  tax  of  $200  in  every  county  in  which  he  operates.  It  is  practically  certain 
that  this  tax  has  never  been  paid  in  any  county.  All  such  are,  therefore,  acting 
unlawfully. 

Section  3365  of  the  Revisal  should  be  explained  to  employers  in  order  that 
they  may  make  specific  contracts  when  employing  labor.  I  urge  that  the  vagrancy 
laws  be  rigidly  and  tirelessly  enforced.  Persons  who  do  not  work  regularly  should 
be  regarded  as  vagrants.  Lists  of  all  such  should  be  made,  and  the  public  made 
aware  of  who  and  where  they  are.  Loafing  places  and  all  idling  congregations 
should  be  broken  up. 

Loafing  and  voluntary  idleness  are  not  to  be  tolerated.  Create  a  public 
sentiment  to  this  effect.  Let  it  start  at  the  top  and  go  through  all  classes.  If 
respectable  people  of  your  community  set  the  example,  the  easier  it  will  be  to  make 
the  others  follow  suit. 

Take  hold  of  the  situation  in  your  community  and  work  it  out.  Enclosed  you 
will  find  a  copy  of  the  resolution  passed  by  the  State  Labor  Conference  on  June  4th. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


.     APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  137 

(22) 

A  CALL  FOR  NURSES 

Raleigh,  N.  C.,  August  9,  1918. 
To  the  Women  of  North  Carolina: 

I  am  just  in  receipt  of  an  appeal  that  cannot  be  denied.  It  is  an  appeal  from  a 
patriotic  woman  to  her  sisters  in  North  Carolina.  Mrs.  Claude  Barbee,  who  writes 
this  appeal,  is  herself  a  graduate  nurse  and  regularly  enrolled  in  the  Red  Cross 
service.  She  knows  exactly  what  she  is  writing  about,  and  what  she  says  is  entitled 
to  the  prayerful  consideration  of  every  young  woman  in  North  Carolina.  I  ask  you 
to  read  every  line  that  she  has  written,  and  sincerely  trust  that  North  Carolina  will 
respond  with  a  number  greatly  in  excess  of  the  460  nurses  that  our  Government  is 
asking  us  to  enroll.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


[The  communication  of  Mrs.  Barbee  is  given  below  in  full.] 

Dear  Governor  Bickett: — The  Government  is  calling  for  25,000  young 
women  to  join  the  United  States  Student  Nurse  Reserves,  and  hold  them- 
selves in  readiness  to  train  for  service  as  nurses. 

The  war  is  creating  an  unprecedented  demand  for  trained  nurses.  Only 
those  who  have  taken  the  full  training  course  are  eligible  for  service  with 
our  forces  overseas.  These  nurses  are  being  drawn  largely  from  our  hos- 
pitals at  home.  Their  places  must  be  filled  by  student  nurses  enrolled  for 
the  full  training  course  of  from  two  to  three  years.  Every  young  woman 
who  enrolls  in  the  United  States  Student  Nurse  Reserve  is  releasing  a 
nurse  for  service  at  the  front  and  swelling  the  home  army  which  we  must 
rely  on  to  act  as  our  second  line  of  hospital  defense.  Upon  the  health  of  the 
American  people  will  depend  the  spirit  of  their  fighting  forces. 

What  the  Training  Course  Prepares  for.  At  present  every  woman 
who  completes  satisfactorily  her  training  in  any  accredited  school  is  eligible 
for  service  to  duty  abroad.  At  the  same  time  she  will  be  qualified  to  earn 
her  living  in  one  of  the  noblest  professions  open  to  women.  It  should  be 
remembered,  furthermore,  that  her  usefulness  will  begin  not  when  she 
graduates  from  the  training  school,  but  as  soon  as  she  enters  it.  Practical 
nursing  is  a  part  of  the  work  of  every  training  school,  and  the  student 
nurse  is  not  only  learning  to  serve,  but  serving  her  country  from  the  outset. 
The  country  will  need  all  the  nurses  that  can  be  trained,  not  only  during 
the  war  but  after  it,  especially  for  reconstruction  work.  Even  if  the  war 
ends  within  three  years,  every  student  nurse  will  be  able  to  complete  her 
training  and  will  be  needed. 

An  Honorable  Service.  Ever  since  the  days  of  Florence  Nightingale 
the  nursing  profession  has  been  one  of  especial  honor.  It  was  never  so  hon- 
orable as  it  is  today.  The  Army  needs  every  nurse  it  can  get  to  "keep  up 
with  the  draft."  The  United  States  Student  Nurse  Reserve  is  equivalent 
for  women  to  the  great  National  Army  training  camps  for  soldiers.  The 
Government  will  rely  upon  the  student  nurses  to  fight  disease  at  home,  to 
care  for  those  injured  and  disabled  in  our  hazardous  war  industries,  and 
to  make  themselves  ready  to  serve  when  the  time  comes  as  fully  trained 


138  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

nurses,  either  abroad  or  at  home.    Let  us  show  that  we  know  how  to  answer 
the  Government's  call  to  the  women  of  the  country. 

There  exists  now  an  extreme  need  for  at  least  25,000  women  of  character, 
intelligence  and  education  to  fill  the  gaps  in  our  hospital  staffs  caused  by 
the  calling  of  many  thousands  of  skilled  nurses  to  the  fighting  front. 

There  is  only  one  way  to  fill  these  gaps:  by  keeping  our  hospital  train- 
ing schools  supplied  with  students,  who  are  not  only  preparing  for  service 
abroad  and  at  home  at  the  end  of  their  course  and  at  the  same  time  are 
equipping  themselves  to  earn  their  living  in  one  of  the  noblest  professions, 
but  from  the  very  outset  of  their  course  are  serving  their  country  as  well 
as  learning. 

The  service  which  we  are  asking  calls  for  the  best  that  the  womanhood 
of  America  can  offer  in  courage,  devotion,  and  resourcefulness.  We  cannot 
go  forward  to  victory  overseas  if  the  wives  and  families  of  our  fighters  are 
not  sustained  in  health  and  strength,  if  we  do  not  protect  our  workers 
against  the  hazards  of  war  industries,  if  we  do  not  defeat  accident  and 
disease,  our  enemies  at  home.  Upon  the  health  of  the  American  people  will 
depend  the  spirit  of  their  forces  in  the  field. 

It  is  probable  that  even  with  the  ban  removed  from  women  with  relatives 
in  the  Army,  there  will  not  be  a  sufficient  number  of  nurses  to  meet  the 
need  "over  there."  The  normal  sickness  among  five  million  men,  not  in- 
cluding wounds  in  battle,  is  100,000.  That  is  the  smallest  percentage  under 
normal  conditions.  Add  to  this  the  large  casualty  percentage,  and  we  can 
ship  all  the  trained  nurses  in  the  United  States  and  still  have  too  few  to 
meet  the  need.  It  seems  to  me  that  this  is  one  of  the  best  ways  in  which 
women  of  strong  bodies  and  steady  minds  can  serve. 

Respectfully  yours, 

Mrs.  Claude  Barbee. 


(23) 

RECEIVING  FEES  FROM  SOLDIERS 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  August  15,  1918. 

To  All  Notaries  Public  and  Justices  of  the  Peace  of  the  State  of  North  Carolina: 
During  the  last  few  days  there  have  come  to  the  Governor's  office  complaints 
that  notaries  public  and  justices  of  the  peace  are  charging  registrants  fees  for 
preparing  affidavits  and  taking  acknowledgments  of  the  same.  This  custom  is  by 
no  means  general,  for  the  great  majority  of  notaries  and  magistrates  are  assisting 
the  registrants  without  any  compensation  whatever.  I  earnestly  desire  every  notary 
public  and  justice  of  the  peace  in  the  State  of  N"orth  Carolina  to  decline  to  receive 
any  fees  for  work  done  for  registrants  or  soldiers.  These  men  are  giving  every- 
thing to  their  country,  and  those  of  us  who  are  not  called  upon  or  are  not  in  a 
position  to  make  the  supreme  sacrifice  should  witness  our  devotion  to  the  cause 
by  helping  in  every  way  possible  the  men  who  are  giving  their  all.  I  know  that 
our  notaries  and  magistrates  are  patriotic  men,  and  I  am  sure  that  when  their 
attention  is  called  to  this  matter  they  will  gladly  respond  to  this  appeal. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  139 


(24) 

TEACHER-TRAINING  SUNDAY 

Raleigh,  N".  C,  September  14,  1918. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

President  "Wilson  has  called  upon  every  agency  in  America  to  do  its  part  in  the 
great  enterprise  of  saving  our  Christian  civilization.  Every  resource  is  pledged 
to  help  win  the  war.  Surely  the  Sunday  school  with  its  millions  of  pupils  is  one 
of  these  resources.  ISTot  only  must  it  do  its  part,  but  it  has  a  part  to  play  that 
no  other  agency  can  do  as  well.  To  it  is  given  the  important  task  of  building  up 
the  Nation's  moral  resources.  It  is  needed  to  keep  the  boys  and  girls  pure  and 
strong.  It  is  needed  to  prevent  the  alarming  increase  in  juvenile  crime.  It  is 
needed  to  help  guard  our  homes  and  schools  in  order  that  childhood  and  youth  may 
he  built  up  and  not  weakened.  It  is  needed  to  train  the  coming  generation  in 
whose  hands  will  be  the  destiny  of  the  world  that  is  now  being  saved  by  the 
splendid  sacrifice  of  our  young  manhood  on  the  altar  of  war. 

In  order  that  the  Sunday  school  may  do  its  most  effective  work,  it  is  imperative 
that  its  officers  and  teachers  thoroughly  understand  the  situation.  It  is  as 
imperative  that  they  be  trained  as  it  is  that  the  officers  of  our  armies  should  be 
trained.  The  teachers  must  understand  the  idealism  for  which  we  are  fighting 
in  this  great  war.  They  must  learn  the  best  methods  of  training  children  in  order 
that  they  may  be  best  able  to  rebuild  a  world.  They  must  know  how  to  teach  the 
children  most  effectively  how  to  live  in  these  war  times. 

The  thirty  denominations  composing  the  Sunday  School  Council  of  the  United 
States  and  Canada  have  invited  all  others  to  cooperate  with  them  in  a  great 
teacher-training  drive  to  be  conducted  during  the  months  of  September  and 
October.  They  invite  you  to  participate  in  this  great  effort.  I  want  to  add  my 
voice  to  their  calls  and  invite  the  people  of  North  Carolina  to  take  part  in  this 
important  work,  and  do  hereby  set  apart  Sunday,  the  29th  day  of  September,  1918, 
as  Teacher-training  Day. 

I  request  that  all  newspapers  give  the  widest  publicity  to  this  day,  and  hope 
that  special  mention  will  be  made  of  this  work  in  the  editorial  columns.  On  that 
day  I  urge  all  ministers  and  leaders  to  present  this  great  cause  to  the  people  in 
order  that  they  may  be  aroused  to  the  necessity  of  preparing  our  people  for  the 
tremendous  moral  tasks  that  confront  us  now  and  that  will  confront  us  even  more 
emphatically  when  this  great  war  is  won. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


140  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(25) 

LET  NOT  A  LOCK  BE  LOST 

Kaleigh,  K  C,  October  7,  1918. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

The  cotton  crop  is  short.  The  world's  need  is  great,  and  today  the  South's 
kingly  staple  is  more  precious  than  was  Jason's  Golden  Fleece.  Every  considera- 
tion of  patriotism  and  profit  urges  that  not  a  lock  be  lost.  Waste  is  always  folly — 
in  the  presence  of  want  it  is  crime.  Therefore  heroic  and  organized  efforts  should 
be  made  to  prevent  loss  or  damage  to  the  cotton  that  has  come  white  to  the 
harvest.     To  this  end  I  earnestly  urge : 

First.  The  Council  of  National  Defense  in  every  cotton  county  to  establish  at 
once  a  Cotton  Pickers'  Bureau. 

Second.  All  farmers  who  need  cotton  pickers  to  submit  at  once  their  needs  in 
detail  to  this  bureau. 

Third.  All  school  children  in  our  cities  and  towns,  and  all  other  persons  who 
are  not  engaged  for  the  whole  day  in  some  useful  work,  to  file  their  names  with 
the  Cotton  Pickers'  Bureau,  and  offer  their  services  to  farmers  needing  pickers, 
these  services  to  be  paid  for  by  the  farmers  at  current  prices. 

The  details  for  putting  into  execution  this  plan  can  be  worked  out  in  each 
county,  according  to  local  conditions. 

The  children  and  adults  who  respond  to  this  appeal  will  render  a  threefold 
service : 

1.  They  will  help  win  the  war,  for  cotton  is  a  vital  necessity  in  maintaining 
our  man  power  and  our  gun  power  on  the  field  of  battle. 

2.  They  will  make  for  themselves  many  honest  dollars,  and  in  the  salvation  of 
the  crop  will  swell  the  sum  total  of  wealth  in  their  community. 

3.  They  will  vastly  improve  their  own  health.  A  half  day  in  the  cotton  field 
is  a  better  tonic  than  a  car  load  of  Swamp  Boot,  Peruna,  and  Tanlac.  The 
outdoor  life  and  exercise  will  tend  to  prevent  the  spread  of  influenza,  and  if  the 
disease  should  be  contracted  the  system  will  be  better  able  to  withstand  its  ravages. 

I  earnestly  urge  every  child,  every  man  and  every  woman  who  has  a  few  idle 
hours  each  day  to  report  at  once  for  patriotic,  profitable  and  healthy  work  to  the 
Cotton  Pickers'  Bureau.  Bespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(26) 

A  DASH  FOR  THE  HOME  PLATE 

Kaleigh,  TS.  C,  October  14,  1918. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

The  most  critical  minute  in  a  baseball  game  is  in  the  last  inning  when  all 
the  bases  are  full.  The  batter  who  then  knocks  a  home  run  is  the  "man  of  the 
hour." 

Precisely  this  situation  today  confronts  the  American  people.  It  is  the  last 
inning  of  the  war.     Our  boys  have  found  the  enemy,  hit  him  hard  and  the  bases 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  141 

are  all  full.     A  six-billion-dollar  hit  will  bring  them  all  over  the  home  plate  and 
win  the  war.    A  strike-out  now  would  be  a  world  tragedy. 

Therefore  I  urge  that  in  every  town  and  township  a  house-to-house  canvass 
be  made.  We  can  have  no  public  meetings,  but  we  can  and  must  see  the  people 
face  to  face.  If  you  are  afraid  of  influenza  spray  your  nose  and  throat,  put  on  a 
gas  mask,  and  go  into  the  fight.  The  Nation  sorely  needs  this  money  to  send  the 
boys  to  complete  victory  and  bring  them  home.  I  pray  that  every  individual  may 
make  this  question  an  intensely  personal  one.  Stand  face  to  face  with  your  own 
soul  and  say,  "The  boys  are  doing  their  level  best  over  there.  Am  I  doing  my 
level  best  over  here?" 

Victory  is  in  the  air.  The  goal  is  almost  in  sight.  The  hour  is  big  with 
destiny. 

"Into  the  breach  once  more, 
Kind  friends,  once  more!" 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(27) 
PERSHING  DAY 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  October  16,  1918. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

Saturday,  October  19th,  is  Pershing  Day.  I  want  the  people  of  North  Carolina 
on  that  day  to  think  of  the  great  drives  General  Pershing  has  been  making  for  us, 
and  to  highly  resolve  to  make  an  equally  great  drive  for  him.  The  following 
message  comes  to  us  from  National  headquarters : 

Let  the  concluding  day  ot  the  Liberty  Loan  campaign  be  one  of  militant 
America  fully  aroused  and  realizing  its  patriotic  obligations,  that  an 
overwhelming  oversubscription  to  the  Nation's  bond  issue  may  result  in  a 
great  tidal  wave  of  patriotism  and  enthusiasm,  which  will  roll  from  ocean 
to  ocean,  striking  fresh  terror  to  the  heart  of  the  Hun,  and  secure  for  all 
time  the  freedom  of  the  world. 

The  order  comes  direct  from  our  Commander-in-Chief  that  on  Saturday  we  go 
forward.    On  that  day  the  Nation  expects  every  man  to  do  his  duty. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

(28) 

IN  YOUR  OWN  VINEYARD 

Raleigh,  N.  O,  October  28,  1918. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

The  United  States  Government  is  undertaking  to  do  big  things  in  North  Caro- 
lina. It  is  endeavoring  to  build  up  a  great  shipbuilding  plant  at  Wilmington;  to 
establish  and  equip  one  of  the  biggest  artillery  camps  in  the  world  near  Fayette- 
ville;  the  only  tank  camp  in  the  United  States  at  Raleigh;  a  large  hospital  for  the 
care  of  our  soldiers  near  Biltmore,  and  the  largest  wireless  plant  in  the  world 


142  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

near  Monroe.  These  enterprises  call  for  labor,  and  today  there  is  dire  need  for 
fifteen  thousand  laborers  at  Camp  Bragg,  three  thousand  at  Camp  Polk,  two 
thousand  at  Biltmore,  and  one  thousand  at  "Wilmington.  The  Government 
naturally  expects  North  Carolina  to  furnish  this  labor,  and  North  Carolina  can 
do  it  if  North  Carolina  laborers  will  quit  leaving  the  State  and  will  work  in 
North  Carolina. 

I  therefore  appeal  to  our  citizens  to  stay  at  home  and  work  on  these  Govern- 
ment plants.  The  work  being  done  is  largely  of  a  permanent  character,  and  will 
mean  much  to  the  State  for  many  years  to  come. 

I  appeal  to  the  Local  Exemption  Boards  and  the  District  Exemption  Boards  to 
enforce  rigidly  the  principle  of  work  or  fight.  There  is  plenty  of  work  to  do,  at 
remunerative  wages,  and  if  any  man  in  the  State  between  the  ages  of  eighteen  and 
forty-five  is  not  working  steadily  in  some  useful  employment,  he  should  be  sent  to 
the  training  camps  at  once. 

I  trust  that  our  citizens  will  put  forth  every  effort  to  meet  the  reasonable 
expectations  of  the  Government.  The  Government  has  done  in  these  things  what 
our  people  urged  it  to  do;  now  let  us  do  what  is  absolutely  necessary  to  the  com- 
pletion of  the  work. 

I  direct  the  special  attention  of  our  citizens  to  the  United  States  Employment 
Service  that  is  prepared  to  bring  laborers  and  employers  together  and  to  afford 
every  facility  to  the  man  who  wants  a  job,  and  to  the  job  that  wants  a  man.  The 
headquarters  of  this  service  are  located  at  Raleigh,  but  there  is  a  representative 
and  enrolling  agent  in  every  county,  and  I  urge  our  people  to  make  the  fullest  use 
possible  of  these  agencies.  Respectfully, 

T.  "W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(29) 

THE  HOME  AND  "THE  CHILD  IN  THE  MIDST" 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  November  4,  19]  8. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

Amid  the  thunder  of  guns  and  the  bickerings  of  politics  there  is  danger  of 
losing  sight  of  the  two  most  vital  forces  in  our  civilization.  These  are  the  home 
and  "the  child  in  the  midst." 

The  two  constitutional  amendments  that  will  be  voted  on  Tuesday  are  designed 
to  multiply  the  homes  of  the  land  and  to  give  to  the  children  a  wider  opportunity 
than  they  have  ever  known.  Such  measures  would  be  helpful  at  all  times  and  in 
all  lands.  But  these  measures  rise  to  the  dignity  of  "life  savers"  amid  the  perils 
and  problems  that  are  even  now  upon  us  as  the  world  war  nears  a  victorious  end 
for  the  ninety  and  nine. 

The  period  of  readjustment  that  will  follow  the  war  will  tax  the  strength  of 
every  government,  and  test  the  intelligence  and  character  of  every  people.  The 
sane  reconstructionist,  the  Utopian  dreamer,  and  the  red-handed  revolutionist  will 
each  bid  high  for  the  allegiance  of  the  people.  In  such  an  hour  the  intelligent 
citizen,  anchored  in  his  own  home,  is  the  Nation's  hope  and  reliance. 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  143 

"Land  without  population  is  a  wilderness;  population  without  land  is  a  mob." 
The  most  enduring  bulwark  against  the  spirit  of  mob  rule  and  the  wild,  mad  ex- 
cesses of  bolshevism  is  the  man  who  lives  under  his  own  roof  and  tills  his  own  soil. 

The  constitutional  amendment  exempting  from  taxation  the  home  owner's 
note  and  mortgage  given  to  acquire  his  home,  makes  it  possible  for  every  honest 
and  industrious  man  to  live  under  his  own  vine  and  fig  tree,  and  I  earnestly  beg 
every  citizen  who  desires  to  multiply  the  home  owners  of  the  land  to  vote  for  this 
amendment. 

Again,  a  well  informed,  well  disciplined  citizenship  is  a  mighty  barrier  against 
the  tides  of  ignorance  and  of  prejudice.  The  six  months  school  amendment  keeps 
open  the  schoolhouse  for  every  child  six  months  in  the  year.  Let  all  good  men 
labor  and  pray  for  the  adoption  of  both  of  these  amendments.  Let  us  open  wide 
the  doors  of  knowledge  to  every  child,  lay  deep  the  foundations  of  our  homes,  and 
neither  the  insidious  encroachments  of  autocracy  nor  the  muddy,  bloody  tide  of 
mobocracy  shall  prevail  against  us.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(30) 

ON  REOPENING  THE  CHURCHES 

Raleigh,  K  C,  November  11,  1918. 
To  All  Ministers  of  the  Gospel: 

Today  our  hearts  leap  for  joy:  our  eyes  shine  with  gladness,  and  our  lips  are 
full  of  praise. 

"God's  in  His  Heaven, 
All's  right  with  the  world." 

For  many  weeks  our  churches  have  been  closed.  On  next  Sunday  they  will 
be  opened  again ;  therefore,  I  devoutly  urge  that  every  service  be  one  of  prayer 
and  thanksgiving.  Let  all  the  people  assemble  in  their  places  of  worship  and  lift 
up  their  hearts  in  praise  of  the  Lord  of  Hosts  for  His  mighty  deliverance,  and  in 
prayer  that  in  our  day  of  triumph  He  will  keep  us  just  and  gentle  still. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


144 


PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 


(31) 


UNITED  WAR  WORK  CAMPAIGN 

GOVERNOR  AND  MRS.  BICKETT'S  PROCLAMATION  FOR  OUR  "BOYS  AND  GIRLS" 


A  PLEA  FOR  THE  BOYS 
By  Governor  T.  W.  Bickett 

Just  before  Hector  went  forth  to 
die  in  a  duel  with  Achilles  he  took  his 
little  son  in  his  arms  and  prayed  to  his 
gods,  "O  Zeus,  and  all  ye  gods,  grant 
that  this  my  son  may  grow  in  wisdom 
and  in  grace,  and  may  the  time  come 
when  the  people  shall  say  of  him,  'Far 
greater  is  he  than  his  father  was,'  and 
his  mother's  heart  be  glad." 

This  is  the  universal  prayer  of 
fatherhood,  and  the  men  and  women 
of  the  United  War  Workers  are  offer- 
ing their  very  lives  to  make  this  prayer 
come  true. 

The  most  fearful  strain  upon  the 
moral  and  spiritual  life  of  the  boys  will 
come  when  the  big  fight  is  over  and 
the  victory  won.  The  reaction  will  be 
like  the  breaking  up  of  the  snows  in 
springtime  when  the  south  winds  blow 
and  the  rivers  are  full.  Every  agency 
will  be  taxed  to  save  the  boys  from  the 
damnation  of  drink  and  the  fascina- 
tions of  those  "whose  feet  go  down  to 
death,  and  whose  steps  take  hold  on 
hell." 

The  United  War  Workers  constitute 
the  first  line  of  defense  against  these 
enemies  more  deadly  than  the  Hun, 
for  they  have  power  to  destroy  both 
body  and  soul. 

Let  us  stand  behind  these  conse- 
crated men  and  women,  even  as  they 
stand  before  our  boys  and  work  and 
pray  and  laugh  and  sing  to  woo  the 
boys  from  haunts  of  sin,  and  send  them 
back  to  mother  and  sweetheart  and 
wife  with  bodies  unblemished  and  souls 
unstained. 

North  Carolina  is  called  upon  to 
contribute    one   million   dollars   to    this 


A  PLEA  FOR  THE  GIRLS 
By  Mrs.  T.  W.  Bickett 

"Over  there"  in  Flanders  Field 
where  poppies  blow,  thousands  of  our 
boys  rest  today;  over  there  in  huts  and 
hospitals  thousands  are  lying  wounded 
sorely,  but  with  an  unquenchable  spirit 
shining  through  their  battered  bodies, 
and  saying  always  to  those  who  come, 
"Just  tell  the  folks  at  home  I  am  fine." 
Over  there  our  boys  are  fighting  with 
purpose  and  spirit  unequaled  in  any 
land  or  age.  Right  gloriously  our  boys 
are  "carrying  on." 

Over  there  and  over  here  men  and 
women  in  our  various  organizations  are 
giving  themselves,  their  very  lives,  with- 
out stint  in  a  noble  service  to  our  boys 
and  to  the  war-weary  people  of  battle- 
scarred  Belgium  and  France.  These, 
too,  are  "carrying  on." 

To  us  at  home  comes  the  oppor- 
tunity to  join  this  great  multitude  who 
serve  today.  To  us  may  not  come  the 
active  service  to  which  so  many  fortu- 
nate ones  are  called.  We  may  not  see 
the  comfort  and  joy  that  come  to  the 
women  and  boys  who  visit  our  hostess- 
houses,  or  the  satisfaction  and  cheer 
of  the  thousands  of  girls  housed  and 
cared  for  in  our  camps  and  cities.  We 
may  not  see  the  brightness  on  the  face 
of  a  soldier  boy  when  he  sees  an  Ameri- 
can woman  over  there,  or  hear  the  thrill 
in  his  voice  when  he  says,  "Gee,  that 
nearly  bowled  me  over,  seeing  some  one 
from  home !"  or  " Jiminy,  I  wonder  if 
you  women  know  how  it  helps  us  to 
straighten  just  to  know  you  are  here." 
We  may  not  see  the  tragic  sweetness  on 
the  face  of  a  weary  munition  worker  as 
she  sits  in  the  bright  foyer  and  hears 
the  soft  strains  of  music,  or  words  of 


APPEALS  TO  TEE  PUBLIC 


145 


high  service.  Conditions  make  it  im- 
possible to  meet  the  people  face  to  face, 
but  I  ask  every  man  and  woman  to  put 
to  himself  the  question,  Is  the  boy  who 
risked  his  life  for  his  country  worth  a 
supreme  effort  to  save? 

In  every  county  there  will  be  a  roll 
of  honor  recorded  and  preserved  for 
all  time,  and  on  this  roll  will  appear 
the  name  of  every  person  who  con- 
tributes to  this  work  of  love  and  salva- 
tion. I  sincerely  hope  that  this  honor 
roll  will  be  a  complete  census  of  our 
population,  that  the  name  of  every  man, 
woman  and  child  of  the  State  will  be 
written  there. 


comfort  and  cheer  from  "one  who 
cares."  We  may  not  hear  the  pathos 
in  the  voice  of  the  rescued  girl  as  she 
says,  "Because  of  you  I  shall  go  back 
to  the  old  life  no  more."  We  may  not 
see  the  refreshment,  the  peace  that 
comes  to  our  nurses  as  they  sit  quiet  for 
a  while  in  the  Rest  Houses  that  are 
planned  for  them,  and  get  rest  and 
recreation  for  mind  and  body,  and  re- 
newed strength  to  go  on  with  their 
glorious  work. 

And  yet  we,  too,  can  be  a  part  of  the 
great  company.  From  our  home  fires 
we  can  light  the  torches  that  those  who 
go  forth  must  bear,  and  in  spirit  and 
truth  with  them  we,  too,  can  "carry  on." 

From  camp  and  field,  from  devas- 
tated homes  and  shell-shattered  villages, 
from  the  cross-filled  fields  of  the  Marne 
and  the  Somme,  Chateau  Thierry,  and 
St.  Mihiel  they  are  calling  us  today. 
We  must  not,  we  cannot,  fail  them  now. 
Every  man,  woman  and  child  must  give 
ear  to  their  Macedonian  cry.  We  must 
"stand  by"  through  the  fierce  fury  of 
battles  yet  to  be  fought,  through  days 
and  months  when,  peace  declared,  our 
boys  shall  still  dwell  in  a  foreign  land 
and  amongst  a  strange  people.  We 
must  not  faint  nor  falter  in  our  support 
until  we  shall  bring  to  perfection  the 
fruits  of  their  high  endeavors — and  we 
have  them  all  safe  again  in  this  blessed 
land  of  ours  "where  the  air  is  full  of 
sunshine  and  the  flag  is  full  of  stars." 


(32) 

SOLDIERS'  INSURANCE 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  November  30,  1918. 
To  the  Soldiers  of  North  Carolina: 

Whatever  else  you  may  do,  hold  on  to  the  life  insurance  the  Government  has 
provided  for  you.  It  is  the  cheapest  insurance  ever  issued  in  the  history  of  the 
world,  and  the  safest. 

You  have  done  everything  for  your  country,  now  do  this  thing  for  yourself, 
for  your  own  loved  ones. 

10 


146  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

I  hope  some  relative  or  friend  of  every  soldier  will  write  to  him  at  once  to  hold 
on  to  his  insurance  now.  If  he  wants  to  change  later  he  can  do  it,  but  he  should 
by  all  means  hold  on  until  he  gets  home  and  can  fully  understand  what  a  great 
investment  he  has  in  this  insurance.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(33) 

THE  COTTON  SITUATION 

Raleigh,  K  C,  February  15,  1919. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

Every  citizen  of  North  Carolina  is  vitally  interested  in  cotton.  Though  a 
man  may  live  on  a  mountain  top  or  on  the  seashore  where  cotton  is  neither  grown 
nor  manufactured,  his  welfare  is  deeply  touched  by  the  staple  that  contributes  so 
enormously  to  the  wealth  of  the  State. 

The  present  cotton  situation  is  distressing.  The  crop  was  made  on  the  basis 
of  thirty-five  cents  a  pound  and  is  now  selling  for  twenty.two.  The  situation  of 
the  manufacturers  is  as  precarious  as  that  of  the  farmers.  They  have  much  high- 
priced  cotton  and  cotton  goods  on  hand.  They  made  their  contracts  and  employed 
their  labor  on  the  basis  of  high  prices,  and  today  they  can  find  no  market  for 
their  goods. 

All  good  men  in  every  walk  of  life  will  desire  to  relieve  these  distressing  con- 
ditions. Measures  must  be  devised  for  holding  the  cotton  we  have  and  reducing 
the  acreage  of  the  next  crop.  To  this  end  a  great  Cotton  Convention  was  held 
in  Raleigh  on  the  11th  day  of  February,  and  the  Governor  was  requested  to 
appoint  a  committee  of  seven  men  to  take  charge  of  a  campaign  for  holding  the 
cotton  we  now  have  and  for  reducing  by  at  least  one-third  the  next  crop.  I  have 
appointed  on  this  committee  the  following  gentlemen : 

CD.  Orrell Moncure 

W.  G.  Clark Tarboro 

S.  H.  Hobbs Clinton 

J.  Z.  Green Marshville 

G.  N.  Ne wsom Goldsboro 

E.  B.  Crow Raleigh 

O.  L.  Clark Clarkton 

February  22d  is  Washington's  birthday,  and  will  be  celebrated  as  North  Caro- 
lina Day  in  every  public  school  in  the  State.  A  most  attractive  program  for  the 
day  has  been  prepared  by  the  State  Department  of  Education.  I  earnestly  urge 
every  teacher  in  a  district  where  cotton  is  grown  to  have  some  farmer  explain  to 
the  people,  on  the  22d  of  February,  the  exact  cotton  situation,  and  get  them  inter- 
ested in  the  campaign  to  hold  and  reduce. 

At  every  schoolhouse  let  delegates  be  selected  to  attend  the  great  Cotton  Con- 
vention which  is  to  be  held  in  every  courthouse  in  the  cotton  belt  of  the  State  on 
Saturday,  March  1st,  for  the  purpose  of  thoroughly  organizing  the  county.  I  beg 
all  good  citizens,  farmers,  manufacturers,  bankers,  and  men  of  all  classes   and 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  147 

conditions  to  attend  this  meeting  at  the  county  courthouse  on  Saturday,  March  1st, 
to  the  end  that  the  common  sense  and  judgment  of  the  people  may  be  pooled  and 
the  wisest  measures  possible  devised  to  meet  the  distressing  and  demoralizing 
situation  that  now  confronts  our  people. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(34) 

A  WIDER  DOOR  FOR  THE  CHILDREN— A  SQUARER  DEAL 
FOR  THE  TEACHERS 

Rausigh,  K  C,  March  12,  1919. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

The  General  Assembly  of  1919  enacted  four  laws  that  are  epoch-making  in  the 
history  of  education  in  North  Carolina. 

First.  It  was  a  comparatively  easy  thing  to  secure  an  order  from  the  people 
for  a  six-months  school,  but  the  filling  of  that  order  taxed  the  brains  and  the 
patriotism  of  the  General  Assembly,  the  State  Department  of  Education,  and 
every  friend  of  education  in  the  State.  The  fact  that  the  bill  in  its  final  shape 
passed  without  substantial  opposition  is  a  high  tribute  to  the  men  who  devoted 
themselves  to  its  preparation. 

Second.  Next  in  importance  to  the  passage  of  the  act  providing  the  funds  for 
conducting  a  six-months  school  is  the  act  compelling  every  child  under  fourteen 
years  of  age  to  attend  that  school  during  the  entire  term.  One  of  the  most  inter- 
esting things  in  the  history  of  the  General  Assembly  is  that,  under  the  clouds  of 
dust  and  smoke  made  by  the  fight  over  whether  this  man  or  that  should  enforce 
the  Child  Labor  law,  the  General  Assembly,  without  debate  and  without  division, 
passed  as  fine  a  compulsory  school  law  as  can  be  found  in  any  state  in  the  Union. 

These  two  acts  open  for  the  children  a  wider  door  than  they  have  ever  known. 

The  act  providing  for  a  sixty-five  dollar  minimum  salary  for  the  teacher 
in  the  public  schools,  and  the  act  providing  for  a  better  system  of  teacher-training, 
give  to  the  teachers  of  the  State  a  squarer  deal  than  they  have  ever  had.  The  State 
is  now  definitely  committed  to  educational  policies  worthy  of  a  great  people, 
and  the  outlook  justifies  a  robust  optimism. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


148  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(35) 
THE  APPOINTMENT  OF  TAX  ASSESSORS 

State  of  Worth  Carolina 

Governor's  Office 

Raleigh 

April  5,  1919. 
To  the  Board  of  County  Commissioners: 

Gentlemen  : — On  the  first  Monday  in  April  you  are  called  upon  to  discharge 
the  most  important  duty  that  has  devolved  upon  you  in  many  years,  that  is,  to 
appoint  two  men  to  act  as  assistants  to  the  county  supervisor  in  carrying  out  the 
provisions  of  the  Revaluation  Act  of  the  General  Assembly  of  1919.  This  act 
means  more  for  the  moral  and  material  advancement  of  North  Carolina  than  any 
act  that  has  been  passed  within  my  recollection.  But  the  act  will  utterly  fail  to 
accomplish  the  wise  and  just  purpose  intended  unless  men  of  splendid  intelligence, 
of  lofty  integrity  and  of  great  firmness  of  character  are  selected  to  carry  out  the 
law.  Therefore,  I  urge  you  before  making  your  appointments  to  take  pains  to 
ascertain  whether  or  not  the  parties  under  consideration  have  the  qualities  above 
named. 

I  especially  urge  you  to  summon  before  you  the  parties  you  are  thinking  of 
appointing,  explain  fully  to  them  their  duties  under  the  law,  make  it  as  plain 
as  day  that  it  is  the  fixed  purpose  of  the  act  to  put  every  piece  of  property  on 
the  tax  books  at  its  actual  value  without  .fear  and  without  favor,  and  ascertain 
from  them  whether  or  not  they  are  in  genuine  and  lively  sympathy  with  its 
purpose. 

If  the  administration  of  the  law  shall  be  placed  in  the  hands  of  men  who 
approach  the  performance  of  their  duties  with  the  correct  conception  of  what  the 
law  means,  and  who  are  in  sympathy  with  that  meaning,  then  there  will  be  little 
trouble  in  securing  a  wise  and  just  administration  of  this  great  act.  To  this  end 
I  bespeak  your  hearty  and  sympathetic  cooperation. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(36) 

HELP  FOR  THE  HELPERS-A  PLEA  FOR  THE  SALVATION  ARMY 

Raleigh,  N  O,  April  22,  1919. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

"A  man  may  be  down,  but  he's  never  out."  This  slogan  of  the  Salvation  Army 
adequately  expresses  the  faith  of  its  officers  and  enlisted  personnel  in  the  saving 
grace  of  Christ  Jesus;  a  faith  that  has  led  them  to  the  uttermost  parts  of  the 
earth  and  produced  results  among  men  of  all  colors  and  races.  The  Salvation 
Army  is  now  established  in  almost  every  nation.     What  about  its  maintenance? 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  149 

"We,"  says  Commander  Evangeline  Booth,  "are  going  to  hold  to  our  contract 
with  God  and  man  and  press  on  to  greater  heights  of  devotion  and  sacrificial 
service,  and  you,  we  hope  and  pray,  will  help  us  with  your  kind  thoughts  as  we 
toil  still  further  up  the  long  hill  in  the  cause  of  humanity.  "We  will  shoulder  new 
responsibilities  which  are  inevitable,  but  we  shall  do  so  as  the  unassuming,  plain, 
seven-days-in-the-week  serving  Salvation  Army." 

For  this  continuous  fight  the  Salvation  Army  needs  munitions.  Surely,  if  its 
soldiers  spend  themselves  in  the  service  of  humanity,  the  men  and  women  of  the 
United  States  and  of  North  Carolina  will  see  to  it  that  the  troops  on  the  battle- 
fronts  are  supplied  with  the  means  of  waging  war  on  sin  in  its  most  unlovely 
forms.  Not  all  of  us  can  go  to  the  aid  of  the  soul  mired  up ;  but  who  can't  help 
support  the  efforts  of  those  who  do  ? 

Rescue  homes,  maternity  hospitals,  industrial  homes,  orphanages,  nurseries, 
shelters  for  the  homeless  and  the  unwanted,  the  sinned  against  and  sinning — a  man 
or  woman  who  would  be  denied  entrance  to  dive  or  brothel  is  welcomed  by  the 
Salvation  Army. 

Oh,  you  who  love  your  fellowman,  who  acknowledge  your  debt  to  your  elder 
brother,  Christ  Jesus !  What  better  use  can  you  find  for  your  money  than  lending 
it  to  the  Lord  for  use  by  the  Salvation  Army? 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(37) 

TO  THE  PEOPLE  OF  CHARLOTTE  AND  MECKLENBURG  COUNTY 
FOR  COOPERATION  OF  LABOR  AND  CAPITAL 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  May  30,  1919. 
Charlotte  Observer, 

Charlotte,  N.  C. 
Please  publish  in  your  morning  paper  the  following  appeal  to  the  people: 

To  All  Good  Citizens  of  the  City  of  Charlotte  and  County  of  Mecklenburg: 

A  situation  has  developed  in  the  city  of  Charlotte  pregnant  with  danger  to 
the  lives  and  property  of  our  citizens.  Without  respect  to  the  causes  that  produced 
the  situation,  violence  is  no  remedy  for  its  solution,  and  it  is  my  duty  and  fixed 
purpose  to  maintain  peace  and  order  without  regard  to  cost  or  consequence. 

The  Mayor  of  the  City  of  Charlotte  has  advised  me  that  the  situation  may 
grow  so  that  it  cannot  be  controlled  by  the  local  authorities,  and  I  have  ordered 
certain  companies  of  the  .Reserve  Militia  to  be  ready  to  proceed  to  Charlotte  and 
maintain  law  and  order.  More  troops  will  be  promptly  sent  if  the  necessities  of 
the  situation  demand  it.  I  call  on  all  good  citizens  of  Charlotte  and  Mecklenburg 
County  and  in  the  State  at  large  to  cooperate  with  the  authorities  and  to  refrain 
from  any  acts  of  violence  or  intimidation.  I  give  solemn  warning  to  all  that  the 
law  must  be  upheld.  I  have  given  strict  instructions  to  the  military  authorities  to 
keep  the  peace,  to  protect  property,  and  these  instructions  will  be  diligently  carried 
out.    If  any  man  or  set  of  men  shall  presume  to  defy  the  law  and  resort  to  violence, 


150  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

tlieir  blood  will  be  on  their  own  beads.  Without  regard  to  the  justice  or  the 
wisdom  of  any  action  of  the  mill  owners  or  the  mill  operatives,  I  propose  to 
enforce  the  law.  Neither  side  to  the  controversy  will  be  permitted  to  assert  its 
contentions  by  a  resort  to  violence. 

Having  said  this  much,  I  would  be  false  to  my  sense  of  duty  if  I  did  not  say 
more.  The  facts  leading  up  to  the  present  dangerous  situation  are  undisputed. 
A  considerable  number  of  mill  operatives  join  a  labor  union.  Thereupon  the 
owners  notify  these  operatives  that  they  must  withdraw  from  the  union  or  they 
will  not  be  permitted  to  work  in  the  mills.  The  operatives  refused  to  withdraw 
from  the  union  and  were  discharged. 

This  position  on  the  part  of  the  mill  owners  is  unwise,  unjust,  and  cannot  be 
maintained.  Labor  has  just  as  much  right  to  organize  as  capital.  This  right — 
the  right  of  collective  bargaining  on  the  part  of  labor — is  recognized  by  every 
civilized  government  in  the  world.  This  right  is  guaranteed  to  labor  everywhere 
by  the  world  treaty  of  peace  that  has  just  been  framed  in  Paris. 

When  the  mill  owners  discharged  the  operatives  because  they  joined  a  union, 
they  resorted  to  force  and  not  to  reason  to  sustain  their  position.  A  lockout  is 
war — industrial  war  waged  by  organized  capital  against  labor.  A  walkout  is 
war  waged  by  organized  labor  against  capital.  Neither  a  lockout  nor  a  walk- 
out bears  any  relation  to  the  sources  of  wisdom  and  of  justice.  In  the  case  of 
a  walkout  or  a  lockout  each  side  is  trying  to  starve  the  other  side  into  sub- 
mission to  its  will. 

The  right  of  labor  to  organize  cannot  be  challenged,  but  I  am  persuaded  that 
the  kind  of  organization  that  both  capital  and  labor  now  maintain  can  never 
bring  about  that  confidence  and  good  will  between  employer  and  employee  that 
is  essential  to  the  success  and  happiness  of  both.  Labor  and  capital  are  in  separate 
camps  viewing  each  other  with  suspicion  and  distrust.  Such  an  attitude  spells 
failure.  The  only  hope  for  better  conditions,  for  enduring  peace,  is  for  labor  and 
capital  to  stand  together  in  a  spirit  of  mutual  helpfulness.  There  must  be  co- 
operation and  not  competition  between  the  men  who  furnish  the  capital  and  the 
executive  ability  on  the  one  hand  and  the  men  who  furnish  the  labor  on  the  other. 

I  earnestly  urge  the  owners  and  operatives  in  Charlotte  and  in  the  adjoining 
sections  to  get  together,  for  eventually  the  happiness  of  all  must  depend  upon  the 
prosperity  of  the  enterprise  in  which  all  are  engaged.  I  am  absolutely  certain 
that  a  wise  and  just  plan  of  cooperation  can  be  devised.  In  the  formation  of  this 
plan  there  should  be  the  fullest  and  freest  participation  by  the  representatives  of 
capital.  Pending  the  working  out  in  good  faith  of  such  a  plan  of  cooperation, 
I  urge  that  all  the  mills  be  reopened  and  that  all  the  laborers  return  to  their  work. 

When  the  mills  reopen  any  and  every  American  citizen  has  a  right  to  work  in 
the  mills  whether  he  belong  to  a  labor  union  or  not.  ISTo  mill  owner  has  any  right 
to  say  a  man  shall  not  work  because  he  belongs  to  a  labor  union.  N"o  labor  union 
has  a  right  to  say  that  a  man  shall  not  work  because  he  does  not  belong  to  a  labor 
union.  That  is  a  question  for  each  man  to  decide  for  himself,  and  the  State  of 
North  Carolina  will  not  tolerate  any  interference  in  either  case.  I  give  my 
solemn  warning  that  the  full  power  of  the  State  will  be  exerted  to  protect  any  man 
who  wants  to  work,  and  any  one  who  shall  dare  to  interfere  with  a  willing  worker 
will  do  so  at  his  own  peril.  Eespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  151 

(38) 

A  LETTER  FROM  THE  GOVERNOR  TO  MR.  AVERAGE  CITIZEN 

State  of  North  Carolina 

Executive  Department 

Raleigh 

July  11,  1919. 

My  dear  Mr.  Average  Citizen  : — An  intimate  acquaintance  with  you,  extend- 
ing over  a  number  of  years,  leads  me  to  write  you  this  intensely  personal  letter. 
I  know  that  you  love  truth,  that  you  despise  injustice,  that  you  are  a  robust 
champion  of  the  square  deal.  The  possession  by  you  of  these  cardinal  virtues  makes 
North  Carolina  a  truly  great  State. 

The  most  vital  power  of  the  State  is  the  power  to  tax,  and  you  believe  that 
this  vital  power  should  be  exercised  with  a  full  knowledge  of  the  truth.  You 
believe  that  from  this  full  knowledge  of  the  truth  there  will  flow  perfect  equality 
in  taxation. 

For  the  first  time  in  the  history  of  the  State  you,  Mr.  Average  Citizen,  have  it 
in  your  power  to  write  the  full  truth  and  perfect  equality  in  the  tax  books  of  the 
State.  You  have  never  been  called  upon  to  do  this  before ;  indeed,  you  have  never 
been  permitted  to  do  this  before.  But  now  the  General  Assembly  has  enacted  a 
law  that  places  the  matter  entirely  in  your  hands.  The  new  tax  law  is  written  on 
correct  principles.  The  machinery  for  its  enforcement  is  adequate  and  appro- 
priate. The  law  is  so  written  that  it  will  be  easy  for  the  citizen  to  do  right  and 
hard  for  him  to  do  wrong.  But  on  you,  Mr.  Average  Citizen,  rests  the  respon- 
sibility of  determining  whether  or  not  the  wise  and  just  purpose  of  the  law  shall 
be  carried  out. 

Now,  Mr.  Average  Citizen,  you  will  receive  a  questionnaire  and  will  be  called 
upon  to  swear  before  God  and  all  your  fellow-citizens  what  is  the  fair  market 
value  of  your  property.  When  you  come  to  take  this  solemn  oath  it  will  be 
helpful  to  you  to  put  to  your  own  conscience  this  question :  "If  I  did  not  own  this 
property,  but  wanted  to  buy  it,  what  would  I  be  justified  in  paying  for  it?"  and 
again,  "If  I  wanted  to  sell  this  property,  not  at  a  forced  sale,  but  in  the  way  and 
on  the  terms  that  property  of  this  class  is  generally  sold  in  this  community,  what 
do  I  really  believe  I  could  get  for  it?"  The  answer  to  these  questions  will  point 
with  reasonable  accuracy  to  the  fair  market  value  of  your  property.  This  fair 
market  value  you  must  write  down  in  your  questionnaire,  else  you  will  cease  to  be 
Mr.  Average  Citizen  and  become  Mr.  Undesirable  Citizen. 

When  you,  Mr.  Average  Citizen,  tell  the  truth  about  your  property,  it  will  do 
no  good  for  your  neighbor,  Mr.  Undesirable  Citizen,  to  tell  a  lie  about  his 
property.  Because  the  books  show  truly  what  the  property  of  Mr.  Average  Citizen 
is  worth,  this  evidence  will  clearly  and  conclusively  show  what  the  property  of 
Mr.  Undesirable  Citizen  is  worth.  The  local  and  district  assessors,  when  they 
come  to  fix  the  value  of  property,  will  be  governed  by  the  sworn  testimony  of 
Mr.  Average  Citizen. 

And  when  you,  Mr.  Average  Citizen,  tell  the  unvarnished  truth  about  your 
property,  that  truth  will  wipe  out  every  discrimination  and  every  inequality  in 
taxation  in  North  Carolina.  True  values  are  always  equal  values,  but  the  greatest 
expert  cannot  equalize  a  series  of  falsehoods. 


152  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BIOKETT 

When  all  the  property  in  the  State  shall  be  placed  on  the  books  at  its  fair 
market  value,  many  benefits  will  accrue  to  you,  Mr.  Average  Citizen. 

1.  You  will  have  the  great  satisfaction  of  knowing  that  the  record  written  by 
all  the  people  of  the  State  is  a  true  record  and  not  a  libel  on  the  commonwealth. 
This  knowledge  will  wonderfully  strengthen  the  moral  fiber  of  our  people. 

2.  You  will  know  that  every  discrimination  in  taxation  is  wiped  out,  and  that 
every  citizen  is  carrying  his  fair  part  of  the  burden. 

3.  As  the  values  go  up  the  rate  of  taxation  will  go  down,  and  hereafter  North 
Carolina  will  be  known  far  and  wide  as  a  wealthy  State  with  a  low  rate  of  tax- 
ation instead  of  a  poor  State  with  a  high  rate  of  taxation. 

4.  The  General  Assembly  has  made  a  pledge  not  to  collect,  under  the  proposed 
true  valuation  of  property,  revenues  greater  than  ten  per  cent  in  excess  of  the 
revenues  collected  under  the  present  false  values.  This  means  that  the  total 
revenues  collected  by  the  State  shall  not  be  greater  than  ten  per  cent  in  excess 
of  the  total  revenues  collected  under  the  present  law.  This  most  emphatically 
does  not  mean  that  no  particular  citizen  will  have  to  pay  taxes  in  excess  of  ten 
per  cent  of  the  amount  he  has  heretofore  paid.  A  particular  citizen  may  pay  less 
taxes  than  he  has  ever  paid  before.  He  may  pay  double  what  he  has  heretofore 
paid.  This  depends  on  whether  or  not  he  has  heretofore  paid  his  fair  share  of  the 
taxes  according  to  his  true  worth.  If  he  has  paid  more  than  his  fair  share  the 
increase  as  to  him  will  be  less  than  ten  per  cent ;  if  he  has  paid  less  than  his  fair 
share  the  increase  as  to  him  will  be  more  than  ten  per  cent. 

You,  Mr.  Average  Citizen,  will  at  once  perceive  the  essential  justice  in  thus 
equalizing  the  public  burden.  I  call  on  you  to  lend  your  vigorous  support,  first, 
by  example,  and  then  by  precept,  to  this  attempt  by  the  General  Assembly  to  build 
up  a  taxation  system  in  North  Carolina  grounded  on  perfect  truth  and  perfect 
justice.  By  so  doing  you  will  help  to  practically  demonstrate  that  it  is  profitable 
in  money  and  in  morals  to  a  people  as  well  as  to  an  individual  to  tell  the  truth  and 
shame  the  devil.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(39) 
NORTH  CAROLINA  TRAFFIC  ASSOCIATION 

A  CALL  BY  THE  GOVERNOR 

Raleigh,  ST.  C,  October  24,  1919. 

At  the  request  of  the  President  of  the  North  Carolina  Traffic  Association,  I 
urge  all  shippers  and  receivers  of  freight  in  North  Carolina  to  attend  a  convention 
to  be  held  in  the  City  of  Raleigh  on  Friday,  October  31st,  where  the  entire 
freight  rate  situation  in  this  State  will  be  thoroughly  considered.  This  is  a  most 
important  meeting  and  it  is  hoped  that  all  interested  will  attend. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  153 

(40) 

RECOMMENDING  SERVICE  IN  THE  ARMY 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  January  19,  1920. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

Whereas,  we  should  consider  our  Army  as  a  part  of  us,  and  not  as  a  thing 
apart;  and 

Whereas,  our  Army  is  our  safeguard  against  domestic  and  external  violence; 
and 

Whereas,  the  Congress  of  the  United  States  has  wisely  appropriated  funds  for 
the  vocational  training  of  our  soldiers ;  and 

Whereas,  there  have  been  established  schools  in  117  camps,  posts  and  stations 
of  our  Army;  and 

Whereas,  the  physical  development,  the  education  and  the  vocational  training 
afforded  by  our  Army  will  promote  good  citizenship : 

Therefore,  I  heartily  recommend  a  period  of  service  in  the  United  States 
Army  to  the  youth  of  North  Carolina,  and  especially  to  young  men  in  need  of  a 
common  school  education  or  of  training  in  some  vocation  that  will  enable  them  to 
make  a  better  living  than  they  are  now  making. 

And  I  hereunto  affix  my  hand  and  seal. 

Respectfully, 
Attest :  T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

B.    S.   RoYSTER, 

Adjutant  General. 


(41) 

SPECIAL  LETTER  FROM  THE  GOVERNOR  TO 
MR.  SOLVENT-CREDIT  OWNER 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  February  3,  1920. 

My  dear  Sir  :— Heretofore  you  have  had  a  just  grievance  against  the  State  of 
North  Carolina.  Your  solvent  credits  were  grossly  discriminated  against  and 
were  taxed  to  a  point  approaching  confiscation.  While  real  property  and  tangible 
personal  property  were  being  taxed  at  from  one-third  to  one-tenth  of  their  real 
value,  you  were  required  to  list  your  credits  at  full  face  value. 

On  account  of  these  discriminatory  and  confiscatory  taxes  against  your  prop- 
erty you  resorted  to  many  devices  to  keep  your  solvent  credits  off  the  tax  books. 
Sometimes  you  sent  them  out  of  the  State  and  deposited  them  in  a  bank  or  trust 
company,  and  flattered  yourself  that  this  made  them  exempt  from  taxation.  This 
was  a  delusion,  for  solvent  credits  owned  by  a  resident  of  North  Carolina  are 
taxable  here  no  matter  where  they  are.  Sometimes  you  resorted  to  fancy  book- 
keeping and  made  fictitious  offsets  against  your  solvent  credits.     Sometimes  you 


154  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

swapped  securities  temporarily  for  the  purpose  of  evading  the  taxes,  and  in  a 
great  many  cases  you  simply  did  nothing  and  said  nothing,  but  conveniently  forgot 
that  you  owned  any  such  property. 

All  this  was  done  and  justified  in  your  own  mind  because  of  the  discrimination 
against  and  practical  confiscation  of  solvent  credits  under  the  old  tax  system. 
Because  you  were  being  sinned  against  you  did  a  little  sinning  yourself,  and 
public  opinion  condoned  your  evasions  on  the  ground  that  "you  were  more  sinned 
against  than  sinning." 

Under  the  Revaluation  Act  all  your  grievances  have  been  removed,  and  every 
discrimination  against  you  has  been  wiped  out.  All  tangible  property,  real  and 
personal,  is  now  being  placed  upon  the  books  at  its  true  value.  By  doing  this  the 
tax  rate  will  be  reduced  to  a  point  where  you  can  pay  the  taxes  on  your  credits 
and  still  have  a  reasonable  income  left.  Heretofore  the  taxes  on  such  credits  have 
averaged  in  the  towns  and  cities  about  three  dollars  on  the  hundred.  Under  the 
Revaluation  Act  they  will  average  about  one  dollar  on  the  hundred.  Heretofore 
it  would  have  taken  one-half  of  your  income  from  solvent  credits  to  pay  taxes  on 
the  same,  but  now  it  will  take  only  one-sixth. 

You  are  no  longer  sinned  against,  and  there  is  left  to  you  no  shadow  of  excuse 
for  failing  to  accurately  list  your  solvent  credits.  The  State  is  dealing  fairly  with 
you,  and  it  expects  and  demands  that  you  shall  now  deal  fairly  with  it.  This 
year  North  Carolina  expects  you  to  list  every  note,  stock,  bond,  open  account,  and 
all  money  on  hand.  If  you  fail  to  do  it,  you  will  be  burned  in  the  hot  fires  of 
public  contempt.  Your  neighbor  will  no  longer  respect  you  and  you  will  not 
respect  yourself.  Moreover,  you  will  wake  up  some  morning  and  find  your  debtor 
refusing  to  pay  you  because  you  have  failed  to  list  for  taxation  your  debt  against 
him.  The  law  gives  him  the  right  so  to  do.  The  law  will  not  assist  you  in  the 
collection  of  your  debt  when  you  disobey  and  defy  the  law  in  respect  to  that  debt. 

The  history  of  every  state  and  nation  shows  that  when  solvent  credits  have 
been  taxed  at  a  low  rate  they  have  straightway  come  out  of  hiding  and  appeared 
on  the  tax  books.  One  illustration :  A  few  years  ago  in  the  city  of  Baltimore 
there  was  a  high  rate  on  solvent  credits.  Under  the  high  rate  only  six  millions 
of  credits  were  listed  for  taxation.  The  rate  was  divided  by  four,  and  there  then 
appeared  on  the  tax  books  four  hundred  and  fifty  millions  of  these  credits.  This 
case  is  typical  of  the  experience  in  every  place  where  such  a  course  has  been 
pursued. 

The  people  of  North  Carolina  are  fundamentally  honest.  They  want  to  do  the 
right  thing,  and  will  do  it  when  they  feel  they  are  treated  right.  So,  Mr.  Solvent- 
Credit  Owner,  the  State,  having  come  clean  with  you,  confidently  expects  you  to 
come  clean  with  it.  I  have  a  supreme  faith  that  you  will  fully  meet  this 
expectation. 

What  I  have  said  with  respect  to  solvent  credits  applies  to  all  classes  of  per- 
sonal property ;  to  goods,  wares  and  merchandise ;  to  raw  material  and  manu- 
factured products  held  by  our  mills  and  factories,  to  automobiles,  and  to  personal 
property  of  every  description.  There  is  an  exemption  of  $300  instead  of  $25  as 
heretofore,  allowed  to  every  taxpayer ;  but,  after  deducting  this  exemption,  personal 
property  must  be  listed  at  its  fair  market  value. 

Respectfully, 

T.  "W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


APPEALS  TO  TEE  PUBLIC  155 

(42) 
AMERICA'S  GIFT  TO  FRANCE 

Ealeigh,  N.  0.,  April  2,  1920. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

The  Statue  of  Liberty  which  stands  in  the  entrance  to  New  York  harbor  was 
the  gift  of  France  to  America.  It  was  not  the  gift  of  the  wealthy,  but  of  all  the 
people.  The  schools  of  France  led  the  move,  and  from  every  corner  in  the  land 
millions  of  contributions  poured  in. 

America  has  determined  to  make  a  similar  gift  to  France.  It  will  take  the 
form  of  a  heroic  statue,  and  will  be  erected  in  the  town  of  Meaux  to  commemorate 
the  First  Battle  of  the  Marne.  No  large  contributions  are  sought,  and  none  will 
be  accepted.  We  want  France  to  know  that  this  gift  is  from  the  people  of  the 
United  States.  I  earnestly  beg  every  man,  woman,  and  child  in  North  Carolina 
to  give  one  penny  to  this  beautiful  memorial.  To  this  end  I  am  placing  the 
movement  in  the  hands  of  the  school  teachers  of  the  State. 

On  Tuesday,  the  6th  of  April,  which  is  Tuesday  after  Easter  Monday,  I  want 
the  school  children  to  carry  to  their  teachers  one  penny  from  every  member  of 
the  family  to  which  they  belong. 

The  children  of  France,  and  their  children,  will  rejoice  in  such  a  tribute  of 
admiration  and  love.  The  number  of  contributions  from  each  state  will  be  certified 
to  France,  and  I  want  North  Carolina,  in  proportion  to  our  population,  to  lead 
all  the  rest. 

All  teachers  will  please  take  notice  of  this  appeal  and  enlist  the  sympathy  and 
cooperation  of  the  children.  Eespectfully, 

T.  "W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(43) 

THE  RESTORATION  OF  THE  HOLY  LAND 

Ealeigh,  N.  C,  April  14,  1920. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

All  good  men  rejoice  that  the  Holy  Land  is  to  be  forever  free  from  the  grip 
of  the  shameless  Turk.  To  be  permanently  free  the  land  must  be  rehabilitated,  its 
resources  developed,  its  waste  places  restored  and  government  in  harmony  with  the 
highest  ideals  of  the  times  firmly  established. 

To  this  end  the  Zionist  movement  is  directed.  This  movement  is  in  charge  of 
wise  and  patriotic  Jews  in  this  and  other  lands.  There  is  in  it  nothing  of 
fanaticism  nor  of  race  prejudice,  but  it  is  a  sane  effort  to  build  up  the  Holy  Land 
so  as  to  make  it  a  great  spiritual  asset  to  Christian  and  Jew  alike. 

Surely  the  hearts  of  our  people  will  respond  to  this  noble  undertaking  of  a 
wandering  race  to  rebuild  its  native  land,  thus  fulfilling  the  hope  voiced  by  our 
own  Vance  that  the  time  would  come  when  the  Jews  would  take  their  harps  down 


156  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

from  the  willows  and  no  longer  refuse  to  sing  the  songs  of  Zion  because  they  are 
captives  in  a  strange  land. 

"And  where  shall  Israel  lave  her  bleeding  feet! 
And  when  shall  Zion's  songs  again  seem  sweet, 
And  Judah's  melody  once  more  rejoice 
The  hearts  that  leaped  before  its  heavenly  voice? 
Tribes  of  the  wandering  foot  and  weary  heart 
How  shall  ye  flee  away  and  be  at  rest? 
The  wild  dove  hath  her  nest,  the  fox  his  cave, 
Mankind  their  country — Israel  but  the  grave." 

Our  people  are  being  called  on  to  lend  a  helping  hand  to  this  movement,  and 
I  trust  they  will  respond  in  a  way  worthy  of  the  cause  and  of  their  own  character. 

Eespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(44) 

AMERICAN  LEGION  WEEK 

Kaleigh,  1ST.  0.,  May  3,  1920. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

The  National  Commander  of  the  American  Legion  requests  that  the  week  of 
May  17th  to  22d  be  observed  as  American  Legion  Week.  During  that  week  a 
special  effort  will  be  made  to  increase  the  membership  of  the  Legion,  and  I 
sincerely  trust  that  every  ex-service  man  in  North  Carolina  will  join  the  Legion. 
The  American  Legion  can  be  made  a  great  instrumentality  for  good  in  the  Nation. 
It  stands  for  Americanism  and  for  patriotism,  and  is  worthy  of  every  encourage- 
ment. Kespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(45) 

URGING  SOLDIERS  TO  KEEP  UP  THEIR  INSURANCE 

Kaleigh,  N.  C,  May  4,  1920. 
To  All  Soldiers  of  the  World  War: 

During  the  war  I  made  every  possible  effort  to  induce  soldiers  to  take  out  the 
life  insurance  offered  by  the  Government.  I  am  gratified  that  so  large  a  per- 
centage of  the  North  Carolina  soldiers  took  advantage  of  this  exceptional  oppor- 
tunity. I  am  distressed  that  so  many  of  our  soldiers  are  failing  to  follow  up  this 
advantage  and  are  allowing  their  policies  to  lapse. 

The  Government  is  offering  great  inducements  to  soldiers  to  continue  their 
policies,  and  I  trust  that  every  soldier  in  North  Carolina  who  has  a  policy  will 


APPEALS  TO  THE  PUBLIC  157 

take  advantage  of  the  offers  now  made  by  the  Government.  It  would  be  a  tragedy 
not  to  do  so.  Major  Benjamin  H.  Hind,  an  ex-service  man,  has  been  placed  in 
special  charge  of  this  work  in  North  Carolina,  with  headquarters  in  Raleigh. 
A  letter  addressed  to  him  will  secure  all  desirable  information ;  and  I  earnestly 
hope  that  the  members  of  the  American  Legion  will  busy  themselves  in  seeing  to 
it  that  all  ex-service  men  are  properly  protected  by  this  great  Government 
insurance.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(46) 

THE  GHOST  OF  A  LOST  OPPORTUNITY 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  June  16,  1920. 
To  North  Carolina  Soldiers  of  the  World  War: 

Soldiers,  do  you  believe  in  ghosts?  I  do.  In  the  daytime  we  hear  their 
whisperings,  and  at  night  their  shivering  figures  drive  slumber  from  our  eyelids. 
There  are  ghosts  of  evil  deeds,  ghosts  of  sudden  passion,  ghosts  of  dead  loves  and 
neglected  friendships;  but  the  one  that  haunts  us  most  is  the  ghost  of  a  lost 
opportunity. 

Many  North  Carolina  soldiers  are  in  danger  of  hearing  this  ghost  wail  around 
their  bedsides  in  their  declining  years.  Soldiers,  your  Government  is  holding  out 
to  you  a  wonderful  opportunity.  It  is  beseeching  you  to  take  advantage  of  the 
best  and  cheapest  insurance  this  world  has  ever  known. 

Think  of  the  little  woman  who  will  some  day  walk  by  your  side !  Think  of  the 
children  who  will  some  day  lisp  your  name !  Think  of  your  own  old  age  when 
your  strength  shall  waste  away  and  the  grasshopper  shall  become  a  burden !  And, 
thinking  of  these  things,  make  haste  to  secure  the  blessings  of  this  golden  oppor- 
tunity. This  is  your  last  chance.  On  July  1st  the  books  will  be  closed,  and 
unless  you  act  between  now  and  then  your  chance  will  be  lost  forever.  Forget 
everything  else.  Quit  everything  else  until  you  have  made  sure  that  your 
insurance  policy  is  in  full  force.  N"o  matter  how  long  you  have  allowed  it  to 
lapse,  you  can  get  reinstated  if  you  will  act  at  once.  I  call  on  all  relatives  of 
soldiers,  on  all  friends  of  soldiers,  on  all  public-spirited  men  and  women  to  see 
to  it  today  that  not  a  single  soldier  fails  to  take  advantage  of  this  great  benefi- 
cence. Soldiers,  a  marvelous  opportunity  is  knocking  loudly  at  your  door.  In 
God's  name  rush  out  and  seize  it. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


-IV) 
PUBLIC  ADDRESSES 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES 

1917 

1.  Founders'  Day  at  University  of  North  Carolina. 

1918 

2.  The  Tie  that  Binds. 

3.  State  and  National  Efficiency. 

4.  Bonds  that  Bless. 

5.  Social  Purity. 

6.  The  Ashe  County  Case. 

1.  The  Triumph  of  the  English  People  at  Y  orktown. 

8.  Patriotism  and  Politics. 

9.  A  Bar  to  Bolshevism — The  Christian  School. 

1919 

10.  Products  and  By-products  of  the  World  War. 

11.  North  Carolina's  Welcome. 

12.  First  Reunion  of  the  Thirtieth  Division. 

13.  A  Fair  System  of  Taxation  the  Finest  Exhibit  at  the  State  Fair. 

14.  A  Debt  of  Honor. 

15.  Stand  Still  and  See  the  Salvation  of  Righteousness. 

1920 

16.  Daughters  of  the  Confederacy. 

17.  Ho,  for  Carolina. 

DELIVERED  AT  VARIOUS  TIMES 

18.  Speech  at  Hampton  Normal  and  Agricultural  Institute. 

19.  How  to  be  Beautiful. 

20.  Civic  Righteousness. 

21.  Educational  Dividends. 

22.  Tenth  of  May  Celebration  in  Gaston  County. 

23.  Good  Roads. 

24.  Lee. 

25.  Mass  Conscience. 

26.  Weights  and  Measures  or  Standards  of  Value. 


ADDRESS  AT  THE  UND7ERSITY  OF  NORTH  CAROLINA 
ON  FOUNDERS'  DAY,  1917 

In  one  of  Kipling's  most  popular  poems  he  says: 

"The  harder  you're  hit  the  higher  you  bounce! 

Be  proud  of  your  blackened  eye. 
It's  not  the  fact  you  are  licked  that  counts; 
It's  how  did  you  fight  and  why." 

I  propose  to  reverse  the  order  of  Kipling's  question  and  discuss  Why  do  we 
fight  and  how?  The  United  States  went  in  because  it  could  no  longer  stay  out  and 
retain  its  own  self-respect.  If  the  Government  had  failed  to  accept  Germany's 
defiant  challenge  an  American  citizen  would  have  teen  ashamed  to  look  at  his 
own  face  in  the  glass.  It  is  proper  to  have  a  decent  respect  for  the  good  opinion 
of  others,  but  it  is  a  necessity  for  a  man  to  keep  on  speaking  terms  with  his  own 
conscience.  King  Arthur  required  each  of  his  knights  to  swear  that  he  would 
reverence  his  conscience  as  his  king,  and  the  hour  a  man  or  nation  fails  to  do 
this  the  processes  of  disintegration  begin. 

There  are  three  considerations,  either  one  of  which  was  sufficient  to  force  the 
United  States  into  this  war. 

1.  Common  gratitude.  We  owe  our  very  existence  as  a  republic  to  France. 
When  George  Washington  marched  from  N~ew  York  to  Yorktown  he  marched  at 
the  head  of  two  thousand  Americans  and  four  thousand  French  soldiers.  When 
he  reached  Yorktown  the  French  fleet  landed  three  thousand  more  soldiers ;  so  that 
the  French  had  seven  thousand  men  at  Yorktown,  trained  soldiers,  more  than 
half  of  the  army  that  captured  Yorktown,  and  in  addition  the  French  fleet  made 
it  impossible  for  Cornwallis  to  escape  by  sea,  and  on  land  stood  LaFayette,  a  host 
in  himself.  Moreover,  before  the  Continental  soldiers  left  New  York  they  were 
paid  off  in  French  gold. 

Without  the  man  power,  the  money  power  and  the  brain  power  of  France  at 
Yorktown,  Cornwallis  would  have  laughed  at  the  Continental  army,  and  the 
probabilities  are  that  George  Washington  would  have  been  hanged  as  a  traitor. 

Today  France  cries  to  us  as  we  cried  to  her  when  the  Nation  was  struggling  for 
its  life.  France  did  nothing  to  provoke  war.  Her  wealth  and  her  beauty  were 
her  only  offense.  Upon  these  Germany  for  thirty  years  has  looked  with  lustful 
eyes. 

2.  Our  own  peace  and  safety  compelled  us  to  go  in.  England  and  France  were 
lost.  The  mailed  fist  was  raised  to  strike  the  last  decisive  blow  when  Uncle  Sam 
reached  for  his  gun  and  said,  "Not  yet." 

And  if  Germany  had  conquered  England  and  France,  it  is  as  plain  as  day  that 
the  United  States  would  soon  have  been  called  upon  to  bow  to  the  Kaiser's  will. 
No  direct  frontal  attack  would  have  been  immediately  made  upon  us.  Germany 
is  entirely  too  smart  for  that.  But  there  is  already  strong  German  influence  in 
Brazil;  and,  flushed  with  victory,  Germany  would  have  at  once  established  a 
protectorate  over  Brazil  and  coolly  inquired  of  us,  "What  are  you  going  to  do 
about  it?"  Then  we  would  have  been  compelled  to  fight  Germany  single-handed 
and  at  a  place  of  her  own  choosing,  or  else  have  advertised  to  the  world  that  our 

11 


162  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

Monroe  Doctrine  was  simply  a  bluff.  And  having  established  its  supremacy  in 
all  South  America,  it  would  have  been  easy  for  Germany  to  have  intrigued  with 
Mexico  and  attacked  us  at  will  on  sea  and  land.  The  whole  course  of  events 
points  with  unerring  certainty  to  this  inevitable  result.  Last  year  the  Kaiser 
became  annoyed  at  the  many  notes  he  was  receiving  from  Mr.  Wilson  and  forgot 
his  discretion  but  not  his  purpose,  and  said  to  Mr.  Gerard:  "When  this  war  is 
over  I  will  not  stand  any  more  nonsense  from  the  United  States." 

As  early  as  1892  the  Kaiser  issued  a  pamphlet  to  his  soldiers  in  which  he 
stated  that  the  ultimate  object  of  his  Government  was  to  Germanize  the  whole 
world.  He  had  a  map  made  of  the  world  showing  Berlin  as  the  capital,  and 
England,  France  and  Eussia  as  German  provinces,  while  "Germania"  was  stamped 
all  over  the  United  States  and  Canada. 

In  1898  a  German  officer  in  Manila  made  a  statement  to  the  same  effect,  and 
Admiral  Dewey  thought  the  statement  of  sufficient  importance  to  incorporate  it  in 
his  official  report. 

We  all  know  that  Germany  wanted  to  butt  in  when  the  United  States  was  at 
war  with  Spain,  and  only  held  back  when  the  British  lion  growled  a  dissent. 
Last  year,  while  professing  a  desire  for  enduring  friendship  between  Germany  and 
the  United  States,  the  Imperial  Government  was  endeavoring  to  bribe  Mexico  and 
Japan  into  a  combination  against  us.  And  yet  despite  these  facts,  a  few  people 
more  feeble-minded  than  faint-hearted  insisted  that  we  ought  to  have  waited  until 
Germany  attacked  us  on  our  own  soil.  Such  a  course  would  have  been  criminal 
stupidity.  We  are  sending  our  armies  to  Germany  to  keep  the  German  armies 
from  coming  here,  and  the  South  is  the  last  place  on  earth  that  ought  to  complain 
because  a  war  is  not  fought  out  on  its  own  soil.  We  saw  enough  and  felt  enough 
of  that  from  '61  to  '65,  and  we  ought  to  be  deeply  grateful  that  the  Government 
at  Washington  had  sense  enough  to  see  that  a  clash  was  inevitable,  and  to  fight 
it  out  while  there  is  plenty  of  help,  and  on  a  foreign  shore. 

3.  The  third  and  most  potent  reason  for  our  going  in  is  that  this  war  will 
mold  and  color  the  civilization  of  the  whole  world.  Despotism,  autocracy, 
plutocracy,  militarism,  pacificism,  constitutional  monarchies,  oligarchies,  bereau- 
cracies,  socialism,  nihilism,  are  all  in  the  melting  pot.  The  thing  that  comes  out 
will  rule  the  earth  for  a  thousand  years  to  come.  The  quarrel  between  Austria 
and  Servia  has  been  well-nigh  forgotten ;  the  rape  of  Belgium  is  remembered  as 
a  ghastly  dream ;  the  submarine  question  is  but  a  bubble  on  a  boiling  sea.  The  one 
vital  question  is,  Who  and  what  shall  rule  the  earth  ?  If  American  ideals  are  to 
come  out  they  must  be  put  in.  If  by  any  chance  Germany  should  emerge  victorious, 
then  for  a  thousand  years  the  ideals  of  Prussianism  will  reign  and  men  will  be 
taught  that  a  gun  is  God,  and  before  it  there  is  none  other.  Every  Government 
on  earth  will  of  necessity  be  fashioned  after  the  Prussian  model.  The  nations 
will  be  converted  into  armed  camps  ready  at  a  moment's  notice  to  spring  at  each 
other's  throats.  All  the  products  of  peace  will  be  fed  to  mills  of  war  and  every 
private  citizen  will  carry  a  soldier  on  his  back. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  the  Allies  shall  triumph  war  will  come  no  more  upon 
the  earth.  We  are  fighting  the  very  soul  of  war.  We  are  fighting  to  send 
militarism  to  the  scrap-heap  of  civilization.  We  are  fighting  to  make  the  con- 
science of  mankind  the  supreme  arbiter  of  a  nation's  rights.  We  are  pouring  out 
blood  and  treasure  to  build  up  a  civilization  in  which  a  woman's  finger  will  weigh 
more  than  a  mailed  fist,  and  the  voice  of  a  little  child  will  be  heard  farther  than 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  163 

a  cannon's  roar.  Is  it  not  worth  fighting  for?  God  knows  I  hate  war,  and  have 
no  lust  for  battle.     I  love  the  ways  of  pleasantness  and  the  paths  of  peace,  but 

"To  every  man  upon  this  earth 
Death  cometh  soon  or  late," 

and  I  know  of  no  finer  way  to  meet  the  grim,  pale  messenger  than  to  traverse  the 
wide  waste  of  waters  and,  in  an  unknown  land,  register  a  stern  challenge  to  the 
blood-red  prestige  of  a  band  of  hereditary  autocrats  who  have  made  unto  them- 
selves and  all  their  people  an  iron  image  and  called  it  God. 

There  is  no  more  inspiring  story  in  all  literature  than  the  story  of  the  Hebrew 
Children  told  in  the  Book  of  Daniel.  When  Nebuchadnezzar  set  up  his  golden 
image  and  commanded  all  men  to  fall  down  and  worship  it,  the  Hebrew  Children 
refused  to  obey  the  command.  The  king  in  a  great  rage  ordered  them  to  appear 
before  him,  and  said :  "If  ye  fall  down  and  worship  the  image  which  I  have  made, 
well ;  but  if  ye  worship  not,  ye  shall  be  cast  in  the  same  hour  into  the  midst  of  a 
burning,  fiery  furnace,  and  who  is  that  God  who  shall  deliver  you  out  of  my 
hands?"  Then  came  the  heroic  answer:  "O  Nebuchadnezzar,  we  are  not  careful 
to  answer  thee  in  this  matter.  If  it  be  so,  our  God,  whom  we  serve,  is  able  to 
deliver  us  from  the  burning,  fiery  furnace;  but  if  not,  be  it  known  unto  thee,  O 
King,  we  will  not  serve  thy  gods  nor  worship  the  golden  image  thou  hast  set  up." 

Young  men,  I  appeal  to  the  red  blood  in  you  and  ask  where  can  you  find  a 
finer  thing  than  that.  There  was  the  divine  recklessness  that  counts  not  the  cost 
when  great  principles  are  at  stake.  There  was  the  blindness  to  consequences  that 
is  the  birthmark  of  the  true  sky-born,  and  I  am  deeply  grateful  that  when  the 
testing  time  came  this  Nation  looked  into  the  seething  hell  of  war  and  neither 
balked  nor  blenched.  I  greatly  rejoice  that  in  this  hour  big  with  destiny,  this 
Nation,  free  from  lust  for  power  or  pelf,  lured  by  no  dream  of  conquest,  but  driven 
by  the  very  majesty  of  its  soul,  is  consecrating  its  virgin  powers  on  the  altar  of  a 
world's  civilization  grounded  on  reason  and  righteousness,  not  on  blood  and  iron. 

I  rejoiced  to  hear  that  wondrous  voice  at  "Washington  in  tones  as  calm  as  the 
Master  when  he  spoke  to  the  storm-lashed  sea,  "The  world  must  be  made  safe  for 
democracy."  And  that  still,  small  voice  was  heard  around  the  world.  Far  across 
the  sea  the  Imperial  Kaiser  heard  it  and,  for  all  his  legions,  was  afraid.  The  weak 
peoples  of  the  world  heard  it  and  thrilled  with  a  larger  hope  than  they  had  ever 
known.  The  young  Davids  of  democracy  heard  it  and  "from  Greenland's  icy 
mountains  to  India's  coral  strand"  they  are  coming  up  to  do  battle  with  the 
Goliath  of  autocracy  in  his  last  bloody  lair.  A  battle  line  that  girdles  the  globe 
is  grinding  Prussianism  in  the  mills  of  the  gods,  and  the  day  is  at  hand  when  the 
Hohenzollerns  and  the  Hapsburgs  shall  be  sent  the  way  of  the  Romanoffs,  when 
every  stronghold  of  autocracy  shall  be  laid  low,  and  upon  their  very  ruins  shall  be 
builded  the  solid  fabric  of  a  world-wide  Christianized  democracy. 

But  how  are  we  to  win  the  war?  By  fighting  with  every  resource  at  our 
command — talon,  tush  and  claw.  We  must  put  all  our  moral  power,  all  our  money 
power,  and  all  our  man  power  into  the  fight.  Every  blow  delivered  must  carry 
the  entire  weight  of  the  Nation.  Every  student  in  this  University  can  help  to 
this  end.  You  can  help  to  solidify  public  sentiment  and  thus  put  the  whole  moral 
power  of  the  Nation  into  the  fight.  A  divided  mind  means  a  weakened  arm. 
You  can  solidify  public  sentiment  by  telling  others  what  you  know  about  the 
causes  of  this  war  and  its  consequences  to  this  Nation.1 

"This  address  existed  in  penciled  notes,  of  which  one  page  is  missing  at  this  point. 

— Editor. 


164  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Again,  every  young  man  in  this  University  can  help  by  keeping  himself  in  per- 
fect physical  condition  to  serve  his  country  when  the  call  comes.  When  ~No.  258  was 
drawn  at  Washington  one  poor  fellow  whose  registration  number  was  258  at  once 
committed  suicide.  You  say  that  was  horrible — and  it  was;  but  the  young  man 
who  by  eating,  drinking,  smoking,  immorality,  or  any  sort  of  intemperance  or 
excess,  debauches  his  body,  is  a  suicide  so  far  as  any  service  to  his  country  is 
concerned.  Every  one  of  you  belongs  to  the  national  reserves.  The  men  on  the 
firing  line  look  to  you  for  support.  They  cannot  do  their  work  with  an  undivided 
mind  if  they  feel  that  there  is  treachery,  cowardice,  or  incompetency  in  the  rear. 
To  fail  to  take  advantage  of  the  opportunities  here  afforded  to  make  yourselves 
fit  for  high  service  is  the  essence  of  disloyalty.  In  this  supreme  hour  to  run  from 
work  is  as  cowardly  as  to  run  from  war.  The  call  will  surely  come  to  every  one 
of  you,  possibly  to  the  war,  certainly  to  work,  and  the  man  who  fails  to  equip  him- 
self for  the  work  he  knows  must  be  done  in  the  midst  or  in  the  wake  of  war  is 
a  traitor  to  the  men  at  the  front,  and  to  the  women  and  children  at  home.  Today 
things  are  being  fought  out.  Forever  hereafter  they  will  be  thought  out.  When 
the  smoke  of  battle  shall  lift,  the  world  will  need  as  it  has  never  needed  before 
men  with  cunning  hands  and  cultured  brains.  Hence,  it  is  of  superlative  im- 
portance for  every  young  man  who  does  not  go  to  war  to  go  to  school,  and  the 
student  who  fails  to  do  hard,  honest  work  in  school  is  the  worst  sort  of  a  slacker 
and  merits  the  contempt  of  his  fellows. 

If  the  young  men  who  are  left  behind  do  their  work  with  as  much  of  heroism 
and  self-denial  as  those  who  go  to  the  front,  the  welfare  of  the  State  will  be  secure ; 
but  if  they  idle  while  others  fight,  if  they  fiddle  while  Rome  burns,  the  saddest 
and  sorriest  chapter  in  the  history  of  the  world  will  be  entitled  "The  Disloyalty 
of  the  Reserves." 

The  State  of  North  Carolina  confidently  expects  you  young  men  to  so  order 
your 'lives  that  when  the  call  comes  to  war  or  work  every  one  of  you  can  stand 
up  with  conscious  power  and  say,  "Here  am  I,  send  me."  Young  gentlemen,  I 
believe  you  will  measure  up  to  the  standards  of  your  fathers  and  to  the  duty  of 
the  hour.  My  faith  in  you  is  Abrahamic  in  its  proportions.  In  the  name  of  this 
University,  whose  honor  is  in  your  keeping,  in  the  name  of  your  fathers  and 
mothers  who  work  and  pray  that  you  may  grow  into  the  full  stature  of  the  perfect 
man,  in  the  name  of  this  dear  old  State  that  looks  to  you  for  the  fruition  of  its 
hopes,  I  appeal  to  you  to  rise  to  the  greatness  of  the  hour,  "to  run  and  not  be 
weary,  to  walk  and  not  faint." 


(2) 

THE  TIE  THAT  BINDS 

ADDRESS  BEFORE  THE  NATIONAL  CONFERENCE  ON  RURAL  EDUCATION  AND  COUNTRY  LIFE, 
WASHINGTON,  D.  C,  FEBRUARY  20,  1918 

The  supreme  task  of  the  hour  is  the  winning  of  the  war;  but  that  is  not  the 
supreme  problem. 

The  supreme,  the  super-problem  lies  just  beyond  the  accomplishment  of  the 
present  task,  and,  when  the  war  is  won,  will  tax  the  strength  and  test  the  character 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  165 

of  this  Eepublic.  That  problem  is  to  maintain  in  the  country  a  government  that 
will  frankly  recognize  the  right  of  the  average  man  to  a  higher  and  broader  plane 
of  living,  and  will  at  the  same  time  guarantee  to  individual  initiative  and  individ- 
ual industry  their  just  rewards. 

I  do  not  find  in  my  political  pharmacopeia  any  specific  warranted  to  solve  this 
problem,  but  I  do  offer  a  tonic  that  will  so  build  up  the  body  politic  as  to  enable 
it  to  survive  the  shock  and  strain  the  solution  of  the  problem  will  shortly  entail. 
That  tonic  is  land. 

Mexico  and  Russia  are  gruesome  and  gigantic  illustrations  of  James  J.  Hill's 
sanest  epigram,  "Population  without  land  is  a  mob."  It  is  easy  for  a  man  without 
land  to  become  a  man  without  a  country. 

In  political  as  well  as  in  physical  economy  land  is  a  centripetal  force.  It  is 
the  best  of  binders,  and  its  wide  diffusion  is  the  surest  guarantee  of  the  safety  and 
solidarity  of  the  Republic. 

It  follows  that  statesmanship  should  seek  diligently  ways  and  means  of  dis- 
tributing the  land  among  a  maximum  number  of  citizens.  This  distribution  may 
be  accelerated  in  two  ways : 

1.  By  making  it  possible  for  the  average  man  to  obtain  land  at  reasonable 
prices  and  on  long  time. 

2.  By  making  life  out  on  the  land  just  as  profitable  and  just  as  attractive  as 
life  in  the  town. 

The  Federal  Land  Banks  are  doing  noble  service  in  supplying  money  at  reason- 
able rates  and  on  long  time.  In  North  Carolina  the  General  Assembly  has  just 
submitted  to  the  people  a  constitutional  amendment  providing  that  notes  and 
mortgages  given  for  money  with  which  to  purchase  a  homestead  shall  be  free  from 
taxation  of  every  kind.  This  provision,  in  conjunction  with  the  Federal  Land 
Banks,  will  enable  every  worthy  man  who  wants  a  vine  and  fig  tree  he  may 
call  his  own  to  obtain  at  reasonable  rates  and  on  long  time  the  money  with  which 
to  buy. 

But  unless  something  can  be  done  to  prevent  land  grabbing  by  speculators 
and  discourage  land  hoarding  by  men  who  do  not  and  cannot  put  to  any  useful 
purpose  vast  areas  held  by  them,  the  beneficent  purposes  of  State  and  Federal 
legislation  will  be  neutralized  by  arbitrary  advances  in  land  values.  There  are 
two  ways  of  killing  this  snake : 

1.  By  a  tax  on  the  unearned  increment. 

2.  By  a  graduated  tax  on  acreage. 

I  incline  to  the  opinion  that  the  graduated  tax  would  prove  to  be  the  more 
efficacious  remedy. 

But  no  matter  how  reasonable  may  be  the  prices  of  land  nor  how  ample  the 
facilities  for  obtaining  money  with  which  to  buy  it,  men  and  women  will  not  live 
on  it  unless  the  attractions  of  the  country  in  some  degree  approach  the  attractions 
of  the  town.  Man  cannot  live  on  land  alone.  The  main  currents  of  life  run  in 
the  direction  of  the  keenest  pleasures  and  the  largest  profits.  In  youth  men  run 
after  pleasure,  in  age  after  profit.    Says  Lord  Byron: 

"So  for  a  good,  old-gentlemanly  vice, 
I  think  I  must  take  up  with  avarice." 

We  simply  cannot  keep  the  boys  and  girls  on  the  land  unless  we  can  find  means 
of  enriching  country  life  and  giving  to  it  wholesome  diversions  it  has  not  here- 
tofore known. 


166  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Having  at  last  recognized  this  obvious  truth,  the  General  Assembly  of  North 
Carolina  at  its  recent  session  enacted  the  following  laws : 

1.  An  act  submitting  to  the  people  of  the  State  a  constitutional  amendment 
making  it  mandatory  to  maintain  in  every  district  a  public  school  for  six  months 
instead  of  four,  which  is  required  under  the  present  Constitution. 

2.  An  act  appropriating  $500,000  to  assist  rural  districts  in  building  better 
schoolhouses. 

3.  An  act  providing  for  schools  for  the  teaching  of  adult  illiterates. 

4.  An  act  to  increase  the  age  of  compulsory  attendance  from  twelve  to  fourteen 
years. 

5.  An  act  to  increase  the  appropriations  to  rural  high  schools. 

6.  An  act  providing  for  the  teaching  of  the  basic  principles  of  good  farming 
in  every  rural  public  school. 

7.  An  act  providing  for  the  medical  inspection  of  all  children  who  attend  the 
public  schools  in  order  that  physical  defects  may  be  discovered  and  corrected  if 
possible  in  their  incipiency. 

8.  An  act  providing  for  the  improvement  of  highways  by  the  expenditure  of 
the  automobile  tax  for  this  purpose  under  the  direction  of  the  State  Highway 
Commission. 

9.  An  act  to  encourage  the  installation  of  running  water,  electric  lights  and 
telephones  in  country  homes  and  communities  by  furnishing  engineers  and  expert 
advice  and  assistance  free  of  charge. 

10.  An  act  providing  for  the  incorporation  of  rural  communities  to  the  end 
that  thickly  populated  communities  in  the  country  may  take  steps  for  their  own 
betterment. 

11.  An  act  to  make  the  schoolhouse  the  social  center  and  to  provide  for  whole- 
some entertainments  in  country  schoolhouses  that  will  be  both  instructive  and 
relaxing. 

All  these  acts  are  designed  and,  it  is  believed,  are  well  calculated  to  strengthen 
country  life  and  give  it  a  more  attractive  environment.  But  the  one  act  I  desire 
to  emphasize  is  the  act  last  named.  Sections  one  and  two  of  this  act  are  as 
follows : 

Section  1.  It  shall  be  the  duty  of  the  State  Superintendent  of  Public 
Instruction  to  provide  for  a  series  of  rural  entertainments,  varying  in 
number  and  cost  and  consisting  of  moving  pictures  selected  for  their  enter- 
taining and  educational  value,  which  entertainments  may  be  given  in  the 
rural  schoolhouses  of  the  State  as  herein  provided. 

Sec.  2.  The  cost  of  such  entertainment  shall  be  borne  one-third  by  the 
State  and  two-thirds  by  the  county  board  of  education  or  the  rural  school 
community  desiring  said  entertainment. 

So  far  as  I  am  advised,  North  Carolina  is  the  only  state  in  the  Union  that 
authorizes  moving  picture  shows  to  be  given  in  country  schools  and  pledges  the 
State  to  the  payment  of  one-third  of  the  cost  of  giving  such  shows. 

The  possibilities  under  this  act  of  adding  to  the  health,  the  wealth  and  the 
joy  of  country  life  are  infinite.  By  arranging  a  well  balanced  program  the  people 
can  see  the  best  way  of  doing  everything  that  is  done  on  the  farm,  can  get  vivid 
impressions  of  the  big  facts  in  science  and  history,  and  at  the  same  time  lose  them- 
selves in  thrilling  adventures  and  wholesome  fun.  The  pathos  of  rural  life  is  its 
loneliness.      Thousands   of  boys   and  girls   are   yearly   driven   from   country   life 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  167 

because  of  lack  of  wholesome  diversions.  The  wives  of  many  farmers  are  found 
in  hospitals  for  the  insane  because  their  lives  are  the  same  yesterday,  today  and 
forever.  By  making  the  schoolhouse  the  social  as  well  as  the  educational  center 
of  the  district  much  of  this  grinding  monotony  can  be  relieved. 

But  the  moving  picture  business  has  been  highly  commercialized.  We  have 
found  it  extremely  difficult  to  secure  the  films  necessary  to  a  well  balanced  program 
at  prices  rural  communities  can  afford  to  pay.  "We  have  arranged  our  circuits, 
provided  the  outfit  and  the  operators,  but  have  met  with  insuperable  obstacles  in 
our  efforts  to  secure  desirable  films  at  reasonable  prices. 

In  our  extremity  we  propose  to  appeal  to  the  Federal  Government.  It  would 
be  a  wise  and  profitable  thing  for  the  United  States  Government  to  furnish 
propaganda  films  from  the  educational,  the  health,  and  the  agricultural  depart- 
ments. Tons  of  printed  propaganda  are  sent  out  from  these  departments  that 
are  never  read.  Everything  that  is  put  on  a  film  will  reach  the  minds  and  hearts 
of  the  people.  Moreover,  the  Government  could  well  afford  to  add  to  the  prop- 
aganda films,  films  of  a  purely  entertaining  and  diversional  character,  so  as  to 
make  an  inviting,  inspiring  and  joyous  program.  For  these  diversional  films  the 
states  and  communities  ought  to  pay  the  Government  exactly  what  they  cost. 
By  producing  them  or  purchasing  them  on  a  large  scale  the  Government  would 
be  able  to  furnish  them  to  the  country  schools  at  prices  they  could  afford  to  pay. 

I  am  profoundly  convinced  that  nothing  the  General  Government  could  do 
along  educational  lines  would  yield  larger  dividends.  Such  a  service  would  tend  to 
divert  millions  of  our  people  from  the  congested  districts  of  the  cities  and  secure 
for  them  the  strength  and  the  joy  of  life  in  God's  great  out-of-doors.  It  would 
anchor  them  to  the  soil,  and  the  citizen  so  attached  is  the  most  cohesive  force  in 
the  life  of  the  Republic. 


(3) 
STATE  AND  NATIONAL  EFFICIENCY 

ADDRESS  BEFORE  THE  NORTH  CAROLINA  CONFERENCE  FOR  SOCIAL  SERVICE, 
RALEIGH,  MARCH  5,  1918 

The  Athenians  were  not  a  peculiar  people  in  their  fondness  for  new  gods.  The 
Israelites  revealed  a  trait  of  character  common  to  mankind  when  they  shifted 
their  religious  allegiance  because  as  a  war  measure  the  food  administrator  ordered 
them  to  substitute  manna  for  onions  and  garlic.  In  the  presence  of  discomforts 
and  disappointments  it  is  hard  for  men  and  nations  to  hold  to  the  faith  that 
the  sources  of  real  power  and  real  joy  are  simple  and  the  same  yesterday,  today  and 
forever.  To  power  add  joy,  and  there  is  wholesome  efficiency.  The  one  sure  source 
of  this  combined  happiness  and  force  is  the  home  builded  in  the  fear  of  God  and 
on  the  unselfish  and  unbounded  love  of  a  good  man  and  a  good  woman.  The 
anchor  and  the  hope,  the  sword  and  the  shield  of  civilization  are  found  in 

"The  wee  cot  and  the  cricket's  chirr, 
Love,  and  the  smiling  face  of  her." 

Destroy  or  in  any  way  discount  the  power  and  the  joy  of  the  home,  and  the 
devil  will  find  a  world  plastic  to  his  touch. 


168  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

The  most  powerful  incentive  to  a  man  to  be  clean  and  strong,  to  be  and  to  do 
bis  level  best,  is  the  perfect  love  and  perfect  faith  of  the  woman  who  walks  by  his 
side.  And  the  finest  forces  in  the  life  of  the  woman  are  born  of  such  perfect  love 
and  perfect  faith.  Such  faith,  like  mercy,  is  twice  blest.  It  blesses  the  woman 
who  believes  and  the  man  who  is  believed  in.  Whatever  tends  to  conserve  and  to 
justify  this  boundless  love  and  boundless  trust,  this  relationship  of  mutual  help- 
fulness and  mutual  dependency  between  the  man  and  the  woman  at  the  head  of 
the  home,  protects  and  promotes  personal  and  public  purity  and  efficiency.  Any 
fact  or  fancy,  reform  or  revolution  that  tends  to  discount  this  basic  relation  and 
send  the  man  and  the  woman  along  separate  ways  in  quest  of  happiness  or  of  the 
fullest  and  finest  expression  of  their  lives,  undermines  the  foundations  of  all  life, 
of  all  love,  of  all  law,  and  is  costly  at  any  price. 

I  have  no  faith  in  nor  patience  with  free  love,  but  solemn  marriage  vows 
impart  no  sanctity  to  a  loveless  union.  It  is  a  fact  both  of  pathos  and  of  tragedy 
that  sometimes  womanhood  is  bartered  at  the  altar  as  well  as  upon  the  streets. 

Every  child  has  a  God-given  right  to  be  the  final  expression  of  a  great  love, 
and  not  the  mere  by-product  of  a  heartless  convention.  The  vigor  and  the  purity, 
the  physical  and  spiritual  dynamics  of  those  who  make  marriage  vows  fix  the 
measure  of  personal  and  ultimately  of  a  national  efficiency  and  purity.  The 
double  standard  of  morality  is  damnable.  The  colossal  folly  of  the  ages  is  the 
belief  that  a  man  may  sin  against  his  body,  and  then  about-face  and  wipe  it  all 
out  with  a  sigh  and  a  tear.  He  can't  do  it.  Nature  keeps  books,  and  with  a  heavy 
hand  collects  every  debt  contracted  by  sin  or  folly.  In  the  economy  of  nature 
there  is  no  pardoning  power.  We  may  look  for  mercy  beyond  the  grave ;  here  there 
is  none. 

"The  moving  finger  writes,  and  having  writ 
Moves  on;  nor  all  your  piety  nor  all  your  wit 

Can  lure  it  back  to  cancel  half  a  line; 
Nor  all  your  tears  wash  out  a  word  of  it." 

Today,  as  never  before,  the  world  needs  clean  men,  for  without  purity  there 
can  be  no  power.  Dr.  Eliot  says  that  in  the  French  army  more  men  have  been 
put  out  of  commission  by  vice  than  by  bullets.  Surgeon-General  Gorgas  says  that 
any  general  on  the  western  front,  if  given  the  option,  would  prefer  to  take  the 
casualties  created  by  bullets  rather  than  casualties  created  by  vice.  And  this,  is 
due  not  to  military  but  to  civil  life.  I  have  recently  visited  three  camps,  and  my 
judgment  is  that  the  men  in  these  camps  are  leading  cleaner  and  more  wholesome 
lives  than  95  per  cent  of  men  of  the  same  age  at  home.  The  army  authorities 
have  carefully  safeguarded  the  men,  and  have  compiled  the  records,  and  these 
show  that  in  the  year  1917  in  the  Regular  United  States  Army  eighty-eight  men 
out  of  one  thousand  were  sick  as  the  result  of  immorality,  while  in  September  of 
the  same  year  in  the  National  Army,  made  up  of  men  fresh  from  civil  life,  388 
out  of  every  thousand  were  afflicted  with  disease  due  to  vice.  This  was  in  Sep- 
tember, during  the  period  of  mobilization,  and  by  December  these  388  per  thousand 
had  been  reduced  to  80  per  thousand.  These  facts  will  be  startling  to  every  one 
who  has  not  investigated  the  subject;  they  were  fearfully  startling  to  me. 

In  my  opinion  one  of  the  best  ways  to  fight  the  spread  of  vice  diseases  is  to  give 
the  people  the  ugly  facts.  These  facts  show  that  practically  every  immoral  person 
is  a  diseased  person,  and  if  people  knew  that  any  breach  of  the  moral  law  would 
almost  certainly  incur  these  frightful  penalties  this  knowledge  would  operate  as  a 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  169 

powerful  restraint.  A  eompaign  of  information  in  the  press,  from  the  pulpit  and 
chiefly  in  the  home  would  produce  gratifying  results.  I  think  the  Government 
would  do  well  to  throw  these  figures  and  charts  on  the  screen  in  every  moving 
picture  show  in  the  land.  False  modesty  should  no  longer  be  allowed  to  camouflage 
the  fearful  ravages  of  social  vice.  I  trust  this  conference  will  take  steps  to  stage 
a  vigorous  campaign  of  information  in  regard  to  this  vital  question. 

It  may  be  suggested  that  medical  science  is  able  to  avert  the  penalties  of 
social  vice.  To  a  degree  this  is  correct,  but  the  best  thought  in  the  modern  world 
is  that  the  best  remedy  is  an  appeal  to  the  moral  conscience  of  the  individual. 
In  this  way  you  save  not  only  bodies,  but  souls  as  well. 

Just  a  word  about  another  matter.  It  seems  to  be  well-nigh  impossible  for  the 
State  to  erect  buildings  rapidly  enough  to  take  care  of  the  ever  increasing  number 
of  mental  defectives.  The  condition  of  many  of  these  defectives  is  directly  due 
to  diseases  incurred  by  social  vices.  But  one  false  step  should  not  be  forever 
perpetuated.  "Ways  and  means  should  be  devised  to  prevent  the  reproduction  of 
these  unfortunate  people.  The  law  very  properly  forbids  the  marriage  of  an 
imbecile,  and  the  law  should  be  equally  diligent  in  preventing  the  unlawful 
increase  of  these  miserable  creatures.  Personally,  I  think  the  State  should  make 
provision  for  rendering  sterile  any  person  adjudged  by  a  competent  board  to  be  an 
incurable  mental  defective.  Such  a  law  would  combine  humanity  and  common 
sense.  I  suggest  that  this  conference  appoint  a  committee  to  consider  the  advis- 
ability and  the  feasibility  of  such  a  statute,  and  make  report  of  their  conclusion  at 
the  next  session  of  this  conference. 

It  is  a  source  of  keen  embarrassment  to  us  all  to  even  think  about  these 
horrible  conditions;  but  I  assume  that  the  object  of  this  conference  is  to  get 
results,  to  translate  its  deliberations  into  action,  and  that  it  is  not  content  to 
confine  itself  to  the  realm  of  purely  academic  discussion. 


(4) 
BONDS  THAT  BLESS 

ADDRESS  ON  THE  OCCASION  OF  SECRETARY  McADOO'S  VISIT  TO  RALEIGH,  APRIL  9,  1918 

Liberty  Bonds,  like  mercy,  are  twice  blest. 

They  bless  the  folks  who  stay  at  home  and  the  men  who  are  going  to  the  front. 

They  breed  in  the  citizen  faith  in  the  soldier,  and  in  the  soldier  respect  for 
the  citizen. 

They  test  and  declare  the  physical  and  spiritual  dynamics  of  this  Republic. 

They  appeal  to  the  commonest  kind  of  sense,  and  to  the  rarest  sort  of  sentiment. 

In  them  will  be  found  more  of  strength  than  in  the  lordly  head  of  the  herd, 
and  more  of  warmth  than  in  the  fleece  of  the  leader  of  the  flocks. 

They  will  carry  one  farther  than  a  "Tord"  and  faster  than  the  fleetest  de- 
scendant of  "Nancy  Hanks." 

They  will  yield  more  solid  comfort  for  the  inner  man  than  'possum  and 
potatoes,  and  more  juicy  sweetness  than  the  apples  for  which  our  first  ancestors 
threw  Paradise  away. 


170  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

They  are  absolutely  free  from  the  uncertainty  that  racks  the  nerves  of  men, 
and  from  the  taxes  that  make  the  grasshopper  a  burden  and  mourners  go  about 
the  streets. 

They  will  add  to  the  glory  of  youth  and  to  the  grandeur  of  age. 

In  them  one  may  hear  ten  thousand  cannon  roar  to  save  a  little  child,  and  see 
ten  million  men  leap  forward  to  die  that  others  may  truly  live. 

They  are  preferred  stock  in  The  Gem  of  the  Ocean. 

They  are  star  dust  from  Old  Glory. 

They  are  the  soul  of  the  Red,  White  and  Blue. 

They  are  messengers  of  hope  to  our  friends,  and  missiles  of  terror  to  our  foes. 

They  are  harbingers  of  peace  to  all  lands,  safety  to  all  seas,  and  freedom  to 
all  of  the  children  of  men. 

They  are  badges  of  chivalry,  certificates  of  nobility,  memorials  of  love. 

Buy  one !  Buy  today  and  live  forever  in  your  own  esteem  and  in  the  gratitude 
of  a  world  you  help  to  save. 


(5) 

SOCIAL  PURITY 

SPEECH  BEFORE  NORTH  CAROLINA  FEDERATION  OF  WOMEN'S  CLUBS. 
WOMAN'S  CLUB.  RALEIGH.  MAY  30.  1918 

Some  time  ago,  in  my  home  town,  a  little  girl  was  asked,  "Annie  Perry,  what 
'      makes  you  so  sweet?"    "God  and  talcum  powder,"  was  the  instant  reply. 

All  unconsciously  the  little  girl  stated  the  law  of  sweetness  with  fine  apprecia- 
tion of  the  priorities.  N~o  life  can  be  sweet  and  fresh  and  strong  that  is  at  enmity 
or  at  odds  with  the  Father's  will.  And  yet  millions  of  men  and  women  seek  health 
in  patent  nostrums  instead  of  in  simple,  wholesome  living,  and  happiness  in  fads 
and  fancies  instead  of  in  the  great  deeps  of  their  own  hearts.  Today,  as  in  the 
beginning,  the  devil  finds  it  easy  to  induce  men  and  women  to  barter  Eden  for  an 
apple  and  to  hypothecate  their  very  souls  for  a  new  sensation. 

Loneliness  depresses,  monotony  grinds,  discomforts  annoy,  and  hopes  deferred 
make  the  heart  sick.  At  such  a  time  revelry  bids  high  against  righteousness  and 
savory  flesh-pots  discount  the  land  of  promise.  In  the  presence  of  these  things 
it  is  hard  to  hold  fast  to  the  fact  that  the  sources  of  real  power  and  real  joy  are 
simple  and  the  same  yesterday,  today  and  forever.  To  power  add  joy,  and  there  is 
wholesome  efficiency.  The  one  sure  source  of  this  combined  happiness  and  force 
is  the  home  builded  in  the  fear  of  God  and  on  the  unselfish  and  unbounded  love 
of  a  good  man  and  a  good  woman.  The  anchor  and  the  hope,  the  sword  and  the 
shield  of  civilization  are  found  in 

"The  wee  cot  and  the  cricket's  chirr, 
Love,  and  the  smiling  face  of  her." 

Destroy  or  in  any  way  discount  the  power  and  the  joy  of  the  home,  and  the 
devil  will  find  a  world  plastic  to  his  touch. 

The  most  powerful  incentive  to  a  man  to  be  clean  and  strong,  to  be  and  to  do 
his  level  best,  is  the  perfect  love  and  perfect  faith  of  the  woman  who  walks  by  his 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  171 

side.  And  the  finest  forces  in  the  life  of  the  woman  are  horn  of  such  perfect  love 
and  perfect  faith.  Such  faith,  like  mercy,  is  twice  blest.  It  blesses  the  woman 
who  believes  and  the  man  who  is  believed  in.  Whatever  tends  to  conserve  and  to 
justify  this  boundless  love  and  boundless  trust,  this  relationship  of  mutual  help- 
fulness and  mutual  dependence  between  the  man  and  the  woman  at  the  head  of 
the  home,  protects  and  promotes  personal  and  public  purity  and  efficiency.  Any 
fact  or  fancy,  reform  or  revolution  that  tends  to  discount  the  basic  relation  and 
send  the  man  and  the  woman  along  separate  ways  in  quest  of  happiness  or  of  the 
fullest  and  finest  expression  of  their  lives  undermines  the  foundations  of  all  life, 
of  all  love,  of  all  law,  and  is  costly  at  any  price.  I  have  no  faith  in  nor  patience 
with  free  love,  but  the  solemn  marriage  vows  impart  no  sanctity  to  a  loveless 
union.  It  is  a  fact  full  of  pathos  and  tragedy  that  sometimes  womanhood  is 
bartered  at  the  altar  as  well  as  upon  the  streets.  Every  child  has  a  God-given 
right  to  be  the  final  expression  of  a  great  love,  and  not  the  mere  by-product  of  a 
heartless  convention.  The  vigor  and  the  purity,  the  physical  and  spiritual 
dynamics  of  those  who  make  marriage  vows  fix  the  measure  of  personal  and  ulti- 
mately of  a  national  efficiency  and  purity.  The  double  standard  of  morality  is 
damnable.  The  colossal  folly  of  the  ages  is  the  belief  that  man  may  sin  against  his 
body  and  then  about-face  and  wipe  it  all  out  with  a  sigh  and  a  tear.  He  can't  do 
it.  Nature  keeps  books,  and  with  a  heavy  hand  collects  every  debt  contracted  by 
sin  or  folly.  In  the  economy  of  nature  there  is  no  pardoning  power.  We  may  look 
for  mercy  beyond  the  grave ;  here  there  is  none. 

"The  moving  finger  writes,  and  having  writ 
Moves  on;  nor  all  your  piety  nor  all  your  wit 

Can  lure  it  back  to  cancel  half  a  line; 
Nor  all  your  tears  wash  out  a  word  of  it." 

Today,  as  never  before,  the  world  needs  clean  men,  for  without  purity  there 
can  be  no  power.  Dr.  Eliot  says  that  in  the  French  army  more  men  have  been 
put  out  of  commission  by  vice  than  by  bullets.  Surgeon-General  Gorgas  says  that 
any  general  on  the  western  front,  if  given  the  option,  would  prefer  to  take  the 
casualties  created  by  bullets  rather  than  casualties  created  by  vice.  And  this  is 
due  not  to  military  but  to  civil  life.  I  have  recently  visited  three  camps,  and  my 
judgment  is  that  the  men  in  these  camps  are  leading  cleaner  and  more  wholesome 
lives  than  95  per  cent  of  men  of  the  same  age  at  home.  The  army  authorities 
have  carefully  safeguarded  the  men,  and  have  compiled  the  records,  and  these 
show  that  in  the  year  1917  in  the  Regular  United  States  Army  eighty-eight  men 
out  of  one  thousand  were  sick  as  the  result  of  immorality,  while  in  September  of 
the  same  year  in  the  National  Army,  made  up  of  men  fresh  from  civil  life,  three 
hundred  and  eighty-eight  out  of  every  thousand  were  afflicted  with  diseases  due 
to  vice.  This  was  in  September,  during  the  period  of  mobilization,  and  by  Decem- 
ber these  three  hundred  and  eighty-eight  per  thousand  had  been  reduced  to 
eighty  per  thousand.  These  facts  will  be  startling  to  every  one  who  has  not 
investigated  the  subject ;  they  were  fearfully  startling  to  me. 

The  Selective  Draft  Law  calls  to  the  colors  men  between  the  ages  of  twenty-one 
and  thirty-one.  Of  these  men  twenty-nine  per  cent  have  been  found  to  be  physi- 
cally unfit  for  military  duty.  Such  a  situation  is  cause  for  grave  alarm.  Such 
conditions  must  be  corrected,  for  it  is  absolutely  certain  that  no  nation  and  no 
race  can  survive  when  one-third  of  the  men  who  ought  to  be  in  the  very  exuberance 
of  manly  vigor  are  so  depleted  in  blood  and  tissue  that  they  are  not  fit  to  wear 
the  uniform  of  a  soldier. 


172  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BIGKETT 

It  is  at  least  debatable  whether  or  not  a  man  who  cannot  stand  a  physical 
examination  that  will  admit  him  to  the  army  ought  to  be  allowed  to  marry. 
Query :  Is  a  man  fit  to  marry  who  is  not  fit  to  fight  ? 

In  my  opinion  one  of  the  best  ways  to  fight  the  spread  of  vice  diseases  is  to 
give  the  people  the  ugly  facts.  These  facts  show  that  practically  every  immoral 
person  is  a  diseased  person,  and  if  people  knew  that  any  breach  of  the  moral  law 
would  almost  certainly  incur  these  frightful  penalties  this  knowledge  would 
operate  as  a  powerful  restraint.  A  campaign  of  information  in  the  press,  from  the 
pulpit  and  chiefly  in  the  home  would  produce  gratifying  results.  I  think  the 
Government  would  do  well  to  throw  these  figures  and  charts  on  the  screen  in  every 
moving  picture  show  in  the  land.  False  modesty  should  no  longer  be  allowed  to 
camouflage  the  fearful  ravages  of  social  vice.  I  trust  that  this  association  will 
take  steps  to  stage  a  vigorous  campaign  of  information  in  regard  to  this  vital 
question. 

It  may  be  suggested  that  medical  science  is  able  to  avert  the  penalties  of  social 
vice.  To  a  degree  this  is  correct,  but  the  best  thought  in  the  modern  world  is  that 
the  best  remedy  is  an  appeal  to  the  moral  conscience  of  the  individual.  In  this 
way  you  save  not  only  bodies,  but  souls  as  well. 

Just  a  word  about  another  matter.  It  seems  to  be  well-nigh  impossible  for  the 
State  to  erect  buildings  rapidly  enough  to  take  care  of  the  ever  increasing  number 
of  mental  defectives.  The  condition  of  many  of  these  defectives  is  directly  due 
to  disease  incurred  by  social  vices.  But  one  false  step  should  not  be  forever 
perpetuated.  Ways  and  means  should  be  devised  to  prevent  the  reproduction  of 
these  unfortunate  people.  The  law  very  properly  forbids  the  marriage  of  an 
imbecile,  and  the  law  should  be  equally  diligent  in  preventing  the  unlawful  in- 
crease of  these  miserable  creatures.  Personally,  I  think  the  State  should  make 
provision  for  rendering  sterile  any  person  adjudged  by  a  competent  board  to  be 
an  incurable  mental  defective.  Such  a  law  would  combine  humanity  and  common 
sense.  I  suggest  that  this  association  appoint  a  committee  to  consider  the  advis- 
ability and  the  feasibility  of  such  a  statute  and  make  report  of  their  conclusion 
at  the  next  session  of  this  association. 

It  is  a  source  of  keen  embarrassment  to  us  all  to  even  think  about  these 
horrible  conditions;  but  I  assume  that  the  object  of  this  conference  is  to  get 
results,  to  translate  its  deliberations  into  action,  and  that  it  is  not  content  to  confine 
itself  to  the  realm  of  purely  academic  discussion. 

I  suggest  that  this  association  prepare  a  memorial  to  be  sent  to  our  soldier 
boys,  setting  forth  that  the  women  of  America  expect  American  soldiers  to  conquer 
themselves  as  well  as  the  enemy. 


(6) 

THE  ASHE  COUNTY  CASE 

On  the  24th  of  June,  1918,  the  Governor  received  the  following  telegram  from 
the  chairman  of  the  Local  Exemption  Board  of  Ashe  County : 

Jefferson,  N.  C,  June  24,  1918. 

Around  forty  deserted  in  Ashe  County.     One  civilian  killed  last  night  in 
attempt  to  arrest  deserter.     Situation  serious.     Home   Guard   selected   but 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  173 

not  yet  organized.  Can  organize  in  a  few  days  and  want  authority  to  call 
them  to  assistance.  Have  wired  Washington  for  soldiers  under  military 
direction.    Answer  at  once.  w   R  McNeill>  chairman. 

Thereupon  the  Governor  sent  Adjutant  General  Lawrence  W.  Young  to  Ashe 
County  with  instructions  to  take  charge  of  the  situation  and  make  full  report. 
On  June  26th  Adjutant  General  Young  sent  the  Governor  the  following  telegram : 

Jeffebson,  N.  C,  June  26,  1918. 

Situation  here  appears  to  be  acute.  Have  conferred  with  citizens. 
Opinion  is  that  an  organized  force  in  addition  to  local  officers  will  be  needed 
to  cope  with  the  deserters.  Is  reported  that  every  inducement  has  been 
offered  them  to  voluntarily  surrender  and  that  the  proposal  has  failed  to 
bring  results.  The  sheriff  is  reported  to  be  in  sympathy  with  fugitives,  and 
I  am  informed  that  he  will  not  cooperate.  Citizens  report  that  approx- 
imately thirty  deserters  are  around  and  in  hiding  ready  to  resist  arrest. 
Authorities  believe  if  militia  is  sent  that  the  deserters  will  surrender  with- 
out resistance.  I  am  convinced  that  the  only  solution  is  to  send  an  outside 
force.    Please  advise.  Young. 

To  this  telegram  the  Governor  replied  as  follows : 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  June  26,  191S. 
General  Lawrence  W.  Young, 
Jefferson,  N.  C. 

Will  arrive  North  Wilkesboro  Friday  night.  Arrange  to  take  me  to 
Jefferson  by  motor  car  Saturday  morning  at  six.  Have  notices  sent  to  every 
nook  and  corner  of  Ashe  County  that  I  will  address  a  mass-meeting  of  the 
citizens  of  Ashe  at  Jefferson,  Saturday,  three  p.  m. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

The  Governor  also  sent  the  following  telegram  to  the  Chairman  of  the  Local 
Exemption  Board: 

W.  E.  McNeill,  Raleigh,  N.  C,  June  27,  1918. 

Chairman.  Local  Exemption  Board, 
Jefferson,  N.  C. 

Send  notices  by  special  messengers  to  every  nook  of  Ashe  County, 
especially  the  disaffected  districts,  that  I  will  be  in  Jefferson  Saturday  and 
speak  to  the  people  at  three  p.  m.  I  especially  want  all  friends  and  relatives 
of  delinquents  notified.  T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Pursuant  to  the  above  correspondence,  the  Governor  proceeded  to  Jefferson, 
the  county-seat  of  Ashe.  As  soon  as  he  arrived  there  one  of  the  delinquents  came 
in  and  surrendered  to  the  Governor,  and  to  him  the  Governor  gave  the  following 
letter : 


174  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Commanding  Offices, 
Camp  Jackson. 
Sib: — This  letter  will  be  presented  to  you  by  .  .  .  who  some  time 
ago  left  camp  at  .  .  .  without  leave.  I  am  sure  that  the  action  of  this 
man  was  due  to  ignorance  and  to  misinformation,  and  not  to  any  lack  of 
fundamental  patriotism.  He  has  seen  the  error  of  his  way,  has  come  in 
voluntarily  and  surrendered  himself,  and  now  desires  to  be  given  an  oppor- 
tunity to  make  a  good  soldier.  These  mountaineers  jump  quick  and  shoot 
straight,  and  I  am  sure  that  they  will  give  a  good  account  of  themselves 
when  they  stand  face  to  face  with  the  Hun.  I  am  carrying  on  a  regular 
campaign  to  get  every  man  in  North  Carolina  who  quit  camp  without  leave 
to  return  to  his  duty.  I  sincerely  trust  that  the  military  authorities  will 
see  fit  to  restore  these  soldiers  to  rank,  and  to  impose  the  very  lightest 
punishment  possible.  T   w    BlCKETTi  Governor_ 

Thereafter  there  was  a  mass-meeting  in  the  courthouse,  and  the  Governor 
spoke  to  the  people  for  two  and  a  half  hours,  saying,  in  part : 

Men  of  the  mountains :  I  come  to  you  today  to  save  and  not  to  destroy.  I 
come  to  save  the  fair  name  of  a  county  in  which  the  whole  State  takes,  and  of 
which  I  have  ever  spoken  with,  peculiar  pride.  I  come  to  save  to  you,  men  of  the 
mountains,  your  birthright  of  honor  and  chivalry ;  I  come  to  save  wayward  and 
willful  boys  from  the  sad  and  certain  consequences  of  ignorance  and  sin. 

My  heart  yearns  after  these  boys  even  as  the  heart  of  David  yearned  after 
Absalom.  Absalom  had  in  him  th'e  elements  of  a  hero.  He  was  beautiful  in  form 
and  brilliant  in  mind,  but  he  listened  to  the  whisperings  of  evil  spirits.  He 
deserted  the  house  of  his  father ;  he  rebelled  against  the  law  of  Israel ;  he  died 
as  the  fool  dieth,  and  the  King  cried  aloud :  "Absalom,  my  son,  my  son,  would  to 
God  I  had  died  for  thee." 

Already  in  North  Carolina  three  young  men,  one  in  Jackson,  one  in  Pitt,  and 
one  in  Ashe,  have  followed  in  the  footsteps  of  David's  son.  Like  Absalom  they 
have  died  as  the  fool  dieth ;  and  to  save  others  from  this  tragic  and  shameful  end 
I  am  here  today. 

I  have  tried  honestly  to  get  at  the  real  cause  of  this  unlovely  situation.  I  have 
put  to  my  soul  the  question,  "Why  do  these  men  seek  to  hurt  their  country,  when 
every  hand  should  be  stretched  to  help?"  Certainly,  it  is  not  because  they  are 
afraid  to  fight.  The  mountaineer  loves  a  scrap.  He  would  just  a  little  rather 
fight  than  not,  for  the  same  money. 

It  is  not  because  they  are  unwilling  to  do  or  to  give  their  share.  Nowhere  on 
earth  will  you  find  truer  hospitality  than  right  here  in  these  hills,  and  if  you  were 
to  tell  any  man  in  this  crowd  that  he  was  unwilling  to  pull  his  end  of  the  single- 
tree, to  tote  his  end  of  the  log,  that  he  was  a  slacker  who  wanted  to  saddle  his 
job  on  another  man's  shoulders,  you  would — well,  in  a  few  minutes  you  would 
devoutly  wish  that  you  had  been  born  with  enough  sense  to  keep  your  mouth  shut. 

I  speak  whereof  I  know.  I  have  spent  much  time  in  these  hills,  have  walked 
with  you  along  rushing  mountain  torrents  and  over  rugged  mountain  slopes,  and 
I  know  your  hospitality  and  the  real  joy  you  take  in  doing  your  part  and  in 
helping  another  fellow  along. 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  175 

I  am  forced  to  the  conclusion  that  these  mountain  boys  are  giving  trouble 
because  they  have  not  been  told  the  truth  about  this  war  and  because  they  have 
been  told  a  lot  of  lies  about  it.  Ignorance  and  misinformation  are  at  the  bottom  of 
all  this  trouble  and  all  this  shame. 

It  is  my  purpose  to  lay  before  you  the  everlasting  truth  about  this  war. 

America  did  not  bring  on  this  fight.  You  didn't  want  war.  I  didn't  want  it. 
He  that  sitteth  upon  the  circle  of  the  heavens  and  readeth  the  heart  of  man  as  an 
open  book  knows  that  Woodrow  Wilson  did  not  want  war.  The  man  is  a  school- 
teacher, a  student,  a  historian.  He  loves  the  quietude  of  his  study,  the  atmosphere 
of  books.  He  loves  to  dig  deep  into  the  truths  of  history  and  the  philosophy  of 
civilization.  He  never  dreamed  of  military  glory.  For  him  there  is  no  intoxica- 
tion in  the  thunder  of  the  captains  and  the  shouting.  He  never  carried  a  big 
stick  in  his  life.  And  so  we  find  in  the  beginning  this  quiet  gentleman  shrinking 
from  every  suggestion  of  war.  He  avoided  it.  He  evaded  it.  He  backed  away 
from  it.  He  taxed  to  the  breaking  point  the  greatest  brain  in  this  world  to  keep 
out  of  it.  And  when  at  last,  with  a  bleeding  and  broken  heart,  he  went  before 
the  Congress  and  lifted  his  voice  in  favor  of  war,  it  was  because  there  was  no 
other  way.  Peace  is  entirely  too  dear  when  it  comes  at  the  price  of  honor.  Men 
and  nations  must  preserve  a  measure  of  self-respect  if  they  would  survive  the 
grinding  of  the  years.  When  a  man  reaches  the  point  where  nobody  loves  him, 
nobody  fears  him,  and  nobody  respects  him,  he  is  done  for.  When  he  descends 
to  the  point  that  be  is  ashamed  to  stand  and  look  at  his  own  face  in  the  glass  there 
is  no  good  reason  why  he  should  not  buy  a  cheap  rope  and  hang  himself. 

You  all  remember  the  long  series  of  injuries  and  insults  the  Imperial  German 
Government  heaped  upon  this  Nation;  how,  at  the  point  of  the  sword,  the  Kaiser 
made  a  solemn  pledge  that  henceforward  he  would  observe  the  laws  of  nations 
and  of  humanity.  It  turned  out  that  this  pledge  was  a  mere  pretense  made  to 
gain  time  in  which  to  build  more  submarines  to  do  their  dastardly  work.  And 
when  they  were  builded  and  all  things  were  ready  the  Kaiser  coolly  informed  us 
that  he  proposed  to  treat  the  solemn  compact  made  with  this  Government  as  a 
scrap  of  paper. 

If  in  the  face  of  this  defiant  and  contemptuous  challenge  our  Government  had 
folded  its  arms,  then  today  Old  Glory  would  float  to  the  breezes  in  lonely  isolation 
as  the  one  flag  on  this  earth  that  no  other  nation  loves,  no  other  nation  fears,  and 
no  other  nation  respects.  We  had  to  go  in  to  preserve  a  single  vestige  of  our  self- 
respect  and  the  respect  of  others. 

In  addition  to  what  I  have  just  said,  there  are  three  vital  considerations, 
either  one  of  which  was  sufficient  to  force  America  into  this  war. 

1.  America  was  forced  into  the  World  War  by  considerations  of  common  grat- 
itude. Some  folks  consider  gratitude  an  old-fashioned  virtue,  out  of  date,  out  of 
tune,  without  place  and  without  power  in  modern  thought  or  action.  I  am  a  bit 
old-fashioned  myself  and  believe  that  gratitude  is  one  of  the  heavenly  virtues. 
If  I  am  in  a  place  of  peril  and  a  man  at  the  risk  of  his  own  life  comes  to  my 
rescue,  then  forever  thereafter  the  safety  of  my  soul  drives  me  to  his  rescue  and 
the  rescue  of  his  children's  children  through  all  their  generations. 

There  is  nothing  in  literature  more  beautiful  than  the  story  of  David  and 
Jonathan,  those  fine  young  men  who  loved  each  other  with  a  love  "passing  the 
love  of  women."  Time  and  again  Jonathan  warned  David  of  plots  against  his 
life,  and  finally  when  the  revolution  came  in  Israel,  when  the  House  of  Saul 


176  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

crumbled  and  David  ascended  the  throne,  his  first  royal  proclamation  was,  "Is 
there  any  one  left  of  the  House  of  Saul  that  I  may  show  him  kindness  for 
Jonathan's  sake?"  And  they  went  out  and  found  a  crippled  son  of  Jonathan  and 
brought  him  before  the  King.  I  would  give  the  half  of  my  kingdom  for  a  picture 
of  that  scene  painted  by  a  master  hand.  The  royal  servitors  clad  in  the  gorgeous 
livery  of  the  court  trundling  the  crippled  lad  into  the  great  festal  hall  of  the 
King,  for  the  Bible  narrative  closes  with  the  statement,  beautiful  in  its  simplicity, 
that  "Mephibosheth  sat  at  the  king's  table  and  was  lame  in  both  his  feet." 
David  had  his  faults,  many  and  grievous.  They  were  condoned,  they  were  for- 
given; but  if  in  the  hour  of  triumph  David  had  forgotten  the  friend  of  his 
youth,  and  failed  to  go  to  the  rescue  of  his  afflicted  son,  no  inspired  writer  would 
have  handed  down  to  the  centuries  the  declaration  that  "David  was  a  man  after 
God's  own  heart." 

This  Republic  owes  its  very  life  to  France.  But  for  France  Old  Glory  would 
never  have  waved  in  the  breezes  "from  the  dawn's  early  light  to  the  twilight's 
last  gleaming."  Cornwallis  was  in  the  South.  He  sent  his  trusted  lieutenant, 
Ferguson,  on  a  foraging  expedition,  but  the  sturdy  mountaineers  tore  through  the 
gaps  and  passes  of  the  mountains  and  swarmed  around  Ferguson  and  his  thousand 
men  on  the  slopes  of  Kings  Mountain,  and  every  man  was  killed  or  captured. 
Cornwallis  said,  "I  have  lost  my  eyes."  Subsequently  Cornwallis  met  Greene  at 
Guilford  Court  House,  and  beat  him,  but  it  was  to  Cornwallis  a  costly  victory. 
His  losses  at  Kings  Mountain  and  Guilford  Court  House  so  depleted  his  ranks 
that  he  was  eventually  forced  to  seek  a  sea  base  at  Yorktown.  General  Greene 
sent  word  of  Cornwallis's  movements  to  George  Washington  in  command  of  the 
Continental  Army  at  New  York.  When  the  news  reached  Washington  his  army 
was  in  a  desperate  plight.  Half  clad,  half  starved,  with  wages  far  in  arrears, 
the  soldiers  were  in  no  condition  for  any  heroic  enterprise.  Rochambeau,  the 
commander  of  the  French,  realized  the  desperateness  of  the  situation,  and  ordered 
the  gold  sent  ashore  from  a  French  ship,  and  before  George  Washington  started 
on  that  world-famous  march  from  New  York  to  Yorktown  the  wages  of  the 
American  soldiers  were  paid  in  French  gold. 

And  more  than  that.  When  Washington  started  on  that  immortal  march  to 
bottle  up  Cornwallis  at  Yorktown,  he  started  at  the  head  of  two  thousand  American 
and  four  thousand  French  soldiers.  And  more  than  that.  The  French  fleet  came 
up  the  Chesapeake  Bay,  cut  off  all  hope  of  retreat  or  rescue  for  Cornwallis  by 
water,  and  then  landed  three  thousand  marines,  the  best  trained  soldiers  on  earth 
at  that  time.  On  the  way  down  Washington  had  gathered  up  some  four  or  five 
thousand  more  ragged  Continentals;  but  even  then,  in  addition  to  holding  the 
waters,  the  French  had  on  foot  at  Yorktown  more  than  half  of  Washington's 
army,  while  at  their  head  stood  LaFayette,  a  host  within  himself.  It  is  as  plain 
as  day  that  without  the  money  power  and  the  man  power  of  France  at  Yorktown, 
Cornwallis,  trained  and  gifted  soldier  as  he  was,  would  have  made  short  work  of 
the  ragged  Continentals,  and  America's  only  hope  for  freedom  would  have  been 
lost  forever  and  forever. 

As  we  were  in  1781,  France  was  in  1917.  There  is  this  exception  in  her  favor. 
France  did  nothing,  absolutely  nothing,  to  bring  on  this  war.  Her  wealth  and  her 
beauty  were  her  only  offense;  but  upon  her  the  Black  Eagle  cast  lustful  eyes.  For 
forty  years,  with  tireless  energy  and  matchless  skill,  the  Imperial  German  Gov- 
ernment converted  every  citizen  into  a  soldier  and  every  industry  into  an  arsenal; 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  177 

and  when  the  work  was  complete,  when  a  vast  empire  had  heen  forged  into  one 
living  thunderbolt,  suddenly,  without  warning,  and  without  cause,  this  thunder- 
bolt was  hurled  at  the  devoted  head  of  France.  Under  this  awful  impact  France 
reeled  and  staggered  back  to  the  very  gates  of  Paris ;  and  then,  like  a  tigress  about 
to  be  robbed  of  her  whelps,  she  rallied  all  her  strength,  sprang  straight  at  the 
invader's  throat,  and  put  up  a  fight  that  made  all  the  world  wonder.  But  despite 
the  godlike  heroism  of  her  men  and  the  godlike  sacrifices  of  her  women,  the  day 
came  when  France  was  bled  white  and  starved  thin.  The  Beast  of  Berlin  was  at 
her  breast ;  and,  still  too  proud  to  cry  aloud  for  help,  she  turned  wistful  eyes  to 
this  young  giant  of  the  West,  and  I  know  that  the  soul  of  every  true  American 
leaped  for  joy  when  General  Pershing  stood  in  the  city  of  Paris  under  the  shadow 
of  a  monument  to  LaFayette  and,  speaking  for  one  hundred  million  American 
freemen,  said,  "LaFayette,  we  are  here !" 

2.  Our  own  peace  and  safety  compelled  us  to  go  in. 

When  the  American  soldiers  first  landed  on  the  other  side  the  cause  of  the 
Allies  was  lost.  Italy  was  torn  with  internal  dissensions;  Russia  was  reeling  like 
a  drunken  man ;  England  was  bleeding  at  every  pore ;  France  was  gasping  for 
breath;  the  mailed  fist  was  raised  ready  to  strike  the  last  fatal  blow,  when  Uncle 
Sam  reached  for  his  gun  and  cried,  "Not  yet !"  And  if  Germany  should  conquer 
Italy  and  Eussia  and  England  and  France,  what  next?  Us.  With  the  British 
Empire  broken  up,  with  all  Europe  at  his  feet,  the  United  States  of  America 
comes  next  in  the  Kaiser's  dream  of  universal  empire. 

As  early  as  1892  the  Kaiser  issued  a  pamphlet  to  his  soldiers  in  which  he 
stated  that  the  ultimate  object  of  the  Imperial  Government  was  to  Germanize  the 
whole  world.  He  had  a  map  made  of  the  world  showing  Berlin  as  the  capital, 
England,  France  and  Russia  as  German  provinces,  while  "Germania"  was  stamped 
in  red  all  over  the  United  States  and  Canada.  Permit  me  to  pause  long  enough 
to  say  that  every  river  in  this  land  will  run  crimson  to  the  sea  before  "Germania" 
is  ever  stamped  on  the  face  of  this  country. 

In  1898  a  German  officer  in  Manila  made  a  statement  to  the  same  effect,  and 
Admiral  Dewey  thought  the  statement  of  sufficient  importance  to  incorporate  it  in 
his  official  report. 

When  Dewey  destroyed  the  Spanish  fleet  in  Manila  Bay  the  German  admiral, 
Von  Diedrich,  stripped  his  ships  for  action  against  Dewey,  but  the  British  Lion 
growled  a  dissent,  and  the  Hohenzollern  held  back. 

During  the  same  Spanish  War  the  German  Government  tried  to  get  England 
and  France  to  place  the  combined  fleets  of  Germany,  England  and  France  between 
the  United  States  and  Cuba,  to  which  England  replied,  "No;  if  England  goes  in 
it  will  be  on  the  side  of  the  Stars  and  Stripes." 

Last  year  the  German  ambassador,  Von  Bernstorff,  was  loudly  proclaiming  how 
dearly  he  loved  us ;  but  at  the  very  time  he  held  out  his  right  hand  to  the  United 
States  in  token  of  eternal  friendship,  he  had  his  left  hand  behind  him  offering  a 
bribe  to  poor  old  poverty-stricken  Mexico  to  join  in  a  league  against  us.  They 
told  Mexico  that  if  she  would  make  war  against  the  United  States  the  Kaiser 
would  restore  to  her  the  lost  provinces  of  Texas  and  Arizona  and  New  Mexico. 
And  at  the  same  time  Germany  was  endeavoring  to  woo  Japan  from  her  allegiance 
to  England  into  a  big  combine  with  Mexico  and  Germany  against  the  United 
States. 

12 


J 


178  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Last  year  the  Kaiser  got  irritated  on  account  of  the  many  notes  he  was 
receiving  from  Mr.  Wilson;  and  in  a  burst  of  anger  forgot  his  discretion,  but  not 
his  purpose,  and  said  to  Mr.  Gerard,  our  ambassador,  "You  just  wait  till  I  finish 
this  war,  and  I'll  stand  no  more  nonsense  from  the  United  States."  The  whole 
course  of  events  points  with  unerring  certainty  to  the  Kaiser's  plan  to  bring 
Europe  to  its  knees,  and  then  rattle  his  sword  in  the  face  of  this  Government. 

The  original  plan  did  not  contemplate  a  direct  frontal  attack  on  us.  Germany 
is  entirely  too  smart  for  that.  No  one  has  ever  said  that  Germany  had  no  sense. 
The  truth  is,  she  has  too  much.  The  most  dangerous  man  in  this  community  is  not 
a  feeble-minded  man,  but  the  man  that  has  the  most  sense  and  the  least  character. 
That  is  the  position  that  today  Germany  occupies  in  the  family  of  nations,  and 
because  she  has  so  much  sense  and  so  little  character,  the  conscience  of  the  world 
is  in  arms  against  her.  The  plan  was  this :  Down  in  Brazil  there  are  strong 
German  influences.  At  a  signal  from  the  Kaiser  the  Germans  in  Brazil  would 
incite  a  revolution,  and  then,  for  the  avowed  purpose  of  protecting  German  citizens 
and  German  property,  the  Kaiser  would  intervene  and  establish  a  protectorate 
over  Brazil;  and  then  with  the  Brazilian  fleet  added  to  his  own,  with  the  mightiest 
army  the  world  has  ever  seen,  flushed  with  victory  at  his  back,  the  Kaiser  would 
turn  to  us  and  coolly  inquire,  "Now,  my  Uncle  Samuel,  what  in  the  thunder  are 
you  going  to  do  about  it  ?"  And  what  would  we  do,  and  what  could  we  do  ?  Just 
one  of  two  things.  We  could  salute,  bow  low,  and  say,  "Dear  Mr.  Kaiser,  be 
assured  that  there  will  be  no  trouble  between  us  and  thee.  We  suppose  that  you 
are  thinking  of  that  ancient  doctrine  sometimes  called  the  Monroe  Doctrine;  but 
pray  do  not  allow  that  to  disturb  you.  We  never  did  mean  a  word  of  it.  It  is 
just  a  great  big  international  joke.  It  is  true  it  is  about  the  only  thing  we  have. 
It  is  the  one  foreign  policy  that  we  have  proclaimed.  It  is  true  that  it  has  kept 
the  peace  of  this  continent  for  a  hundred  years  and  saved  twenty  baby  republics 
to  the  south  of  us  from  being  gobbled  up  by  kings  of  Europe;  but  we  never  did 
mean  it ;  it  was  all  bluff,  sounding  brass  and  tinkling  cymbal ;  and  so  good  morning, 
Mr.  Kaiser,  and  good  day,  Mr.  Kaiser,  and  may  you  live  long  and  prosper."  We 
could  have  said  that,  and  at  once  in  our  own  estimation  and  in  the  estimation  of 
all  lands  sunk  below  the  level  of  a  hound  pup.  The  contempt  for  the  United 
States  in  such  a  case  would  have  been  such  that  from  Shanghai  to  Bagdad  prin- 
cipalities and  powers  would  join  in  the  taunting  chorus,  "The  United  States  ain't 
nothing  but  a  hound,  and  any  old  country  can  kick  her  around." 

Of  course  we  would  not  say  it.  We  would  stand  by  our  honor  and  our  tradi- 
tions. Unaided  and  alone,  without  the  help  or  sympathy  of  any  other  nation,  we 
would  go  down  into  the  southern  seas  and  fight  it  out  with  Germany  at  a  place 
of  her  own  choosing.  Of  course  we  would  lose  in  such  a  fight,  and  then  Germany 
would  commence  her  triumphant  advance.  She  would  seize  all  the  baby  republics, 
for  a  single  battleship  can  overpower  any  one  of  them ;  and  then,  coming  on  north, 
she  would  intrigue  with  Mexico  that  is  always  ready  to  intrigue  with  anybody 
against  the  United  States ;  and,  landing  her  victorious  soldiers  in  Mexican  ports, 
would  establish  a  new  Hindenburg  line  along  the  Bio  Grande,  and  soon  Texas 
would  be  another  Belgium. 

Despite  these  facts,  which  are  as  plain  as  day,  we  find  a  few  people,  more 
feeble-minded  than  faint-hearted,  who  still  insist  that  we  ought  to  wait  until  the 
German  hordes  are  treading  our  own  soil,  till  the  whirr  of  the  Zeppelins  is  heard 
above  our  cities,  and  then  call  out  our  militia  and  clean  up  the  whole  crowd  before 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  170 

breakfast.  Such  a  course  would  be  criminal  stupidity.  "We  are  sending  our 
armies  to  Germany  to  keep  the  German  armies  from  coming  here.  The  South  is 
the  last  place  in  the  world  to  complain  that  a  war  is  not  fought  out  on  our  own 
soil.  From  '61  to  '65  our  fathers  fought  it  out  on  our  soil,  and  we  are  just 
beginning  to  recover  from  that  tragic  experience.  The  South  ought  to  be  deeply 
grateful  that  we  had  at  "Washington  a  government  that  had  sense  enough  to  see 
that  the  conflict  was  inevitable,  and  to  walk  in  and  fight  it  out  on  a  foreign  shore 
while  there  is  plenty  of  help. 

3.  The  third  and  most  potent  reason  for  our  going  in  is  that  this  war  will  mold 
and  color  the  civilization  of  the  world  for  a  thousand  years.  That  far-flung  battle 
line  is  one  vast  melting  pot  in  which  there  is~T5eing  tried  out  every  theory  of 
government  and  every  ideal  of  humanity.  Into  this  hissing,  roaring  cauldron 
there  is  being  dumped  despotism  and  anarchism,  bolshevism,  militarism,  pacificism. 
Into  the  melting  pot  there  is  going  autocracy,  and  plutocracy,  and  democracy ;  and 
the  thing  that  emerges  triumphant  from  this  ordeal  of  fire  will  rule  this  earth 
for  a  thousand  years  to  come.  The  quarrel  between  Austria  and  Servia  has  been 
well-nigh  forgotten.  The  rape  of  Belgium  is  remembered  as  a  ghastly  dream. 
The  submarine  question  is  but  a  bubble  on  a  boiling  sea.  The  one  vital  question 
is,  "Who  and  what  shall  rule  the  earth?  Suppose  Germany  should  win.  Suppose 
Prussia  in  shining  armor  should  leap  triumphant  from  the  melting  pot.  Then 
for  a  thousand  years  the  ideals  of  Prussia  would  reign  and  men  would  be 
taught  that  a  gun  is  God,  and  before  it  there  is  none  other.  Every  government 
on  earth  would  of  necessity  be  fashioned  after  the  Prussian  model.  Nations  would 
be  converted  into  armed  camps  ever  ready  as  Prussia  was  ready  to'  spring  at 
another's  throat.  For  a  thousand  years  all  the  products  of  peace  would  be  fed 
to  mills  of  war  and  every  private  citizen  would  carry  a  soldier  on  his  back. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  the  Allies  shall  achieve  a  great  victory,  then  I  devoutly 
believe  that  war  will  come  no  more  upon  the  earth.  "We  are  fighting  the  very  soul 
of  war.  We  are  battling  to  send  militarism  to  the  scrap-heap  of  civilization,  and 
to  make  the  conscience  of  mankind  the  supreme  arbiter  of  the  rights  of  nations. 
We  are  pouring  out  blood  and  treasure  to  build  up  a  civilization  in  which  a 
woman's  finger  will  weigh  more  than  a  mailed  fist,  and  the  voice  of  a  little  child 
will  be  heard  farther  than  a  cannon's  roar.  Is  it  not  all  well  worth  fighting  for? 
God  knows  I  hate  war,  and  have  no  lust  for  battle.  My  heart  bleeds  with  com- 
passion for  the  mothers  and  fathers  and  wives  of  the  men  who  are  moving  to  the 
front.     I  shall  deeply  mourn  the  unreturning  braves.     But,  my  friends, 

"To  every  man  upon  this  earth 
Death  cometh  soon  or  late." 

And  I  know  of  no  finer  way  to  meet  the  grim,  pale  messenger  than  to  traverse  a 
dangerous  sea  and  in  an  unknown  land  register  a  stern  challenge  to  the  blood-red 
prestige  of  a  band  of  hereditary  autocrats  who  have  made  unto  themselves  and  all 
their  people  an  iron  image  and  called  it  God. 

But  how  can  we  win  ?  By  fighting  with  every  resource  at  our  command — talon, 
tush  and  claw.  "We  must  put  all  our  moral  power,  all  our  money  power,  all  our 
man  power  into  the  fight.  Every  blow  must  carry  the  weight  of  the  entire  Nation. 
This  is  precisely  what  we  are  doing.  To  this  end  we  are  training  our  soldiers  in 
the  right  way.  I  have  recently  been  through  the  training  camps.  I  went  through 
for  the  purpose  of  seeing  what  was  being  done  to  and  with  our  boys.     They  are 


180  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

making  mighty  men  of  them.  I  noticed  what  they  had  to  eat.  I  ate  with  them. 
I  observed  their  sleeping  quarters.  I  took  a  nap  in  one  of  the  bunks.  I  noticed 
the  precautions  taken  to  protect  the  health  and  morals  of  the  boys,  and  I  can  say 
to  you  mothers  and  fathers  advisedly  that  the  boys  in  the  camps  are  better  fed, 
better  clothed,  are  leading  more  healthful  and  more  decent  lives  than  the  men  of 
the  same  age  at  home. 

We  are  raising  our  army  in  the  right  way.  The  Selective  Draft  law  is  a  legis- 
lative embodiment  of  the  principle  of  equal  justice  to  all  and  special  privilege  to 
none.  It  is  the  essence  of  Americanism  and  the  sublimation  of  the  square  deal. 
The  man  who  understands  the  law  and  does  not  endorse  it  is  not  a  good  citizen. 
He  is  worse  than  a  slacker — he  is  a  shirker.  He  wants  the  other  fellow  to  carry 
his  part  of  the  load.  He  believes  in  equal  rights,  but  despises  equal  duties.  When 
we  come  to  raise  money  by  taxation  we  all  say  that  there  must  be  absolute  equality. 
The  situation  requires  it  and  the  conscience  of  the  people  approves  it.  To  call 
a  citizen  to  war  is  the  highest  tax  a  government  can  levy.  It  is  the  tax  of  blood 
and  death.  Should  there  be  uniformity  in  taxing  property,  and  discrimination 
in  taxing  life?  Should  there  be  equality  in  peace  and  favoritism  in  war?  If 
there  is  to  be  preference,  to  whom  should  it  be  shown — you  or  me?  If  there  is  to 
be  prejudice,  against  whom  should  it  be  directed — your  boy  or  mine?  ~No,  my 
friends,  the  innate  American  love  of  fair  play  forces  every  man  to  admit  that 
equal  benefits  and  equal  burdens  go  hand  in  hand;  and  the  man  who  holds  that 
the  Selective  Draft  law  is  founded  on  the  wrong  principle  does  not  believe  in  the 
Declaration  of  Independence  and  is  an  alien  to  the  genius  of  this  Republic. 

I  said  the  law  is  the  essence  of  Americanism.  Let  me  illustrate:  A  number 
of  years  ago  Bill  Fife,  the  drummer  evangelist,  and  Mr.  Litch,  who  was  the  Fife 
of  South  Carolina,  joined  forces  down  in  Monroe,  and  held  a  great  meeting.  They 
converted  a  livery  stable  into  a  tabernacle,  and  preached  hell  fire  and  damnation 
straight  from  the  shoulder  three  times  a  day.  They  held  the  congregation  over 
the  burning  pit  and  fairly  singed  it.  In  the  town  there  lived  a  little  fellow  by  the 
name  of  June  Hamilton.  June  weighed  about  ninety  pounds,  and  kept  a  set  of 
books  for  the  Farmers  Alliance  store  that  weighed  more  than  he  did.  One  day  the 
boys  were  gathered  in  front  of  the  store  and  one  said  to  June,  "Did  you  hear 
Brother  Litch  this  morning?"  Said  June,  "I  was  right  there."  "Well,"  said  the 
boy,  "according  to  Brother  Litch  about  ninety-nine  folks  out  of  every  hundred  are 
going  straight  to  hell."  "Yes,"  said  June,  "I  am  a  bookkeeper,  and  that's  the  way 
I  figure  it  out.  It's  awful,  boys,  ain't  it?  It's  horrible,  terrible  to  contemplate; 
but  I  tell  you,  I  have  just  made  up  my  mind  that  if  the  other  ninety-eight  can 
stand  it,  I  can."  That  is  Americanism  red-hot.  We  are  perfectly  willing  to 
carry  our  end  of  the  singletree  if  the  other  fellow  carries  his.  We  are  willing  to 
line  up  to  the  rack,  fodder  or  no  fodder,  if  every  other  man  is  compelled  to  line 
up  to  the  same  rack.  We  are  willing  to  stand  hell  fire  and  damnation  if  every 
other  man  is  required  to  stand  the  same  thing.  And  that  is  precisely  what  the 
Selective  Draft  law  requires.  It  measures  every  man  with  the  same  yardstick, 
and  feeds  him  out  of  the  same  spoon.  It  is  no  respecter  of  persons,  but  treats 
every  man  exactly  alike  from  John  D.  Rockefeller,  Jr.,  up.  And  this  is  fair 
treatment.  It  is  good  medicine,  compounded  of  the  logic  of  justice  and  the  grace 
of  common  sense.  If  a  man  is  not  willing  to  take  the  medicine,  we  propose  to  hold 
his  nose  and  pour  it  down. 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  181 

The  volunteer  system  is  always  unwise  and  unjust.  It  places  a  tax  on  patriot- 
ism and  a  premium  on  cowardice.  When  the  war  drums  throb  and  the  bugles 
blow,  the  brightest  and  the  bravest  rush  to  the  front,  while  baser  breeds  skulk  at 
home  and  become  the  fathers  of  the  race.  The  cruel  injustice  of  such  a  system  is 
only  surpassed  by  its  colossal  stupidity. 

In  raising  our  first  National  Army  the  military  necessity  of  the  hour  forced 
the  War  Department  to  place  the  emphasis  on  the  drafting  principle  in  the  law. 
In  the  present  call  the  emphasis  is  placed  on  the  selective  principle.  Men  are 
called  in  the  order  that  will  entail  the  least  hardship  on  families  and  communities. 
To  this  end  all  registrants  are  divided  into  classes.  In  a  general  way  the  single 
men  will  be  called  first,  married  men  without  children  second,  and  married  men 
with  children  third.  Unskilled  labor  is  called  before  skilled  labor,  and  the  idle 
before  the  industrious.  Indeed,  in  the  forefront  of  the  first  class  will  be  placed 
married  men  who  have  not  habitually  supported  their  families.  The  man  who 
has  been  boarding  with  his  wife  is  going  to  try  Uncle  Sam's  grub  for  a  while. 
The  fellow  whose  chief  occupation  has  been  holding  down  a  goods  box  is  going 
to  take  up  his  goods  box  and  walk  for  the  United  States  "from  the  dawn's  early 
light  till  the  twilight's  last  gleaming."  The  fellow  who  has  been  hanging  around 
the  corner  drug  store  with  a  cigarette  at  an  angle  of  forty-five  degrees  in  the  south- 
west corner  of  his  mouth  is  going  to  hold  a  rifle  on  his  shoulder  at  an  angle  of 
seventy  degrees  in  the  sun  where  it  is  ninety-six  in  the  shade.  The  poolroom 
aristocracy  and  the  coca-cola  gentry  are  going  to  be  rounded  up.  After  this  call 
I  will  be  able  to  issue  a  proclamation  over  the  Great  Seal  of  the  State  that 
between  the  ages  of  twenty-one  and  forty-five  there  is  not  a  loafer  left  in  North 
Carolina.  The  net  is  spread  and  the  camel-and-needle  act  is  dead  easy  compared 
with  any  attempt  of  a  loafer  to  get  away  from  a  fair  chance  to  die  for  his  country. 


CO 
THE  TRIUMPH  OF  THE  ENGLISH  PEOPLE  AT  YORKTOWN 

ADDRESS  DELIVERED  AT  MOORE'S  CREEK  BRIDGE,  JULY  25,  1918 

We  are  met  to  celebrate  the  first  victory  of  American  arms  in  the  War  of  the 
Revolution.  On  this  spot,  one  hundred  and  forty-two  years  ago,  democracy  in 
arms  presented  a  stern  challenge  to  the  advance  of  autocracy  in  the  New  World, 
and  made  that  challenge  good.  Moore  and  Lillington  and  Caswell,  and  their 
devoted  followers,  here  planned  so  wisely  and  fought  so  well  that  the  Battle  of 
Moore's  Creek  Bridge  will  be  forever  charted  on  the  map  of  Freedom  as  a  place 
where,  in  a  crucial  hour,  the  divine  rights  of  kings  went  down  before  the  diviner 
rights  of  men.  The  victory  here  achieved  strengthened  the  arms  of  our  people 
and  inspired  them  to  carry  on  through  days  of  darkness  and  disaster  until  the 
final  triumph  at  Yorktown. 

This  brings  me  to  the  central  thought  that  I  desire  to  impress  upon  you  today. 
Yorktown  was  a  great  victory  for  the  American  armies,  but  it  was  an  even 
greater  triumph  for  the  ideals  and  aspirations  of  the  English  people.  To  every 
true  lawyer  there  come  cases  he  cannot  afford  to  win.     To  win  the  case  would  be 


182  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

to  lose  the  law  to  which  he  owes  his  first  and  highest  allegiance.  This  is  as  true 
of  contests  on  the  field  as  in  the  forum.  From  Moore's  Creek  Bridge  to  Yorktown 
the  English  Government  was  endeavoring  to  win  a  case  contrary  to  English  law. 
The  attack  on  the  rights  of  Englishmen  here  was  a  flank  attack  on  the  rights  of 
Englishmen  at  home.  William  Pitt,  the  great  commoner,  sensed  the  real  issue, 
and  rising  from  his  seat  in  Parliament,  passionately  exclaimed :  "I  rejoice  that 
America  has  resisted !  Three  millions  of  people  so  dead  to  all  feelings  of  liberty 
as  to  voluntarily  submit  to  be  slaves  would  be  fit  instruments  to  make  slaves  of 
the  rest  of  us !" 

In  humble  petitions,  in  dignified  protests,  and  in  ringing  resolutions  the 
colonists  made  it  plain  that  "the  rights  and  privileges  of  Englishmen"  were  their 
lawful  inheritance,  and  that  they  would  be  satisfied  with  nothing  less.  Edmund 
Burke,  in  his  immortal  speech  on  conciliating  America,  maintained  that  English 
colonies  could  not  be  established  on  any  other  basis.  A  noble  array  of  broad- 
minded,  farseeing  English  statesmen  stood  with  Pitt  and  Burke  on  the  side  of  the 
colonies.  But  these  "English  liberties"  were  the  pet  abomination  of  George  III. 
His  ruling  passion  was  to  destroy  government  in  England  by  a  Ministry  and 
Parliament  responsive  to  the  will  of  the  people,  and  to  make  the  royal  will  the 
law  of  the  land.  He  had  no  patience  with  the  British  theory  of  a  democratic 
monarchy,  for  he  was  a  German  autocrat  to  the  bone. 

GEOEGE  III   ONLY  ONE   ONE-HUNDBED-AND-THIRTY-SIXTH   ENGLISH 

The  truth  is,  that  only  one  drop  of  blood  out  of  every  hundred  and  thirty-six 
in  George  III  was  English  blood.  One  thirty-second  part  was  Scotch  and  the 
balance  was  plain,  petrified  German.  The  king  was  as  hostile  to  English  law  as 
he  was  ignorant  of  the  English  language,  a  language  he  never  learned  to  speak. 
His  mother  was  a  German  princess,  and  from  childhood  dinned  into  his  ears  the 
injunction,  "George,  be  king !" 

The  result  of  this  German  blood  and  German  "kultur"  is  stated  by  the  great 
English  historian,  Green :  "In  ten  years  he  reduced  government  to  a  shadow 
and  turned  the  loyalty  of  his  subjects  at  home  into  disaffection.  In  twenty,  he 
had  forced  the  American  colonies  into  revolt  and  independence.  The  House  of 
Commons  was  the  slave  of  the  king.  The  ministry  of  Lord  North  was  a  mere 
cloak  for  the  direction  of  public  affairs  by  George  himself,  and  the  shame  of  the 
darkest  hour  of  English  history  lies  wholly  at  his  door." 

A  German  king,  backed  by  a  servile  minister,  a  corrupt  and  cowardly  Parlia- 
ment, supported  by  the  German  soldiers  that  the  king  hired,  made  war  on  our 
forefathers  because  they  boldly  asserted  the  rights  and  privileges  that  had  come 
down  to  them  through  a  thousand  years  of  struggle  and  bloodshed.  When  these 
rights  and  privileges  were  saved  for  us  at  Yorktown,  they  were  saved  for  our 
kinsmen  on  the  moors  of  Devonshire  and  in  the  shadows  of  Westminster  and  St. 
Paul's.  It  is  true,  England  lost  the  American  colonies,  but  in  losing  them  she 
learned  how  to  save  Canada  and  India  and  Egypt  and  Australia,  and  the  vast 
dominions  on  which  the  sun  never  sets.  After  Yorktown  the  policy  of  England 
toward  her  colonies  was  one  of  liberality  and  generosity.  Green  says :  "To  the 
nations  that  she  founded  she  was  to  give  not  only  her  blood  and  her  speech,  but 
the  freedom  which  she  had  won."  In  this  wise  England  became  the  Mother  of 
Colonies.  When  Cornwallis  fell,  Lord  North  fell,  and  the  autocratic  power  of  the 
king  waned  until  it  was  lost  in  the  gloom  of  insanity  that  shrouded  his  declining 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  183 

years.  Since  then  no  king  of  England  has  seriously  denied  that  in  all  vital 
matters  he  was  subject  to  the  will  of  the  English  people.  The  broad  views  of 
Camden  and  Pitt  and  Burke  have  molded  the  entire  course  of  English  history,  and 
today  the  successors  of  these  men  are  fighting  side  by  side  with  the  successors  of 
"Washington  and  Jefferson  against  the  people  of  George  III.  Ever  since  York- 
town  the  principles  for  which  the  colonies  fought  have  been  followed  by  England, 
and  on  the  Fourth  of  July  of  this  year  the  British  ambassador  in  Paris  made 
this  noble  confession :  "England  owes  America  a  debt  of  gratitude  for  the  Ameri- 
can Revolution." 

ENGLAND  A   FOETEESS   AND  A   FRIEND 

Great  Britain  has  in  a  number  of  crucial  hours  proved  herself  our  fortress 
and  our  friend.  We  have  had  some  quarrels  with  England  about  trade  and  com- 
merce, but  on  all  questions  affecting  territorial  rights  in  this  hemisphere,  and  the 
principle  of  government  by  consent  of  the  governed,  England  has  given  us  lively 
sympathy  and  mighty  support.  Napoleon  Bonaparte,  in  the  heydey  of  his  glory 
and  power,  forced  the  proud  King  of  Spain  to  turn  over  to  him  that  vast  empire 
that  stretches  from  the  Mississippi  to  the  Rocky  Mountains.  He  then  planned  to 
establish  in  this  virgin  territory  a  French  empire  that  would  be  a  perpetual  barrier 
to  the  growth  and  a  perpetual  menace  to  the  existence  of  democracy  on  this 
continent.  He  perfected  his  plans  with  Napoleonic  energy  and  completeness.  He 
arranged  to  send  over  here  a  highly  trained  army  to  take  possession  of  the  territory 
he  had  wrenched  from  Spain,  and  to  destroy  all  opposition  to  his  ambitions  in 
the  New  World.  Thomas  Jefferson  at  once  recognized  the  peril  to  this  Republic 
involved  in  such  an  expedition,  and  he  took  swift  and  heroic  action  to  prevent  it. 
He  first  obtained  assurance  from  Great  Britain  that  in  case  of  war  between  the 
United  States  and  France  the  English  fleet  would  at  once  seize  the  city  of  New 
Orleans  and  hold  it  for  the  United  States.  Thus  fortified,  Jefferson  directed  the 
American  minister  in  Paris  to  offer  to  buy  this  territory  from  Napoleon  and,  in 
case  Napoleon  refused  to  sell,  to  proceed  to  England  and  make  preparations  for 
war.  Napoleon  was  the  very  incarnation  of  autocracy.  After  him  the  Kaiser  has 
sought  to  fashion  his  own  life,  for  he  despised  the  rule  of  the  people  and  gloried 
in  the  edicts  of  kings.  But,  though  he  despised  this  Government  and  held  our 
military  power  in  contempt,  he  had  vast  respect  for  the  British  navy;  and  when 
he  realized  that  the  British  fleet  stood  between  him  and  New  Orleans,  he  said : 
"It  is  certainly  worth  while  to  sell,  when  you  can,  what  you  are  certain  to  lose." 
And  so,  for  the  sum  of  fifteen  millions  of  American  money,  backed  by  the  navy 
of  Great  Britain,  Napoleon  transferred  an  empire  to  the  Republic  he  despised. 
In  this  fashion  there  was  saved  to  the  country  the  city  of  New  Orleans  and  the 
mouth  of  the  Mississippi,  through  which  at  that  time  three-fourths  of  our  inland 
commerce  passed;  the  territory  of  the  Republic  was  more  than  doubled  and  the 
hopes  of  despotic  governments  of  Europe  to  establish  themselves  in  the  heart  of 
this  continent  were  forever  blasted. 

THE  BEITISH  FLEET  THE  BULWARK   OF  THE  MONROE  DOCTRINE 

The  Monroe  doctrine  is  the  most  vital  international  policy  ever  declared  by 
the  United  States.  For  nearly  a  century  it  has  saved  all  the  baby  republics  of  this 
hemisphere  from  being  the  spoils  of  the  kings  of  Europe  and  the  hotbed  of  inter- 
national strife.     Senator  Lodge,  in  his  history  of  the  United  States,  says:    "It 


184  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

has  so  commended  itself  to  the  people  as  a  wise  and  proper  course,  as  so  vital  to  the 
existence  of  the  United  States,  that  it  has  been  cherished  and  enforced  by  all 
political  parties  and  by  all  subsequent  statesmen  of  the  Eepublic." 

It  is  therefore  of  absorbing  interest  to  inquire  just  how  the  promulgation  of 
this  doctrine  came  about.  It  did  not  originate  with  Monroe.  Washington  him- 
self was  in  favor  of  the  principle,  and  so  were  Jefferson  and  Madison.  The  people 
generally  were  committed  to  the  view  that  European  intervention  in  American 
affairs  would  be  a  menace  to  our  own  safety.  The  difficulty  was  that  the  United 
States  was  not  in  a  position  to  enforce  the  doctrine.  It  was  here  that  England 
came  to  the  rescue. 

The  colonies  of  Spain  had  revolted  against  despotic  rule.  South  America  had 
become  inoculated  with  the  spirit  of  our  own  revolution.  In  lively  sympathy  with 
the  aspirations  of  the  people  to  the  south  of  us,  the  Congress  of  the  United  States 
recognized  their  independence.  Thereupon  the  Holy  Alliance,  a  compact  between 
the  emperors  of  Russia  and  Austria  and  the  king  of  Prussia,  proposed  to  intervene 
in  South  America  and  impose  upon  the  people  the  absolute  rule  of  a  distant  king. 
Erance  was  not  a  party  to  the  Holy  Alliance,  but  Louis  XVIII  was  in  sympathy 
with  its  purposes  in  South  America.  At  this  juncture  England,  through  her 
Foreign  Secretary,  George  Canning,  proposed  to  the  American  Minister,  Mr. 
Richard  Rush,  for  Great  Britain  and  the  United  States  to  unite  in  a  declaration 
that  the  two  powers  would  not  brook  any  interference  in  American  affairs.  For 
some  reason  the  joint  proclamation  was  never  made,  but  Mr.  Rush  submitted  the 
proposition  to  President  Monroe,  who  at  once  sent  the  entire  correspondence  to 
Jefferson,  in  retirement  at  Monticello,  and  Jefferson  promptly  wrote  him  to  pro- 
claim the  doctrine  and  it  would  be  the  greatest  American  document  since  the 
Declaration  of  Independence.  Thereupon,  Monroe  made  his  famous  proclamation, 
and  true  to  the  assurance  of  Canning,  Great  Britain  gave  notice  that  the  British 
fleet  stood  ready  to  maintain  the  doctrine. 

GREAT  BRITAIN  THE  CHAMPION  OF  REPRESENTATIVE  GOVERNMENT 

Not  alone  on  questions  of  territory,  but  whenever  the  existence  of  our  form  of 
government  has  been  assailed  England  has  championed  our  cause. 

In  1820  there  was  a  healthy  spirit  of  freedom  in  Europe.  The  emancipated 
soul  of  the  ISTew  "World  was  making  itself  felt  in  the  monarchies  of  the  Old.  Kings 
felt  the  breath  of  the  people's  hopes,  and  trembled  on  their  thrones.  Thereupon 
the  Holy  Alliance  called  a  congress  of  the  great  powers  at  Verona,  at  which 
Austria,  Russia,  Prussia,  France,  and  England  were  represented.  The  congress 
solemnly  resolved  to  stamp  out  republican  government  wherever  found  in  Europe, 
and  to  prevent  its  spread  in  America.  Thereupon  the  Duke  of  Wellington  washed 
his  hands  of  the  whole  business  and  refused  to  have  anything  further  to  do  with 
the  deliberations  of  the  congress.  In  this  fashion  England  served  notice  upon  the 
absolute  monarchies  of  the  Old  World  that  she  would  be  no  party  to  any  designs 
to  destroy  government  by  the  chosen  representatives  of  the  people. 

In  1892  the  Emperor  of  Germany  published  a  pamphlet  in  which  he  stated 
that  the  ultimate  purpose  of  the  Imperial  Government  was  the  Germanization 
of  the  world.  When  the  United  States  intervened  in  Cuba,  in  1898,  to  protect  the 
suffering  people  of  that  fair  land  from  the  tyranny  and  inefficiency  of  Spanish 
rule,  the  Kaiser  at  once  perceived  that  such  action  on  our  part  tended  to  blast  his 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  185 

dream  of  a  Germanized  world.  He  deeply  resented  any  republic  interfering  with 
any  king.  One  of  his  favorite  sayings  was :  "We  princes  must  stand  together." 
Therefore  the  Kaiser  proposed  to  England  and  France  to  unite  with  Germany  and 
place  the  combined  fleets  of  the  three  powers  between  the  United  States  and  Cuba. 
England  said :  "No ;  if  the  British  fleet  goes  in,  it  will  be  on  the  side  of  the 
United  States."  In  Manila  Bay  the  German  admiral,  Von  Diedrich,  got  ready 
to  fire  on  Dewey,  but  the  British  lion  growled  dissent  and  the  Hohenzollern  held 
back.  Afterwards  the  Kaiser  said :  "If  I  had  had  a  larger  fleet  I  would  have  taken 
Uncle  Sam  by  the  scruff  of  the  neck."  The  only  reason  he  did  not  try  was  because 
he  knew  that  the  British  bulldog  would  have  at  once  taken  him  by  the  scruff. 

THE  KINSHIP   OF   THE   SOUL 

The  United  States  and  England  are  thus  bound  together  by  ties  of  a  common 
blood  and  a  common  language,  by  a  joint  inheritance  of  the  blessings  of  constitu- 
tional liberty,  by  a  chain  of  epoch-making  events  that  have  given  course  and  color 
to  world  history,  and,  what  is  more  than  all  these,  by  the  essential  kinship  of 
the  soul.  The  waves  may  now  and  then  clash,  but  the  great  tides  of  American 
and  British  thought  advance  side  by  side.  Our  thoughts  are  their  thoughts ; 
their  ways  are  our  ways.     Britannia  and  Columbia  "are  sisters  under  the  skin." 

TWO  EEMAEKABLE  STATEMENTS 

Recently  the  world  has  heard  two  remarkable  statements — one  by  the  Kaiser, 
and  one  by  Lloyd  George. 

In  his  speech,  celebrating  his  ascension  to  the  throne,  the  Kaiser  recently  de- 
clared that  the  real  issue  involved  in  this  war  was  whether  or  not  Teutonic  or 
Anglo-Saxon  ideals  shall  triumph  in  the  earth.  Intoxicated  by  his  faith  in  the 
divine  right  of  the  Hohenzollerns  to  rule  the  earth,  the  Kaiser  was  betrayed  into 
the  first  truthful  statement  he  has  given  as  to  why  this  war  was  "made  in 
Germany."  It  was  to  compel  all  nations  and  tongues  to  bow  down  to  the  iron 
image  the  Kaiser  had  set  up.  And  the  war  is  going  to  settle  for  all  time  whether 
"blood  and  iron"  or  reason  and  righteousness  shall  rule  on  land  and  sea  and  in  the 
hearts  of  men.  "We  have  accepted  the  challenge.  The  nation  that  has  appealed 
to  the  sword  must  perish  by  the  sword.  And  we  and  all  our  allies  must  not  cease 
to  strike  until  the  German  people  shall  themselves  confess  that  militarism  is  a 
ghastly  failure,  and  shall  with  contrite  hearts  unite  with  us  in  wiping  autocracy 
off  the  earth  forever  and  forever. 

The  other  statement  was  made  by  Lloyd  George,  once  a  Welsh  peasant,  now 
Prime  Minister  of  Great  Britain.  Just  the  other  day  Lloyd  George  said :  "Ger- 
many can  have  peace  at  any  time  on  terms  that  are  satisfactory  to  the  United 
States."  This  is  the  noblest  tribute  ever  paid  to  the  wisdom  and  the  justice  of  our 
people.  Just  as  the  military  leadership  of  the  Allies  has  been  delegated  to  General 
Foch,  the  moral  leadership  has  been  delegated  to  Woodrow  Wilson.  And  with 
Foch  as  our  Joshua,  and  Wilson  as  our  Moses,  we  shall  carry  on  until  all  the 
"Sons  of  Anak"  have  been  put  to  the  sword,  and  all  the  people  of  the  earth  can 
sit  down  under  their  own  vine  and  fig  tree  in  the  blessed  assurance  that  there  are 
none  to  molest  or  make  them  afraid. 


186  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(8) 
PATRIOTISM  AND  POLITICS 

SPEECH  AT  SPENCER  ON  LABOR  DAY,  SEPTEMBER  2,  1918 

This  is  election  year,  and  doubtless  you  have  wondered  why  it  is  that  I,  who 
am  the  accredited  head  of  the  Democratic  Party  in  North  Carolina,  have  spoken 
for  nearly  two  hours  and  have  said  not  one  word  about  politics.  The  answer  is 
that  since  this  Nation  entered  the  world  war  we  have  all  been  trained  in  the  school 
of  self-denial ;  we  have  been  drilled  in  the  art  of  doing  without  things.  We  do 
without  sugar — to  win  the  war;  we  do  without  wheat  bread — to  win  the  war; 
we  do  without  beef — to  win  the  war;  we  do  without  our  boys — to  win  the  war. 
And  there  is  nothing  that  will  help  so  much,  and  hurt  so  little,  as  to  do  without 
partisan  politics. 

"What  purely  political  issue  is  today  presented  to  the  American  people?  The 
tariff?  It  sleeps,  and  no  man  cares  to  awaken  it.  The  trusts?  Neither  party 
makes  them  an  issue,  and  many  of  them  are  in  the  control  of  the  Government,  and 
being  used  to  help  win  the  war.  Circulating  medium?  It  is  so  plentiful  one  can 
scarcely  cart  enough  of  it  around  to  pay  traveling  expenses.  Initiative  and 
referendum  ?  Even  Mr.  Bryan  has  thrown  it  into  a  fence  corner,  while  he  stands 
on  the  topmost  rail  and  vociferates  that  there  are  but  two  sides  to  a  fight,  and  the 
nearest  way  out  is  the  straightest  way  through.  No,  my  friends,  there  is  but  one 
issue  before  the  American  people,  and  that  is  how  to  lick  hell  out  of  Germany. 
I  live  always  under  the  blood-red  shadow  of  that  colossal  undertaking.  So  living, 
it  is  impossible  for  me  to  understand  how  any  human  being  can  this  year  be 
interested  in  discussing  the  ancient,  if  not  always  honorable,  differences  between 
a  Democrat  and  a  Republican.  The  son  of  the  Republican  and  the  son  of  the 
Democrat  are  touching  elbows  over  there ;  together  they  are  going  over  the  top ; 
side  by  side  they  are  falling  in  the  great  adventure,  and  the  angels  of  God  are 
bearing  them  away  to  the  same  reward.  Shall  we  at  home  snarl  over  petty 
personal  and  political  differences  while  the  boys  die  together  for  a  common  cause? 
\  This  is  my  plea,  this  is  my  prayer,  straight  from  the  heart  of  a  Democrat  to  the 
heart  of  a  Republican :  For  the  sake  of  the  boys  let  us  love  one  another,  let  us  pull 
together  over  here  as  they  strike  over  there.  Let  one  hundred  million  loyal  and 
loving  hearts  present  a  united  front  to  the  foe,  and  hell  and  Hun  shall  not  prevail 
against  us. 

Some  folks  doubted  the  wisdom  and  some  the  sincerity  of  my  position;  but, 

God  help  me,  I  can  take  no  other.     There  is  need,  sore  need,  for  every  man  and 

\         every  dollar  to  fall  in  line,  and  while  I  have  a  fairly  big  mouth,  possessed  of  a 

\'      fair  degree  of  elasticity,  it  is  neither  big  enough  nor  elastic  enough  to  enable  me 

to  cuss  a  Republican  out  of  one  side  of  it,  and  ask  him  to  buy  a  Liberty  Bond 

out  of  the  other. 

PATRIOTISM   AT   THE   POLLS 


\f 


But  one  can  be  just  as  patriotic  at  the  polls  as  in  the  trenches.  The  first  duty 
of  every  patriot  is  to  go  to  the  polls.  Let  no  good  citizen  this  year  stay  away 
from  the  election.  It  is  the  high  privilege  and  the  solemn  duty  of  every  citizen 
to  turn  out  on  election  day,  and  with  his  ballot  do  all  that  he  can  to  win  this 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  187 

war.    If  he  stays  at  home  he  is  the  worst  sort  of  a  slacker,  for  this  is  slackerism 
without  the  semblance  of  an  excuse. 

GUIDES  FOB  PATEIOTS 

But  how  must  a  patriot  vote  ?  The  answer  is  easy.  Vote  like  you  fight.  Con- 
sider your  ballot  a  bullet,  and  make  sure  before  it  is  cast  that  it  is  aimed  straight 
at  the  heart  of  a  Hun.  Stand  there  at  the  ballot  box  in  the  same  spirit  that  the 
boys  stand  in  the  trenches.  Strip  yourself  of  every  political  and  personal  preju- 
dice ;  forget  that  you  ever  voted  before ;  remember  only  the  common  enemy  of  your 
country  and  of  all  mankind,  and  then,  in  the  fear  of  God  and  with  reverence  for 
your  own  conscience,  cast  your  ballot.  Do  that,  do  it  boldly,  do  it  sincerely,  and 
I  will  take  off  my  hat  to  you  no  matter  for  what  candidate  you  may  cast  your 
ballot.  I  do  not  presume  to  sit  in  judgment  on  the  conscience  of  any  man;  I 
simply  insist  that  he  shall  have  respect  for  his  own  conscience. 

THE  ACID  TEST 

Apply  the  acid  test  of  patriotism  to  every  candidate.  Vote  for  no  slacker,  and 
for  no  man  who  curries  favor  with  slackers  or  seeks  their  support.  So  far  as  I 
know,  no  man  who  has  a  drop  of  my  blood  in  his  veins,  on  either  my  father's  or 
my  mother's  side,  ever  scratched  a  Democratic  ticket ;  but  show  me  a  Democratic 
candidate  who,  since  the  day  war  was  declared  against  Germany,  has  failed  to  do 
a  man's  part  in  the  winning  of  this  war,  and,  although  he  may  have  been 
nominated  by  every  Democratic  organization,  from  a  precinct  meeting  to  State- 
wide primary,  I'll  see  him  in  hell  before  I'll  vote  for  him.  If  a  candidate  has 
failed  to  do  his  part  in  the  War  Stamps  and  the  Liberty  Bond  campaigns;  if  he 
has  failed  to  respond  to  the  plea  of  the  Red  Cross ;  if  he  has  apologized  for  this 
war  or  damned  it  with  faint  praise;  if  he  has  skulked  in  the  bush  and  sought  to 
get  votes  from  folks  who  are  opposed  to  this  war,  let  no  patriot  debauch  his  ballot 
by  casting  it  for  such  a  renegade. 

DANGEROUS   TO  SWAP  HORSES  IN   THE  MIDDLE  OF  THE  STREAM 

Abraham  Lincoln  has  set  up  a  guide-post  for  patriots.  It  is  entitled  to  vast 
respect  because  Lincoln  set  it  up.  When  General  McClellan  allowed  General  Lee 
to  beat  him  all  over  Virginia,  Lincoln  removed  McClellan  as  commander-in-chief 
of  the  Army  of  the  Potomac.  Thereafter  McClellan  ran  against  Lincoln  for 
President.  Mr.  Lincoln  made  no  speech  against  McClellan,  but  he  did  make  a 
remark,  and  that  was  a  plenty.  Lincoln's  immortal  remark  was,  that  the  Ameri- 
can people  had  too  much  sense  to  change  horses  in  the  middle  of  the  stream.  They 
did,  and  the  years  have  justified  their  wisdom.  And  one  hundred  years  from 
today  history  will  write  down  in  letters  of  gold  that  the  immortal  triumvirate  of 
American  presidents  is  George  Washington,  Abraham  Lincoln  and  Woodrow 
Wilson. 

COMMON   SENSE   STILL   ABIDES 

Today  this  Nation  is  confronted  with  the  same  perils  and  perplexities  that 
confronted  it  in  the  days  of  Lincoln,  and  the  common  sense  of  the  people  will  at 
once  perceive  the  great  danger  of  "swapping  horses  in  the  middle  of  the  stream." 


V 


188  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Under  the  Constitution  the  President  is  charged  with  the  duty  of  prosecuting  this 
war  to  a  victorious  and  righteous  conclusion,  and  any  vote  that  would  tend  to  tie 
the  hands  of  the  President  or  discredit  him  in  the  eyes  of  the  world  would  postpone 
the  hour  of  final  triumph.  Patriots,  put  to  yourself,  in  solemn  sincerity,  the 
question :  Will  it  help  Woodrow  Wilson  to  win  this  war  by  changing  the  political 
complexion  of  Congress,  and  confronting  the  President  with  a  House  or  a  Senate 
of  a  political  faith  opposite  to  his  own? 

PICK  THE  BEST  WAR  HORSES 

The  leaders  on  the  tickets  this  year  in  North  Carolina  are  Furnifold  M. 
Simmons  and  John  Motley  Morehead.  Which  of  these  two  is  the  best  war  horse? 
Would  it  help  to  win  the  war  to  swap  Simmons,  who  is  at  the  head  of  the  Senate, 
for  Morehead,  who,  under  the  rules,  would  stand  at  the  foot  ?  Would  Morehead 
have  a  greater  desire  to  win  the  war  or  greater  ability  in  framing  and  getting 
enacted  laws  for  that  purpose?  In  a  word,  would  Morehead  weigh  and  count 
more  in  the  Senate  for  the  winning  of  the  war  than  Simmons?  If  so,  then  it  is 
your  duty,  to  God  and  to  your  country,  to  vote  for  Morehead,  although  you  may 
be  in  the  habit  of  voting  the  Democratic  ticket.  On  the  other  hand,  if  Simmons 
would  keep  in  closer  and  more  sympathetic  touch  with  the  President ;  if,  by  reason 
of  his  long  training  and  experience,  he  can  do  more  in  framing  and  getting  enacted 
wise  war  measures  than  Morehead,  then  it  is  your  duty,  to  God  and  to  your 
country,  to  vote  for  Simmons,  although  you  may  be  in  the  habit  of  voting  the 
Republican  ticket.  Apply  this  principle  to  every  candidate,  from  United  States 
Senator  to  township  constable,  and  you  will  cast  the  ballot  of  a  patriot  and  not  of 
a  partisan. 

WHAT    WILL    THE    KAISER    SAT? 

The  most  vital  question  for  the  patriot  to  consider  at  the  polls  is  what  effect 
his  vote  will  have  on  the  enemy.  Will  it  discourage  him,  or  give  him  aid  and 
comfort  ?  This  is  of  supreme  importance,  for  it  means  the  shortening  or  the  pro- 
longation of  the  war.  If  the  elections  this  year  discourage  Germany  they  will 
shorten  the  war.    If  they  give  hope  to  Germany  they  will  prolong  the  war. 

North  Carolina  is  a  rock-ribbed  Democratic  State,  by  from  forty  to  fifty 
thousand  majority.  If  it  should  go  Republican  this  year,  what  would  the  Kaiser 
say  ?  What  would  the  German  people  think  ?  Why,  the  Kaiser  would  issue  a  royal 
proclamation,  and  every  German  paper  would  publish  in  screaming  headlines 
that  the  people  of  North  Carolina  had  repudiated  the  war.  Nothing  on  earth 
could  convince  the  German  people  that  when  North  Carolina  shifted  from  a 
rock-ribbed  Democratic  to  a  Republican  State  it  was  due  to  anything  except 
opposition  to  the  war.  And  our  boys  would  have  to  do  at  least  one  year  more  of 
hard  fighting  to  shoot  that  opinion  out  of  Germany's  head.  Suppose  the  National 
House  or  the  Senate  should  be  converted  from  a  Democratic  to  a  Republican 
organization,  what  would  the  Kaiser  say?  Instantly  he  would  proclaim  to  his 
subjects  that  the  American  people  had  repudiated  Woodrow  Wilson  and  were 
opposed  to  the  further  prosecution  of  this  war.  It  would  take  a  year  of  hard 
fighting  to  shoot  that  conviction  out  of  Germany's  head. 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  189 


THE   EYES  OF  THE  WORLD 

Not  only  in  Germany,  but  in  the  eyes  of  the  world,  "Woodrow  Wilson  would  be 
discredited  if  our  people  should  confront  him  with  a  Congress  of  a  political  faith 
hostile  to  his  own.  This  would  be  most  unfortunate,  for  today  the  world  expects 
Woodrow  Wilson  to  dictate  the  terms  of  a  righteous  and  enduring  peace.  When 
the  nations  shall  sit  down  in  a  peace  conference,  Wilson  will  sit  at  the  head  of 
the  table.  Just  as  the  military  leadership  of  the  Allies  has  been  delegated  to 
Marshal  loch,  the  moral  leadership  has  been  delegated  to  Woodrow  Wilson.  Just 
the  other  day  Lloyd  George,  the  Prime  Minister  of  Great  Britain,  said  Germany 
can  have  peace  at  any  time  on  terms  that  are  satisfactory  to  the  United  States. 

If  we  want  to  get  exactly  what  we  are  fighting  for,  if  we  want  American  ideals 
to  mold  and  color  the  peace  pact  of  the  world,  then  we  must  let  the  world  under- 
stand that  the  voice  of  Woodrow  Wilson  is  the  voice  of  the  American  people. 

As  I  said  in  my  Goldsboro  speech,  I  say  again :  This  year  politics  should  be 
submerged  in  patriotism.  We  are  fighting  one  battle,  under  the  supreme  command 
of  one  leader,  and  every  patriot  should  highly  resolve  to  give  to  that  leader  un- 
faltering support,  and  to  cast  no  ballot  that  would  tend  to  hamper  him  at  home 
or  discredit  him  abroad. 


(9) 

A  BAR  TO  BOLSHEVISM— THE  CHRISTIAN  SCHOOL 

EXTRACT  FROM  SPEECH  AT  THE  FIRST  BAPTIST  CHURCH  IN  CHARLOTTE, 
SUNDAY,  DECEMBER  1,  1918 

A  proposal  to  raise  a  million  dollars  is  to  little  souls  a  terror,  to  great  souls 
a  challenge.  The  very  bigness  of  the  thing  is  an  inspiration.  And  now  that  the 
war  is  won,  this  campaign  is  the  biggest  thing  before  the  people  of  North  Carolina. 

I  come  before  you  in  two  capacities :  first,  as  the  Governor  of  North  Carolina ; 
and  second,  as  an  alumnus  of  Wake  Forest  College,  the  next-door  neighbor  of 
Meredith,  and  a  warm  personal  friend  of  all  the  schools  embraced  in  this  movement. 

This  million  dollars  will  mean  much  to  the  State  of  North  Carolina,  and  I  do 
not  know  how  I  could  at  this  time  serve  the  State  better  than  by  urging  the  people 
to  respond  to  this  call  in  the  same  spirit  of  generosity  and  self-denial  that  has 
characterized  their  answer  to  every  appeal  made  for  the  winning  of  the  war. 

America's  primacy 

The  war  has  been  fought  to  a  noble  finish.  America  has  not  been  seduced  by 
avarice  nor  degraded  by  brutality.  Above  the  roar  of  a  million  guns  the  Nation 
has  heard  the  celestial  mandate,  "Keep  thine  heart  with  all  diligence,  for  out  of 
it  are  the  issues  of  life."  And  because  of  the  very  purity  of  our  purpose  we  are 
clothed  with  power.  Today  the  whole  world  looks  to  the  United  States  to  blaze 
the  new  path  in  which  all  nations  must  henceforth  walk.  It  is  grand,  and  at  the 
same  time  an  awful  thing  to  be  given  in  charge  the  peace  and  happiness  of  all 
mankind. 


190  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

Our  only  hope  to  measure  up  to  the  opportunities  and  obligations  of  the  hour 
is  to  bring  to  our  task  free,  strong  minds  and  hearts  of  health.  Ignorance  would 
lead  straight  to  destruction,  selfishness  would  cover  us  with  eternal  shame. 

In  a  democracy  the  integrity  and  efficiency  of  the  government  depend  abso- 
lutely upon  the  virtue  and  the  intelligence  of  the  people.  The  people  cannot 
select  intelligent  officials  unless  they  themselves  are  intelligent.  They  will  not 
call  virtuous  men  to  power  unless  they  themselves  love  virtue. 

The  chain  of  schools  and  colleges  embraced  in  the  Million-Dollar  campaign 
are  indispensable  channels  for  the  diffusion  of  knowledge  and  the  spread  of 
righteousness.  They  constitute  a  magnificent  line  of  defense  against  which  billows 
of  ignorance  and  avarice  and  anarchy  will  break  in  vain.  They  impart  knowledge, 
they  inculcate  wisdom,  they  develop  understanding.  They  show  forth  the  beauty 
of  literature,  they  explain  the  truths  of  science,  they  unfold  and  illuminate  the 
facts  of  history.  But  more  important  than  any  or  all  of  these  things,  these 
schools  burn  into  the  hearts  and  hammer  into  the  very  souls  of  men  that  "The 
fear  of  the  Lord  is  the  beginning  of  wisdom."  Such  men  will  make  good  citizens, 
and  such  citizens  will  make  a  great  State. 

THE   WORLD    PEACE   PACT 

There  will  soon  meet  the  most  august  body  that  ever  assembled  upon  this 
earth.  It  will  have  in  charge  the  very  destiny  of  the  world.  I  shall  not  be  con- 
cerned about  the  hundred  and  one  details  that  will  come  before  that  great  tribunal, 
and  be  embodied  in  the  immortal  document  it  will  write,  if  the  conference  shall 
lay  down  in  the  beginning  the  broad  and  basic  declaration  that  the  principles  of 
the  Ten  Commandments  and  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  are  as  binding  on  nations 
as  they  are  on  individuals.  The  only  way  to  secure  forever  the  peace  and  happi- 
ness of  the  world  is  for  nations  as  well  as  men  to  "Fear  God  and  keep  his  com- 
mandments." The  supreme  task  that  today  confronts  us  all  is  to  make  the  public 
conscience  as  sensitive  as  that  of  the  individual. 

These  schools  and  colleges  are  doing  noble  work  in  informing  the  public  mind 
and  vitalizing  the  public  conscience.  They  are  rendering  to  this  commonwealth 
a  service  incapable  of  human  appraisement,  and,  therefore,  as  Governor  of  the 
State,  I  feel  in  duty  bound  to  urge  our  people  to  give  to  this  vital  movement  love, 
sympathy,  and  liberal  support. 

WHSS    PROPHECY   IS    A    LIABILITY 

Militarism  has  been  completely  overthrown.  Prussianism  has  gone  down  in 
death  and  dishonor — and  yet  the  world  is  not  safe  for  Democracy.  In  Russia  the 
despotism  of  a  czar  has  been  supplanted  by  the  despotism  of  a  mob,  and  the  last 
state  of  that  unhappy  land  is  worse  than  the  first. 

The  deadly  virus  of  bolshevism  is  being  injected  into  Austria,  into  Hungary, 
into  all  the  Balkan  states,  and  even  in  Germany  the  red  flag  has  been  raised  and 
the  red  terror  stalks  in  the  background.  And  right  here  in  our  own  dear  land, 
where  men  enjoy  larger  freedom  and  wider  opportunities  than  they  have  ever 
known,  fanaticism  is  digging  in  and  preparing  to  undermine  the  foundations  of 
this  Republic.  An  era  of  readjustment  and  reconstruction  is  before  us,  full  of 
peril  and  perplexity.  Myriads  of  isms  and  schisms  will  spring  up  and  run  riot 
in  the  earth.    The  sane  reformer,  the  Utopian  dreamer,  the  red-handed  revolution- 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  191 

ist  will  each  bid  high,  for  the  allegiance  of  a  world  intoxicated  with  a  new  birth 
of  freedom. 

The  best  antidote  for  bolshevism  is  an  educated,  Christianized  citizenship. 
Ignorance  is  the  mother  of  poverty,  and  the  handmaiden  of  crime.  Atheism  and 
anarchy  walk  hand  in  hand.  I  want  the  men  of  means  to  let  this  statement  soak 
in :  Close  down  either  the  churches  or  the  schools,  and  your  property  will  become 
to  you  a  liability  instead  of  an  asset.  In  Russia  today  the  naked  fact  that  a  man 
owns  property  makes  him  a  mark  for  a  firing  squad.  You  pay  yearly  premiums 
to  insurance  companies  for  protecting  your  property  from  fire.  Mark  this :  The 
most  powerful  companies  in  which  you  can  insure  that  property  is  in  the  churches 
and  the  schools.  Neither  is  safe  without  the  other.  The  Quaker  poet  sums  up 
the  truth  : 

"The  riches  of  a  commonwealth 

Are  free,  strong  minds  and  hearts  of  health. 

And  more  to  her  than  gold  or  grain, 

The  cunning  hand  and  cultured  brain. 

Nor  heeds  the  skeptic's  puny  hand 

While  near  her  schools  the  church  spires  stand; 

Nor  fears  the  blinded  bigot's  rule 

While  near  her  church  spires  stands  the  school." 

And  there  is  no  room  nor  wisdom  for  enmity  between  the  State  and  the  church 
school.  It  would  be  the  acme  of  unwisdom  for  the  State  to  undertake  the  work  of 
the  church  schools.  It  would  be  the  height  of  folly  for  the  churches  to  assume 
the  obligation  that  rests  upon  the  State  to  educate  all  the  people.  The  two  systems 
supplement  each  other,  and  both  are  vital  necessities  to  a  well  ordered,  well 
balanced  civilization.  Training  in  the  three  R's — Readin',  'Ritin'  and  'Rithmetic 
— is  well,  but  the  fourth  R,  of  Righteousness,  must  be  added  to  make  a  fine  and 
firm  foundation  for  a  prosperous  and  happy  state. 


(10) 

PRODUCTS  AND  BY-PRODUCTS  OF  THE  WORLD  WAR 

SPEECH  BY  GOVERNOR  BICKETT  AT  PEORIA,  ILLINOIS,  FEBRUARY  22,  1919 

For  some  reason  the  United  States  Census  Report  does  not  contain  the  exact 
number  of  times  that  Lillian  Russell  got  married,  but  her  matrimonial  ventures 
were  sufficiently  numerous  to  lead  Mark  Twain  to  inquire:  "Why  do  people 
marry  Lillian  Russell?" 

I  am  equally  puzzled  by  the  practice  among  clubs  and  societies  of  bringing 
men  halfway  across  a  continent  to  speak  anywhere  from  fifteen  minutes  to  two 
hours  and  a  half,  according  to  the  humanity  of  the  speaker  and  the  fortitude  of 
the  audience.  It  has  recently  occurred  to  me  that  grown-ups  import  speakers  for 
the  same  reason  that  children  go  to  the  zoo.  They  want  to  see  the  animals.  This 
view  is  supported  by  a  newspaper  report  of  a  county  fair  in  North  Carolina. 
The  orator  of  the  fair  was  one  J.  M.  Gray.  A  near-poetess  told  the  story  of  tbe 
day  in  rhyme,  and  embalmed  the  orator  of  the  occasion  in  this  immortal  couplet : 


192  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

"The  chief  attractions  of  the  day 
"^n^  Were  Bynum's  bull  and  J.  M.  Gray." 

I  suspect  that  my  invitation  is  largely  due  to  a  desire  on  your  part  to  see  just 
what  sort  of  an  animal  the  Governor  of  the  finest  State  in  the  Union  is. 

But  whatever  may  be  the  psychology  responsible  for  my  presence  here,  it  is  a 
real  joy  to  be  with  you  and  to  extend  to  Illinois  the  friendly  hand  of  Carolina. 
I  am  not  here  to  indulge  in  flattery.  The  State  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  Ulysses  S. 
Grant,  and  Eugene  Field  is  too  conscious  of  its  own  dignity  to  be  cheapened  by 
fulsome  praise.  And  then,  not  that  you  needed  him,  nor  that  we  could  very  well 
spare  him,  but  just  to  give  you  a  sample  of  the  stuff  we  grow,  North  Carolina 
loaned  to  Illinois  for  and  during  the  term  of  his  natural  life,  that  venerable  and 
pious  sage  of  Danville,  "Uncle  Joe." 

I  do  not  come  around  with  prescriptions  for  the  treatment  of  the  social  and 
industrial  problems  peculiar  to  your  State.  I  am  no  more  qualified  to  advise 
Illinois  how  to  solve  her  labor  problems  than  you  are  to  advise  North  Carolina 
how  to  solve  her  race  problem.  But  I  left  my  home  and  trusted  my  State  to  the 
tender  mercies  of  the  General  Assembly  now  is  session  and  came  out  here  because 
I  very  greatly  desire  to  vitalize  and  make  enduring  the  friendship  between  Illinois 
and  North  Carolina.  In  this  big,  blessed  hour,  when  the  purity  of  American 
arms  is  the  marvel  and  the  glory  of  the  world,  I  desire  to  advance  Americanism 
and  wipe  out  sectionalism  forever  and  forever. 

The  American  soldier  has  found  out  that  no  section  of  our  country  and  no  class 
of  our  people  has  a  monopoly  of  brains  or  courage  or  character.  In  camp  and 
field  the  soldiers  met  on  the  eye  level.  They  were  disciplined  by  the  same  training, 
they  were  subjected  to  the  same  tests,  they  were  ground  together  in  all  the  mills 
of  war.  In  the  trenches  they  stood  shoulder  to  shoulder  and  took  the  battle's 
blood-red  bath.  Together  they  leaped  over  the  top,  side  by  side  they  fell  in  the 
great  adventure,  and  the  angels  of  God  bore  them  away  to  the  same  reward. 

Shall  we  perpetuate  sectional  and  political  strife  when  our  boys  have  died 
together  for  a  common  cause?  This  is  my  message,  straight  from  the  heart  of 
the  South  to  the  heart  of  the  North :  For  the  sake  of  the  boys,  let  us  love  one 
another. 

I  am  proud  of  these  boys,  and  I  don't  care  who  knows  it.  I  am  proud  of  the 
heroic  living  and  of  the  deathless  dead.  I  am  proud  that  these  boys  got  to  France 
just  in  time  to  save  the  civilization  of  the  world.  And  they  did.  The  Allies  were 
lost  when  we  went  in.  Once  that  was  debatable.  Nobody  debates  it  now.  Russia 
was  reeling  like  a  drunken  man;  Italy  was  torn  with  dissension;  England  was 
bleeding  at  every  pore;  France  was  gasping  for  breath;  the  mailed  fist  was  raised 
ready  to  strike  the  last  fatal  blow,  when  Uncle  Sam  reached  for  his  gun  and  cried, 
"Not  yet !" 

General  Jubal  A.  Early  of  the  Confederate  Army,  was  once  asked  to  give  his 
opinion  as  to  why  General  Lee  lost  the  Battle  of  Gettysburg.  Said  Early,  "That 
question  has  been  debated  for  twenty  years.  I  have  read  books  on  it,  hundreds 
of  magazine  articles,  listened  to  scores  of  speeches;  and,  besides,  I  was  there 
myself,  and  I  have  at  last  reached  the  conclusion  that  the  Union  Army  had  right 
much  to  do  with  it."  And  when  fifty  years  from  now  the  world  shall  debate  as  to 
why  Germany  lost  the  war,  the  universal  opinion  will  be  that  the  Army  of  the 
United  States  had  right  much  to  do  with  it.    In  the  midst  of  the  German  offensive 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  193 

last  spring  when  it  seemed  that  absolutely  nothing  could  stop  it,  Lloyd  George 
said,  "The  race  is  between  Hindenburg  and  "Wilson."  Today  the  ends  of  the 
earth  know  and,  knowing,  rejoice  that  Woodrow  Wilson  won  that  great  Olympic. 

And  yet  the  man  who  was  once  the  senior  partner  of  the  firm  of  "Me  und  Gott" 
said  that  we  would  not  fight.  He  thought  that  because  we  were  a  peace-loving 
people  we  were  afraid.  Well,  as  Uncle  Eemus  would  say,  "Right  dar  is  whar  de 
Kaiser  drapped  his  jug  er  molasses."  We  gave  him  the  same  medicine  that  the 
old  Quaker  gave  his  enemy.  This  enemy,  knowing  the  Quaker's  aversion  to 
fighting,  lurked  in  his  path,  and  when  he  came  along  arose  and  smote  him  on  the 
right  cheek.  In  orthodox  fashion  he  turned  the  left,  and  the  enemy  landed  there; 
and  then  the  old  Quaker  quietly  removed  his  coat,  rolled  up  his  sleeves  and  said, 
"Now,  thou  son  of  Beelzebub,  having  fully  complied  with  the  law  of  heaven,  I 
shall  lick  hell  out  of  thee."  And  then,  the  Kaiser  argued  that  we  could  not  fight ; 
that  we  did  not  have  an  army;  that  we  could  not  raise  one;  that  if  we  raised  one 
we  had  no  officers  to  train  it;  that  if  we  raised  it  and  trained  it  we  could  not 
equip  it ;  that  if  we  raised  and  trained  and  equipped  it  we  could  not  transport  it ; 
that  the  Germans  would  cross  the  Seine  before  the  Americans  could  cross  the  sea. 
The  Kaiser  ought  to  have  known  better.  He  ought  to  have  known,  for  he  is  a 
scholar,  that  every  Yankee  is  descended  from  the  fool  who  did  not  know  a  thing 
could  not  be  done,  and  done  it.  He  ought  to  have  remembered  that  in  the  sixties 
while  we  were  fighting  each  other  this  country  raised  two  great  armies,  and  either 
the  army  under  Grant  or  the  army  under  Lee  could  have  licked  the  stuffing  out  of 
any  army  Europe  had  ever  seen.  But  he  did  not  know.  He  failed  to  remember, 
and  there  came  to  him  the  sharp  and  fatal  awakening  that  came  to  the  daring 
investigator  in  the  foothills  of  Carolina  who  sat  down  on  a  circular  saw  to  see  (_ 
whether  or  not  it  was  running,  and  the  neighbors  who  gathered  up  his  fragments 
said  she  was  running  some. 

The  war  has  brought  to  each  of  us  proof  of  the  worth  of  the  rest  of  us.  A 
heterogeneous  population  has  been  fused  into  a  homogeneous  Nation,  and  today 
from  the  Gulf  of  Mexico  to  the  Yukon,  and  from  Sandy  Hook  to  the  Golden  Gate 
we  are  one  people.  This  is  the  first  by-product  of  the  war,  and  to  us  it  is  worth 
all  that  it  cost. 

The  very  life  of  this  Republic  depends  on  the  preservation  of  this  homogeneity 
of  thought  and  purpose.  During  the  era  of  readjustment  we  do  not  want  to  be 
distracted  by  the  inflow  of  millions  from  Europe  who  have  no  comprehension  of 
and  no  sympathy  with  American  ideals  and  institutions.  It  is  the  plain  duty  of 
Congress  to  forbid  for  a  period  of  five  years  immigration  to  this  country  from  any 
land  under  the  sun. 

And  those  who  are  here  already  and  are  seeking  to  undermine  the  foundations 
of  our  institutions  ought  to  be  told  to  move  out,  and  not  to  stand  on  the  order  of 
their  going,  but  to  go  at  once.  We  ought  to  say  to  every  one  of  them  just  as  we  did 
during  the  war,  "If  you  don't  like  your  Uncle  Sammy,  then  go  back  to  your  home 
o'er  the  sea." 

The  war  not  only  linked  North  and  South  and  East  and  West  with  bonds  of 
mutual  respect  and  affection,  but  it  has  intrenched  America  in  the  very  heart  of 
France.  A  rather  curious  trait  of  human  nature  is  that  we  are  not  apt  to  think 
well  of  our  creditors.  The  sense  of  obligation  is  irritating.  Shakespeare  was 
thinking  of  this  when  he  said,  "A  loan  oft  loses  both  itself  and  friend."     Since 

13 


194  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

1781  this  country  has  been  under  a  deep  sense  of  obligation  to  France.  Indeed, 
this  Eepublic  owes  its  very  life  to  France.  Cornwallis  was  in  the  South.  He  sent 
his  trusted  lieutenant,  Ferguson,  on  a  foraging  expedition,  but  the  sturdy  moun- 
taineers poured  through  the  gaps  and  passes  of  the  mountains  and  swarmed  around 
Ferguson  and  his  thousand  men  on  the  slopes  of  Kings  Mountain,  and  every  man 
was  killed  or  captured.  Cornwallis  said,  "I  have  lost  my  eyes."  Subsequently 
Cornwallis  met  Greene  at  Guilford  Court  House  in  North  Carolina  and  beat  him, 
but  it  was  to  Cornwallis  a  costly  victory.  His  losses  at  Kings  Mountain  and 
Guilford  Court  House  so  depleted  his  ranks  that  he  was  eventually  forced  to  seek 
a  sea  base  at  Yorktown.  General  Greene  sent  word  of  Cornwallis's  movements  to 
George  Washington  in  command  of  the  Continental  Army  at  New  York.  When 
the  news  reached  Washington  his  army  was  in  a  desperate  plight.  Half  clad, 
half  starved,  with  wages  far  in  arrears,  the  soldiers  were  in  no  condition  for  any 
heroic  enterprise.  Rochambeau,  the  commander  of  the  French,  realized  the 
desperateness  of  the  situation,  and  ordered  gold  sent  ashore  from  a  French  ship, 
and  before  George  Washington  started  on  that  world  famous  march  from  New 
York  to  Yorktown,  the  wages  of  the  American  soldiers  were  paid  in  French  gold. 

And  more  than  that.  When  Washington  started  on  that  immortal  march  to 
bottle  up  Cornwallis  at  Yorktown,  he  started  at  the  head  of  two  thousand  American 
and  four  thousand  French  soldiers.  And  more  than  that.  The  French  fleet  came 
up  the  Chesapeake  Bay,  cut  off  all  hope  of  retreat  or  rescue  for  Cornwallis  by 
water,  and  then  landed  three  thousand  marines,  the  best  trained  soldiers  on  earth 
at  that  time.  On  the  way  down,  Washington  had  gathered  up  some  four  or  five 
thousand  more  ragged  Continentals,  but  even  then,  in  addition  to  holding  the 
waters,  the  French  had  on  foot  at  Yorktown  more  than  half  of  Washington's  Army, 
while  at  their  head  stood  LaFayette,  a  host  within  himself.  It  is  as  plain  as  day 
that  without  the  money  and  the  man  power  of  France  at  Yorktown,  Cornwallis, 
trained  and  gifted  soldier  as  he  was,  would  have  made  short  work  of  the  ragged 
Continentals  and  America's  only  hope  for  freedom  would  have  been  lost  forever 
and  forever. 

As  we  were  in  1781,  France  was  in  1917.  There  is  this  exception  in  her  favor. 
France  did  nothing,  absolutely  nothing,  to  bring  on  this  war.  Her  wealth  and  her 
beauty  were  her  only  offense ;  but  upon  these  the  Black  Eagle  cast  lustful  eyes. 
For  forty  years,  with  tireless  energy  and  matchless  skill,  the  Imperial  German  Gov- 
ernment converted  every  citizen  into  a  soldier  and  every  industry  into  an  arsenal, 
and  when  the  work  was  complete,  when  a  vast  empire  had  been  forged  into  one 
living  thunderbolt,  suddenly,  without  warning  and  without  cause,  this  thunder- 
bolt was  hurled  at  the  devoted  head  of  France.  Under  its  awful  impact  France 
reeled  and  staggered  back  to  the  very  gates  of  Paris,  and  then,  like  a  tigress  about 
to  be  robbed  of  her  whelps,  she  rallied  all  her  strength,  sprang  straight  at  the 
invader's  throat,  and  put  up  a  fight  that  made  all  the  world  wonder.  But  despite 
the  Godlike  heroism  of  her  men  and  the  Godlike  sacrifices  of  her  women,  the  day 
came  when  France  was  bled  white  and  starved  thin.  The  Beast  of  Berlin  was  at 
her  breast;  and  then,  too  proud  to  cry  aloud  for  help,  she  turned  wistful  eyes  to 
this  young  giant  of  the  West.  And  I  know  the  soul  of  every  true  American  leaped 
for  joy  when  General  Pershing  stood  in  the  city  of  Paris  under  the  shadow  of  a 
monument  to  LaFayette  and,  speaking  for  one  hundred  million  American  freemen, 
said,  "LaFayette,  we  are  here!" 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  195 

In  going  to  the  rescue  of  France  this  Nation  preserved  its  self-respect  and  the 
integrity  of  its  soul.  The  books  have  been  balanced  between  two  great  republics. 
On  neither  side  is  there  any  irritating  sense  of  obligation,  but  on  both  sides  there 
is  respect,  admiration  and  love.  The  spirits  of  Washington  and  LaFayette  brood 
over  these  mighty  republics ;  hand  in  hand  America  and  France  will  march  down 
the  ever  broadening  highways  of  civilization,  and  by  day  her  lilies  and  by  night 
our  stars  shall  point  the  way.    This  is  the  second  by-product  of  the  war. 

The  war  has  brought  about  a  family  reunion  between  England  and  the  United 
States.  For  many  years  there  has  been  a  feeling  on  both  sides  that  there  ought 
to  be  such  a  reunion,  but  there  was  no  great  occasion  to  bring  it  about.  The  Hun 
furnished  the  occasion,  and  we  owe  him  something  for  that.  Talk  about  neutral- 
ity !  I  was  perfectly  neutral  so  long  as  I  was  firmly  convinced  that  England  and 
France  could  lick  hell  out  of  Germany.  Down  in  my  State  an  old  justice  of  the 
peace  lived  on  a  farm,  and  the  fence  that  enclosed  his  farm  was  on  the  line 
between  North  and  South  Carolina.  One  day  his  son  and  the  hired  man  got  into 
a  fight.  The  old  justice  mounted  the  fence,  and  as  in  duty  bound  called  out,  "In 
the  name  of  the  State  of  North  Carolina  I  command  the  peace!"  The  fighters 
heeded  him  not,  and  presently  the  hired  man  seemed  to  be  getting  the  best  of  the 
boy.  The  old  man  jumped  from  the  fence  into  the  State  of  South  Carolina  and 
shouted  through  the  crack,  "Give  him  hell,  Jim.     I  have  lost  my  jurisdiction." 

Not  for  one  moment  did  we  dream  of  allowing  dear  old  England  to  be  crushed 
under  the  heel  of  the  Hun.  She  is  our  mother  and  the  mother  of  our  civilization. 
We  left  her  because  she  was  at  the  time  misruled  by  a  German  autocrat.  Only 
one  drop  of  blood  out  of  every  one  hundred  and  thirty-six  in  George  III  was 
English  blood ;  one  thirty-second  was  Scotch  and  the  balance  was  German. 
George  III  was  as  hostile  to  English  liberties  as  he  was  ignorant  of  the  English 
language,  a  language  he  never  fully  learned  to  speak.  His  fixed  purpose  was  to 
destroy  constitutional  government  in  England,  and  his  direct  attack  against  the 
rights  of  Englishmen  in  these  colonies  was  a  flank  movement  against  the  rights 
of  Englishmen  at  home.  William  Pitt,  the  Great  Commoner,  sensed  the  real  issue, 
and  rising  from  his  seat  in  Parliament  thundered  out,  "I  thank  God  America 
has  resisted !" 

Yorktown  was  a  great  victory  for  American  arms,  but  it  was  an  even  greater 
triumph  for  the  English  people.  When  our  rights  and  privileges  were  saved  at 
Yorktown  the  same  rights  and  privileges  were  saved  for  our  kinsmen  on  the  moor 
of  Devonshire  and  in  the  shadow  of  St.  Paul's.  It  is  true  England  lost  the 
American  colonies,  but  in  losing  these  she  learned  how  to  save  India  and  Egypt 
and  Australia,  and  all  her  vast  dominions  on  which  the  sun  never  sets.  This  is 
why  on  the  Fourth  day  of  July  of  this  year  the  Ambassador  from  Great  Britain 
to  France  made  a  speech  in  the  city  of  Paris  and  said,  "England  owes  to  the 
United  States  a  debt  of  gratitude  for  the  American  Revolution." 

Since  Yorktown  we  have  had  some  minor  troubles  with  England,  but  in  every 
crucial  hour,  on  every  crucial  question  involving  the  integrity  of  our  own  territory 
or  the  principle  of  government  by  the  consent  of  the  governed,  England  has  been 
our  fortress  and  our  friend.  But  for  England  it  is  doubtful  if  Peoria  would  be 
in  the  United  States. 

Napoleon  Bonaparte,  in  the  heydey  of  his  glory  and  power,  forced  the  proud 
king  of  Spain  to  turn  over  to  him  that  vast   empire  that  stretched  from  the 


196  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Mississippi  to  the  Rocky  Mountains.  He  then  planned  to  establish  in  this  virgin 
territory  a  French  empire  that  would  be  a  perpetual  barrier  to  the  growth  and  a 
perpetual  menace  to  the  existence  of  democracy  on  this  continent.  He  perfected 
his  plans  with  Napoleonic  energy  and  completeness.  He  arranged  to  send  over 
here  a  highly  trained  army  to  take  possession  of  the  territory  he  had  wrenched 
from  Spain,  and  to  destroy  all  opposition  to  his  ambitions  in  the  New  World. 
Thomas  Jefferson  at  once  recognized  the  peril  to  this  Republic  involved  in  such  an 
expedition,  and  he  took  swift  and  heroic  action  to  prevent  it.  He  first  obtained 
assurance  from  Great  Britain  that  in  case  of  war  between  the  United  States  and 
Trance  the  English  fleet  would  at  once  seize  the  city  of  New  Orleans  and  hold 
it  for  the  United  States.  Thus  fortified,  Jefferson  directed  the  American  minister 
in  Paris  to  offer  to  buy  this  territory  from  Napoleon,  and  in  case  Napoleon 
refused  to  sell,  to  proceed  to  England  and  make  preparations  for  war.  Napoleon 
was  the  very  incarnation  of  autocracy.  After  him  the  Kaiser  has  sought  to  fashion 
his  own  life,  for  he  despised  the  rule  of  the  people  and  gloried  in  the  edicts  of 
kings.  But  though  he  despised  this  Government  and  held  our  military  power  in 
contempt,  he  had  vast  respect  for  the  British  navy ;  and  when  he  realized  that  the 
British  fleet  stood  between  him  and  New  Orleans,  he  said,  "It  is  certainly  worth 
while  to  sell,  when  you  can,  what  you  are  certain  to  lose."  And  so,  for  the  sum 
of  fifteen  millions  of  American  money,  backed  by  the  navy  of  Great  Britain, 
Napoleon  transferred  an  empire  to  the  republic  he  despised. 

Some  people  profess -to  fear  that  in  the  League  of  Nations  we  are  going  to 
abandon  the  Monroe  Doctrine.  As  I  read  the  Constitution  of  the  League  of 
Nations,  thirteen  other  nations  swear  they  will  help  us  maintain  the  doctrine. 
Who  wants  to  abandon  it  ?  Who  has  suggested  that  we  abandon  it  ?  Certainly  not 
England.  She  was  responsible  for  its  original  proclamation.  In  the  first  quarter 
of  the  nineteenth  century  the  South  American  countries  became  inoculated  with 
the  spirit  of  the  American  Revolution.  Thereupon  the  Holy  Alliance,  a  compact 
between  the  rulers  of  Russia,  Austria  and  Prussia  for  the  purpose  of  maintaining 
the  divine  right  of  kings,  proposed  to  intervene  in  South  America,  to  put  down  the 
revolutions  of  the  people  and  impose  upon  them  the  rule  of  a  distant  monarch. 
Then  it  was  that  George  Canning,  the  Foreign  Secretary  of  England,  proposed  to 
Mr.  Richard  Rush,  our  minister  to  the  Court  of  St.  James,  that  Great  Britain  and 
the  United  States  should  unite  in  a  declaration  that  they  would  not  brook  any 
interference  by  European  kings  in  American  affairs.  Mr.  Rush  submitted  the  propo- 
sition to  President  Monroe,  who  at  once  sent  the  entire  correspondence  to  Thomas 
Jefferson,  in  retirement  at  Monticello;  and  Jefferson  promptly  wrote  him  to  pro- 
claim the  doctrine,  and  that  it  would  be  the  greatest  American  document  since  the 
Declaration  of  Independence.  For  some  reason  Great  Britain  did  not  join  in 
the  proclamation,  but  Monroe  proclaimed  the  great  doctrine  that  bears  his  name, 
and  true  to  the  assurance  of  Canning,  Great  Britain  gave  notice  that  the  British 
fleet  would  maintain  the  doctrine,  and,  with  the  exception  of  a  slight  misunder- 
standing about  Venezuela  when  England  declined  to  fight,  she  has  kept  the  faith 
and  the  British  navy  has  been  the  bulwark  of  the  Monroe  doctrine. 

In  1898,  when  we  declared  war  on  Spain,  the  Kaiser  proposed  to  Britain  and 
France  to  place  the  combined  fleets  of  the  three  nations  between  the  United  States 
and  Cuba.  England  said,  "No;  when  the  British  fleet  goes  in  it  will  go  under  the 
Stars  and  Stripes."  The  whole  world  is  familiar  with  the  incident  in  Manila  Bay 
when  the  German  admiral  wanted  to  fire  on  Dewey's  fleet,  but  the  British  Lion 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  197 

growled  its  dissent,  and  the  Hohenzollern  held  back.  Afterwards,  in  discussing 
this  question,  the  Kaiser  said,  "If  I  had  had  a  fleet  big  enough  I  would  have  taken 
Uncle  Sam  by  the  scruff  of  the  neck." 

The  United  States  and  England  are  thus  bound  together  by  ties  of  a  common 
blood  and  a  common  language,  by  a  joint  inheritance  of  the  blessings  of  constitu- 
tional liberty,  by  a  chain  of  epoch-making  events  that  have  given  course  and  color 
to  the  world's  history,  and,  what  is  more  than  all  these,  by  the  essential  kinship 
of  the  soul.  The  waves  may  now  and  then  clash,  but  the  great  tides  of  American 
and  British  thought  advance  side  by  side.  Our  thoughts  are  their  thoughts;  their 
ways  are  our  ways.    Britannia  and  Columbia  "are  sisters  under  their  skins." 

It  was  because  of  this  essential  kinship  of  the  soul  that  Lloyd  George  said  last 
spring,  "The  central  powers  can  have  peace  at  any  time  on  terms  that  are  satis- 
factory to  the  United  States." 

The  welding  together  of  all  classes  and  sections  of  our  country,  the  establish- 
ment of  friendship  between  America  and  France  on  a  basis  of  mutual  affection 
and  esteem,  and  the  reunion  of  the  great  English  households  constitute  in  them- 
selves a  foundation  for  a  League  of  Nations  that  will  endure. 

It  is  cause  for  pride  and  gratitude  that  the  President  of  the  United  States 
is  translating  into  reality  Tennyson's  Dream  of  the  Parliament  of  Man.  On  the 
8th  day  of  January,  1918,  Mr.  Wilson  stood  before  Congress,  interpreted  the  best 
thought  of  the  world,  and  set  up  the  solid  framework  of  a  civilization  grounded 
on  reason  and  righteousness  and  not  on  blood  and  iron.  I  do  not  speak  as  a 
partisan — God  forbid — but  reverently,  and  weighing  my  every  word,  I  say  that 
these  now  world-famous  Fourteen  Articles  have  in  them  more  elements  of  salvation 
for  the  ninety  and  nine  than  any  utterance  this  world  has  heard  since  the  Man  of 
Galilee  preached  His  Sermon  on  the  Mount.  The  proclamation  of  these  articles 
and  their  acceptance  by  every  great  power  marks  the  transition  of  governments 
from  the  Mosaic  to  the  Christian  dispensation.  Henceforward  people  are  going  to 
insist  that  governments  must  be  just  as  honest,  just  as  truthful,  just  as  fair  in 
their  dealings  with  each  other,  and  just  as  careful  of  human  life  as  governments 
require  individuals  to  be.  In  the  new  day  that  is  now  upon  us  the  community 
conscience  must  be  just  as  sensitive  as  that  of  the  individual.  A  last  word:  The 
great  Italian  patriot,  Massini,  said :  "Those  who  can  deny  the  existence  of  a  God 
on  a  starry  night,  at  the  graves  of  their  dear  ones,  or  in  the  presence  of  martyrdom, 
must  be  greatly  unhappy  or  greatly  wicked."  He  must  be  a  very  unhappy  or  a 
very  wicked  man  who  does  not  see  the  hand  of  the  great  Creator  saving,  molding, 
and  coloring  the  life  of  this  Nation. 

In  every  supreme  crisis  there  has  been  a  man  sent  from  God  to  show  us  the 
way.  And  what  men  they  have  been !  "When  you  go  home,  if  you  will  turn  to 
Green's  History  of  the  English  People,  you  will  find  a  splendid  full-page  portrait 
of  the  man  whose  birth  we  this  day  celebrate,  and  on  the  opposite  page  you  will 
find  this  remarkable  statement  by  the  great  English  historian :  "George  "Washing- 
ton was  the  noblest  figure  that  ever  stood  in  the  forefront  of  a  nation's  life." 
My  countrymen,  what  a  start  was  that !  And  then  in  the  dark  days  of  the  sixties, 
when  it  seemed  that  our  ship  would  be  battered  to  pieces  upon  the  rocks  of  internal 
dissension,  and  the  monarchies  of  the  Old  "World  were  watching  and  waiting  to 


198  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

administer  upon  the  wreck,  there  was  a  man  sent  straight  from  God  to  pilot  us 
safely  through  the  night  and  the  storm.  My  father  fought  against  that  man  for 
four  years,  and  the  record  of  that  Confederate  soldier  is  my  most  precious  inher- 
itance, and  his  memory  my  dearest  inspiration.  I  am  profoundly  certain  that 
under  the  Constitution  as  it  was  written  any  state  had  the  right  at  any  time  to 
quit  and  go  in  peace;  but  this  man  sent  from  God  conceived  that  the  Union  was 
more  sacred  than  the  Constitution,  and  highly  resolved  to  save  the  Union  if  he  had 
to  smash  the  Constitution  to  smithereens.  On  that  question  he  was  eternally 
right,  and  tonight  the  son  of  a  Confederate  soldier  honors  and  blesses  the  name 
of  Abraham  Lincoln. 

And  now  in  this  big  hour,  when  the  whole  world  is  in  the  birth  throes  of  a 
new  order,  God  raised  up  in  our  midst  a  man  whom  the  ends  of  the  earth 
hail  as  prophet  and  builder  of  a  better  day.  Like  "Washington  and  Lincoln, 
Woodrow  Wilson  is  building,  not  on  the  things  that  are  seen  and  temporal,  but  on 
the  things  that  are  unseen  and  eternal.  From  1783  to  1789  is  rightly  called  the 
critical  period  in  American  history.  The  most  critical  hour  in  that  critical  period 
was  when  the  delegates  in  the  Federal  Convention  seemed  disposed  to  submit  to 
the  people  a  weak,  half-baked  constitution  because  they  feared  that  the  people 
would  not  adopt  a  strong  and  vital  one.  Then  it  was  that  George  Washington, 
who  presided  over  the  Convention  and  had  had  but  little  to  say,  arose  and  ex- 
claimed in  tones  of  suppressed  emotion :  "It  is  too  probable  that  no  plan  we 
propose  will  be  adopted.  If  to  please  the  people  we  offer  what  we  ourselves 
disapprove,  how  can  we  afterward  defend  our  work?  Let  us  raise  a  standard  to 
which  the  wise  and  honest  can  repair ;  the  event  is  in  the  hand  of  God."  The 
delegates  took  new  courage  and  went  forward  with  their  great  work. 

The  Union  was  not  saved  at  Gettysburg.  It  was  saved  when  there  was  born 
into  the  soul  of  Abraham  Lincoln  the  spirit  that  made  him  stand  in  Cooper 
Institute  in  February,  1860,  and  say:  "Let  us  have  faith  that  right  makes  might, 
and  in  that  faith  let  us  to  the  end  dare  to  do  our  duty  as  we  understand  it." 

Successor  to  the  high  courage  of  Washington,  heir  to  the  serene  faith  of 
Lincoln,  Woodrow  Wilson  today  stands  before  the  assembled  powers  of  the  earth 
and  demands  world-wide  and  enduring  peace  bottomed  on  world-wide  justice.  The 
high  priests  of  privilege  and  profit,  the  Pharisees  and  Sadducees  of  the  old 
order  are  rising  up  and  shouting,  "Crucify  him!  Crucify  him!"  but  in  the  ends 
and  girdles  of  the  earth,  in  the  caves  of  every  mountain  and  on  the  shores  of 
every  sea,  the  common  people  hear  him  gladly  as  he  cries,  "A  new  commandment 
give  I  unto  the  nations,  that  they  love  one  another." 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  199 

(H) 
NORTH  CAROLINA'S  WELCOME 

Soldiers  of  the  113th  Artillery: 

This  is  a  happy  day  for  North  Carolina. 

Our  hearts  are  brim  full  with  gratitude; 

Our  eyes  shine  with  gladness, 

Our  lips  quiver  with  prayer  and  praise 

As  you  stand  before  us  in  martial  array. 

As  we  grasp  your  rugged  hands, 

As  we  hear  your  voices, 

And  realize  that  in  very  truth  you  are  home  again, 

Safe  from  the  perils  of  the  sea, 

Delivered  from  the  dangers  and  horrors  of  war, 

Crowned  with  victory  and  clothed  in  immortal  honor, 

We  lift  up  our  hearts  to  the  God  of  battles  and  cry, 

"Bless  the  Lord,  O  our  souls,  and  forget  not  all  His  benefits." 

All  we  have  and  are  is  yours : 

We  are  yours  by  right  of  deliverance  and  redemption, 

For  us  you  answered  the  high,  clear  call, 

For  us  you  endured  the  privations  of  the  camp, 

For  us  you  braved  the  serpents  of  the  sea, 

For  us  you  made  the  long,  long  march, 

For  us  you  stood  in  the  trench  and  took  the  battle's  blood-red  bath, 

For  us  you  bared  your  breast  to  liquid  fire  and  leaden  hail, 

For  us  many  of  your  comrades  found  a  soldier's  sepulcher, 

And  in  "Flanders  Field  where  poppies  blow"  await  the  reveille  of  the  eternal 

morning. 
I  voice  the  soul  of  North  Carolina  when  I  say, 
God  bless  you,  every  one ! 
We  are  so  gratefully  proud  of  you — 
Proud  that  you  went  and  were  willing  to  go, 

Proud  that  you  arrived  just  in  time  to  save  the  civilization  of  the  world, 
Proud  that  you  planted  Old  Glory  high  on  the  peaks  of  fame  and  deep  in  the 

hearts  of  men, 
Prouder  still  that  you  did  the  biggest,  finest  thing  that  mortal  men  can  do — 
That  you  not  only  conquered  the  Hun,  but  yourselves  as  well, 
And  bring  home   an   official   record  of   personal   purity   unsurpassed   by   any 

regiment  in  any  war  in  any  country  in  any  time. 
It  follows,  as  the  morning  follows  the  night, 
That  you  look  mother  and  sweetheart  and  wife  in  the  face  unashamed  and 

unafraid. 
When  you  were  about  to  go  forth  to  war, 
You  stood  before  Carolina,  the  beautiful  and  loving 
Mother  of  us  all,  and  in  your  hearts  said, 
"Carolina,  we,  who  are  about  to  die,  salute  you." 
Today,  Carolina,  arrayed  in  happiness, 
Athrill  with  the  joy  of  triumphant  motherhood,  cries, 
"O  sons,  who  are  about  to  live,  Carolina  salutes  you." 


200  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(12) 

NOTES  ON  REMARKS  AT  THE  FIRST  REUNION 
OF  THE  THIRTIETH  DIVISION 

(Greenville,  S.  0.,  September  29,  1919) 

Tennessee  and  the  Carolinas  make  a  trinity  of  virtue,  of  vigor,  and  of  faith 
that  just  one  year  ago  a  Hindenburg  found  it  impossible  to  hinder.  The  people 
of  the  three  states  are  essentially  one.  Tennessee  is  the  beautiful,  if  at  one  time 
the  somewhat  rantankerous,  daughter  of  North  Carolina,  while  the  two  Carolinas 
are  knit  together  by  ties  of  blood  and  business  and  by  a  common  inheritance  of 
the  birthplace  of  Andrew  Jackson. 

All  of  us  are  happy  today.  Our  eyes  shine  with  gladness,  our  hearts  thrill 
with  gratitude,  and  our  lips  are  full  of  praise.  Boys,  we  are  all  proud  of  you ; 
we  are  delighted  with  you — the  truth  is,  we  are  a  bit  puffed  up  about  you,  and 
we  don't  care  who  knows  it.  Even  the  girls  are  glad  to  see  you.  They  are  plumb 
crazy  about  you.  (Tell  the  story  of  the  girl  in  Raleigh  who  lassoed  sixteen 
soldiers.     The  derivation  of  the  word  "lassie.") 

And  so  I  am  happy  to  be  here,  and  help  do  honor  to  the  men  who  on  a  foreign 
shore  lifted  high  the  flag  of  this  Republic,  snatched  victory  from  the  jaws  of 
disaster,  and  won  for  themselves  and  all  their  countrymen  an  immortality  of 
renown. 

Eighteen  months  ago  we  saw  you  girded  for  the  fray.  With  anxious  hearts 
we  watched  you  launched  out  into  a  submarine  infested  sea.  With  prayers  of 
thanksgiving  we  heard  of  your  safe  arrival  on  the  other  side,  and  then  with  bated 
breath  watched  for  your  blood-red  challenge  to  the  foe. 

That  foe  was  drunk  with  victory  and  pride.  He  felt  that  he  belonged  to  a 
super-race,  and  nothing  seemed  able  to  halt  his  triumphant  advance.  The  Allied 
lines  staggered  on  the  verge  of  ruin,  the  heart  of  Christendom  was  shrouded  in 
despair.  Then  came  the  Thirtieth  Division,  and,  glory  to  God,  what  a  coming 
was  that ! 

Cradled  in  the  very  heart  of  Dixie,  where  disloyalty  is  a  monstrosity  and 
cowardice  a  crime,  exalted  with  the  knowledge  that  around  the  home  fires  every 
man  was  counted  a  hero,  sustained  by  a  flaming  faith  in  the  justice  of  your  cause, 
and  goaded  by  the  arrogance  and  insults  of  a  brutish  foe,  you  leaped  to  the  attack 
with  a  divine  scorn  of  costs  and  consequences,  and  the  Hindenburg  line  was  not ! 
Would  that  I  had  the  gift  divine  to  write  for  you  a  fitting  hymn  of  praise,  but 
I  am  oppressed  with  a  sense  of  inadequacy  that  amounts  to  pain  when  I  contrast 
the  most  that  I  can  say  for  you  with  the  least  that  you  have  done  for  us  and  for 
all  humanity.  Pitiful  is  the  poverty  of  language  in  the  presence  of  battles  and 
wounds  and  graves  and  all  the  blood-red  drama  of  war.  Powerless  is  tongue  or 
pen  to  add  to  the  sublimity  of  the  record  you  wrote  with  flame  and  carved  with 
steel  and  sealed  with  blood.  That  record  is  its  own  noblest  eulogy.  It  declares 
its  own  glory.  But  while  I  may  not  with  words  emblazon  valor  that  made  all 
the  world  wonder,  I  want  you  to  know  that  all  our  people  rise  up  and  call  you 
blessed,  that  your  children  will  cherish  your  record  as  their  most  precious  in- 
heritance, and  find  in  it  their  dearest  inspiration.     The  name  of  the  Thirtieth 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  201 

Division  belongs  to  Freedom  now  and  Fame,  "one  of  the  few  immortal  names 
that  were  not  born  to  die." 

Just  one  practical  word.  We,  most  of  us,  realize  that  a  soldier  cannot  live  on 
bread  alone.  The  love  and  gratitude  of  a  people  are  precious  possessions,  but  they 
do  not  constitute  a  well-balanced  diet.  Our  soldiers  seek  no  charity — they  would 
scorn  it — but  every  man  of  them  has  a  blood-bought  title  to  a  good  job.  I  have 
endeavored  to  so  impress  this  truth  upon  the  people  of  North  Carolina  that  today 
every  normal  man  in  the  State  would  count  it  a  joy  to  rise  up  at  midnight  and 
assist  a  soldier  in  getting  a  decent  job. 

Not  only  should  a  soldier  be  given  a  decent  job,  but  he  should  be  given  a  fair 
chance  to  get  a  decent  home  of  his  own  to  live  in.  This  is  not  charity;  it  is 
common  sense,  it  is  statesmanship.  The  citizen  standing  in  the  doorway  of  his 
own  home  is  at  once  the  builder  and  the  bulwark  of  the  Eepublic.  The  surest 
protection  against  mob  rule,  against  the  insanity  and  butchery  of  bolshevism,  is 
the  man  who  is  anchored  to  a  home  that  is  all  his  own.  Give  every  soldier  a  fair 
chance  to  make  an  honest  living,  give  him  a  fair  chance  to  own  the  home  he  lives 
in,  and  Trotsky,  Lenine,  Emma  Goldman  and  Berger,  and  all  the  legions  of  hell 
and  Hearst  cannot  prevail  against  us. 


(13) 

A  FAIR  SYSTEM  OF  TAXATION  THE  FINEST  EXHIBIT 
AT  THE  STATE  FAIR 

SPEECH  AT  STATE  FAIR,  OCTOBER  21,  1919 

[The  General  Assembly  of  North  Carolina  requires  the  Governor  to  open  the 
State  Fair.    In  performing  this  statutory  duty  Governor  Bickett  today  said :] 

I  congratulate  the  management  of  the  State  Fair  upon  securing  for  the  edifica- 
tion and  entertainment  of  the  people  such  a  large  and  attractive  line  of  exhibits. 
These  exhibits  demonstrate  in  convincing  fashion  the  abundance  and  variety  of 
our  natural  resources  and  the  industry  and  ingenuity  of  our  people. 

But  the  most  inspiring  exhibit  that  can  be  made  at  a  State  Fair  is  a  fair  state — 
a  state  arrayed  in  vestments  of  wisdom  and  justice  seeking  diligently  to  give  to 
all  her  citizens  the  largest  possible  measure  of  opportunity  and  of  hope. 

The  one  indispensable  requisite  to  such  a  state  is  a  just  and  adequate  system  of 
taxation.  Therefore,  ladies  and  gentlemen,  I  present  to  you  as  the  fairest  and 
finest  exhibit  at  this  Fair  the  system  of  taxation  enacted  by  the  General  Assembly 
of  1919.  Fermit  me  to  call  your  attention  to  several  features  of  this  magnificent 
exhibit. 

1.  It  permits  the  people  of  the  State  to  tell  the  truth  about  their  property. 
The  people  have  not  heretofore  enjoyed  this  privilege.  The  people  have  been 
slandered  by  a  system,  degraded  by  a  mechanism  of  falsehood,  with  whose  opera- 
tions they  had  little  or  nothing  to  do. 


202  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

2.  The  tax  books  are  forced  to  tell  the  truth.  The  machinery  is  so  constructed 
that  of  itself  it  cannot  lie,  and  any  officer  or  individual  who  tampers  with  the 
machinery  in  order  to  make  it  lie  will  find  the  jail  doors  opening  to  receive  him. 

3.  The  new  system  through  the  Eevaluation  Act  wipes  out  forever  inequalities 
in  taxation.  True  values  are  always  equal  values,  but  the  wisdom  of  Solomon  and 
the  genius  of  Edison  combined  cannot  equalize  a  series  of  lies.  It  has  been  said, 
"The  truth  shall  make  you  free,"  and  this  applies  with  mathematical  accuracy 
to  freedom  from  inequalities  in  taxation.  The  Revaluation  Act  is  an  earnest 
search  for  the  truth,  and  the  man  who  runs  away  from  it  simply  confesses  that  he 
is  afraid  of  what  the  truth  will  reveal.     Why? 

4.  The  fourth  feature  of  this  exhibit,  upon  which  I  desire  to  focus  your 
attention,  is  that  it  requires  that  what  a  man  pays  out  in  taxes  shall  be  in  part 
determined  by  what  he  takes  in.  This  is  the  Income  Tax  Amendment.  Under  the 
general  law  a  reasonable  tax  is  levied  on  all  classes  of  property,  but  if  these  are 
found  not  to  be  sufficient  to  meet  the  demands  of  a  growing  state,  then  the 
additional  burdens  are  laid  on  the  shoulders  best  able  to  bear  them.  This  is  the 
very  essence  of  wisdom  and  of  justice.  It  is  the  divine  plan  for  raising  funds  for 
the  support  of  the  church.  The  Great  Apostle  says :  "On  the  first  day  of  the 
week  let  every  one  of  you  lay  by  in  store  as  God  hath  prospered  him." 

5.  Pots  and  pans,  beds  and  blankets,  tools  and  books  get  an  immunity  bath. 
Property  of  the  above  description  to  the  amount  of  three  hundred  dollars  is 
made  absolutely  free  from  taxation  of  any  kind.  This  is  as  it  should  be.  The 
State  of  North  Carolina  is  too  big  and  too  rich  to  levy  a  tribute  on  these  simple 
necessities  and  comforts  of  the  home.  If  there  is  anybody  opposed  to  this 
exemption  let  him  send  me  his  name  and  photograph  and  I  will  publish  both. 

When  the  new  system  of  taxation  is  in  full  force,  North  Carolina  can  point 
with  pride  to  the  lowest  tax  rate  of  any  state  in  the  American  Union,  to  a  system 
that  wipes  out  every  inequality  and  every  discrimination  in  taxation,  to  a  well 
balanced,  well  digested  scheme  of  taxation  that  will  entail  no  hardship  on  any  class 
of  property  or  people,  and  will  raise  revenues  sufficient  to  maintain  in  our  borders 
a  decent  and  enlightened,  progressive  civilization. 


(14) 

A  DEBT  OF  HONOR 

[In  his  address  before  the  Georgia  Memorial  Association  in  Atlanta  on  the, 
night  of  November  11,  1919,  Governor  T.  W.  Bickett  of  North  Carolina  said  in 
part :] 

I  am  always  happy  to  run  far  down  the  road  to  meet  an  opportunity  to  co- 
operate in  any  movement  looking  to  the  honor  of  the  men,  living  and  dead,  who, 
in  the  darkest  hour  of  the  world's  history,  lifted  high  the  flag  of  this  Republic, 
snatched  victory  from  the  jaws  of  disaster,  and  won  for  themselves  and  all  their 
countrymen  an  immortality  of  renown. 

Some  two  and  a  half  years  ago,  with  mingled  emotions  of  pride  and  sorrow, 
we  saw  our  young  men  moving  to  the  camps  to  train  for  the  great  adventure. 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  203 

Later,  with  anxious  hearts  we  watched  them  start  across  a  sea  infested  with 
German  submarines ;  with  tears  of  joy  and  gratitude  we  heard  of  their  safe  arrival 
on  the  other  shore,  and  then,  with  bated  breath,  we  waited  for  their  blood-red 
challenge  to  the  foe. 

That  foe  was  drunk  with  victory  and  pride.  He  had  been  fed  up  on  the  conceit 
that  he  was  an  invincible  warrior,  that  he  belonged  to  a  super-race ;  and  in  a  frenzy 
of  fanaticism  his  legions  swept  forward  like  the  billows  of  a  storm-lashed  sea. 
Nothing  seemed  able  to  halt  his  victorious  advance.  The  Allied  line  staggered 
on  the  verge  of  ruin.  The  heart  of  humanity  was  shrouded  in  despair.  Then 
came  the  American  soldiers !  And,  glory  to  God,  what  a  coming  was  that !  Bred 
in  a  land  where  tyranny  is  a  monstrosity  and  freedom  a  dream  come  true,  exalted 
by  the  knowledge  that  around  the  home  fires  every  man  was  counted  a  hero, 
sustained  by  a  flaming  faith  in  the  eternal  justice  of  their  cause,  and  goaded  by 
the  insolence  and  arrogance  of  a  brutish  foe,  the  American  soldiers  crashed  like 
a  living  tornado  through  the  far  famed  Hindenburg  line,  and  the  "invincible 
warriors  of  the  super-race,"  cringing  and  crawling  in  the  dust,  cried  "Kamerad!" 

ONE  INCONTROVERTIBLE,  COLOSSAL  FACT 

After  every  great  war  many  questions  arise  which  are  the  subject  of  legitimate 
controversy.  But  already  out  of  the  smoke  and  dust  of  the  world  war  there  looms 
up  one  incontrovertible,  indestructible,  and  colossal  fact :  during  the  year  1918 
the  American  army  and  the  American  people  accomplished  vastly  more  than  our 
enemies  dreamed  we  could,  and  vastly  more  than  our  friends  hoped  we  could,  and 
vastly  more  than  we  ourselves  believed  we  could. 

Germany  treated  our  threatened  intervention  with  open  contempt.  She  said 
that  we  had  no  army,  and  could  not  raise  one ;  that  if  we  raised  it  we  had  no 
officers  to  train  it ;  that  if  we  trained  it  we  could  not  equip  it ;  that  if  we  equipped 
it  we  could  not  transport  it.  And  so  the  Kaiser  and  all  his  captains  proclaimed 
to  the  world  that  the  Germans  would  cross  the  Seine  before  the  Americans  could 
cross  the  sea. 

Our  friends  did  not  hope  that  we  could  do  anything  substantial  in  a  military 
way  in  1918.  The  High  Commissions  from  Great  Britain  and  France  came  over 
in  January  of  last  year  and  asked  earnestly  for  money  for  munitions  for  the 
physical  equipment  of  war,  but  said  very  little  about  men.  They  did  hope  that 
we  would  be  able  to  rush  over  a  few  divisions  just  for  the  moral  effect,  and  when 
the  Secretary  of  "War  intimated  that  if  they  would  furnish  some  ships  we  could 
put  a  half  million  fighting  men  in  France  by  midsummer  they  were  dizzy  with 
delight  overshadowed  by  doubt. 

Our  own  folks  did  not  believe  that  we  could  make  a  substantial  contribution 
to  the  military  forces  in  France  by  midsummer  (Senator  Chamberlain,  Dem- 
ocratic chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Military  Affairs  in  the  Senate,  ran  up  to 
]STew  York  and  made  a  speech  and  said  that  the  War  Department  had  broken  down 
and  could  do  nothing),  and  when  Mr.  Baker  went  before  the  Committee  on 
Military  Affairs  and  told  them  that  he  was  planning  to  place  a  half  million  men 
in  France  by  July  1st,  some  members  of  the  committee  snickered,  and  others 
laughed  aloud.  The  great  newspapers  took  it  up  and  ridiculed  the  Secretary  of 
"War;  said  that  he  was  indulging  child's  talk,  and  broadly  intimated  that  he 
ought  to  be  sent  to  a  school  for  the  feeble-minded  when  he  indulged  in   such 


204  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

ridiculous  prophecies.  Then  on  the  22d  day  of  March  the  Hun  launched  his 
terrific  offensive.  Nothing  could  stop  him,  and  everything  seemed  to  he  lost.  In 
this  fateful  hour  Lloyd  George  stood  up,  and  looking  wistfully  towards  the  West, 
said :  "The  fight  for  civilization  is  on,  and  the  race  is  between  Hindenburg  and 
Wilson." 

Over  here  we  caught  the  S.  O.  S.  signal  from  Mother  England.  We  treated 
it  as  a  challenge  and  a  Macedonian  cry.  We  sprang  forward  with  a  fury  and 
efficiency  that  made  all  the  world  wonder;  and  it  will  be  written  in  history  in 
letters  of  gold  that  Woodrow  Wilson  won  that  great  Olympic.  On  the  fourth  day 
of  July  the  President  of  the  United  States  proclaimed  to  the  world  that  America 
had  one  million  men  in  France.  In  January  a  half  million  men  was  a  schoolgirl's 
dream ;  in  July  a  million  men  in  line  was  a  solid,  invincible,  and  immortal  reality. 

If  we  had  not  gone  into  the  fight  the  world  would  have  branded  us  as  a  nation 
of  ease-loving,  money-hoarding  cowards.  From  Shanghai  to  Bagdad  principalities 
and  powers  would  have  joined  in  the  chorus — 

"The  United  States  ain't  nothing  but  a  hound, 
And  any  old  country  can  kick  her  around." 

But  we  went  in — and  today  there  is  not  a  nation  on  the  face  of  the  earth  that 
would  not  walk  a  thousand  miles  out  of  its  way  to  keep  from  stepping  on  the 
toes  of  your  Uncle  Samuel.  As  a  matter  of  national  defense  the  reputation  that 
our  soldiers  made  for  courage  and  fortitude  over  there  and  the  reputation  that 
the  people  at  home  made  for  capacity  to  endure  and  to  sacrifice  are  worth  more 
than  all  the  forts  and  all  the  ships  we  could  build  in  a  hundred  years. 

We  owe  it  to  the  American  soldier  and  to  ourselves  as  well  to  do  the  things  that 
will  certify  to  the  waiting  centuries  our  admiration,  our  gratitude,  our  love  for 
the  men  who  wrought  so  grandly  and  so  well  to  advance  American  ideals  and 
institutions  and  to  save  the  civilization  of  the  world. 

INTOXICANTS   NOT  A  WELL  BALANCED  DIET 

But  a  soldier  cannot  live  on  honor  and  praise.  Memorials  and  music  and  love 
and  kisses  and  flowers  are  intoxicants — about  the  only  intoxicants  not  under  the 
ban  of  the  National  Bone-Dry  Law.  But  intoxicants,  while  tremendously  exhil- 
arating, do  not  make  a  well  balanced  diet.  We  owe  it  to  the  American  soldier  to 
afford  him  a  fair  chance  to  make  a  decent  living.  He  seeks  no  charity — he  would 
scorn  it — but  every  soldier  has  a  blood-bought  title  to  a  good  job.  We  want  to  so 
hammer  this  truth  into  the  hearts  of  the  people  that  every  man  will  count  it  honor 
and  joy  to  rise  up  at  midnight  and  help  any  soldier  find  honest  and  lucrative 
employment. 

THE  BEST  BARRIER  AGAINST  BOLSHEVISM 

We  also  owe  it  to  the  soldier  to  make  it  easy  by  laws,  State  and  National,  for 
him  to  acquire  and  pay  for  a  home.  This  is  not  charity.  It  is  common  sense; 
it  is  statesmanship.  The  most  impregnable  line  of  fortification  that  the  Nation 
can  erect  to  check  the  blood-red  tide  of  bolshevism  is  a  network  of  homes  that 
will  measure  the  land  "from  sea  to  shining  sea."  The  mightiest  forces  for  law, 
for  peace,  for  prosperity,  are — 

"The  wee  cot  and  the  cricket's  chirr, 
Love,  and  the  smiling  face  ot  her." 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  205 

A  homeless  people  may  at  any  time  make  of  us  a  Russia  or  a  Mexico,  but  the 
citizen  standing  under  his  own  vine  and  fig  tree  is  at  once  the  builder  and  the 
bulwark  of  the  Republic. 

OUR   SACRED  DEBT    OF   HONOR 

Our  one  sacred  debt  of  honor  to  the  American  soldier,  a  debt  unshirkable  and 
inescapable,  is  for  all  the  people  to  maintain  in  purity  and  power  over  here  the 
principles  for  which  he  fought  over  there. 

The  first  principle  to  which  the  American  soldier  gave  spectacular  and  im- 
mortal recognition  is  that  no  individual  citizen  has  any  rights  the  assertion  of 
which  would  prove  fatal  to  the  welfare  and  happiness  of  all  the  people. 

In  the  spring  of  1917  the  individual  citizen  was  tremendously  busy  about  his 
personal  affairs.  He  was  enjoying  to  the  fullest  degree  the  life,  liberty  and  pur- 
suit of  happiness  guaranteed  to  him  by  the  Declaration  of  Independence.  The 
farmer  was  pitching  tremendous  crops  to  feed  and  clothe  a  hungry,  naked  world; 
the  manufacturer  was  running  his  plant  overtime  to  meet  the  orders  that  flowed 
in  from  every  quarter  of  the  globe;  the  merchant  was  laying  in  his  stock  to  be 
ready  for  the  unprecedented  demands  of  trade;  the  doctor  was  riding  day  and 
night  ministering  to  the  sick  and  the  dying ;  the  lawyer  was  burning  the  midnight 
oil  in  getting  ready  to  try  his  cases  in  court.  Then  suddenly  there  stood  before 
the  individual  citizen  a  tall,  gray  figure  and  touched  him  on  the  shoulder  and 
said,  "Son,  come;  I  have  need  of  thee."  The  individual  said,  "What  are  you 
going  to  do  with  me  ?"  Uncle  Sam  replied,  "I'm  going  to  put  you  into  a  training 
camp  and  work  you  from  five  o'clock  in  the  morning  until  nine  o'clock  at  night 
for  one  dollar  a  day.  I'm  going  to  take  you  out  of  the  shade  and  march  and 
counter-march  you  in  the  broiling  sun  until  the  sweat  rolls  off  you  in  drops  as  big 
as  muscadines,  and  you  lose  every  pound  of  your  surplus  flesh.  I'm  going  to 
make  you  salute  second  lieutenants  746  times  a  day  to  imbue  you  with  proper 
respect  for  military  discipline,  and  then,  when  I  get  you  whipped  into  proper 
shape  and  discipline,  I'm  going  to  load  you  on  a  ship,  about  ten  thousand  at  a 
time,  and  carry  you  three  thousand  miles  through  German  submarines.  When 
you  get  over  to  the  other  side  I'm  going  to  march  you  over  to  Flanders  and 
point  out  to  you  several  million  German  soldiers  and  say,  'Go  after  them  and  get 
their  limburger  before  they  get  your  cigarettes !'  "  The  individual  citizen  said, 
"Well,  Uncle,  that  is  something  fierce;  what's  it  all  about?  What  is  it  for?" 
Uncle  Sam  replied:  "It  is  for  the  future  safety,  peace,  prosperity  and  happiness 
of  all  the  people  of  the  United  States."  Thereupon  the  individual  straightened 
up,  squared  his  shoulders,  and  with  a  light  in  his  eye,  and  a  ring  in  his  voice  that 
boded  ill  for  the  Hun,  he  said,  "Well,  Uncle,  if  that's  the  game,  I'm  your  meat." 
And  the  result  was  that  the  doughboy  went  forth  to  fight  for  the  welfare  and 
happiness  of  all  the  people  of  the  United  States.  Yes,  he  made  a  good  job  of  it. 
Even  the  Kaiser  will  admit  that  the  American  doughboy  "seen  his  duty  and 
done  it." 

Then  he  came  back  home,  threw  down  his  gun,  took  off  his  uniform,  became  a 
private  citizen  and  settled  here  in  Atlanta  to  enjoy  the  blessings  and  privileges 
of  the  community  he  fought  to  save.    The  folks  were  delighted  to  see  him.     They 


206  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

gave  him  the  glad  hand.  They  got  him  a  good  job,  and  then  he  went  around  to 
see  the  little  woman  who  had  waited  and  prayed  for  him  while  he  was  on  the 
other  side ;  and  it  was  not  long  before  they  called  in  the  parson  and  started  down 
the  long  path  hand  in  hand.  They  were  very  happy.  The  years  stretched  before 
them  in  all  the  glory  and  freshness  of  a  dream,  and  life  was  strangely  sweet,  as 
it  ever  is  to  the  young  when  the  heart  beats  fast  and  hopes  climb  high. 

Then  one  morning  he  stepped  out  into  the  streets,  saw  the  people  gathered  in 
excited  crowds,  went  up  to  see  what  was  the  matter,  and  he  read  in  flaming  head- 
lines in  the  Constitution,  in  the  Georgian,  in  the  Journal,  that  Atlanta,  the  gate 
city  of  the  South,  was  isolated  from  the  rest  of  the  world.  No  telegraphic,  no 
telephonic  communication,  no  trains  could  enter  or  leave  the  city,  and  the  erst- 
while soldier  exclaimed :  "Am  I  dreaming  ?  Is  this  some  frightful  nightmare,  or 
have  I  been  living  in  a  fool's  paradise?  Have  those  pesky  Germans  tricked  us 
after  all,  and  in  a  mighty  aerial  squadron  swept  across  the  sea  and  surrounded 
this  city  in  a  single  night?"  The  neighbors  said,  "Oh,  no,  son;  no  Huns  around 
anywhere.  The  employers  and  employees  in  the  telegraph,  telephone  and  railroad 
companies  have  had  a  disagreement,  and  everybody  got  mad  and  quit.  They 
won't  work  themselves  and  they  won't  let  anybody  else  work."  And  then  the 
doughboy  laughed  aloud  and  said,  "You  just  leave  it  to  me  and  I'll  settle  this 
damned  foolishness  in  fifteen  minutes."  And  he  threw  back  his  head  and  in 
stentorian  tones  that  had  many  a  time  made  the  Hun  tremble  in  his  dug-out,  he 
cried,  "Uncle  Sam !  Uncle  Sam !"  Instantly  there  stood  before  him  the  tall,  gray 
figure  that  had  touched  him  on  the  shoulder  in  the  spring  of  1917.  The  soldier 
said,  "Uncle,  two  years  ago  you  needed  me;  now  I  need  you.  Way  up  in  the 
mountains  the  dear  old  mother  is  wasting  away.  The  last  letter  that  came  said 
that  she  was  anxious  to  see  her  boy  before  she  passed  over  the  river.  I  cannot  hear 
from  her  any  more — no  mails,  no  telegrams,  no  telephones.  I  would  like  to  go 
up  and  see  how  she  is  getting  along,  but  no  trains  are  permitted  to  enter  or  leave 
the  city.  And  then,  Uncle,  you  know  when  I  got  back  home  I  married  Mary,  who 
had  waited  patiently  for  me.  I  got  a  good  job.  I  commenced  to  save  my  money  to 
build  a  little  nest,  and,  Uncle,  just  in  a  little  while  the  Heavenly  Father  is  going 
to  send  a  little  angel  down  to  brighten  and  bless  our  home.  But  the  factory  where 
I  work  has  only  three  days  supply  of  coal.  If  no  more  coal  comes  in,  the  factory 
will  close  down.  I  will  be  out  of  a  job,  the  winter  is  coming  on,  and  God  alone 
knows  what  will  become  of  Mary  and  the  baby  that  is  to  be.  Now,  Uncle,  I  want 
you  to  put  an  end  to  this  damned  foolishness.  I  want  you  to  issue  an  order  that 
all  the  wires  shall  be  opened,  and  that  every  train  shall  move  on  schedule  time." 
But  the  shoulders  of  that  tall,  gray  figure  drooped,  a  look  of  unutterable  sadness 
and  shame  comes  into  his  face,  and  he  says,  "Son,  I  am  very  sorry,  but  in  a  crisis 
like  this  I  can  do  nothing."  Then  that  soldier  leaps  to  his  feet  like  a  tiger  that 
fights  for  mate  and  cub,  his  lips  curl,  his  eyes  blaze,  he  points  his  finger  at  that  tall, 
gray  figure,  and  says :  "Two  years  ago  you  snatched  me  from  home  and  job, 
hurled  me  across  the  sea,  stood  me  up  before  German  machine  guns  and  told  me 
to  kill  or  be  killed  for  the  welfare  and  happiness  of  the  people.  Now  if  a  handful 
of  men  can  cut  this  city  off  from  the  world,  close  up  every  store,  shut  down  every 
factory,  and  starve  and  freeze  the  women  and  children,  then  tell  me,  my  Uncle 
Samuel,  what  in  the  hell  was  I  fighting  for  ?"    Ah !  was  that  paying  the  debt  ? 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  207 


A    NEW  BREATH    OF   LIFE 

When  the  American  soldier  sacrificed  every  individual  right,  abandoned  every 
personal  pleasure  and  buried  every  personal  profit  for  the  common  good,  he 
breathed  new  life  into  the  principle  that  no  individual  in  the  United  States  has 
any  rights  the  assertion  of  which  would  prove  fatal  to  the  welfare  and  happiness 
of  all  the  people. 

Water,  lights,  means  of  communication  and  transportation  are  essential  not 
only  to  the  welfare  and  happiness,  but  to  the  very  life  of  the  people.  It  follows, 
as  the  night  the  day,  that  the  people  of  the  United  States  have  an  inalienable 
right  to  utilities  that  will  surely  provide  these  necessities.  If  a  group  of  financial 
magnates,  or  industrial  magnates,  or  labor  magnates,  singly  or  combined,  have  the 
power  to  tie  up  the  public  utilities  of  the  continent,  immediately  paralyze  the 
business  of  the  Nation  and  ultimately  starve  and  freeze  the  people  into  submission 
to  their  will,  then  government  for  the  people  has  already  perished  from  the  United 
States. 

Congress  owes  it  to  the  American  soldier  to  at  once  enact  a  law  that  will 
absolutely  guarantee  to  the  people  the  constant  and  efficient  operation  of  all 
public  utilities  engaged  in  interstate  commerce. 

Of  course,  any  such  law  would  provide  a  tribunal  of  the  people  to  hear 
grievances,  and  in  case  of  disputes  to  fix  wages,  but  all  men  engaged  in  operating 
such  utilities,  whether  employers  or  employees,  must  be  made  to  understand  that 
they  are  servants  of  the  people,  that  they  must  trust  the  people  to  deal  fairly  with 
them,  and  that  they  cannot  come  before  the  tribunal  of  the  people  with  a  plea  of 
justice  in  one  hand  and  a  six-shooter  in  the  other. 

A  NOBLE   OBJECTIVE 

We  have  seen  that  the  American  soldier  made  every  sacrifice  for  the  common 
good.  What  was  that  good?  What  was  America's  final  objective  when  she  went 
forth  to  war?  It  was  to  end  all  war — to  put  down  the  reign  of  blood  and  iron, 
and  to  set  up  the  rule  of  reason  and  righteousness  in  every  corner  of  the  earth. 
If  this  is  not  precisely  what  we  fought  for,  then  we  are  a  Nation  of  liars.  The 
President,  standing  on  the  topmost  peak  of  fame,  with  the  light  of  the  world 
beating  on  his  face,  proclaimed  that  America  was  raising  her  army  to  send 
militarism  to  the  scrap-heap  of  civilization,  to  wipe  out  autocracy  wherever  found, 
and  to  secure  the  blessings  of  liberty  under  laws  of  righteousness  to  all  the  peoples 
of  the  earth.  Amid  the  fierce  clamor  of  industrial  and  political  strife,  above  the 
tread  of  armies  and  the  din  of  battles,  the  voice  of  the  President  rang  out  like  a 
prophet  in  the  wilderness,  proclaiming  that  a  new  dispensation  was  at  hand. 

The  bleeding  heart  of  the  world  leaped  for  joy  at  the  celestial  note  in  that  high, 
clear  call.  Straightway  ministers  of  the  gospel  climbed  into  their  pulpits,  and  in 
the  name  of  the  Prince  of  Peace  urged  men  to  go  forth  to  war.  Teachers  gathered 
the  children  about  them  and  thrilled  their  young  hearts  with  the  story  that  we 
were  sending  our  armies  forth  to  drive  the  bloody  dragon  from  the  world  forever 
and  forever.  Gentle  women  thrust  guns  into  the  hands  of  their  sons  and  sped 
them  forth  to  battle  for  a  civilization  in  which  a  woman's  finger  would  weigh 
more  than  a  mailed  fist  and  the  voice  of  a  little  child  would  carry  farther  than 
a   cannon's   roar.     All  classes   and   conditions   of   men   and   women   stood   on   a 


208  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

hundred  thousand  platforms  and  hurned  it  into  the  hearts  of  the  people  that 
America  was  waging  war  against  the  very  soul  of  war;  that  we  were  in  a 
death  grapple  with  a  power  that  had  decreed  that  a  gun  is  God  and  before 
it  there  is  none  other. 

The  press,  in  ten  million  flaming  headlines  spread  the  news  from  pole  to  pole 
that  America's  great  objective  was  to  dethrone  the  gun  and  make  the  enlightened 
conscience  of  mankind  the  supreme  arbiter  of  the  destiny  of  nations. 

All  these  things  were  devoutly  believed  by  the  fathers  and  mothers  of  the  land 
and  by  the  soldiers  who  rushed  eagerly  to  the  fray.  In  confirmation  of  these  I  am 
going  to  put  on  the  witness  stand  a  young  North  Carolina  Captain  in  the  Thirtieth 
Division.  On  the  29th  of  September  last  the  Thirtieth  Division  won  immortality 
by  being  the  first  to  smash  the  Hindenburg  line,  and  on  that  day  the  young  Captain 
made  the  supreme  sacrifice.  Just  two  weeks  before  he  wrote  his  mother  a  letter 
from  which  I  make  the  following  extract :  "This  is  a  wonderful  Sunday  night, 
clear  moonlight,  in  a  beautiful,  peaceful  country.  Trees,  grass,  berries  on  the 
hedges  along  the  roads,  the  stacked  wheat  making  beautiful  silhouettes  against 
the  sky  line.  Just  such  a  night  as  I  want  to  take  you  in  my  arms  and  talk  to  you, 
tell  you  what  my  heart  feels.  Soon,  very  soon  I  feel,  we  are  going  back  into  the 
line,  and  what  that  holds  for  me,  God  alone  knows,  and  I  am  going  in  with  a 
singing  heart  and  a  light  heart.  I'm  not  worrying,  for  I'm  not  making  a  sacrifice. 
It  is  the  dear  mothers  like  you,  the  wives,  the  babies  who  are  making  the  sacrifice. 
We  are  granted  a  blessed  privilege  of  giving  our  pitiful  little  all,  and  cheerfully 
we  are  giving  it.  We  will  not  only  give  our  lives,  but  we  will  give  them  with  a 
smile,  for  we  know  that  our  gift  will  be  made  that  you  mothers  may  never  again 
look  with  tear-dimmed  eyes  at  the  boys  you  held  once  so  close  to  your  breasts  and 
whose  tiny  feet  you  led  and  whose  lips  you  taught  to  say,  'Wow  I  lay  me' — that  you 
may  never  again  watch  them  march  away  to  war ;  that  wives  may  never  again  have 
to  sit  in  fear,  dreading  the  approach  of  the  postman,  lest  he  bring  unwelcome 
news ;  that  babies  may  no  more  cry  for  daddies  that  have  died  for  the  other 
babies.  Remember  that  it's  for  you,  the  mothers,  wives,  and  babies,  we  are  fighting, 
and  we  are  going  to  do  such  a  good  job  that  you  shall  never  again  know  heartache 
from  wars." 

Tonight,  with  thousands  of  his  comrades,  the  Captain  rests  in  Flanders  field, 
waiting  for  the  reveille  of  an  eternal  morning.  But  from  every  soldier's  sepulcher 
there  comes  to  this  Nation  the  solemn  warning,  "If  you  break  faith  with  us  who 
died,  we  shall  not  sleep." 

DANGEROUS   TO  LIE   TO   GOD 

I  am  not  a  preacher,  nor  the  son  of  one;  but  there  are  some  things  that  I 
devoutly  believe.  I  believe  that  it  is  a  dangerous  thing  to  lie  to  God.  Two  years 
ago  this  Nation  went  down  on  its  knees  before  the  altars  of  the  Most  High.  We 
called  for  His  blessings  on  our  forces  on  land  and  sea,  and  we  told  Him  that  we 
were  fighting  to  establish  "peace  on  earth  and  good  will  toward  men."  "God  is 
not  mocked,"  and  if  in  the  day  of  our  pride  and  power  we  shall  forget  the  solemn 
vows  we  made  to  him,  there  will  descend  upon  this  Nation  some  withering  curse 
and  our  greatness  will  pass  away  like  the  glory  that  was  Greece  and  the  grandeur 
that  was  Rome. 

THE  DEATH  WAKKANT  OF  WAK 

The  League  of  Nations  is  an  honest,  earnest  effort  to  keep  the  faith.  It  is  the 
only  chart  ever  framed  by  man  that  maps  out  for  all  peoples  ways  of  blessedness 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  209 

and  paths  of  peace.  "When  this  covenant  shall  be  signed  and  sealed  by  the  great 
powers  of  the  world  it  will  be  the  death  warrant  of  war.  Let  all  good  men  pray 
that  to  the  Senate  of  the  United  States  there  may  be  given  wisdom  and  grace  to 
ratify  this  immortal  document  and  thus  usher  in  the  good,  glad  time  by  poets  and 
prophets  foretold — 

"When  peace  shall  over  all  the  earth 

Her  final  splendors  fling, 
And  the  whole  earth  send  back  the  song 
That  now  the  angels  sing." 


(15) 

STAND  STILL  AND  SEE  THE  SALVATION  OF  RIGHTEOUSNESS 

ADDRESS  BEFORE  THE  NORTH  CAROLINA  TEACHERS'  ASSEMBLY, 
RALEIGH,  NOVEMBER  28,  1919 

In  his  address  to  the  Teachers'  Assembly,  Governor  Bickett  said  in  part : 

It  is  known  of  all  men  that  in  North  Carolina  there  has  been  mapped  out  a 
wholesome  program  for  the  enlargement  and  enrichment  of  the  life  of  all  our 
people.  Our  faith  is  that  this  can  be  done  by  treating  our  wonderful  resources, 
in  men  and  material,  with  a  well  balanced  solution  of  Christianity  and  common 
sense. 

President  Wilson  has  well  said  that  back  of  every  reform  lies  the  means  of 
getting  it.  And  the  means  indispensable  to  solid  and  permanent  progress  is  a 
system  of  taxation  that  is  fair  to  all  classes  of  people  and  property,  and  that  will 
produce  revenues  sufficient  to  meet  the  legitimate  needs  of  a  decent  and  progressive 
civilization. 

Such  a  system  of  taxation  was  devised  by  the  General  Assembly  of  1919. 
This  system  I  commend  to  your  careful  consideration.  Mark  this :  the  chief 
objective  of  the  new  system  is  not  increased  revenues;  these  could  have  been 
obtained  in  easier  ways.  The  real  objective  is  a  system  of  taxation  that  is  intelli- 
gent and  fair.  The  old  system  was  neither.  Indeed,  the  injustices  and  inequalities 
under  the  old  system  were  largely  due  to  a  lack  of  knowledge  of  the  essential  facts. 
A  child  is  able  to  see  that  it  is  impossible  to  frame  a  tax  law  just  and  adequate 
without  any  accurate  knowledge  of  the  value  of  the  property  to  which  the  law 
is  to  be  applied. 

There  are  three  evidences  that  the  State  is  not  seeking  primarily  to  increase 
its  revenues : 

1.  During  the  next  two  years  the  State  will  collect  forty  per  cent  less  revenues 
from  property  than  it  would  have  collected  if  the  General  Assembly  had  not 
written  a  line  on  the  subject  of  taxation.  The  State  foregoes  the  collection  of  forty 
per  cent  of  revenues  that  it  would  have  received  in  order  to  try  out,  for  the  first 
time  in  our  history,  a  tax  plan  bottomed  on  accurate  knowledge  of  all  the  facts  and 
a  passion  to  do  equal  justice  to  all  classes  of  people  and  property. 

2.  The  poll  tax  in  many  of  our  towns  and  cities  runs  as  high  as  from  six  to 
eight  dollars.    Under  the  new  plan  the  largest  possible  poll  tax  that  any  one  can  be 

14 


210  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

required  to  pay,  under  any  combination  of  taxation,  will  be  three  dollars,  and  in 
the  vast  majority  of  cases  it  will  be  less. 

3.  Heretofore  there  has  been  an  exemption  allowed  of  only  twenty-five  dollars. 
Under  the  new  plan  this  tax  exemption  is  increased  to  three  hundred  dollars,  and 
household  and  kitchen  furniture,  wearing  apparel,  books,  scientific  instruments, 
mechanics'  tools,  and  farming  implements  that  do  not  exceed  in  value  three 
hundred  dollars,  are  made  absolutely  exempt  from  taxation  of  any  kind.  This 
is  done  to  encourage  people  in  having  these  comforts  and  conveniences,  and  also 
to  relieve  the  tax  books  of  the  burden  of  this  class  of  property. 

FINDING   THE   FACTS 

The  Revaluation  Act  is  an  honest  effort  to  find  the  facts  in  regard  to  the 
property  in  North  Carolina.  At  present  the  facts  are  utterly  unknown,  and  we 
are  compelled  to  levy  taxes  on  a  good-natured  or  ill-natured  guess  as  to  values, 
made  by  men  without  the  time,  without  the  evidence,  and  in  many  cases  without 
any  desire  to  ascertain  the  real  facts  in  the  case.  When  the  facts  are  all  in,  the 
General  Assembly  can  proceed  intelligently  to  enact  such  laws  as  in  its  wisdom 
it  may  see  fit. 

The  Revaluation  Act  is  finding  the  facts.  For  the  first  time  in  our  history  our 
people  have  been  given  the  privilege  of  telling  the  truth  about  their  own  property, 
and  they  are  telling  it.  I  now  speak  with  authority  and  from  the  record :  At  least 
four  out  of  five  men  are  telling  the  truth  about  the  value  of  their  property,  and 
are  telling  it  gladly.  Everybody  knows  that  when  four  witnesses  out  of  five  to  a 
transaction  tell  the  absolute  truth  it  does  not  do  the  fifth  witness  a  bit  of  good  to 
lie  about  it.  In  one  township  that  has  recently  been  considered  there  were  some- 
thing less  than  one  thousand  property  owners.  When  the  questionnaires  were  all 
in  the  assessors  fixed  the  value  at  exactly  what  seven  hundred  of  them  had  sworn 
their  own  property  was  worth.  Over  sixty  of  the  property  owners  had  placed 
values  on  their  property  that  the  assessors  deemed  too  high,  and  these  were  lowered 
to  harmonize  with  the  values  fixed  by  the  seven  hundred.  In  about  two  hundred 
cases  the  values  given  in  by  property  owners  were  raised,  some  very  slightly,  some 
very  radically,  to  make  these  values  conform  to  the  true  values  ascertained  by  the 
testimony  of  the  seven  hundred  witnesses.  This  township  is  not  exceptional,  but 
rather  typical  of  the  work  that  is  being  done  all  over  the  State. 

BE    YE    PATIENT 

A  few  people  seem  to  think  that  the  new  system  is  concerning  itself  only  with 
the  revaluation  of  land.  This  is  not  true.  The  Tax  Commission  has  a  corps  of 
able  experts  who  are  making  a  complete  examination  of  every  industrial  plant 
in  the  State,  and  the  true  value  of  all  business  property  will  be  ascertained.  Take 
two  examples : 

1.  Two  cotton  mills  in  the  same  county,  and  in  sight  of  each  other,  were 
recently  examined.  Our  experts  ascertained  that  one  mill  was  on  the  tax  books  at 
seventeen  per  cent  of  its  true  value  and  the  other  at  sixty-five  per  cent.  Next 
year  both  of  these  mills  will  be  placed  on  the  tax  books  on  a  basis  of  one  hundred 
per  cent  of  their  true  value.  The  result  will  be  that  the  seventeen  per  cent  mill 
will  pay  vastly  more  taxes  than  it  has  heretofore  paid,  and  the  sixty-five  per  cent 
mill  will  pay  vastly  less.  Any  man  who  will  contend  that  this  is  not  right  is  in 
urgent  need  of  the  prayers  of  all  the  churches. 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  211 

2.  The  Kevaluation  Act  is  finding  a  lot  of  property  that  has  never  been  on 
the  tax  books  at  all.  We  are  finding  a  considerable  amount  of  land  that  has  never 
formed  the  habit  of  being  taxed  and  we  are  finding  millions  of  dollars  worth  of 
personal  property  that  is  an  absolute  stranger  to  the  tax  books.  In  one  town  of 
more  than  ten  thousand  inhabitants  there  will  be  placed  on  the  tax  books  next 
year  personal  property  that  has  never  paid  any  taxes,  greater  in  value  than 
all  the  real  and  personal  property  now  on  the  tax  books  in  that  town. 

Not  only  are  we  finding  this  property,  but  a  lot  of  it,  millions  of  it,  will 
voluntarily  come  out  of  hiding.  The  present  tax  rate  on  money  and  solvent  credits 
is  confiscatory,  and  this  class  of  property  flees  for  its  very  life  from  the  tax 
gatherer.  This  is  not  prophecy,  but  it  is  the  experience  of  every  government  in 
this  world  that  has  dealt  with  the  subject.  I  am  not  in  the  habit  of  making 
promises,  but  I  will  absolutely  guarantee  that  next  year,  under  the  Revaluation 
Act,  there  will  be  on  the  tax  books  of  this  State  ten  times  as  much  personal 
property  as  we  find  there  at  the  present  time. 

When  the  facts  are  all  in  and  the  values  of  all  properties  are  ascertained  and 
recorded,  the  wisdom  of  the  act  will  be  so  manifest  that  there  will  not  be  found  in 
all  our  borders  a  single  fair-minded  man  who  will  dispute  it.  For  the  present  I 
urge  the  people  to  stand  still  and  see  the  salvation  of  righteousness. 

The  time  limits  of  this  talk  will  not  permit  a  discussion  of  the  income  tax 
provided  in  the  Constitutional  Amendment.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  if  this  amend- 
ment shall  be  adopted,  and  we  apply  to  incomes  received  from  property  the  same 
graduated  tax  rate  of  from  one  to  two  and  one-half  per  cent  that  we  now  apply 
to  incomes  received  from  work,  it  will  not  be  necessary  for  the  State  to  levy  any 
taxes  for  the  support  of  the  State  Government  on  any  real  or  personal  property. 

North  Carolina  is  the  only  State  in  the  Union,  and  the  only  government  in  the 
civilized  world  that  does  not  have  the  right  to  levy  taxes  on  incomes  from  property 
as  well  as  on  incomes  from  work.  We  need  some  revenues  from  this  source,  and 
our  people  are  able  to  pay  it.  In  the  last  two  years  the  people  of  North  Carolina 
have  paid  for  the  support  of  the  Federal  Government  vastly  more  money  than  they 
have  paid  for  the  support  of  the  State  Government  from  the  signing  of  the 
Mecklenburg  Declaration  of  Independence  down  to  this  good  hour.  This  does 
not  mean  that  North  Carolina  can  afford  to  misspend  a  single  dollar.  Waste  is 
crime  and  extravagance  is  vulgarity,  but  it  does  not  mean  that  we  can  plead 
poverty  as  an  excuse  for  denying  to  the  children  and  to  the  unfortunate  of  the 
State  the  things  that  are  demanded  by  every  consideration  of  justice  and  humanity. 


^ 


212  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BIGKETT 

(16) 
DAUGHTERS  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY 

ADDRESS  OF  WELCOME  AT  ASHEV1LLE,  NOVEMBER,  1920 

Daughters  of  the  Confederacy: 

I  have  been  admonished  by  the  management  to  be  short  and  sweet.  This  is 
easy.  It  is  in  perfect  harmony  with  my  proportions  and  my  disposition.  Fronted 
and  flanked  as  I  am  tonight,  rigid  self-restraint  is  required  to  keep  from  being 
too  sweet. 

North  Carolina  is  happy  to  have  in  her  borders  an  organization  that  through 
all  the  years  has  played  the  part  of  both  Martha  and  Mary  to  the  weary  pilgrims 
in  gray.  You  have  kept  ward  over  the  welfare  of  the  Confederate  soldier  and 
watch  over  his  honor  and  fame. 

You  are  the  guests  of  a  State  that  loves  peace,  that  was  slow  to  leave  the 
Union,  but,  having  left,  gave  her  all  to  the  new  Nation.  Though  North  Carolina 
counted  only  115,000  voters  in  all  her  borders,  she  marshaled  127,000  men  under 
the  Bonnie  Blue  Flag. 

And  the  women  were  as  brave  as  the  men.  They  worked  as  hard  and  suffered 
more. 

In  a  public  square  in  the  city  of  Paris  there  is  a  statue  in  bronze  by  the  great 
sculptor  Mercie.  A  woman  is  bearing  a  wounded  warrior  from  the  field  of  battle. 
He  hangs  limp  and  unconscious  on  her  shoulder,  but  in  his  right  hand  he  still 
holds  with  stubborn  grip  his  broken  sword.  The  statue  is  called  "The  Glory  of 
the  Conquered." 

Nothing  could  more  fittingly  portray  the  Confederate  soldier  at  Appomattox. 
He  fell,  but  with  relentless  grip  he  held  to  his  broken  sword,  while  the  womanhood 
of  the  South  in  mighty  arms  of  love  bore  him  from  the  field. 

It  would  ill  become  the  exalted  dignity  of  ber  character  for  me  to  cheapen  the 
woman  of  the  South  with  fulsome  praise.  She  sent  her  warrior  forth  while  her 
eyes  flashed  and  her  heart  bled.  She  suffered  and  sacrificed  and  gave  no  cry  when 
she  knew  that  her  dearest  had  found  a  soldier's  sepulcher.  When  the  Confederate 
soldier  returned  wan  and  wasted  and  bleeding  at  every  pore,  she  broke  for  him 
the  alabaster  box  of  an  immeasurable  love  whose  fragrance  filled  the  earth. 

On  the  ruins  of  shattered  dreams  the  Southern  man,  upheld  by  the  love  of  the 
Southern  woman,  began  to  build  a  new  civilization.  Though  overpowered  they 
refused  to  be  degraded,  though  cast  down  they  would  not  be  destroyed.  Unarmed, 
they  defied  bayonets;  compassed  about  with  enemies,  they  laughed  at  laws  aimed 
at  their  destruction.  They  swore  that  they  would  not  touch  pitch  and  that  pitch 
should  not  touch  them.  Immutable  as  the  rocks  and  glorious  as  the  stars,  they 
stood  for  the  integrity  of  a  white  civilization  and  a  white  race ;  and  by  reason  of 
their  immortal  stand  North  Carolina  today  holds  in  trust  for  the  safety  of  the 
Nation  the  purest  Anglo-Saxon  blood  to  be  found  on  the  American  shores.  We 
are  proud,  we  are  happy,  we  are  highly  honored  to  have  in  our  midst  the  chosen 
representatives  of  the  womanhood  of  the  Confederacy.  In  behalf  of  all  oiir  people 
I  give  you  the  hand  and  heart  of  Carolina. 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  213 

(17) 
HO,  FOR  CAROLINA 

ADDRESS  BEFORE  THE  NORTH  CAROLINA  SOCDZTY  OF  PENNSYLVANIA, 
PHILADELPHIA,  DECEMBER  4,  1920 

For  many  years  North  Carolina  was  known  as  the  Rip  Van  Winkle  State  of 
the  Union.  For  many  years  the  State  was  pictured  in  the  public  mind  as  a  barren 
strip  of  land  over  which  it  was  necessary  to  pass  from  Virginia  to  South  Carolina, 
During  these  years  our  patriotic  spellbinders  would  point  with  pride  and  say, 
"God  bless  North  Carolina,  there  she  stands."  And  she  did.  For  thirty  years 
the  State  was  a  study  in  statics.  She  was  as  steadfast  in  her  position  as  the 
Georgia  Cracker.  A  stranger,  traveling  through  Georgia,  said  that  he  had  always 
wanted  to  see  a  typical  Georgia  Cracker.  A  bystander  remarked,  "Well,  between 
here  and  the  next  county-seat  you  will  see  many  of  them."  "How  can  I  know  when 
I  see  one?"  the  stranger  asked.  The  Georgian  replied,  "Well,  you  will  be  driving 
along,  and  out  in  the  fields  you  will  see  two  dark  objects;  one  of  them  is  a  stump, 
the  other  is  a  Georgia  Cracker.    The  one  that  moves  first  is  the  stump." 

This  condition,  it  is  fair  to  say,  was  not  due  to  lack  of  initiative  or  energy 
upon  the  part  of  the  people  of  North  Carolina,  but  to  the  complete  paralysis 
wrought  by  the  havoc  of  war.  When  the  Confederate  soldier  got  home  from  the 
war  "he  had  nothing,  nothing  to  get  nothing  with,  and  nothing  to  put  it  in." 

About  thirty  years  ago  the  old  State  arose  like  a  giant  refreshed  from  sleep, 
and  began  to  make  tremendous  strides  along  all  the  highways  of  progress,  and 
today  it  can  be  said  of  North  Carolina  as  it  was  of  Theodore  Roosevelt,  that  her 
"natural  gait  is  running  away." 

I  am  sure  you  will  be  interested  in  hearing  about  some  of  the  outstanding 
characteristics  and  achievements  of  this  truly  wonderful  State. 

OUE  FOLKS   OUE  BEST  ASSET 

1.  The  most  valuable  and  interesting  asset  of  any  country  are  the  folks  that 
live  in  it.  The  folks  in  North  Carolina  are  the  purest  Anglo-Saxon  stock  on  the 
American  continent.  The  Geographic  Magazine  some  time  ago  published  a  colored 
map  showing  that  less  than  one  per  cent  of  the  population  of  North  Carolina  is 
foreign  born.  Biologically,  our  Americanism  is  one  hundred  per  cent  pure. 
Theologically,  we  believe  in  a  good  God,  a  bad  devil,  and  a  hot  hell.  Sociologically 
— well,  a  Bolshevist  would  live  in  North  Carolina  about  as  long  as  a  Spanish 
mackerel  on  the  summit  of  Mount  Mitchell.  Politically,  though  for  the  time  we 
have  been  carried  away  into  captivity,  we  still  pray  with  our  faces  toward 
Jerusalem,  and  though  overwhelmed  by  legions  of  sinners,  we  still  cherish  an 
Abrahamic  faith  in  the  final  perseverance  of  the  saints. 

A  DEARTH  OF  COFFINS A  DELUGE  OF  CRADLES 

2.  Next  in  importance  to  folks  is  health,  and  North  Carolina  is  the  healthiest 
State  in  the  Union.  The  records  show  that  our  death  rate  is  the  lowest,  and  our 
birth  rate  the  highest,  of  any  state.  According  to  population,  we  buy  more 
cradles  and  fewer  coffins  than  any  other   state  in  the  Union.      This  marvelous 


214  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

record  is  based  on  a  climate  more  soothing  than  "Mrs.  Winslow's   Syrup"   and 
more  intoxicating  than  anything  you  can  buy  in  open  market. 

A  KOYAL    MIXTURE 

But  folks  love  land,  and  that  is  one  reason  why  they  are  just  now  crazy  about 
North  Carolina.  We  have  the  land — more  than  fifty-seven  varieties  of  it — for 
beauty  and  for  use.  In  going  from  Cape  Hatteras  to  the  Smoky  Mountains  you 
will  find  a  greater  variety  of  soil  and  climate  than  in  going  from  Hatteras  to 
Boston.  A  lot  of  this  land  was  not  originally  productive;  in  fact,  at  one  time 
some  of  it  was  so  poor  that  we  would  have  to  hold  an  inquest  over  it  to  find  out 
who  owned  it.  But  in  recent  years,  with  the  cunning  of  an  alchemist,  we  have 
learned  to  mix  Tar  Heel  brains  with  Tar  Heel  dirt.  This  mixture  has  wrought 
miracles  on  our  farms.  Today  we  grow  more  cotton  per  acre  than  any  other 
state  in  the  Union.  Also,  we  grow  peaches  that  blush  at  their  own  loveliness, 
grapes  that  rival  "the  vintage  of  Abiezer,"  and  apples  that  tempt  us  to  forgive 
Adam  for  throwing  Paradise  away. 

During  the  last  nine  years  North  Carolina  has  climbed  from  the  twenty-second 
to  the  fourth  state  in  the  Union  in  the  value  of  agricultural  products.  Only 
Texas,  Iowa  and  Illinois  beat  us  last  year.  Texas  is  not  a  state — it  is  an  empire. 
Speaking  in  terms  of  states,  only  two — Iowa  and  Illinois — made  a  larger  con- 
tribution of  agricultural  wealth  last  year. 

WEALTH    IN    WATEE 

We  also  have  a  wealth  of  water.  In  a  speech  on  "How  to  Build  Up  the 
American  Navy,"  Mark  Twain  once  said :  "It  is  easy  enough.  All  we  need  is 
some  men  and  ships.  We've  got  the  water."  North  Carolina  has  the  water.  Our 
average  rainfall  is  50.12  inches  per  year.  This  not  only  furnishes  a  plentiful 
supply  of  water  for  animal  and  vegetable  life,  but  from  the  mountains  to  the 
sea  we  have  a  fall  of  seven  thousand  feet,  and  this  gives  us  water  power  sufficient 
to  pull  all  the  trains,  light  all  the  cities,  and  run  all  the  factories  in  the  State. 
Engineers  call  running  water  "white  coal,"  and  we  can  gather  up  enough  of  this 
white  coal  to  make  it  unnecessary  for  North  Carolina  to  call  for  a  single  ton  of 
black  coal  from  the  mines.  We  have  already  gone  far  in  this  direction.  Charlotte, 
North  Carolina,  is  the  largest  distributing  center  of  hydro-electric  power  in  the 
world.  But  we  need  more  capital  to  conserve  this  unfailing  source  of  power  and 
heat  and  light,  and  statesmen  with  a  nation-wide  and  century-long  vision  would 
do  well  to  give  profound  study  to  the  water  powers  of  North  Carolina. 

THE    WHEELS    GO    BOUND 

While  agriculture  has  gone  forward,  manufacturing  has  not  lagged  in  the 
background.  For  many  years  about  the  only  thing  we  made  in  North  Carolina 
was  mistakes.  We  would  dig  something  out  of  the  ground  or  cut  it  from  the  forest, 
sell  it  to  you  folks  in  Philadelphia  for  ten  cents,  and  then  you  would  blow  on  it 
and  sell  it  back  to  us  for  a  dollar.  The  only  reason  this  process  did  not  kill  us 
long  ago  was  because  of  our  amazing  vitality.  Thirty  years  ago  everything  we 
manufactured  in  the  State  was  worth  forty  million  dollars.     Last  year  a  single 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  215 

concern  turned  out  manufactured  products  worth  two  hundred  million  dollars,  and 
while  the  exact  figures  are  not  available,  our  total  manufactured  products  during 
the  last  twelve  months  will  approximate  one  billion  dollars. 

We  manufacture  more  cotton  goods  than  any  other  state  except  Massachusetts. 
For  a  long  time  our  cotton  mills  confined  themselves  to  the  production  of  yarns 
and  the  cheapest  grades  of  plaids  and  sheetings,  but  now  they  make  everything 
from  jeans  strong  enough  to  hold  a  bucking  schoolboy  to  hosiery  so  delicate  it  is 
invisible  to  the  naked  eye. 

A     FEW     LEADING     SAMPLES 

And  we  do  not  confine  ourselves  to  cotton. 

Winston-Salem  manufactures  more  tobacco  than  any  other  city  in  the  world. 

At  Canton,  in  Haywood  County,  we  have  the  largest  wood  pulp  mill  in  the 
world. 

High  Point  makes  more  furniture  than  any  other  city  in  the  world  except 
Grand  Rapids. 

At  Badin,  on  the  Yadkin  River,  we  have  the  second  largest  aluminum  plant 
in  the  world. 

At  Kannapolis  is  the  largest  towel  plant  in  the  world. 

Durham  is  the  center  of  the  largest  hosiery  industry  in  the  world. 

Greensboro  is  the  home  of  the  largest  denim  mill  in  the  world. 

What  we  do,  we  do  with  all  our  might.  Worth  Carolina  was  slow  to  leave  the 
Union,  but  when  she  left  she  went  with  all  her  might,  and  although  we  had  only 
115,000  voters  in  the  State,  we  marshaled  127,000  men  under  the  Stars  and  Bars. 
And  then  we  came  back — back  with  all  our  might — without  reservations,  or  secret 
evasions  of  mind ;  and  as  an  illustration  of  how  completely  we  have  come  back  to 
the  Union,  there  is  today  in  Winston-Salem  a  factory  that  makes  more  union  suits 
than  any  other  place  in  the  world. 

TRIBUTE   TO    CLESAR 

There  is  another  substantial  bit  of  evidence  that  we  are  essentially  in  and  of 
the  Union.  Last  year  North  Carolina  paid  in  taxes  to  the  support  of  the  Federal 
Government  $163,000,000.     Only  seven  states  paid  more,  and  forty  paid  less. 

And  after  paying  out  all  this  money,  and  taking  more  than  our  allotment  of 
every  Liberty  Bond  issue,  on  the  first  day  of  January,  1920,  we  still  had  on 
deposit  in  our  banks  $359,000,000. 

It  is  said  that  currency  is  the  blood  of  commerce.  A  fair  conception  of  the 
growth  of  North  Carolina  commerce  during  the  last  twenty  years  may  be  ob- 
tained from  the  fact  that  in  1900  we  had  on  deposit  in  our  banks  $18,000,000;  in 
1910,  $66,000,000,  and  in  1920,  $359,000,000. 

North  Carolina  is  today,  per  capita,  the  richest  state  between  the  Potomac  and 
the  Rio  Grande,  and  a  recent  radical  but  scientific  revision  of  our  tax  laws  gives 
us  the  lowest  tax  rate  of  any  state  in  the  Union. 

A   GLANCE  AT  THE  PROCESSION 

The  limits  of  this  address  will  not  permit  even  a  snap  picture  of  what  has  been 
done  in  recent  years  for  the  physical,  intellectual  and  spiritual  regeneration  of 


216  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

our  people.  In  1918  the  people  in  ninety-nine  out  of  one  hundred  counties  voted 
to  put  into  our  State  Constitution  a  mandate  for  a  minimum  six-months  public 
school  in  every  district  in  the  State.  Theretofore  the  minimum  had  been  four 
months.  The  General  Assembly  of  1919  more  than  doubled  the  tax  rate  levied  for 
the  support  of  the  public  schools.  The  physical  examination  of  school  children 
at  public  expense;  a  thoroughly  modern  system  of  juvenile  courts;  a  public  wel- 
fare commission  that  touches  every  phase  of  the  State's  life;  moving  pictures  in 
country  schoolhouses  to  relieve  the  monotony  of  lonely  lives;  a  comprehensive  and 
highly  efficient  system  of  farm  demonstration  and  home  economics;  intelligent  aid 
and  supervision  on  the  part  of  the  State  in  installing  telephones,  electric  lights 
and  waterworks  in  country  homes ;  a  liberal  and  elastic  law  for  the  establishment 
of  farm  credit  associations ;  a  determined  crusade  against  the  crop  lien's  deadly 
blight ;  a  health  campaign  that  has  planted  the  banners  of  Life  in  the  very  citadels 
of  Death :  these  are  a  few  of  the  things  that  moved  a  great  teacher  in  our 
University  to  say  in  a  recent  public  address  that  "our  Valley  of  Humiliation  has 
been  changed  into  the  Valley  of  Decision  that  the  Prophet  Joel  saw  in  his  dreams." 
Therefore,  ladies  and  gentlemen,  not  in  pride,  but  with  the  grace  of  gratitude. 
I  give  you  the  toast : 

"Here's  to  the  land  of  the  long-leaf  pine, 
A  summer  land  where  the  sun  doth  shine; 
Where  the  weak  grow  strong  and  the  strong  grow  great — 
Here's  to  Down  Home — the  Old  North  State!" 


(18) 

SPEECH  AT  HAMPTON  NORMAL  AND 
AGRICULTURAL  INSTITUTE 

(Friday,  April  15,  1921) 

Though  only  fifty-three  years  old,  the  Hampton  Normal  and  Agricultural 
Institute  has  achieved  the  unique  and  noble  distinction  of  becoming  at  once  a 
fountain  and  a  shrine.  From  it  are  constantly  flowing  streams  that  make  waste 
places  glad,  and  from  every  quarter  of  the  continent  weary  pilgrims  come  here 
for  a  new  birth  of  courage,  of  faith  and  love. 

This  exalted  position  is  at  once  an  asset  and  a  liability.  Opportunity  is  ever 
the  forerunner  of  obligation,  and  power  is  inseparably  linked  with  responsibility. 
All  our  holdings  are  in  trust,  and  institutions  and  men  must  render  unto  the  Lord 
His  own,  with  usury. 

The  students  of  this  institution  should  never  forget  that  their  own  people  look 
to  them  for  light  and  leadership.  The  civilization  of  your  race  is  in  its  infancy, 
and  millions  of  your  fellows  are  plastic  to  your  touch.  Herein  lies  your  tremen- 
dous power  and  your  fearful  responsibility. 

If  you  shall  use  this  power  to  lead  your  people  away  from  ignorance  and 
poverty,  from  disease  and  crime;  if  you  shall  use  it  to  multiply  among  them  the 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  217 

forces  that  make  for  industry  and  economy,  for  cleanliness  and  morality,  for 
stability  and  reliability,  you  will  discbarge  your  debt  to  God,  to  tbis  institution, 
and  to  your  fellows.  If  you  sball  use  your  power  to  mislead  your  people,  to 
explort  them  or  to  debauch  them;  if  you  shall  sing  a  song  of  hate  or  hang  out 
false  lights  along  a  dangerous  coast,  then  it  were  better  for  you  that  a  millstone 
were  hanged  about  your  neck  and  you  were  cast  into  the  midst  of  the  sea. 

Your  mission  is  clear  and  compelling.  It  is  to  make  your  people  free.  But 
you  may  say,  "Mr.  Lincoln  freed  us,"  and  in  a  way  he  did.  He  gave  you  physical 
freedom,  the  right  to  rise  up  and  lie  down,  to  come  and  go,  at  your  will.  Such 
freedom  ought  to  be  a  blessing;  sometimes  it  is  a  curse. 

The  mudsill  of  all  genuine  freedom  is  self-control.  The  most  abject  slave  in 
this  world  is  the  man  who  is  a  slave  to  himself,  to  passion,  to  appetite,  to  hate. 
To  such  a  man  Magna  Charta  and  the  Declaration  of  Independence  are  empty 
words.  No  writ  of  habeas  corpus  can  release  him  from  bondage,  no  emancipation 
proclamation  can  break  his  shackles.  Upon  the  altar  of  genuine  freedom  must  be 
sacrificed  every  selfish  instinct  and  every  savage  passion. 

I  recently  saw  confined  in  a  great  iron  cage  two  magnificent  tigers.  My  first 
thought  was  that  the  cage  was  for  the  protection  of  the  people,  but  upon  reflection, 
I  realized  that  it  afforded  even  greater  protection  to  the  tigers.  Outside  of  that 
cage  the  tigers  would  not  have  lived  for  an  hour.  If  a  man  is  disposed  to  let  loose 
the  beast  there  is  in  him,  the  safest  place  in  the  world  for  him  is  in  jail.  Turn 
him  out,  and  he  will  be  shot  or  lynched. 

You  have  heard  it  said  that  vigilance  is  the  price  of  liberty.  I  say  unto  you 
that  obedience  is  the  price  of  life.  All  this  vast  scheme  of  things  moves  in 
obedience  to  law,  and  the  man  who  goes  counter  to  the  law,  either  in  the  physical 
or  moral  world,  will  be  ground  to  powder.  Self-discipline,  self-denial,  self-control, 
are  the  only  gateways  that  lead  to  the  marvelous  light  and  liberty  of  the  children 
of  God. 

Again,  you  cannot  have  even  physical  freedom  if  your  body  is  ravaged  by 
disease.  Disease  forges  more  chains  than  crime.  Elbert  Hubbard  says,  "It  is 
a  greater  disgrace  to  be  sick  than  to  be  in  the  penitentiary,"  and  there  is  more 
than  a  grain  of  truth  in  the  saying.  A  man  gets  into  the  penitentiary  by  violating 
the  laws  of  man,  while  he  frequently  gets  sick  by  violating  the  laws  of  God.  In  a 
vast  majority  of  cases,  sickness  may  be  traced  to  ignorance  or  vice  on  the  part 
of  the  public  or  the  individual.  Why  is  the  negro  more  frequently  afflicted  with 
smallpox  than  the  white  man?  It  is  not  an  African  disease;  it  flourishes  most  in 
cold  countries.  I  leave  the  answer  to  your  imagination.  Booker  "Washington  says 
that  one  of  the  most  valuable  things  that  he  learned  at  Hampton  Institute  was 
the  use  of  the  bath.  Let  the  educated  negro,  first  by  example  and  then  by  precept, 
preach  the  gospel  of  cleanliness,  and  the  race  will  take  a  long  step  in  the  direction 
of  genuine  freedom. 

Again,  a  man  cannot  be  truly  free  when  he  is  everlastingly  in  debt.  It  is 
certainly  no  disgrace  not  to  have  a  dollar,  but  it  is  sometimes  excruciatingly  in- 
convenient. I  may  want  to  travel  and  I  am  at  liberty  to  do  so,  but  tbis  liberty 
is  of  little  worth  if  I  can't  raise  the  price  of  a  ticket.  Before  the  war  if  a  ne°ro 
wanted  to  leave  his  master's  plantation,  he  had  to  get  a  permit.  If  he  did  not 
the  patrol  was  likely  to  give  him  some  embarrassment ;  hence,  the  old  plantation 
song,  "Run,  Negro,  run,  or  the  patrol  will  get  you."     This  was  a  humiliating 


218  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

situation,  but  the  negro  who  has  to  get  an  order  from  a  white  man  before  he  can 
buy  a  sack  of  meal  or  a  side  of  meat  is  almost  as  much  a  slave  as  the  man  who  had 
to  get  a  permit  before  he  could  leave  his  master's  land.  The  borrower  wears  the 
yoke  of  the  lender.  Put  this  down :  The  negro  as  a  race  will  not  travel  far  until  his 
credit  in  store  or  in  bank  is  as  good  as  that  of  the  white  man  who  lives  at  the 
other  end  of  the  street. 

Again :  The  place  that  any  race  occupies  in  the  scale  of  civilization  is  largely 
determined  by  the  way  it  treats  its  women,  and  the  negro  race  will  not  climb  high 
until  it  learns  to  treat  its  wives  and  its  mothers  and  its  daughters  with  the  same 
consideration  and  respect  that  the  white  man  treats  his.  Let  the  negroes  who 
go  from  this  institution  hammer  it  into  the  souls  of  their  people  with  a  white-hot 
brand,  that  the  negro  man  who  allows  his  wife  to  support  him,  who  beats  her  or 
neglects  her,  or  spends  his  dollars  on  another  woman,  is  a  disgrace  to  all  his  people. 

So,  I  say  that  self-control,  cleanliness,  morality,  industry,  reliability,  and 
proper  regard  for  its  women,  are  the  plain  highways  that  lead  to  a  larger  freedom 
for  the  negro  race.  Follow  these  highways,  do  not  stray  from  them,  and  you  will 
by  and  by  enter  fully  into  that  freedom  to  which  Mr.  Lincoln  merely  unlocked  the 
door. 

In  all  your  high  endeavors  to  reach  this  goal,  you  may  be  assured  of  the  un- 
stinted sympathy  and  cooperation  of  every  good  man  and  woman  in  the  South. 
We  are  not  only  willing,  but  very  eager  to  help.  My  wife's  old  negro  mammy 
was  a  most  lovable,  and  also  a  most  original  character.  She  was  a  sort  of  female 
"Uncle  Remus."  One  day  when  my  wife  was  just  budding  into  young  womanhood 
the  old  mammy  said  to  her,  "Honey,  a  man  has  got  a  sugar  tongue,  but  doan  you 
lis'en  to  de  things  he  say ;  you  watch  de  things  he  do." 

I  propose  to  meet  mammy's  test,  and  lay  before  you  some  of  the  things  that 
have  actually  been  done  in  North  Carolina  during  the  last  four  years.  I  shrink 
from  speaking  of  my  own  administration  as  Governor,  and  do  so  only  because 
I  devoutly  believe  that  the  administration  truly  reflected  the  best  thought  of  the 
best  people  of  North  Carolina,  and  of  the  entire  South. 

The  negro  is  entitled  to  equal  and  exact  justice  before  the  law.  The  white  man 
must  accord  him  that  justice  or  be  false  to  all  those  traditions  that  have  made  the 
Anglo-Saxon  race  the  glory  of  the  world. 

If  there  is  anything  that  a  white  man  despises  it  is  another  white  man  who 
tries  to  cheat  a  negro  out  of  his  wages  or  his  property.  One  of  the  first  cases 
that  ever  came  to  me  as  a  lawyer  was  one  in  which  a  white  man  was  trying  to 
swindle  an  old  negro  out  of  his  wages.  Hot  with  indignation  I  went  to  the  jury, 
preached  for  one-half  hour  on  the  text,  "The  laborer  is  worthy  of  his  hire."  The 
jury  administered  on  that  white  man  and  gave  the  old  negro  every  dollar  that  he 
claimed.  Mark  this :  While  the  white  man  has  a  profound  contempt  for  another 
white  man  who  won't  pay  a  negro  for  his  work,  he  has  a  like  contempt  for  a 
negro  who  won't  work  for  his  pay. 

When  I  became  Governor,  I  highly  resolved  that  during  the  four  years  of  my 
administration  there  should  be  measured  out  to  black  and  white  exactly  the  same 
quality  and  quantity  of  justice.  One  of  the  very  first  things  that  I  did  was  to 
make  a  careful  survey  of  the  State  prison,  and  in  it  I  found  many  of  your  people, 
literally  buried  alive.  Their  very  families  had  forgotten  their  existence.  I  found 
one  boy  who  was  sent  to  the  prison  when  he  was  eleven  years  old,  and  had  been 
there  twenty  years.     I  reached  down  a  hand  and  lifted  about  forty  of  these  out  of 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  219 

a  living  grave.  All  during  my  administration  the  hand  of  executive  clemency 
knew  no  color  line,  and  I  opened  the  prison  doors  to  more  than  four  hundred  of 
your  people.  To  me  the  most  beautiful  of  all  hymns  is,  "Abide  with  me ;  fast  falls 
the  eventide."  The  most  beautiful  lines  in  that  most  beautiful  hymn  are:  "When 
other  helpers  fail  and  comforts  flee,  Help  of  the  helpless,  oh,  abide  with  me." 
I  shall  ever  be  deeply  grateful  that  for  four  years  I  was  given  the  almost  Godlike 
power  to  be  the  "Help  of  the  helpless." 

Sentiment  against  mob  law  is  steadily  growing  in  North  Carolina.  During 
my  administration  I  preached  against  it  and  I  fought  against  it.  I  rushed  troops 
to  protect  prisoners,  leaders  of  mobs  were  indicted  and  convicted,  and  I  personally 
walked  right  into  a  mob  that  had  its  guns  drawn  on  me,  and  persuaded  it  to 
abandon  its  purpose.  During  my  administration  only  one  person  was  lynched 
after  he  had  been  taken  into  the  custody  of  the  law. 

Much  work  was  also  done  to  build  up  the  negro  along  physical,  moral  and 
educational  lines.  A  reformatory  for  delinquent  negro  boys  was  established,  a 
sanatorium  for  the  treatment  of  negroes  afflicted  with  tuberculosis  was  provided 
for,  and  the  appropriation  for  negro  teacher-training  schools  was  multiplied  by  five. 

Much  was  also  done  to  build  up  a  strong  public  sentiment  for  better  accom- 
modations on  the  trains.  When  a  negro  pays  the  same  money,  he  is  entitled  to 
ride  in  a  car  as  safe,  as  clean,  and  as  comfortable  as  the  white  man  rides  in.  It  is 
best  for  both  races  that  they  ride  in  separate  cars,  but  the  accommodations  should 
be  the  same.  The  law  already  requires  this,  and  you  will  find  the  good  people  of 
the  South  everlastingly  with  you  in  insisting  upon   its  efficient   administration. 

All  these  things  show  with  convincing  certainty  that  we  are  profoundly  in- 
terested in  the  protection  of  the  life,  the  liberty,  and  the  property  of  the  negro; 
and  that  we  propose  to  lay  ever  deeper  and  broader  foundations  for  his  physical, 
moral  and  intellectual  welfare. 

The  one  fly  in  the  ointment,  the  one  discord  in  the  music,  the  one  stumbling 
block  in  the  path  of  the  negro's  progress  is  the  fool  and  the  fanatic  who  go  about, 
stirring  up  prejudice  and  ill-will  between  the  races.  There  are  in  this  land  today 
negroes  with  brilliant  minds  who  are  using  their  talents  in  sowing  seeds  of  hate 
between  the  blacks  and  the  whites.  They  are  blinded  by  their  own  passions,  and 
in  the  insanity  of  wrath  would  lead  the  whole  race  into  an  open  grave. 

There  are  two  classes  of  these  agitators.  In  one  class  is  the  man  who  goes 
around  secretly,  in  the  lodges,  in  the  churches,  among  the  families,  and  poisons 
the  minds  and  hearts  of  negroes  against  their  white  neighbors.  Beware  of  the 
whisperer!  The  devil  whispered  in  the  ear  of  Eve  to  eat  of  the  forbidden  fruit 
and  she  would  not  surely  die.  She  hearkened  to  his  poisonous  tongue,  and  lost 
for  herself  and  her  race  a  Paradise.  Beware  of  the  whisperer !  In  this  free 
country  the  message  that  cannot  be  proclaimed  from  the  housetops  ought  not  to 
be  heard  by  a  loyal  American  citizen.  The  Ku  Klux  Klan  believes  in  the  whisper, 
and  that  is  one  of  the  reasons  why,  when  the  strong  man  from  Texas  tried  to 
establish  one  in  ISTorth  Carolina,  I  rose  up  and  hit  it  with  all  my  might,  and  drove 
it  from  our  borders.  Listen  to  your  leaders  who  proclaim  their  message  from  the 
pulpit  and  through  the  local  press,  and  when  the  whispering  agitator  comes  around, 
say  unto  him,  "Get  thee  behind  me,  Satan." 

The  other  class  of  agitator  is  the  man  who  does  not  come  down  into  the  South 
at  all,  but  who  stays  one  thousand  miles  away  and  through  newspapers  and  cir- 
culars and  magazines  sings  his  song  of  hate.     He  writes  about  appeals  to  force, 


220  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

but  lie  does  not  make  bare  bis  mighty  arm.  He  talks  about  guns  and  revolutions, 
but  be  does  not  come  down  and  bead  tbe  procession.  He  exercises  magnificent 
"long  distance"  courage.  Seated  in  a  swivel  cbair  in  a  luxuriant  office  one  thou- 
sand miles  from  tbe  firing  line,  be  bravely  sbouts  to  you :  "JSTow  is  tbe  time ;  up 
and  over  tbe  top."  Tbis  brand  of  agitator  reminds  me  of  tbe  speecb  made  by 
Artemus  Ward  during  the  War  Between  tbe  States.  Said  Artemus:  "I  tell  you, 
people,  tbis  Union  must  be  preserved.  I  bave  already  sbed  tbe  blood  of  two 
brothers,  five  uncles  and  thirty-seven  cousins  in  the  defense  of  this  Union,  and  I 
am  willing  to  keep  up  the  fight  for  the  Union  until  T  have  shed  the  last  drop  of 
blood  in  all  my  kinsfolk's  veins." 

Seriously,  my  friends,  suppose  the  agitator  should  succeed  in  his  purpose; 
suppose  tbe  seeds  of  bate  take  root,  and  the  two  races  in  the  South  rise  up  against 
each  other — what  will  be  the  consequences?  History  makes  that  plain.  Three 
hundred  years  ago  a  handful  of  negroes  landed  on  this  continent  in  a  state  of 
slavery.  They  found  here  millions  of  Indians  in  a  state  of  royal  freedom.  Today 
the  handful  of  negroes  has  grown  to  twelve  million,  while  the  millions  of  Indians 
have  dwindled  to  a  handful.  Why?  The  Indian  refused  to  live  on  friendly 
terms  with  the  whites.  He  learned  to  bate  the  white  man  and  to  defy  him. 
We  hear  him  sing  the  spirit  of  his  people : 

"I  love  among  the  wounded  to  hear  the  white  man  groan, 
And  catch,  while  chanting  at  his  side,  the  music  of  his  moan." 

When  tbe  white  man  wronged  the  Indian — and  he  did  wrong  him — the  Indian 
scorned  to  appeal  to  the  white  man's  sense  of  justice;  he  appealed  to  the  tomahawk, 
to  the  torch — and  tbe  places  that  knew  him  once,  know  him  no  more,  forever! 
There  is  no  doubt  that  these  apostles  of  hate  and  violence  offer  a  permanent 
solution  to  the  negro  problem,  for  there  can  be  no  negro  problem  when  there  are 
no  negroes. 

Let  me  make  a  candid  and  solemn  confession :  The  whites  in  the  South  and 
in  the  Worth  as  well  do  not  always  deal  justly  by  the  negro ;  we  sometimes  do  him 
wrong,  and  God  knows  I  am  ashamed  of  it;  but  violence  will  not  hasten  the  day 
of  your  deliverance,  and  hate  will  always  binder.  Tbe  God  of  your  redemption 
will  come,  not  in  the  migbty  wind,  not  in  tbe  earthquake,  and  not  in  the  fire ; 
but  in  a  "still,  small  voice"  that  will  trouble  the  white  man's  conscience  and 
drive  sleep  from  his  eyes  until  he  gives  to  your  people  the  fullest  measure  of 
justice.  Tbe  one  safe  path  for  the  negro  to  follow  is  tbe  path  that  leads  straight 
to  the  door  of  the  white  man's  conscience.  As  your  ardent  friend,  let  me  urge 
you  to  rest  your  case  on  the  white  man's  sense  of  justice,  and  to  keep  it  there. 
Let  it  be  known  that  you  propose  to  appeal  to  no  other  tribunal;  that  through 
days  and  nights,  in  sun  and  rain,  you  are  going  to  stand  patiently  at  the  door  and 
knock.  And  not  today,  and  perchance  not  tomorrow,  but  as  sure  as  tbe  Lord  God 
lives  and  rules  in  the  hearts  of  men,  some  day  every  plea  that  is  born  of  wisdom 
and  justice  will  be  allowed. 

Any  other  policy  will  surely  result  in  failure  and  may  result  in  tragedy. 
Radical  measures  of  any  kind  will  lock  the  wheels  of  your  progress  for  fifty  years. 
Appeal  to  force,  and  you  reap  a  riot;  appeal  to  the  fears  of  the  whites,  and  the 
sheeted  legions  of  the  Ku  Klux  Klan  will  bring  on  nights  of  horror.  Make  a  drive 
for  political  dominion,  and  the  red  shirt  will  again  take  the  saddle.     But  while 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  221 

hate  and  wrath  will  lead  to  failure  and  destruction,  love  and  faith  will  surely 
conquer.    "Love  never  f  aileth." 

My  message,  my  prayer  to  both  races  is,  "First,  love  one  another,  and  all  these 
things  will  he  added  unto  you." 


(19) 
HOW  TO  BE  BEAUTIFUL 

Max  O'Rell  tells  the  following  story  on  himself.  Say  he:  "I  was  once 
scheduled  to  lecture  before  a  woman's  college  in  the  United  States.  During  the 
day  the  members  of  the  senior  class  called  on  me  at  my  hotel,  and  the  president 
of  the  class  asked  me  on  what  subject  I  would  lecture  that  evening.  I  replied, 
'On  Woman.'  I  thought  I  detected  a  look  of  impatience  in  the  face  of  the  young 
lady,  and  said,  'Is  madamoiselle  not  pleased?'  'Well,'  she  replied,  'I  was  just 
wondering  why  you  should  leave  your  home  in  the  pleasant  land  of  France  and 
travel  three  thousand  miles  across  the  ocean  to  talk  to  an  audience  of  women  upon 
a  subject  about  which  any  girl  of  sixteen  years  knows  more  than  you  will  ever 
dream  of.' " 

Well,  it  is  a  truism  that  no  man  profits  by  the  experience  of  another,  and  very 
few  by  their  own.  And  so  in  spite  of  Mr.  O'Rell's  experience,  I  am  going  to  talk 
to  you  today  about  women. 

A  man  is  so  constituted,  and  woman  may  be  his  sister  in  this  respect,  that  he 
will  talk  about  that  which  is  of  absorbing  interest  to  himself.  And  a  man's 
interest  in  a  subject  is  frequently  in  inverse  proportion  to  his  knowledge. 

The  Athenians  were  not  a  peculiar  people  in  their  disposition  to  worship  an 
unknown  God.  Indeed,  I  will  hazard  the  statement  that  a  measure  of  mystery  is 
essential  to  romance,  and  it  may  be  that  the  very  elusiveness  of  woman  accounts 
for  her  perpetual  lure. 

However  deficient  the  treatment  may  be,  you  will  all  allow  that  I  have  selected 
an  attractive  subject,  that  subject  being  yourselves.  I  suspect  that  the  only 
subject  that  could  rival  it,  not  in  attractiveness,  but  in  interest,  would  be  ourselves. 
I  confess,  however,  that  I  am  awed  by  my  own  daring,  when  I  tell  you  that  I  am 
going  to  talk  to  you  on  How  to  be  Beautiful. 

My  first  remark  is :  Be  beautiful.  You  must  be.  If  you  cannot  be  entirely 
beautiful,  then  wage  an  unwearying  campaign  to  be  as  beautiful  as  you  can  be. 

Wo  woman  has  a  right  to  be  ugly.  An  ugly  woman  is  a  mistake;  a  misfit; 
out  of  joint;  out  of  tune;  at  war  with  the  law  and  the  purpose  of  her  being. 
Whenever  I  see  an  ugly  woman  I  know  that  somebody,  somewhere,  has  either 
sinned  or  blundered,  and  the  woman  has  been  cheated  of  her  birthright.  It  was 
the  first  intention,  the  original  plan,  that  woman  should  be  beautiful,  the  climax 
and  the  glory  of  creation.  In  the  very  genesis  of  the  race  "the  sons  of  God  saw 
the  daughters  of  men  that  they  were  fair." 

Says  the  Scotch  bard: 

"Auld  Nature  swears  the  lovely  dears 

Her  noblest  work  she  classes,  oh. 
Her  'prentice  han'  she  tried  on  man, 
And  then  she  made  the  lasses,  oh." 


222  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

And  Milton,  old  and  blind  though  he  was,  and  unfortunate  in  his  domestic 
relations,  says  of  the  first  woman,  as  she  came  fresh  from  the  hand  of  God : 

"Grace  was  in  all  her  steps,  Heaven  in  her  eye, 
In  every  gesture  dignity  and  love." 

The  poets  are  the  best  witnesses.  To  them  are  given  eyes  to  see,  and  I  could 
marshal  them  all  in  shining  array  to  bear  witness  to  the  truth  that  it  is  the  natural 
right  of  every  woman  to  be  beautiful — it  was  her  first  estate. 

But,  while  chivalry  shrinks  from  it,  candor  forces  the  admission  that  some  have 
fallen  from  that  high  eminence.  How  ?  Partly  through  sin — chiefly  through 
folly.  And  not  the  least  folly  is  that  of  tamely  submitting  to  ugliness  as  a  dis- 
pensation of  Providence.  Such  a  mental  attitude  would  be  blasphemy  if  it  were 
not  for  its  colossal  stupidity. 

We  stand  up  in  church  and  recite,  "The  heavens  declare  the  glory  of  God  and 
the  firmament  showeth  His  handiwork,"  and  then  go  out  and  in  our  hearts  charge 
Him  with  responsibility  for  the  things  that  are  defective  and  ugly  and  vile. 

Mark  it,  memorize  it  and  inwardly  digest  it :  ugliness  is  a  preventable  disease. 
It  belongs  in  the  same  category  with  smallpox,  tuberculosis  and  typhoid  fever. 
Once  we  get  it  properly  classified,  branded  in  the  public  mind  for  what  it  is,  we 
have  gone  far  towards  accomplishing  its  annihilation. 

Again,  some  supposedly  strong-minded  women  and  a  few  anemic  men  belittle 
the  value  of  beauty,  and  what  is  cheapened  is  neglected.  Why,  some  people  in 
mock  humility  return  thanks  because  they  have  no  looks  to  make  them  proud. 
They  treat  the  absence  of  physical  beauty  as  evidence  of  spiritual  grace.  They 
make  capital  of  their  ugliness  as  Tom  Sawyer  did  of  his  sore  toe. 

Let  it  be  understood,  once  for  all,  that  woman's  crowning  glory  and  chief 
endowment  is  her  beauty.  Lord  Byron  did  not  draw  on  his  poetic  license  when 
he  wrote : 

"Who  doth  not  feel,  until  his  failing  sight 
Paints  into  dimness,  at  its  own  delight, 
His  changing  cheek,  his  sinking  heart  confess, 
The  might,  the  majesty  of  loveliness?"  » 

Her  own  loveliness  is  the  lever  by  which  woman  is  enabled  to  mightily  in- 
fluence the  world  in  favor  of  the  things  that  are  lovely  and  of  good  report.  Beauty 
is  the  master  key  that  opens  every  door.  The  world  has  never  yet  denied  a  beauti- 
ful woman  a  fair  chance.  If  a  good  face  is  a  letter  of  recommendation,  a  beautiful 
one  is  a  letter  of  credit.  In  the  outset,  the  world  never  rates  a  woman  at  less  than 
her  face  value. 

One  of  the  most  human  of  all  stories  is  that  of  Samson.  It  will  be  remembered 
that  when  he  fell  in  love  with  the  woman  of  Timnath  his  father  remonstrated  with 
him  and  said :  "Is  there  never  a  woman  among  the  daughters  of  thy  people  that 
thou  goest  to  take  a  wife  of  the  uncircumcised  Philistines?"  But  Samson  said 
unto  his  father:   "Get  her  for  me;  she  pleaseth  me  well." 

In  this  attitude  Samson  is  typical  of  all  his  brothers.  When  a  strong  man  loves 
a  beautiful  woman,  entreaties  and  arguments  fall  upon  deaf  ears.  With  a  blind- 
ness to  consequences  at  once  foolish  and  sublime,  he  says :   "She  pleaseth  me  well." 

But  it  may  be  said  that  events  show  that  Samson  played  the  fool.  Granted. 
But  the  fact  remains  that  he  was  Samson,  the  strongest  man  that  ever  walked  this 
earth,  and  the  Judge  of  Israel  for  twenty  years. 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  223 

All  history  shows  that  in  the  supreme  crisis  of  life  sentiment  triumphs  over 
thought.  The  cold  figures  on  the  bank  ledgers  bear  witness  that  the  world  pays 
far  more  for  fancies  than  it  does  for  facts.  Herein  may  lie  the  explanation  why 
a  man  sometimes  spends  more  money  on  his  sweetheart  than  he  does  on  his  wife. 
A  sweetheart  is  always  a  fancy;  the  wife  may  descend  to  or  be  reduced  to  a  mere 
fact.  Then  comes  disillusionment,  disenchantment,  and  the  man  and  woman  who 
erstwhile  took  passage  on  a  golden  galleon  for  the  Islands  of  the  Blest,  find  them- 
selves adrift  on  a  common  freighter,  bound  for  one  of  three  ports :  the  first  is  the 
port  of  Indifference,  and  many  there  be  who  anchor  there ;  the  second  is  the  cold, 
bleak  harbor  of  Despair,  and  the  third  the  murky,  muddy  water  of  Divorce. 

A  woman  went  to  a  lawyer  one  day  and  told  him  a  tale  of  domestic  woe.  The 
lawyer  said:  "Well,  madam,  under  this  state  of  facts  you  are  clearly  entitled  to 
a  divorce."  "But  I  don't  want  a  divorce,"  said  the  woman.  "Well,  then,"  said  the 
lawyer,  "I  can  get  you  a  liberal  allowance  for  alimony."  "But  I  don't  want  any 
alimony,"  replied  the  woman.  "Well,  my  dear  woman,  what  do  you  want  me 
to  do  for  you,"  asked  the  lawyer.    "I  want  you  to  make  him  love  me." 

Well,  we  lawyers  are  wonderful  men.  At  least,  we  like  for  our  clients  to  so 
regard  us ;  it  pays.    But  even  a  lawyer  cannot  make  Humpty  Dumpty  whole  again. 

But  what  the  lawyer,  with  all  his  wisdom  and  his  cunning,  could  not  restore, 
the  woman  might  have  preserved  in  its  primal  vigor  by  the  judicious  use  of  a  smile, 
a  ribbon  and  a  rose.     Women  may  not  like  flattery;  men  do — from  a  woman. 

"When  I  tell  Csesar  he  hates  flatterers,  he  smiles  and  says  he  does, 
Being  then  most  flattered." 

And  there  is  no  more  delicious  flattery  to  a  man's  vanity  than  for  a  woman  to 
dress  up,  to  take  pains  to  make  herself  look  beautiful,  just  for  him.  And  this 
flattery  loses  none  of  its  magic  if  the  woman  happens  to  be  his  own  wife. 

Byron  struck  a  deep  note  when  he  wrote 

"  'Tis  sweet  to  know  there  is  an  eye  will  mark  your  coming, 
And  grow  brighter  when  you  come." 

Just  one  word  more  on  the  supreme  importance  of  being  as  beautiful  as  you 
may.  If  a  woman  will  not  take  pains  to  look  beautiful  in  the  eyes  of  her  husband, 
there  is  always  the  possibility  that  some  other  woman  will. 

An  eminent  American  physician  discovered  a  profound  insight  into  the  real 
character  of  a  man  when  he  said :  "When  a  man  limits  his  praises  of  his  wife 
exclusively  to  her  good  judgment  and  fine  traits  of  character,  it  is  high  time  for 
her  to  take  a  vacation  and  get  some  new  clothes." 

But  the  practical  question  is:  How  may  this  kingdom  of  beauty  be  acquired? 
N"ow,  do  not  think  for  one  moment  that  I  am  going  to  venture  into  the  bewildering 
labyrinth  of  hats  and  hairpins,  and  laces  and  furs,  and  ribbons  and  embroideries, 
and  flounces  and  frills,  and  whalebone  and  cosmetics.  My  prescriptions  relate  to 
the  woman  and  not  to  her  environment.    I  offer  just  three. 

First.  Be  strong.  This  is  basic,  fundamental.  The  dictum  of  Herbert  Spencer 
that  it  takes  a  good  animal  to  make  a  good  man  is  now  accepted  as  a  working 
principle  in  every  movement  for  the  uplift  of  the  human  race. 

The  beginning  of  beauty  is  a  good  digestion.  Try  just  for  a  moment  to 
associate  in  your  mind  beauty  with  dyspepsia.  You  can't  do  it.  The  two  are 
not  affinities.  It  follows  that  the  triumphs  of  the  parlor  begin  in  the  kitchen. 
The  cook  does  the  first,  best  work  in  the  creation  of  the  belle  of  the  ball. 


224  PAPERS  OP  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

How  does  the  florist  produce  a  perfect  rose?  By  a  careful  study  of  soil  and 
atmosphere.  A  flower  cannot  realize  its  finest  possibilities  unless  it  be  properly 
fed.    Neither  can  a  woman. 

A  sensible  diet  should  be  the  first  course  in  every  school  for  girls.  A  practical 
course  in  dietetics  will  contribute  more  to  the  development  of  a  fine  type  of 
American  womanhood  than  a  taste  of  near-French  or  a  glimpse  of  far-off  art. 
The  importance  of  a  sensible  diet  deserves  daily  emphasis.  It  is  hard  to  get  a 
sweet,  fluffy  young  thing  to  understand  that  the  simplest  fare  is  the  best.  Young 
ladies,  there  are  more  roses  for  your  cheeks  in  poached  eggs  and  turnip  salad  than 
in  those  dainty,  delicious  promoters  of  indigestion  that  Mr.  Huyler  sells  for 
eighty  cents  a  pound.  There  is  more  elasticity  of  step  in  a  sound,  ripe  apple  than 
in  all  the  fifty-seven  toothsome  varieties  that  Mr.  Heinz  has  made  famous. 
There  is  more  sparkle  for  your  eyes  in  a  glass  of  pure  buttermilk  than  in  the 
whole  sizzling  aggregation  of  soda  fountain  concoctions.  There  are  more  graceful 
curves  for  your  figure  in  dry  toast  than  in  those  darling  little  wafers  and  Zu-zus 
that  have  brought  wealth  and  fame  to  the  National  Biscuit  Company. 

An  immortal  illustration  of  how  a  simple  diet  makes  for  personal  beauty  is 
found  in  the  Book  of  Daniel : 

And  the  king  appointed  them  a  daily  provision  of  the  king's  meat,  and 
of  the  wine  which  he  drank,  so  nourishing  them  three  years  that  at  the  end 
thereof  they  might  stand  before  the  king.  But  Daniel  purposed  in  his  heart 
that  he  would  not  defile  himself  with  the  portion  of  the  king's  meat,  nor  with 
the  wine  which  he  drank;  therefore  he  requested  of  the  prince  of  the 
eunuchs  that  he  might  not  defile  himself.  And  the  prince  of  the  eunuchs 
said  unto  Daniel,  "I  fear  my  lord  the  king,  who  hath  appointed  your  meat 
and  your  drink;  for  why  should  he  see  your  faces  worse  liking  than  the 
children  which  are  of  your  sort?"  Then  said  Daniel  to  Melzar,  "Prove  thy 
servants,  I  beseech  thee,  ten  days;  and  let  them  give  us  pulse  to  eat  and 
water  to  drink.  Then  let  our  countenances  be  looked  upon  before  thee,  and 
the  countenance  of  the  children  that  eat  of  the  portion  of  the  king's  meat, 
and  as  thou  seest,  deal  with  thy  servants."  So  he  consented  to  them  in  this 
matter,  and  proved  them  ten  days.  At  the  end  of  ten  days  their  counte- 
nances appeared  fairer  and  fatter  in  flesh  than  all  the  children  which  did 
eat  the  portion  of  the  king's  meat.  Now  at  the  end  of  the  days  that  the 
king  had  said  he  should  bring  them  in,  then  the  prince  of  the  eunuchs 
brought  them  in  before  Nebuchadnezzar.  And  the  king  communed  with 
them;  and  among  them  all  was  found  none  like  Daniel,  Hananiah,  Mishael 
and  Azariah;  therefore  stood  they  before  the  king. 

Wot  only  should  the  girls  be  taught  the  value  of  food  products,  but  they  should 
be  trained  in  cooking  the  food  so  as  to  make  a  palatable,  wholesome  meal.  I  do 
not  say  you  should  be  a  cook,  but  I  do  say  that  you  should  master  the  art.  Tou 
owe  it  to  yourself,  and  to  the  brethren,  to  be  an  authority  on  the  subject.  The 
things  that  come  from  the  kitchen  tend  to  kill  or  to  make  alive.  Here  you  are  in 
a  very  real  sense  your  brother's  keeper. 

I  often  dream  of  what  I  would  do  if  I  were  a  Carnegie.  It  is  a  delightful  and 
withal  inexpensive  sort  of  diversion.  I  would  spend  millions  in  establishing 
cooking  schools.  I  would  put  one  in  every  county  in  Worth  Carolina,  and  then 
I  would  have  my  legislature — for  of  course,  if  I  were  a  Carnegie,  I  would  have  me 
a  legislature — I  would  have  my  legislature  to  pass  me  a  law  that  no  license 
should  be  issued  for  the  marriage  of  any  woman  in  Worth  Carolina  who  could 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  225 

not  produce  a  diploma  from  one  of  those  cooking  schools.  Oh,  they  would  be  great 
institutions !  They  would  do  more  for  the  health  of  the  people  than  all  the 
doctors  and  more  for  religion  than  half  the  preachers.  For  making  a  man  live 
in  love  and  fellowship  with  his  neighbor,  for  making  him  feel  like  he  has  old-time 
religion,  a  good  cook  can  beat  a  revivalist. 

But  the  development  of  beauty  that  will  neither  wash  off  nor  wear  off  requires 
daily  exercise  as  well  as  daily  bread.  The  God  of  Nature  has  enacted  one  inexor- 
able law.  The  penalty  for  disuse  is  death.  Service  is  not  only  the  test  of  efficiency ; 
it  is  the  very  condition  of  life.  Every  bone  and  nerve  and  sinew  in  the  wonderful 
mechanism  of  the  human  body  daily  cries  out,  "Lean  on  me,  use  me,  let  me  labor 
that  I  may  live." 

Begin  the  day  with  at  least  ten  minutes  exercise  in  some  of  the  gymnastics 
prescribed  by  Sargent  of  the  Harvard  School  of  Physical  Culture  or  by  any 
standard  authority  on  the  subject.  Then  when  you  are  through  with  your  classes, 
make  for  the  open  air,  and  spend  at  least  one  hour  in  playing  tennis,  basketball  or 
some  other  lively  outdoor  sport.  The  Olympic  games  furnished  Grecian  sculptors 
the  finest  models  the  world  has  ever  known. 

But  above  all  things  walk,  walk  from  three  to  five  miles  a  day.  The  child  is 
supposed  to  be  able  to  walk  well  when  it  is  two  years  old.  I  have  seen  girls  of 
sixteen  who  had  never  walked  enough  to  know  how.  And  do  not  walk  in  a  house ; 
you  need  to  spend  every  hour  possible  in  God's  great  out-of-doors.  Put  on  a 
sensible  pair  of  shoes  and  strike  out  across  the  country.  "Walk  briskly  up  and  down 
hill,  through  woods  and  fields,  jump  ditches,  walk  slippery  logs,  scale  a  barbed 
wire  fence,  climb  a  hickory-nut  tree;  and  then  go  home  and  be  sure  that  you 
are  in  bed  by  ten  o'clock;  take  a  ten  hours  beauty  sleep  with  your  windows  wide 
open,  and  when  you  come  down  the  next  morning  to  breakfast  the  very  sight  of 
you  will  make  any  son  of  Adam  feel  like  he  has  been  hit  by  a  bolt  of  sweetened 
lightning. 

The  very  foundation  of  all  beauty  is  a  well  trained  body.  If  books  or  bodies 
must  be  neglected,  then  throw  books  out  of  the  window.  A  good  red  corpuscle  is 
of  more  value  than  a  curriculum.  An  education  that  takes  the  roses  from  a 
girl's  cheeks,  the  spring  from  her  steps  or  the  light  from  her  eye  is  a  crime  against 
girlhood  and  against  womanhood. 

Over  the  gateway  of  every  college,  on  the  walls  of  every  classroom  should  be 
emblazoned  the  prayer  of  the  Latin  poet :  "Orandum  est  ut  sit  mens  sana  in 
corf  ore  sano." 

Of  all  the  nature  poets  Wordsworth  has  the  finest,  the  most  unerring  touch. 
In  lines  as  beautiful  and  more  enduring  than  the  tracing  of  Phidias  on  Parian 
marble,  he  tells  how  nature  fosters  and  fashions  a  perfect  woman. 

Three  years  she  grew  in  sun  and  shower, 
Then  Nature  said,  "A  lovelier  flower 

On  earth  was  never  sown; 
This  Child  I  to  myself  will  take; 
She  shall  be  mine,  and  I  will  make 

A  lady  of  my  own. 
15 


226  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

"Myself  will  to  my  darling  be 
Both  law  and  impulse;  and  with  me 

The  Girl,  in  rock  and  plain, 
In  earth  and  heaven,  in  glade  and  bower, 
Shall  feel  an  overseeing  power 

To  kindle  or  restrain. 

"She  shall  be  sportive  as  the  fawn 
That  wild  with  glee  across  the  lawn 

Or  up  the  mountain  springs; 
And  hers  shall  be  the  breathing  balm, 
And  hers  the  silence  and  the  calm 
Of  mute,  insensate  things. 

"The  floating  clouds  their  state  shall  lend 
To  her;  for  her  the  willow  bend; 

Nor  shall  she  fail  to  see 
Even  in  the  motions  of  the  Storm 
Grace  that  shall  mould  the  Maiden's  form 
By  silent  sympathy. 

"The  stars  of  midnight  shall  be  dear 
To  her;  and  she  shall  lend  her  ear 

In  many  a  secret  place 
Where  rivulets  dance  their  wayward  round, 
And  beauty  born  of  murmuring  sound 
Shall  pass  into  her  face. 

"And  vital  feelings  of  delight 
Shall  rear  her  form  to  stately  height, 

Her  virgin  bosom  swell; 
Such  thoughts  to  Lucy  I  will  give 
While  she  and  I  together  live 

Here  in  this  happy  dell." 

My  second  prescription  is :   Be  natural. 

It  is  the  only  way  to  be  forceful.  The  great  actresses  are  easily  numbered.  Few 
people  can  pose  and  not  be  ridiculous.  Affectation  spoils  more  faces  than  smallpox. 
You  simply  cannot  develop  grace  and  charm  in  a  self-conscious  personality.  Be 
genuine,  be  open-minded,  be  sincere.  Ours  is  an  age  of  imitation,  of  sham.  So 
many  things  are  painted  over,  or  powdered  over,  or  plastered  over,  or  veneered  over. 

Notwithstanding  the  Pure  Food  and  Drug  Act,  it  is  hard  to  find  anything  that 
is  exactly  what  it  purports  to  be.  Satin  has  given  way  to  sateen,  velvet  to  vel- 
veteen, beer  to  beerine,  and  even  butter  to  butterine.  The  "eens"  are  in  the  saddle. 
Is  there  a  danger  that  our  girls  will  become  "girlines"  ?  Please  don't !  Be  a  girl, 
be  yourself,  and  not  the  shoddy  imitation  of  somebody  else.  Find  the  niche  in 
the  Pantheon  the  Builder  designed  you  should  fill,  and  then  fill  it,  fill  it  to  the 
uttermost,  "for  the  gods  see  everywhere." 

A  young  lady,  a  relative  of  mine,  was  once  going  to  meet  a  lot  of  new  people. 
She  said  to  me,  "I  am  afraid  I  won't  know  what  to  say  to  those  people."  I  replied, 
"Say  what  you  think."  She  said,  "I  might  not  think  anything."  I  said,  "Then 
sav  that." 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  227 

One  child  is  as  interesting  as  three  grown  people ;  why  ?  The  child  is  always 
perfectly  natural.  It  says  exactly  what  it  thinks  and  in  its  own  way.  It  is  some- 
times as  embarrassing  as  it  is  interesting.  Said  the  small  boy  to  the  visiting  lady: 
"My  paw  says  you  ain't  no  two-faced  woman."  "How  nice  of  your  papa!"  ex- 
claimed the  lady.  "Yes,"  said  the  small  boy,  "my  paw  says  you  ain't  no  two- 
faced  woman,  cause  if  you  was  you  would  wear  your  other  face." 

I  once  asked  a  young  lady  what  she  thought  of  a  certain  book.  She  said  that 
she  thought  nothing  of  it,  that  books  bored  her.  She  said  she  liked  to  talk  about 
hats,  and  asked  me  what  I  thought  of  the  one  she  had  on.  How  delightfully 
refreshing  that  was!  The  girl  knew  all  about  hats,  could  talk  interestingly  and 
discriminatingly  about  hats;  and  how  much  better  that  was  than  a  lot  of  stereo- 
typed, mildewed,  moth-eaten  platitudes  and  insipidities  about  books  of  which  she 
knew  little  and  cared  less. 

Know  what  you  pretend  to  know.  Do  not  be  smatter-brained ;  do  not  be 
scatter-brained.  Be  accurate,  be  thorough.  Inaccuracy  lives  next  door  to  dis- 
honesty, and  slovenliness  in  work  or  dress  is  half-sister  to  immorality.  In  the 
matter  of  dress — 

"To  thine  own  self  be  true; 
And  it  must  follow,  as  the  night  the  day, 
Thou  canst  not  then  be  false  to  any  man." 

I  want  to  see  the  day  when  the  refined,  cultured  women  of  America  will  defy 
the  shopkeepers  of  Paris ;  when  they  will  refuse  to  hop  because  some  sprig  of 
royalty  goes  lame. 

Speaking  of  the  state  of  slavery  in  which  American  women  are  held  by  the 
United  Dressmakers  Association,  Dr.  Woods  Hutchinson  says :  "When  the  par- 
ticular Hindoo  idol  atrocity  for  the  year  of  grace  has  been  established,  nine- 
tenths  of  the  intelligent,  cultured,  refined  and  beauty-loving  women  of  the 
country  fairly  tumble  over  one  another  in  their  eagerness  to  bow  down  before  it, 
and  make  themselves  like  unto  it.  As  a  crusher-out  of  individuality  and  whole- 
some beauty,  the  modern  god  Style  has  the  car  of  Juggernaut  beaten  to  a  frazzle. 
These  extravagances  are  merely  the  result  of  our  attitude  of  frank  and  cheerful 
idiocy  toward  beauty  and  its  claims.  The  best  way  to  abolish  them  is  to  encourage 
the  banner  of  revolt  which  the  natural  taste  and  good  sense  of  woman  has  already 
raised  against  the  adoption  of  any  style,  no  matter  what  its  popularity,  which  does 
not  happen  to  be  becoming  to  her  personality." 

That  is  the  doctrine;  that  is  the  new  Declaration  of  Independence  that  will 
give  to  American  women  the  largest  measure  of  freedom.  Dress  is  essentially 
and  intimately  personal.  Every  woman  of  culture  knows  all  about  colors  and 
proportion,  and  knows  what  is  personally  becoming  to  her.  I  am  glad  that  so 
many  college-bred  women  are  asserting  their  independence  in  the  matter  of  dress. 
They  can  render  their  less  fortunate  sisters  heroic  service  by  leading  the  revolt 
that  will  throw  off  the  yoke  of  these  lowborn  tyrants,  whose  business  it  is  to 
distort  and  caricature  the  human  body  that  profits  may  accrue. 

Go  your  own  way,  travel  your  own  gait.  "Study  well,  wherein  kind  nature 
meant  you  to  excel."  If  your  talent  be  to  sew,  then  sew  with  hand  and  heart,  and 
verily  there  shall  be  virtue  in  the  hem  of  the  garment.  If  it  be  to  sing,  then  sing 
from  your  heart  a  song  that  will  reach  the  heart  of  the  world ;  and  the  young  shall 
see  visions  and  the  old  dream  dreams.  Throw  yourself,  all  of  you,  into  your  work, 
and  you  will  do  your  part  toward  bringing  on  that  ideal  hour  when — 


228  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

"Each  for  the  joy  of  the  working, 
And  each  in  his  separate  star, 
Shall  draw  the  Thing  as  he  sees  it, 
For  the  God  of  Things  as  they  are." 

I  have  said  that  in  order  to  be  beautiful,  be  strong,  be  natural. 

A  last  word :  Be  holy.  You  must  be  if  you  would  enter  into  the  full  kingdom 
of  the  Woman  Beautiful.  The  King's  daughter  is,  and  of  necessity  must  be,  all 
glorious  within.  No  scientific  truth  is  more  surely  established  than  that  the  face 
is  an  etching  of  the  soul.  "A  merry  heart  maketh  a  comely  countenance;  a  man's 
wisdom  maketh  his  face  to  shine." 

Stephen  had  climbed  to  the  hour  of  his  martyrdom.  In  the  midst  of  the 
council  that  had  met  to  condemn  him  to  die,  he  stood  calm,  peaceful,  unafraid. 
It  was  not  a  miracle,  but  the  operation  of  an  eternal,  natural  law,  that  made  his 
enemies  see  his  face  "as  it  had  been  the  face  of  an  angel." 

The  intimate  relation  between  beauty  and  holiness  was  felt  by  dear  John 
Charles  McNeill,  and  he  has  forever  linked  the  two  in  his  inimitable  poem  on 
Sunset.  I  knew  him  and  loved  him  well,  and  I  shall  always  think  of  him  as 
standing  on  the  brow  of  a  lonely  hill,  gazing  deep  into  the  glories  of  the  sunset, 
seeing  far  beyond  its  radiant  glow,  his  dark  face  illumined  with  a  "glory  brighter 
than  the  sun"  as  he  translates  for  us  the  beauty  of  the  scene : 

"Hills  wrapped  in  gray,  standing  along  the  west; 
Clouds,  dimly  lighted,  gathering  slowly; 
The  star  of  peace  at  watch  above  the  crest — 

Oh,  holy,  holy,  holy! 
We  know,  O  Lord,  so  little  what  is  best; 

Wingless,  we  move  so  lowly; 
But  in  Thy  calm  all-knowledge  let  us  rest — 
Oh,  holy,  holy,  holy!" 

Mind  you,  I  did  not  say,  be  sanctimonious.  Please  don't  be.  Above  all  things, 
do  not  sap  your  strength  of  mind  and  heart  in  speculations  upon  the  myriad 
creeds  and  isms  that  divide  and  distract  the  world.  It  is  a  sinful  waste  of  God's 
good  hours.  But  in  all  sincerity  I  urge  you  to  be  holy.  "Take  time  to  be  holy; 
the  world  rushes  on." 

In  that  exquisitely  beautiful  sketch,  "The  Pride  of  the  Village,"  Washington 
Irving  says :  "She  was  ever  surrounded  with  a  halo  of  virgin  purity,  and  within 
that  hallowed  circle  no  guilty  thought  could  live." 

The  world  needs  this  kind  of  atmosphere ;  it  must  have  it  or  perish  from  moral 
malaria.  It  is  the  high  privilege  of  woman  to  supply  this  demand.  Man  cannot 
do  it.  Every  morning  he  faces  the  problem  of  how  to  make  a  living.  He  must 
go  down  into  the  dust  and  mire  of  the  streets,  and  sometimes  must  wade  through 
the  very  sewers  of  life  to  solve  it.  In  the  rude  crush,  in  the  stress  and  strain  of 
competition,  in  the  eternal  duel  with  "faces  lined  with  scheming,"  the  finest 
instincts,  the  gentler  impulses  are  impaired,  if  not  destroyed,  and  the  man  some- 
times finds  that  part  of  his  nature  which  God  intended  should  blossom  as  a  rose, 
hardening  into  flint.  It  is  at  this  point  that  woman  can  save  him;  it  is  her 
opportunity — her  hour.  In  the  world  about  us  there  is  no  lack  of  suffering,  of 
sorrow,  of  tragedy.  On  every  hand  we  hear  the  low  moan  of  pain,  the  wail  of 
wild  unrest.     Many  and  varied  are  the  forms  of  human  suffering;  but  there  is 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  229 

one  man  who  stands  alone,  apart,  the  very  chief  of  sufferers.  It  is  the  man  who, 
when  he  has  done  his  day's  work  and  starts  home,  goes  down  grade ;  when  the 
woman  to  whom  he  goes,  be  she  mother,  sister  or  wife,  lives  on  a  lower  plane,  has 
more  sordid  and  selfish  views  of  men  and  things  than  he  has.  God  pity  such  a 
man ;  he  lives  in  a  cellar. 

But  blessed  the  man  who  climbs  to  his  home,  who  can  go  down  to  his  work  and 
when  the  struggle  waxes  fierce,  when  temptations  to  do  an  unworthy  thing  crowd 
thick  upon  him,  he  can  lift  his  eyes  to  the  hills  and  through  the  smoke  and  dust 
see  his  home — shining  like  a  star.  This  is  the  climax  of  the  power  and  the  glory 
of  the  Woman  Beautiful. 

But  the  soul,  like  the  body,  grows  on  what  it  feeds  on.  Then  be  careful  of 
your  thoughts.  Read  the  best  literature  and  commune  with  the  best  thought  of 
all  times.  "Keep  thine  heart  with  all  diligence,  for  out  of  it  are  the  issues  of 
life."  Let  nothing  low  or  little  find  a  lodgment  in  your  mind;  set  an  angel  with 
a  flaming  sword  at  every  gateway  of  the  soul,  that  no  creeping,  crawling  thing 
may  enter.  Feed  on  flowers ;  live  in  light ;  climb  high  upon  the  mountain-top ; 
catch  a  glorious  vision  of  your  destiny;  and  then  come  down  and  let  a  tired  and 
tempted  world  behold  the  ineffable  beauty  of  the  face  of  a  woman,  "sweet  with 
the  breath  of  the  angels,"  and  "bright  with  the  kisses  of  the  stars." 


(20) 

CIVIC  RIGHTEOUSNESS 

When  the  achievements  of  the  Twentieth  Century  shall  be  viewed  in  the  dry 
light  of  history  I  hazard  the  opinion  that  it  will  be  recorded  that  the  most  whole- 
some contribution  this  century  made  to  the  progress  of  civilization  was  not  wire- 
less telegraphy  nor  flying  machines  nor  submarines,  but  was  the  universal 
acknowledgment  by  enlightened  peoples  that  a  man's  life  should  be  measured  by 
its  relation  to  the  common  good.  The  significance  and  potency  of  this  contribution 
will  be  seen  to  rest  on  the  fact  that  the  acknowledgment  was  not  merely  verbal, 
but  was  made  in  terms  of  service  and  self-denial. 

It  is  now  elementary  to  say  that  Christianity  is  not  a  creed,  but  a  life.  Faith 
itself  is  submitted  to  the  acid  test  of  facts.  Likewise  governments  are  no  longer 
classified  according  to  forms  through  which  they  express  themselves,  but  rather 
according  to  the  measure  of  opportunity  to  grow  to  the  humane  provisions  made 
for  those  who  through  no  fault  of  their  own  are  unable  to  care  for  themselves. 

As  the  women  of  the  State  have  always  exerted  a  profound  influence  in 
securing  legislation  designed  to  better  the  condition  of  the  unfortunate,  it  occurred 
to  me  that  you  would  be  interested  in  a  brief  review  of  just  what  the  State  has 
done  and  is  now  doing  in  this  direction. 

Demosthenes  says  that  eloquence  consists  of  three  things :  First,  action ;  second, 
action;  third,  action. 

Fine  phrases  harvest  indifference  or  derision  unless  they  be  born  of,  or  lead  to, 
finer  facts.  I  have  heard  many  eloquent  things  said  about  the  North  Carolina 
soldier  in  the  Civil  War,  but  the  finest  thing  that  ever  has  been  or  ever  can  be  said 
is  the  simple  statement  that  though  North  Carolina  only  counted  one  hundred  and 


230  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

fifteen  thousand  voters  in  all  her  borders,  she  marshaled  one  hundred  and  twenty- 
seven  thousand  men  under  the  "Bonnie  Blue  Flag." 

The  most  eloquent  declaration  of  love  I  ever  read  is  found  in  Les  Miserables. 
A  battle  was  raging  in  the  streets  of  Paris.  Epoinine,  a  girl  born  to  poverty  and 
neglect,  had  become  interested  in  Marius.  She  saw  a  soldier  level  his  gun  on 
Marius,  and  without  a  moment's  hesitation  she  jumped  in  front  of  the  gun  and 
received  the  entire  load  in  her  own  side.  As  she  lay  dying,  Marius  bent  above  her 
and  asked,  "Epoinine,  why  did  you  do  this  thing?"  With  a  smile  that  borrowed 
radiance  from  the  skies,  she  answered,  "I  think,  Monsieur,  I  was  just  a  little  in 
love  with  you." 

What  is  true  in  love  and  war  holds  in  the  social  and  political  entity  we  call 
the  State.  North  Carolina  will  always  be  seen  to  the  best  advantage  if  we  let  the 
simple  facts  appear. 

Up  to  1848  the  State  had  made  no  provision  whatever  for  the  care  of  those 
bereft  of  reason.  At  least  one  thousand  of  these  unfortunate  people  were  scattered 
/throughout  the  State.  Many  were  in  what  were  very  properly  called  "poorhouses." 
Some  were  confined  in  dark  cells  in  loathsome  jails,  while  some  were  kept  by 
their  own  to  the  infinite  distress  of  whole  families  and  to  the  terror  of  whole  com- 
munities. Miss  Dorothy  Dix  of  Massachusetts,  a  woman  of  wealth  and  culture, 
gave  her  whole  life  to  the  betterment  of  the  lot  of  these  unfortunates.  In  1848 
she  labored  in  North  Carolina,  going  from  one  end  of  the  State  to  the  other  and 
gathering  together  the  actual  facts,  which  she  presented  in  a  memorial  to  the 
General  Assembly.  A  bill  to  establish  a  State  insane  asylum,  carrying  an  appro- 
priation of  $75,000,  was  introduced.  But  North  Carolina  is  constitutionally 
opposed  to  doing  anything  new,  and  the  bill  went  down  to  defeat.  The  biggest  man 
in  the  General  Assembly  was  James  C.  Dobbin  of  Cumberland,  who  afterwards 
became  Secretary  of  the  Navy  under  President  Franklin  Pierce.  The  wife  of  Mr. 
Dobbin  was  spending  the  winter  in  Raleigh  with  her  husband,  and  during  the 
session  of  the  General  Assembly  she  grew  desperately  ill.  Miss  Dix,  among  her 
other  accomplishments,  was  a  good  nurse.  She  and  Mrs.  Dobbin  had  been  thrown 
much  together,  and  when  Mrs.  Dobbin  grew  ill  Miss  Dix  was  unwearying  in  her 
ministrations.  Realizing  that  she  had  but  a  little  while  to  live,  Mrs.  Dobbin  asked 
Miss  Dix  if  there  was  anything  she  could  do  to  show  her  appreciation  of  her  great 
kindness.  Instantly  Miss  Dix  said,  "Yes;  ask  your  husband  if  he  won't  use  his 
influence  to  get  my  asylum  bill  reconsidered."  Mrs.  Dobbin  readily  promised  to 
do  this ;  and  in  her  last  hours  Mr.  Dobbin  gave  his  pledge  to  his  wife  to  do  what 
he  could  to  have  the  bill  reinstated  on  the  calendar  and  passed.  A  day  or  two  after 
his  wife  was  buried  Mr.  Dobbin  arose  in  his  seat  in  the  House  of  Representatives, 
moved  a  reconsideration  of  the  vote  by  which  the  bill  had  been  defeated,  and  in 
its  support  made  one  of  the  most  powerful  speeches  ever  heard  in  the  General 
Assembly  of  North  Carolina.  Mrs.  Dobbin  was  in  her  grave,  but  verily  on  that 
day  she  spoke  with  the  tongue  of  men  and  angels,  and  the  bill  which  had  been 
previously  defeated  now  passed  by  an  overwhelming  majority.  The  hospital  was 
built,  and  the  place  where  it  stands  is  still  called  "Dix  Hill"  in  loving  memory 
of  the  woman  who  gave  her  whole  life  to  the  cause.  In  twenty  states  in  the 
Union  and  in  foreign  lands  she  succeeded  in  having  erected  comfortable  homes 
for  those  who  grope  in  the  blackness  of  mental  night.  While  making  a  visit  to  a 
beautiful  home  she  had  been  instrumental  in  getting  the  State  of  New  Jersey  to 
build  she  grew  ill.     She  was  made  the  guest  of  the  institution,  and  her  last  years 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  231 

were  spent  in  the  retreat  she  had  planned  for  others.  When  she  passed  away  at 
the  extreme  age  of  eighty  a  great  physician  said,  "There  has  died  and  been  laid  to 
rest  the  most  useful  and  distinguished  woman  America  has  yet  produced." 

While  North  Carolina  is  constitutionally  opposed  to  doing  anything  new,  yet 
when  she  has  once  put  her  hand  to  the  plow  she  never  turns  back.  Having  once 
seen  her  duty  with  respect  to  the  care  of  the  insane,  the  work  has  gone  steadily 
forward  as  the  wealth  and  population  have  increased. 

The  General  Assembly  at  the  session  of  18S1  recognized  the  duty  of  the  State 
to  our  negro  citizens  and  made  just  and  adequate  provision  for  the  care  of  the 
insane  of  that  race  by  establishing  the  State  Hospital  at  Goldsboro.  This  in- 
stitution has  been  a  perfect  Godsend  to  the  negro  race  in  North  Carolina.  At  the 
same  session  an  act  was  passed  for  the  establishment  of  another  hospital  for  the 
white  insane  at  Morganton.  The  first  superintendent  of  this  hospital  was  Dr. 
Patrick  Livingston  Murphy,  who  continued  at  the  head  of  the  institution  until 
his  death  in  1907.  In  this  quarter  of  a  century  Dr.  Murphy  made  the  hospital 
at  Morganton  one  of  the  greatest  institutions  of  its  kind  in  all  the  land.  He  was 
one  of  the  first  alienists  to  abolish  forever  the  dark  cell  and  the  straitjacket. 
Largely  through  his  influence  the  conception  of  an  institution  of  this  kind  was 
changed  from  that  of  a  jail  to  a  hospital.  On  a  tablet  in  the  main  building  at 
Morganton  there  will  be  found  the  following  eloquent  inscription : 

TO  THE  MEMORY  OF 

PATRICK  LIVINGSTON  MURPHY 

1848-1907 

The  wise  and  beloved  Physician  and  gifted  Alienist  who  organized  this 
Hospital  and  was  its  Superintendent  for  the  first  twenty-five  years  of  its 
existence,  from  January,  1SS3,  until  his  death,  September  11,  1907. 

A  Strong  Man  of  Large  Human  Sympathy,  Vigorous  of  Intellect,  Coura- 
geous of  Thought  and  Action,  Firm  of  Will,  Steadfast  and  Noble  of  Purpose, 
Conscientious  in  the  Performance  of  Duty,  Broadminded  and  of  Far-seeing 
Vision,  He  Wrought  to  the  Limit  of  His  Strength  and  Splendid  Capacity  for 
the  Good  of  His  State  and  its  People  and  Died  as  He  Had  Lived,  in  Full 
Enjoyment  of  Their  Affectionate  Esteem  and  Grateful  Confidence. 

In  1907  the  writer  introduced  in  the  General  Assembly  a  bill  to  appropriate 
$500,000  for  the  purpose  of  enlarging  and  improving  the  facilities  at  Raleigh, 
Morganton  and  Goldsboro  for  taking  care  of  the  insane.  This  was  by  far  the 
largest  appropriation  for  a  single  object  the  State  had  ever  been  called  upon  to 
make.  But  to  the  honor  of  our  people  be  it  said  that  when  the  bill  had  been  fully 
explained  every  member  of  the  House,  without  regard  to  politics,  voted  in  favor 
of  the  bill.  Today  the  State  is  taking  care  of  4,488  insane  people,  that  is  to  say, 
1,469  at  Raleigh,  1,655  at  Morganton,  and  1,276  at  Goldsboro,  and  85  in  the 
department  for  the  criminal  insane  in  the  State's  Prison.  In  addition  to  the  cost 
of  enlarging  the  permanent  improvements,  the  State  is  spending  yearly  for  the 
support  and  maintenance  of  these  people  the  sum  of  $500,000. 

An  institution  closely  allied  to  these  hospitals  for  the  insane  is  the  Caswell 
Training  School  at  Kinston.  This  institution  receives  children  who  are  not 
insane,  but  who  are  below  normal  in  their  mental  development,  and  who  require 
special  attention  and  training.     It  is  impossible  to  realize  what  a  blessing  this 


232  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

institution  has  been  to  homes  where  a  child  of  this  class  had  to  be  kept  prior  to 
the  opening  of  this  school.  The  school  has  been  opened  for  only  about  three 
years,  but  there  are  in  it  one  hundred  and  ninety-five  of  these  children,  and  we 
are  spending  for  their  maintenance  $40,000  a  year.  This  makes  a  total  of  4,683 
mental  defectives  cared  for  by  the  State  at  a  yearly  cost  of  $540,000.  In  1848  a 
bill  carrying  the  pitiful  sum  of  $75,000  to  build  one  hospital  was  defeated,  and  it 
required  the  eloquence  of  a  man  speaking  under  the  inspiration  of  a  deathbed 
promise  to  his  wife  to  resurrect  the  bill.  Today  the  General  Assembly  appro- 
priates without  a  dissenting  voice  a  half  million  dollars  for  larger  facilities,  and 
spends  a  half  million  more  for  the  maintenance  of  these  unfortunate  people  as  a 
matter  of  course.     Verily  the 

"Thoughts  of  men  are  widening 
With  the  process  of  the  suns." 

In  addition  to  these  hospitals,  the  State  maintains  at  Ealeigh  a  school  for  the 
white  blind,  in  which  there  are  208  children,  a  school  for  the  colored  deaf  and 
blind,  in  which  are  201,  and  at  Morganton  a  great  school  for  the  white  deaf,  in 
which  are  313  children,  making  a  total  of  722  blind  and  deaf  children  cared  foi 
by  the  State  at  an  annual  cost  of  $151,000.  Practically  all  of  these  children  when 
they  leave  these  schools  are  burdens  neither  to  themselves  nor  to  the  communities 
in  which  they  live,  but  are  taught  to  be  self-supporting,  contented,  useful  citizens. 

Another  charitable  institution  which  has  just  gotten  fairly  under  way  is  the 
Tuberculosis  Sanatorium  at  Sanatorium.  In  1916  there  were  434  patients  treated 
in  this  institution.  The  State  appropriated  $20,000  towards  the  support  of  the 
institution,  and  ten  thousand  a  year  for  extension  work.  Those  who  are  able 
to  pay  can  secure  expert  treatment  in  this  institution  for  one  dollar  per  day, 
a  nominal  sum  compared  with  the  charges  in  private  institutions  that  do  no 
better  work. 

The  Stonewall  Jackson  Training  School  at  Concord  was  established  in  1907 
by  the  same  General  Assembly  that  appropriated  the  half  million  dollars  for 
enlarging  the  facilities  for  the  insane.  Virtue,  as  well  as  vice,  is  largely  a  matter 
of  habit.  This  school  is  for  the  training  of  boys  who  violate  the  laws  of  the 
State  who  ought  not,  on  account  of  their  tender  years,  to  be  sent  to  the  State 
Prison  or  to  county  chain-gangs.  It  is  proper  to  say,  and  the  writer  speaks 
advisedly,  as  he  was  a  member  of  that  General  Assembly,  that  the  women  of  the 
State,  and  in  a  large  measure  the  King's  Daughters,  are  responsible  for  the 
establishment  of  this  school.  In  this  school  boys  are  confined,  but  are  sent  reg- 
ularly to  school  and  are  trained  besides  in  some  useful  trade  to  the  end  that  when 
they  are  discharged  from  the  institution  they  will  be  in  a  position  to  make  an 
honest  living.  In  1916  121  boys  were  trained  in  this  institution  at  a  cost  to  the 
State  of  $18,000  for  maintenance  and  $18,500  for  permanent  improvements. 

The  Soldiers'  Home  takes  care  of  204  soldiers  at  an  annual  cost  of  $35,000, 
while  over  $500,000  are  annually  paid  out  in  pensions  to  Confederate  veterans 
and  their  widows.  In  all  of  these  institutions  the  State  is  today  taking  care  of 
6,164  unfortunate  people  at  a  cost  of  $769,500. 

The  institutions  whose  work  has  been  briefly  reviewed  devote  themselves  in  the 
main  to  caring  for  and  curing,  if  possible,  mental,  moral  and  physical  defectives. 
A  vastly  more  important  work,  and  one  to  which  the  State  is  just  beginning  to 
give  serious  attention,  is  to  wage  war,  offensive  and  defensive,  against  the  forces 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  233 

that  produce  these  defectives.  The  chief  object  of  the  Penitentiary  is  to  keep 
folks  out  of  it.  The  State  Hospital  at  Raleigh  is  just  beginning  a  campaign  of 
education  in  mental  hygiene,  insanity  being  one  disease  with  respect  to  which  the 
proverbial  ounce  of  prevention  is  worth  a  ton  of  cure. 

Not  until  about  seven  years  ago  could  it  be  said  that  the  State  of  North 
Carolina  had  a  Department  of  Public  Health.  It  is  true  that  in  1877  the  General 
Assembly  granted  to  the  State  Board  of  Health  permission  to  exist,  and  contrib- 
uted to  its  sustenance  the  munificent  sum  of  one  hundred  dollars  per  annum.  The 
man  who  first  said  "Show  me"  may  have  been  in  Missouri  when  he  made  that 
famous  remark,  but  I  would  wager  my  bottom  dollar  that  he  or  his  ancestors 
went  to  Missouri  from  North  Carolina.  So  the  General  Assembly  said  to  the 
infant  State  Board  of  Health,  "Here's  a  hundred  dollars.  Show  us  what  you  can 
do  with  it."  The  show  must  have  been  fairly  satisfactory,  for  the  next  year  the 
appropriation  was  doubled.  Then  for  twelve  years  the  State  Board  managed  to 
keep  alive  on  this  pitiful  sum,  but  in  1897  the  appropriation  was  increased  to 
$2,000;  in  1909  to  $10,500,  and  in  1915  to  $50,500.  In  1913  the  writer  framed 
a  bill  levying  a  tax  of  one-fourth  of  one  cent  on  a  glass  or  bottle  of  coca-cola  and 
all  kindred  concoctions,  the  proceeds  of  this  tax  to  be  turned  over  to  the  State 
Board  of  Health  to  be  used  in  improving  the  health  these  beverages  tend  to  impair. 
Not  less  than  $50,000  could  have  been  raised  in  this  way,  but  the  General  Assembly 
in  its  wisdom  saw  fit  to  chloroform  the  bill.  However,  since  1909  the  State  Board 
of  Health  has  been  doing  efficient  work  and  getting  good  results. 

Its  activities  may  be  divided  into  two  classes — office  and  field.  Necessarily 
some  work  is  done  partially  in  the  office  and  partially  in  the  field.  The  major 
part  of  the  office  work  is  done  by  the  Laboratory  of  Hygiene.  The  magnitude  of 
the  work  done  in  this  Laboratory  will  be  seen  from  the  official  reports,  which  show 
that  in  the  year  1915-16  there  were  made  in  this  Laboratory  10,000  microscopic 
or  chemical  examinations.  The  law  requires  a  monthly  examination  of  samples 
of  water  taken  from  sources  of  public  supply,  and  also  of  bottled  water  sold  to  the 
public.  Any  citizen  who  suspects  that  his  well  or  spring  is  contaminated  can 
have  the  water  analyzed  without  cost.  In  191-6  there  were  3,289  samples  of  water 
analyzed,  and  .  .  .  were  condemned  as  dangerous  to  health.  These  examina- 
tions would  have  cost  the  State  $16,500.  There  were  many  examinations  made  to 
detect  the  germs  of  diphtheria,  tuberculosis,  rabies  and  malaria.  In  1915,  175 
persons  were  given  the  Pasteur  treatment  for  the  prevention  of  rabies.  Each 
person  so  treated  was  saved  at  least  $100,  making  a  net  saving  to  the  citizens  of 
$17,200.  General  statistics  show  that  one  person  out  of  every  two  hundred  and 
fifty  who  apply  for  the  Pasteur  treatment  dies  from  rabies.  In  our  State  Labora- 
tory of  Hygiene  1,556  people  have  been  treated,  and  not  one  has  died.  In  1915 
the  Laboratory  distributed  12,385,200  units  of  diphtheria  antitoxin,  at  prices 
that  saved  to  the  people  $30,000.  During  the  same  period  the  Laboratory  made 
and  distributed  to  the  citizens  456,180  doses  of  typhoid  vaccine,  a  quantity 
sufficient  to  immunize  150,000  people.  This  was  done  absolutely  without  charge, 
and  upon  the  basis  of  lowest  retail  price  of  this  vaccine  it  saved  to  the  people 
$150,000. 

The  Laboratory  has  an  appropriation  of  $25,000,  and  with  this  it  saves  in 
dollars  and  cents  $200,000 ;  and  this  takes  no  account  of  the  incalculable  value 
of  the  protection  it  affords  to  the  lives  and  health  of  the  citizens. 


234  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

The  most  important  part  of  the  field  work  is  educational  in  its  character. 
The  Health  Bulletin,  which  is  issued  monthly  by  the  Department,  is  now  eagerly 
read  by  the  people,  and  the  press  of  the  State  is  doing  splendid  and  unselfish 
service  in  publishing  many  of  the  articles  that  appear  in  the  Bulletin. 

The  field  campaigns  against  the  fly  and  mosquito  have  assumed  large  pro- 
portions. A  well-screened  house  is  rapidly  becoming  an  absolute  necessity,  in  the 
minds  of  the  people,  and  even  the  children  have  been  taught  to  take  great  joy  in 
swatting  the  fly.  In  1915  a  typhoid  campaign  was  conducted  in  twelve  counties, 
with  the  result  that  in  these  twelve  counties  deaths  from  typhoid  fever  were  re- 
duced from  175  in  1914  to  132  in  1914,  a  net  saving  of  43  human  lives. 

But  by  far  the  most  important  field  work  done  is  in  collecting  vital  statistics. 
In  1913  the  General  Assembly  passed  an  act  providing  for  the  registration  of  every 
birth  and  every  death  in  the  State.  This  law  is  the  imperial  demand  of  Star-eyed 
Science  that  she  be  given  all  the  facts.  When  the  facts  are  all  on  record,  con- 
clusions may  be  drawn  with  mathematical  certainty,  the  weak  points  in  our 
public  health  line  will  be  disclosed,  and  the  forces  that  combat  disease  can  be 
concentrated  at  these  points.  These  vital  statistics  show  that  the  birth  rate  in 
North  Carolina  for  1915  was  31.7  per  hundred  thousand  of  the  population,  while 
the  death  rate  was  13.2.  It  is  interesting  to  know  that  there  is  a  call  for  two  and 
one-half  times  as  many  cradles  as  coffins  in  the  State. 

The  counties  are  being  encouraged  to  elect  whole-time  health  officers  wherever 
they  have  sufficient  funds  and  where  an  official  can  be  secured.  North  Carolina 
has  more  county  whole-time  health  officers  than  any  other  state  in  the  Union. 
This  is  the  best  investment  a  county  can  make,  provided  a  conscientious,  intelligent 
physician  is  assigned  to  this  work  by  reason  of  his  fitness  for  the  work  and  not  by 
reason  of  a  political  pull.  Such  an  investment  will  pay  bigger  dividends  in 
dollars  and  cents  than  the  same  amount  invested  in  any  business  enterprise  in  the 
county.  This  is  not  sentiment,  it  is  sense — spelled  both  ways.  To  correct,  while 
it  may  be  corrected,  some  defect  in  the  hearing  or  sight  of  a  child,  to  convert  one 
dull  mind  into  a  bright  one  by  the  removal  of  adenoids,  to  arrest  the  development 
of  an  incipient  disease,  to  make  one  defective  into  an  effective  child,  will  save 
to  a  county  more  money  than  the  salary  of  a  health  officer  for  an  entire  year. 
The  wealth  of  any  community  is  determined  by  the  earning  capacity  of  the 
average  man,  and  this  earning  capacity  is  wholly  dependent  upon  all  the  faculties 
of  body  and  mind  being  kept  in  good  working  order.  In  counties  where  there  is 
no  whole-time  health  officer  the  State  Board  of  Health  is  proposing  to  send  out 
a  member  of  its  own  staff  who  will  make  a  careful  examination  of  all  the  children 
in  a  school  for  $10  per  school.  This  work  has  recently  been  done  thoroughly  in 
Alamance  and  Wilson  counties,  and  with  great  satisfaction  to  the  people.  In  the 
forenoon  the  children  are  examined,  in  the  afternoon  the  physician  talks  to  the 
children  on  the  health  catechism  prepared  by  the  State  Board  of  Health,  and  at 
night  a  lecture  is  given  to  which  all  the  people  are  invited,  a  magic  lantern  being 
used  to  illustrate  the  lecture. 

The  State  Board  of  Health  cannot  be  too  highly  commended  for  the  relentless 
war  that  it  wages  against  quacks  and  quackery.  The  motto  of  Barnum,  that  the 
people  dearly  love  to  be  humbugged,  applies  with  tragic  emphasis  to  the  treatment 
of  disease. 

It  would  require  a  book  to  deal  with  the  fake  foods,  fake  drugs,  and  fake 
mechanical  devices  that  are  palmed  off  on  the  public.     Sanatogen  is  advertised 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  235 

in  all  high-class  magazines  as  the  most  marvelous  food  tonic,  and  yet  Dr.  Wiley- 
says  the  preparation  has  practically  no  medicinal  value,  and  that  one  cent's  worth 
of  wheat  flour  has  as  much  food  value  as  a  dollar's  worth  of  Sanatogen. 

The  Bye  cancer  cure  had  a  wide  sale  in  eastern  North  Carolina.  I  was  down 
in  Currituck  County  this  year  and  the  people  told  me  of  an  old  woman  who  nearly 
starved  herself  to  death  to  save  up  $75  to  pay  for  a  cancer  treatment  which  when 
analyzed  turned  out  to  be  glycerine,  cottonseed  oil,  and  sweetened  water.  The 
whole  combination  did  not  cost  over  thirty  cents. 

One  of  the  greatest  fakes  ever  palmed  off  on  the  public  is  the  Oxypathor,  that 
retails  for  $35.  The  writer  had  an  aunt  of  limited  means  who  paid  this  sum 
for  one  of  those  contrivances. 

A  member  of  the  General  Assembly  of  North  Carolina  tells  this  story  on  his 
wife:  She  bought  an  Oxypathor  for  $15,  and,  according  to  directions,  she  would 
fasten  the  cord  around  her  ankle  when  she  went  to  bed  and  let  the  battery  hang 
out  of  the  window.  The  theory  was  that  the  battery  extracted  the  oxygen  from 
the  air,  and  this  was  carried  by  the  cord  to  the  body  and  accomplished  wonderful 
results.  Now  the  lady  left  the  battery  hanging  out  of  the  window  with  the  cord 
fastened  to  the  bed-post  during  the  daytime,  and  she  would  attach  it  to  her  ankle 
at  night.  She  protested  to  her  husband  that  she  was  deriving  great  good  by  the 
treatment,  when  one  day  it  was  discovered  that  the  goat  had  chewed  the  cord  in 
two,  and  during  the  time  she  claimed  to  have  derived  the  greatest  benefit  no 
battery  was  attached  to  the  cord  at  all. 

It  is  to  the  eternal  honor  of  the  General  Assembly  of  1917  that  these  frauds 
can  no  longer  be  perpetrated.  It  is  now  a  crime  in  North  Carolina  to  sell,  or 
advertise  for  sale,  a  cure  for  an  incurable  disease.  A  man  who  advertises  a  cancer 
cure  will  now  be  put  in  jail.  Likewise  the  Electropoise,  and  all  of  its  kind,  have 
gone  to  the  scrap-heap,  for  it  is  a  crime  to  sell  or  advertise  for  sale  any  mechanical 
device  for  the  treatment  of  diseases  when  the  North  Carolina  State  Board  of 
Health  declares  that  such  a  device  is  without  curative  value. 

The  recent  General  Assembly  also  passed  a  law  making  mandatory  an  exam- 
ination, under  medical  supervision,  of  every  child  who  attends  the  public  schools. 
In  my  opinion,  the  value  of  such  a  law  is  beyond  all  computation. 

In  addition  to  this,  the  General  Assembly  made  a  special  appropriation  of 
$15,000  a  year  for  a  campaign  for  rural  sanitation,  and  also  made  a  special 
appropriation  to  encourage  the  installation  of  running  water,  electric  lights,  and 
telephones  in  country  homes.  Dr.  E.  C.  Brooks,  of  Trinity  College,  tells  of  a 
friend  of  his  who  lived  up  in  one  of  our  fine  mountain  counties  and  graduated 
at  the  University  of  North  Carolina.  Upon  returning  to  his  mountain  home  he 
noticed  his  mother  carrying  water  from  the  spring,  and  made  an  exact  calculation 
of  the  distance  she  had  walked  in  doing  so,  and  demonstrated  that  this  woman, 
in  carrying  water  for  household  purposes,  had  walked  three  times  the  distance 
from  Raleigh  to  San  Francisco. 

The  General  Assembly  furthermore  made  an  appropriation  of  $25,000  a  year 
to  aid  in  giving  wholesome  entertainments  in  country  schoolhouses  to  relieve  the 
monotony  of  country  life.  One  of  the  very  finest  things  done  by  this  General 
Assembly  was  to  establish  a  home  for  crippled  children,  where  their  infirmities  can 
be  cured,  if  possible,  and  if  not,  they  can  be  taught  some  useful  occupation  so 
they  will  be  saved  from  the  misery  of  being  burdens  to  themselves  and  others 
throughout  life.    What  are  well-nigh  miracles  are  wrought  in  institutions  of  this 


236  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BIOKETT 

kind  in  behalf  of  little  children.  For  example,  they  are  given  artificial  hands,  and 
are  taught  to  use  them  in  operating  the  typewriter  and  other  kinds  of  machinery. 
This  institution  was  established  largely  as  the  result  of  one  man  and  one  woman, 
Mr.  It.  B.  Babington  and  Miss  Lena  Rivers  Smith,  and  their  work  suggests  the 
lines  of  John  Hay  in  "Little  Breeches" : 

How  did  tie  get  thar?  Angels. 

He  never  could  have  walked  in  that  storm. 

They  just  swooped  down  and  toted  him 

To  where  it  was  safe  and  warm. 

And  I  think  that  saving  a  little  child, 

And  fetching  him  to  his  own, 

Is  a  dern  sight  better  business 

Than  loafing  around  the  throne. 

Then  the  home  for  delinquent  women  also  shows  that  the  General  Assembly 
of  1917  was  responsive  to  the  suggestions  of  humanity.  It  seems  to  me  that  over 
the  doorway  of  this  home  should  be  written  the  lines  of  that  most  beautiful  of  all 
the  hymns,  "Help  of  the  helpless,  Lord,  abide  with  me." 

The  everlasting  truth  is  that  the  record  of  the  General  Assembly  of  1917  is 
attracting  world-wide  attention  to  North  Carolina.  In  addition  to  the  specific 
acts  I  have  mentioned,  it  made  the  following  appropriations  to  increase  the  per- 
manent equipment  of  our  educational  and  charitable  institutions :  For  the  blind, 
$125,000;  for  the  feeble-minded,  $75,000;  for  the  insane,  $525,000;  for  the  deaf, 
$60,000;  for  the  treatment  and  prevention  of  tuberculosis,  $150,000;  for  the 
reformatory  school  for  boys,  $50,000;  for  the  University  of  North  Carolina, 
$500,000;  for  the  State  Normal  and  Industrial,  $500,000;  to  aid  in  building 
public  schoolhouses  in  the  country,  $500,000 ;  for  the  East  Carolina  Teacher- 
Training  School,  $200,000 ;  for  the  Agricultural  and  Engineering  College,  $300,000, 
and  for  other  educational  institutions,  $75,000. 

All  these  things  require  a  vast  amount  of  money,  but  how  could  it  be  better 
spent?  The  money  must  go  somewhere.  Croesus  is  a  figure  of  speech,  and  Dives 
is  a  reproach,  but  the  ointment  that  Mary  wasted  on  the  Master's  feet  is  a 
memorial  to  her  forever.  These  things  call  for  taxes,  and  the  average  North  Caro- 
linian requires  an  anesthetic  to  pay  taxes  without  pain ;  but  it  is  written  in  the  very 
constitution  of  things  that  salvation  comes  through  sacrifice,  and  today,  when  the 
world  is  girdled  with  war's  blood-red  bands,  there  is  universal  acceptance  of 
the  doctrine  of  the  Nazarene  that  only  he  who  is  willing  to  lose  his  life  can  save  it. 
Tennyson  never  struck  a  truer  note  than  when  he  said,  "Men  may  rise  on  stepping 
stones  of  their  dead  selves  to  higher  things."  No  individual  and  no  nation  ever 
achieved  enduring  power  that  was  unwilling  to  immolate  the  pleasures  and  the 
profits  of  today  upon  the  altar  of  tomorrow. 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  237 

(21) 

EDUCATIONAL  DIVIDENDS 

It  is  said,  "All  the  world  loves  a  lover."  This  may  be  open  to  some  doubt, 
but  it  is  absolutely  certain  that  the  average  man  and  woman  cherish  a  positive 
affection  for  a  dividend.  The  stockholders  of  a  corporation  may  sleep  three 
hundred  and  sixty-four  days  in  the  year,  but  on  dividend  day  they  awake  right 
early.  If  the  corporation  pays  no  dividends,  the  jaws  of  that  modern  dragon, 
the  receiver,  open  wide  to  devour  it.  Saint  and  sinner  concede  that  the  judgment 
pronounced  upon  the  barren  fig  tree  was  the  very  essence  of  justice.  It  deserved 
to  be  cut  down.  Education  should  stand  or  fall  by  the  same  test.  If  it  does  not 
yield  a  fair  return  upon  what  is  invested  in  it,  either  the  matter  taught  or  the 
method  of  teaching,  it  deserves  utter  condemnation.  Education  means  efficiency. 
It  is  not  a  badge;  it  is  a  tool.  It  is  not  a  uniform;  it  is  an  equipment.  It  is  not 
knowledge ;  it  is  power.  Its  first  dividends  should  be  the  capacity  to  earn  a  living, 
and  its  second,  an  understanding  of  the  meaning  of  life. 

I  have  neither  sympathy  nor  patience  with  that  cheap  brand  of  pessimism  that 
considers  every  man  who  has  a  dollar  ahead  a  suspicious  character.  I  know  the 
dollar  has  sinned.  I  also  know  it  has  been  sinned  against.  The  abuse  of  it  is  often 
made  a  cloak  for  emptiness  of  mind  and  littleness  of  soul.  A  dollar  honestly 
earned  has  a  value  and  a  virtue  entirely  independent  of  its  purchasing  power. 
The  man  who  goes  into  the  wilderness,  into  a  factory,  or  into  the  marts  of  trade, 
and  with  clean  hands  builds  up  a  fortune,  is  worth  more  than  his  property.  His 
energy,  his  intelligence,  his  character,  his  success,  are  all  assets  to  the  community 
in  which  he  lives. 

In  the  evolution  of  civilization,  material  well-being  has  always  been  a  vital 
condition  of  growth.  A  vigorous  body  is  the  natural  if  not  necessary  antecedent 
of  a  vigorous  mind.  In  the  divine  economy  man's  body  was  first  made,  sym- 
metrical and  strong,  and  thereafter  man  became  a  living  soul. 

In  many  of  our  plans  for  the  betterment  of  mankind  we  fall  into  the  error 
of  discussing  ways  and  means  of  employing  forces  not  at  our  command.  Suppose 
you  were  solicited  to  buy  a  book  on  "How  to  Eeform  the  Man  in  the  Moon."  The 
thought  would  naturally  arise  that  the  author  could  have  spent  his  time  to  a 
better  purpose  by  first  showing  us  how  to  reach  the  moon.  The  problem  of  re- 
forming the  man  in  it  could  well  wait.  In  every  community  there  will  be  found 
a  surplusage  of  men  who  can  tell  us  exactly  what  to  do  with  money,  but  there 
is  a  painful  scarcity  of  men  who  can  tell  us  how  to  make  it.  In  the  very  nature  of 
things,  the  creation  of  wealth  must  precede  its  regulation.  You  are  doubtless 
familiar  with  the  famous  receipt  for  making  the  best  rabbit  pie.  It  begins : 
"First  catch  the  rabbit."  Certainly,  before  wealth — whether  of  goods  and  chattels 
or  of  intellectual  and  spiritual  power — can  be  expended  for  the  uplift  of  the  race, 
that  wealth  must  be  acquired.  This  leads  to  my  basic  proposition,  to  wit :  the 
first  thing  to  do  with  a  dollar  is  to  make  it.  Any  educational  system  which  fails 
to  recognize  this  primal  necessity  must  either  die  or  be  born  again.  I  am  not 
making  the  dollar  the  measure  of  man,  but  am  saying  that  it  is  the  imperative 
duty  of  the  parent  or  the  State  to  so  train  a  child  that  when  it  arrives  at  its 
majority  and  is  thrown  upon  its  own  resources,  it  will  be  able  to  make  a  living. 


238  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

A  child  must  be  able  to  walk  before  it  can  carry  many  burdens.  The  engine 
that  is  so  faultily  constructed  that  it  cannot  pull  its  own  weight  is  without  value 
in  any  system  of  transportation.  No  sort  of  war  can  be  long  waged  without  the 
sinews  thereof,  and  a  sane  patriotism  demands  a  knowledge  of  how  to  make  gun- 
powder as  well  as  how  to  sing  the  Star-Spangled  Banner. 

How  to  feed  in  peace  and  war  is  an  ever  grave  and  pressing  problem.  And 
the  man  or  nation  that  is  always  prepared  to  solve  this  problem  has  a  tremendous 
advantage  in  any  conflict.  This  is  not  a  very  poetic  view  to  present,  and  I  know 
it  is  not  in  the  best  of  taste  to  lug  the  kitchen  into  the  parlor,  but  I  also  know 
that  when  the  kitchen  goes  out  of  business  the  parlor  will  not  be  crowded  with 
guests. 

Every  child  should  receive  such  a  physical,  mental  and  moral  equipment  as 
will  enable  it  to  make  a  living,  because  upon  that  ability  depends  and  in  it  is 
involved  something  bigger  and  finer  than  the  living  itself.  To  me  there  is  no 
more  inspiring  scene  than  that  the  world  presents  every  morning  when  men  and 
women  in  obedience  to  the  divine  command  go  forth  to  make  their  bread.  How 
tremendously  fascinating  is  the  drama  as  the  struggle  grows  hard  and  fierce. 
All  the  lines  of  hope  and  fear,  of  love  and  hate,  of  joy  and  despair,  are  seen  on  the 
faces  of  the  toilers.  The  struggle  is  ever  the  same,  even  for  so  many  pence  per 
day;  but  how  different  the  meaning!  To  the  beggar,  it  means  his  crumb;  to  the 
king,  it  means  his  kingdom;  to  the  farmer,  his  field  and  flocks;  to  the  merchant, 
his  stock  and  store;  to  the  painter,  his  brush  and  a  pictured  glory;  to  the  poet, 
the  thrill  and  rapture  of  his  song ;  to  the  lover,  a  new  fire  kindled  in  the  home  and 
in  the  heart  the  light  that  never  was  on  sea  or  land.  Truly,  in  the  ability  to  make 
a  living  there  is  involved  something  finer  than  the  living  itself. 

It  is  not  denied  that  adversity  has  its  uses,  but  it  is  none  the  less  true  that 
the  tendency  of  grinding,  hopeless  poverty  is  to  degrade.  It  represses  the  noblest 
instincts  and  stifles  the  finest  sensibilities.  It  takes  the  snap,  the  freshness  and 
too  often  the  sweetness  out  of  life  to  be  constantly  humiliated  by  being  unable 
to  pay  for  its  common  necessities. 

As  a  lawyer,  time  and  again  I  have  been  out  on  the  firing  line  with  strong 
men  in  hours  of  financial  storm  and  distress;  and  I  tell  you,  it  takes  a  higher 
degree  of  courage  for  a  good  man  to  face  a  line  of  creditors  with  an  empty  pocket 
than  it  does  to  storm  a  battery. 

It  is  the  birthright  of  every  child  born  under  the  American  flag  to  receive  such 
a  training  as  will  give  him  a  market  value  in  the  world ;  such  that,  come  wbat  may, 
he  will  be  able  with  head  or  hand  to  produce  something  the  world  wants  and  is 
willing  to  pay  for.  Such  men  are  the  kings  of  this  earth.  They  carry  their  sover- 
eignty in  a  cunning  hand  and  cultured  brain,  and  need  never  bend  the  knee  that 
thrift  may  follow  fawning.  It  makes  a  man  a  better  neighbor  and  a  better  citizen 
to  feel  that  he  is  always  able  to  make  a  living  and  have  a  little  to  spare. 

"Not  for  to  hide  it  in  a  hedge,  not  for  a  trained  attendant, 
But  for  the  glorious  privilege  of  being  independent." 

The  true  man  loves  to  stand  alone  and  carry  others  on  his  shoulders,  and  when 
he  realizes  that  he  cannot  do  it,  the  laughter  dies  out  of  his  voice,  the  spring  out 
of  his  step  and  the  light  out  of  his  eyes,  and  too  often  misery  deepens  and  darkens 
into  crime. 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  239 

It  is  everlastingly  true  that  man  cannot  live  by  bread  alone,  but  the  Heavenly 
declaration  recognizes  that  bread  is  a  primal  necessity.  Whether  it  be  an  individ- 
ual, a  family  or  a  nation,  it  must  be  able  to  make  its  bread  or  be  eliminated  from 
those  forces  that  weigh  and  count  in  the  world.  In  the  beginnings  of  English 
history  it  often  happened  that  a  debtor  unable  to  pay  flung  upon  the  ground  his 
freeman's  sword  and  spear,  took  up  a  laborer's  mattock  and  placed  his  head  as  a 
slave  within  a  master's  hand.  And  down  through  the  centuries  comes  the  cry  of 
the  old  monkish  historian,  bewailing  the  evil  days  when  famine  drove  men  to 
bow  themselves  for  meat. 

All  history  shows  with  fearful  certainty  that  a  man  or  nation  that  always 
mortgages  will  in  the  long  years  become  the  slave  of  the  mortgagee.  The  borrower 
wears  the  yoke  of  the  lender.  Israel  went  to  Egypt  for  corn,  and  for  four  hun- 
dred years  was  in  bondage  to  the  House  of  Pharoah. 

But  the  vital  question  is,  how  may  we  increase  the  earning  capacity  of  the 
average  man,  for  the  permanent  happiness  of  any  community  depends  not  upon 
the  gigantic  fortunes  of  the  few,  but  upon  the  opportunities  of  the  many.  An 
illustration  is  always  better  than  an  argument.  Some  years  ago  a  great  builder 
of  engines  in  the  State  of  New  York  was  asked  by  the  president  of  a  rival  house 
how  he  managed  to  get  five  cents  a  pound  more  for  his  engines  than  any  one  else. 
The  great  builder  replied:  "The  answer  is  easy.  I  get  five  cents  a  pound  more 
for  my  engines  than  you  do  because  along  with  every  pound  of  iron  and  steel 
that  I  put  into  my  engines  I  put  with  it  exactly  five  cents  worth  of  brains." 
That's  the  proposition,  that's  the  task  that  confronts  Virginia  and  North  Carolina, 
and  all  the  states  from  the  Potomac  to  the  Rio  Grande.  "We  have  a  section  won- 
derfully rich  in  climate  and  natural  resources,  but  if  we  are  to  take  our  rightful 
place  in  the  march  of  progress  and  in  the  scale  of  civilization,  we  must  so  train 
the  heads  and  hands  of  our  people  that  to  the  pound  of  raw  material  that  every- 
where abounds  they  will  be  able  to  add  the  five  cents  worth  of  brains. 

We  can  felicitate  ourselves  that  we  are  making  substantial  progress  in  this 
direction.  A  few  years  ago  I  was  a  member  of  the  General  Assembly  of  North 
Carolina  and  was  making  a  short  speech  on  the  floor  of  the  House  in  favor  of 
the  establishment  of  a  school  of  technology.  A  member  from  one  of  the  mountain 
counties  arose  and  said,  "Will  the  gentleman  from  Franklin  please  tell  me  what  a 
school  of  technology  is  ?"  I  replied,  "It  is  a  school  to  teach  our  folks  how  to  make 
silk  out  of  cotton."  The  mountain  member  said :  "Well,  then,  I  am  in  favor  of 
the  bill." 

For  many  years  after  the  Civil  War  about  the  only  thing  we  made  in  the 
South  was  mistakes.  We  would  dig  something  out  of  the  ground  or  cut  it  out  of 
the  forest,  ship  it  North  and  sell  it  to  the  Yankee  for  ten  cents,  and  he  would 
blow  on  it  and  sell  it  back  to  us  for  a  dollar.  During  these  years  our  people  were 
simply  hod-carriers,  straining  their  backs  and  receiving  a  pittance  for  carrying 
building  material  to  the  trained  artisans  upon  the  scaffold.  Now,  our  mills  turn 
out  almost  everything  and  in  North  Carolina  our  cotton  mills  produce  everything 
that  can  be  made  from  cotton,  from  jeans  strong  enough  to  hold  a  bucking  school- 
boy, to  hosiery  so  delicate  it  is  invisible  to  the  naked  eye. 

On  the  farm  as  well  as  in  the  factory,  training  pays.  A  little  brains  mixed 
with  your  favorite  brand  of  V.  C.  makes  the  very  finest  fertilizer.  Just  a  few 
years  ago  Moore  County,  in  our  State — in  which  is  now  located  Southern 
Pines  and  Pinehurst — had  the  reputation  of  being  the  very  poorest  county  in  the 


240  PAPERS  OP  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

State;  and  deserved  it.  The  lands  were  so  poor  that  the  sheriff  had  to  employ 
detectives  to  find  out  who  owned  them.  Fifty  cents  an  acre  was  a  fancy  price. 
I  remember  as  I  used  to  pass  through  the  county  on  the  train  and  look  out  upon 
the  emptiness  and  poverty  on  every  side,  that  it  occurred  to  me  that  it  must  have 
been  somewhere  out  there  on  the  white  sand-hills  of  Moore  that  Lazarus  got  his 
start  in  the  world.  But  by  and  by  eyes  that  could  see  rested  upon  those  barren 
hills;  trained  hands  commenced  to  busy  themselves  in  bringing  out  their  latent 
possibilities.  Patiently  through  the  long  years  the  poor  old  hills  had  waited  for 
their  hour,  and  now  with  a  joyous  bound  they  sprang  into  life;  with  swelling 
pride  they  decked  themselves  in  the  verdant  glory  of  tree  and  vine,  and  today 
no  lands  in  the  South  pay  handsomer  dividends  than  the  once  despised  lands  of 
Moore  County.  Climate,  plus  soil,  made  a  desert ;  climate,  plus  soil,  plus  brains, 
made  a  paradise. 

But  if  the  first  thing  to  do  with  a  dollar  is  to  make  it,  the  second  is  to  use  that 
dollar  for  the  glory  of  God  and  the  happiness  of  mankind.  An  idle  dollar  is  just 
as  vicious  as  an  idle  man.  Neither  has  any  place  in  a  progressive  community. 
The  work  that  we  do  in  making  the  dollar  gets  color  and  character  from  the  use 
to  which  we  propose  to  put  it.  What  relation  do  you  sustain  to  your  wealth  ? 
Do  you  fancy  you  have  a  right  to  use  it,  not  use  it,  or  misuse  it,  as  you  see  fit  ? 
If  such  be  your  faith,  then  you  are  traveling  one  of  those  ways  "that  seemeth 
right  unto  a  man,  but  the  end  thereof  is  death."  In  the  divine  economy  there  is 
no  such  thing  as  a  fee-simple  estate.  All  our  holdings  are  in  trust,  and  whether 
we  have  wealth  of  goods,  of  intellect,  or  heart,  we  are  under  compulsion  to  use 
that  wealth  in  accordance  with  the  will  of  Him  who  gave  to  one  five  talents,  to 
another  two,  and  to  another  one. 

When  a  man  dies  an  administrator  is  appointed  by  the  court  and  an  inventory 
of  his  assets  and  liabilities  is  taken ;  his  estate  is  wound  up,  a  final  report  is  made 
to  the  court,  and  an  entry  is  made  showing  a  balance  on  the  debit  or  credit  side 
of  the  column.  I  am  not  a  preacher  nor  the  son  of  one;  I  belong  to  a  profession 
the  members  of  which  are  not  generally  accused  of  having  more  religion  than  the 
law  allows;  but  I  devoutly  believe  that  sometime,  somewhere,  the  great  Admin- 
istrator of  the  Universe  takes  an  account  of  every  man's  life;  and  if  in  the  great 
accounting  it  shall  appear  that  a  man  got  more  out  of  the  world  than  he  put  into 
it,  that  he  allowed  humanity  to  do  more  for  him  than  he  for  it,  then  no  matter 
what  the  books  in  the  courts  here  may  show,  there  the  entry  will  be  made  and  will 
stand,  that  the  man  was  insolvent  and  died  in  debt.  It  was  possibly  some  such 
notion  as  this  that  made  Andrew  Carnegie  say  it  was  a  disgrace  for  a  man  to  die 
rich. 

When  the  achievements  of  the  twentieth  century  shall  be  viewed  in  the  dry 
light  of  history  I  venture  the  opinion  that  it  will  be  recorded  that  the  most 
wholesome  contribution  this  century  made  to  civilization  was  not  wireless  teleg- 
raphy, nor  radium,  nor  flying  machines,  nor  submarines,  but  was  the  universal 
acknowledgment  that  a  man's  life  should  be  measured  by  its  relation  to  the  common 
good.  And  the  peculiar  value  of  this  contribution  will  rest  in  the  fact  that  the 
acknowledgment  was  not  merely  verbal,  but  was  made  in  terms  of  service  and 
self-denial.  Some  time  ago  I  read  some  lines,  the  title  to  which  I  do  not  now 
recall,  but  they  sum  up  in  striking  fashion  the  spirit  of  the  twentieth  century. 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  241 

An  old  man,  traveling  a  lone  highway, 

Came  at  the  evening,  cold  and  gray, 

To  a  chasm  deep  and  wide; 

The  old  man  crossed  in  the  twilight  dim: 

The  sullen  stream  had  no  fears  for  him. 

But  he  turned  when  safe  on  the  other  side 

And  built  a  bridge  to  span  the  tide. 

"Old  man,"  said  a  fellow  pilgrim  near, 

"You  are  wasting  your  strength  in  building  here; 

Your  journey  will  end  with  the  ending  day, 

You  never  again  will  pass  this  way; 

You've  crossed  the  chasm  deep  and  wide. 

Why  build  you  the  bridge  at  eventide?" 

The  builder  lifted  his  old  gray  head. 

"Good  friend,  in  the  path  I've  come,"  he  said, 

"There  followeth  after  me  today 

A  youth  whose  feet  must  pass  this  way. 

This  chasm  that  was  as  naught  to  me 

To  that  fair  youth  may  a  pitfall  be; 

He,  too,  must  cross  in  the  twilight  dim; 

Good  friend,  I  am  building  the  bridge  for  him." 


(22) 
TENTH  OF  MAY  CELEBRATION  IN  GASTON  COUNTY 

The  first  cornerstone  of  a  monument  is  laid  in  the  hearts  of  a  people.  By 
these  eloquent  and  imperishable  witnesses  we  certify  to  the  centuries  the  things 
we  love  and  honor.  The  ideals  of  a  people  are  discovered  through  their  affections. 
The  thing  he  loves  the  best  is  the  measure  of  the  man.  It  follows  that  every 
monument  is  at  once  an  expression  of  love  and  a  revelation  of  character.  When 
we  build  a  monument  to  the  Confederate  soldier  we  consecrate  ourselves  to  the 
virtues  he  embodies.  Hence  it  is  with  legitimate  pride  that  I  hail  this  day  when 
the  good  County  of  Gaston  leaves  factories  and  fields,  and  clothed  in  the  beauty 
of  self-forgetfulness  and  led  by  these  fair  priestesses  of  the  brave,  makes  her 
offering  of  love  upon  the  altar  of  a  lost  cause  and  lays  the  cornerstone  of  a 
monument  to  those  mighty  spirits  of  sixty-one  and  five  who  had  a  faith  and  fought 
for  it  and  died  for  it. 

Veterans,  I  come  to  you  today  with  reverence  in  my  heart,  but  with  feeble 
phrases  upon  my  lips.  I  am  overwhelmed  with  a  sense  of  inadequacy  that  amounts 
to  pain  when  I  contrast  the  most  that  I  can  say  with  the  least  that  you  did. 
Pitiful  is  the  poverty  of  language  in  the  presence  of  battles,  wounds,  and  graves, 
and  all  the  blood-red  drama  of  war.  Powerless  is  tongue  or  pen  to  add  to  the 
sublimity  of  the  record  you  wrote  with  flame  and  carved  with  steel.  That  record 
is  its  own  eulogy  and  its  own  monument.    It  declares  its  own  glory. 

And  yet,  while  I  cannot  with  words  emblazon  valor  that  made  the  world 
wonder,  I  can  and  do  come  from  your  sons  and  daughters  with  a  message — a 
message  of  pride,  of  admiration,  of  gratitude,  of  love.     We  realize  that  it  is  but 

16 


242  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

little  that  we  may  do.  The  years  are  not  many;  the  shadows  fall  far  to  the  east. 
The  great  gaps  in  your  ranks  show  the  hand  of  the  reaper  is  busy  among  the 
ripened  grain,  and  in  battalions  you  are  joining  your  comrades  on  those  eternal 
camping  grounds  that  lie  beyond  the  stars. 

But  while  you  are  yet  with  us  we  want  you  to  know  and  the  world  to  know 
that  your  sons  and  daughters  rise  up  and  call  you  blessed;  that  we  cherish  and 
will  forever  defend  your  memory  as  our  most  precious  inheritance,  and  in  your 
heroism  and  endurance  find  our  dearest  inspiration. 

"While  I  was  not  in  the  Confederacy,  I  am  essentially  and  everlastingly  of  it. 
My  father  served  for  four  years,  first  as  lieutenant  in  the  Tenth  Battalion,  and 
afterwards  as  surgeon.  This  makes  me  a  son  of  the  Confederacy.  And  then  I 
married  the  daughter  of  the  Fifteenth  1ST.  C.  Regiment,  and  this  makes  me  a  son- 
in-law  of  the  Confederacy.  So  I  can  establish  my  credentials  both  by  blood  and 
by  marriage. 

I  have  sometimes  heard  speakers  on  occasions  like  this  lament  that  they  were 
not  permitted  to  be  with  you  on  the  field  of  battle.  While  I  have  always  admired 
their  enthusiasm,  I  have  doubted  their  sincerity. 

I  was  born  four  years  after  the  last  gun  was  fired,  and  I  have  never  railed 
against  fate  or  anybody  else  on  account  of  the  date  of  my  birth.  In  fact,  I  have 
always  felt  that  it  was  a  nice  quiet  time  in  which  to  be  born.  I  am  perfectly 
satisfied  with  the  sort  of  fight  you  put  up.  It  has  never  occurred  to  me  that  I 
could  have  improved  it  in  any  respect.  I  have  always  fancied  that  when  a  full- 
grown  battery  or  line  of  infantry  got  down  to  business  the  farther  off  one  hap- 
pened to  be  the  more  beautiful  the  scenery.  Standing  up  before  real  guns  is  a 
perfectly  serious  business,  and  I  am  not  complaining  because  I  was  not  per- 
mitted to  do  so. 

There  is  another  school  of  speakers  and  writers  who  exhaust  their  energies  in 
an  effort  to  prove  that  the  South  fought  a  rash  and  reasonless  war.  Such  an 
attitude  is  a  confession  that  they  have  made  no  adequate  study  of  the  underlying 
causes  of  that  conflict.  That  war  simply  had  to  come;  it  was  not  made,  it  was 
born.  The  seeds  of  secession  were  sown  in  the  very  bed  of  our  Constitution.  The 
germ  of  war  was  imbedded  in  the  very  core  and  kernel  of  our  political  and  social 
life.  Most  things  can  be  thought  out ;  some  things  must  be  fought  out.  Wo 
tribunal  could  have  written  a  final  decree  upon  the  stupendous  issues  involved  in 
that  conflict  save  the  dread  tribunal  of  war. 

If  you  had  shown  any  disposition  to  shun  the  issue  or  shirk  the  conflict ;  if  you 
had  been  less  conscious  of  your  rights  or  less  fearless  in  maintaining  them,  you 
could  have  delayed  a  war  you  wTere  powerless  to  prevent.  You  could  have  be- 
queathed the  quarrel  to  this  generation. 

Bethel  and  Appomattox  had  to  come,  but  if  you  had  so  willed  they  would  have 
come  in  the  nineties  instead  of  in  the  sixties.  Your  chief  claim  upon  the  gratitude 
of  this  generation  lies  in  the  fact  that,  seeing  the  conflict  was  inevitable,  you  did 
not  run  away  from  it.  You  did  not  cower  behind  your  walls  and  wait  for  a 
siege,  but  boldly  marched  out  into  the  open  and  startled  the  enemy  with  a  challenge 
to  submit  the  quarrel  to  the  God  of  battles.  With  a  courage  that  never  faltered, 
with  a  faith  that  knew  no  fear,  you  faced  the  wrinkled  front  of  war.  For  four 
years  you  presented  your  bodies  a  living  sacrifice  upon  the  altar  of  your  faith,  and 
under  God  worked  out  for  your  country  a  deliverance  from  a  body  of  death,  and 
made  your  sons  and  daughters  the  heirs  of  hope  instead  of  fear,  of  peace  instead 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  243 

of  war,  of  life  instead  of  death.     Here  and  now  on  behalf  of  those  sons  and 
daughters,  I  make  acknowledgment  of  the  debt  that  we  can  never  pay. 

I  never  see  a  Confederate  soldier  halting  on  his  crutch,  or  his  empty  sleeve 
fluttering  in  the  wind,  without  feeling  in  my  heart,  "There  goes  the  man  that  took 
my  place  in  the  ranks."     On  Memorial  Day,  when  I  stand  above  the  soldiers' 

".     .     .     low  green  tent, 
Whose  curtain  never  outward  swings," 

I  always  feel,  "There  lies  the  man  who  died  that  I  might  live."     May 

"The  benediction  of  the  overcovering  heavens 
Fall  on  their  heads  like  dew,  for  they  were  worthy 
To  inlay  heaven  with  stars." 

I  propose  to  call  several  witnesses,  whose  disinterested  testimony  conclusively 
refutes  the  charge  that  the  South  heedlessly  and  needlessly  plunged  into  war. 

In  1837  De  Tocqueville,  the  great  French  statesman,  wrote  his  masterpiece, 
"Democracy  in  America."  In  this  book,  which  was  received  with  universal 
approval  both  in  Europe  and  America,  the  author  says:  "However  strong  a 
government  may  be,  it  cannot  escape  from  the  consequences  of  a  principle  which 
it  has  once  admitted  as  a  foundation  of  its  constitution.  The  Union  was  formed 
by  the  voluntary  agreement  of  the  states,  and  in  uniting  together  they  have  not 
forfeited  their  nationality  nor  have  they  been  reduced  to  one  and  the  same 
people.  If  one  of  the  states  chose  to  withdraw  its  name  from  the  compact  it 
would  be  difficult  to  disprove  its  right  of  doing  so,  and  the  Federal  Government 
would  have  no  means  of  maintaining  its  claim  either  by  force  or  by  right." 

This  was  the  voice  of  France  a  quarter  of  a  century  before  the  war. 

In  1887,  Von  Hoist,  the  great  German  philosopher  and  historian,  wrote  his 
monumental  work  on  the  "Constitutional  History  of  the  United  States."  He  says : 
"Calhoun  and  his  disciples  were  not  the  authors  of  the  doctrine  of  nullification 
and  secession.  That  question  is  as  old  as  the  Constitution  itself,  and  has  always 
been  a  living  one,  even  when  it  has  not  been  one  of  life  and  death.  Its  roots  lay 
in  the  actual  circumstances  of  the  time,  and  the  Constitution  was  the  living 
expression  of  these  actual  circumstances." 

This  is  the  voice  of  Germany  a  quarter  of  a  century  after  the  war. 

The  next  witness  I  call  is  Colonel  Henderson  of  the  British  Army,  whose 
"Life  of  Stonewall  Jackson"  has  commanded  worldwide  attention.  Colonel  Hen- 
derson says:  "There  can  be  no  question  but  that  secession  was  revolution,  and 
revolutions,  as  has  been  well  said,  are  not  made  for  the  sake  of  greased  cartridges. 
Secession  in  fact  was  a  protest  against  mob  rule.  The  spirit  of  self-sacrifice  which 
animated  the  Confederate  South  has  been  characteristic  of  every  revolution  which 
has  been  the  expression  of  a  nation's  wrongs.  "When,  in  the  process  of  time,  the 
history  of  secession  comes  to  be  viewed  with  the  same  freedom  from  prejudice  as 
the  history  of  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries,  it  will  be  clear  that  the 
fourth  great  revolution  of  the  English-speaking  race  differs  in  no  essential 
characteristics  from  those  that  preceded  it.  In  each  a  great  principle  was  at 
stake.  In  1642,  the  liberty  of  the  subject;  in  1688,  the  integrity  of  the  Protestant 
faith;  in  1775,  taxation  only  with  the  consent  of  the  taxed;  in  1861,  the  sov- 
ereignty of  the  individual  states.  Tbe  world  has  long  since  done  justice  to  the 
motives  of  Cromwell  and  of  Washington,  and  signs  are  not  wanting  that  before 
many  years  have  passed  it  will  do  justice  to  the  motives  of  the  Southern  people." 

This  is  the  voice  of  England  today. 


244  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

For  my  last  witness  I  go  to  the  very  heart  of  the  enemy's  camp,  the  venerable 
State  of  Massachusetts.  The  most  scholarly  man  in  public  life  in  Massachusetts 
today  is  United  States  Senator  Henry  Cabot  Lodge.  Mr.  Lodge  has  written  the 
"Life  of  Daniel  "Webster."  N~ow,  when  the  most  scholarly  statesman  in  Massachu- 
setts sits  down  to  write  the  life  of  the  greatest  man  Massachusetts  ever  produced, 
it  is  fair  to  assume  that  he  will  write  as  one  having  authority.  In  the  "Life  of 
Webster,"  Senator  Lodge  says :  "When  the  Constitution  was  adopted  by  the 
assembly  of  states  at  Philadelphia,  and  accepted  by  votes  of  states  in  popular 
convention,  it  is  safe  to  say  that  there  was  not  a  man  in  the  country,  from  "Washing- 
ton and  Hamilton  on  the  one  side,  to  George  Clinton  and  George  Mason  on  the 
other,  who  regarded  the  new  system  as  anything  but  an  experiment  entered  upon 
by  the  states  and  from  which  each  and  every  state  had  the  right  to  peaceably 
withdraw,  a  right  which  was  very  likely  to  be  exercised." 

I  will  add  that  this  doctrine  that  any  state  had  an  undoubted  constitutional 
right  to  withdraw  from  the  Union  is  emphatically  and  clearly  taught  in  Rawle  on 
the  Constitution,  a  text-book  used  by  the  United  States  Government  in  the 
Military  Academy  at  West  Point  when  Jefferson  Davis  and  Robert  E.  Lee  were 
cadets  in  that  academy. 

The  scope  of  this  address  does  not  comprehend  any  elaborate  argument  upon 
the  constitutional  right  of  secession.  But  I  submit  that  the  voices  of  these  eminent 
and  disinterested  statesmen  from  Prance,  Germany  and  England,  and  the  testi- 
mony of  the  most  scholarly  statesman  now  in  public  life  on  the  other  side,  should 
forever  silence  those  latter-day  bigots  who  would  teach  that  the  Confederate 
soldier  died  as  the  fool  dieth,  who  would  fain  translate  his  patriotism  into 
prejudice  and  his  heroism  into  folly. 

The  past  is  secure.  The  Confederate  soldier  can  no  longer  be  calumniated  or 
misunderstood.  With  simple  dignity  he  faces  the  judgment  bar  of  the  centuries 
and  with  serene  confidence  says : 

"I  stand  amid  the  eternal  ways, 
And  know  my  own  shall  come  to  me." 

Fifty-two  years  have  elapsed  since  the  Confederate  States  of  America  passed 
into  history.  What  message  do  we  of  today  find  on  their  red-leaved  record? 
"What  voices  speak  to  us  from  a  Nation's  sepulcher?  What  is  our  heritage  from 
the  Titanic  struggle?  Were  the  blood  and  treasure  all  wasted?  Were  a  million 
sacrifices  made  for  naught?  Did  the  Confederate  soldier  die  as  the  fool  dieth? 
I  think  not. 

There  is  in  the  natural  world  a  law  of  the  conservation  of  energy.  This  law 
denies  that  anything  can  be  wholly  lost.  It  stands  for  the  immortality  of  matter. 
I  steadfastly  believe  in  the  existence  of  such  a  law  in  the  moral  world.  ISTo  good 
deed  is  ever  wasted.  Sometime  and  somewhere  it  will  find  its  place  in  the  eternal 
scheme  and  swell  the  sum  total  of  those  forces  that  bless  and  uplift  the  world. 

"No  action,  whether  foul  or  fair, 
Is  ever  done,  but  it  leaves  somewhere 
A  record,  written  by  fingers  ghostly, 
As  a  blessing  or  a  curse,  and  mostly 
In  the  greater  weakness  or  greater  strength 
Of  the  acts  which  follow  it." 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  245 

And  so  out  of  the  crucible  of  war  there  comes  to  your  children  three  im- 
perishable lessons :   How  to  fight ;  how  to  fall ;  how  to  rise  again. 

Wo  man  who  ever  faced  your  battle  line  will  deny  that  you  knew  how  to  fight. 
You  were  a  quiet,  peace-loving  people,  slow  to  leave  the  Union,  but  when  there 
could  be  no  peace  except  at  the  price  of  honor,  you  gave  your  all  to  the  new 
nation;  and  with  only  115,000  voters  in  all  her  borders,  North  Carolina  marshaled 
127,000  men  under  the  Bonnie  Blue  Flag. 

It  is  not  my  purpose  to  discuss  in  detail  the  causes  that  led  to  the  war,  nor 
review  its  many  battles.  No  tongue  can  fitly  tell  the  story  of  those  four  years 
of  heroism  and  hardships.  The  daily  life  of  the  Confederate  soldier  spelled  out 
the  great  words,  "Obedience,"  "Sacrifice,"  "Courage,"  "Death." 

In  a  single  letter  General  Lee  has  embalmed  the  North  Carolina  soldiery  in 
an  immortality  of  fame.    I  quote  it  in  full. 

August  29,  1864. 
His  Excellency,  Z.  B.  Vance, 

Governor  of  North  Carolina, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

I  have  frequently  been  called  upon  to  mention  the  services  ot  North 
Carolina  soldiers  in  this  army,  but  their  gallantry  and  conduct  were  never 
more  deserving  of  admiration  than  in  the  engagement  at  Reams  Station  on 
the  25th  ultimo. 

The  brigades  of  General  Cooke,  MacRae,  and  Lane,  the  last  under  the  tem- 
porary command  of  General  Conner,  advanced  through  a  thick  abatis  of 
felled  trees,  under  heavy  fire  of  musketry  and  artillery,  and  carried  the 
enemy's  works  with  a  steady  courage  that  elicited  the  warm  commendation 
and  the  admiration  of  the  army. 

On  the  same  occasion  the  brigade  of  General  Barringer  bore  a  con- 
spicuous part  in  the  operations  of  the  cavalry  which  were  no  less  dis- 
tinguished for  boldness  and  efficiency  than  those  of  the  infantry. 

If  the  men  who  remain  in  North  Carolina  share  the  spirit  of  those  they 
have  sent  to  the  field,  as  I  doubt  not  they  do,  her  defense  may  securely  be 
trusted  in  their  hands. 

I  am,  with  great  respect,      Your  obedient  servant, 

R.  E.  Lee,  General. 

Lee  was  no  wordy  warrior.  He  weighed  well  his  words  as  he  did  his  deeds, 
and  this  letter  ought  to  be  framed  and  hung  in  every  home  in  North  Carolina. 
It  is  a  certificate  of  nobility,  issued  by  the  knightliest  Christian  soldier  this 
world  has  ever  known.  Such  is  your  record,  and  our  inheritance.  It  calls  like 
the  trumpet,  it  guides  like  a  star.  The  boyish  eagerness  for  the  fray;  the  tears 
that  fell  like  rain  as  the  women  watched  the  gray  legions  march  to  the  front ; 
the  slow  starvation  in  the  camp ;  the  ice-clad  sentinel  on  his  lonely  beat ;  the  wild, 
mad  charge ;  the  shout  of  triumph  when  the  red  field  was  won ;  the  soldier's  shallow 
sepulcher. 

All  these  call  to  us  of  today  to  be  strong  and  to  quit  ourselves  like  men.  We 
must  measure  up  to  the  standard  or  wither  in  the  slow  fires  of  self-contempt. 
Shall  the  cub  of  the  lion  be  a  cur?  I  tell  you,  Veterans,  if  your  sons  should  balk 
in  the  face  of  deadly  peril,  should  falter  in  any  crucial  hour,  your  graves  would 
open  and  your  reincarnated  spirits  would  stalk  forth  and  scourge  them  into  the 
path  of  honor.     "Thy  dead  men  shall  live,"  cries  the  Hebrew  prophet,   and  the 


246  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  PICKETT 

shrouded  legions  of  a  Lost  Cause  give  color  and  character  to  the  civilization  of 
the  hour. 

But  if  your  fight  was  glorious,  your  fall  was  sublime,  and  this  is  the  rarer 
virtue.  Adversity  is  the  supreme  test  of  character.  Then  the  soul,  stripped  of  its 
trimmings  and  trappings,  stands  naked  before  God  and  man.  Your  crowning 
glory  lies  in  the  fact  that  on  the  field  of  battle  you  acted  like  men,  and  in  the 
hour  of  defeat  you  acted  like  gods.  This  is  the  crucial  test :  the  temptation  that 
came  to  you  in  the  wilderness  of  despair,  and  from  its  darkness  and  desolation 
you  emerged  with  souls  unsullied,  heroes  still,  "with  hearts  of  gold." 

You  gave  up  your  guns  at  Appomattox — that  was  all.  Your  ranks  were 
broken,  but  your  souls  never  left  the  firing  line.  You  surrendered,  but  you  did 
not  quit.  You  bowed  low  as  the  great  tidal  wave  of  destiny  swept  over  you, 
and,  rising  with  the  light  of  battle  in  your  eyes,  you  faced  the  future  unashamed 
and  unafraid. 

At  Appomattox  God  said  to  the  Confederate  soldier :  "About  face !"  In 
obedience  to  the  celestial  order  there  was  change  of  front.  By  the  alchemy  of  a 
divine  faith  and  a  divine  heroism,  the  soldier  of  war  was  translated  into  the 
soldier  of  peace,  and  in  the  place  of  the  man  with  the  sword  stood  the  man  with 
the  hoe. 

In  a  public  square  in  the  city  of  Paris  there  is  a  statue  in  bronze  by  the  great 
French  sculptor  Mercie.  A  woman  is  carrying  a  wounded  warrior  from  the  field 
of  battle.  He  hangs  limp  and  unconscious  on  her  shoulder,  but  in  his  right  hand 
he  still  holds,  with  stubborn  grip,  his  broken  sword.  The  statue  is  called  "The 
Glory  of  the  Conquered." 

Nothing  could  more  fitly  portray  the  Confederate  soldier  at  Appomattox. 
He  fell,  but  with  relentless  grasp  he  held  to  his  broken  sword  while  in  mighty 
arms  of  love  the  womanhood  of  the  South  bore  him  from  the  field.  It  would  ill 
become  the  exalted  dignity  of  her  character  for  me  to  cheapen  the  woman  of  the 
South  with  fulsome  praise.  As  she  sent  her  soldier  forth  while  her  eyes  flashed 
and  her  heart  bled;  as  she  suffered  and  sacrificed  and  gave  no  cry  when  she  knew 
that  her  dearest  had  found  a  soldier's  sepulcher,  so  now,  when  he  returned,  worn 
and  wasted  and  bleeding  at  every  pore,  she  broke  for  him  the  alabaster  box  of  an 
immeasurable  love  whose  fragrance  filled  the  earth. 

On  the  smouldering  ruins  of  a  hallowed  past  the  Southern  man,  upheld  by  the 
love  of  a  Southern  woman,  began  to  build  anew.  Together  they  wrought  out  the 
grandest  chapter  in  American  history.  Though  they  had  been  overpowered,  they 
refused  to  be  degraded.  Though  cast  down,  they  would  not  be  destroyed.  They 
swore  they  would  not  touch  pitch  and  that  pitch  should  not  touch  them.  They 
defied  bayonets;  they  laughed  at  statutes.  Immutable  as  the  rocks  and  as  glorious 
as  the  stars,  they  stood  for  the  integrity  of  a  white  civilization  and  a  white  race. 
And  by  reason  of  your  immortal  stand  North  Carolina  today  holds  in  trust  for 
the  safety  of  the  Nation  the  purest  Anglo-Saxon  blood  to  be  found  on  the  American 
shores.  And  the  Nation  is  beginning  to  realize  how  well  you  served  it  when,  in 
the  hour  of  utter  desolation,  you  refused  to  be  defiled. 

Secretary  of  State  John  Hay,  when  he  pronounced  his  great  eulogy  upon  the 
martyred  McKinley,  before  the  assembled  representatives  of  the  civilized  world, 
paid  high  tribute  to  you  men  in  gray  because  when  you  ceased  to  be  soldiers  you 
became  the  best  of  citizens. 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  247 

The  New  York  Sun,  a  paper  of  strong  Northern  prejudices  but  edited  with 
matchless  scholarship,  has  declared  that  the  Fifteenth  Amendment,  which  gave  the 
negro  the  right  to  vote,  was  the  most  colossal  blunder  and  crime  in  the  history 
of  the  civilized  world.    Everywhere  the  people  are  beginning  to  recognize  that  the 
South  and  only  the  South  is  competent  to  deal  with  the  race  question,  and  the 
doctrine  of  "Let  the  South  alone"  is  in  the  saddle  in  the  very  heart  of  the  North. 
Yes,  Veterans,  I  come  to  you  today  with  good  tidings.    The  night  is  far  spent, 
the  day  is  at  hand,  and  I  rejoice  that  some  of  you  have  been  spared  to  see  the 
realization  of  the  prophecy  of  the  South's  tenderest  and  sweetest  poet : 
"And  the  graves  of  our  dead,  with  grass  o'ergrown, 
Shall  yet  be  the  footstool  of  liberty's  throne, 
And  each  single  wreck  in  the  warfare  of  night 
Shall  yet  be  a  rock  in  the  temple  of  right." 

And  now,  Veterans,  in  behalf  of  your  sons  who  on  this  Memorial  Day  stand 
with  uncovered  heads  to  do  you  honor,  in  behalf  of  these  Daughters  of  the  Con- 
federacy, guardian  angels  of  the  shattered  remnant  of  your  immortal  line,  I  say, 
God  bless  you,  every  one.  May  your  last  days  be  your  best  days ;  may  loving  hands 
lead  you  gently  down  the  hill,  and  when,  at  last,  you  stand  at  its  foot  among  the 
gathering  shadows,  God  grant  that  it  may  be  given  to  every  one  of  you  to  say, 
in  the  language  of  your  beloved  Jackson :  "Let  us  pass  over  the  river  and  rest 
under  the  shade  of  the  trees." 


(23) 
GOOD  ROADS 


Every  community  engaged  in  the  work  of  building  good  roads  will  need  two 
things:  money  and  encouragement.  I  am  here  today  to  lend  you  some  en- 
couragement. 

And  I  know  of  nothing  more  encouraging  to  folks  who  are  working  toward 
a  better  achievement  than  the  fact  that  another  community  similarly  and  no 
better  situated  has  successfully  and  satisfactorily  built  good  roads. 

The  fact  that  it  has  been  done  is  the  finest  proof  that  it  can  be  done.  That 
message  I  bring  you  and  it  is  the  excuse  for  my  presence. 

Beginning  less  than  three  years  ago  in  Eranklinton  Township  with  a  bond 
issue  of  $40,000,  we  now  have  in  that  one  township  sixty  miles  of  splendid  gravel 
roads.  There  are  no  grades  in  excess  of  five  per  cent,  and  only  two  places  that 
exceed  four  per  cent,  and  on  an  average  Franklinton  Township  has  more  hills 
and  valleys  than  "Wake  County.  All  roads  are  thirty  feet  wide  and  well  drained. 
They  have  been  put  where  they  ought  to  be.  In  no  instance  has  the  recommen- 
dation of  a  location  by  the  engineer  been  disregarded. 

Carrying  the  election  at  first  was  a  hard,  close  fight,  in  doubt  till  the  last  day, 
yet  last  December,  on  a  proposition  to  spend  $10,000  additional,  there  was  prac- 
tically no  opposition  and  the  majority  was  overwhelming.  "We  have  just  passed 
through  the  hardest  winter  in  my  knowledge,  yet  the  great  majority  of  our  roads 
have  kept  in  good  shape  and  the  few  places  where  the  gravel  was  cut  through  can 
be  repaired  at  small  expense. 


248  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Sixty  miles  of  roads  in  one  township  means  that  every  man  travels  a  good 
road  coming  into  town,  it  means  that  every  section  is  reached  and  benefited,  and 
it  means  a  feeling  of  satisfaction  among  our  people. 

Before  the  inauguration  of  any  system  of  good  roads  there  must  be  a  program 
of  education.  Our  people  are  all  from  Missouri  when  it  comes  to  spending  their 
money.  With  us  it  is  impossible  to  carry  out  any  office-made  plan  for  public 
improvement.  The  average  North  Carolinian  is  unwilling  for  the  Lord  to  change 
him  into  an  angel  before  he  is  ready. 

For  the  permanent  success  of  any  plan  we  must  have  a  majority  of  the  people 
with  us  at  the  beginning  and  all  along.  We  need  their  approval  of  the  plan  as 
well  as  of  the  end.  They  may  seem  unreasonable  about  it,  unwilling  to  consider 
the  larger  public  good  or  to  look  far  enough  ahead,  but  it  is  a  condition  and 
not  a  theory  which  we  have  to  face. 

They  must  be  made  to  understand  two  things :  First,  the  economical  im- 
portance and  convenience  of  good  roads.  Second,  that  they  will  get  value  re- 
ceived for  the  money  put  into  it. 

The  first  we  are  attaining  through  meetings  like  this  and  most  largely  through 
the  help  of  newspapers  both  big  and  little.  I  do  not  know  a  country  weekly  in 
the  State  but  is  giving  the  weight  of  its  influence  to  this  end,  and  I  believe  in 
acknowledging  our  debt  as  we  go  along. 

Many  folks,  realizing  the  benefit  of  good  roads,  seem  to  believe  that  they  come 
too  high.  They  have  pictures  in  their  heads  of  broad  macadamized  highways. 
We  need  to  emphasize  more  and  more  the  gravel,  sand-clay,  and  top-soil  roads, 
which  will  meet  admirably  the  traffic  conditions  in  most  places. 

However,  the  big  job  is  to  convince  people  that  they  will  get  value  for  the 
money  that  goes  into  the  work. 

The  first  thing  they  will  want  is  assurance  of  competent,  efficient,  and  dis- 
interested management.  I  have  no  suggestions  to  make,  but  I  do  commend  to 
you  the  example  of  three  business  men  of  my  township  who  have  given  to  the 
work  their  time,  their  ability,  and  their  interest,  who  have  had  at  all  times  regard 
to  the  public  good,  and  have  applied  to  the  conduct  of  public  work  the  same  degree 
of  intelligent  care  that  they  give  to  their  private  interests.  And  I  want  to  say 
here  and  now  that  in  my  opinion  these  men  have  rendered  a  larger  measure  of 
service  to  this  community  than  they  could  have  done  as  governors  or  United 
States  Senators. 

Also,  the  quicker  the  work  is  done  the  greater  satisfaction  will  be  given. 
Folks  may  not  expect  so  very  much  in  this  world,  but  what  they  do  want  they 
want  it  quick.  Hope  deferred  maketh  the  heart  sick,  but  a  good  road  delayed 
makes  a  man  mad.  For  this  reason,  as  well  as  many  others,  a  bond  issue  is  the 
only  satisfactory  method.  I  believe  it  would  be  wise  in  any  county  system  to 
have  sufficient  road  force  and  equipment  to  build  roads  as  fast  as  an  engineer 
could  survey  and  locate  them. 

Again,  and  it  is  the  crucial  test  of  the  wisdom  of  any  plan,  a  good  roads 
system  should  be  such  that  it  will  reach  every  section.  Nothing  is  more  resented 
than  the  belief  that  one  section  is  getting  the  benefit  of  money  which  belongs  to  all. 
Highways  which  reach  from  one  end  of  the  State  to  the  other,  routes  which 
connect  the  North  and  the  South  appeal  to  you  and  me.  They  link  section  with 
section,  promote  the  intermingling  of  our  people,  and  we  would  take  a  pride  in 
them,  but  the  average  citizen  requires  something  more  than  pride  and  sentiment 
to  sustain  his  good  humor  when  tax-paying  time  has  come. 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  249 

And  there  is  an  economic  reason.  Roads,  after  all,  are  primarily  to  serve  as 
channels  of  commerce.  Railroads  have  long  ago  superseded  country  roads  as  the 
trunk  lines  of  commercial  interchange.  Country  roads  now  are  but  the  little 
feeders  running  out  from  the  big  arteries  to  every  part  of  the  body,  and  their  great 
office  is  to  let  a  man  get  his  stuff  to  market  quickly,  surely,  and  cheaply.  They  are 
essentially  for  the  man  who  sells  and  the  man  who  buys.  To  the  visitor,  the 
traveler,  the  churchgoer,  a  good  road  is  a  convenience.  To  the  farmer  and  the 
merchant  it  has  become  a  necessity.  A  system  is  to  be  judged  not  by  the  length 
of  its  highways,  but  by  the  thoroughness  of  the  service  it  gives  to  the  people. 

Agricultural  papers  and  town  folks  are  forever  advising  farmers  to  diversify 
their  crops.  Well,  the  quickest  road  to  diversified  industry  on  the  farm  is  a  good 
road  to  town. 

When  all  the  counties  get  good  roads  we  will  have  the  State-wide  highways 
all  right,  but  I  do  not  believe  we  can  build  up  a  permanent  sentiment  for  good 
roads  unless  the  primary  aim  of  our  plans  shall  be  the  bringing  of  the  folks  and 
all  the  folks  closer  to  the  market. 


(24) 
LEE 

A  Prince  once  said  of  a  Monarch  slain,  "Taller  he  seems  in  death." 

This  is  even  so  of  Robert  E.  Lee.  The  figure  that  loomed  so  grandly  in  the 
red  glare  of  battle  towers  higher  still  in  the  pure  white  light  in  which  men  are 
measured  before  the  judgment  bar  of  history. 

There  are  just  three  qualities  of  Lee  I  desire  to  emphasize :  1.  His  supreme 
and  superb  unselfishness.  This  quality  is  not  only  a  badge,  but  is  the  condition 
of  greatness.  No  man  ever  rose  to  true  greatness  on  the  wings  of  a  selfish  spirit. 
Great  deeds  born  of  love  and  executed  in  a  spirit  of  self-immolation  are  the  price 
of  an  enduring  place  in  the  minds  and  hearts  of  men.  On  earth  as  well  as  in 
heaven  the  truth  holds  that  "he  who  would  save  his  life  must  lose  it." 

This  quality  of  Lee  that  molded  and  colored  his  whole  life  is  immortalized 
in  three  incidents. 

First,  his  refusal  to  accept  the  command  of  the  Union  Armies  when  this 
position  was  tendered  him  by  Mr.  Lincoln. 

By  birth  and  training  Lee  was  essentially  a  soldier.  His  father,  who  died 
when  he  was  only  eleven  years  old,  and  whose  memory  he  idolized,  was  "Light 
Horse  Harry"  of  Revolutionary  fame.  He  it  was  who  said  of  Washington  that 
"He  was  first  in  war,  first  in  peace,  and  first  in  the  hearts  of  his  countrymen." 
And  as  Washington  was  the  idol  of  the  father,  he  was  the  model  of  the  son. 
Lee  was  connected  with  Washington  by  more  than  one  strain  of  blood,  and  he 
married  Miss  Custis,  who  was  the  granddaughter  of  Washington's  adopted  son. 
He  was  trained  for  a  soldier's  life  at  West  Point,  and  in  the  Mexican  War  he 
displayed  such  convincing  evidence  of  military  genius  that  General  Scott,  the 
commander-in-chief  of  the  forces  in  Mexico,  said:  "If  I  were  on  my  deathbed 
tomorrow,  and  the  President  of  the  United   States  should  tell  me  that   a  great 


250  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

battle  was  to  be  fougbt  for  tbe  liberty  or  slavery  of  the  country,  and  asked  niy 
judgment  as  to  tbe  ability  of  a  commander,  I  would  say  witb  my  dying  breath, 
Let  it  be  Lee."  It  was  doubtless  this  opinion  of  General  Scott  that  led  Mr. 
Lincoln  to  tender  to  a  colonel  tbe  position  of  Commander-in-Chief  of  the  Armies 
of  the  North.  Thus  highly  endowed,  Lee  must  have  foreseen  what  the  end  would 
be.  He  must  have  divined  that  the  day  would  come  "when  valor  and  strategy 
could  no  longer  cope  with  overwhelming  numbers  and  resources." 

In  view  of  all  this,  the  offer  of  Mr.  Lincoln  was  in  very  truth  a  temptation  in 
the  wilderness.  Lee  was  carried  to  the  top  of  a  high  mountain  and  shown  this 
world  and  all  the  glory  of  it,  and  dominion  over  it  all  was  tendered  him  if  he 
would  turn  his  back  upon  his  native  State.  If  there  had  been  in  him  one  spark 
of  the  selfish  ambition  that  has  made  angels  fall  he  would  have  surrendered  to 
the  temptation.  But  no  selfish  motive  could  find  lodgment  in  the  imperial  soul 
of  Robert  E.  Lee.  Beyond  the  dazzling  offer,  through  all  the  clouds  of  glory,  he 
saw  the  pleading  face  of  his  own  Virginia,  and  with  that  indifference  to  conse- 
quences that  is  the  birthmark  of  the  true  sky-born,  he  walked  straightway  to  her 
side.  In  this  act  he  parallels  the  great  leader  of  Israel  who  "refused  to  be  called 
the  son  of  Pharaoh's  daughter,  choosing  rather  to  suffer  affliction  with  the  people 
of  God." 

I  was  amazed  some  weeks  ago  to  know  that  a  school  teacher  in  one  of  the 
principal  cities  of  the  State  denied  that  Lee  was  ever  offered  the  command  of  the 
Union  Army.  I  want  to  settle  this  question  forever  in  the  minds  of  all  present. 
Thomas  Nelson  Page  in  "Lee,  the  Southerner,"  at  page  32,  says :  "The  President 
of  the  United  States  tendered  to  Lee  the  command  of  the  armies  of  the  Union 
about  to  take  the  field."  Woodrow  Wilson  in  his  great  work,  "The  History  of 
the  American  People,"  in  Vol.  4,  page  226,  says:  "Mr.  Lincoln  had  offered  him 
(Lee)  the  command  of  the  Army  which  was  to  act  against  the  South,  but  he  had 
declined  the  command."  Long  before  the  people  of  the  United  States  made  him 
their  chief  executive,  Mr.  Wilson  bad  a  worldwide  reputation  as  a  historian,  and 
his  statement  will  be  accepted  as  respectable  authority.  The  most  exhaustive  and 
accurate  history  of  this  particular  period  is  that  of  James  Ford  Rhodes  of 
Massachusetts,  who  writes  seven  large  volumes  and  covers  only  twenty-seven 
years  of  American  history,  the  period  from  1850  to  1877 ;  and  in  Volume  3,  page 
412,  this  profound  historian  from  Massachusetts  says :  "The  active  command  of 
the  Federal  Army  with  the  succession  to  the  chief  place  was  virtually  offered 
to  him."  But  the  very  best  evidence  on  the  subject  is  to  be  found  in  the  statement 
of  Lee  himself.  I  take  it  that  99  per  cent  of  the  men  who  faced  him  on  the  field 
of  battle  will  accept  his  statement  at  par;  and  in  a  letter  written  February  25, 
1868,  by  General  Lee  to  Senator  Beverly  Johnson,  Lee  says  that  he  had  a  con- 
versation with  Mr.  Francis  P.  Blair,  and  Mr.  Blair,  at  the  instance  of  Mr.  Lincoln, 
tendered  him  the  command  of  the  army  that  was  to  be  brought  into  the  field. 
This  is  the  very  last  word  that  can  be  said  upon  this  subject. 

The  second  illustration  of  Lee's  supreme  unselfishness  is  in  his  treatment  of 
Longstreet  at  Gettysburg.  In  the  first  day's  fight,  which  was  stubborn  and  bloody, 
Lee  achieved  a  signal  victory,  capturing  Gettysburg  with  about  five  thousand 
prisoners.  It  was  Meade's  plan  to  destroy  the  army  in  detail :  in  other  words, 
to  whip  it  after  the  fashion  of  Stonewall  Jackson,  on  the  installment  plan.  This 
was  fully  determined  on.  Longstreet  was  opposed  to  fighting  at  Gettysburg  at  all, 
and  had  attempted  to  dissuade  Lee  from  offering  battle,  and  the  next  morning, 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  251 

instead  of  executing  the  orders  of  his  chief,  he  hunted  Lee  up  and  again  protested 
against  making  the  fight.  Lee  then  inspected  the  entire  line  and  again  reached  his 
original  conclusion,  and  ordered  Longstreet  to  attack  at  11  o'clock,  as  previously- 
directed.  Again  Longstreet  delayed  until  the  afternoon,  hut  with  all  this  delay,  the 
second  day's  fight  was  really  a  drawn  battle.  On  the  third  day  Lee  ordered  Long- 
street  to  attack  soon  after  sunrise.  Longstreet's  infantry  did  not  move  until  2 
o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  and  in  the  meantime  regiment  after  regiment  by  forced 
marches  had  come  to  the  relief  of  Meade.  Colonel  Henderson,  the  great  military 
critic  of  the  British  Army,  in  reviewing  this  battle,  inquires,  "Why  did  Longstreet 
delay  his  attack  for  eight  hours,  during  which  time  Lee's  second  corps,  with  which 
Longstreet  was  to  act,  was  heavily  engaged?  If  he  had  moved  only  under  com- 
pulsion, if  he  deliberately  forebore  to  use  his  best  efforts  to  carry  out  Lee's  design 
and  compel  him  to  adopt  his  own,  the  case  is  very  different."  That  he  did  so 
seems  perfectly  clear.  Mr.  Page,  in  his  book  on  Lee,  says :  "Longstreet  at  Gettys- 
burg is  a  subject  that  few  Southerners  can  contemplate  with  philosophic  calm." 
And  he  further  says  that  soon  after  the  war  it  was  common  for  Confederate 
officers  to  say  that  Lee  should  have  ordered  Longstreet  to  be  shot  for  insubordina- 
tion. But  Lee,  with  that  grand  unselfishness  which  is  the  keynote  of  his  character, 
while  he  knew  most  fully  how  absolutely  Longstreet  had  frustrated  his  plans,  took 
all  the  blame  upon  his  own  shoulders,  and  there  it  rested  until  the  quiet  judgment 
of  history  lifted  it  forever.  After  the  war  Lee  said,  and  in  this  judgment  the 
military  critics  of  the  world  agree,  that  if  Stonewall  Jackson  had  been  with  Lee 
at  Gettysburg  the  Confederate  Army  would  have  won  a  great  victory.  If  Jack- 
son had  been  ordered  to  attack  at  sunrise,  at  daybreak  the  wild  rebel  yell  that 
startled  Hooker  at  Chancellorsville  would  have  roused  the  sleeping  Federals  like 
the  crack  of  doom,  and  the  sun  would  have  risen  upon  the  Confederate  hosts  in 
triumphant  array  on  the  crest  of  Cemetery  Ridge.  Much  has  been  said  about 
"The  High  Tide  at  Gettysburg,"  but  I  venture  to  say  that  the  high  tide  of  the 
Confederacy  was  reached  at  Chancellorsville.  It  is  true  that  a  wave  dashed  up 
to  the  crest  of  Cemetery  Ridge  on  that  blood-red  July  day,  but  the  real  tide  turned 
at  Chancellorsville. 

The  death  of  Jackson  is  embalmed  in  some  tender  verses  by  John  Gillespie  of 
North  Carolina,  a  poet  of  real  talent,  who,  like  your  own  dear  John  Charles 
McNeill,  too  early  went  away. 

The  foe  in  confusion  was  flying 

Prom  the  scene  of  the  terrible  fray, 
While  wounded,  bleeding,  and  dying, 

The  invincible  Stonewall  lay. 

Yet  still  in  fancy  he  was  leading 

His  legion  after  the  fight, 
At  God's  holy  altar  was  pleading 

For  aid  in  the  cause  of  the  right. 

But  the  arrows  were  gone  from  the  quiver, 

The  cup  was  drained  to  the  lees, 
As  he  cried,  "Let  us  cross  o'er  the  river 

And  rest  under  the  shade  of  the  trees." 


252  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

None  heard  the  rush  of  the  waters, 

None  heard  the  splash  of  the  oar, 
But  the  leader  forever  departed, 

And  the  army  wept  by  the  shore. 

The  third  incident  that  immortalizes  Lee's  unselfishness  occurred  after  the 
war.  Bill  Arp  says  that  "when  the  Confederate  soldier  got  home  from  Appo- 
mattox, he  had  nothing,  nothing  to  get  nothing  with,  and  nothing  to  put  it  in." 
The  condition  in  which  General  Lee  found  himself  was  not  unlike  that  of  the 
soldiers  in  the  rank  and  file.  His  magnificent  home  at  Arlington  had  been  con- 
fiscated and  converted  into  a  Federal  cemetery.  All  of  his  private  fortune  had 
been  exhausted  during  the  long  war  and  he  and  his  family  were  reduced  to 
absolute  poverty.  At  this  time  a  life  insurance  company  offered  Lee  the  sum  of 
$50,000  a  year  to  serve  as  president  of  the  company.  "But,"  said  Lee,  "I  am  not 
familiar  with  the  work."  "Why,  General,"  replied  the  representative  of  the 
insurance  company,  "we  do  not  expect  you  to  do  any  work;  we  simply  want  the 
use  of  your  name."  "Well,"  replied  Lee,  "if  my  name  is  worth  $50,000  a  year, 
don't  you  think  I  ought  to  be  careful  about  how  I  use  it?"  And  so,  again  he 
turned  his  back  upon  all  the  world  could  offer,  and  went  to  work  as  president 
of  a  poor  little  college  at  a  salary  of  $1,500  a  year. 

Solomon  said,  "A  good  name  is  rather  to  be  chosen  than  great  riches."  Lee 
exemplified  it.  Solomon  reduced  his  faith  to  a  proverb;  Lee  translated  his  into 
a  life.  Is  it  not  suggestive  of  the  real  soul  of  the  South  that  the  two  greatest 
men  she  has  produced  in  a  hundred  years  were  college  presidents?  Lee  crowned 
his  life's  work  by  teaching  the  young  men  of  the  land,  while  Woodrow  Wilson 
made  that  teaching  the  basis  of  his  subsequent  career. 

The  second  quality  of  Lee  I  wish  to  emphasize  is  that  the  man  was  never 
submerged  in  the  soldier.  Lee  is  today  by  impartial  critics  placed  in  the  first 
rank  as  a  military  captain,  but  never  in  all  his  career  did  the  captain  efface  the 
Christian.  He  had  in  heroic  fashion  proved  his  allegiance  to  his  native  State, 
but  never  for  one  moment  did  he  forget  nor  permit  his  army  to  forget  that  his 
and  their  supreme  allegiance  was  to  God  and  to  humanity.  ~No  theories  about 
military  necessity  could  tempt  him  to  forget  the  fatherhood  of  God  and  the 
brotherhood  of  man.  Sherman  said  that  war  was  hell,  and  in  his  march  through 
Georgia  and  South  Carolina  he  did  his  best  to  prove  his  own  definition.  In 
striking  contrast  with  the  conduct  of  Sherman  in  South  Carolina  is  that  of  Lee 
in  Pennsylvania.  His  general  order  'No.  72  makes  for  him  a  place  as  lofty  as  it 
is  unique  in  the  history  of  an  invading  army.     In  that  great  order  he  says : 

The  Commanding  General  considers  that  no  greater  disgrace  would  befall 
the  army,  and  through  it  our  whole  people,  than  the  perpetration  of  the 
barbarous  outrages  upon  the  innocent  and  defenseless  and  the  wanton  de- 
struction of  private  property  that  have  marked  the  course  of  the  enemy  in 
our  own  country.  Such  proceedings  not  only  disgrace  the  perpetrators  and 
all  connected  with  them,  but  are  subversive  of  the  discipline  and  efficiency 
of  the  army  and  obstructive  to  the  ends  of  our  present  movements.  It  must 
be  remembered  that  we  make  war  only  on  armed  men  and  that  we  cannot 
take  vengeance  for  the  wrongs  our  people  have  suffered  without  lowering  our- 
selves in  the  eyes  of  all  whose  abhorrence  has  been  excited  by  the  atrocities 
of  our  enemy,  and  offending  against  Him  to  whom  vengeance  belongeth,  with- 
out whose  favor  and  support  our  efforts  must  all  prove  in  vain.     The  Com- 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  253 

manding  General,  therefore,  earnestly  exhorts  the  troops  to  abstain  with 
most  scrupulous  care  from  unnecessary  or  wanton  injury  to  private  property, 
and  he  enjoins  upon  all  officers  to  arrest  and  bring  to  summary  punishment 
all  who  shall  in  any  way  offend  against  the  orders  on  this  subject. 

R.  E.  Lee,  General. 

If  the  spirit  of  this  order  had  controlled  the  armies  of  Europe  in  the  present 
war,  what  frightful  suffering,  what  nameless  outrages  would  have  been  spared 
the  women  and  children  of  those  unhappy  lands. 

The  third  quality  of  Lee  I  desire  to  emphasize  is  that  while  in  victory  he  was 
great,  in  defeat  he  was  glorious — and  this  is  the  rarer  virtue.  Adversity  is  the 
supreme  test  of  character,  and  through  this  furnace  heated  with  the  baleful  fires 
of  envy,  malice  and  bigotry,  Lee  walked  like  the  chosen  of  God  in  the  olden  times 
and  came  forth  unscathed,  unscarred,  and  without  even  the  smell  of  fire  upon  his 
garments.  One  of  his  favorite  sayings  was  that  human  fortitude  ought  always  to 
be  equal  to  human  calamity.  "When  the  test  came  he  lifted  his  life  to  the  level 
of  his  ideals.  In  a  sense  Lee  failed  just  as  Napoleon  failed — each  lost  the  army 
under  his  command.  Neither  accomplished  the  immediate  object  for  which  he 
fought.  But  to  Napoleon  the  loss  of  his  army  meant  a  tragedy  of  impotency  and 
despair ;  to  Lee  it  meant  simply  the  shifting  of  his  forces  to  a  new  field  of 
endeavor.  To  Napoleon,  Waterloo  was  a  fathomless  abyss ;  to  Lee,  Appomattox 
was  a  vale  of  darkness  and  tears,  through  which  he  passed  and  led  his  people  to 
a  nobler  and  higher  destiny.     He  incarnated  the  immortal  lines  of  Tennyson, 

"That  men  may  rise  on  stepping-stones 
Of  their  dead  selves  to  higher  things." 

But  the  thought  I  most  love  to  dwell  upon  is  that  Robert  E.  Lee  and  Stone- 
wall Jackson  are  not  merely  individuals — they  are  types,  they  are  the  products 
of  Southern  civilization  and  sum  up  the  virtues  of  their  people.  In  them  we  find 
incarnated  the  noblest  traits  of  the  Confederate  soldier.  In  their  characters  are 
realized  the  aspirations  of  the  men  who  followed  them. 

I  am  now  going  to  make  the  strongest  statement  I  ever  made  in  my  life. 
I  have  a  son,  an  only  son.  I  talk  to  him  about  Lee,  read  to  him  about  Lee,  give 
him  books  about  Lee  and  pictures  of  Lee.  I  want  to  get  his  mind  saturated  with 
the  spirit  of  Lee,  for  I  would  rather  that  boy  would  take  Lee  for  his  model,  for  his 
hero,  than  any  human  being  that  ever  walked  this  earth.  Take  him  as  a  boy  of 
eleven,  honoring  the  memory  of  his  father  and  looking  with  tenderest  solicitude 
after  the  comfort  of  his  widowed  mother;  take  him  as  a  student,  submitting  to 
the  rigid  military  discipline  at  West  Point,  going  through  the  entire  course 
without  a  single  demerit  against  him  and  graduating  second  in  a  class  of  forty-six ; 
take  him  as  a  young  officer,  handsome  as  Apollo,  the  scion  of  a  noble  house,  his 
lineage  and  his  uniform  threw  wide  open  the  doors  of  society,  and  temptations 
to  lead  a  life  of  ease,  of  adventure,  of  knightly  conquests,  were  as  thick  around 
him  as  flowers  in  springtime;  and  yet  he  works  hard  at  his  chosen  profession, 
uses  neither  liquor  nor  tobacco,  and  brings  to  his  young  wife  a  record  of  personal 
purity  as  stainless  as  her  own.  Look  at  him  as  a  subaltern  in  Mexico,  watching 
with  eagle  eye  for  every  opportunity  to  serve,  and  performing  every  service  with 
such  splendid  efficiency  and  unselfish  courage  that  General  Scott  came  to  love  him 
as  his  own  son,  and  in  later  years  the  old  General  begged  the  young  Colonel  with 
tears  in  his  eyes  to  be  the  Commander-in-Chief  of  all  the  armies  of  the  North. 


254  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

Follow  his  majestic  figure  through  the  tangled  mazes  of  the  Seven  Days  Battle 
around  Richmond,  in  the  irresistible  sweep  of  his  legions  at  Chancellorsville,  upon 
the  trembling  hills  of  Gettysburg,  in  the  mad,  wild  work  of  the  Wilderness,  as 
with  matchless  skill  he  "rides  the  whirlwind  and  directs  the  storm."  Go  to  the 
quiet  shades  of  "Washington  College  and  see  him  with  simple  dignity  teaching  the 
young  men  how  to  rebuild  a  wasted  land.  Taken  all  and  in  all,  he  was  a  man. 
We  shall  not  see  his  like  again. 

Young  gentlemen,  let  us  take  these  two  types  of  the  Southern  soldier  and  the 
Southern  gentleman  for  our  models.  Let  us  square  our  lives  by  their  exalted 
standards.  Let  us  hearken  to  the  spirit  of  Lee  and  Jackson  even  as  our  fathers 
hearkened  to  their  voice.  Thus  will  the  blood  of  our  fathers  find  noble  fruitage. 
Thus  from  the  grave  will  come  forth  victory,  and  the  sentinels  whose  beat  is  the 
sky-line  will  report  to  our  deathless  dead  that  "All  is  well  in  Dixie." 


(25) 

MASS  CONSCIENCE 

Tn  his  "Chambered  Nautilus,"  Oliver  "Wendell  Holmes  says: 

"Year  after  year  beheld  the  silent  toil 
That  spread  his  lustrous  coil; 
Still,  as  the  spiral  grew, 
He  left  the  past  year's  dwelling  for  the  new, 
Stole  with  soft  step  its  shining  archway  through, 
Built  up  its  idle  door, 
Stretched  in  his  last-found  home,  and  knew  the  old  no  more." 

This  description  of  progressive  achievement  is  as  accurate  as  it  is  poetic,  and 
applies  widely  to  community  as  well  as  to  individual  life.  All  discarded  customs, 
conveniences  and  creeds  are  outgrown  shells  of  a  civilization  that  by  divine  impetus 
moves  ever  on  to  higher  and  broader  levels. 

Time  was  when  the  Samsons  and  Goliaths,  the  Herculeses,  the  Gargantuans  and 
Brobdingnagians,  held  the  world  in  their  hands  and  lorded  over  their  fellows  by 
sheer  brute  force.  Then  the  Caesars  and  Alexanders,  Napoleons  and  Kaisers, 
forged  men  and  machinery  into  thunderbolts  and  conquered  and  dazzled  the 
world  with  military  power  and  glory.  The  Rothschilds,  the  Goulds,  the  Rocke- 
fellers and  the  Morgans  next  gained  the  ascendancy  and  made  the  dollar-mark 
the  sign  manual  of  our  civilization  and  hard  cash  the  passport  to  power.  All 
these  have  had  their  day  and  are  still  in  our  midst.  But  while  we  recognize  their 
presence  we  no  longer  bow  down  to  them  nor  worship  them.  A  new  force  is 
gripping  the  souls  of  men  and  chiseling  the  civilization  of  the  hour.  It  is  the 
mass  conscience  of  the  race. 

Man  had  not  traveled  far  from  cave  and  jungle  before  he  recognized  that 
personal  integrity  was  an  essential  factor  to  enduring  happiness  and  success. 
There  could  be  neither  commercial  nor  social  intercourse  unless  A.  B.  was  required 
to  deal  fairly  with  C.  D.  The  rights  of  the  first  and  second  persons  had  to  be 
guaranteed  before  the  rights  of  the  third  person  could  be  considered.     Hence,  for 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  255 

nineteen  centuries  the  moral  energies  of  sages  and  prophets  were  exerted  to  produce 
a  just  man.  Thousands  of  years  ago  celestial  wisdom  challenged  the  race  "to 
mark  the  perfect  man  and  behold  the  upright." 

The  peculiar  obligation  of  the  twentieth  century  is  to  produce  a  just  com- 
munity. Ours  is  the  task  to  make  the  public  conscience  as  sensitive  as  that  of 
the  individual.  A  crowd  of  college  students  will  make  a  raid  upon  a  chicken 
roost  when  no  single  boy  among  them  could  be  tempted  to  commit  petty  larceny. 
A  mob  will  lynch  a  prisoner  when  no  man  in  it  would  commit  murder.  The  sense 
of  personal  responsibility  is  lost  in  the  crowd.  Likewise,  men  banded  together  in 
corporations,  in  communities  and  in  states  absolve  themselves  of  all  individual 
responsibility  for  the  conduct  of  the  aggregation.  They  think  of  the  corporation, 
of  the  community,  of  the  state  as  an  entity  entirely  separate  and  distinct  from 
themselves.  The  times  demand  that  there  be  driven  into  the  hearts  of  men  the 
truth,  that  if  a  corporation  commits  grand  larceny  every  officer  and  director  in  it 
is  a  petty  thief  and  every  stockholder  a  receiver  of  stolen  goods.  If  a  town 
permits  crime  and  preventable  disease  to  flourish  in  its  limits  the  sin  lies  at  the 
door  of  every  man  in  the  town.  Theologically  and  biologically,  a  clean  street  is 
as  vital  and  as  personal  as  a  clean  shirt.  More  than  this:  if  a  state  stands  by 
and  allows  a  man  who  is  engaged  in  a  legitimate  business  to  be  sandbagged  by  a 
more  powerful  rival  every  citizen  of  that  state  is  accessory  to  the  crime.  If  one 
nation  makes  war  on  another  in  the  absence  of  a  supreme  necessity  all  the  citizens 
of  that  nation  are  guilty  of  manslaughter.  Today  the  whole  world  has  through 
agony  and  bloody  sweat  been  driven  to  the  conviction  that  the  great  command, 
"Thou  shalt  not  kill,"  is  as  binding  on  the  conscience  of  a  nation  as  on  that  of 
an  individual. 

Long  ago  governments  decreed  that  men  must  not  settle  their  differences  by 
an  appeal  to  "blood  and  iron."  The  adjudication  of  titles  to  land  by  wager  of 
battle,  the  wiping  out  of  personal  affronts  on  the  "field  of  honor,"  the  levying  of 
tribute  by  barons  and  buccaneers,  the  bloody  clash  of  hostile  clans,  have  all  been 
barred  and  banned  by  "Order  of  the  King."  Governments  have  taught  the  people 
that  brute  force  is  savagery  and  have  compelled  individuals  and  communities  to 
submit  all  their  grievances  to  the  judgment  of  an  impartial  tribunal.  The  people 
have  learned  that  lesson  well.  They  have  become  enamored  of  the  principle,  and 
today  the  mass  conscience  of  mankind  sternly  demands  that  governments  shall  be 
as  careful  of  human  life  as  they  require  individuals  to  be ;  that  nations  as  well  as 
men  shall  abandon  the  appeal  to  force  and  fear  and  settle  their  differences  in  a 
forum  of  reason  and  righteousness. 

The  continued  existence  of  civilization  depends  on  the  universal  acceptance 
of  two  basic  principles.  First,  that  governments  as  well  as  men  must  come  into 
court.  Second,  that  no  man  nor  group  of  men  has  any  rights  the  assertion  of 
which  would  be  fatal  to  the  peace  and  happiness  of  all  the  people. 

The  last  named  principle  was  given  spectacular  and  immortal  recognition  in 
the  United  States  when  we  entered  the  World  War. 

In  the  spring  of  1917  the  individual  citizen  was  intensely  busy  about  his 
personal  affairs.  He  was  enjoying  as  never  before  the  life,  liberty  and  pursuit  of 
happiness  guaranteed  to  him  by  the  Declaration  of  Independence.  The  farmer 
was  pitching  tremendous  crops  to  feed  and  clothe  a  hungry,  naked  world;  the 
manufacturer  was  running  his  plant  overtime  to  meet  the  orders  that  flowed  in 
from  every  quarter  of  the  globe;  the  merchant  was  laying  in  vast  stocks  of  goods 


256  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

to  be  ready  for  the  unprecedented  demands  of  trade;  the  doctor  was  riding  day 
and  night,  ministering  to  the  sick  and  the  dying;  the  lawyer  was  burning  the 
midnight  oil,  getting  ready  to  try  his  cases  in  court.  Then  suddenly  there  stood 
before  the  individual  citizen  a  tall,  gray  figure  and  touched  him  on  the  shoulder 
and  said:  "Son,  come;  I  have  need  of  thee."  The  individual  said:  "What  are 
you  going  to  do  with  me?"  Uncle  Sam  replied:  "I'm  going  to  put  you  into  a 
training  camp  and  work  you  from  five  o'clock  in  the  morning  until  nine  o'clock 
at  night  for  one  dollar  a  day.  I'm  going  to  march  and  counter-march  you  in  the 
broiling  sun  until  you  lose  every  pound  of  your  surplus  flesh  and  become  as  hard 
as  nails.  I'm  going  to  make  you  salute  second  lieutenants  746  times  a  day  to 
imbue  you  with  proper  respect  for  military  authority ;  and  then,  when  I  get  you 
whipped  into  proper  shape  and  discipline,  I'm  going  to  load  you  on  a  ship  and 
carry  you  three  thousand  miles  through  German  submarines.  When  you  get) 
over  on  the  other  side,  I'm  going  to  point  out  to  you  several  million  German 
soldiers  and  say:  'Go  after  them,  my  son,  and  get  their  limburger  before  they  get 
your  cigarettes.'  "  The  individual  citizen  said :  "Well,  Uncle,  that  is  some  fierce 
program ;  what's  it  all  about  ?  What's  it  for  ?"  Uncle  Sam  replied :  "It  is  for 
the  future  safety,  peace,  prosperity  and  happiness  of  all  the  people  of  the  United 
States,  and  for  the  civilization  of  the  world."  Thereupon  the  individual 
straightened  up,  squared  his  shoulders,  and  with  a  light  in  his  eye  and  a  ring  in 
his  voice  that  boded  ill  for  the  Hun,  he  said :  "Well,  Uncle,  if  that's  the  game, 
I'm  your  meat."  And  so  the  soldier  went  forth  to  fight  and  die  for  the  welfare 
and  happiness  of  all  the  people  of  the  United  States.  He  made  a  good  job  of  it. 
The  Kaiser  and  all  his  captains  will  admit  that  the  American  doughboy  "seen  his 
duty  and  done  it." 

Then  he  came  back  home,  threw  down  his  gun,  took  off  his  uniform,  became  a 
private  citizen  and  settled  down  to  enjoy  the  blessings  and  privileges  of  the 
community  he  fought  to  save.  The  folks  were  delighted  to  see  him.  They  gave 
him  the  glad  hand.  They  got  him  a  good  job,  and  then  he  went  around  to  see  the 
little  woman  who  had  waited  and  prayed  for  him  while  he  was  on  the  other  side; 
and  it  was  not  long  before  they  called  in  the  parson  and  started  down  the  long 
path,  hand  in  hand.  They  were  very  happy.  The  years  stretched  before  them  in 
all  the  glory  and  freshness  of  a  dream,  and  life  was  strangely  sweet,  as  it  ever  is 
to  the  young  when  the  heart  beats  fast  and  hopes  climb  high. 

Then  one  morning  he  stepped  out  into  the  streets,  saw  the  people  gathered  in 
excited  crowds,  went  up  to  see  what  was  the  matter,  and  he  read  in  flaming  head- 
lines in  the  newspaper  that  the  city  in  which  he  lived  was  isolated  from  the  rest 
of  the  world.  No  telegraphic,  no  telephonic  communication,  no  trains  could  enter 
or  leave  the  city,  and  the  erstwhile  soldier  exclaimed:  "Am  I  dreaming?  Is  this 
some  frightful  nightmare,  or  have  I  been  living  in  a  fool's  paradise?  Have  those 
pesky  Germans  tricked  us  after  all,  and  in  a  mighty  aerial  squadron  swept  across 
the  sea  and  surrounded  this  city  in  a  single  night  ?"  The  neighbors  said :  "Oh, 
no,  son — no  Huns  around  anywhere.  The  employers  and  employees  in  the  tele- 
graph, telephone  and  railroad  companies  have  had  a  disagreement,  and  everybody 
got  mad  and  quit.  They  won't  work  themselves  and  they  won't  let  anybody  else 
work."  And  then  that  doughboy  laughed  aloud,  and  said :  "You  just  leave  it  to 
me  and  I'll  settle  this  damned  foolishness  in  fifteen  minutes."  And  then  he  threw 
back  his  head  and  in  stentorian  tones  that  had  many  a  time  made  the  Hun  tremble 
in  his  dug-out,  he  cried :  "Uncle  Sam !    Uncle  Sam  !"     Instantly  there  stood  before 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  257 

him  that  tall,  gray  figure  that  had  touched  him  on  the  shoulder  in  the  spring  of 
1917.  The  soldier  said:  "Uncle,  two  years  ago  you  needed  me;  now  I  need  you. 
Way  up  in  the  mountains  the  dear  old  mother  is  wasting  away.  The  last  letter 
that  came  said  that  she  was  so  anxious  to  see  her  hoy  before  she  passed  over  the 
river.  I  cannot  hear  from  her  any  more — no  mails,  no  telegrams,  no  telephones. 
I  would  like  to  go  up  and  see  how  she  is  getting  along,  but  no  trains  are  permitted 
to  enter  or  leave  the  city.  And  then,  Uncle,  you  know  when  I  got  back  home, 
I  married  Mary,  who  had  waited  patiently  for  me.  I  got  a  good  job.  I  com- 
menced to  save  my  money  to  build  a  little  nest,  and,  Uncle,  very  soon  the  Heavenly 
Father  is  going  to  send  a  little  angel  down  to  brighten  and  bless  our  home.  But 
the  factory  where  I  work  has  only  three  days  supply  of  coal.  If  no  more  coal 
comes  in,  the  factory  will  close  down.  I  will  be  out  of  a  job ;  the  winter  is  coming 
on,  and  God  alone  knows  what  will  become  of  Mary  and  the  baby  that  is  to  be. 
Now,  Uncle,  I  want  you  to  put  an  end  to  this  damned  foolishness.  I  want  you 
to  issue  an  order  that  all  the  wires  shall  be  opened  and  that  every  train  shall 
move  on  schedule  time."  The  shoulders  of  that  tall,  gray  figure  droop ;  a  look  of 
unutterable  sadness  and  shame  comes  into  his  face,  and  he  says :  "Son,  I  am  very 
sorry,  but  in  a  crisis  like  this  I  can  do  nothing."  Then  that  soldier  leaps  forward 
like  a  tiger  that  fights  for  mate  and  cub,  his  lips  curl,  his  eyes  blaze;  he  points  his 
finger  at  that  tall,  gray  figure  and  says:  "Two  years  ago  you  snatched  me  from 
home  and  job,  hurled  me  across  the  sea,  stood  me  up  before  German  machine 
guns  and  told  me  to  kill  or  be  killed  for  the  welfare  and  happiness  of  all  the  people. 
Now,  if  a  handful  of  men  can  cut  this  city  off  from  the  world,  close  up  every 
store,  shut  down  every  factory,  and  starve  and  freeze  the  women  and  children, 
then  tell  me,  my  Uncle  Samuel,  what  in  the  hell  was  I  fighting  for?" 

When  the  American  soldier  sacrificed  every  individual  right,  abandoned  every 
personal  pleasure,  and  buried  every  private  profit  to  fight  for  the  common  good 
in  France  he  breathed  immortal  life  into  the  principle  that  no  man  in  the  United 
States  has  any  rights  the  assertion  of  which  would  prove  fatal  to  the  welfare  and 
happiness  of  all  the  people.  ^ 

Water,  heat,  light,  and  means  of  communication  and  transportation  are 
essential  not  only  to  the  welfare  and  happiness,  but  to  the  very  life  of  the  people. 
It  follows  as  the  night  the  day  that  the  people  of  the  United  States  have  an  in- 
destructible right  to  utilities  that  will  surely  provide  these  supreme  necessities. 
If  a  group  of  financial  magnates,  or  industrial  magnates,  or  labor  magnates, 
singly  or  combined,  have  the  power  to  tie  up  the  public  utilities  of  the  continent, 
immediately  paralyze  the  business  of  the  Nation  and  ultimately  starve  and  freeze 
the  people  into  submission  to  their  will,  then  government  for  the  people  has 
already  perished  from  the  United  States. 

Congress  owes  it  as  a  debt  of  honor  to  the  American  soldier  to  enact  a  law 
that  will  absolutely  guarantee  to  the  people  the  constant  and  efficient  operation  of 
all  public  utilities  engaged  in  interstate  commerce.  Of  course,  any  such  law 
would  of  necessity  provide  a  tribunal  of  the  people  to  hear  grievances  and,  if 
necessary,  to  fix  wages;  but  all  men  engaged  in  operating  such  utilities,  whether 
employers  or  employees,  must  be  made  to  understand  that  they  are  the  servants 
of  the  people,  that  they  must  trust  the  people  to  deal  fairly  with  them,  and  that 
they  cannot  come  before  the  august  tribunal  of  the  people  with  a  plea  for  justice 
in  one  hand  and  a  six-shooter  in  the  other. 

17 


258  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Walkouts  and  lockouts  are  on  a  dead  moral  level  with  fists  and  clubs  and 
fire  and  sword ;  and  unless  we  can  devise  some  saner  method  of  adjusting  industrial 
disputes  that  menace  the  very  lives  of  the  people  our  civilization  will  collapse 
and  we  will  hark  back  to  the  law  of  the  jungle,  and  let  him  take  who  has  the 
power,  and  let  him  keep  who  can. 

But  some  one  will  cry:  "You  want  to  rob  us  of  our  personal  liberty!"  Alas, 
how  many  crimes  have  been  committed  in  that  name.  The  whole  social  fabric 
is  built  up  on  the  principle  that  a  man  may  not  so  use  his  liberty  as  to  injure  or 
destroy  his  neighbor.  And  whether  or  not  one  is  so  using  his  personal  liberty 
is  for  the  community,  and  not  for  himself,  to  decide.  The  genius  of  justice  for- 
bids any  man  to  sit  in  judgment  on  his  own  case.  A  claims  that  B  owes  him  a  large 
sum  of  money  arising  out  of  contract  or  tort.  B  denies  that  he  owes  anything. 
A  says,  "Well,  let  the  courts  decide  the  issue."  "But,"  says  B,  "there  is  nothing 
for  the  courts  to  decide.  The  whole  claim  is  a  wicked  frame-up,  and  if  it  should 
be  allowed  it  would  rob  me  and  my  family  of  all  we  have  labored  to  accumulate 
in  a  lifetime,  and  leave  my  wife  and  myself  paupers  in  our  old  age."  This  plea 
is  powerful  and  pathetic,  but  of  no  avail.  Society  has  decreed  that  B  must  come 
into  court  and  abide  its  decision,  no  matter  what  the  consequences  may  be. 

Again,  A  is  indicted  for  murder  and  a  warrant  is  issued  for  his  arrest.  He 
backs  against  the  wall  and  says :  "I  am  no  murderer.  I  never  saw  the  dead  man ; 
I  never  heard  of  him.  I  was  a  thousand  miles  away  when  the  crime  was  com- 
mitted. I  have  done  nothing  to  be  tried  for,  and  I  refuse  to  have  my  life  placed 
in  jeopardy  when  I  am  as  innocent  as  the  angels  above."  But  society  says  to 
him :  "Come  into  court  and  let  twelve  men,  good  and  true,  say  whether  or  not 
you  are  to  live  or  die." 

If  society  can  compel  an  individual  to  submit  to  the  judgment  of  an  impartial 
tribunal  a  matter  involving  all  the  labor  of  all  his  years,  and  even  life  itself, 
it  is  tragic  stupidity  to  allow  a  whole  community  to  be  frozen  and  starved  while 
the  men  who  have  undertaken  to  supply  it  with  fuel  and  food  haggle  over  whether 
they  shall  receive  sixty  or  seventy  cents  an  hour  for  their  services.  All  of  us 
believe  in  justice  to  all  men,  at  all  times,  but  the  vital  question  is,  How  shall  what 
is  justice  be  ascertained  and  decreed  ?  Savagery  says,  by  a  club ;  civilization 
says,  by  the  enlightened  judgment  of  an  impartial  court. 

The  mass  conscience  of  mankind  has  rendered  a  definite  decision  in  favor  of 
the  court  and  against  the  club.  The  world  is  weary  of  the  thunder  of  the  captains 
and  the  shoutings,  and  is  ripe  to  yield  allegiance  to  that  wisdom  whose  ways  are 
the  ways  of  pleasantness  and  all  whose  paths  are  peace.  But  if  the  council  table 
is  to  grip  the  souls  of  men  and  chart  the  highways  of  civilization  there  must  be 
no  quibbling  nor  any  semblance  of  shuffling,  but  it  must  hand  down  decisions 
saturated  with  and  sanctified  by  the  "wisdom  of  the  just." 

The  great  Cardinal  Richelieu  lay  dying.  His  followers  gathered  about  him 
and  said :  "Tell  us,  O  Richelieu,  the  secret  of  your  wondrous  power."  The  dying 
Cardinal  replied :  "Some  say  it  is  courage — that  I  am  a  lion.  Others  say,  it  is 
cunning — that  I  am  a  fox.  I  tell  you  it  is  neither;  it  is  justice."  Justice,  a  divine 
sense  of  justice,  regnant  in  the  councils  of  nations  and  in  the  hearts  of  men,  is 
the  only  power  that  can  save  the  world  today  from  a  saturnalia  of  selfishness 
and  savagery. 

The  great  statistician,  Roger  W.  Babson,  said  in  a  recent  address :  "The  funda- 
mentals of  prosperity  are  in  the  Ten  Commandments."     /  say  that  the  funda- 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  259 

mentals  of  life  are  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount.  Those  sinister  spirits  who 
despise  all  law  and  seek  to  dynamite  the  foundations  of  society  keenly  realize 
that  Christianity  is  the  barrier  that  blocks  their  way.  Therefore,  every  anarchist 
in  the  world  is  an  atheist,  and  bolshevisni  shrieks  from  the  housetops  that  there 
is  no  God.  The  only  hope  for  humanity,  the  only  power  that  can  save  it  from 
hell — and  not  from  some  fanciful  hell  in  the  hereafter,  but  from  hell  right  now — 
is  in  the  voice  that  said  to  the  troubled  waters  of  Galilee,  "Peace,  be  still." 

Young  man,  that  voice  straight  from  the  skies  calls  to  you  today  and  says : 
"Son,  give  me  thine  heart."  A  world  reeking  with  blood  and  drenched  with 
tears  waits  and  prays  for  your  dauntless  faith  and  deathless  love.  Out  of  the 
presses  of  the  gods  a  new  wine  is  gushing.  Old  bottles  cannot  contain  it.  The 
mighty  issues  of  the  hour  cannot  be  met  by  those  "whose  windows  are  darkened 
and  who  are  afraid  of  that  which  is  high."  The  task  calls  for  youth  with  its  far, 
clear  vision  and  its  sublime  audacity. 

"Our  hearts,  our  hopes,  our  prayers,  our  tears, 
Our  faith,  triumphant  o'er  our  fears, 
Are  all  with  thee,  are  all  with  thee." 


(26) 

WEIGHTS  AND  MEASURES  OR  STANDARDS  OF  VALUE 

The  story  is  told  that  some  years  ago,  up  in  one  of  the  western  counties,  the 
news  went  abroad  that  a  certain  elder  in  the  Primitive  Baptist  Church  was  to  be 
tried  by  his  church  on  the  charge  of  selling  whiskey.  Owing  to  the  prominence 
of  the  elder  and  the  nature  of  the  charge,  a  vast  crowd  of  people  assembled  at  the 
church  on  the  day  set  for  the  trial. 

At  the  hour  appointed  the  Senior  Elder  of  the  church  arose  and  said  that  he 
had  learned  since  arriving  upon  the  grounds  that  there  was  an  impression  that 
Elder  Shelton  was  to  be  tried  upon  the  charge  of  selling  whiskey.  He  stated  that 
this  was  a  grave  mistake;  that  no  such  charge  had  been  preferred,  and  would 
not  have  been  investigated  by  the  church  if  it  had  been  preferred ;  that  whether 
or  not  Elder  Shelton  should  sell  whiskey  was  a  matter  to  be  settled  in  his  own 
conscience.  But  the  very  serious  charge  which  had  been  preferred,  and  which  the 
church  felt  called  upon  to  sift  to  the  bottom,  was  that  when  Elder  Shelton  sold 
whiskey  he  did  not  always  give  good  measure. 

This  incident  serves  to  introduce  the  subject  on  which  I  propose  to  talk,  to 
wit :   "Weights  and  Measures  or  Standards  of  Value. 

The  importance  of  weighing  and  measuring  with  absolute  honesty  and  in- 
fallible accuracy  is  everywhere  recognized.  Business,  morality,  and  religion  unite 
in  demanding  standards  of  weight  and  measure  that  will  guarantee  twelve  inches 
to  the  foot  and  sixteen  ounces  to  the  pound.  Every  enlightened  people  in  every 
age  have  insisted  upon  standards  that  know  neither  variableness  nor  shadow  of 
turning. 

Time  and  again  in  the  history  of  that  marvelous  journey  through  the  wilder- 
ness Jehovah  warns  his  chosen  people  against  sin  in  this  respect.  "Thou  shalt  do 
no  injustice  in  judgment,  in  mete  yard,  in  weight  or  in  measure." 


260  PAPEES  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

And  the  very  wisest  of  men  declares  that  "A  false  balance  is  an  abomination  to 
the  Lord,  while  a  just  weight  is  his  delight." 

The  governments  of  the  world  have  expended  large  sums  of  money  and  taxed 
the  ingenuity  of  their  men  of  science  in  bringing  their  systems  of  weights  and 
measures  up  to  the  highest  degree  of  perfection.  Any  error  or  uncertainty  in 
this  respect  is  odious  and  intolerable.  The  Pope  may  err — who  cares?  But  if 
the  peck  measure  falls  from  grace  there  is  rebellion,  chaos  and  confusion  among 
the  people. 

Many  cunning  devices  for  weighing  and  measuring  with  absolute  accuracy 
have  been  invented,  until  today,  from  the  machine  in  the  grocery  store  that  cuts 
you  off  exactly  one-quarter  of  a  pound  of  cheese,  to  those  marvelous  instruments 
with  which  we  weigh  and  measure  the  stars  in  their  courses,  there  is  left  no  room 
for  mistakes. 

Observations  of  daily  life  emphasize  the  necessity  for  correct  standards.  If  the 
rule  and  square  of  the  carpenter  be  untrue,  who  can  vouch  for  the  grace  or  the 
strength  of  the  building?  If  the  compass  records  a  lie,  the  good  ship  will  be 
driven  far  from  her  course  and  may,  at  any  moment,  go  to  pieces  on  unknown 
rocks  in  uncharted  seas. 

The  integrity  of  our  standards  must  be  preserved,  else  there  will  be  waste, 
blunders,  and  crimes. 

Archimedes  was  one  of  the  most  celebrated  mathematicians  of  ancient  times. 
The  Tyrant  of  Syracuse  had  given  his  jeweler  a  lot  of  gold  to  be  made  into  a 
crown.  The  crown  was  made,  but  the  Tyrant  suspected  that  his  jeweler  had  mixed 
with  the  gold  some  baser  metal,  and  he  called  upon  Archimedes  to  find  out  whether 
or  not  the  crown  was  all  of  pure  gold.  The  great  scholar  was  much  perplexed, 
but  one  day,  while  he  was  taking  his  bath,  he  began  to  think  of  how  much  less  he 
would  weigh  in  the  water  than  out  of  it.  The  great  law  of  specific  gravity  flashed 
through  his  mind,  and  he  leaped  from  the  bath-tub  and  without  waiting  to  put 
on  his  cravat,  ran  through  the  streets  of  the  city  crying,  "Eureka,  eureka." 

Every  man  in  this  world  is  striving  for  a  crown.  Is  it  all  of  pure  gold?  What 
is  this  thing  worth  for  which  we  are  taxing  the  energies  of  body  and  soul  ?  What 
does  it  weigh  and  count  in  the  "vast  concerns  of  an  eternal  scheme"  ? 

In  every  wholesale  house  there  is  a  rating  department.  This  is  in  charge  of 
the  credit  man.  A.  B.  sends  in  his  order,  but  before  it  reaches  the  sales  department 
it  must  pass  the  rating  department.  The  credit  man  says  the  first  word.  He  gets 
all  the  facts  he  can  about  A.  B.  and  about  his  property,  his  habits,  his  character, 
and  then  he  rates  him  and  decides  whether  or  not  the  house  can  afford  to  honor 
the  order. 

In  every  well-regulated  mind  there  should  be  a  like  rating  department.  There 
every  proposition  should  be  carefully  analyzed,  for  every  important  transaction 
in  life  has  in  it  the  elements  of  bargain  and  sale.  Daily  men  and  women  go  forth 
in  the  marts  of  the  world  to  barter  for  happiness  and  success.  We  give  and  we 
receive,  we  put  in  and  we  take  out.  There  is  an  exchange  of  values.  And  whether 
the  day's  work  spells  profit  or  loss  depends  upon  our  ability  to  appraise  at  their 
true  value  the  offerings  of  the  street. 

The  Bible  is  essentially  a  book  of  values,  and  the  Great  Teacher  states  the 
philosophy  of  life  in  terms  of  a  balance  sheet  when  he  inquires,  "What  shall  it 
profit  a  man  if  he  gain  the  whole  world  and  lose  his  own  soul  ?" 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  261 

We  speak  of  crises  in  lives  of  men  and  nations,  and  by  a  crisis  we  mean  a 
crossing,  a  place  where  the  ways  divide  and  a  man  must  choose  his  course.  A 
crisis  always  presents  a  question  of  values.  It  tests  a  man's  capacity  to  rate  at 
their  true  worth  the  things  between  which  he  must  choose. 

There  stood  one  day  in  a  Grecian  village  two  gods,  Neptune  and  Athene,  and 
bid  for  the  allegiance  of  the  people.  Neptune  offered  them  wealth  and  power, 
while  Athene  tendered  wisdom  and  virtue.  There  was  much  debate,  but  at  last 
the  people  decided  to  follow  Athene.  They  named  their  village  Athens,  and  her 
arts  and  learning  became  the  marvel  and  the  glory  of  the  world. 

It  may  be  said  that  this  is  a  myth,  found  in  the  literature  of  a  poetic  people, 
but  there  is  an  immortal  truth  in  the  tale.  For  today,  in  every  town  and  city 
and  in  the  highways  and  byways  of  the  world,  the  same  gods  stand  and  bid  for  the 
allegiance  of  men.  On  one  hand  stands  Neptune,  with  his  trident  of  power, 
offering  "this  world  and  all  the  glory  of  it."  On  the  other  hand  stands  Athene, 
with  eyes  that  fathom  the  years,  saying,  "Son,  give  me  thine  heart."  And  the 
two  gods  represent  the  two  standards  of  weighing  and  measuring  human  life 
which  press  for  adoption.  The  one  is  the  subjective  theory.  The  mudsill  of 
this  theory  is  that  selfishness  both  is  and  of  right  ought  to  be  the  mainspring 
of  all  human  action.  It  is  the  standard  that  always  writes  the  big  "I"  and  the 
little  "you."  Its  prayer,  when  it  prays  at  all,  is,  "God  bless  me  and  my  wife, 
and  my  son  John  and  his  wife — us  four,  and  no  more."  This  theory  of  life  finds 
its  perfect  incarnation  in  the  man  who  says,  "I  don't  care  a  hang  what  happens 
in  this  world  so  long  as  it  doesn't  happen  to  me." 

Essentially  and  grossly  materialistic,  this  system  refuses  to  count  anything 
as  an  asset  that  cannot  be  measured  by  the  yard  or  weighed  by  the  pound.  The 
dollar-mark  is  its  sign  manual  and  its  password  is  hard  cash.  If  it  ever  dreams, 
its  dreams  are  of  gold,  gigantic  fortunes  made  in  a  day  and  palaces  more 
gorgeous  than  Aladdin's  rising  in  a  single  night.  Its  only  poetry  is  of  the  power 
of  wealth,  its  only  music  the  jingling  of  the  guinea  that  helps  the  hurt  that  honor 
feels.  It  reverses  the  celestial  mandate  and  cries,  "Seek  ye  first  all  these  things 
and  the  kingdom  of  heaven  will  be  added  unto  you."  Hence,  the  inordinate 
passion  of  the  age  for  things,  the  bondage  of  men  to  matter,  the  passing  of  the 
prophets  and  the  reign  of  the  profiteer. 

The  horseman  serves  the  horse, 

The  neat-herd  serves  the  neat, 
The  merchant  serves  his  purse, 

The  eater  serves  his  meat. 
'Tis  the  day  of  the  chattel, 

Web  to  weave  and  corn  to  grind, 
Things  are  in  the  saddle 

And  ride  mankind. 

Do  not  understand  me  to  decry  wealth.  It  is  a  cheap  and  senseless  thing  to  do. 
I  have  neither  sympathy  nor  patience  with  that  brand  of  pessimism  that  considers 
every  man  who  has  a  dollar  ahead  a  suspicious  character.  It  is  a  man's  duty  to 
earn  what  he  can  with  clean  hands  and  without  oppressing  his  neighbor.  "Seest 
thou  a  man  diligent  in  business,  he  shall  stand  before  kings." 

It  is  eminently  right  and  desirable  for  a  man  to  own  a  dollar,  but  it  is  an 
entirely  different  matter  when  the  dollar  owns  the  man.  It  is  a  question  of  owner- 
ship— of  mastery.     You  have  a  certain  piece   of  property.     Did  you  buy  the 


262  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

property  or  did  the  property  buy  you?  The  difference  is  vital  and  plain.  It  was 
not  the  presence  of  gold  in  the  Israelitish  camp  that  gave  offense  to  Moses; 
it  was  against  the  worship  of  the  calf  that  he  filed  his  immortal  protest. 

The  corollary  of  measuring  life  by  a  bank  account  is  rating  a  man  by  the 
office  he  happens  to  hold,  or  by  the  particular  kind  of  work  in  which  he  is  engaged. 
These  things  are  the  incidents,  sometimes  the  accidents,  of  life.  They  are  mere 
brackets  and  trimmings,  and  do  not  necessarily  enter  into  the  real  framework  of  a 
man's  character. 

Our  State  motto  is  a  fine  protest  against  judging  a  life  by  appearances.  But 
is  "To  be  rather  than  to  seem"  the  ruling  passion  of  our  people  at  the  present  time  ? 
Why  does  any  man  knowingly  and  persistently  live  beyond  his  income  ?  His  whole 
life  is  on  an  impossible,  false  basis,  and  he  knows  it.  But  he  values  more  highly 
what  his  neighbor  thinks  than  what  he  himself  knows.  He  would  rather  appear 
prosperous  in  the  eyes  of  the  world  than  to  he  rich  in  his  own  heart.  Hence,  man- 
hood and  womanhood  are  sacrificed  to  an  insane  desire  to  keep  up  appearances. 
Economy  is  a  despised  art  and  frugality  a  forgotten  virtue.  Men  mortgage  their 
homes  for  automobiles  and  women  buy  diamonds  on  the  installment  plan.  All 
sorts  of  get-rich-quick  schemes  abound  and  appeal  to  the  excited  fancies  of  men. 
To  my  mind  the  most  pernicious  evil  of  the  times  is  the  unwillingness  of  men 
to  do  a  day's  work  for  a  day's  pay.  The  young  man  wants  to  get  rich  over  night. 
He  is  not  content  to  abide  the  sure,  slow  processes  of  the  years;  and  so  we  "grow 
a  gourd  vine  where  we  wanted  an  oak." 

Two  young  people  get  married.  They  want  to  start  in  life  just  one  round 
higher  than  where  the  old  people  left  off  after  fifty  years  of  toil  and  self-denial. 
They  are  unwilling  to  grow  the  wings  upon  which  to  rise,  but  want  to  sail  on 
bought  or  borrowed  plumage.  Therefore,  in  certain  circles,  marriage  is  rapidly 
becoming  the  exception  rather  than  the  rule. 

I  read  some  time  ago  in  a  magazine  that  in  a  first-class  club  in  New  York  a 
man  can  live  comfortably  on  $10,000  a  year,  while  it  would  cost  the  same  man 
$50,000  a  year  to  marry  and  associate  with  the  same  people.  The  home  is,  there- 
fore, fighting  a  losing  battle  with  the  club.  There  is  a  slump  in  matrimonial 
values,  and  all  over  this  land  we  find  thousands  of  men  taking  exercise  by  swinging 
Indian  clubs  in  a  gymnasium  who  ought  to  be  getting  their  physical  training 
doing  midnight  skirt  dance  stunts  to  the  warlike  lamentations  of  their  latest  born. 

This  over-capitalization  of  appearances  is  responsible  for  the  habit  of  rating 
people  by  the  profession  they  follow  or  the  kind  of  work  in  which  they  are 
engaged.  It  should  be  burned  in  the  minds  of  the  young  that  there  are  no  degrees 
in  honest  toil  except  degrees  of  excellence. 

Said  Thomas  Carlyle :  "Two  men  I  honor  and  no  third.  First,  the  toil-worn 
craftsman,  that  with  earth-made  implements  laboriously  conquers  the  earth  and 
makes  her  man's.  Venerable  to  me  is  the  hard  hand,  crooked,  coarse,  wherein 
notwithstanding  lies  a  cunning  virtue,  indefeasibly  royal,  as  of  the  scepter  of  this 
planet."  To  me  there  is  no  more  appealing  picture  than  that  which  the  world 
presents  every  morning  when  in  obedience  to  the  divine  command  men  go  forth 
to  earn  their  bread. 

I  don't  know  how  it  originated,  but  there  is  abroad  in  the  land  a  notion  that 
a  business  which  calls  on  a  man  to  wear  a  long-tailed  coat  and  put  on  a  clean 
shirt  every  day  is  more  respectable  than  one  in  which  he  is  expected  to  wear  no 
coat  at  all.    "Well,  I  have  never  heard  of  a  soldier  being  looked  down  upon  because 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  263 

he  emerged  from  the  fight  covered  with  the  smoke  and  dust  of  battle,  and  to  my 
mind  the  smoke  of  a  furnace  is  just  as  honorable  as  that  of  a  cannon.  The 
prevalence  of  this  notion  is  responsible  for  the  fact  that  the  professions,  so-called, 
are  crowded,  while  in  the  industrial  callings  there  are  not  enough  workers  to 
supply  the  demand.  I  am  not  much  of  a  philologist,  and  I  don't  know  why  it  is 
that  doctors  and  lawyers  and  preachers  and  teachers  are  called  professional  men, 
while  the  farmer  and  carpenter  and  machinist  are  called  laboring  men,  unless  it 
be  that  the  doctors  and  lawyers  and  preachers  and  teachers  are  always  professing 
to  do  something,  while  the  other  folks  just  go  ahead  and  do  it  without  making  any 
professions  about  it.  A  profession  is  just  as  honorable  as  the  men  in  it  make  it, 
and  the  man  who  does  not  honor  his  profession  is  dishonored  by  it.  The  world 
tips  its  cap  to  the  blacksmith  who  knows  his  business,  while  it  regards  with  pity 
and  contempt  the  man  who  is  a  doctor  in  name  only.  David  was  just  as  much 
the  servant  of  God  when  he  was  tending  his  father's  sheep  upon  the  hills  of  Judea 
as  when  he  went  up  to  do  battle  with  Goliath  of  Gath ;  for,  then  and  now,  it  was 
just  as  essential  to  the  salvation  of  Israel  to  raise  sheep  as  to  kill  Philistines. 
The  man  who  makes  a  chair  is  worthy  of  as  much  honor  and  consideration  as  the 
man  who  makes  a  sermon,  the  only  difference  between  the  two  jobs  being  that 
while  the  chair  will  always  make  you  feel  rested,  the  sermon  will  not  always  make 
you  feel  tired. 

The  women,  too,  are  not  entirely  blameless  in  this  respect.  Too  often  is  it 
the  case  that  a  young  woman  will  be  all  smiles  to  the  counter-jumper  from  the 
city,  who  parts  his  hair  in  the  middle  and  wears  the  latest  cut  of  spring  trousers 
while  she  turns  a  cold  shoulder  to  the  sturdy  young  farmer  or  mechanic  who  has 
in  him  the  physical,  moral  and  intellectual  stuff  that  turns  the  wheels  of  the 
world.  And  this  has  its  effect,  for  deny  it  as  they  may  and  lie  about  it  as  they 
will,  the  truth  remains  that  every  man,  down  in  the  bottom  of  his  heart,  wants 
to  be  just  the  sort  of  fellow  that  some  woman  will  be  proud  of. 

"Men  will  travel  far  to  plant  a  star 
Where  fame's  wide  sky  is  thrown, 
But  a  longer  way  for  some  woman  to  say, 
'I  love  you  for  my  own.'  " 

I  have  a  notion  that  the  devil  would  not  pay  much  to  insure  the  delivery  to 
him  of  the  average  man  if  it  were  not  for  the  saving  grace  of  some  good  woman. 
Now  mind  you,  I  did  not  say  good,  I  said  good  woman,  with  the  circumflex  upon 
the  woman.  Young  lady,  do  not  make  the  mistake  of  exhausting  all  your  energies 
in  being  good;  remember  you  are  to  be  a  woman.  We  want  you  to  be  an  angel, 
but  what  Carlyle  calls  "a  blooming,  warm,  earth  angel."  Be  as  irreproachable  as 
the  North  Pole,  but  not  so  unapproachable.  Be  as  pure  as  the  snowflake  that 
falls  from  the  sky,  but  do  not  be  a  snowflake.  For  however  much  we  may  admire 
the  stainless  beauty  of  the  falling  snow,  we  do  not  want  to  marry  a  snow-bank. 

Do  not  understand  me  to  say  that  a  young  man  should  not  have  his  dreams. 
Let  him  put  on  wings  and  browse  among  the  uttermost  stars.  I  would  simply 
save  him  from  the  rude  awakening  which  comes  to  every  man  who  finds  himself 
trying  to  do  something  for  which  he  has  no  special  fitness.  Seek  the  work  you 
can  do  better  than  anything  else;  to  that  work  you  are  divinely  called.  Give 
yourself  to  that  work,  go  to  it  with  the  enthusiasm  with  which  the  bridegroom 
goes  to  marriage.  Put  hand  and  head  and  heart  into  the  work  and  let  it  be  a 
perfect  work,  even  as  the  work  of  His  hands  is  perfect.     For  it  is 


264  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BIOKETT 

"Thus  at  the  roaring  loom  of  Time  I  ply 
And  weave  for  God  the  garment  thou  seest  him  by." 

So  much  for  those  standards  that  measure  life  in  yards  and  pounds.  The  other 
theory  holds  that  goodness  is  greatness,  that  virtue  is  value,  that  service  to  God 
and  his  fellows  is  the  measure  of  a  man.  This  theory  answers  the  question  of 
Cain  and  boldly  asserts  that  every  man  is  his  brother's  keeper.  It  acknowledges 
allegiance  to  the  law  of  kindness.  It  believes  that  to  live  in  hearts  we  leave 
behind  is  not  to  die.  It  accepts  at  par  the  declaration  of  the  ISTazarene  that 
"he  who  loses  his  life  shall  save  it." 

Abraham  Lincoln  voiced  this  theory  when  he  said :  "Die  when  I  may,  I  want 
it  said  of  me  by  those  who  knew  me  best  that  I  always  plucked  a  thistle  and 
planted  a  flower  where  I  thought  a  flower  would  grow." 

This  theory  resents  the  suggestion  that  man  is  one  with  the  fowl  and  the  brute, 
that  the  clay  is  the  peer  of  the  potter.  It  realizes  that  man  cannot  live  by  bread 
alone,  but  requires  for  his  proper  development  every  "word  that  proceeds  out  of 
the  mouth  of  God." 

The  Boman  poet  said  that  all  men  should  pray  for  a  sound  mind  in  a  sound 
body;  but  what  is  a  sound  body?  It  is  a  body  in  perfect  harmony  with  its  en- 
vironment, a  body  in  which  all  the  organs  are  in  perfect  harmony  with  each 
other  and  with  every  other  fact  in  physical  life.  An  imperfect  correspondence 
between  the  body  and  its  environment  means  disease.  A  total  failure  of  this  cor- 
respondence means  death.  And  this  principle  of  natural  law  holds  in  the  spiritual 
world.  Do  you  really  believe  that  man  is  something  more  than  an  animal?  Do 
you  believe  in  love  as  distinguished  from  passion?  Is  faith  a  very  real  force  in 
your  life?  And  do  you  believe  in  dreams,  which  are  the  finest  form  of  faith, 
and  in  poetry,  which  is  the  living  voice  of  love  and  faith  and  dreams? 

Then  if  you  would  live  this  higher  life,  you  must  maintain  a  correspondence 
with  these  great  currents  in  the  spiritual  world.     If,  by  nonuse  and  misuse,  you 
lose  your  grip  on  these  things,  then  for  you  there  can  be  no  spiritual  health. 
And  so  this  theory  says  that  love  is  the  last,  best  test  of  life. 
"He  prayeth  best  who  loveth  best 
All  things,  both  great  and  small." 

Love  is  not  sickly  sentimentality,  it  is  no  weakling ;  it  is  the  only  thing  that 
lifts  man  above  himself  and  makes  heroes  of  common  dust. 

"The  bravest  are  the  tenderest, 
The  loving  are  the  daring." 

And  then  there  are  faith  and  dreams,  which  are  the  finest  forms  of  faith.  But 
some  one  will  inquire,  do  you  believe  in  dreams?  Most  assuredly.  All  the  great 
achievements  of  this  world  are  simply  dreams  come  true.  The  men  who  carry  the 
world  on  their  shoulders  are  the  men  who  have  great  dreams  and  under  their 
inspiration  go  forth  and  make  the  dream  of  today  the  fact  of  tomorrow. 

Joseph  was  a  dreamer.  He  dreamed  that  the  sun  and  moon  and  eleven  stars 
bowed  down  to  him,  and  his  brethren  exclaimed  with  scorn :  "Behold,  this  dreamer 
cometh!"  And  yet  the  dreamer  became  a  king's  counselor  and  the  savior  of  all 
his  people. 

The  temple  in  all  its  grandeur  must  rise  in  the  fancy  of  the  architect  before  it 
becomes  a  fact  in  wood  and  marble.  The  great  picture  hangs  long  in  the  gallery 
of  the  artist's  mind  before  it  is  transferred  to  canvas. 


PUBLIC  ADDRESSES  265 

When  Jenny  Lind  sang  in  Castle  Garden  and  dissolute  men  and  depraved 
women  listened  in  silence  and  in  tears,  she  simply  threw  open  the  windows  of  her 
soul  and  let  the  music  out. 

I  like  to  remember  that  it  was  Paul,  the  greatest  scholar  of  his  age,  a  logician 
than  whom  the  world  has  seen  no  greater,  who  stood  up  before  a  pagan  king  and 
said,  "Whereupon,  0  King  Agrippa,  I  was  not  disobedient  unto  that  heavenly 
vision." 

God  pity  the  young  man  who  has  no  heavenly  vision,  who  builds  no  castles  in 
Spain,  high  and  stately  mansions,  through  whose  spacious  halls  walk  the  good 
and  the  great.  Yes,  dream  on,  young  man.  Believe  in  goodness  and  in  greatness. 
Have  faith  that  every  mau  is  a  hero  and  every  woman  a  virgin.  Paint  the  future 
in  glorious  colors.  Garland  it  with  roses,  gild  it  with  rainbows,  and  jewel  it  with 
stars.  And  though  the  north  winds  blow  and  blight  all  the  roses,  though  the 
rainbow  fade  away  and  all  the  stars  go  out,  you  will  in  the  darkness  of  desolation 
be  a  stronger  and  better  man  by  reason  of  a  beautiful  dream. 

He  came  to  us  with  dreams  to  sell. 

Ah,  long  ago  it  seems! 
From  regions  where  enchantments  dwell 
He  came  to  us  with  dreams  to  sell, 

And  we  had  need  of  dreams. 

Our  thought  had  planned  with  artful  care, 

Our  patient  toil  had  wrought 
The  roomy  treasure  houses  where 
Were  heaped  the  costly  and  the  rare; 

But  dreams  we  had  not  bought. 

Nay;   we  had  felt  no  need  of  these 

Until,  with  dulcet  strain, 
Alluring  as  the  melodies 
That  mock  the  lonely  on  the  seas, 

He  made  all  else  seem  vain. 

Bringing  an  aching  sense  of  dearth, 

A  troubled,  vague  unrest, 
A  fear  that  we  whose  care  on  earth 
Had  been  to  garner  things  of  worth 

Had  somehow  missed  the  best. 

Then,  as  had  been  our  wont  before, 

Unused  in  vain  to  sigh, 
We  turned  our  treasures  o'er  and  o'er, 
But  found  in  all  our  vaunted  store 

No  coin  that  dreams  would  buy. 

We  stood  with  empty  hands;  but  gay 

As  though  upborne  on  wings, 
He  left  us,  and  at  set  of  day 
We  heard  him  singing  far  away 

The  song  of  simple  things. 

He  left  us,  and  with  apathy 

We  gazed  upon  our  gold, 
But  to  the  world's  ascendancy 
Submissive  soon  we  came  to  be, 

Much  as  we  were  of  old. 


PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Yet  sometimes  when  the  fragrant  dawn 

In  early  splendor  beams, 
And  sometimes  when,  the  twilight  gone, 
The  moon  o'ersilvers  wood  and  lawn, 

An  echo  of  his  dreams 
Brings  to  the  heart  a  swift  regret 

Which  is  not  wholly  pain, 
And  grieving  we  would  not  forget 
The  vision  hallowed  to  us  yet, 

The  hope  that  seemed  so  vain. 
And  then  we  envy  not  the  throng 

That  careless  passes  by, 
With  no  remembrance  of  the  song; 
Though  we  must  listen  still  and  long 

To  hear  it,  till  we  die. 

And  this  standard  places  a  high  value  on  poetry,  the  living  voice  of  love  and 
faith  and  dreams.  The  poets  are  the  prophets,  endowed  with  eyes  to  see  and 
tongues  to  tell.  Pitiful  would  be  the  poverty  of  the  world  if  the  poets  should  all 
be  taken  away.  Who  can  measure  the  value  to  the  Jews  and  to  all  Christendom  of 
the  songs  of  the  shepherd  lad  ?  The  scepter  has  departed  from  Judah  and  not 
one  stone  of  the  great  temple  is  left.  The  Jews  have  scattered  to  the  ends  of  the 
earth,  and  as  a  nation  they  are  not :  but  while  time  endures  the  world  will  continue 
to  read,  "The  heavens  declare  the  glory  of  God  and  the  firmament  showeth  His 
handiwork." 

The  long  spear  of  the  Macedonian  phalanx  and  the  short  sword  of  the  Roman 
soldier  centuries  ago  lost  their  terror  and  their  might,  but  in  Homer  and  Horace 
the  world  still  sees  and  feels  something  of  the  "glory  that  was  Greece  and  the 
grandeur  that  was  Rome." 

Scotland  has  a  great  history.  In  peace  and  war,  in  religion  and  in  science  she 
has  written  her  name  so  high  that  today,  from  the  great  ships  built  in  her  docks 
to  her  Scotch  plaids,  Scotch  snuff  and  Scotch  whiskey,  the  world  pays  a  premium 
for  everything  that  bears  the  Scottish  name.  But  when  Scotland  shall  become  as 
Nineveh  and  Tyre,  when  her  "Wallace  and  Bruce,  her  Douglas  and  Macgregor  shall 
have  been  forgotten,  and  their  very  names  perish  from  the  memory  of  man,  the 
carefree  will  still  revel  in  the  rollicking  fun  of  Tarn  O'Shanter,  the  worshiper 
of  delicate  beauty  will  read  with  rapture,  To  a  Mountain  Daisy,  and  the  Banks 
and  Braes  o'  Bonnie  Doon.  The  broken-hearted  lover  will  find  solace  and  sympathy 
in  the  wild,  passionate  strains  of  Highland  Mary,  and  all  the  homes  of  the  world 
will  be  baptized  in  the  fadeless  beauty  of  A  Cotter's  Saturday  Night. 

We  all  stand  uncovered  in  the  presence  of  England.  Dear  old  England,  Mother 
of  Civilization !  In  what  titanic  proportions  her  mighty  figure  looms  up  against 
the  sky-line !  Yet  when  England  shall  pass  away,  when  the  sun  shall  set  on  all 
her  domains,  and  when,  in  the  fine  language  of  her  own  Macaulay,  "Some  traveler 
from  N~ew  Zealand,  in  the  midst  of  a  vast  solitude,  shall  take  his  stand  on  a  broken 
arch  of  London  Bridge  to  sketch  the  ruins  of  St.  Paul's,"  still,  in  the  very  ends 
and  girdles  of  the  earth,  and  mayhap  in  worlds  now  undiscovered,  down  to  the 
very  last  syllable  of  recorded  time,  men  and  women  will  stand  in  the  gray  eventide 
of  life  and  in  their  souls  whisper — 

"Sunset,  and  evening  star, 
And  one  clear  call  for  me. 
And  may  there  be  no  moaning  of  the  bar 
When  I  put  out  to  sea." 


(V) 
STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS 

1917 

1.  The  General  Assembly  of  1917 — An  Impression. 

2.  Loyalty  of  North  Carolina. 

3.  State  Food  Conservation  Commission. 

4.  Meeting  of  Sheriffs. 

5.  North  Carolina  Orphan  Association. 

1918 

6.  The  Democratic  Platform. 

7.  The  Hunger  for  a  Home — How  It  May  Be  Satisfied. 

1919 

8.  An  Inspiring  Record. 

9.  Governor    Bickett's    Administration    Represents    Neiv    High 

Record  of  Legislative  Achievement. 

10.  Not  Running  for  Office. 

11.  Statement  About  Committee  on  Negro  Economics. 

12.  Statement  in  Regard  to  South  Atlantic  Maritime  Corporation. 

13.  Loyal  Order  of  Klansmen — A  Very  Foolish  and  a  Very  'Wicked 

Order. 

14.  Negro  Emigration. 

15.  Address  to  State  Federation  of  Labor  in  Raleigh. 

16.  The  Miners'  Strike. 

17.  Preliminary  Statement  of  the  State  Reconstruction  Commis- 

sion. 

1920 

18.  Industrial  Dispute  Settled. 

19.  Tuskegee  Institute. 

20.  Herbert  Hoover. 

21.  The  Truth  About  the  Revaluation  Act. 

22.  Lincoln. 

23.  Taxes  and  the  Revaluation  Act. 

24.  The  Overall  Club. 

25.  Injustice  of  Old  System  of  Taxation. 

26.  Clark  vs.  Paul — Chaos  vs.  Revenues. 

27.  Final  Reply  to  Judge  Clark. 

28.  Alamance  County  Mob. 

29.  No  Outside  Meddling. 

30.  A  Resume  of  the  Work  of  the  Special  Session  of  the  General 

Assembly  of  1920. 

31.  Pardons  and  Paroles. 


(1) 

THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  OF  1917— AN  IMPRESSION 

(March  15,  1917) 

The  finest  commentary  on  the  General  Assembly  of  1917  will  be  found  in  the 
simplest  statement  of  its  record.  The  outstanding  feature  of  that  record  is  that 
it  deals  entirely  with  industrial,  social  and  educational  problems.  Only  in  a 
negative  way  did  the  Assembly  touch  the  domain  of  politics.  The  big,  con- 
structive measures  were  considered  in  patriotic  fashion,  and  it  is  due  the  members 
of  the  minority  party  to  say  that  on  these  questions  they  refrained  from  playing 
politics  and  gave  vote  and  voice  to  the  support  of  what  they  conceived  to  be  the 
highest  good. 

The  record  discloses  that  the  Assembly  recognized  two  fundamental  principles : 

1.  That  every  citizen  is  entitled  to  a  fair  chance  to  make  his  bread. 

2.  That  a  high  grade  citizenship  cannot  live  by  bread  alone. 

The  constitutional  amendment  exempting  homestead  notes  from  taxation,  the 
crop-lien  law  regulating  the  penalty  imposed  on  poverty  for  its  inability  to  pay 
cash  for  supplies,  the  act  providing  for  the  teaching  of  the  fundamentals  of  good 
farming  in  every  country  school,  the  law  providing  for  medical  inspection  of 
school  children  so  as  to  discover  physical  defects  in  their  incipiency,  the  act  to 
protect  the  citizens  from  being  defrauded  by  the  sale  of  nostrums  for  incurable 
diseases,  the  establishment  of  the  home  and  school  for  cripples,  the  State-wide 
quarantine  law,  the  law  providing  rural  sanitation,  were  all  designed  and  are 
calculated  to  aid  the  citizen  in  the  world-old  battle  for  bread.  They  deal  largely 
with  the  physical  necessities  of  men,  but  in  addition  to  their  commercial  value 
they  are  shot  through  with  the  spirit  of  humanitarianism. 

On  the  other  hand  the  constitutional  amendment  calling  for  a  six-  instead  of  a 
four-months  school,  the  act  authorizing  the  incorporation  of  rural  communities, 
the  liberal  appropriation  for  moonlight  schools,  the  expansion  of  the  work  of  rural 
libraries,  the  act  providing  for  a  system  of  State  highways,  the  act  to  encourage 
the  installation  of  running  water  and  electric  lights  and  telephones  in  country 
homes,  the  appropriation  to  relieve  the  loneliness  of  country  life  by  giving  whole- 
some, instructive  and  entertaining  exhibitions  in  country  schoolhouses,  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  home  for  delinquent  women,  the  creation  of  the  State  Board 
of  Charities  and  Public  Welfare,  the  special  act  for  the  building  of  a  new 
home  for  the  blind,  the  three-million-dollar  bond  issue  to  encourage  the  building  - 
of  better  schoolhouses  in  the  country,  and  to  provide  adequate  quarters  and  equip- 
ment for  our  educational  and  charitable  institutions,  all  recognize  the  truth  that 
man  cannot  live  by  bread  alone,  but  requires  for  his  proper  development  the 
enrichment  of  his  social  and  intellectual  life. 

In  addition  to  these  measures  that  so  vitally  touch  the  life  of  the  people,  the 
administration  of  the  State's  affairs  was  placed  upon  a  more  intelligent  and 
humane  basis  by  the  prison  reform  bill,  the  consolidation  of  the  three  hospitals 
for  the  insane  under  a  single  management,  the  act  to  establish  a  new  and  modern 
system  of  accounting  in  the  State  departments  and  institutions,  the  law  creating  ' 
an  educational  commission  to  consider  the  entire  school  system  of  the  State,  the 
act  providing  for  a   State  board  to   examine  teachers   and  conduct   educational 


270  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

institutes,  the  creation  of  a  subcommission  to  devise  an  equitable  system  of 
taxation,  and  the  law  eliminating  unnecessary  and  cumbersome  reports  of  State 
departments. 

I  do  not  have  before  me  any  lists  of  the  acts  of  the  General  Assembly,  and  I 
may  have  omitted  some  important  measures  in  this  outline.  But  in  the  record 
above  given  there  will  be  found  twenty-one  separate  and  distinct  acts  dealing  with 
new  subjects  or  old  subjects  in  a  new  way.  And  the  fine  thing  about  the  record 
is  that  not  one  of  the  acts  named  was  written  in  a  spirit  of  hostility  to  persons  or 
property,  but  every  one  of  them  represents  a  proper  conception  of  public  service. 
The  General  Assembly  made  scant  use  of  the  hatchet,  but  was  very  busy  with  the 
trowel,  the  hammer  and  the  saw.  In  the  early  days  of  the  session  there  was  con- 
siderable lost  motion  and  there  were  a  few  grave  errors  of  omission,  but  the  record 
in  its  entirety  reveals  the  Legislature  of  1917  as  a  "Workman  that  needeth  not 
to  be  ashamed." 


(2) 

LOYALTY  OF  NORTH  CAROLINA 

(April  7,  1917) 

In  the  natural  excitement  of  the  times  there  is  grave  danger  that  injustice 
may  be  done  good  men.  And  in  view  of  some  things  that  have  come  to  my 
attention  I  feel  it  to  be  my  duty  to  proclaim  my  supreme  faith  in  the  perfect 
loyalty  of  every  class  of  our  people,  regardless  of  race  or  blood. 

Our  citizens  who  are  of  German  extraction  have  done  much  in  the  upbuilding 
of  the  State.  It  was  the  most  natural  thing  in  the  world  for  them  to  sympathize 
with  their  kinsmen  who  were  engaged  in  a  war  with  other  nations;  but  now  when 
this  country,  which  is  their  own  country,  has  entered  the  conflict,  I  am  profoundly 
certain  they  will  be  found  nobly  loyal  to  the  Flag.  I  want  to  say,  furthermore, 
that  the  men  in  our  midst  who  are  still  citizens  of  Germany  need  have  no  appre- 
hension of  danger  to  their  persons  or  to  their  property.  They  are  safer  in  North 
Carolina  than  they  would  be  in  Berlin,  and  no  one  will  molest  or  make  them 
afraid  so  long  as  they  observe  the  rules  of  decency  and  propriety  under  the  con- 
ditions which  surround  them. 

But  I  want  to  especially  proclaim  my  abiding  faith  in  the  loyalty  of  our 
colored  population.  To  question  this  loyalty  is  a  horrible  injustice  to  these 
faithful  people.  There  is  no  page  in  history  that  shines  more  gloriously  than  that 
which  records  the  loyalty  of  black  men  to  white  women  and  children  from  1861 
to  '65,  when  the  white  men  were  at  the  front.  Treason  and  disloyalty  are  foreign 
to  the  soul  of  the  negro.  He  is  naturally  faithful  and  true,  and  in  this  crucial 
hour  he  can  be  counted  on  to  do  his  full  part  in  defense  of  the  honor  of  the  Nation 
and  the  safety  of  those  around  him. 

I  want  the  Nation  and  the  world  to  know  that  the  loyalty  of  North  Carolina 
is  99  99/100  per  cent  pure.  Cranks  and  lunatics  will  doubtless  appear,  but  these 
should  cause  no  suspicion  to  attach  to  any  class  of  our  people. 

In  due  time  North  Carolina  will  be  called  upon  to  do  her  part  and  will  do  it. 
In  the  meantime  I  urge  our   people  to  diligently  pursue  their  usual  vocations. 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOB  THE  PRESS  271 

Especially  do  I  urge  them  to  leave  nothing  undone  to  increase  and  conserve  our 
food  supplies.  When  I  issued  my  Planting  Day  proclamation  this  was  the  prudent 
thing  to  do;  today  it  is  an  imperative,  patriotic  duty. 


(3) 

STATE  FOOD  CONSERVATION  COMMISSION 

(April  11,  1917) 

Our  country  has  at  last  been  drawn  into  the  maelstrom  of  war.  When  the  call 
comes  for  soldiers  and  seamen,  as  it  must  surely  come  in  one  form  or  another, 
North  Carolina  will  freely  answer  with  the  same  full  measure  of  manhood  with 
which  she  has  answered  every  such  call  in  the  past.  The  flower  of  our  manhood, 
as  well  as  its  fruitage,  will  be  gladly  offered  to  our  country  in  this  greatest  crisis 
in  its  history. 

But  with  war  has  come  a  stern  duty,  a  necessity  startling  in  suddenness  and 
importance,  that  calls  now,  even  before  the  mobilization  of  our  armies,  for  the 
patriotic  service  of  every  man,  woman  and  child  in  the  State.  We  must  feed 
ourselves  from  our  own  soil. 

It  is  probably  too  late  to  greatly  decrease  the  acreage  of  cotton  and  tobacco, 
the  only  "money  crops"  that  cannot  be  used  as  feed  and  food.  But  that  will  not 
be  necessary  if  only  we  will  conscript  and  properly  mobilize  our  idle  acres.  On 
almost  every  farm  there  are  idle  patches  enough,  if  planted  to  sweet  potatoes, 
peas,  beans,  late  Irish  potatoes,  etc.,  to  feed  a  family.  The  productivity  of  these 
patches  could  be  greatly  increased  by  the  use  of  the  manure  from  henhouses,  un- 
sightly chip  yards,  hogpens,  and  other  places  where  it  is  now  probably  going  to 
waste.  And  in  nearly  every  family  there  are  women  and  children  who  do  not 
work  regularly  upon  the  farm,  but  who  would  gladly  volunteer  to  do  the  hoeing 
in  these  patches  in  order  that  our  people  may  be  fed.  Every  tenant  should  be 
given,  rent  free,  enough  land  to  grow  his  own  vegetables. 

In  some  of  our  most  populous  counties  large  farms  are  lying  idle  for  lack  of 
tenants.  County  chain-gangs  could  rent  these  and  easily  produce  their  own  food 
and  feed.  Every  acre  of  stubble  land  should  be  planted  to  peas  or  late  corn. 
Every  vacant  lot  in  cities  and  towns  should  be  drafted  into  the  service  of  the 
State  by  making  it  produce  food  for  man  and  beast. 

To  organize  and  direct  this  work  and  make  the  results  worthy  of  our  people 
and  commensurate  with  the  pressing  need,  I  have  called  to  my  assistance  the 
following  gentlemen  to  compose  the  State  Eood  Conservation  Commission :  W.  A. 
Graham,  Commissioner  of  Agriculture ;  B.  W.  Kilgore,  Director  of  the  Experiment 
Station;  W.  C.  Biddick,  President  of  the  Agricultural  and  Engineering  College; 
C.  B.  Hudson,  State  Demonstration  Agent;  J.  Paul  Lucas,  President  State 
Farmers'    Convention,   and   H.   Q.   Alexander,    President   State   Farmers'   Union. 

The  commission  will  hold  its  first  meeting  at  3  o'clock  p.  m.,  Tuesday,  the  17th 
of  April. 

A  subcommission  will  be  appointed  in  each  county,  so  that  a  farm-to-farm 
canvass  may  be  made. 


272  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BIOEETT 

We  have  here  a  plain  and  pressing  duty  which  gives  to  all  alike  the  oppor- 
tunity for  a  great  and  patriotic  service.  The  haunting  specter  of  loosened  belts, 
of  hungry  women  and  children,  should  impel  us  to  act  speedily  and  with  deter- 
mination. T.  W.  Bickett, 

Governor. 


(4) 
MEETING  OF  SHERIFFS 

[The  following  account  of  the  meeting  of  the  sheriffs  called  by  the  Governor 
October  15,  1917,  appeared  in  the  Raleigh  News  and  Observer,  October  16,  1917.] 

Governor  Calls  Sheriffs  to  Meet  Here  to  Discuss  Matters  of  Grave  Im- 
portance to  State  and  Nation;  and  Eighty-nine  of  Hundred  in  State 
Respond,  Forming  an  Organization  While  Here. 

"Four-fifths  of  the  civilized  world  is  today  engaged  in  a  concerted  effort  to 
arrest  one  William  Hohenzollern,  generally  known  as  the  Kaiser  of  the  Imperial 
German  Government,"  Governor  Bickett  yesterday  told  eighty-nine  of  the  one 
hundred  sheriffs  of  the  State  meeting  at  his  call  in  the  Senate  Chamber  at  the 
State  Capitol.  Accepting  the  challenge  thrown  down,  the  sheriffs  enthusiastically 
complied  with  Governor  Bickett's  urgent  request  that  they  go  into  the  highways 
and  the  hedges  and  bring  in  subscribers  to  the  second  Liberty  Loan  Bond  issue 
by  which  the  hands  of  the  Highwayman  of  the  World  may  be  tied,  and  his 
depredations  ended. 

By  mobilizing  the  sheriffs  of  the  State  for  Liberty  Loan  Bonds,  Governor 
Bickett  believes  that  the  State  has  taken  a  long  step  toward  the  achievement  of 
its  purpose  to  do  its  full  share  in  the  war.  More  than  any  other  officials  the 
sheriffs,  he  feels,  come  in  contact  with  the  men  and  women  in  the  counties  of 
the  State  who  are  able  to  take  $50  bonds  or  $100  bonds,  but  whose  fortune  will  not 
stand  greater  investment.  Many  were  ready  yesterday  to  sign  pledges  and  make 
promises,  but  they  were  urged  to  return  to  their  homes,  spread  the  word  of  the 
intense  need,  and  then  get  results. 

Incidentally,  the  sheriffs,  coming  from  all  parts  of  Worth  Carolina,  organized  a 
North  Carolina  Sheriffs'  Association,  with  dues  of  $2  annually,  and  with  Sheriff 
R.  H.  Edwards,  Wayne,  president ;  Sheriff  N.  W.  Wallace,  Mecklenburg,  first 
vice-president;  Sheriff  D.  B.  Stafford,  Guilford,  second  vice-president;  Sheriff 
Leon  Lane,  Chatham,  third  vice-president,  and  Sheriff  J.  H.  Sears,  Wake  County, 
secretary-treasurer. 

It  was  the  first  time  in  the  history  of  the  State  that  virtually  all  the  high 
sheriffs  have  been  assembled  in  one  place.  They  came  together  upon  the  tele- 
graphic request  of  Governor  Bickett,  who  simply  notified  them  that  matters  of 
grave  importance  to  the  State  and  Nation  called  for  their  presence  in  Raleigh. 
From  the  coast  to  the  mountains  they  came,  all  eager  to  have  a  share  in  whatever 
the  Governor  might  propose  for  the  best  interest  of  the  State  and  Nation.  The 
eleven  who  were  not  here  sent  telegrams  explaining  their  absence.  Until  he  made 
them  a  statement  in  the  Senate  Chamber,  shortly  after  one  o'clock,  not  one  of 
them  knew  the  real  significance  of  their  visit  to  Raleigh.     When  they  did  know, 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  273 

they  entered  into  the  spirit  of  the  campaign  with  a  vim,  and  went  back  to  their 
homes  after  resolving  to  turn  over,  in  fifty-  and  hundred-dollar  bonds,  at  least 
half  of  the  State's  allotment. 

CALLS    FOR   COOPERATION 

Governor  Bickett  told  them  the  story  of  the  war,  emphasized  the  necessity  of 
action  at  home  as  well  as  in  France,  and  called  for  cooperation.  Then  Captain 
Stuart  Allen,  of  the  Canadian  forces,  now  engaged  in  training  the  students  at 
the  University  of  North  Carolina,  related  some  of  the  horrors  of  the  war;  Mr. 
E.  C.  Duncan  appealed  for  a  nonpartisan  participation  in  the  struggle  by  the 
political  forces  at  home;  Mr.  E.  B.  Crow  explained  the  details  of  the  bond  issue; 
and  the  sheriffs  assailed  their  new  task  in  earnest. 

"Eour-fifths  of  the  world,"  Governor  Bickett  said  in  his  opening  remarks, 
"is  today  engaged  in  a  concerted  effort  to  arrest  one  William  Hohenzollern, 
generally  known  as  the  Kaiser  of  the  Imperial  German  Government.  The 
Council  of  National  Defense  for  the  State  of  North  Carolina,  the  committee  that 
has  in  hand  the  sale  of  the  Liberty  Loan  Bonds  in  this  State  and  your  Governor, 
were  all  of  the  opinion  that  one  of  the  best  ways  to  effect  the  arrest  of  this 
character  that  has  disturbed  the  peace  of  the  world  was  to  get  the  high  sheriffs 
of  the  State  of  North  Carolina  deeply  interested  in  this  matter. 

NOT   A    STREAK    OF   YELLOW 

"I  am  gratified,  beyond  my  power  of  words  to  express,  at  the  patriotic  re- 
sponse that  has  been  given  to  this  appeal.  I  have  said  repeatedly  in  public 
speeches  made  throughout  the  State  that  after  having  gone  through  all  the  one 
hundred  counties,  there  is  not  a  streak  of  yellow  in  North  Carolina  from  Cape 
Lookout  to  Slick  Bock  Creek." 

The  statement  brought  generous  applause  as  the  sheriffs  warmed  under  the 
appealing  eloquence  of  the  Governor,  who  added : 

"If  there  be  any  man  in  North  Carolina  who  doubts  the  accuracy  of  that 
statement,  I  am  sure  if  he  could  be  present  and  could  look  upon  this  gathering 
of  representative  men,  the  chosen  representatives  of  the  people  at  home,  that 
doubt  would  be  removed. 

"It  is  true  that  in  some  quarters  there  is  ignorance  and,  in  some,  misinformation 
about  the  causes  that  brought  about  the  war  and  the  necessary  consequences  that 
it  involves,  so  far  as  this  Nation  is  concerned.  But  I  am  profoundly  convinced 
that  wherever  people  see  the  situation  as  it  is  and  understand  it  as  the  responsible 
heads  of  our  Government  understand  it,  and  understood  it  when  we  entered  this 
war,  there  is  not  a  man  in  North  Carolina  that  would  not  realize  that  a  stern 
necessity  faced  this  Government,  and  that,  finally,  when  our  bleeding  and  well- 
nigh  broken-hearted  Woodrow  Wilson  declared  in  favor  of  going  in,  it  was 
because  it  was  truly  impossible  to  longer  stay  out. 

PRESERVE    SELF-RESPECT 

"We  were  compelled  to  enter,"  Governor  Bickett  insisted,  "in  order  to  preserve 
any  measure  of  self-respect.  It  is  good  and  desirable  for  a  man  to  have  the  good 
opinion  of  others,  and  to  entertain  a  decent  respect  for  the  opinion  of  mankind, 
but  it  is  a  supreme  necessity  for  a  man  or  a  nation  to  keep  on  speaking  terms 

18 


274  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

with  his  own  conscience.  And,  in  view  of  the  history  of  this  war,  if  our  Govern- 
ment at  Washington  had  declined  to  accept  Germany's  defiant  and  contemptuous 
challenge,  no  American  citizen  could  have  looked  at  his  own  face  in  the  glass. 
We  would  have  forfeited  our  own  respect  and  the  respect  of  the  whole  world. 
I  weigh  my  words  when  I  say  if,  after  Germany  had  made  a  solemn  compact  with 
the  United  States  to  observe  the  laws  of  nations  and  the  common  laws  of  humanity 
in  its  further  conduct  of  the  war,  and  then,  when  the  hour  was  ripe,  had  served 
notice  upon  this  Government  that  it  proposed  to  treat  that  compact  as  it  treated  the 
compact  with  Belgium,  as  a  scrap  of  paper — if,  in  the  face  of  those  facts,  this 
Government  had  said  it  didn't  mean  what  it  said  when  at  the  point  of  the  sword  it 
had  wrested  this  promise  from  the  Imperial  German  Government,  the  United 
States  would  have  been  without  a  single  friend  among  all  the  nations  of  the 
earth.  Nations  are  like  individuals,  and  when  an  individual  gets  in  that  con- 
dition where  no  man  loves  him,  no  man  fears  him  and  no  man  respects  him,  there 
is  absolutely  no  reason  why  he  should  not  go  out  and  get  a  cheap  rope  and  hang 
himself.  And  yet,  if  we  had  failed  to  accept  this  defiant  and  contemptuous  chal- 
lenge no  other  nation  on  the  face  of  the  earth  would  have  loved  the  United  States, 
no  nation  would  have  feared  the  United  States,  and  no  nation  would  have  respected 
the  United  States. 

"So  that,"  Governor  Bickett  added,  "for  the  preservation  of  that  self-respect 
without  which  life,  of  a  nation  or  of  an  individual,  is  not  worth  living,  we  had  to 
go  into  this  war.  We  went  in  as  a  matter  of  self-defense.  It  is  as  plain  as  day 
that  if  we  had  not  gone  in  England  and  France  would  have  lost  in  the  fight  and, 
eventually,  the  United  States  would  have  had  to  reckon  with  the  Imperial  German 
Government  single-handed,  unaided  by  any  government  on  earth." 

RECOUNTS    FEATURES    OF    WAR 

Governor  Bickett  then  briefly  recounted  the  events  of  the  war,  featuring  those 
details  of  the  conduct  of  the  Imperial  German  Government  which  have  gone  out 
as  evidences  of  bad  faith  and  a  long  adopted  policy  of  deception  and  fraud  where 
this  Nation  has  been  concerned. 

"The  South  is  the  last  place  that  ought  to  complain  that  a  war  is  not  fought 
on  its  own  soil,"  Governor  Bickett  continued,  emphasizing  the  opportunity  before 
this  Nation  to  keep  the  fight  away  from  American  shores,  to  stop  the  conflict 
before  it  shall  become  localized  and  before  America  has  to  spend  its  fortune  of 
young  manhood  in  the  struggle. 

"It  is  my  judgment  that  the  more  money  we  put  into  this  war  the  less  life 
it  is  going  to  cost,"  he  added,  expressing  the  belief  that  Germany  is  going  to  take 
this  war  just  as  seriously  as  the  people  of  America  take  it,  and  that  psychology 
will  play  a  big  part  in  winning  it. 

IN    DESPERATE    EARNESTNESS 

"When  once  the  German  people  understand,"  Governor  Bickett  went  on,  "that 
we  are  in  desperate  and  deadly  earnestness  and  have  put  our  hands  to  the  plow 
and  do  not  intend  to  turn  back,  that  we  propose  to  put  into  this  fight  every  man 
and  every  dollar  in  order  to  win  it — the  minute  that  fact  sinks  into  the  Teutonic 
mind  will  be  the  beginning  of  the  end  of  the  war. 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  275 

"The  way  to  get  the  people  interested  in  this  war  is  to  get  them  to  put  a  little 
money  into  it.  For  it  is  written,  where  a  man's  treasure  is  there  will  his  heart 
he  also.  Every  man  who  buys  a  Liberty  Loan  Bond,  whether  it  be  a  $100  or  a  $50 
bond,  will  at  once  develop  a  keener  interest  in  the  war  than  ever  before. 

"We  want  every  man  who  can  possibly  raise  as  much  as  $50  to  take  one  of 
these  Liberty  Bonds,  and  we  feel  that  the  best  way  to  do  it  is  to  get  the  sheriffs 
of  the  State  interested.  You  come  most  closely  in  contact  with  the  people.  They 
look  to  you.  Most  of  them  love  you  and  all  of  them  fear  you.  If  we  can  get  the 
sheriffs  interested,  preaching  this  doctrine  and  holding  before  them  the  necessity 
of  investing  in  these  bonds,  the  end  will  not  be  in  doubt.  "We  ought  to  get  100,000 
men  to  buy  each  a  $100  bond.  If  we  can  get  one  hundred  thousand  men  to  invest 
in  these  bonds  there  will  not  be  a  question  about  the  end  any  longer." 

CAPTAIN    ALLEN    SPEAKS 

Captain  Stuart  Allen,  member  of  the  famous  Princess  Pat  Regiment  of 
Canadian  troops,  which  lost  in  one  engagement  of  the  Battle  of  the  Somme  in 
killed  and  wounded  thirty  of  the  thirty-four  officers  who  entered  it  and  seven 
hundred  and  sixty-five  of  the  nine  hundred  and  fifty  men,  was  presented  by 
Governor  Bickett.  Captain  Allen,  who  came  home  from  the  war  shot  to  pieces, 
is  now  recuperating.  By  the  courtesy  of  his  government  he  is  engaged  now  in 
training  the  students  of  the  University  of  North  Carolina  in  military  funda- 
mentals. 

Captain  Allen,  in  a  simple,  straightforward  manner,  told  his  story,  which  was 
not  the  less  graphic  and  not  the  less  gruesome  from  its  simple  telling.  He  told 
of  the  various  methods  of  trench  warfare,  and  demonstrated  the  use  of  the  gas 
mask. 

NONPARTISAN  FIGHT 

When  he  had  concluded,  Governor  Bickett  called  attention  to  the  nonpartisan 
attitude  of  all  political  parties  toward  the  conduct  of  the  war,  and  Mr.  Carl 
Duncan,  one  of  the  prominent  Republican  leaders  in  North  Carolina,  was 
presented.  Mr.  Duncan  said  in  the  beginning  that  he  could  not  make  a  speech, 
but  he  brought  the  sheriffs  to  a  solid  round  of  applause  when  he  told  them  how, 
when  he  gave  up  his  son  to  join  the  colors,  he  felt  that  he  was  ready  to  retire,  but 
that,  when  he  said  good-bye,  he  resolved  to  work  harder  than  ever. 

"Good-bye,  boy,"  he  had  said;  "while  you  are  gone  I'll  be  trying.  I'll  be  here 
in  the  game  and  I'll  be  trying  to  keep  the  State  as  good  as  it  can  be." 

Mr.  E.  B.  Crow,  cashier  of  the  Commercial  National  Bank,  then  outlined  the 
details  of  the  Liberty  Loan  and  the  manner  of  subscribing.  This  done,  the  meeting 
was  turned  over  to  the  sheriffs,  who  voted  a  rousing  approval  of  the  Governor's 
proposal,  pledged  themselves  to  get  to  work,  and  then  elected  officers  for  a 
permanent  organization. 

SHERIFFS    WHO    WERE   HERE 

The  sheriffs  here  were: 

C.  D.  Story,  Alamance;  R.  A.  Adams,  Alexander;  A.  P.  Reeves,  Alleghany; 
T.  S.  Clark,  Anson;  W.  B.  Windley,  Beaufort;  John  W.  Cooper,  Bertie;  J.  M. 
Clark,  Bladen;  J.  E.  Robinson,  Brunswick;  E.  M.  Mitchell,  Buncombe;  D.  A. 
Johnston^  Burke;   H.  W.   Caldwell,   Cabarrus;   J.  A.  Triplett,   Caldwell;   J.  B. 


276  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Mitchell,  Camden;  T.  M.  Thomas,  Jr.,  Carteret;  T.  N".  Finch,  Caswell;  John 
A.  Isenhour,  Catawba;  Leon  T.  Lane,  Chatham;  P.  C.  Gentry,  Cherokee;  G.  W. 
Goodwin,  Chowan;  Ed  Kitchens,  Clay;  W.  D.  Lackey,  Cleveland;  J.  0.  Ammons, 
Columbus;  R.  B.  Lane,  Craven;  N.  H.  McGeachy,  Cumberland;  R.  E.  Flora, 
Currituck;  L.  D.  Farrow,  Dare;  A.  T.  Delap,  Davidson;  G.  F.  Winecoff,  Davie; 
G.  G.  Best,  Duplin ;  John  F.  Harward,  Durham ;  R.  P.  Hyatt,  Edgecombe ; 
G.  W.  Flynt,  Forsyth;  H.  A.  Kearney,  Franklin;  W.  N.  Davis,  Gaston;  J.  W. 
Brown,  Gates ;  J.  A.  Ammons,  Graham ;  S.  C.  Hobgood,  Granville ;  J.  E.  Herring, 
Greene;  D.  B.  Stafford,  Guilford;  J.  A.  House,  Halifax;  W.  H.  Turlington, 
Harnett;  Allard  Case,  Henderson;  A.  E.  Garrett,  Hertford;  Edgar  Hall,  Hoke; 
T.  D.  Davis,  Hyde;  M.  P.  Alexander,  Iredell;  W.  F.  Grimes,  Johnston;  John  S. 
Hargett,  Jones ;  D.  E.  Lasater,  Lee ;  A.  W.  Taylor,  Lenoir ;  Caney  Ramsey, 
Madison ;  J.  H.  Page,  Martin ;  J.  A.  Laughridge,  McDowell ;  ST.  W.  Wallace, 
Mecklenburg;  L.  F.  Burleson,  Mitchell;  G.  W.  Stuart,  Montgomery;  D.  Al.  Blue, 
Moore ;  1ST.  C.  Warren,  Nash ;  George  C.  Jackson,  New  Hanover ;  H.  L.  Joyner, 
Northampton;  Elisha  H.  Walton,  Onslow;  Charles  G.  Rosemond,  Orange;  E.  S. 
Lupton,  Pamlico;  Charles  Reid,  Pasquotank;  Robert  T.  Murray,  Pender;  B.  F. 
Bray,  Perquimans;  Joseph  McGlawhorn,  Pitt;  A.  L.  Hill,  Polk;  H.  D.  Baldwin, 
Richmond;  R.  E.  Lewis,  Robeson;  T.  L.  Gardner,  Rockingham;  J.  H.  Krider, 
Rowan ;  C.  E.  Tanner,  Rutherford ;  I.  T.  McLamb,  Sampson ;  W.  D.  McLaurin, 
Scotland;  G.  D.  Blalock,  Stanly;  S.  P.  Christian,  Stokes;  N.  G.  Belton,  Surry; 
Cos  Paxton,  Transylvania ;  J.  V.  Griffith,  Union ;  J.  H.  Sears,  Wake ;  R.  E.  Davis, 
Warren;  J.  E.  Reid,  Washington;  W.  P.  Moody,  Watauga;  R.  H.  Edwards, 
Wayne;  W.  D.  Woodruff,  Wilkes;  H.  M.  Rowe,  Wilson;  J.  E.  Zachary,  Yadkin; 
J.  W.  Bennett,  Yancey. 


(5) 

NORTH  CAROLINA  ORPHAN  ASSOCIATION 

(November  26,  1917) 

I  want  to  endorse  and  officially  recognize  the  splendid  work  the  publicity  com- 
mittee of  the  North  Carolina  Orphan  Association  is  doing  in  the  interest  of  the 
fatherless  and  motherless  children  of  the  State.  The  suggestion  that  every  citizen 
of  the  Commonwealth  contribute  the  amount  of  one  day's  earnings  during  the 
year  to  the  orphanage  of  his  (or  her)  choice  is  reasonable  and  appropriate. 
It  is  a  beautiful  custom  practically  everybody  may  participate  in  with  little  in- 
convenience or  sacrifice.  The  Thanksgiving  season  is  a  most  propitious  period 
during  which  the  people  of  the  State  may  show  their  appreciation  of  the  merito- 
rious service  the  orphan  homes  are  rendering  in  the  care,  protection,  training  and 
education  of  helpless  children  who  might  otherwise  become  a  burden  or  even  a 
menace  to  society. 

That  the  present  inmates  of  the  various  orphan  homes  will  continue  to  receive 
proper  care  and  attention  I  have  no  reason  to  express  the  slightest  doubt.  But 
there  are  thousands  of  bright  little  boys  and  girls  out  on  the  highways  and  by- 
ways of  the  State  who  cannot  be  admitted  into  any  of  these  homes  because 
there  is  no  room  for  them.     It  is  for  these  we  should  interest  ourselves  to  the 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  277 

extent  of  contributing  the  income  of  a  day  at  Thanksgiving,  so  that  the  manage- 
ment of  the  homes  may  be  provided  with  funds  to  warrant  reasonable  expansion. 
Let  it  not  be  said  of  North  Carolinians  that  they  neglected  at  any  time  the  care 
and  protection  of  helpless  children  at  their  own  doors.  We  must  assist  in  pro- 
viding adequate  facilities  for  the  accommodation  of  orphans,  and  every  one  is 
urged  to  do  his  bit. 


(6) 

THE  DEMOCRATIC  PLATFORM 

(April  12,  1918) 

[Governor  Bickett  today  gave  out  the  following  statement  in  regard  to  the 
platform  adopted  by  the  Democratic  State  Convention.] 

The  Democratic  platform  is  essentially  one  of  patriotism.  It  endorses  without 
reservation  the  fact  that  I  have  emphasized  in  all  of  my  speeches,  that  the  one 
supreme  issue  before  the  people  is  the  winning  of  the  war.  In  the  finest  sort  of 
spirit  it  assures  the  Republican  Party  of  our  confidence  in  the  loyalty  of  its 
membership,  and  urges  all  the  people  to  subordinate  every  other  question  to  the 
one  colossal  task  of  the  hour.  The  platform  is  a  bugle-call  to  the  Colors,  and 
appeals  to  all  classes  and  conditions  of  our  people  to  rally  to  the  support  of  those 
who  in  the  providence  of  God  are  charged  with  the  fearful  responsibilities  of 
the  war. 

There  is  not  a  line  in  the  platform  calculated  to  offend  any  loyal  American 
citizen,  white  or  black,  of  any  political  faith.  The  only  time  it  mentions  the 
Republican  Party  is  when  it  congratulates  that  party  upon  the  loyalty  of  its 
membership.  It  is  refreshing  to  note  that  the  platform  neither  "condemns" 
nor  "denounces"  nor  "deplores." 

The  speeches  made  on  the  floor  of  the  Convention  breathe  the  same  spirit  and 
call  for  the  same  undivided  front  in  the  face  of  the  foe.  In  his  keynote  speech 
Mr.  Bryant  accurately  interprets  the  thought  and  the  feeling  of  all  loyal  citizens 
when  he  says : 

Assembled  as  representatives  of  the  dominant  political  party  in  the 
State  and  Nation,  we  must  assume  the  responsibilities  and  face  the  duties 
of  the  hour.  They  are  the  gravest  in  history,  and  there  is  no  precedent  to 
guide  us.  The  present  and  the  near  future  call  for  the  strength  of  every 
man,  the  wisdom  of  all  parties.  What  we  have  been  taught  to  revere  and 
hold  most  sacred  is  threatened.  The  virtue  of  women,  the  lives  of  children, 
sacredness  of  treaty,  the  continuance  of  popular  government,  and  the  reign 
of  the  Prince  of  Peace  are  in  jeopardy.  Matters  of  internal  policy  in  the 
State  and  Nation  shall  for  the  present  be  subordinated,  in  order  that  the 
United  States  and  her  allies  may  win  the  war. 

All  the  other  speeches  and  the  platform  are  in  complete  harmony  with  the 
"one  clear  note"  of  patriotism  sounded  by  Mr.  Bryant. 

The  speeches  of  these  leaders  of  the  party  and  the  platform  adopted  encourage 
me  in  the  determination  I  have  so  often  voiced  on  the  platform  to   refuse  to 


278  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

quarrel  with  any  man  about  petty  political  differences  so  long  as  our  boys  are 
going  over  the  top  together  and  dying  for  a  common  cause. 

I  am  heartened  in  my  resolve  to  talk  in  the  coming  campaign  about  nothing 
else  except  the  war  and  how  to  win  it.  After  the  war  has  been  won,  when  our 
boys  come  home,  when  our  wives  are  safe  from  debauchery  and  our  children  from 
mutilation  and  our  whole  people  secure  from  slavery  at  the  hands  of  the  Hun, 
then  and  not  until  then,  if  our  Republican  friends  so  desire  it,  I  will  take  up 
with  them  our  ancient  quarrel  and  proceed  in  due  and  solemn  form  to  "point 
with  pride"  and  "view  with  alarm." 

The  three  constructive  measures  endorsed  by  the  Convention  have  in  them  no 
suggestion  or  trace  of  politics.  The  platform  recognizes  the  right  of  the  child  to 
a  longer  school  term,  the  right  of  the  teacher  to  a  living  wage,  and  the  right  of  the 
homeless  man  to  a  better  opportunity  to  acquire  a  vine  and  fig  tree  that  he  may 
call  his  own.  These  are  measures  for  which  all  good  men  can  work  and  for 
which  all  good  men  should  pray. 


(7) 
THE  HUNGER  FOR  A  HOME— HOW  IT  MAY  BE  SATISFIED 

(From  the  Progressive  Farmer,  October  23,  1918) 

It  is  a  truth  everywhere  confessed  that  the  best  bulwark  of  a  republic  is  the 
citizen  standing  in  the  doorway  of  his  own  home.  Therefore,  it  is  the  part  of 
wisdom  and  of  safety  to  afford  every  man  an  opportunity  to  live  under  his  own 
roof  and  on  his  own  soil. 

When  the  world  war  shall  end,  the  homes  of  the  land  will  constitute  our  first 
line  of  defense  against  the  myriads  of  isms  and  schisms  that  will  menace  our 
prosperity  and  threaten  our  peace. 

But  unless  something  shall  be  done  to  help  him,  the  poor  man  who  wants  to 
anchor  to  the  soil  will  seek  in  vain  for  the  money  to  enable  him  to  do  so.  Billions 
of  Government  bonds  will  be  on  the  market,  and  with  these  the  poor  man  will  have 
to  compete  when  he  seeks  to  borrow  money  on  long  time.  All  that  he  can  now 
offer  is  a  6  per  cent  paper  subject  to  a  tax  rate  that  averages  2%  per  cent,  making 
his  paper  worth  net  only  3%  per  cent.  What  money  lender  will  take  such  a  paper 
when  he  can  get  a  Government  bond  that  will  net  him  4%  per  cent  ? 

The  constitutional  amendment  providing  for  the  exemption  from  taxation  of 
a  note  and  mortgage  given  for  the  purchase  price  of  a  home  that  does  not  cost 
more  than  $3,000  comes  to  the  relief  of  the  situation.  It  gives  to  the  poor  man's 
note  a  dignity  equal  to  that  of  a  Government  bond,  and  makes  it  a  better  invest- 
ment, for  it  pays  5V2  per  cent,  and  is  free  from  taxation,  and  the  money  is  loaned 
for  not  less  than  five  years. 

With  this  amendment  every  honest  and  industrious  man  can  find  the  mone;y 
with  which  to  buy  a  home.  Without  this  amendment  he  will  seek  for  that  money 
in  vain. 

This  amendment  is  a  companion  amendment  to  the  six-months  school  amend- 
ment. I  urge  every  man  to  vote  for  both  amendments,  and  he  will  encourage 
and  uplift  the  two  great  sources  of  joy  and  power — the  home  and  the  child. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 

Governor. 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  279 

(8) 
AN  INSPIRING  RECORD 

(March  13,  1919) 

The  closing  sentence  of  my  Biennial  Message  to  the  General  Assembly  of  1919 
is:  "My  prayer  to  God  and  my  faith  is  that  when  the  General  Assembly  of  1919 
shall  pass  into  history  its  record  will  declare  its  glory." 

I  am  deeply  grateful  that  the  work  of  the  General  Assembly  justifies  the 
above  confession  of  faith.  It  is  not  a  perfect  record.  A  careful  reading  of  the 
Journal  will  disclose  errors  of  omission  and  of  commission.  But  viewed  in  its 
entirety,  it  is  an  inspiring  record. 

In  the  very  beginning  the  General  Assembly  evidenced  its  sympathy  with 
"the  new  tides  running  in  the  hearts  of  men."  The  General  Assembly  of  Worth 
Carolina  enjoys  the  noble  distinction  of  being  the  very  first  in  the  Union  to 
petition  the  American  Peace  Commissioners  in  Paris  to  incorporate  in  the  Treaty 
of  Peace  a  League  of  Nations  that  will  deliver  the  world  forever  from  the  burdens 
and  horrors  of  war. 

The  General  Assembly  promptly  ratified  the  Federal  Prohibition  Amendment, 
and  thus  aided  in  cutting  out  of  our  social  and  political  life  the  most  fruitful 
source  of  poverty,  disease  and  crime. 

In  three  great  fields  of  legislation,  to  wit,  taxation,  education  and  health,  the 
General  Assembly  established  new  and  noble  standards. 

TAXATION 

1.  The  budget  bill  is  abreast  with  the  best  thought  of  the  times  and  will  enable 
succeeding  General  Assemblies  to  consider  demands  for  the  expenditure  of  public 
funds  with  a  full  knowledge  of  all  essential  facts. 

2.  The  Income  Tax  Amendment  to  the  Constitution  will  enable  the  State  to 
derive  a  reasonable  revenue  from  sources  well  able  to  pay  it,  and  will  wipe,  out  the 
discrimination  now  practiced  against  the  man  who  earns  a  small  income  in  favor 
of  the  man  who  collects  a  large  one,  and  will  make  it  possible  for  a  succeeding 
General  Assembly  to  write  a  model  tax  law  under  which  it  will  be  unnecessary  for 
the  State  to  levy  any  ad  valorem  tax  on  real  or  personal  property,  but  can  leave 
all  of  this  to  the  counties  and  towns. 

3.  The  Eevaluation  Machinery  Act  marks  the  high  tide  in  sane  and  progressive 
tax  legislation  in  North  Carolina.  It  is  a  complete  abandonment  of  a  standard 
hoary  with  age  and  iniquity,  and  the  establishment  of  a  new  standard  of  truth  and 
justice.  I  am  well  within  the  bounds  of  conservative  statement  in  saying  that 
the  fixed  purpose  of  the  General  Assembly  to  make  all  men  come  clean  to  the  tax 
books  will  add  more  to  the  moral  and  material  welfare  of  our  people  than  all  the 
tax  laws  that  have  been  written  in  North  Carolina  since  Virginia  Dare  first  saw 
the  light  on  Roanoke  Island. 

EDUCATION 

1.  It  was  a  monumental  achievement  to  get  the  people  of  North  Carolina  to 
insert  in  the  organic  law  of  the  State  a  mandate  that  every  child  shall  have  a 
chance  to  go  to  school  six  months  in  the  year.     But  it  was  a  more  difficult  task 


280  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

to  frame  a  wise  and  just  law  to  carry  out  this  constitutional  mandate.  This  task 
has  been  accomplished  so  well  that  when  the  measure  was  fully  explained,  many 
who  "came  to  scoff  remained  to  pray."  In  the  beginning  there  seemed  to  be  a 
hopeless  division  of  opinion,  but,  when  the  true  light  was  turned  on,  these 
differences  disappeared  and  practically  all  men  of  all  parties  now  confess  that  the 
law  as  written  is  the  very  best  that  can  be  devised  under  the  conditions  that  obtain. 

Last  year  the  average  teacher  received  a  salary  of  $45  per  month,  and  was 
employed  four  months  in  the  year.  Under  a  minimum  wage  law  enacted  by  this 
General  Assembly,  the  average  teacher  will  receive  approximately  $65  per  month 
for  a  minimum  term  of  six  months. 

The  law  requiring  every  child  under  fourteen  years  of  age  to  go  to  school 
during  the  entire  term  of  the  public  school  in  the  district  in  which  the  child 
resides,  and  providing  for  the  rigid  enforcement  of  this  law  through  a  system  of 
juvenile  courts,  gives  to  North  Carolina  a  compulsory  school  law  that  ranks  with 
that  of  any  state  in  the  Union. 

The  act  appropriating  $50,000  to  provide  teacher-training  through  a  series  of 
county  summer  schools  conducted  in  every  county  in  the  State  is  a  most  vital  and 
valuable  departure. 

HEALTH 

The  General  Assembly  made  tremendous  strides  in  health  legislation.  The 
steps  taken  for  the  protection  of  the  health  of  this  and  future  generations  in 
themselves  abundantly  justify  the  existence  of  the  present  session  of  the  General 
Assembly. 

In  my  opinion  the  most  important  and  the  most  advanced  step  taken  in  the 
domain  of  health  laws  is  the  statute  that  gives  authority  to  the  medical  staffs  in 
our  penal  and  charitable  institutions  to  perform  operations  on  inmates  of  those 
institutions  that  will  make  it  impossible  for  incurable  lunatics  and  imbeciles  to 
"multiply  and  replenish  the  earth."  The  law  carefully  safeguards  the  patients, 
and  these  operations  can  be  performed  only  when  in  the  judgment  of  the  medical 
staff  they  will  redound  to  the  benefit  of  the  patients.  This  law  is  the  very  essence 
of  humanity  in  so  far  as  it  affects  the  individual  patient,  and  is  the  only  way  to 
bring  about  a  gradual  decrease  in  the  number  of  these  unfortunate  people. 

The  act  calls  for  the  regular  examination  of  every  child  who  attends  a  public 
school  in  order  to  ascertain  the  existence  of  either  physical  or  mental  defects,  and 
the  appropriation  of  $50,000  per  annum  to  correct  these  defects  in  indigent 
children  breaks  a  new  ground  in  this  field  of  legislation.  This  law  is  bottomed  on 
the  sound  principle  that  a  Christian  civilization  cannot  allow  a  child  to  stagger 
through  life  under  the  handicap  of  a  curable  physical  or  mental  defect  simply 
because  the  parents  of  that  child  may  be  stricken  with  poverty. 

The  law  making  it  mandatory  to  maintain  in  all  towns  and  thickly  settled 
communities  sanitary  closets  in  accordance  with  plans  and  specifications  prepared 
by  the  State  Board  of  Health  means  the  saving  of  nearly  a  thousand  lives  a  year, 
the  prevention  of  ten  thousand  cases  of  sickness,  together  with  all  the  suffering 
and  expense  incident  to  sickness  and  death. 

North  Carolina  has  for  several  years  been  the  leading  state  in  the  Union  in 
the  development  of  rural  health  work.  The  appropriation  for  this  work  was 
practically  doubled,  and  this  means  increased  activity  and  efficiency  in  this  great 
field. 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  281 

A  series  of  acts  was  passed  for  the  purpose  of  cooperating  with  the  Federal 
Government  in  the  suppression  of  vice  and  the  prevention  of  diseases  incident  to 
vice.    These  measures  are  as  follows : 

The  education  of  the  public  by  suitable  means  regarding  the  cause  and  pre- 
vention of  unhygienic  sex  life  and  venereal  diseases. 

The  furnishing  of  free  salvarsan,  the  specific  for  syphilis,  for  the  treatment  of 
all  syphilitics  of  the  State,  and  making  provision  through  the  State  for  free 
treatment  of  persons  diseased  with  gonorrhea  and  syphilis,  in  order  that  these 
diseases  may  not  be  transmitted  to  others. 

Making  prostitution  a  dangerous  practice  in  North  Carolina  by  enacting  laws 
that  will  reach  the  prostitute,  and  providing  the  necessary  law-enforcing  agents 
to  see  that  the  laws  are  properly  applied. 

SOCIAL    WELFARE 

For  the  first  time  in  the  history  of  the  State  we  have  the  machinery  for  a 
unified  State  and  county  system  of  social  welfare  work.  The  State  Board  of 
Charities  and  Public  Welfare,  which  has  oversight  of  the  State's  charitable  and 
penal  institutions,  has  been  given  the  right  to  appoint  three  persons  in  each  county 
to  act  as  a  local  welfare  board  and  to  advise  with  the  local  authorities  on  all 
matters  pertaining  to  local  conditions.  In  addition  to  this,  the  Legislature  made 
it  the  duty  of  the  board  of  education  and  the  county  commissioners  in  each 
county  to  elect,  not  later  than  July  15th  next,  a  county  superintendent  of  public 
welfare,  who  shall  be  an  officer  trained  in  all  matters  pertaining  to  constructive 
social  work.  This  officer  will  be  the  chief  school  attendance  officer  and  the  chief 
probation  officer  of  the  county,  charged  especially  with  the  duty  of  looking  after 
delinquent  and  neglected  children.  His  position  is  made  to  fit  with  the  compulsory 
attendance  law  and  the  new  juvenile  court  law. 

The  juvenile  court  law  marks  the  most  wholesome  advance  in  child  welfare 
legislation  ever  accomplished  in  this  State  at  one  stroke.  It  provides  that 
children  under  sixteen  years  of  age  who  may  be  infractors  of  the  laws  shall  not 
be  treated  as  criminals,  but  as  wayward  children  needing  parental  control,  educa- 
tion and  discipline,  which  must  be  supplied  by  the  State,  since  it  has  not  been 
provided  by  natural  guardians.  The  law  provides  that  every  clerk  of  the  Superior 
Court  in  the  State  shall  be  a  juvenile  court  judge  and  shall  have  exclusive  juris- 
diction over  children  of  less  than  sixteen  years.  Every  city  of  more  than  ten 
thousand  population  must  establish  a  juvenile  court  or  make  provision  for  com- 
bining with  the  county  court.  Any  towns  of  five  thousand  population  which  are 
not  county-seat  towns,  and  therefore  not  of  easy  access  to  the  county  clerk,  may 
provide  courts  if  they  choose.  The  design  is  to  guarantee  that  every  child  shall 
be  within  the  jurisdiction  of  a  juvenile  court,  no  matter  whether  he  lives  in  town 
or  country.  The  law  provides  the  manner  of  procedure  for  carrying  out  the 
juvenile  court  principle  as  it  is  known  in  the  modern  legislation  of  the  country, 
and  is  not  behind  any  state  in  the  Union.  This  law  was  perfected  and  carried 
through  at  the  earnest  solicitation  of  the  Commissioner  of  Public  Welfare  and  the 
State  Board,  and  the  plans  are  to  afford  every  help  in  working  out  the  practical 
operation  of  the  law  in  the  several  towns  and  counties. 


282  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  B1CEETT 

GOOD  KOADS 

The  General  Assembly  did  good  work  in  public  road  legislation : 

1.  A  bill  of  vital  importance  was  passed  so  quietly  that  it  was  scarcely  men- 
tioned in  the  press,  and  yet  it  is  essential  to  tbe  very  existence  of  good  roads.  The 
sin  in  North  Carolina  has  not  been  our  failure  to  build  good  roads,  but  our  criminal 
negligence  in  failing  to  keep  them  up.  The  General  Assembly  has  enacted  a 
law  making  it  mandatory  for  county  commissioners  to  levy  an  annual  upkeep  tax 
where  bonds  have  been  issued  for  the  construction  of  roads.  This  applies  to  every 
county  in  the  State,  and  hereafter  there  will  be  no  excuse  for  any  road  in  North 
Carolina  that  it  has  built  on  bonds  to  be  allowed  to  go  to  the  bad. 

2.  The  Road  Act  passed  by  the  General  Assembly  for  the  purpose  of  meeting 
the  requirements  for  obtaining  aid  from  the  Federal  Government  is  not  a  perfect 
piece  of  legislation.  It  does  not  represent  the  views  of  any  one  member  of  the 
General  Assembly,  but  in  the  hands  of  a  wise  and  fair  commission  it  can  be  made 
the  instrument  of  great  good  in  the  State. 

The  work  of  the  Appropriations  Committee  reflects  great  credit  upon  the 
intelligence  and  patriotism  of  that  committee.  It  is  a  well  balanced  appropriation 
bill,  and  meets  the  requirements  of  our  educational  and  charitable  institutions  in 
so  far  as  they  can  be  met  in  the  present  financial  condition  of  the  State. 

THE    WAREHOUSE    ACT 

This  act  is  designed  to  benefit  the  cotton  growers  of  the  State.  It  was  passed 
upon  the  earnest  insistence  of  those  most  deeply  interested  in  the  welfare  of 
cotton  growers.  I  hope  that  much  good  will  result  from  the  act,  but  I  frankly 
confess  that  in  my  opinion  the  only  way  the  cotton  grower  can  win  in  his  perpetual 
war  with  Wall  Street  is  to  fight  his  battles  behind  breastworks  of  bread  and 
bacon.  A  warehouse  may  enable  him  to  win  a  single  fight,  but  it  can  never  make 
him  win  a  war. 

A  reading  of  the  Journal  would  doubtless  disclose  many  other  bills  of  value 
and  of  importance,  but  I  am  writing  from  memory,  and  the  bills  above  mentioned 
are  those  that  come  into  my  mind  in  reviewing  the  work  of  the  General  Assembly. 
These  bills  make  a  robust  body  of  sane,  progressive  legislation ;  and  in  addition 
to  all  these,  one  cannot  forget  Ray's  "literary  gem" — the  Dog  Law. 

The  General  Assembly  was  singularly  free  from  personal  and  political  animos- 
ities. The  members  had  a  mind  to  work,  and  during  the  sixty  days  gave  the 
very  best  that  was  in  them  to  the  building  up  of  the  State. 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  283 

(9) 

GOVERNOR  BICKETTS  ADMINISTRATION 

REPRESENTS  NEW  HIGH  RECORD  OF 

LEGISLATIVE  ACHIEVEMENT 

(From  the  News  and  Observer,  April  20,  1919) 

From  the  standpoint  of  legislation,  the  Bickett  administration  in  K"orth  Caro- 
lina is  almost  a  matter  of  history,  written  in  words,  pages  and  whole  chapters  of 
legislative  achievement  and  establishing  a  new  high  record  for  gubernatorial 
influence.  With  two  General  Assemblies  to  his  credit,  the  normal  legislative  span 
for  the  four-year  governor,  he  yet  has  a  special  session  in  1920  to  anticipate  with 
the  consolation  that  out  of  the  forty-three  measures  he  has  proposed  and  advocated 
during  his  administration,  thirty-five  of  them  have  been  enacted  into  law.  The 
Governor's  platform  of  rural  life  legislation,  with  nine  specific  planks,  comes  out 
of  the  legislative  machine  a  finished  piece  of  carpentry.  They  were  proposed  in 
the  inaugural,  repeated  in  messages  to  the  General  Assembly  of  1917  and  1919, 
and  while  most  of  them  got  through  at  the  first  session,  the  remainder  went  on  the 
statute  books  this  year. 

XIFE   ON   THE   FAEM 

Concluding  his  inaugural  recommendations  he  said:  "I  have  suggested  nine 
measures,  all  designed  to  serve  one  end,  that  is,  to  make  life  on  the  farm  just  as 
profitable  and  just  as  attractive  as  life  in  town.  What  I  am  trying  to  do  is  to 
focus  the  thought  of  the  State  on  the  subject,  for  I  know  that  if  I  get  two  million 
people  to  thinking  of  these  things  with  the  intensity  and  constancy  their  super- 
lative importance  demands,  some  mind  among  the  millions  will  find  the  best 
remedy  for  every  evil  and  the  best  path  to  every  good."  Every  one  of  these  rural 
measures  urged  by  the  Governor  on  the  day  he  entered  office  is  now  a  law ;  in  fact, 
nearly  all  his  recommendations  dealing  with  the  social,  educational  and  industrial 
life  of  the  State  have  been  written  into  the  statutes  during  these  two  General 
Assemblies.  Those  which  failed  of  passage  were  mainly  of  a  political  nature. 
The  special  session  to  be  called  in  1920  is,  in  itself,  a  part  of  the  Governor's 
program  advocated  in  a  message  to  the  lawmakers.  That  body,  it  is  proposed, 
will  take  steps  to  make  effective  the  new  system  of  taxation  which  contemplates 
complete  honesty  in  tax  listing  and  in  tax  paying  with  every  dollar's  worth  of 
property  in  the  State  on  the  books  at  its  actual  value. 

STILL   TO   BE    HEARD   FROM 

It  may  be  that  along  with  the  tax  legislation  some  of  the  eight  laws  proposed 
but  which  still  are  without  statutory  effect  may  pass.  Here  are  the  eight,  and 
some  of  them  bring  recollections  of  hard  fights,  with  a  promise  of  more  to  come : 

The  following  measures  recommended  by  the  Governor  failed  to  pass : 

1.  A  bill  requiring  all  venders  of  proprietary  medicines  to  file  with  the  State 
Board  of  Health  a  statement  showing  the  exact  composition  of  such  medicines, 
better  known  as  the  Open  Formula  Bill. 

2.  A  constitutional  amendment  limiting  State  officers  to  two  successive  terms 
and  county  officers  to  three  successive  terms:  amendment  not  to  apply  to  officers 


284  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

in  the  judicial,  educational  and  health  departments,  better  known  as  Rotation  in 
Office  Recommendation. 

3.  A  measure  providing  for  the  short  ballot. 

4.  A  measure  providing  for  the  removal  of  the  Agricultural  Department  to  the 
State  College  of  Agriculture  and  Engineering,  and  for  putting  both  under  the 
same  management. 

5.  A  bill  to  protect  illegitimate  children. 

6.  A  bill  to  require  applicants  for  marriage  license  to  produce  health  cer- 
tificates. 

7.  A  bill  providing  for  better  enforcement  of  the  prohibition  laws. 

8.  A  bill  to  strengthen  and  purify  the  State  primary  law. 

EECOMMENDATIONS   APPROVED 

Following  are  the  thirty-five  measures,  recommended  by  the  Governor  in  his 
inaugural  address  and  in  his  biennial  message,  which  were  enacted  into  law  by 
the  Legislatures  of  1917  and  1919 : 

1.  An  act  to  amend  the  Constitution  of  ISTorth  Carolina  in  regard  to  the 
taxation  of  homestead  notes  and  mortgages,  which  provides  that  "notes,  mortgages 
and  all  other  evidences  of  indebtedness  given  in  good  faith  for  the  purchase  price 
of  a  home  when  said  purchase  price  does  not  exceed  $3,000,  and  said  notes,  mort- 
gages and  other  evidences  of  indebtedness  shall  be  made  to  run  for  not  less  than 
five  nor  more  than  twenty  years,  shall  be  exempt  from  taxation  of  every  kind : 
Provided,  that  the  interest  carried  by  such  notes  and  mortgages  shall  not  exceed 
514  per  cent."     Chap.  119,  Public  Laws  1917. 

2.  An  act  to  provide  for  the  teaching  of  agriculture,  manual  training  and 
home  economics  in  the  public  schools  of  North  Carolina.  Chap.  190,  Public 
Laws  1917. 

3.  An  act  to  relieve  the  crop-lien  evil,  which  provides  that  landlords  and  other 
persons  advancing  supplies  to  tenants  shall  not  charge  for  such  supplies  a  price 
or  prices  of  more  than  ten  per  cent  over  the  retail  cash  price  or  prices  of  the 
article  or  articles  advanced.     Chap.  134,  Public  Laws  1917. 

4.  An  act  to  provide  for  assisting  rural  communities  in  the  utilization  of  small 
water  powers,  which  authorizes  the  State  Highway  Commission  to  advise  and 
assist  in  providing  a  water  supply  and  electric  power  and  electric  lights  for  such 
communities,  and  provides  $5,000  annually  for  the  purpose  of  carrying  out  the 
provisions  of  the  act.     Chap.  267,  Public  Laws  1917. 

5.  An  act  providing  for  installation  of  rural  telephone  lines  and  the  formation 
of  rural  mutual  telephone  systems.     Chap.  267,  Public  Laws  1917. 

6.  An  act  to  improve  the  social  and  educational  conditions  in  rural  com- 
munities, which  makes  it  the  duty  of  the  State  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruc- 
tion to  provide  for  a  series  of  rural  entertainments  consisting  of  moving  pictures 
given  in  rural  schoolhouses,  the  cost  of  same  to  be  borne  one-third  by  the  State 
and  two-thirds  by  the  county  board  of  education  or  the  rural  school  community 
desiring  the  entertainment;  and  appropriates  $25,000  per  year  to  carry  out  the 
provisions  of  the  act.     Chap.  186,  Public  Laws  1919. 

7.  An  act  making  it  mandatory  upon  the  county  commissioners  to  levy  an 
annual  tax  for  upkeep  of  roads,  the  amount  of  said  tax  to  be  in  proportion  to 
the  amount  spent  on  the  construction  of  roads.     Public  Laws  1919. 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  285 

8.  An  act  to  amend  the  Constitution  of  North  Carolina  so  as  to  insure  a 
six-months  school  term.    Chap.  192,  Public  Laws  1917. 

9.  An  act  to  provide  for  the  incorporation  of  rural  communities.  Chap.  128, 
Public  Laws  1917. 

10.  A  resolution  directing  a  commission  to  make  an  extensive  investigation  of 
the  subject  of  taxation,  said  commission  to  be  appointed  by  the  Governor.  Reso- 
lution No.  46,  Public  Laws  1917. 

11.  An  act  to  provide  for  the  physical  examination  of  the  school  children  of 
the  State  at  regular  intervals,  and  appropriating  for  the  purpose  of  aiding  in  the 
treatment  of  children  found  to  be  defective  a  sum  not  to  exceed  $10,000  per  annum. 
Chap.  244,  Public  Laws  1917. 

12.  An  act  to  prevent  the  sale,  offering  for  sale,  or  advertising  certain  proprie- 
tary or  patent  medicines.    Chap.  27,  Public  Laws  1917. 

13.  An  act  to  allow  absent  electors  to  vote,  or  better  known  as  the  Absentee 
Voters  Law.     Chap.  23,  Public  Laws  1917. 

14.  An  act  to  amend  chapter  97  of  the  Revisal  of  1905,  relating  to  hospitals 
for  the  insane,  to  provide  for  the  appointment  of  a  consolidated  board  of  directors 
for  such  hospitals,  and  to  create  a  cooperative  purchasing  committee  for  said 
institutions,  and  for  the  School  for  the  Deaf,  the  School  for  the  Blind,  and  the 
Caswell  Training  School.     Chap.  150,  Public  Laws  1917. 

15.  An  act  to  issue  bonds  of  the  State  for  the  permanent  enlargement  and 
improvement  of  the  State's  educational  and  charitable  institutions  to  an  amount 
not  to  exceed  three  million  dollars.     Chap.  154,  Public  Laws  1917. 

16.  An  act  to  provide  for  the  preparation  and  review  of  estimates  for  expend- 
itures and  revenue,  and  to  establish  a  budget  system  for  all  State  expenditures. 
Public  Laws  1919. 

17.  A  memorial  endorsing  the  proposed  League  of  Nations.    Public  Laws  1919. 

18.  An  act  to  prevent  incurable  mental  defectives  from  perpetuating  their 
species.    Public  Laws  1919. 

19.  An  act  to  provide  for  the  removal  of  physical  defects  of  indigent  children 
at  the  expense  of  the  State,  and  appropriating  $50,000  to  carry  out  the  provisions 
of  said  act.    Public  Laws  1919. 

20.  An  act  to  provide  machinery  and  raise  revenue  for  a  minimum  school 
term  of  six  months  in  every  school  district  in  North  Carolina.     Public  Laws  1919. 

21.  An  act  raising  the  minimum  salary  of  school  teachers  from  $45  to  $65 
per  month.    Public  Laws  1919. 

22.  An  act  requiring  children  under  the  age  of  fourteen  to  attend  school  during 
the  entire  school  term.     Public  Laws  1919. 

23.  An  act  to  prevent  children  under  the  age  of  fourteen  from  working  in 
mills  or  other  industries.    Public  Laws  1919. 

24.  An  act  to  enable  the  State  to  secure  the  benefit  of  the  Federal  appropriation 
for  good  roads  without  issuing  State  bonds,  and  providing  that  the  county  may 
put  up  one-fourth,  the  State  one-fourth,  and  the  Federal  Government  one-half  for 
the  construction  of  a  State  system  of  highways.     Public  Laws  1919. 

25.  An  act  providing  for  the  erection  of  a  new  building  for  the  Agricultural 
Department,  the  cost  of  same  not  to  exceed  $250,000.     Public  Laws  1919. 

26.  An  act  to  provide  for  the  transfer  of  the  State  Prison  from  Raleigh  to  the 
State  Farm,  and  to  convert  the  present  prison  into  a  hospital  for  the  insane. 
Public  Laws  1919. 


286  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BIOKETT 

27.  An  act  to  protect  sheep,  better  known  as  the  Dog  Law,  which  meets 
the  Governor's  urgent  recommendation  that  dogs  be  kept  up  at  night.  Public 
Laws  1919. 

28.  An  act  ratifying  the  Federal  prohibition  amendment.     Public  Laws  1919. 

29.  An  act  submitting  a  constitutional  amendment  to  the  voters  of  the  State 
at  the  next  general  election  to  reduce  the  poll  tax  to  $2.     Public  Laws  1919. 

30.  An  act  submitting  a  constitutional  amendment  abolishing  the  requirement 
of  the  payment  of  poll  tax  as  a  prerequisite  to  voting.    Public  Laws  1919. 

31.  An  act  submitting  a  constitutional  amendment  to  reduce  the  time  of 
residence  in  the  State  for  voting  from  two  years  to  one  year.     Public  Laws  1919. 

32.  An  act  increasing  the  exemption  from  taxation  of  household  and  kitchen 
furniture,  tools  of  farmers  and  mechanics,  and  books  and  scientific  instruments 
from  $25  to  $300.    Public  Laws  1919. 

33.  An  act  submitting  a  constitutional  amendment  to  provide  for  taxation  of 
income  although  derived  from  property  that  is  taxed.     Public  Laws  1919. 

34.  An  act  to  provide  for  the  listing  and  valuing  of  all  property,  real,  personal, 
and  mixed,  at  its  real  value  in  money,  better  known  as  the  Revaluation  Act. 
Public  Laws  1919. 

35.  An  act  to  provide  for  sanitary  closets.     Public  Laws  1919. 


(10) 

NOT  RUNNING  FOR  OFFICE 

(May  2,  1919) 

The  ink  was  hardly  dry  on  my  signature  to  my  oath  of  office  as  Governor  of 
North  Carolina  before  letters  and  rumors  began  to  reach  me  suggesting  that  I 
ought  to  or  was  planning  to  run  for  the  United  States  Senate  against  Senator 
Simmons.  To  all  such  letters  and  to  all  persons  speaking  to  me  on  the  subject 
I  invariably  and  emphatically  replied  that  under  no  circumstances  would  I  be  a 
candidate. 

When  Senator  Simmons  was  renominated  without  opposition,  as  he  ought  to 
have  been,  there  was  quiet  for  a  time;  but  recently  reports  have  come  to  me  from 
numerous  sources  that  I  am  thinking  of  running  against  Senator  Overman. 
I  have  never  thought  nor  dreamed  of  doing  any  such  thing,  and  under  no  circum- 
stances would  I  permit  my  name  to  be  used  as  a  candidate.  I  am  trying  to  put  all 
my  mind,  all  my  heart,  and  all  my  strength  into  the  office  which  I  now  hold. 
The  real  power  of  the  Governor  is  not  legal  but  moral,  and  it  cripples  his  ability 
to  serve  the  State  when  his  words  and  acts  are  judged  in  the  light  of  a  desire  or  a 
design  to  secure  some  other  office.  For  this  reason  I  deem  it  proper  to  make  this 
statement.  I  am  deeply  grateful  to  the  people  for  electing  me  Governor  at  a  time 
so  full  of  opportunity  to  serve,  but  I  am  neither  asking  nor  seeking  any  other 
office  at  their  hands.  T.  W.  Bickett. 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  287 


(11) 

STATEMENT  ABOUT  COMMITTEE  ON  NEGRO  ECONOMICS 

(June  16,  1919) 

On  Saturday,  June  14th,  there  was  held  in  the  Hall  of  the  House  of  Kepre- 
sentatives  the  first  annual  meeting  of  the  Committee  on  Negro  Economics  for 
ISTorth  Carolina.  Just  one  year  ago  this  Committee  was  appointed  by  Hon.  "W.  B. 
"Wilson,  Secretary  of  Labor,  upon  the  recommendation  of  the  Governor  of  North 
Carolina. 

The  members  of  the  committee  are  representative  men  and  women  of  the 
negro  race  in  North  Carolina,  and  are  as  follows : 

Dr.  S.  G.  Atkins,  President  Slater  Normal  School,  Winston-Salem,  Chairman. 

Dr.  A.  M.  Moore,  Special  Agent  and  Supervisor  of  Negro  Economics,  Durham. 

R.  J.  Beverly,  Wadesboro. 

Dr.  J.  W.  Walker,  Asheville. 

Capt.  L.  E.  Hall,  Chadbourn. 

Raphael  O'Hara,  New  Bern. 

Dr.  R.  B.  McRary,  Lexington. 

Prof.  W.  G.  Pearson,  Durham. 

Mrs.  Esther  Fountain,  Rocky  Mount. 

Prof.  T.  S.  Inborden,  Bricks. 

W.  S.  Scales,  Winston-Salem. 

H.  P.  Cheatham,  Superintendent  Colored  Orphan  Asylum,  Oxford. 

Y.  D.  Garrett,  Tarboro. 

Mrs.  M.  C.  Faulkner,  Jean  Supervisor,  Greensboro. 

Dr.  James  S.  Dudley,  President  A.  and  T.  College,  Greensboro. 

Prof.  John  D.  Wray,  Farm  Makers'  Club  Agent,  A.  and  T.  College,  Greensboro. 

Dr.  C.  S.  Brown,  Principal  Waters  Normal  Institute,  Winton. 

Bishop  G.  W.  Clinton,  Charlotte. 

Mrs.  C.  J.  McCrory,  Biddle  University,   Charlotte. 

John  E.  Taylor,  Wilmington. 

Rev.  J.  D.  Harrell,  Lumberton. 

Dr.  W.  H.  Goler,  Livingstone  College,  Salisbury. 

Bishop  H.  B.  Delaney,  St.  Augustine  School,  Raleigh. 

Mrs.  Annie  W.  Holland,  Raleigh. 

Berry  O'Kelly,  Method. 

Col.  James  H.  Young,  Raleigh. 

Mrs.  F.  C.  Williams,  Director  Sanatorium  for  Tuberculosis,  Raleigh. 

S.  H.  Vick,  Wilson. 

Dr.  J.  A.  Cotton,  Principal  Henderson  Normal  School,  Henderson. 

There  was  also  appointed  an  advisory  committee  of  white  people,  among 
them  being : 

Mr.  Walter  L.  Reynolds,  of  the  Reynolds  Tobacco  Company,  Winston-Salem. 

Mr.  W.  A.  Erwin,  of  the  Erwin  Cotton  Mills. 

Mr.  W.  F.  Carr,  of  the  Durham  Hosiery  Mills. 

Mr.  J.  E.  S.  Thorpe,  Superintendent  of  the  big  aluminum  plant  at  Badin. 

Mr.  James  S.  Sprunt,  Wilmington. 

And  a  number  of  other  leading  business  men  in  the  State. 


288  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  B1CKETT 

The  report  of  the  committee,  through  their  supervisor,  Dr.  Moore,  is  the  most 
wholesome  and  altogether  inspiring  document  dealing  with  the  betterment  of 
the  negro  laborer  and  his  family  that  has  come  to  my  attention.  The  whole  report 
is  shot  through  with  the  spirit  of  progress  and  of  patriotism,  and  as  soon  as  it  can 
be  copied  it  will  be  sent  to  all  the  newspapers  in  the  State. 

Among  other  things,  the  report  says :  "There  is  the  greatest  cordiality  and 
willingness  on  the  part  of  the  white  employers  and  liberal  white  citizens  to  co- 
operate with  the  negroes.  In  many  instances  they  rival  the  colored  citizens  in 
spirit  and  enthusiasm.  They  spoke  freely  and  are  asking  on  every  hand  to  be 
called  upon  for  cooperation."  The  report  sets  out  that  in  many  industries  and 
on  the  farms  intelligent  and  sympathetic  efforts  are  being  made  to  improve  living 
conditions  of  the  negro,  and  to  afford  him  every  incentive  to  put  forth  his  very 
best  efforts.  In  one  plant  at  Badin  the  plan  was  devised  to  publish  an  honor  roll 
containing  the  names  of  all  negroes  who  work  steadily  six  days  in  the  week. 
Under  this  system  the  loafing  list  decreased  57  per  cent,  and  there  was  a  corre- 
sponding increase  in  the  list  of  steady  workers  of  57  per  cent. 

In  a  number  of  industries  rewards  are  offered  ranging  from  $2.50  to  $40.00 
a  month  for  steady,  efficient  work. 

The  committee  sent  out  questionnaires  to  employers  designed  to  ascertain  the 
weak  and  the  strong  points  in  the  negro  labor  problem.  The  answers  to  these 
questionnaires  are  immensely  interesting  and  deserve  the  careful  and  sympathetic 
study  of  both  races. 

At  the  meeting  Saturday  the  Chief  Justice  of  the  State,  the  Federal  Director 
of  the  United  States  Employment  Service,  and  Mr.  Reynolds  of  Winston-Salem 
all  expressed  themselves  as  profoundly  impressed  with  the  scope  and  character 
of  the  work  done  by  the  committee. 

The  work  of  these  patriotic  men  of  both  races  deserves  the  hearty  support  of 
all  our  citizens,  and  I  bespeak  for  them  wherever  they  appear  the  help  and 
sympathy  of  all  people  who  desire  to  see  North  Carolina  go  forward,  and  all 
classes  of  our  people,  black  and  white,  live  together  in  the  spirit  of  mutual  help- 
fulness and  friendliness. 

I  was  especially  impressed  with  the  speech  made  by  Dr.  George  E.  Haynes,  the 
negro  who  represents  the  Department  of  Labor  at  Washington.  His  speech  showed 
a  sane  and  sympathetic  comprehension  of  the  problems  of  his  own  people,  and 
among  other  things  he  said  that  today  the  negroes  of  the  United  States  have  before 
them  the  greatest  opportunity  that  has  ever  come  to  laboring  people  in  any  land 
or  at  any  time  in  the  history  of  labor. 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  289 

(12) 

STATEMENT  IN  REGARD  TO  SOUTH  ATLANTIC 
MARITIME  CORPORATION 

(June  21,  1919) 

I  find  that  there  is  a  growing  interest  in  the  development  of  our  South  Atlantic 
ports ;  that  the  people  feel  that  the  State  is  about  to  come  to  its  own  commercially 
through  this  movement.  The  activities  of  the  South  Atlantic  Maritime  Corpora- 
tion, powerfully  assisted  by  Senator  Simmons,  have  succeeded  in  getting  the 
United  States  Shipping  Board  to  allocate  to  the  South  Atlantic  ports  all  the  ships 
that  the  traffic  will  justify. 

The  ships  being  assured,  it  now  becomes  of  the  first  importance  to  get  cargoes 
for  these  ships.  To  this  end  an  export  company  is  being  formed  under  the  leader- 
ship of  Mr.  Matthew  Nale,  and  the  people  of  North  Carolina  are  going  to  be 
asked  to  back  up  this  export  company,  whose  business  will  be  to  develop  the  trade 
between  South  Atlantic  states  and  the  South  American  countries,  and  have  the 
traffic  handled  through  South  Atlantic  ports.  I  have  talked  with  a  great  many 
of  our  strongest  business  men  about  this  proposition,  and  they  all  agree  that  the 
formation  of  such  a  company  is  not  only  important  but  absolutely  necessary  for 
the  proper  development  of  our  commercial  life.  I  hope  that  our  people  will  give 
careful  and  sympathetic  attention  to  this  movement. 


(13) 

LOYAL  ORDER  OF  KLANSMEN— A  VERY  FOOLISH 
AND  A  VERY  WICKED  ORDER 

(June  30,  1919) 

A  number  of  leading  papers  in  the  State  have  been  carrying  full-page  or  half- 
page  advertisements  of  the  Loyal  Order  of  Klansmen.  These  advertisements  also 
contain  a  large  death-head  with  cross-bones,  and  on  the  death-head  is  stamped  the 
words,  "Ku  Klux  Klan."  The  advertisements  have  caused  considerable  alarm 
amongst  the  thoughtful  people  of  both  races,  and  I  took  steps  to  get  some  of  the 
literature  of  this  order. 

The  blue-sky  artist  blossoms  to  perfection  in  the  literature  and  advertisements 
of  this  order.  Starting  with  absolutely  nothing,  and  with  only  $10,000  in  stock 
subscribed  for,  ninety-five  per  cent  of  this  being  subscribed  by  people  utterly 
unknown  in  North  Carolina  and  not  known  to  have  any  tangible  property,  the 
order  promises  to  all  who  will  join  it  to  have  ready  for  their  use  and  enjoyment 
by  1921,  on  a  tract  of  land  in  Richmond  County — 

19 


290  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Four  school  buildings,  with  grades  from  the  primary  to  the  high  school; 

auditorium; 

ten  boarding  school  buildings; 

one  hundred  residences  for  our  governors  and  teachers; 

hospital; 

sanitarium; 

emblem  factory,  this  being  the  only  one  west  of  the  Atlantic  coast; 

machine  shop,  carpenter  and  woodworking  factory; 

garment  factory,  printing  and  binding  plant; 

canning  factory  and  cement  works. 
Also  a   large    nursery,   and   a   two-story   building   to    be    known    as   the 
K.  K.  K.  Building  for  the  teaching  of  art,  voice,  instrumental,  and  general 
business  course. 

Every  building  that  is  built  upon  our  Grand  Range  will  be  fireproof 
throughout  and  strictly  sanitary  and  modern  in  every  detail.  In  order  to 
make  the  surroundings  one  of  home  for  our  children,  besides  all  the  above, 
we  will  have  on  our  Grand  Range  a  moving  picture  producing  company 
taking  and  developing  the  latest  art  in  the  production  of  pictures,  having  our 
own  studios  there  on  our  Grand  Range.  The  balance  of  about  two  thousand 
acres  will  be  put  into  cultivation,  parks,  lagoons,  drives,  lakes,  dairy  farm, 
barns,  etc. 

We  furnish  you  with  all  the  above  absolutely  free  to  you.  It  is  yours  to 
protect  as  long  as  you  are  of  our  Klan,  and  after  you  depart  from  this  earth 
your  wife  and  little  ones  will  be  sent  there  to  receive  a  thorough  education 
and  a  trade  or  craft.  At  the  age  of  eighteen  they  will  leave  there  to  start 
in  this  world  for  themselves,  bearing  their  father's  name,  as  we  do  not 
believe  in  the  adoption  of  our  little  ones  to  be  kicked  about  this  world  as  you 
can  see  from  reading  of  this  letter. 

In  addition  to  the  foregoing  material  things  the  order  proposes  to  take  over 
and  underwrite  the  government  of  this  State  and  the  United  States.  In  its 
literature  and  advertisements  it  says  that  it  is  going  to 

Protect  our  Parmer,  his  Crops  and  Cotton; 

Protect  our  Country  from  Lawless  Invasion; 

Protect  the  Women  of  our  Southland; 

Protect  our  Government; 

Protect  our  State  Laws; 

Protect  your  Family  and  Educate  them; 

Protect  our  Country  from  Foreign  Interference  in  State; 

Protect  our  Properties  from  Unlawful  Seizures; 

Protect  our  People  from  Riots  and  Disorder. 

And  all  it  costs  to  enter  into  the  possession  of  these  vast  estates  and  into  the 
power  and  the  glory  of  this  omnipotent  order  is  to  pay  into  the  now  empty 
treasury  the  sum  of  $50  to  join  and  $18  a  year  thereafter. 

The  scheme  is  so  transparently  impossible,  so  plainly  a  gold  brick  proposition 
that  ordinary  inmates  of  a  school  for  the  feeble-minded  could  not  be  induced  to 
part  with  their  coin  for  a  certificate  of  membership  in  such  a  soap  bubble. 

A  WICKED  APPEAL  TO  RACE  PREJUDICE 

But  running  through  the  whole  scheme  is  a  wicked  appeal  to  race  prejudice. 
There  is  a  hark  back  to  the  lawless  time  that  followed  the  Civil  "War,  and  there 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  291 

is  paraded  before  the  mind  of  the  reader  the  terrors  of  those  dark  days.  The  very 
name  that  is  written  on  the  death-head  is  a  subtle  appeal  to  the  fears  and  to  the 
prejudices  of  our  people. 

Such  an  appeal  is  desperately  wicked.  There  is  no  need  for  any  secret  order 
to  enforce  the  law  of  this  land,  and  the  appeal  to  race  prejudice  is  as  silly  as  it 
is  sinful.  Just  now  all  of  us  need  to  be  considerate  and  kind  and  trustful  in  our 
dealings  with  the  negro.  The  best  and  wisest  men  in  both  races  are  working  to 
strengthen  the  ties  of  friendship  and  of  peace  and  lay  broad  and  deep  foundations 
of  an  enduring  peace  and  prosperity  for  both  races.  I  call  on  all  men  who  do  not 
desire  to  throw  their  money  away  to  have  nothing  to  do  with  this  wildest  of  wild- 
cat schemes,  and  I  call  on  all  true  patriots  to  frown  down  on  any  and  every 
attempt  to  capitalize  race  prejudice  into  cash. 

The  man  or  order  that  encourages  hatred  or  suspicion  between  races  in  North 
Carolina  is  the  mortal  enemy  of  both  races.  Let  us  wipe  out  all  feelings  of  envy, 
of  suspicion,  of  ill-will  of  every  kind  between  the  black  man  and  the  white  man, 
and  if  there  be  any  virtue,  if  there  be  any  praise,  let  us  think  on  these  things. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(14) 

NEGRO  EMIGRATION 

(From  the  News  and  Observer,  August  4,  1919) 

Answering  a  query  received  at  the  executive  offices  Friday,  Governor  Bickett 
yesterday  sent  a  telegram  to  the  Chicago  Herald  and  Examiner,  informing  that 
paper  that  North  Carolina  could  absorb  25,000  negroes  "who  may  desire  to  come 
to  this  State  for  the  purpose  of  securing  honorable  employment  at  remunerative 
wages,"  unless  these  negroes,  who  went  North  to  get  war  work,  "have  become 
tainted  or  intoxicated  with  dreams  of  social  equality  or  of  political  dominion." 

The  Chicago  paper  wired  the  Governor,  at  the  request  of  the  spokesman  for 
"many  negroes  who  came  here  for  war  work,"  asking  how  many  North  Carolina 
could  absorb.  The  negroes  appealed  to  the  paper  in  the  midst  of  the  Chicago 
race  rioting  last  week. 

When  the  telegram  reached  the  executive  offices,  Governor  Bickett  was  out  of 
the  city,  as  was  his  private  secretary,  Col.  Santford  Martin,  but  upon  his  return 
here  yesterday  he  sent  a  lengthy  telegram  to  the  paper  in  answer  to  this  query: 
"Many  negroes  who  came  here  for  war  work  are  anxious  to  return  South  if 
the  South  needs  them.  Their  spokesman  asks  us  to  inquire  how  many  your  State 
can  absorb.  They  are  of  the  more  industrious  class,  distinct  from  the  bad  element 
responsible  for  the  difficulties  here.     Please  rush  answer  at  our  expense." 

In  his  answer  the  Governor  adverts  to  the  rioting  in  Washington  and  Chicago, 
and  says  that  it  has  confirmed  his  conviction  that  the  South  is  the  best  place  in 
the  world  for  a  decent  negro  to  make  a  decent  living. 

"The  farms,  the  lumber  plants  and  the  companies  engaged  in  building  public 
highways  in  North  Carolina  can  easily  absorb  negroes  who  may  desire  to  come 
to  this  State  for  the  purpose  of  securing  honorable  employment  at  remunerative 
wages.     But   if,  during  their  residence  in   Chicago,   any  of  these   negroes  have 


292  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

become  tainted  or  intoxicated  with  dreams  of  social  equality  or  of  political 
dominion,  it  would  be  well  for  them  to  remain  where  they  are,  for  in  the  South 
such  things  are  forever  impossible." 

The  full  text  of  the  Governor's  reply  to  the  Chicago  paper  follows : 

"Absence  from  my  office  prevented  an  immediate  answer  to  your  telegram," 
the  Governor  wired.  "By  inheritance,  by  association  and  by  a  sympathetic  under- 
standing of  his  virtues  and  his  limitations,  the  Southern  white  people  are  the 
natural  and  consistent  friends  of  the  negro. 

"The  recent  troubles  in  Washington  and  Chicago  confirm  my  conviction  that 
the  South  is  the  best  place  in  the  world  for  a  decent  negro  to  make  a  decent  living," 
continues  the  Governor's  telegram.  "In  the  South,  the  negro  is  not  only  afforded 
every  opportunity,  but  is  given  every  encouragement  to  do  honest,  clean  work. 
In  North  Carolina  we  are  doing  all  we  can  to  foster  and  promote  the  kindliest 
relations  between  the  races,  and  to  this  end  the  wisest  and  best  men  and  women 
of  both  races  are  steadily  working. 

"In  every  field  of  industry,  in  education,  in  religion  and  before  the  law,  we  are 
earnestly  and  honestly  seeking  to  secure  the  same  privileges  and  protection  for  the 
black  people  that  are  accorded  the  whites.  The  negroes  of  North  Carolina  know 
and  appreciate  that  this  policy  is  one  of  the  passions  of  the  present  State  admin- 
istration. Socially,  the  two  races  are  kept  separate  and  apart,  and  the  white  man 
or  the  negro  who  attempts  to  ignore  the  social  barrier  is  held  in  utter  contempt  by 
the  best  people  of  both  races. 

"Candor  and  my  deep  friendship  for  and  my  abiding  interest  in  the  permanent 
happiness  of  the  negro  race  compel  me  to  add  that  it  is  the  settled  conviction  of 
the  best  people  in  all  political  parties  in  the  South  that  it  is  necessary  for  the 
protection,  the  progress  and  the  happiness  of  both  races  for  the  government  to 
be  run  by  white  people,  and  it  is  the  unalterable  determination  of  the  whites  to 
keep  in  their  own  hands  the  reins  of  government. 

"The  farms,  the  lumber  plants,  and  the  companies  engaged  in  building  public 
highways  in  North  Carolina  can  easily  absorb  twenty-five  thousand  negroes 
who  may  desire  to  come  to  this  State  for  the  purpose  of  securing  honorable 
employment  at  remunerative  wages.  But  if,  during  their  residence  in  Chicago, 
any  of  these  negroes  have  become  tainted  or  intoxicated  with  dreams  of  social 
equality  or  of  political  dominion,  it  would  be  well  for  them  to  remain  where  they 
are,  for  in  the  South  such  things  are  forever  impossible." 


(15) 

ADDRESS  TO  STATE  FEDERATION  OF  LABOR  IN  RALEIGH 

(From  the  News  and  Observer,  August  12,  1919) 

The  barbecue  at  the  State  Fair  grounds  and  the  Governor's  address  followed 
a  ride  about  town  arranged  for  the  delegates,  though  a  shortage  of  gasoline  in 
Ealeigh  very  nearly  disrupted  the  program.  It  was  at  the  conclusion  of  the  dinner 
that  the  Governor  was  lifted  to  the  table  for  his  speech,  which  from  the  very  first 
was  received  with  fine  feeling  by  the  delegates. 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  293 

The  average  man  Governor  Bickett  held  up  for  chief  consideration,  while  he 
declared  the  tremendous  leveling  influence  of  the  great  war  one  of  the  most 
valuable  by-products  of  the  struggle. 

'That  war  taught  us,"  he  said,  "that  no  particular  section  of  the  United  States 
and  no  particular  class  of  people  have  a  monopoly  of  brains,  of  courage,  or  of 
character. 

"I  have  confidence  in  the  brain  of  the  workingman  of  North  Carolina,"  con- 
tinued he.  "I  have  confidence  in  your  virtue  and  your  patriotism,  and  I  want  to 
suggest  something  that  I  think  is  worthy  of  the  best  brains  and  the  best  patriotism 
in  this  or  any  other  land.    It  is  this : 

"For  centuries  the  capitalist  was  in  a  position  to  say  to  the  laboring  man,  'If 
you  don't  like  my  terms,  you  can  go  to  hell.'  Unfortunately,  capital  frequently 
fell  into  the  temptation  of  taking  that  attitude.  That  was  the  attitude  of  the  man 
who  said,  'Let  the  public  be  damned.' 

"Now  labor  is  in  a  position  to  say  to  capital,  'If  you  don't  like  my  terms,  you 
can  go  to  hell.'  I  am  human  enough  to  understand  the  force  of  the  temptation 
that  comes  to  the  laboring  man  who  finds  himself  with  power  in  his  hand  to  occupy 
that  attitude.  But  just  as  it  was  a  wicked  blunder  for  capital  to  say  to  labor, 
'If  you  don't  like  my  terms,  you  can  go  to  hell,'  so  it  must  now  be  a  wicked  blunder 
for  labor  to  say  to  capital,  'If  you  don't  like  my  terms,  you  can  go  to  hell.' 

"There  is  nothing  of  wisdom  or  justice  or  patriotism  in  either  attitude. 
At  all  times  labor  and  capital  should  be  fairly  considerate  of  the  rights  of  each 
other  and  of  the  larger  public.  For  we  have  this  case :  capital  seems  to  forget  and 
labor  sometimes  seems  to  forget  that  whether  or  not  capital  is  giving  labor  hell 
or  labor  is  giving  capital  hell,  all  the  time  they  are  both  giving  hell  to  business, 
upon  the  ultimate  and  permanent  prosperity  of  which  both  must  depend." 

Governor  Bickett  referred  to  the  tremendous  task  before  the  world  today,  and 
concluded :  "The  greatest  service  any  man  can  render  is  to  bring  all  people 
together  in  a  spirit  of  mutual  benefit,  consideration  and  friendliness.  There  ought 
to  be,  and  there  must  be  found  in  this  country  enough  of  brain  and  enough  of 
patriotism  to  devise  some  plan,  fair  and  equitable,  for  the  adjustment  of  industrial 
disputes  without  resort  to  industrial  war." 

Governor  Bickett  was  followed  by  Mr.  L.  L.  Jenkins,  who  declared:  "There 
could  come  to  me  no  greater  opportunity  at  this  time  than  to  be  used  as  the 
humble  instrument  to  be  a  pioneer  to  carry  out  the  spirit  and  the  purpose  of  this 
suggestion." 


(16) 

THE  MINERS'  STRIKE 

The  following  is  a  telegram  received  by  the  Governor  from  the  New  York 
American,  and  the  Governor's  reply  thereto : 

Governor  Thomas  W.  Bickett,  New  York,  October  26,  1919. 

Raleigh,  N.  C. 
The  threatened  strike  of  the  coal  miners  in  the  bituminous  fields,  called 
for   November    first,    apparently   is    about   to   precipitate    a   great    national 
calamity.    President  Wilson  says  that  means  will  be  found  to  deal  with  the 


294  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

situation.  The  strike  has  been  ordered.  What  ought  to  be  done?  What  can 
be  done?  What  workable  program  do  you  suggest  to  meet  this  impending 
calamity?    Will  you  please  telegraph  the  New  York  American  your  answer? 

New  York  American,  Raleigh,  N.  C,  October  28,  1919. 

New  York  City. 
In  reply  to  your  telegram  beg  to  say  that  the  President  has  given 
assurance  that  means  will  be  found  for  operating  the  mines.  I  assume  the 
President  knows  exactly  what  he  is  talking  about,  and  it  is  the  patriotic 
duty  of  every  true  American  citizen  to  line  up  behind  the  President  and  urge 
him  to  put  forth  all  the  legal,  moral,  civil  and  military  power  of  the  Nation 
to  stamp  out  this  unholy  conspiracy  to  freeze  the  people  to  death. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(17) 

PRELIMINARY  STATEMENT  OF  THE  STATE 
RECONSTRUCTION  COMMISSION 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  October  29,  1919. 
To  the  People  of  North  Carolina: 

The  State  Reconstruction  Commission  created  by  the  General  Assembly  of  1919 
is  impressed  that  the  work  before  the  commission  falls  naturally  into  two 
divisions : 

1.  The  pressing  necessities  of  the  present  hour. 

2.  The  needs  of  the  near  future. 

The  comprehensive  work  the  commission  proposes  to  do  will  be  taken  up  by 
committees  and  reports  will  be  made  to  the  full  commission.  The  commission 
will  then  make  specific  findings  in  regard  to  the  several  subjects  under  considera- 
tion and  these  will  be  given  to  the  public. 

The  commission  is  deeply  impressed  that  there  can  be  no  real  improvement 
in  the  present  situation  until  our  people  shall  hark  back  to  the  homely  virtues 
of  industry,  economy  and  faith  in  our  fellowmen.  We  call  attention  to  one  of 
the  most  recent  utterances  of  President  Wilson : 

Only  by  keeping  the  cost  of  production  on  its  present  level,  by  increasing 
production,  and  by  rigid  economy  and  saving  on  the  part  of  the  people  can 
we  hope  for  large  decreases  in  the  burdensome  cost  of  living  which  now 
weighs  us  down. 

1.  Work.  This  is  essential  to  increased  production  of  the  necessities  of  life, 
and  increased  production  is  the  only  way  to  curtail  the  present  excessive  high 
cost  of  living. 

We  call  your  attention  to  the  most  recent  utterance  of  Mr.  Herbert  Hoover, 
who  has  studied  the  subject  more  profoundly  than  any  other  living  man,  and  he 

says : 

It  must  be  founded,  too,  upon  the  fundamental  fact  that  every  section  of 
this  Nation,  the  farmer,  the  industrial  worker,  the  professional  man,  the 
employer,  are  all  absolutely  interdependent  upon   each   other  in   this  task 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  TEE  PRESS  295 

of  maximum  production  and  the  better  distribution  of  its  results.  It  must  be 
founded  upon  the  maximum  exertion  of  every  individual  within  his  physical 
ability,  and  upon  the  reduction  of  waste,  nationally  and  individually. 

2.  Economy.  In  the  excitement  incident  to  the  war,  and  the  intoxication 
induced  hy  much  new  money,  economy  has  become  a  lost  art  and  frugality  a 
forgotten  virtue.  In  the  face  of  the  crisis  that  now  confronts  us,  waste  is  a  crime 
and  improvidence  savors  of  insanity.  The  commission  urges  the  people  to  practice 
the  most  rigid  economy  in  personal  expenditures  and  the  greatest  caution  in 
making  investments.  If  one  is  not  absolutely  sure  that  an  investment  is  sound 
let  him  buy  a  Liberty  Bond;  and  our  judgment  is  that  the  dollar  thus  invested 
will,  in  the  not  distant  future,  greatly  increase  in  purchasing  power. 

We  urge  the  farmers  to  invest  in  pure-bred  livestock,  in  farming  implements 
that  will  multiply  man  power  and  horse  power,  in  water  and  light  systems  that 
will  decrease  the  burdens  and  increase  the  joys  of  home  life. 

We  submit  that  it  is  not  an  ideal  time  in  which  to  buy  an  automobile.  It  will 
be  entirely  safe  to  "bide  a  wee."  Our  conviction  is  that  in  a  few  years  you  can 
buy  the  same  machine  for  about  half  the  money  it  now  costs,  and  in  the  meantime 
one  will  not  be  burdened  with  the  cost  of  upkeep. 

In  some  sections  land  values  are  inflated.  If  one  can  pay  cash  for  land  it  is 
nearly  always  a  good  investment,  as  he  will  have  the  land  and  be  delivered  from 
the  temptation  of  squandering  surplus  money.  If  one  can  pay  one-half  cash  it 
will  be  fairly  safe  to  invest  in  land;  but  if  one  is  able  to  pay  only  a  small  sum 
down  and  agrees  to  pay  a  fancy  price  for  land  at  present  values,  he  may  be 
hanging  a  millstone  around  his  neck.  Again  we  say,  if  in  doubt  buy  a  Liberty 
Bond.  In  this  there  can  be  no  mistake.  Liberty  Bonds  to  the  amount  of  two 
hundred  and  fifty  dollars  per  horse  ought  to  be  a  part  of  the  permanent  equipment 
of  every  farm. 

3.  Faith  in  our  fellows.  The  times  call  for  faith  in  our  fellows  as  never 
before.  We  must  get  rid  of  suspicion  and  envy  and  distrust,  and  all  classes  and 
conditions  of  people  must  work  together  in  a  spirit  of  mutual  helpfulness.  We 
need  the  elbow  touch  that  our  boys  had  in  the  trenches  and  that  made  them 
invincible  when  they  faced  the  foe.  Class  feeling  is  the  mortal  enemy  of  civiliza- 
tion. Government  by  groups  would  surely  and  early  destroy  this  Republic. 
A  living,  working  faith  in  the  fatherhood  of  God  and  the  brotherhood  of  man  will 
carry  us  far  in  the  happy  solution  of  the  industrial  problems  that  now  disturb  and 
distress  the  JSTation. 

4.  During  the  era  of  readjustment  and  reconstruction  we  ought  not  to  be 
harassed  by  hordes  of  ignorant  foreigners  wno  have  no  knowledge  of  and  little 
sympathy  with  American  ideals  and  institutions.  We  need  to  be  free  from  these 
troublesome  strangers  while  we  are  putting  our  house  in  order.  Therefore  we 
urge  our  representatives  in  Congress  to  secure  the  passage  of  a  law  prohibiting 
immigration  for  at  least  a  period  of  five  years. 

5.  The  farmer  will  need  next  year  fertilizers  to  increase  production.  The 
proper  kind  and  amount  cannot  be  obtained  without  aid  from  the  Government 
in  transportation  facilities,  and  we  urge  our  officials,  State  and  Federal,  to  take 
action  to  secure  such  governmental  aid. 

6.  We  are  facing  a  coal  famine,  and  we  cannot  too  strongly  urge  upon  individ- 
uals and  communities  the  supreme  necessity  for  laying  in  wood  supplies.     To  fail 


296  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

to  do  so  will  be  criminal  negligence.    Begin  at  once  and  don't  stop  until  the  wood 
house  is  full. 

A  last  word : 

While  the  general  situation  calls  for  serious  thought,  for  prudent  foresight, 
for  the  exercise  of  the  cardinal  virtues  upon  which  we  have  builded  this  Nation, 
we  find  no  room  for  despair.  The  whole  world  has  been  hard  hit.  For  four  years 
all  the  thought  and  the  energies  of  the  world  have  been  devoted  to  processes  of 
destruction.  We  may  not  hope  to  react  from  such  a  calamity  in  a  day,  but  the 
forces  of  growth  that  yesterday  were  prostrate  under  the  heels  of  war  are  today 
on  their  feet.  They  grope,  they  stumble,  but  the  general  course  is  forward  and 
upward.  Let  us  all  thank  God  for  a  truly  great  deliverance,  and  face  the  future 
unafraid. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Chairman. 


(18) 

INDUSTRIAL  DISPUTE  SETTLED 

For  several  days  I  have  been  in  conference  with  representatives  of  the  local 
branch  of  the  United  Textile  Workers  of  America  and  with  representatives  of  the 
management  of  the  Consolidated  Textile  Corporation,  Pilot  Division.  As  a  result 
of  these  conferences,  the  management  today  submitted  to  me  the  letter  which  is 
below  set  forth  in  full. 

Upon  the  assurances  contained  in  this  letter  I  advised  the  employees  to  go 
back  to  work,  and  they  freely  and  graciously  agreed  to  do  so.  It  is  my  sincere 
hope  that  both  employers  and  employees  will  now  work  together  in  a  spirit  of 
friendliness  and  cooperation,  all  remembering  that  in  the  last  analysis  the  things 
desired  by  all  must  depend  upon  the  efficient  and  economic  operation  of  the  mill. 

All  parties  requested  me  to  give  a  statement  to  the  press,  and  assured  me  that 
my  statement  would  be  the  only  one  given  out. 

The  letter  from  the  management  of  the  Pilot  Mill  to  the  Governor  is  as  follows : 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  January  2,  1920. 
Hon.  T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

Deae  Sie: — Because  of  a  recent  exchange  of  notes  between  the  manage- 
ment of  Pilot  Cotton  Mills  and  the  representative  of  the  local  branch  of  the 
United  Textile  Workers  of  America,  I  beg  to  submit  for  your  consideration 
the  following  as  constituting  the  policy  of  the  management  of  this  mill  with 
its  employees: 

The  management  will  at  all  times  listen  to  and  deal  with  its  employees, 
as  a  whole  or  from  any  separate  department,  individually,  collectively,  or 
through  representatives  of  employees  who  are  themselves  employees  of 
Pilot  Cotton  Mills.  Some  of  the  employees  of  this  company  are  members 
of  a  textile  union  and  some  are  not,  and  the  mill  management  has  not  and 
will  not  discriminate  in  any  manner  against  any  employee  because  such 
employee  belongs  or  does  not  belong  to  a  union. 

This  policy  of  the  management  of  this  mill  has  been  stated  to  its  em- 
ployees and  it  was  thought  that  they  understood  it. 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  TEE  PRESS  297 

There  are  no  differences  between  this  company  and  its  employees,  and 
should  any  arise  the  management  will  be  glad  to  consider  these  matters 
with  its  employees;  and  it  does  not  believe  it  will  have  trouble  settling  any 
differences. 

This  letter  is  written  so  that  you  may  know  definitely  and  at  first  hand 
what  is,  has  been,  and  will  be  the  policy  of  the  management  of  the  Pilot 
Mills.  Very  respectfully, 

Consolidated  Textile  Cobpobation, 
By  A.  Y.  Kelly,  Pilot  Division. 

Manager. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(19) 
TUSKEGEE  INSTITUTE 

(January  25,  1920) 

[Governor  Bickett,  who  has  just  returned  from  a  visit  to  Tuskegee  Institute 
in  Alabama,  today  gave  out  the  following  interview.] 

Tuskegee  is  a  truly  wonderful  institution.  It  is  a  dream  come  true.  There 
are  today  in  actual  attendance  upon  the  institution  1,755  students.  It  is  by  far 
the  largest  negro  school  in  the  United  States. 

The  institution  has  two  aims :  first,  to  teach  the  boys  and  girls  who  go  there 
how  to  make  a  decent  living;  and,  second,  how  to  lead  a  decent  life. 

The  report  of  my  speech  sent  out  by  the  Associated  Press  is  absolutely  accurate, 
but  as  I  spoke  for  something  over  an  hour,  the  report  could  not  and  did  not 
pretend  to  cover  the  entire  speech.  I  think  it  is  important  for  the  public  to  know 
all  that  I  said  on  the  subject  of  race  relations,  and  therefore  I  am  asking  the 
papers  to  print  the  following  extract  from  my  speech,  which  is  the  only  part  of 
the  speech  that  was  reduced  to  writing : 

"I  have  been  asked  to  speak  on  race  relations.  Two  things  qualify  me  to  speak 
on  the  subject.  First,  a  passionate  longing  to  help  both  races  to  a  level  of  mutual 
sympathy  and  understanding.  Second,  my  own  relations  with  the  negro  from 
my  boyhood  to  this  hour  have  been  those  of  mutual  sympathy,  consideration  and 
affection.  This  enables  me  to  speak  to  you  with  the  utmost  kindness  and  at  the 
same  time  with  the  utmost  candor. 

"The  first  thought  I  desire  to  leave  with  you  is  that,  in  the  South,  race  relations 
will  adjust  themselves  on  a  basis  of  wisdom  and  justice  if  the  fools  and  firebrands 
in  both  races  will  let  us  alone.  It  requires  sense  and  sympathy  and  patience  to 
work  out  a  reformation,  but  any  fool  can  start  a  conflagration.  A  cow  is  not 
noted  for  mentality,  but  one  kicked  over  a  lamp  and  burned  up  the  city  of  Chicago. 

"The  next  thought  I  desire  to  impress  upon  you  is  that  real  greatness  and 
progress  of  men,  of  races  and  of  nations  are  measured  not  by  power  or  possessions, 
but  by  their  contribution  to  the  forces  that  make  life  brighter  and  sweeter  for  the 
average  man.  The  nation  or  race  that  greatly  serves  links  up  with  the  Father's 
will,  and  neither  man  nor  devil  can  mar  its  glory  or  cheat  it  of  its  destiny.  Hence 
I  urge  you  to  hearken  to  the  wisdom  of  Booker  Washington  when  he  said,  'We 
(the  negroes)  ought  not  to  allow  onr  grievances  to  overshadow  our  opportunities.' 


298  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

"This  applies  with  equal  force  to  the  white  race.  It  would  just  now  be  a  price- 
less boon  to  a  shell-shocked  world,  a  moral  triumph  that  would  make  the  angels 
sing  and  devils  gnash  their  teeth,  if  all  men  would  for  a  season  forget  their 
grievances  and  remember  only  their  opportunities;  if  they  would  talk  less  of  their 
rights  and  more  of  their  duties;  think  less  of  what  they  can  get  out  of  the  world 
and  more  of  what  they  can  put  into  it. 

"I  frankly  concede  that  in  the  search  for  right  relations,  and  in  the  climb  of 
both  races  to  higher  levels,  the  burden  rests  upon  the  white  man  to  point  the  way. 
We  are  the  dominant  race,  but  our  very  supremacy  is  a  challenge  to  do  justice. 
We  cannot  do  the  negro  a  great  wrong  without  doing  ourselves  a  greater  injury. 
The  white  man  owes  it  to  his  own  traditions,  to  his  own  self-respect,  and  to  his 
own  self-preservation  to  guarantee  to  the  negro  the  fullest  protection  of  the  law. 
The  South  in  denying  to  the  negro  any  participation  in  the  making  and  in  the 
administration  of  the  law,  makes  him  in  a  very  sacred  sense  the  ward  of  the  law. 
The  settled  policy  of  the  South  to  maintain  a  white  government  creates  between 
that  government  and  the  negro  the  relation  of  guardian  and  ward,  and  every 
principle  of  American  jurisprudence,  every  whisper  of  conscience  and  every 
instinct  of  decency  require  the  guardian  to  foster  and  protect  the  welfare  of  his 
ward. 

"This  is  an  hour  of  isms  and  schisms.  The  sane  reconstructionist,  the  Utopian 
dreamer,  the  red-handed  revolutionist,  are  all  clamoring  for  attention;  but  the 
one  safe  path  for  the  negro  to  follow  is  the  path  that  leads  straight  to  the  door 
of  the  white  man's  conscience.  As  your  ardent  friend  I  urge  you  to  put  every 
question  that  touches  your  well-being  squarely  up  to  the  conscience  of  the  white 
man  and  keep  it  there.  Let  it  be  known  that  you  propose  to  appeal  to  no  other 
tribunal;  that  through  days  and  nights,  in  sun  and  rain,  you  are  going  to  stand 
patiently  at  the  door  and  knock;  and  not  today,  and  perchance  not  tomorrow,  but 
as  surely  as  the  Lord  God  liveth,  some  day  that  door  will  open  wide  and  every 
plea  born  of  wisdom  and  justice  will  be  allowed. 

"Any  other  policy  will  certainly  result  in  failure,  and  may  result  in  tragedy. 
Radical  measures  of  any  kind  will  lock  the  wheels  of  your  progress  for  fifty  years. 
Appeal  to  fear  and  you  will  reap  a  riot.  Resort  to  force  and  you  will  start  up  a 
Ku  Klux  Klan.  Make  a  drive  for  political  dominion,  and  the  Red  Shirt  will 
again  take  the  saddle.  Again  I  say,  lay  your  cause  at  the  door  of  the  white  man's 
conscience  and  leave  it  there,  for  the  white  man's  sense  of  justice  is  your  dearest 
hope  and  your  surest  reliance." 


(20) 

HERBERT  HOOVER 

(February  3,  1923) 

[A  representative  of  the  New  York  World  called  on  Governor  Bickett  today 
and  asked  him  for  an  expression  of  opinion  on  Herbert  Hoover.  The  Governor 
thereupon  gave  out  the  following  statement.] 

For  some  time  prior  to  the  World's  now  famous  pronouncement  I  was  of 
opinion  that  it  would  be  wise  statesmanship  for  the  Democratic  Party  to  nominate 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  299 

Hoover  for  President.  The  fact  that  he  has  no  entangling  political  past  is  certainly 
not  a  millstone  around  his  neck  in  the  present  state  of  the  public  mind.  There 
is  a  widespread  feeling  among  the  ninety  and  nine  that  a  little  new  blood  would 
make  for  wholesome  growth. 

One  thing  is  reasonably  certain.  Neither  the  reactionaries  in  the  Republican 
Party  nor  the  runaways  in  the  Democratic  Party  are  going  to  name  the  next 
President  of  the  United  States.  Barring  the  President  himself,  Mr.  Hoover  makes 
a  more  powerful  dual  appeal  to  the  sanity  and  to  the  imagination  of  the  people 
than  any  other  man.  He  would  seem  to  be  an  answer  to  the  prayer  of  the  pious 
citizen  who  said,  "Lord,  send  us  a  man  who  can  be  a  progressive  without  losing 
his  head,  and  a  conservative  without  hardening  his  heart." 

In  its  finest  sense  Hoover  is  essentially  a  Democrat.  His  record  during  the 
World  War  and  his  recent  writings  convince  one  that  he  adequately  comprehends 
the  situation  that  today  confronts  America  and  the  whole  civilized  world. 

As  President,  Hoover  would  wisely  safeguard  the  foundations  upon  which  our 
fathers  builded  this  Republic,  and  at  the  same  time  would  fearlessly  meet  the  new 
and  world-wide  obligations  we  recognized  and  assumed  when  we  entered  the 
World  War. 

In  Hoover  the  Nation  would  find  a  worthy  successor  to  our  present  immortal 
chieftain.  He  is  the  one  man  endowed  with  the  genius  and  the  grace  to  carry  to 
glorious  completion  "the  unfinished  window  in  Aladdin's  Tower." 


(21) 
THE  TRUTH  ABOUT  THE  REVALUATION  ACT 

THE  REVALUATION  ACT  MAKES  A  GOOD  START  BY  SAVING  EVERY  PROPERTY  OWNER 
45  PER  CENT  ON  TAXES  HE  OTHERWISE  WOULD  HAVE  PAID 

(February  9,  1920) 

Every  one  who  studies  the  Revaluation  Act  should  at  the  outset  give  the  act 
credit  for  a  saving  of  45  per  cent.  In  the  years  1919  and  1920  every  property 
owner  pays  forty-five  per  cent  less  taxes  than  he  would  have  paid  if  the  General 
Assembly  of  1919  had  not  touched  the  subject  of  valuation.  This  is  not  an  argu- 
ment ;  it  is  a  statement  of  a  fact. 

Under  the  old  law  there  was  a  reassessment  every  four  years,  and  if  the 
General  Assembly  of  1919  had  done  nothing  with  respect  to  valuation  the  re- 
assessment would  have  been  made  in  1919,  and  the  taxes  for  1919  and  1920  would 
have  been  paid  on  this  reassessment.  This  law  has  been  in  force  for  about  twenty 
years,  and  every  four  years  there  has  been  a  substantial  increase  in  values.  The 
average  increase  has  been  261/4  per  cent.  There  is  not  a  man  in  the  State  outside 
of  an  institution  for  the  insane  or  the  feeble-minded  who  does  not  know  that  the 
actual  increase  in  property  values  during  the  last  four  years  has  been  greater  than 
in  any  four-year  period  since  the  reassessment  law  has  been  on  the  books.  No 
mortal  man  will  deny  that  if  the  old  law  had  been  allowed  to  stand  without  the 
dotting  of  an  i  or  the  crossing  of  a  t,  the  values  in  1919  would  have  been  increased 
as  much  as  they  have  in  any  four-year  period.     Just  knock  off  the  iy±  per  cent 


300  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

and  say  that  property  values  would  have  been  increased  25  per  cent.  Then  in 
1919  the  property  owners  would  have  paid  25  per  cent  more  taxes  on  the  same 
property  than  they  paid  in  1918.  Under  the  Revaluation  Act  they  did  not  pay 
a  cent  more.  A  similar  amount  would  have  to  be  paid  in  1920,  but  under  my 
recommendation  to  the  General  Assembly  this  25  per  cent  increase  in  1920  will 
be  reduced  to  5  per  cent,  this  for  public  schools.  This  makes  a  net  saving  to 
property  owners  in  1920  of  20  per  cent ;  and  this,  added  to  the  25  per  cent  saved  in 
1919,  makes  a  total  saving  to  the  property  owners  on  account  of  the  Revaluation 
Act  of  45  per  cent. 

Pure  mathematics  requires  the  worst  enemy  of  the  Revaluation  Act  to  enter 
this  credit  of  45  per  cent  as  the  first  item  in  every  calculation  made  in  regard  to 
the  act. 

Of  course  the  taxes  in  1919  are  higher  than  in  1918,  but  this  is  not  because  of, 
but  in  spite  of,  the  Revaluation  Act.  The  increased  taxes  for  the  year  1919  are 
due  to  two  things  : 

1.  The  public  school  term  was  by  a  practically  unanimous  vote  of  the  people 
of  North  Carolina  increased  from  four  to  six  months.  Of  course  when  the  people 
voted  for  this  increase  of  50  per  cent  in  the  length  of  the  school  term  they  under- 
stood that  it  would  cost  50  per  cent  more  money,  and  no  fair-minded  man  can 
complain  on  account  of  this  increase  in  his  taxes.    He  voted  it  on  himself. 

2.  The  General  Assembly  of  1919  increased  the  salaries  of  teachers  in  the 
public  schools  50  per  cent.  This  was  done  because  the  General  Assembly  reached 
the  conclusion  that  it  was  not  only  unwise,  but  positively  indecent  to  starve  the 
young  women  of  the  State  who  were  devoting  their  lives  to  teaching  our  children. 
Before  this  increase  the  average  teacher  in  the  public  schools  got  $45  a  month  for 
teaching  four  months,  her  year's  work  netting  her  $180.  Under  the  Constitution 
the  term  was  lengthened  to  six  months  and  the  Legislature  increased  her  salary 
to  $67.50,  which  makes  her  earnings  for  the  year  $405,  an  increase  of  more  than 
100  per  cent.  If  a  man  is  opposed  to  this  increased  tax  to  give  to  the  children  a 
longer  school  term  and  pay  the  teachers  wages  that  will  keep  them  off  the  outside 
pauper  list,  let  him  come  out  boldly  and  say  so.  Please  do  not  charge  up  these 
increases  to  the  Revaluation  Act,  which,  as  heretofore  stated,  reduced  the  taxes 
paid  in  1919  and  1920  45  per  cent. 

"ye  shall  know  the  truth,  and  the  truth  shall  make  you  free" 

For  many  years  the  State  of  North  Carolina  struggled  along  under  the  yoke 
of  an  unwise  and  unjust  system  of  taxation.  The  yoke  was  not  easy  nor  was  the 
burden  light.  It  produced  a  sense  of  irritation  that  has  been  constant  and 
universal.  The  whole  State  was  sore  on  the  subject.  Governor  Glenn,  in  his 
inaugural  address,  and  two  years  later  in  his  biennial  message  to  the  General 
Assembly,  vigorously  denounced  the  folly  of  maintaining  in  this  State  property 
values  ridiculously  low  and  tax  rates  terrifyingly  high  instead  of  maintaining  true 
values  and  low  rates. 

Governor  Kitchin,  in  his  messages  to  the  General  Assembly  in  1911  and  1913, 
points  out  the  evils  of  undervaluing  the  property  of  the  State. 

During  the  first  month  of  the  Craig  administration  a  banquet  was  given  in  the 
auditorium  in  Raleigh  in  honor  of  Governor  Craig  and  Senator  Simmons.  At  this 
banquet  Governor  Craig  made  a  speech  in  which  he  insisted  that  the  General 
Assembly  of  1913  should  not  levy  any  taxes,  but  should  provide  for  a  general  re- 
assessment of  the  property  of  the  State  at  its  true  value,  and  after  this  was  done 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  301 

that  the  General  Assembly  should  be  called  into  special  session  and  levy  a  tax 
based  upon  the  true  value  of  the  property  of  the  State  disclosed  by  a  general 
reassessment. 

The  Legislature  did  not  adopt  this  course,  but  appointed  a  Constitutional 
Commission  to  consider,  among  other  things,  the  subject  of  taxation.  This  com- 
mission made  its  report,  and  at  a  special  session  of  1914  a  taxation  amendment 
was  submitted  to  the  people  and  was  voted  down  at  the  polls  that  year.  When  the 
people  voted  down  the  taxation  amendment  they  reaffirmed  the  present  consti- 
tutional provision,  which  emphatically  requires  that  all  property  shall  be  listed 
by  a  uniform  rule  according  to  its  true  value  in  money. 

When  the  General  Assembly  of  1919  came  to  deal  with  this  vexed  subject  it  at 
once  realized  that  it  was  impossible  to  proceed  with  intelligence  or  with  justice 
until  the  actual  facts  were  ascertained.  It  was  known  of  all  men  that  the  old 
system  had  failed  miserably  to  ascertain  values  that  even  remotely  approached 
the  facts.  Hence  the  machinery  of  the  Revaluation  Act  was  devised  for  the  sole 
purpose  of  finding  out  the  truth,  and  the  Revaluation  Act  is  bottomed  on  the 
declaration  of  Jesus  Christ,  "Ye  shall  know  the  truth,  and  the  truth  shall  make 
you  free." 

No  matter  how  fundamentally  honest  nor  how  scientifically  accurate  any  plan 
may  be,  there  will,  of  course,  be  some  errors  of  administration  so  long  as  it  is 
human  to  err;  but  the  true  remedy  in  such  a  case  is  to  reduce  the  errors  of 
administration  to  a  minimum  and  not  to  hark  back  to  a  system  that  does  not 
even  pretend  to  look  for  the  truth. 

The  Revaluation  Act  is  finding  the  facts  with  remarkable  success  for  a  new 
measure.  It  is  finding  and  placing  on  the  tax  books  millions  of  property  never 
there  before.  It  is  assessing  the  property  of  the  State  with  wonderful  accuracy. 
The  returns  that  have  come  in  to  the  State  Tax  Commission  indicate  that  about 
80  per  cent  of  the  people  are  assessing  their  own  property  at  what  it  is  worth; 
that  about  5  per  cent  are  assessing  it  too  high,  and  the  authorities  are  having 
to  reduce  these  assessments;  that  about  15  per  cent  are  assessing  their  property 
too  low,  and  the  authorities  are  having  to  increase  it.  And  just  in  proportion  as 
the  truth  appears  on  the  tax  books,  inequalities  and  injustices  will  disappear. 
This  is  the  ultimate  objective  of  the  Revaluation  Act.  The  General  Assembly 
passionately  desired  to  equalize  the  burden  of  taxation.  It  was  realized  that  this 
could  be  done  only  by  first  finding  the  facts.  True  values  are  always  honest  values, 
but  the  wisdom  of  Solomon  and  the  genius  of  Edison  combined  cannot  equalize 
a  kettle  of  lies. 

Just  how  the  act  is  wiping  out  inequalities  will  be  shown  by  a  few  illustrations 
taken  from  the  books. 

1.  In  one  of  our  county-seats  there  lives  upon  the  same  street  a  lawyer  and  a 
widow.  The  lawyer  owns  a  valuable  piece  of  property  in  a  desirable  portion  of 
the  town,  and  this,  under  the  old  system,  was  assessed  at  $3,850.  The  widow  had 
$10,000  that  she  received  from  life  insurance  policies  on  her  husband.  This  money 
was  loaned  on  real  estate  mortgages  which  were  listed  for  taxation  at  their  par 
value  of  $10,000.  Under  the  Revaluation  Act  the  property  of  the  lawyer  was 
valued  at  $15,000,  and  he  can  get  this  amount  of  money  for  it  any  morning  before 
breakfast.  Under  the  old  law  the  widow,  in  proportion  to  her  real  worth,  was 
paying  four  times  as  much  taxes  as  the  lawyer.  Under  the  new  law  this  wicked- 
ness is  wiped  out,  and  both  the  lawyer  and  the  widow  are  paying  according  to  what 


302  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

they  are  really  worth.  The  result  is  that  the  lawyer  is  cursing  the  Eevaluation 
Act  and  swearing  that  he  is  going  to  repeal  it,  while  the  widow  is  praising  God 
and  the  General  Assembly  of  1919  for  its  enactment. 

2.  In  one  of  our  Piedmont  counties  the  experts  of  the  Tax  Commission  recently 
examined  two  cotton  mills.  They  found  that  one  mill  was  on  the  tax  books  at  17 
per  cent  of  its  real  value,  while  the  other  mill  was  on  the  books  at  65  per  cent  of 
its  real  value.  Under  the  Eevaluation  Act  this  vicious  inequality  disappears. 
Both  mills  will  be  placed  on  the  books  at  their  true  value,  and  this  year  the  17 
per  cent  mill  will  pay  a  great  deal  more  taxes  than  it  has  heretofore  paid,  while 
the  65  per  cent  mill  will  pay  a  great  deal  less. 

3.  In  a  certain  mountain  county,  and  in  the  same  neighborhood,  there  lived 
two  farmers,  one  on  a  twelve-acre  and  the  other  on  a  fifty-acre  farm.  Under  the 
old  law  the  twelve-acre  farm  was  assessed  at  $600,  and  the  fifty-acre  farm  likewise 
at  $600.  Now  when  these  farmers  received  their  questionnaires  the  twelve-acre 
farmer  swore  that  his  land  was  worth  $650.  The  fifty-acre  farmer  swore  that  his 
land  was  worth  $4,000.  Under  the  Revaluation  Act  the  two  honest  citizens,  when 
they  had  an  opportunity  to  do  so,  corrected  a  rank  injustice. 

4.  Down  in  Wilson  County  a  man  had  a  son  and  a  daughter.  In  his  will  he 
stated  that  he  desired  to  give  them  an  equal  amount  of  property.  He  had  a 
farm  which,  in  his  will,  he  said  was  worth  $10,000,  and  it  is  worth  it.  It  will 
bring  that  amount  on  the  market  any  morning.  He  gave  this  farm  to  his  son, 
and  then  he  gave  to  his  daughter  $10,000  in  money.  When  the  sheriff  came  around 
he  collected  from  the  daughter  five  times  as  much  taxes  as  he  did  from  the  son. 
The  daughter  naturally  complained  about  it,  and  asked  the  sheriff  why  she  should 
pay  five  times  as  much  taxes  as  her  brother,  when  their  father  had  given  them, 
as  stated  in  his  will,  exactly  the  same  amount  of  property.  The  sheriff  explained 
to  her  that  the  land  was  assessed  at  only  $2,000,  though  he  admitted  that  it  was 
worth  $10,000,  while  the  money  was  assessed  at  $10,000,  and  that  he  (the  sheriff) 
had  no  power  to  change  it.  The  Revaluation  Act  does  change  it.  It  carries  out 
the  will  of  the  dead  father  and  makes  the  son  and  the  daughter  equal  before 
the  law. 

The  correction  of  inequalities  like  those  cited  above — and  there  are  hundreds 
of  thousands  of  them  in  North  Carolina — justify  the  statement  that  the  Reval- 
uation Act  is  bottomed  on  the  celestial  declaration,  "Ye  shall  know  the  truth,  and 
the  truth  shall  make  you  free !" 


THE  REVALUATION  ACT  IN  HARMONY  WITH  THE  RULES  SUGGESTED  BY 
THE  STATE  FARMERS'  UNION 

At  a  recent  meeting  in  Greensboro  the  State  Farmers'  Union  passed  the  follow- 
ing resolution : 

"We  ask  the  Legislature  to  amend  the  Revaluation  Act  and  that  all  property 
be  assessed  according  to  its  ability  to  produce  an  income  and  its  position  to  give 
it  a  value." 

With  interpretations  that  will  make  instant  appeal  to  every  thoughtful  man, 
this  is  precisely  what  the  Revaluation  Act  does.  It  taxes  all  property  according 
to  its  fair  market  value.  Two  things  determine  market  value — profit  and  pleasure. 
When  a  man  parts  with  his  hard-earned  cash  for  a  piece  of  property  he  does  it 
because  of  the  profit  or  the  pleasure  he  expects  to  get  in  return.     The  market 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  303 

value  of  any  piece  of  property,  real  or  personal,  is  fixed  by  the  profit  it  is  already 
yielding,  or  in  the  opinion  of  the  public  can  be  made  to  yield,  or  by  the  pleasure 
the  ownership  of  the  property  will  afford. 

Below  I  give  some  illustrations  of  how  these  rules  of  value  work,  for  illustra- 
tions are  always  better  than  arguments : 

1.  A  invests  $10,000  in  Ford  passenger  cars  and  trucks  and  goes  into  the 
business  of  carrying  goods  and  passengers  for  hire.  He  makes  $2,000  a  year  on 
his  investment.  B  pays  $10,000  for  a  silver-mounted,  velvet  upholstered  Pierce- 
Arrow  touring  car.  He  pays  out  his  $10,000  for  the  pleasure  he  expects  to  get 
out  of  the  car.  He  never  dreams  of  making  any  money  out  of  it,  but,  on  the  other 
hand,  it  costs  him  $2,000  a  year  to  run  the  car  and  keep  it  in  good  repair.  Should 
the  Fords  be  taxed  at  their  fair  market  value  because  they  pay  20  per  cent  on  the 
investment,  and  the  Pierce-Arrow  be  exempt  from  taxation  because  it  involves  a 
loss  of  20  per  cent  on  the  investment  ? 

2.  A  builds  ten  houses  for  rent  at  a  total  cost  of  $50,000.  He  rents  the  houses 
for  $500  each  and  they  yield  him  10  per  cent  on  his  investment.  B  builds  a  $50,000 
residence.  It  pays  no  income  and  never  could  be  rented  to  pay  any  reasonable 
income  on  the  investment,  for  people  who  are  able  to  pay  $5,000  a  year  for  a 
house  to  live  in,  live  in  their  own  homes.  Should  the  ten  rented  houses  be  taxed 
for  what  they  are  fairly  worth  on  the  market  and  the  $50,000  mansion  be  tax  free 
because  it  never  can  pay  an  income? 

3.  There  is  a  hunting  club  in  North  Carolina  that  owns  17,000  acres  of  land. 
It  yields  no  income.  On  the  other  hand,  it  costs  the  members  of  that  club  several 
thousand  dollars  a  year  to  keep  it  up.  This  land  has  a  fair  market  value  based 
on  two  things:  (1)  what  some  other  group  of  men  is  willing  to  pay  for  it  as  a 
hunting  club;  (2)  what  men  believe  could  be  made  out  of  it  as  a  farming 
proposition.  The  lands  surrounding  the  club  lands  are  farming  lands,  and  have 
a  market  value  determined  by  what  men  believe  they  can  be  made  to  produce. 
Should  the  farm  lands  be  taxed  at  their  market  value,  and  the  hunting  club  lands 
be  exempt  because  they  yield  no  income? 

4.  A  man  in  the  city  of  Raleigh  bought  a  house  and  lot.  In  the  rear  of  the 
lot  purchased  was  a  vacant  lot.  The  man  bought  this  lot  because  he  did  not 
want  anybody  to  live  behind  him.  He  paid  $2,000  for  it.  It  never  will  yield  an 
income,  but  should  the  vacant  lot  be  tax  free  on  this  account? 

I  think  these  illustrations  will  serve  to  show  that  it  would  never  do  to  base 
tax  values  solely  on  what  income  property  either  does  or  can  be  made  to  produce. 
The  amount  of  pleasure  and  satisfaction  that  the  ownership  of  the  property  will 
afford  is  a  real  element  of  value. 

Again,  when  there  is  no  consideration  of  pleasure  and  satisfaction,  and  we 
consider  incomes  only,  the  market  value  is  and  of  right  ought  to  be  determined, 
not  by  what  the  property  is  actually  producing,  but  by  the  judgment  of  the  public 
as  to  what  it  can  be  made  to  produce,  and  this  is  what  actually  does  determine 
market  value. 

Illustrations : 

1.  In  a  certain  city  in  this  State  a  man  owned  a  large  block  of  property  that 
under  the  old  law  was  on  the  tax  books  at  $25,000.  It  did  not  yield  him  a  fair 
income  on  that  value  and  in  its  present  condition  never  could  be  made  to  yield 
an  income  on  $25,000,  but  the  man  was  offered  a  certified  check  for  $375,000  for 
this  property,  and  refused  to  take  it.     Enterprising  citizens  offered  this  money 


304  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

because  they  believed  they  could  take  the  property,  build  apartment  houses  and 
office  buildings  on  it  at  a  cost  of  more  than  one  million  dollars  and  make  it  pay 
a  fair  dividend  on  the  investment.  Should  this  property  stay  on  the  tax  books 
at  $25,000  or  at  $375,000? 

2.  In  a  certain  county  in  the  State  there  is  a  man  who  owns  10,000  acres  of 
land.  It  is  on  the  tax  books  under  the  old  law  at  from  eight  to  ten  dollars  an 
acre,  and  it  does  not  pay  a  reasonable  income  upon  this  tax  value.  But  all  over 
that  county  there  are  men  who  are  willing  to  pay  for  this  land  from  seventy-five 
to  one  hundred  dollars  per  acre  because  they  believe  that  they  can  take  the  land 
and  make  it  pay  an  income  on  the  investment.  The  man  will  not  sell.  Should 
this  land  stay  on  the  tax  books  at  eight  or  ten  dollars  an  acre,  or  should  it  go  on 
the  tax  books  at  from  seventy-five  to  one  hundred  dollars  an  acre,  which  the 
farmers  in  that  county  are  able,  and  willing,  and  anxious  to  pay? 

3.  A  few  years  ago  in  a  certain  county  there  were  two  cotton  mills.  They  had 
practically  the  same  equipment  in  buildings  and  in  machinery,  worth  approx- 
imately $200,000.  One  paid  from  the  beginning  a  handsome  dividend,  the  other 
lost  money,  and  finally  went  into  the  hands  of  a  receiver.  Should  the  buildings 
and  machinery  of  the  successful  mill  be  taxed  at  $200,000  and  the  buildings  and 
machinery  of  the  unsuccessful  mill  be  tax  free  because  it  paid  no  income?  Is  it 
a  wise  policy  to  penalize  success  and  reward  failure? 

4.  Jones  inherited  200  acres  of  land.  On  it  he  eked  out  an  existence.  Finally 
Smith  came  along  and  bought  from  Jones  one-half  of  this  land  and  paid  him  one 
hundred  dollars  an  acre  for  it.  He  paid  $1,000  in  cash  and  gave  his  notes  payable 
$1,000  a  year  for  nine  years.  Smith  went  to  work.  He  rotated  his  crops,  he  used 
improved  farm  machinery,  and  in  four  years  on  that  hundred  acres  he  made 
enough  clear  money  to  take  up  the  $9,000  outstanding  against  it.  Jenkins  comes 
along  and,  seeing  what  Smith  has  done,  offers  Jones  one  hundred  dollars  an  acre 
for  the  other  half  of  the  land.  Jones  refuses  to  take  it.  Should  the  farm  of 
Smith  be  taxed  at  a  hundred  dollars  per  acre  because  it  pays  a  handsome  income 
on  that  investment,  and  the  farm  of  Jones  be  taxed  at  ten  dollars  per  acre  because 
it  pays  no  income  at  all? 

Let  me  repeat,  that  the  market  value  of  land  is  fixed  by  what  it  is  now 
producing  or  by  what  the  public  believes  it  can  be  made  to  produce. 

This  increase  in  the  productive  power  of  the  lands  of  North  Carolina  explains 
the  steady  rise  in  the  market  value  of  these  lands.  In  1909  the  crops  produced 
on  the  lands  in  North  Carolina  were  worth  one  hundred  and  forty-two  millions 
of  dollars.  These  values  have  steadily  increased.  In  1915  they  amounted  to  two 
hundred  and  two  millions;  in  1916  to  four  hundred  and  seventeen  millions;  in 
1918,  five  hundred  and  thirty-seven  millions;  in  1919,  six  hundred  and  eighty- 
three  millions.  In  1910  North  Carolina  was  the  twenty-second  state  in  the  Union 
in  the  value  of  its  farm  products;  in  1919  it  was  the  fourth  state  in  the  Union. 
In  nine  years  we  passed  eighteen  states  in  the  value  of  the  products  of  our  farms. 
It  would  be  a  miracle  if  this  increase  in  the  value  of  the  products  was  not  reflected 
in  the  market  value  of  the  lands. 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  305 

SPECIAL  LETTER  FROM  THE  GOVERNOR  TO  MR.  SOLVENT-CREDIT  OWNER 

My  deab  Sik: — Heretofore  you  have  had  a  just  grievance  against  the  State 
of  North  Carolina.  Your  solvent  credits  were  grossly  discriminated  against  and 
were  taxed  to  a  point  approaching  confiscation.  While  real  property  and  tangible 
personal  property  were  being  taxed  at  from  one-third  to  one-tenth  of  their  real 
value,  you  were  required  to  list  your  credits  at  full  face  value. 

On  account  of  these  discriminatory  and  confiscatory  taxes  against  your 
property,  you  resorted  to  many  devices  to  keep  your  solvent  credits  off  the  tax 
books.  Sometimes  you  sent  them  out  of  the  State  and  deposited  them  in  a  bank 
or  trust  company,  and  flattered  yourself  that  this  made  them  exempt  from  taxation. 
This  was  a  delusion,  for  solvent  credits  owned  by  a  resident  of  North  Carolina 
are  taxable  here  no  matter  where  they  may  be.  Sometimes  you  resorted  to  fancy 
bookkeeping  and  made  fictitious  offsets  against  your  solvent  credits.  Sometimes 
you  swapped  securities  temporarily  for  the  purpose  of  evading  the  taxes,  and  in 
a  great  many  eases  you  simply  did  nothing  and  said  nothing,  but  conveniently 
forgot  that  you  owned  any  such  property. 

All  this  was  done  and  justified  in  your  own  mind  because  of  the  discrimination 

against   and   practical  confiscation   of  solvent   credits   under  the   old  tax   system. 

Because  you  were  being  sinned  against,  you  did  a  little   sinning  yourself,   and 

public  opinion  condoned  your  evasions  on  the  ground  that  "you  were  more  sinned 

.  against  than  sinning." 

Under  the  Revaluation  Act  all  your  grievances  have  been  removed  and  every 
discrimination  against  you  has  been  wiped  out.  All  tangible  property,  real  and 
personal,  is  now  being  placed  upon  the  books  at  its  true  value.  By  doing  this  the 
tax  rate  will  be  reduced  to  a  point  where  you  can  pay  the  taxes  on  your  credits 
and  still  have  a  reasonable  income  left.  Heretofore  the  taxes  on  such  credits  have 
averaged  in  the  towns  and  cities  about  three  dollars  on  the  hundred.  Under  the 
Revaluation  Act  they  will  average  about  one  dollar  on  the  hundred.  Heretofore 
it  would  have  taken  one-half  of  your  income  from  solvent  credits  to  pay  taxes  on 
the  same,  but  now  it  will  take  only  one-sixth. 

You  are  no  longer  sinned  against,  and  there  is  left  to  you  no  shadow  of  excuse 
for  failing  to  accurately  list  your  solvent  credits.  The  State  is  dealing  fairly 
with  you,  and  it  expects  and  demands  that  you  shall  now  deal  fairly  with  it. 
This  year  North  Carolina  expects  you  to  list  every  note,  stock,  bond,  open  account, 
and  all  money  on  hand.  If  you  fail  to  do  it,  you  will  be  burned  in  the  hot  fires 
of  public  contempt.  Your  neighbor  will  no  longer  respect  you  and  you  will  not 
respect  yourself.  Moreover,  you  will  wake  up  some  morning  and  find  your  debtor 
refusing  to  pay  you  because  you  failed  to  list  for  taxation  your  debt  against  him. 
The  law  gives  him  the  right  so  to  do.  The  law  will  not  assist  you  in  the  collection 
of  your  debt  when  you  disobey  and  defy  the  law  in  respect  to  that  debt. 

The  history  of  every  state  and  nation  shows  that  when  solvent  credits  have 
been  taxed  at  a  low  rate  they  have  straightway  come  out  of  hiding  and  appeared 
on  the  tax  books.  One  illustration :  A  few  years  ago  in  the  city  of  Baltimore 
there  was  a  high  rate  on  solvent  credits.  Under  the  high  rate  only  six  millions  of 
credits  were  listed  for  taxation.  The  rate  was  divided  by  four,  and  there  then 
appeared  on  the  tax  books  four  hundred  and  fifty  millions  of  these  credits.  This 
case  is  typical  of  the  experience  in  every  place  where  such  a  course  has  been 
pursued. 

20 


306  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

The  people  of  North  Carolina  are  fundamentally  honest.  They  want  to  do  the 
right  thing,  and  will  do  it  when  they  feel  that  they  are  treated  right.  So,  Mr. 
Solvent-Credit  Owner,  the  State  having  come  clean  with  you,  confidently  expects 
you  to  come  clean  with  it.  I  have  a  supreme  faith  that  you  will  fully  meet  this 
expectation. 

What  I  have  said  with  respect  to  solvent  credits  applies  to  all  classes  of 
personal  property;  to  goods,  wares  and  merchandise;  to  raw  material  and  manu- 
factured products  held  by  our  mills  and  factories,  to  automobiles,  and  to  personal 
property  of  every  description.  There  is  an  exemption  of  $300,  instead  of  $25  as 
heretofore,  allowed  to  every  taxpayer ;  but  after  deducting  this  exemption,  personal 
property  must  be  listed  at  its  fair  market  value. 

Very  truly  yours, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


RECOMMENDATIONS  TO  THE  SPECIAL  SESSION  OF  THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY 

After  hearing  the  report  made  by  the  district  supervisors  in  charge  of  the 
Revaluation  Act,  and  after  a  full  conference  with  the  State  Budget  Commission, 
the  State  Tax  Commission,  and  the  State  Treasurer,  I  find  that  I  will  be  justified 
in  giving  to  the  people  of  the  State  the  following  information : 

I  propose  to  submit  to  the  special  session  of  the  General  Assembly,  which  is 
expected  to  meet  in  July,  the  following  recommendations : 

1.  That  the  State  take  no  advantage  of  that  part  of  the  Revaluation  Act  which 
authorized  a  10  per  cent  increase  of  revenues  for  the  year  1920,  but  that  the 
General  Assembly  fix  a  rate  for  1920  that  will  yield  for  all  State  purposes  exactly 
the  same  amount  of  revenue  from  real  and  personal  property  which  was  collected 
in  the  year  1919.  There  may  be  one  exception  to  this  recommendation,  and  that 
is  that  it  may  be  necessary  to  increase  the  funds  provided  by  the  State  for  the 
public  schools  to  the  extent  of  5  per  cent,  certainly  not  more  than  this.  This  in- 
crease will  be  only  half  the  amount  contemplated  by  the  General  Assembly  of 
1919  for  this  specific  purpose. 

It  will  thus  be  seen,  in  the  light  of  this  recommendation,  that  the  Revaluation 
Act  becomes  one  of  equalization,  pure  and  simple,  and  with  the  vast  quantities 
of  property  now  going  on  the  tax  books  that  was  not  taxed  at  all  heretofore,  both 
of  lands  and  of  intangible  personal  property,  it  is  certain  that  many  thousands  of 
taxpayers  will  actually  pay  less  taxes  in  1920  than  they  paid  in  1919. 

2.  I  will  also  recommend  that  there  be  inserted  in  the  Revaluation  Act  a  clause 
providing  that  in  any  year,  at  any  time  before  the  taxes  are  actually  levied  by  the 
county  authorities,  any  property  owner  may  ask  for  a  reassessment  of  his  property 
upon  filing  an  affidavit  supported  by  two  disinterested  freeholders  that  his  property 
is  on  the  tax  books  at  a  sum  greater  than  its  then  market  value. 

3.  I  will  also  recommend  to  the  special  session  of  the  General  Assembly  that 
there  be  embodied  in  the  constitutional  amendments  now  pending  and  to  be  voted 
on  in  November  a  provision  greatly  reducing  the  present  constitutional  limitation 
of  66%  cents  on  the  one  hundred  dollars  worth  of  property.  It  was  the  purpose 
of  the  Finance  Committee  of  the  House  and  Senate  at  the  regular  session  to  revise 
this  limitation  downwards.  It  is  now  apparent  that  the  revised  valuations  will 
be  large  enough  to  permit  a  substantial  reduction  of  this  limitation,  and  still  leave 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  307 

a  reasonable  margin  for  the  necessities  of  our  future  development.  Just  what 
figure  will  be  a  proper  limitation  cannot  be  determined  until  the  total  values  under 
the  new  assessment  are  ascertained. 

Three  facts  in  regard  to  the  Revaluation  Act  are  now  outstanding,  and  no 
longer  the  subject  of  controversy: 

1.  The  one  purpose  of  the  act  is  to  wipe  out  the  inequalities  of  the  existing 
system. 

2.  Under  the  act  the  tax  rate  will  be  so  low  that  no  class  of  property  will  be 
outlawed  and  driven  from  the  State. 

3.  The  extraordinarily  low  rate  under  the  Revaluation  Act  will  uncover 
millions  of  dollars  in  the  State  that  has  never  been  on  the  tax  books  at  all,  and 
will  draw  into  the  State  millions  of  capital  from  the  ends  of  the  earth. 


SAVING  AT  THE  SPILE  AND  LOSING  AT  THE  BUNG 

In  former  articles  I  have  endeavored  to  show  the  reasons  for  and  the  right- 
eousness of  the  Revaluation  Act.  In  this  last  article  I  propose  to  demonstrate 
that  the  act  is  justified  by  a  farsight  ed  selfishness.  If  the  people  of  Worth 
Carolina  were  dead  to  all  considerations  of  truth  and  justice — which  considerations 
are  the  mudsills  of  the  Revaluation  Act — still  an  enlightened  selfishness  would  lead 
them  to  adopt  the  fundamental  principles  of  the  Revaluation  Act. 

When  I  was  a  boy  living  in  Union  County  I  often  heard  the  expression, 
"Saving  at  the  spile  and  losing  at  the  bung."  This  is  precisely  what  the  old  tax 
system  has  been  doing  in  Worth  Carolina.  We  have  maintained  tax  rates  so  high 
and  tight  that  nothing  could  leak  out  at  the  spile,  but  the  bung  has  been  wide  open 
and  through  it  the  wealth  that  ought  to  have  stayed  in  Worth  Carolina  has  been 
constantly  running  out. 

Some  three  years  ago  a  man  of  wealth,  a  native  of  North  Carolina,  who  had 
recently  moved  to  a  distant  state,  came  into  the  Governor's  office,  and  I  teased 
him  about  abandoning  his  old  State  when  he  got  rich.  At  once  he  became  serious 
and  said,  "Governor,  I  never  hated  to  do  anything  in  my  life  as  bad  as  I  did  to 
leave  Worth  Carolina.  My  people  have  lived  here  for  generations.  I  love  the 
State,  its  climate,  its  soil,  its  people,  its  traditions ;  but  the  simple  truth  is  that  I 
cannot  afford  to  live  in  Worth  Carolina."  I  said,  "Why?"  He  replied,  "In  the 
city  in  which  I  live  the  combined  city,  county,  and  State  tax  rate  is  $3.25  on  the 
one  hundred  dollars  worth  of  property.  Wow  my  property  consists  largely  of  high- 
class,  low  interest-bearing  securities.  They  will  not  average  more  than  5  per  cent. 
The  result  is  that  every  time  I  get  $5  income  from  my  property  I  have  to  pay 
$3.25  of  it  for  the  support  of  the  State,  county,  and  city  government,  and  this 
leaves  me  only  $1.75  for  the  support  of  myself  and  family."  Then  he  added, 
"It  costs  me  $200,000  a  year  more  in  taxes  to  live  in  the  State  of  Worth  Carolina 
than  it  does  in  the  state  to  which  I  have  removed." 

A  short  time  ago  this  man  died  in  the  distant  state  to  which  he  had  removed. 
The  Worth  Carolina  policy  literally  drove  him  out  of  the  State.  By  maintaining 
rates  that  practically  confiscated  his  income,  the  State  got  nothing.  If  he  had 
remained  here  under  a  low  rate  the  State,  the  county,  and  the  city  would  have 
received  a  fair  sum  in  taxes  on  his  property,  another  fair  sum  in  taxes  on  his 
income,   and  when  he  died  the   State  would  have  received  a  handsome   sum   in 


308  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

inheritance  taxes  on  his  estate.  As  it  is,  we  get  nothing.  This  is  saving  at  the 
spile  and  losing  at  the  bung  with  a  vengeance! 

Everybody  knows  that  when  Mrs.  Bingham,  a  North  Carolina  woman,  died  in 
Kentucky,  the  inheritance  taxes  on  her  estate  paid  off  the  entire  bonded  indebted- 
ness of  the  State  of  Kentucky  and  left  a  considerable  surplus  to  go  into  the 
Treasury  of  the  State. 

There  is  today  one  man,  a  native  of  North  Carolina,  but  a  resident  of  another 
state,  who,  I  have  reason  to  believe,  would  like  to  live  in  North  Carolina,  but  he 
cannot  afford,  he  says,  to  pay  three-fourths  of  his  income  to  the  State  while  he  is 
living.  Now,  if  we  maintain  a  low  rate,  and  that  man  should  come  back  to  North 
Carolina,  we  would  get  a  handsome  revenue  in  taxes  at  a  low  rate  on  his  estate 
while  he  is  living.  We  would  get  a  reasonable  income  tax  while  he  lives,  and  when 
he  dies  the  inheritance  tax  on  his  estate  would  pay  off  the  entire  bonded  indebted- 
ness of  the  State  of  North  Carolina  and  leave  enough  surplus  to  build  many  miles 
of  hard-surface  roads.  To  maintain  rates  so  frightfully  high  that  this  man  and 
hundreds  of  others  like  him  are  driven  out  of  the  State  is  saving  at  the  spile  and 
losing  at  the  bung. 

North  Carolina  is  a  wonderfully  attractive  state  in  which  to  live.  We  have 
here  a  climate  more  intoxicating  than  anything  that  you  can  buy  in  the  open 
market,  a  soil  that  will  produce  everything  for  the  comfort  of  man  and  beast, 
glorious  scenery  on  land  and  sea.  If  to  all  these  attractions  we  add  the  lowest 
property  tax  rate  of  any  state  in  the  Union — and  this  we  shall  do  under  the 
Revaluation  Act — then  from  all  over  the  United  States  men  who  have  scored  in 
the  big  business  world  and  who  want  to  spend  the  evening  of  their  lives  in  whole- 
some and  attractive  surroundings  will  flock  to  North  Carolina.  Their  coming  will 
greatly  add  to  the  wealth  of  the  State  and  wonderfully  lighten  the  burden  of 
taxation  on  those  who  are  already  here.  It  is  a  penny  wise  and  pound  foolish 
policy  to  maintain  a  tax  system  that  literally  drives  our  own  men  of  wealth  out  of 
our  borders  and  frightens  others  from  coming  in. 

A  low  tax  rate  will  not  only  keep  our  own  capital  here  and  lure  retired 
capitalists  from  other  states,  but  it  will  attract  big  capital  right  now  that  is 
seeking  investment  where  the  tax  rates  are  not  confiscatory.  In  one  of  our 
progressive  towns  in  eastern  North  Carolina  the  present  tax  rate,  State,  city  and 
county  combined,  is  over  $4  on  the  one  hundred  dollars  worth  of  property.  A 
million-dollar  enterprise  in  that  city  would  have  to  pay  in  taxes  over  $40,000  a 
year.  Such  a  tax  rate  quarantines  that  town  against  money  from  the  outside. 
Divide  that  rate  by  four  and  new  enterprises  would  spring  up,  new  wealth  would 
flow  into  the  town,  and  the  burden  of  taxation  on  the  average  man  would  be 
proportionately  relieved. 

Finally,  brethren,  I  desire  to  leave  four  questions  on  the  doorsteps  of  every 
man's  conscience  and  intelligence  : 

1.  Do  we  really  desire  to  make  the  tax  books  of  North  Carolina  speak  the 
truth  ? 

2.  Do  we  really  desire  to  wipe  out  discriminations  and  in  the  realm  of  taxation 
treat  all  people  and  all  property  exactly  alike? 

3.  Do  we  desire  to  have  true  values  and  low  rates  or  values  ridiculously  low 
and  rates  terrifyingly  high? 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  309 

4.  Do  we  desire  to  maintain  a  system  of  taxation  that  will  drive  men  and 
property  out  of  North  Carolina,  or  a  system  that  will  draw  both  men  and  property 
into  the  State? 

The  object  of  the  Eevaluation  Act  is  the  plain  truth.  The  machinery  was 
designed  to  reach  this  objective.  If  in  any  case  the  machinery  has  failed  to 
accomplish  the  end  for  which  it  was  designed,  the  remedy  is  to  correct  the 
machinery  and  not  to  abandon  the  act. 

The  Eevaluation  Act  is  headed  straight  towards  truth  and  justice — a  godly 
government  in  a  goodly  land.     Egypt  lies  behind. 


(22) 

LINCOLN 

Raleigh,  K  C,  February  7,  1920. 
Managing  Editor  New  Yoek  American, 
New  York. 
Replying  to  your  request  for  a  statement  about  Mr.  Lincoln,  I  beg  to  say: 
Lincoln  once  said,  "Die  when  I  may,  I  want  it  said  of  me  by  those  who  knew  me 
best  that  I  always  plucked  a  thistle  and  planted  a  flower  where  I  thought  a  flower 
would  grow."     It  seems  to  me  that  this  sentiment  ought  to  be  emphasized  in  all 
Lincoln  celebrations  at  this  time.    If  the  minds  and  hearts  of  our  people  could  be 
inoculated  with  this  Lincoln  spirit  much  of  the  bitterness  and  many  troubles  that 
now  distress  and  distract  the  Nation  would  disappear.    And  while  we  are  planting 
flowers  in  our  own  favored  land,  we  would  joyfully  enter  into  a  League  of  Nations 
designed  to  pluck  the  thistle  of  war  that  has  caused  such  infinite  pain  to  our  own 
Nation  and  to  less  fortunate  peoples  beyond  the  seas. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(23) 

TAXES  AND  THE  REVALUATION  ACT 

(February  11,  1920) 

The  Governor  today  received  a  letter  from  the  widow  of  a  minister  in  High 
Point  in  which  she  says  she  has  $5,000  in  money  which  she  lends  out  at  6  per  cent, 
and  takes  notes  secured  by  mortgages.  She  complains  that  the  taxes  on  these 
notes  and  mortgages  are  so  high  that  it  leaves  her  very  little  on  which  to  live. 
The  Governor  took  very  great  pleasure  in  writing  her  that  under  the  Revaluation 
Act  her  taxes  would  be  greatly  reduced,  depending  on  the  total  values  of  property 
in  Guilford  and  High  Point.  The  Governor  assured  her  that  she  would  not  have 
to  pay  more  than  one-third  as  much  as  she  had  been  paying  heretofore,  and  it 
might  be  that  she  would  not  have  to  pay  more  than  one-fifth  as  much  as  she  had 
been  paying  heretofore. 


310  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

(24) 

THE  OVERALL  CLUB 

(April  17,  1920) 

Governor  Bickett  was  asked  by  a  reporter  of  the  News  and  Observer  today  if 
he  intended  to  join  the  Overall  Club.     He  said: 

"Most  emphatically  I  do  not.  I  regard  the  Overall  movement  as  a  passing  fad 
with  no  permanent  economic  value.  If  the  movement  should  be  generally 
successful  the  immediate  result  would  be  to  boost  the  price  of  overalls  to  a  point 
where  the  man  who  must  of  necessity  wear  them  could  not  afford  to  buy  them. 
I  would  not  hesitate  to  join  a  club  that  would  map  out  a  well  balanced  program 
of  economy.  Such  a  program  ought  not  to  be  put  into  effect  until  next  fall,  for 
any  general  movement  not  to  buy  any  class  of  goods  now  on  the  merchants'  shelves 
at  prevailing  prices  would  work  a  great  hardship  upon  the  merchants  and  would 
involve  many  of  them  in  financial  ruin.  I  do  not  want  to  hurt  anybody,  but  I  do 
want  to  help  everybody.  I  think  it  would  be  wise  to  form  economic  clubs  wherein 
the  members  would  agree  not  to  pay  above  a  certain  price  for  any  of  the  ordinary 
necessities  of  life,  and  to  cut  out  a  great  many  of  the  luxuries.  For  instance,  I 
would  agree  not  to  pay  more  than  $5  for  a  hat.  You  can  get  a  decent  hat  for 
that  amount.  I  would  agree  not  to  pay  more  than  $7.50  for  a  pair  of  shoes,  nor 
more  than  $3  for  a  shirt,  nor  more  than  $40  for  a  suit  of  clothes,  nor  more  than 
50  cents  for  a  pair  of  socks,  nor  more  than  20  cents  for  a  collar.  I  think  the 
members  of  the  club  ought  also  to  agree  not  to  buy  any  more  automobiles  until 
present  prices  are  reduced  at  least  25  per  cent,  and  all  owners  of  automobiles  ought 
to  agree  that  where  automobiles  are  operated  for  pleasure  that  they  will  reduce 
the  amount  of  gasoline  they  use  50  per  cent.  This  saving  in  the  automobile  cost 
could  be  made  without  any  real  sacrifice. 

"So  long  as  people  are  willing  to  pay  any  price  for  the  things  they  want,  and 
are  not  willing  to  practice  self-denial,  all  talk  about  cutting  down  the  high  cost 
of  living  is  gabble." 


(25) 

INJUSTICE  OF  OLD  SYSTEM  OF  TAXATION 
(May  13,  1920) 

I  have  just  received  a  letter  from  one  of  the  best  citizens  in  North  Carolina 
who  lives  in  one  of  our  most  progressive  counties.     In  the  letter  he  says  : 

I  have  a  niece  whose  husband  left  her,  as  he  thought,  in  comfortable 
circumstances.  He  left  her  a  home  and  several  thousand  dollars  in  cash 
which  she  has  loaned  out  at  6  per  cent.  She  pays  four  and  a  quarter  per 
cent  regular  town,  county  and  State  taxes.  Please  tell  me  how  she  is  to  live, 
and  greatly  oblige. 

"Will  some  one  who  is  in  favor  of  perpetuating  such  iniquity  tell  me  what  to 
write  this  man  about  his  widowed  niece?  Her  case  is  not  exceptional,  but  is 
typical  of  thousands  in  the  State. 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  311 

The  State  of  North  Carolina  says  to  this  widow  whose  husband  by  hard  work 
and  self-denial  saved  up  several  thousand  dollars  for  her  protection  after  he  had 
passed  away: 

The  State  forbids  you  to  make  more  than  six  dollars  on  the  hundred  on 
what  your  husband  left  you  and  his  orphan  children.  You  may  not  make 
that  much — you  may  make  a  bad  loan;  but  if  you  keep  ail  your  money 
loaned  out  all  the  time  and  collect  all  the  interest  promptly,  then  out  of 
every  six  dollars  that  you  collect  you  must  turn  over  J4.25  to  the  State, 
town  and  county,  and  you  can  keep  $1.75  for  the  support  of  yourself  and 
children. 

The  cruel  tyranny,  the  brutal  injustice,  the  deep  and  black  damnation  of  such 
a  tax  system  so  outrages  every  instinct  of  decency,  every  pulsebeat  of  humanity, 
and  every  rule  of  reason  and  common  sense  that  even  a  governor  finds  it  hard  to 
discuss  the  subject  in  terms  permitted  by  the  rules  and  regulations  of  the  church. 

Such  a  law  gives  the  lie  to  every  pretense  that  we  maintain  a  Christian 
civilization  and  brands  with  infamy  our  vaunted  Southern  chivalry,  for  we  are 
crucifying  the  widows  and  orphans  of  the  land  with  a  law  that  no  set  of  men 
would  submit  to  for  thirty  seconds. 

If  the  General  Assembly  should  dare  to  enact  a  law  taking  from  every  man  in 
the  State  $4.25  out  of  every  $6  that  the  law  permits  him  to  make,  hell  would  break 
loose  in  North  Carolina.  I  want  it  distinctly  understood  that  in  office  and  out  of 
office,  in  sunny  or  in  stormy  weather,  I  propose  to  fight  this  tyranny  and  injustice 
until  it  is  wiped  off  the  statute  books  of  North  Carolina  forever  and  forever. 

Under  the  Eevaluation  Act,  in  the  very  county  from  which  this  letter  comes, 
the  tax  rate  will  be  reduced  from  four  and  a  quarter  to  one  per  cent,  if  not  less. 
Then  out  of  every  six  dollars  that  the  widow  collects  she  will  pay  one  dollar  to 
the  State,  town  and  county,  and  have  five  dollars  left  for  the  support  of  herself 
and  children.  And  surely  this  is  enough.  An  income  tax  of  sixteen  and  two- 
thirds  per  cent  without  allowing  any  exemptions  is  certainly  enough  to  require 
any  class  of  citizens  to  pay.  T.  W.  Bickett, 

Governor. 


(26) 

CLARK  VERSUS  PAUL— CHAOS  VERSUS  REVENUES 

(June  26,  1920) 

For  as  the  body  is  one  and  hath  many  members,  and  all  the  members 
of  that  body  being  many  are  one  body.  .  .  .  For  the  body  is  not  one  mem- 
ber, but  many. — I  Corinthians  12:14. 

From  the  above  opinion  of  the  learned  Paul,  Chief  Justice  Clark  dissents,  and 
in  a  six-column  article  attempts  to  show  that  this  famous  pronouncement  of  the 
most  famous  of  the  apostles  is  contrary  to  all  logic,  all  law,  and  all  justice.  He 
boldly  maintains  that  the  whole  does  not  include  the  parts,  and  that  the  parts  do 
not  constitute  the  whole.  He  asseverates  that  when  you  tax  a  corporation  you 
do  not  tax  its  members,  and  that  when  you  tax  the  members  you  do  not  tax  the 
corporation. 


312  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Boiled  down,  his  proposition  is  just  this :  A,  B  and  C  invest  $30,000  in  a  farm, 
a  store  or  a  factory.  Each  contributes  $10,000  to  the  enterprise  and  they  conduct 
the  business  as  a  partnership.  Under  the  law — the  Kevaluation  Act — these  men 
list  for  taxation  all  the  assets  of  the  partnership  at  their  true  value,  to  wit,  $30,000. 
One  day  A  suggests  that  as  a  matter  of  business  convenience,  and  owing  to  the 
uncertainty  of  life,  it  would  be  well  to  convert  the  partnership  into  a  corporation. 
The  other  members  of  the  firm  favor  the  suggestion  and  they  all  go  to  the  Secre- 
tary of  State  and  pay  the  State  of  North  Carolina  for  a  charter  authorizing  them 
to  hereafter  conduct  this  business  as  a  corporation  instead  of  a  partnership. 
Thereupon  a  certificate  is  issued  to  each  of  the  former  partners  showing  that  he 
has  $10,000  worth  of  stock  in  the  corporation.  Not  a  dollar  in  money,  not  an  item 
of  property  is  added  to  the  business ;  but  the  Chief  Justice  gravely  maintains  that 
because  of  the  naked  fact  that  the  method  of  doing  business  has  been  changed,  these 
men  ought  to  be  made  to  pay  taxes  on  $60,000  instead  of  on  $30,000,  as  heretofore. 
Such  a  proposition  is  so  glaringly  illogical,  so  atrociously  unjust,  as  to  nauseate 
the  reason  and  shock  the  conscience  of  every  fair  thinking  man.  And  yet  the 
Chief  Justice  uses  this  vicious  absurdity  as  a  sole  basis  for  his  colossal  mis- 
statement that  the  laws  of  North  Carolina  exempt  corporate  stocks  from  taxation 
to  the  amount  of  five  hundred  million  dollars. 

Not  a  dollar  is  exempted.  The  corporation  pays  taxes  on  everything  it  owns, 
and  pays  these  taxes  for  the  members  of  the  corporation  who  own  it.  Not  only 
does  the  corporation  pay  tax  on  every  item  of  property  that  it  owns,  but  it  pays 
the  State  for  its  charter,  and  thereafter  pays  an  annual  privilege  tax  for  being 
allowed  to  do  business  as  a  corporation. 

One  of  the  most  sensible  women  in  North  Carolina,  discussing  the  contention 
of  the  Chief  Justice,  said  this  to  me:  "A  family  of  four  people  invest  in  a  pie. 
They  pay  for  it  out  of  the  family  funds.  There  are  four  members  of  the  family 
and  the  four  own  the  pie.  Under  the  law  the  family  lists  this  pie  for  taxation  at 
its  full  value  as  the  property  of  the  family.  Then  a  meal  ticket  is  issued  to  each 
member  of  the  family  showing  that  he  is  entitled  to  one-fourth  of  the  pie."  Says 
this  woman,  "I  understand  our  Chief  Justice  to  argue  that  each  member  of  the 
family  should  then  be  required  to  list  his  meal  ticket  for  taxation,  although  the 
family  has  already  paid  the  tax  on  the  whole  pie." 

Our  Chief  Justice  is  famous  for  his  contention  that  women  are  quite  as  com- 
petent to  run  the  affairs  of  government  as  men.  This  knock-out  blow  that  the  clear 
common  sense  of  the  woman  gives  to  the  morbid  sophistry  and  twisted  ratioci- 
nation of  a  learned  judge  supports  his  general  contention  that  women  have  quite 
as  much  sense  as  men. 

The  Chief  Justice  hates  a  monopoly,  and  is  the  last  man  in  the  world  who 
would  claim  that  he  himself  enjoys  any  monopoly  of  brains,  character  or 
patriotism.  In  the  absence  of  such  a  monopoly  on  his  part,  it  is  strikingly 
significant  that  although  the  Chief  Justice  has  for  ten  years  diligently  labored 
to  get  his  Associates  on  the  Supreme  Court  to  endorse  his  strange  theories  of 
taxation,  not  one  of  them  has  any  sympathy  or  patience  with  the  contentions  of 
their  chief. 

It  is  still  more  striking,  in  the  absence  of  the  monopoly  above  referred  to,  that 
nowhere  in  this  broad  land,  not  even  in  the  wild  and  woolly  west,  where  the  Non- 
partisan League  holds  sway,  not  even  in  Kansas  where  sockless  Jerry  Simpson  once 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  313 

tickled  itching  ears,  not  even  in  the  councils  of  the  "Committee  of  Forty-eight," 
have  any  such  wild  and  vicious  theories  of  taxation  been  enacted  into  law. 

To  adopt  such  theories  of  taxation  would  produce  chaos  instead  of  revenues, 
would  paralyze  the  business  life  of  the  State,  would  permanently  halt  its  progress, 
and  would  be  as  pernicious  to  its  industrial  health  as  the  frogs,  the  lice  and  the 
flies  that  came  up  on  the  land  of  Egypt. 

If  any  member  of  the  General  Assembly  should  dream  of  framing  a  measure 
incorporating  the  tax  theories  of  the  Chief  Justice  he  should  entitle  that  measure 
"A  Bill  to  be  entitled  an  Act  to  drive  every  corporation  out  of  the  State  of  North 
Carolina."  Every  one  that  could  possibly  do  so  would,  in  the  presence  of  such  a 
law,  take  the  wings  of  the  morning  and  fly  to  the  uttermost  parts  of  the  earth — 
not  one  would  remain  that  could  possibly  get  away. 

The  Chief  Justice  appeals  to  the  laboring  men  and  to  the  farmers.  No  greater 
calamity  could  befall  these  people  than  for  the  theories  of  the  judge  to  be 
incorporated  into  law.  If  the  corporations  should  be  driven  from  the  State,  as 
they  surely  would  be  if  the  opinions  of  the  Chief  Justice  should  prevail,  where 
would  the  laboring  men  find  employment  in  North  Carolina,  and  where  would  the 
farmer  find  a  market  for  the  products  of  the  soil? 

But  Mr.  Average  Citizen  will  naturally  inquire,  Why  should  the  Chief  Justice 
of  the  Supreme  Court  of  North  Carolina  make  any  such  contentions?  To  the 
knowing  ones  the  answer  is  easy  and  plain.  Whenever  the  Chief  Justice  hears 
the  word  "corporation"  he  "sees  red."  At  a  banquet  given  him  in  the  city  of 
Durham,  Ex-President  Taft  said  in  the  presence  of  Judge  Clark  that  he  would  not 
be  willing  to  trust  the  Chief  Justice  with  the  Constitution  over  night.  The  bias 
of  the  judge  against  corporations  is  so  well  known  that  neither  his  nearest  relative 
nor  his  dearest  friend  would  be  willing  to  trust  him  with  any  corporation  for 
thirty  seconds.  This  bias  is  partly  due  to  the  strongly  socialistic  tendency  of  the 
judge's  mind,  and  partly  due  to  his  well-known  personal  hostility  to  the  Duke 
family  of  North  Carolina,  which  family  he  always  thinks  of  in  terms  of  corpora- 
tions, and  also  thinks  of  corporations  in  terms  of  Dukes.  This  hostility  to  the 
Duke  family  dates  back  to  a  number  of  years  before  the  series  of  events  that  led 
up  to  the  notorious  case  of  Gattis  vs.  Kilgo.  It  is  greatly  to  be  deplored  that  our 
Chief  Justice  has  allowed  his  hostility  to  the  Duke  family  to  become  such  an 
obsession  with  him  that  in  order  to  punish  a  Duke  he  is  willing  to  paralyze  the 
industrial  life  and  permanently  halt  the  magnificent  progress  of  the  State. 

It  has  been  seen  above  that  the  statement  of  Judge  Clark  that  we  exempt  five 
hundred  million  dollars  of  corporate  property  from  taxation  is  absolutely  without 
foundation  in  fact,  but  there  is  abundant  reason  for  believing  that  the  hostility  of 
our  Chief  Justice  to  business  and  to  all  men  who  are  attempting  to  do  big  things 
in  North  Carolina,  a  hostility  that  he  himself  has  widely  advertised,  has  kept  out 
of  North  Carolina  many  millions  of  dollars.  This  obsession  upon  the  part  of  the 
judge  drives  him  into  a  forgetfulness  of  the  proprieties  of  his  position,  in  that 
the  Chief  Justice  is  attempting  to  dictate  the  course  of  the  legislative  and 
executive  branches  of  government,  and  this  in  spite  of  the  plain  constitutional 
declaration  that  the  legislative,  executive  and  judicial  departments  of  our  State 
government  must  be  kept  separate  and  apart. 

He  goes  out  of  his  way  to  attack  the  State  Tax  Commission  on  account  of  the 
manner  in  which  it  is  handling  the  inheritance  taxes  due  from  the  estate  of  the 
late  R.  J.  Reynolds.     It  is  highly  probable  that  some  questions  with  respect  to 


314  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

these  taxes  will  come  before  tlie  Supreme  Court  for  adjudication.  If  so,  Low 
terribly  embarrassing  it  will  be  to  tbe  Chief  Justice  to  know  that  he  has  already 
gone  out  of  his  way  to  express  a  biased  opinion  in  regard  to  this  tax. 

With  respect  to  the  change  in  the  laws  in  regard  to  foreign  corporations,  the 
general  purpose  of  the  change  is  to  place  a  foreign  corporation  on  the  same  footing 
as  a  North  Carolina  corporation.  The  justice  of  the  act  must  appeal  to  every 
fair  thinking  man,  and  its  wisdom  from  a  revenue  standpoint  is  incontrovertibly 
established  by  the  indisputable  fact  that  under  the  change  we  are  getting  more 
taxes  out  of  the  foreign  corporations  than  we  did  before. 

The  General  Assembly  of  1920  made  a  conscientious  effort  to  frame  a  tax 
system  absolutely  fair  to  all  classes  of  people  and  all  property.  It  did  not  go 
gunning  for  anybody  or  anything.  It  sought  to  avoid  anything  that  would  appear 
like  class  legislation.  Any  man  or  any  measure  that  seeks  to  stir  up  class  feeling 
and  to  divide  the  citizens  of  North  Carolina  into  hostile  groups  deserves  the  deep 
damnation  of  all  good  men.  The  General  Assembly  steered  far  from  such  a  policy, 
and  with  patience  and  perseverance  worthy  of  all  praise  worked  out  a  sane,  well 
balanced  tax  program  adequate  to  meet  the  ever-increasing  necessities  of  a  pro- 
gressive civilization,  and  yet  distributing  the  burdens  of  taxation  so  as  to  impose 
no  undue  hardships  on  any  class  of  our  citizens. 

Prof.  C.  J.  Bullock  of  Harvard  University  is  the  greatest  authority  on  taxation 
in  the  United  States.  His  counsel  is  sought  far  and  near  by  men  who  are  earnestly 
seeking  for  truth,  for  equity  and  for  adequacy  in  taxation.  In  a  public  letter 
Professor  Bullock  has  given  to  the  tax  program  mapped  out  by  the  General 
Assembly  of  1920  the  highest  commendation. 

Reactionaries  have  criticised  the  program  for  going  entirely  too  far,  and 
radicals  have  railed  against  it  for  not  going  half  far  enough.  These  utterly  in- 
consistent and  contradictory  criticisms  have  produced  in  the  mind  of  the  average 
man  a  growing  conviction  that  the  General  Assembly  actually  hit  on  that  golden 
mean  that  lies  between  two  dangerous  extremes. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


(27) 

FINAL  REPLY  TO  JUDGE  CLARK 

(July  12,  1920) 

[Upon  being  asked  today  by  several  newspaper  men  whether  or  not  he  was 
going  to  write  a  reply  to  the  eight-column  article  of  Chief  Justice  Clark  that 
appeared  in  today's  News  and  Observer,  Governor  Bickett  replied :] 

I  certainly  am  not.  Time  and  white  paper  are  entirely  too  valuable  to  con- 
tinue this  discussion  ad  infinitum.  Judge  Clark  correctly  says  that  our  personal 
relations  have  been  cordial.  I  wrote  what  I  wrote  not  because  I  wanted  to  do  it, 
not  because  it  was  any  pleasure  to  do  it,  but  because  of  an  unescapable  conviction 
that  it  was  my  duty  to  the  State  of  North  Carolina  to  do  it. 

I  naturally  expected  the  judge  to  dissent.  He  always  does.  On  this  very 
proposition  he  dissents  not  only  from  the  opinion  of  the  Governor  about  what  is 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  315 

wise  and  just  in  taxation,  but  also  from  the  opinion  of  all  the  other  Supreme 
Court  judges,  from  the  opinion  of  the  Attorney-General  of  the  State,  from  the 
opinion  of  the  State  Treasurer,  the  Secretary  of  State,  the  State  Auditor,  the 
members  of  the  State  Tax  Commission.  In  fact,  if  there  is  a  single  State  officer 
who  has  any  patience  or  sympathy  with  the  rabid  views  of  Judge  Clark  on  taxation 
I  have  not  been  able  to  locate  him. 

He  also  dissents  from  the  opinion  of  the  General  Assembly,  from  several 
General  Assemblies,  for  the  judge  has  diligently  sought,  in  season  and  out  of 
season,  to  get  the  General  Assemblies  to  enact  into  law  his  grotesque  program. 
With  practical  unanimity  and  with  great  enthusiasm  the  General  Assemblies  have 
declined  to  do  so. 

Is  Judge  Clark  alone  wise,  alone  virtuous? 

The  judge  also  dissents  from  the  opinion  of  the  legislatures  of  every  state  in 
the  Union,  for  no  state  in  the  Union  levies  on  corporations  the  taxes  Judge  Clark, 
contends  should  be  levied  in  North  Carolina. 

Is  Judge  Clark  endowed  with  more  wisdom  and  more  virtue  than  all  the 
members  of  all  the  legislatures  of  all  the  states  in  the  American  Union? 

The  judge  is  a  voluminous  writer,  but  he  may  write  until  doomsday  and  he 
will  never  convince  the  people  of  North  Carolina  that  it  is  either  just  or  wise  to 
make  a  corporation  pay  twice  as  much  taxes  as  a  copartnership  pays  that  is 
engaged  in  exactly  the  same  business  with  exactly  the  same  capital.  Stripped  of 
all  learning  and  legal  prestidigitation,  that  is  precisely  all  the  judge  is  contending 
for,  and  the  proposition  meets  with  instant  rejection  in  the  minds  of  all  men  who 
really  stand  for  justice  to  one  hundred  per  cent  of  the  people  of  North  Carolina. 

So  far  as  I  am  concerned,  the  discussion  is  closed. 


(28) 

ALAMANCE  COUNTY  MOB 

(July  22,  1920) 

In  view  of  the  action  of  the  civil  authorities  of  Alamance  County,  I  deem  it 
due  the  soldiers  on  duty  and  the  citizenship  of  the  entire  State  to  have  a  careful 
investigation  made  of  the  alleged  assault  on  the  jail  in  Graham  and  on  the  conduct 
of  the  troops  on  the  night  of  July  19th. 

The  members  of  the  committee  to  make  the  investigation  will  be  announced  as 
soon  as  it  is  ascertained  that  they  will  serve. 


316  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

(29) 

NO  OUTSIDE  MEDDLING 

(July  24,  1920) 

"I  do  not  propose  to  let  anybody  from  outside  North  Carolina  investigate  any 
of  our  institutions,"  Governor  Bickett  declared  today  when  his  attention  was 
directed  to  special  dispatches  published  in  morning  papers  that  the  Prisoners' 
Relief  Society  of  Washington  was  contemplating  an  investigation  "of  an  epidemic 
of  complaints"  in  regard  to  prison  conditions  in  this  State. 

"We  at  least  have  State  rights  left  as  to  the  conduct  of  our  prisons,"  said  the 
Governor,  "and  I  intend  that  this  right  shall  be  maintained  and  exercised. 

"We  have  a  State  superintendent  of  health,  Dr.  W.  S.  Rankin,  who  looks  after 
all  sanitary  conditions  in  the  State;  we  have  a  State  superintendent  of  public 
welfare,  R.  F.  Beasley,  who  looks  after  the  moral  and  humanitarian  conditions 
in  our  prisons  and  other  institutions,  and  I  have  more  confidence  in  the  judgment 
and  sincerity  of  these  officials  than  I  have  in  any  ex-convict  agitator. 

"I  have  been  'cussed'  all  over  North  Carolina  from  Cape  Lookout  to  Slick  Rock 
Creek  on  account  of  my  sentimental  love  for  convicts.  One  leading  newspaper 
accused  me  of  making  reformatories  out  of  our  prisons. 

"I  have  been  perfectly  willing  to  take  this  'cussing'  from  North  Carolina  folks. 
I  am  their  servant  and  it  is  the  constitutional  right  of  all  Tar  Heels  to  'cuss' 
their  officials,  a  right  which  they  exercise  freely  and  about  which  I  make  no 
complaint.  But  I  refuse  to  take  'cussing'  or  criticism  of  my  official  conduct  from 
any  outlander." 


(30) 

A  RESUME  OF  THE  WORK  OF  THE  SPECIAL  SESSION  OF 
THE  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  OF  1920 

(August  29,  1920) 

The  General  Assembly  of  1920,  in  special  session,  meets  the  apostolic  standard 
of  efficiency — "A  workman  that  needeth  not  to  be  ashamed." 

IT   KEPT   THE   FAITH 

The  General  Assembly  more  than  redeemed  its  solemn  pledge  made  to  the 
people  that  the  taxes  derived  from  property  in  1920  should  not  be  more  than  ten 
per  cent  above  those  derived  in  1919.  This  pledge  was  made  in  the  utmost  good 
faith  by  the  General  Assembly  of  1919,  and  has  been  kept  in  letter  and  in  spirit. 

Despite  the  bludgeonings  of  ignorance  and  prejudice,  the  howls  of  wounded 
vanity  and  conceit,  and  the  ambitious  schemes  of  a  few  wholly  selfish  politicians, 
the  General  Assembly  did  not  for  one  second  waver  from  its  allegiance  to  the 
plain  honesty  and  simple  justice  that  requires  all  property  to  be  listed  for  tax- 
ation at  its  true  value.  On  the  other  hand,  it  reiterated  and  emphasized  the  high 
resolve  made  at  the  regular  session  of  1919,  that  henceforward  the  tax  books  of 
North  Carolina  must  speak  the  truth. 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  317 

The  constitutional  amendments  perpetuate  the  equalizing  principle  of  the 
Revaluation  Act  and  lay  deep  and  broad  foundations  for  the  permanent  separation 
of  the  sources  of  State  and  local  revenues. 

The  reduction  of  the  constitutional  limitation  from  66%  cents  to  15  cents  on 
the  one  hundred  dollars  worth  of  property  is  in  harmony  with  the  declared 
purposes  of  the  Revaluation  Act.  The  fifteen-cent  rate  is  as  low  as  the  most 
implacable  foe  of  taxation  would  suggest,  and  yet  when  applied  to  true  values 
will  yield  ample  revenues. 

THE  INCOME  TAX  AMENDMENT 

The  resubmission  of  the  Income  Tax  Amendment  opens  the  way  to  obtain  in 
a  manner  wholly  righteous  and  approved  by  every  state  in  the  Union  and  every 
enlightened  government  on  earth,  additional  revenues  to  meet  the  demands  of  a 
progressive  civilization.  It  also  insures  the  permanent  separation  of  the  sources 
of  State  and  local  revenues. 

A  LONG   SOUGHT   END 

This  is  the  goal  towards  which  I  have  been  steadily  driving  ever  since  I 
entered  public  life.  In  1913  I  submitted  a  paper  to  the  Constitutional  Commis- 
sion appointed  by  Governor  Craig  to  revise  our  tax  system,  in  which  I  said : 

However  much  we  may  disagree  with  the  theories  of  government  advo- 
cated by  Alexander  Hamilton,  it  must  be  conceded  that  he  was  the  greatest 
public  financier  America  has  produced.  It  has  been  well  said,  "Hamilton 
smote  the  rock  of  national  resources  and  abundant  streams  of  revenue 
gushed  forth."  Hamilton's  master  stroke  was  the  separation  of  the  sources 
of  State  and  National  revenues.  The  adoption  of  this  policy  at  once  removed 
a  fruitful  source  of  irritation  between  the  Federal  Government  and  the 
states,  and  at  the  same  time  placed  the  central  government  for  all  time  on 
a  basis  of  financial  independence. 

I  am  profoundly  convinced  that  a  like  separation  of  State  and  local 
revenues  will  bring  about  an  era  of  good  feeling  between  the  several  counties, 
and  between  the  counties  and  the  State,  and  will  further  enable  the  State 
to  go  forward  with  its  proper  work  without  the  handicap  of  a  permanent 
deficit  in  the  Treasury.  Much  has  been  said  in  recent  years  about  equal- 
ization, but  there  can  be  no  equalization  without  segregation. 

In  my  Inaugural  Address,  after  recommending  the  appointment  of  a  Special 
Tax  Commission,  I  said : 

In  the  meantime,  I  desire  to  say,  in  order  that  our  people  may  be  giving 
the  matter  thought,  that  in  my  opinion  any  plan  of  taxation  that  will  raise 
sufficient  revenues  and  be  at  all  acceptable  to  our  people  must  involve  the 
separation  of  the  sources  of  State  and  local  revenues.  If  this  fundamental 
principle  can  once  be  agreed  upon,  its  application  will  become  a  matter  of 
detail. 

THE   MAECH   TOWARDS   SEGREGATION    STARTS 

In  1917  the  State  levied  a  general  property  tax  for  the  support  of  the  State 
Government  of  27%  cents  on  the  one  hundred  dollars  worth  of  property.  In  1919 
it  was  found  that  the  State  could  derive  by  the  enforcement  of  reasonable  privilege 
and  inheritance  taxes  a  larger  amount  of  money  than  heretofore,  and  thereupon 
the  property  tax  for  State  purposes  was  divided  by  two,  being  reduced  from  23% 


318  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

cents  to  11%  cents  for  State  purposes,  and  four  cents  for  pensions,  making  a  total 
of  15%  cents  as  against  27%  cents  in  1917. 

This  year,  on  account  of  the  increased  efficiency  in  the  collection  of  privilege 
taxes  and  inheritance  taxes,  and  by  increasing  certain  franchise  and  privilege 
taxes  to  the  point  where  they  are  in  harmony  with  similar  taxes  in  other  pro- 
gressive states,  it  was  found  that  it  would  not  be  necessary  to  levy  any  property 
tax  at  all  for  the  support  of  the  State  Government  or  pensions.  It  will  be  seen, 
therefore,  that  during  this  administration  and  strictly  in  harmony  with  every 
recommendation  I  have  ever  made  on  the  subject,  we  have  reduced  the  State 
property  tax  from  27%  cents  to  nothing. 

AN    IMMORTAL,    INCONTROVERTIBLE    FACT 

If,  during  this  administration,  not  a  line  nor  a  letter  in  our  tax  laws  had  been 
changed,  if  the  word  "revaluation"  had  never  been  written  and  had  never  been 
spoken  in  North  Carolina,  this  year  under  the  old  rates  and  under  the  old 
valuations,  the  people  would  have  paid  in  taxes  on  their  property  for  the  support 
of  the  State  Government  $3,040,000.  This  year  they  are  not  required  to  pay 
one  cent.  If  the  Income  Tax  Amendment  should  be  adopted  it  will  never  again 
be  necessary  to  levy  a  property  tax  for  the  support  of  the  State  Government,  but 
all  property,  real  and  personal,  individual  and  corporate,  can  be  left  to  the 
counties  and  towns  to  meet  their  local  necessities. 

THE   TEACHERS    WERE    NOT    FORGOTTEN 

The  Educational  bill  makes  another  step  forward.  It  provides  money  sufficient 
to  put  into  effect  the  salary  schedule  adopted  by  the  teachers  and  superintendents 
at  the  Greensboro  conference  this  year.  This  is  a  classified  schedule  that  places 
the  proper  premium  on  efficiency  and  length  of  service.  It  makes  provision  for 
the  establishment  of  standard  high  schools  in  twenty-six  counties  that  now  have 
no  such  schools,  and  it  gives  to  the  counties  much  needed  supervision  in  the 
erection  of  their  school  buildings  and  in  the  expenditure  of  the  public  school 
funds. 

HUMAN   BREAKAGE 

The  General  Assembly  accepted  the  principle  that  in  our  industrial  plants 
human  breakage  should  be  as  much  a  part  of  the  fixed  charges  as  mechanical 
breakage.  It  put  the  man  on  an  equality  with  the  machine.  It  authorized  the 
Governor  to  appoint  a  commission  to  prepare  a  modern  workmen's  compensation 
act  embodying  this  principle.  This  will  be  promptly  done.  The  skeleton  bill 
pretending  to  deal  with  the  situation  at  the  special  session  was  utterly  inadequate, 
and  was  clearly  introduced  for  political  and  not  for  practical  purposes. 

WHITE   TREATMENT    FOR   THE    NEGRO 

The  General  Assembly  recognized  that  if  we  are  to  maintain  a  white  civiliza- 
tion in  North  Carolina  it  must  be  white  in  soul  as  well  as  in  skin.  Therefore  it 
authorized  the  Governor  to  appoint  a  commission  to  prepare  plans  looking  to  the 
establishment  of  a  reformatory  for  negro  delinquent  boys,  a  sanatorium  for  the 
treatment  of  negroes  afflicted  with  tuberculosis,  a  first-class  teacher-training 
school,  and  for  safer  and  more  sanitary  accommodations  for  negroes  on  the  trains. 
All  these  things  are  demanded  by  a  Christian  civilization. 


STATEMENTS  AND  INTERVIEWS  FOR  THE  PRESS  319 

WOMAN  SUFFRAGE 

The  General  Assembly  of  North  Carolina  did  not  run  away  from  the  subject. 
There  were  radical  differences  of  opinion,  but  every  man  stood  by  his  honest 
conviction.  There  was  no  suggestion  that  improper  influences  of  any  kind  were 
used  on  either  side,  and  no  man  or  woman  in  North  Carolina  has  a  right  to 
criticise  any  other  man  or  woman  on  account  of  his  conviction  on  this  matter. 
The  question  is  now  settled  and  it  behooves  us  all,  men  and  women,  to  put  our 
shoulders  together  and  build  up  in  our  midst  a  civilization  richer  and  finer  than 
we  have  ever  known. 


(31) 

PARDONS  AND  PAROLES 

(December  22,  1920) 

I  am  this  week  issuing  my  final  series  of  pardons  and  paroles.  In  connection 
with  these  last  acts  of  executive  clemency  I  desire  to  make  a  statement  to  the 
public.  I  have  been  much  criticised  on  account  of  my  exercise  of  the  pardoning 
power.  I  have  regretted  this  criticism,  but  have  not  resented  it.  It  is  entirely 
possible  that  if  some  other  governor  had  made  the  same  pardon  record  I  would 
have  been  among  his  critics.  It  is  simply  impossible  for  an  outsider  to  see  the 
case  with  the  Governor's  eyes.  Of  course  mistakes  have  been  made  by  myself,  and 
by  all  governors  who  have  gone  before  me,  and  will  be  made  by  all  who  follow  after 
me,  and  this  for  the  simple  reason  that  a  man  who  is  so  cold-blooded  that  he  will 
not  occasionally  make  a  mistake  on  the  side  of  mercy  will  never  get  close  enough 
to  the  people  of  North  Carolina  to  be  chosen  as  their  Governor. 

I  do  not  have  in  my  heart  anything  that  resembles  an  apology  for  throwing 
out  the  life-line  to  men  who  have  fallen  overboard.  I  am  deeply  grateful  to  God 
and  to  the  people  of  North  Carolina  for  giving  me  the  power  to  do  so.  But  I 
do  think  it  proper,  just  before  the  curtain  falls  on  my  administration,  to  make 
known  to  the  people  the  principles  that  have  guided  me  in  the  exercise  of  the 
highest  and  most  sacred  function  of  my  office. 

First.  I  believe  in  the  indeterminate  sentence.  That  all  punishment  should 
be  for  a  minimum  and  maximum  time.  The  people  of  North  Carolina  believe  in 
this  principle.  The  General  Assembly  in  the  year  1917  conferred  on  our  judges 
the  right  to  impose  these  indeterminate  sentences.  In  the  vast  majority  of  cases 
before  me  I  have  simply  applied  this  principle  to  prisoners  convicted  before  the 
passage  of  this  law.  Wherever  the  judge  has  imposed  a  maximum  and  minimum 
term,  I  have  not,  so  far  as  I  can  recall,  interfered  in  any  case  before  the  minimum 
term  imposed  by  the  judge  had  expired.  The  underlying  principle  is  intended  to 
rebuild  men,  and  not  destroy  them. 

Second}  I  am  profoundly  convinced  that  the  average  man  sent  to  prison  is 
not  essentially  a  criminal.  As  Attorney-General  of  the  State  I  prosecuted  every 
criminal  case  that  came  before  the  Supreme  Court  in  eight  years.  During  these 
years  I  was  immersed  in  the  study  of  crimes  and  criminals.  It  was  my  duty  to 
sustain  every  conviction  when  legally  possible  to  do  so,  and  my  work  tended  to 


-? 


320  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

develop  a  bias  against  the  prisoner.  But  these  eight  years  experience  and  study 
have  produced  in  my  mind  a  deep  and  definite  conviction  that  the  average  violator 
of  the  law  is  not  a  moral  pervert,  is  not  essentially  a  criminal,  but  is  a  perfectly 
normal  man  who,  by  reason  of  an  environment  for  which  he  was  not  responsible, 
or  by  reason  of  some  sudden  passion  or  overwhelming  temptation,  commits  an 
act  for  which  he  is  very  properly  sent  to  prison.  But  after  this  normal  man  has 
been  in  prison  for  a  reasonable  time,  if  the  State  gives  him  another  chance  he  will 
not  be  a  menace  to  society,  but  will  be  a  better  citizen  than  he  was  before  he  fell 
into  temptation.    He  has  learned  something  about  the  wages  of  sin. 

There  are,  of  course,  gross  and  vicious  exceptions  to  this  general  rule,  but 
the  conviction  that  the  average  prisoner  is  not  fundamentally  wicked  has  been 
intensified  by  my  study  of  crimes  and  my  experiences  with  criminals  during  my 
four  years  service  as  Governor. 

In  the  exercise  of  the  almost  Godlike  power  granted  me  by  the  Constitution 
I  have  not  been  guided  by  impulse,  by  caprice  or  sentimentalism,  but  in  every 
case  I  have  put  to  my  soul  the  question,  "Is  the  man  worth  saving,  and  is  it 
possible  to  save  him  without  hurt  to  society  at  large?"  J  ' 

This  is  no  defense  of  my  pardon  record.  It  is  my  confession  of  faith — a  faith 
whose  roots  reach  back  to  the  days  of  my  childhood  when  I  used  to  hear  the 
people  sing  in  the  old  church  that  appealing  gospel  hymn : 

"Deal  gently  with  the  erring  one, 

Oh!  do  not  thou  forget, 
However  darkly  stained  with  sin, 

He  is  thy  brother  yet. 
Heir  of  the  selfsame  heritage, 

Child  of  the  selfsame  God ; 
He  has  but  stumbled  in  the  path 

Thou  hast  in  weakness  trod." 


(VI) 
PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS 

[  Telegram] 

New  Yoek,  1ST.  Y.,  January  31,  1917. 
Governor  Thomas  W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Germany  has  presented  a  note  tonight  withdrawing  her  submarine  pledges  and 
indicating  her  intention  of  sinking  without  warning  by  mine  or  torpedo  any  vessel, 
including  American,  carrying  goods  or  passengers  into  a  zone  extending  about 
twenty  miles  around  the  coasts  of  France  and  the  British  Isles  after  February 
fifth.    Please  telegraph  us  a  brief  expression  of  your  view  on  this  situation. 

New  York  Times. 

[  Telegram] 

Kaleigh,  1ST.  C,  February  1,  1917. 
The  New  York  Times, 
New  York  City. 
The  grave  issue  presented  by  the  German  note  is  one  to  be  calmly  determined 
by  the  President  and  Congress.     The  people  of  North  Carolina  have  the  utmost 
confidence  in  the  wisdom  and  patriotism  of  those  who  represent  us  in  Washington, 
and  this  State  will  uphold  their  hands  in  whatever  course  it  is  deemed  necessary 
to  pursue.  T.  W.  Bickett, 

Governor. 

Kaleigh,  N.  C,  February  3,  1917. 
The  World, 

New  York  City. 
North  Carolina  is  a  conservative  State.  Our  people  love  peace  and  hate  war. 
It  is  the  curse  of  the  nations.  We  had  hoped  that  the  warring  governments  of  the 
Old  World  would  respond  to  the  plea  of  our  President  and  enter  into  a  compact 
that  would  insure  permanent  and  universal  peace.  The  reply  of  Germany  to  this 
plea  for  peace  is  a  deliberate  invitation  to  further  strife.  When  the  German 
Government  delivered  its  note  of  January  31  it  knew  then  as  well  as  it  knows  now 
that  diplomatic  relations  would  be  severed.  The  President  could  not  have  done 
less  without  obliterating  every  trace  of  our  national  honor.  We  deeply  hope  that 
Germany  may  yet  stay  her  hand;  but  if  American  ships  or  American  lives  shall 
be  wantonly  destroyed,  then  our  people,  as  one  man,  without  respect  to  race  or 
politics,  will  uphold  the  President  in  whatever  action  he  may  take  to  preserve  the 
honor  and  safety  of  the  Nation.  Respectfully, 

Thomas  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


324  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Raleigh,  N".  C,  March  9,  1917. 
To  All  Judges  of  Superior  Courts: 

My  dear  Judge: — I  have  examined  with  care  the  manuscript  of  Rules  and 
Regulations  and  score  cards  for  convict  camps  prepared  by  the  Board  of  Health 
and  Board  of  Charities  and  Public  Welfare,  and  thoroughly  approve  the  same. 
It  is  the  purpose  of  the  Secretary  of  the  State  Board  of  Health  and  the  Commis- 
sioner of  Public  Welfare  to  send  copies  of  these  manuscripts  to  you  and  the  several 
other  judges  of  Superior  Courts  for  your  consideration  and  approval,  with  request 
for  your  cooperation  in  seeing  them  made  effective.  It  might  be  wise  to  let  it  be 
known  in  the  counties  which  maintain  chain-gangs  that  in  sentencing  prisoners  to 
the  roads,  preference  will  be  given  to  those  counties  which  most  readily  respond 
to  plans  for  proper  treatment  and  care  of  the  men. 

I  would  suggest  that  when  you  can  possibly  do  so  you  make  a  visit  to 
the  camps  in  person,  and  let  it  be  known  that  you  may  go  at  any  time,  and  that 
you  expect  to  see  conditions  as  they  should  be.  It  seems  to  me  that  in  this  way  the 
judges  have  the  matter  of  immediate  improvement,  where  needed,  in  their  hands. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  N".  C,  April  3,  1917. 
Mr.  Paul  Miliukoff, 

Minister  Foreign  Affairs, 
Petrograd,  Russia. 
The  State  of  North  Carolina  sends  warmest  greetings  to  the  greatest  Republic 
of  the  Old  World.  The  high  tides  of  human  thought  and  feeling  all  set  in  your 
direction,  and  all  the  stars  of  destiny  smile  on  you.  The  Russian  people  have 
asserted  their  divine  rights  in  joining  the  Brotherhood  of  Man,  and  may  the  Lord 
of  Liberty  keep  them  steadfast. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  K  C,  April  18,  1917. 
Secretary  of  War, 

Washington,  D.  C. 
Sir: — If  it  will  be  of  service  to  you  in  this  crisis,  North  Carolina  will  get  up 
a  complete  abstract  of  all  of  its  resources  that  may  be  needed  for  army  supplies, 
and  furnish  your  office  with  a  tabulated  list  of  where,  and  in  what  quantities,  and 
in  what  space  of  time,  the  supplies  may  be  obtained.  If  this  service  will  help  you 
kindly  have  some  of  your  officers  send  me  a  list  of  what  sort  of  supplies  you  will 
first  need.  We  want  to  cooperate  with  you  in  the  most  direct  and  most  prac- 
tical way. 

An  answer  by  wire  will  be  appreciated. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  325 

Raleigh,  K  C,  April  18,  1917. 
Hon.  Woodeow  Wilson, 

President  of  the  United  States, 
Washington,  D.  C. 
My  deae  Mr.  President  : — I  am  taking  the  liberty  of  enclosing  herewith  copy 
of  a  telegram  I  have  just  sent  the  New  York  American  in  reply  to  an  inquiry  from 
it  in  regard  to  my  views  upon  the  bill  to  raise  an  army  by  selective  draft. 

In  my  opinion  for  Congress  to  refuse  to  enact  this  bill  will  be  a  colossal 
blunder.  I  incline  to  the  opinion,  however,  that  the  minimum  age  for  selection 
should  be  twenty-one  years  and  the  maximum  thirty.  A  great  many  young  men 
are  taking  courses  in  college  and  the  age  of  nineteen  years  finds  them  in  their 
sophomore  year;  and  to  take  them  away  from  college  at  that  time  means  that 
their  education  will  never  be  completed. 

With  assurances  of  great  esteem,  I  beg  to  remain, 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  April  18,  1917. 
New  York  American, 
New  York  City. 

Equal  rights  entail  equal  duties.  But  men  there  be  who  boldly  assert  their 
rights  and  shrewdly  forget  their  duties. 

A  decent  respect  for  the  principle  of  equality  of  right  and  of  responsibility 
demands  that  in  providing  an  army  for  the  common  defense  selections  should  be 
made  upon  the  basis  of  a  common  liability.  No  sane  person  would  propose  to 
finance  the  war  with  volunteer  subscriptions.  Even  in  times  of  war  money  must 
be  accorded  the  equal  protection  of  the  law.  But  the  volunteer  system  of  raising 
an  army  works  a  tragic  discrimination  against  manhood.  The  flower  of  our  youth 
present  their  bodies  as  a  living  sacrifice  to  their  country  while  baser  breeds  remain 
at  home  and  propagate  the  race.  The  burning  injustice  of  such  a  system  is 
surpassed  only  by  its  nauseating  stupidity.  Men  should  be  selected  for  service 
upon  the  basis  of  natural  fitness.  To  be  so  called  to  the  colors  ought,  and  when 
properly  understood  will  be,  considered  a  nation's  stamp  of  distinction. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Washington,  D.  C,  April  19,  1917. 
Hon.  T.  W.  Bickett, 

Governor  of  North  Carolina, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
My  dear  Governor  : — Let  me  thank  you  for  your  letter  of  April  18th,  with  its 
enclosure.     I  have  read  what  you  say  with  interest  and  appreciation. 

Cordially  and  sincerely  yours, 

Woodrow  Wilson. 


326  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Kaleigh,  N".  0.,  April  21,  1917. 
Chairman  of  Board  of  County  Commissioners: 

My  deae  Me.  Chairman  : — Your  attention  has  been  called  to  the  report  of  the 
Government  showing  that  we  are  facing  a  serious  food  famine  in  the  United 
States.  You  have  seen  the  proclamation  issued  from  this  office  on  the  16th  day  of 
March,  calling  attention  to  the  imperative  necessity  for  increasing  our  food 
supplies,  and  within  the  last  week  the  President  of  the  United  States  has  made  an 
appeal  to  the  people  urging  them  to  increase  our  food  supplies  as  a  patriotic  duty. 

In  every  county  in  the  State  will  be  found  vacant  farms.  The  owners  are  not 
able  to  cultivate  them  and  for  some  reason  have  not  been  able  to  get  tenants  to  do 
so.  Every  one  of  these  farms  ought  to  be  located  and  planted  to  grains,  grasses, 
peas  and  potatoes  this  year.    I  therefore  urge  you : 

1.  To  ascertain  all  such  vacant  farms  in  your  county. 

2.  To  make  arrangements  to  secure  these  farms  for  a  nominal  rent,  which  I  am 
sure  can  easily  be  done,  and  cultivate  them  by  using  the  county  chain-gang  when 
the  convicts  can  be  spared  from  the  public  roads  and  by  additional  labor  employed 
by  the  county,  if  necessary. 

I  have  consulted  the  Attorney-General  of  the  State,  and  he  advises  me  that 
there  is  absolutely  nothing  in  our  statutes  that  makes  it  unlawful  for  the  county 
commissioners  to  do  this.  In  this  way  the  commissioners  can  wonderfully  increase 
our  food  supplies,  and  without  the  assumption  of  any  real  risk  make  a  considerable 
sum  of  money  for  the  county. 

With  much  respect,  I  beg  to  remain, 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Kaleigh,  K  C,  May  9,  1917. 
Col.  Wilson  G.  Lamb, 

Society  of  the  Cincinnati, 

Battery  Pari:  Hotel,  Asheville,  N.  C. 
All  North  Carolinians  are  of  the  seed  of  Cincinnatus — born  rulers  of  empires, 
but  eighty  per  cent  of  them  have,  with  superb  self-restraint,  stuck  to  the  plow. 
The  crisis  that  now  confronts  the  Nation  vindicates  the  wisdom  of  their  choice, 
for  in  the  very  presence  of  "war's  wrinkled  front"  the  plow  ranks  the  sword. 
I  am  the  official  head  of  the  battalions  in  North  Carolina  who  man  the  bread  line. 
From  the  dawn's  early  light  to  the  twilight's  last  gleaming  these  forces  toil  and 
tire  not  that  those  who  fight  may  be  fed.  The  supreme  obligations  of  the  hour 
keep  my  hand  to  the  plow,  and  make  it  impossible  for  me  to  attend  the  meeting  of 
your  illustrious  society.  I  send  the  State's  most  gracious  greetings,  and  throw 
wide  the  door  to  the  hearts  of  a  people  of  whom  more  than  ninety-nine  per  cent 
are  home  born,  and  whose  patriotism  is  exactly  one  hundred  per  cent  pure. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  327 

[  Telegram] 

General  Leonard  Wood,  Raleigh,  N.  C,  May  14,  1917. 

Commander  Southeastern  Department, 
Charleston,  S.  C. 
North  Carolina  sends  greeting  to  you  and  best  wishes  for  the  success  of  your 
administration  of  the  Southeastern  Department  of  the  Army. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  May  19,  1917. 

To  All  Sheriffs,  Clerks  of  Superior  Court,  and  County  Physicians : 

Deae  Sir: — The  President  has  issued  his  proclamation  calling  for  the  regis- 
tration of  all  male  citizens  between  the  ages  of  twenty-one  and  thirty  on  the  fifth 
of  June,  1917,  between  the  hours  of  seven  a.  m.  and  nine  p.  m. 

By  virtue  of  the  power  vested  in  me  by  act  of  Congress,  I  hereby  nominate  and 

commission  you  as  a  member  of  the  County  Board  of  Registration  for 

County,   which   board   is   charged   with   the   administration   of   the   said    act    of 
Congress  in  said  county. 

The  County  Board  of  Registration  is  hereby  directed  to  convene  at  once  and 

1.  Appoint  one  registrar  in  each  voting  precinct  in  the  county.  Where  it  is 
estimated  that  more  than  eighty  persons  will  be  required  to  register  in  the  precinct 
an  additional  registrar  for  each  eighty  persons  to  be  registered  should  be  appointed. 
The  law  contemplates  that  the  registrar  who  served  at  the  State  and  county 
general  election  last  year  shall  be  appointed.  His  experience  is  supposed  to  fit 
him  for  the  peculiar  duties  of  the  office  of  registrar  under  the  act  of  Congress. 
But  the  registrar  must  be  a  competent  clerk,  whose  handwriting  is  neat  and  legible. 

2.  The  Government  encourages  the  appointment  of  volunteer  registrars  who 
will  make  no  charge  for  their  services,  but  will  take  pleasure  in  performing  the 
work  as  a  patriotic  duty  in  this  crisis  of  the  Nation's  life.  But  the  appointments 
of  registrars  must  not  be  delayed  if  volunteer  registrars  do  not  come  forward. 

3.  All  appointments  of  registrars  must  be  made  by  the  24th  day  of  May,  but 
it  is  important  not  to  delay  the  matter,  but  to  make  the  appointments  at  the 
earliest  hour  possible  consistent  with  the  exercise  of  judgment. 

4.  Please  notify  at  once  all  registrars  of  their  appointment  and  furnish  them 
with  the  printed  instructions  as  to  their  duties,  which  printed  instructions  have 
been  sent  direct  to  the  sheriff  of  each  county  from  the  War  Department. 

5.  As  soon  as  your  county  is  completely  organized  notify  me  of  the  fact  and 
send  names  of  all  registrars,  to  the  end  that  I  may  telegraph  the  Provost  Marshal- 
General  at  Washington  that  North  Carolina  is  organized. 

6.  County  attorneys  will  advise  County  Board  and  registrars  on  any  questions 
pertaining  to  the  administration  of  the  law,  but  if  there  is  any  doubt  in  your 
minds  write  or  wire  me. 

7.  Head  all  telegrams  to  me  "War  Department,  Official  Business,  Charge  to 
Federal  Government."     Do  not  use  telegrams  save  where  time  is  important. 

8.  I  am  satisfied  our  citizens  can  be  relied  upon  to  cooperate  with  the  County 
Board  and  with  the  registrars  in  every  possible  way.    Let  me  urge  that  there  be  no 


328  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  B1CKETT 

raising  of  technical  objections,  no  spirit  of  evasion  or  controversy;  but  let  every 
citizen,  young  and  old,  feel  that  his  country  expects  him  to  do  his  part  in  bringing 
about  a  speedy  and  efficient  organization  under  the  law. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Mb.  F.  E.  Seely,  Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  May  24,  1917. 

Asheville,  N.  C. 

My  deae  Me.  Seely  : — In  compliance  with  the  plan  of  organization  devised  by 
the  National  Council  of  Defense,  I  am  organizing  a  subcouncil  for  the  State  of 
North  Carolina  to  be  known  as  the  State  Council  of  Defense  of  North  Carolina. 
The  Governor  and  the  Adjutant-General  are  ex  officio  members  of  this  Council, 
together  with  nine  others  appointed  by  the  Governor.  I  have  appointed  you  as  a 
member  of  this  Council,  and  am  sending  your  commission  herewith.  I  sincerely 
trust  that  you  will  be  able  to  serve  the  country  in  this  capacity.  The  first  meeting 
of  the  Council  will  be  held  in  the  Senate  Chamber  in  Raleigh  on  Thursday,  the 
31st  day  of  May,  at  12  o'clock,  when  the  entire  plan  will  be  outlined. 

Respectfully, 
Same  letter  to :  T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Me.  Jas.  Speunt,  Wilmington,  N.  C. 

Me.  Geo.  W.  Watts,  Durham,  N.  C. 

Me.  C.  C.  Tayloe,  Greensboro,  N.  C. 

Me.  R.  N.  Page,  Biscoe,  N.  C. 

Me.  W.  S.  Lee,  Charlotte,  N.  C. 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  June  6,  1917. 
Peovost  Maeshal-Geneeal, 
Washington,  D.  C. 
Am  gratified  to  report  full  registration  in  North  Carolina.     Not  one  trace  of 
opposition  or  disturbance  at  any  precinct  in  the  State. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[Telegram  to  all  Sheriffs] 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  June  11,  1917. 

Sheeiff County,  N.  C. 

The  War  Department  orders  the  arrest  of  every  man  whose  duty  it  was  to 
register  and  failed  to  do  it.  Please  make  a  searching  investigation  in  every 
precinct  in  your  county,  and  if  a  single  man  failed  to  register  according  to  law, 
report  the  same  to  the  nearest  United  States  Attorney  or  Marshal,  and  the 
delinquent  will  be  arrested  at  once.  North  Carolina  registered  more  men  than 
the  Government  estimated  it  would,  according  to  our  population.  This  fine  fact 
makes  it  all  the  more  important  to  require  all  delinquents  to  be  registered.  When 
ninety-nine  men  voluntarily  do  their  duty  it  is  the  essence  of  justice  to  the  ninety- 
nine  to  compel  the  hundredth  man  to  do  his.  The  quota  from  North  Carolina  will 
be  based  on  the  original  estimate  of  the  Government,  and  not  on  our  actual 
registration.  Therefore  every  additional  man  registered  reduces  the  proportion 
of  the  whole  that  will  be  first  selected  for  service. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  329 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  June  12,  1917. 
Paul  C.  "Whitlock, 

Charlotte,  N.  C. 
I  deeply  regret  that  war  duties  specific  and  imperative  preclude  the  possibility 
of  my  appearing  in  person  before  the  people  of  Charlotte  tonight  in  the  interest  of 
the  Liberty  Loan  Bonds.  I  desire  to  register  my  abiding  faith  that  the  birthplace 
of  American  liberty  will  do  its  full  duty  in  the  battle  for  the  liberties  of  all 
mankind.  On  the  fifth  of  June  we  dedicated  our  man  power  to  the  cause  of 
humanity  in  heroic  fashion.  The  man  has  gone  forward.  Shall  the  dollar  skulk 
in  the  background  ?  The  instincts  of  humanity  and  business  sagacity  alike  urge 
that  the  dollar  back  the  man.  In  the  last  analysis  the  man  backs  the  dollar. 
If  our  armies  should  fail,  and  they  must  fail  unless  they  are  given  adequate 
support,  then  our  industries  would  be  sold  into  bondage,  and  our  chief  occupation 
for  a  hundred  years  would  be  to  render  tribute  unto  the  Kaiser. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

"Washington,  D.  C,  June  30,  1917. 
Goveenob  T.  "W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Dear  Governor  Bickett  : — At  the  close  of  the  wonderfully  successful  cam- 
paign for  the  Red  Cross  War  Fund  I  intended,  in  behalf  of  the  "War  Council,  to 
send  you  and  your  associates  a  telegram  of  thanks  and  congratulations  for  your 
splendidly    effective   work.      On    reflection,   however,    I    decided    in   view    of   the 
Nation-wide  extent  of  our  organization  that  it  would  be  more  economical,  and 
equally  satisfactory,  to  write  to  you  instead  of  telegraphing. 

We  of  the  War  Council  are  deeply  grateful  to  you,  to  your  colleagues,  to  the 
devoted  men  and  women  of  local  Red  Cross  Chapters  and  Auxiliaries,  and  to 
every  element  and  individual  in  your  community  who  aided  by  service  and  con- 
tribution. 

There  is  no  method  by  which  we  can  reach  the  legion  of  individuals,  organiza- 
tions, churches,  newspapers,  societies,  banks,  companies  and  firms  whose  united 
effort  has  provided  this  great  fund  for  humanity,  and  if  through  your  press  and 
by  other  means  you  can  make  public  expression  of  our  gratitude  we  shall  deeply 
appreciate  the  courtesy.  Their  joint  accomplishment  has  stirred  the  pride  of  every 
American. 

I  wish  to  add  my  personal  thanks  to  you,  and  through  you  to  all  who  con- 
tributed to  the  splendid  result. 

Very  sincerely  yours, 

H.  P.  Davison,  Chairman, 

Red  Cross  War  Council. 


390  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

[Telegram] 

Goveknoe  T.  W.  Bickett,  Dubham,  N.  C,  July  4,  1917. 

Executive  Mansion, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

The  increasing  lynchings  of  a  helpless  people  both  North  and  South,  in  many 
instances  for  trivial  things,  are  having  depressing  effects  on  a  people  who  love 
their  country  and  who  are  loyal  and  true  to  the  flag.  The  courts  of  the  land  are 
in  control  of  the  whites,  so  there  is  never  an  excuse  for  a  lynching.  All  crimes 
should  be  justly  and  severely  punished,  and  there  need  be  no  fear  that  any  negro 
criminal  or  supposed  criminal  will  ever  escape.  The  negro  is  asking  for  a  right 
to  live  and  to  hope.  I  appeal  to  you  as  a  great  Governor  to  issue  a  public  state- 
ment in  behalf  of  the  negro,  asking  the  people  that  wherever  a  supposed  crime  is 
committed  to  refrain  from  lynching  and  to  give  the  courts  a  chance.  I  appeal 
to  you  to  see  that  the  strong  do  not  unnecessarily  oppress  the  weak,  and  the  negro 
be  given  fair  and  just  treatment,  so  that  inter-racial  differences  be  avoided  and 
that  all  together  in  America  may  present  to  the  outside  world  the  picture  of 
absolute  justice  to  all  races  and  classes  working  side  by  side  to  help  make  the 
world  a  better  place  in  which  people  can  live. 

With  great  respect  and  esteem,  Yours  very  truly, 

Jas.  E.  Shepakd, 
President  National  Training  School. 

[  Telegram] 

Hon.  Newton  D.  Bakek,  Kaleigh,  N.  C,  July  6,  1917. 

Secretary  of  War, 

Washington,  D.  C. 
A  great  many  members  of  the  North  Carolina  National  Guard  are  out  of 
employment  and  without  means  of  support.  It  would  be  a  blessing  to  these  men 
to  be  employed  in  the  construction  of  military  camps  and  cantonments.  They 
would  not  only  be  glad  to  do  this  work  at  the  prices  the  Government  pays  civilians, 
but  their  employment  would  prevent  the  paralysis  of  other  industries  by  laborers 
being  taken  away  from  them  to  build  these  camps.  I  earnestly  urge  you  to  give 
the  members  of  the  North  Carolina  National  Guard  the  opportunity  to  work  in 
this  capacity.  Of  course  I  do  not  ask  that  an  order  be  issued  making  it  mandatory 
for  members  of  the  Guard  to  do  this  work,  but  I  do  ask  and  urge  that  they  be 
given  the  privilege  of  doing  it,  if  they  feel  so  disposed. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[Telegram] 

"Washington,  D.  C,  July  6,  1917. 
Hon.  T.  W.  Bickett, 

Governor  of  North  Carolina, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Your   telegram   July   six   relative   employment    members   National   Guard   in 
military  camps  received.     Matter  will  receive  consideration. 

McCain. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  331 

Hon.  H.  P.  Davison,  Raleigh,  N.  C,  July  6,  1917. 

Chairman  Red  Cross  War  Council, 
Washington,  D.  C. 
My  dear  Sib: — I  thank  you  sincerely  for  your  letter  of  June  30th  in  regard 
to  the  campaign  waged  for  the  Red  Cross  in  North  Carolina.  I  can  assure  you 
that  it  was  a  labor  of  love  on  the  part  of  those  who  took  part  in  this  campaign. 
It  is  my  hope  that  in  the  future  this  State  will  be  found  at  the  very  forefront  in 
cooperation  with  the  Red  Cross  in  the  great  work  it  has  to  do  during  this  war. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Dr.  Jas.  E.  Shepasd,  Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  July  7,  1917. 

President  National  Training  School, 
Durham,  N.  C. 

Dear  Sir: — I  concur  without  reservation  in  the  sentiments  expressed  in  your 
telegram  of  July  4th.  For  a  mob  to  kill  a  man  is  the  essence  of  brutality  and 
cowardice.  The  white  people  are  under  a  peculiar  obligation  to  refrain  from 
violence  of  any  sort  against  the  colored  people  of  the  land.  Up  to  this  time  there 
has  been  no  mob  violence  in  the  State  of  North  Carolina  during  the  present  admin- 
istration, and  I  am  earnestly  endeavoring  to  promote  good  feeling  between  the 
races,  and  sincerely  trust  that  our  people  under  all  circumstances  will  refrain 
from  taking  the  law  into  their  own  hands. 

It  is  my  opinion  that  the  people  of  North  Carolina,  white  and  black,  are 
law  abiding  and  humane.  We  have  been  exceptionally  free  from  the  riots  and 
disorder  that  have  prevailed  in  some  sections  of  the  country,  and  I  earnestly  hope 
that  the  people  of  this  State  will  not  only  sustain  but  improve  the  reputation  for 
decency,  peace  and  respect  for  law  that  they  now  enjoy. 

The  riots  in  St.  Louis  are  simply  cumulative  evidence  that  after  all  the  South 
is  the  best  place  for  the  black  man.  In  the  South  the  negro  is  recognized  as  a 
legitimate  factor,  and  there  has  never  been  any  disposition  to  interfere  with  his 
lawful  activities.  The  South  understands  the  negro  and  is  ever  ready  to  give  him 
intelligent  aid  and  sympathy. 

I  see  in  today's  papers  that  Mr.  Samuel  Gompers,  President  of  the  American 
Federation  of  Labor,  charges  that  negroes  have  been  induced  in  large  numbers  to 
leave  the  South  and  go  to  sundry  cities  in  the  North  and  West  in  order  to  "break 
the  back  of  labor."  It  seems  to  me  that  it  is  an  opportune  time  for  the  leaders  of 
the  negro  race  to  impress  upon  their  people  the  truth  that  the  best  friends  of  the 
negro  are  right  here  in  the  South  and  that  in  many  cases  those  who  make  system- 
atic efforts  to  induce  the  negro  to  leave  the  South  know  that  trouble  and  danger 
await  him.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  July  10,  1917. 

To  All  Members  of  the  Local  Exemption  Boards  in  the  Various  Counties  and 
Cities  of  the  State: 
Dear  Sir  : — Several  letters  have  come  to  this  office  from  different  parts  of  the 
State,  indicating  a  fear  on  the  part  of  a  few  people  that  local  boards  may  not  in 


392  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

all  cases  act  with  absolute  impartiality  in  passing  upon  claims  for  exemption  and 
in  prescribing  tbe  order  in  which  persons  not  exempt  shall  be  called  to  service. 

It  is  not  necessary  for  me  to  say  that  I  do  not  personally  share  this  fear. 
Your  recommendation  by  me  to  the  President  of  the  United  States  for  this 
patriotic  service  carried  with  it  my  abiding  faith  that  you  would  do  your  duty 
without  fear  and  without  favor. 

I  deem  it  proper,  however,  to  call  your  attention  to  the  apprehension  reflected 
in  these  letters  and  to  beg  you  to  hold  your  sacred  office  so  high  above  personal 
or  partisan  considerations  that  when  the  work  is  done  your  enemies  will  be  forced 
to  concede  that  in  every  case  you  acted  with  the  fear  of  God  and  the  love  of  your 
country  before  your  eyes.  Above  all  things,  let  me  beseech  you  not  to  allow 
political  influences  to  touch  the  hem  of  your  garment.  It  would  be  a  tragic  and 
nauseating  prostitution  of  a  wise  and  just  law  if  politics  should  be  considered 
when  the  lives  of  men  and  the  very  destiny  of  the  race  are  in  the  balance. 

It  is  proper  to  say  that  the  letters  mentioned  have  come  from  less  than  five  per 
cent  of  the  counties  in  the  State,  but  the  fact  that  the  fear  has  been  expressed  at  all 
makes  it  my  duty  to  advise  all  members  of  local  boards  to  the  end  that  their  work 
may  be  done  on  a  plane  of  patriotism  so  high  that  no  breath  of  suspicion  can 
reach  it. 

With  great  esteem,  I  beg  to  remain      Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

His  Excellency,  Hon.  T.  W.  Bickett,         Silek  City>  X-  C->  August  2>  1917- 
Governor  of  North  Carolina, 

Raleigh,  North  Carolina. 

Deae  Sir  : — Certain  parties  in  this  county  are  reported  to  be  soliciting  funds 
from  men  drafted,  using  the  argument  that  the  draft  law  is  unconstitutional,  and 
proposing  to  employ  counsel  to  test  it,  etc.,  and  are  using  language  that  is  calcu- 
lated to  arouse  the  ignorant  against  the  Government.  Each  day  we  hear  of  this 
going  on  in  different  sections,  and  greatly  fear  that  we  are  going  to  have  a  serious 
situation  in  certain  sections  unless  something  can  be  done  to  stop  it. 

In  one  township  we  learn  that  an  effort  is  being  made  to  prevent  any  man 
whose  name  has  been  drawn  among  the  first  to  be  examined  from  appearing,  and 
various  other  things  are  being  done  that  may  give  us  trouble. 

On  yesterday  we  wrote  the  District  Attorney  in  regard  to  this  matter,  but 
have  deemed  it  wise  to  call  it  to  your  attention  and  to  ask  that  you  cooperate 
with  us  in  an  effort  to  have  the  Department  of  Justice  send  some  representative  to 
Chatham  to  take  the  matter  in  hand.  If  we  can  now  secure  the  arrest  of  a  few 
men,  we  believe  it  will  strike  terror  to  the  disloyal  element  and  that  further 
trouble  may  be  avoided.  Anything  you  will  do  or  suggest  in  this  connection  will 
be  most  heartily  appreciated.  Yours  very  truly, 

Leon  L.  Lane, 
Sheriff  of  Chatham  County. 

Walter  D.  Siler, 
Solicitor  of  the  Fourth  District. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  333 

Solicitor  "Waiter  D.  Silek,  Raleigh,  IT.  C,  August  4,  1917. 

Sheriff  Leon  L.  Lane, 
Siler  City,  N.  C. 
Gentlemen  : — Your   joint   letter   of   August   2d   received   and  carefully   con- 
sidered.   In  it  you  say: 

Certain  parties  in  this  county  are  reported  to  be  soliciting  funds  from 
men  drafted,  using  the  argument  that  the  draft  law  is  unconstitutional  and 
proposing  to  employ  counsel  to  test  it,  etc.,  and  are  using  language  that  is 
calculated  to  arouse  the  ignorant  against  the  Government.  Each  day  we 
hear  of  this  going  on  in  different  sections,  and  greatly  fear  that  we  are  going 
to  have  a  serious  situation  in  certain  sections  unless  something  can  be  done 
to  stop  it.  In  one  township  we  learn  that  an  effort  is  being  made  to  prevent 
any  man  whose  name  has  been  drawn  among  the  first  to  be  examined  from 
appearing,  and  various  other  things  are  being  done  that  may  give  us  trouble. 

In  reply  I  beg  to  advise  that  the  first  article  and  the  eighth  section  of  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States  clothes  the  Congress  with  power  "to  declare 
war,  to  raise  and  support  armies  and  to  make  all  laws  which  shall  be  necessary 
and  proper  for  carrying  into  execution  the  foregoing  powers." 

In  strict  conformity  to  the  constitutional  powers  so  conferred,  Congress  has, 
with  practical  unanimity,  declared  that  a  state  of  war  exists  between  the  United 
States  and  the  Imperial  German  Government,  and  has  enacted  the  Selective 
Draft  Law  for  the  purpose  of  raising  an  army  to  carry  on  the  war  so  declared. 

The  Nation  is,  therefore,  lawfully  at  war.  Through  its  accredited  repre- 
sentatives it  has  declared  its  will  and  fixed  its  course.  There  was  a  time  for 
difference  and  debate.  That  time  has  now  expired.  We  are  in  a  death-grapple 
with  the  enemy,  and  the  man  who  in  this  perilous  hour  lifts  voice  or  hand  to 
weaken  the  Nation's  will  or  shorten  its  arm  is  a  traitor  to  his  country  and  a  friend 
to  its  foes.  He  is  more  than  a  traitor.  He  is  a  murderer.  Any  word  spoken, 
any  deed  done  to  hinder  the  vigorous  prosecution  of  the  war  means  a  prolongation 
of  the  war,  and  this  means  added  loss  of  life. 

The  men  who  for  love  of  money  are  promising  to  show  registrants  a  way  of 
escape  from  their  duty  have  sounded  depths  of  infamy  heretofore  unknown.  Send 
me  their  names  and  I  promise  that  they  shall  be  forever  pilloried  in  a  people's 
contempt. 

The  Constitution  defines  treason  against  the  United  States  to  be  "giving  aid 
and  comfort  to  their  enemies."  Every  discordant  note  is  comfort  to  the  Kaiser. 
Every  attempt  to  prevent  the  Nation  from  presenting  a  solid  front  is  strength 
to  his  arm. 

I  do  not  propose  to  tolerate  treason  in  North  Carolina  by  word  or  deed,  if 
there  be  power  in  State  or  Federal  law  to  prevent  it.  You  and  all  sheriffs  and 
solicitors  in  the  State  are  directed  to  report  by  wire  to  the  United  States  District 
Attorney  and  to  this  office  any  man  who  may,  by  word  or  deed,  give  aid  and 
comfort  to  the  enemy  by  seeking  to  palsy  the  Nation's  arm  as  it  is  raised  to  strike. 
Immediate  and  drastic  action  will  be  taken  upon  every  report,  and  men  who  thus 
desert  their  country  in  its  hour  of  peril  will  be  made  to  feel  the  strong  arm  of  the 
law.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


334  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Hon.  E.  L.  Doughton,  Raleigh,  N.  C,  September  4,  1917. 

Member  of  Congress, 

Washington,  D.  C. 
My  deab  Mb.  Doughton  : — I  enclose  herewith  some  correspondence  in  regard 
to  sweet  potatoes.  All  I  have  to  say  is  that  if  the  President,  or  anybody  else, 
fails  to  put  sweet  potatoes  on  the  soldiers'  bill  of  fare  while  in  the  South,  he  does 
the  soldiers  a  great  injustice.  Evidently  these  people  do  not  know  anything  about 
North  Carolina  yams.  I  hope  that  you  can  do  something  to  get  the  sweet  potato 
introduced  in  the  military  circles.  Once  the  soldiers  eat  them  they  will  fight  for 
them.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  September  25,  1917. 
Adjutant  Geneeal, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

Sie  : — Pursuant  to  the  proclamation  issued  by  me  on  the  23d  day  of  September, 
1917,  you  are  directed  to  proceed  to  organize  State  Militia  companies  in  the 
several  counties  of  the  State,  beginning  in  the  counties  having  the  largest  popu- 
lation. 

You  will  designate  an  advisory  committee  of  three  men  for  each  county  and 
direct  such  committees  to  carefully  select  the  members  for  the  militia  companies. 
It  is  my  desire  that  the  men  selected  shall  represent  the  intelligence,  the  character 
and  the  courage  of  the  communities  in  which  they  live.  These  men  are  to  be  the 
special  guardians  of  our  women  and  children  and  the  keepers  of  the  peace  and 
order  of  the  State.  The  service  they  are  to  perform  requires  that  the  militia  roll 
shall  be  a  roll  of  honor.    I  insist  that  the  men  selected  shall  be: 

1.  Men  who  fear  God  and  make  a  decent  effort  to  keep  His  commandments. 

2.  Men  of  fortitude  who  are  able  and  willing,  for  the  public  weal,  to  face 
danger  and  endure  hardships  without  complaint. 

3.  Men  of  quiet  minds  who  will  be  very  careful  of  human  life,  but  will,  when 
stern  necessity  demands  it,  shoot  straight  to  protect  the  helpless  and  preserve  the 
peace  and  order  of  the  State. 

These  men  are  to  be  selected,  but  not  drafted.  The  organizations  are  to  be 
composed  neither  of  volunteers  nor  of  drafted  men,  but  of  men  chosen  by  the 
committees  because  it  is  believed  that  they  possess  peculiar  qualifications  for  the 
service  to  which  they  are  called.  If  any  man  who  is  selected  shall  decline  the 
honor,  it  will  not  be  thrust  upon  him.  Any  unwillingness  to  serve  would  indicate 
that  the  committee  had  made  a  mistake  in  the  selection  of  that  particular  man. 
In  designating  the  advisory  committees  you  will  take  pains  to  name  men  who 
are  themselves  patriotic,  intelligent,  unselfish  and  unafraid. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  335 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C.,  September  25,  1917. 
Provost  Makshal-General, 
Washington,  D.  C. 

My  deab  Sib  : — I  am  profoundly  convinced  that  the  administration  of  the 
Selective  Draft  Law  is  being  attended  with  much  unnecessary  hardship  and 
suffering.  It  seems  to  me  that  not  enough  attention  has  been  paid  to  the  selective 
principle  in  the  law.  The  determination  of  the  order  in  which  registrants  shall 
be  called  to  the  service  by  chance  has  undoubtedly  the  merit  of  equality  in  the 
sense  that  there  is  no  discrimination  between  registrants.  But  my  deep  conviction 
is  that  justice  and  the  highest  kind  of  equality  require  discrimination.  In  order 
that  there  may  be  a  wise  and  just  discrimination  in  the  selection  of  the  men  who 
are  to  be  sent  to  the  front,  I  submit  the  following  plan: 

Let  the  local  boards  divide  all  registrants  into  three  classes : 

1.  All  single  men  and  all  married  men  who  do  not  habitually  support  their 
families. 

2.  All  married  men  who  have  no  children. 

3.  All  married  men  who  have  children. 

Let  the  registrants  be  called  for  examination  in  the  order  of  their  serial 
number,  but  let  all  men  in  Class  No.  1  who  are  entitled  to  exemption  be  certified 
by  the  District  Board  to  the  Local  Board  for  service  before  any  registrants  are 
certified  from  Class  No.  2.  In  many  instances  it  will  be  found  that  the  entire 
quota  of  a  county  can  be  supplied  from  Class  jSTo.  1. 

If,  however,  the  quota  cannot  be  made  up  from  Class  No.  1,  then  let  the 
District  Board  begin  to  certify  in  the  order  of  their  serial  number  the  men  from 
Class  No.  2,  and  continue  this  process  through  the  several  classes  until  the  quota  is 
complete. 

In  my  opinion  this  method  will  carry  out  the  spirit  of  the  law,  and  certainly 
it  is  the  very  essence  of  humanitarianism.  It  is  cruel  to  the  last  degree  to  send 
a  husband  and  father  away  from  his  wife  and  children,  although  they  may 
possibly  be  able  to  subsist  without  his  financial  support,  while  further  down  the 
line  are  young  men  entirely  free  from  family  ties  and  obligations.  I  earnestly 
bespeak  for  this  method  your  serious  consideration,  and  hope  that  the  rule  can  be 
made  retroactive,  especially  with  reference  to  men  who  have  wives  and  children. 

This  method  would  involve,  of  course,  the  immediate  examination  of  all  regis- 
trants, but  I  understand  that  this  has  already  been  definitely  agreed  upon. 

With  sentiments  of  great  esteem,  I  beg  to  remain, 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  September  27,  1917. 

To  County  Superintendents  of  Public  Instruction: 

My  deae  Sib: — I  am  sending  you  under  separate  cover  copies  of  an  appeal  to 
the  farmers  of  the  State  to  observe  the  month  of  November  as  Thrift  Month. 
I  earnestly  request  you  to  get  these  copies  at  once  into  the  hands  of  every  teacher 
in  rural  or  small  village  schools.     Ask  the  teacher  to  read  these  appeals  to  the 


336  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

children  to  call  the  matter  to  the  attention  of  their  parents.  Ask  the  teachers  also 
to  post  one  of  these  appeals  upon  the  door  of  every  schoolroom,  or  in  some  con- 
spicuous place  where  it  can  be  read.  Later  on  a  plan  will  be  devised  for  taking  a 
census  in  each  school  district  showing  how  many  farmers  in  the  district  have 
heeded  the  appeal. 

I  will  greatly  appreciate  your  kindly  cooperation  in  making  Thrift  Month  a 
notable  success. 

With  much  respect,  I  beg  to  remain, 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  October  8,  1917. 

To  Members  of  All  Local  Exemption  Boards: 

Deae  Sie: — I  have  just  returned  from  Washington,  wThere  I  had  a  personal 
interview  with  Provost  Marshal-General  Crowder  and  with  the  Secretary  of  War. 
As  a  result  of  these  interviews,  I  am  prepared  to  advise  you  that  hereafter  when 
married  men  claim  exemptions  on  the  ground  of  dependent  wife  or  children,  or 
both,  the  board  will  determine: 

1.  Whether  or  not  as  a  matter  of  fact  the  registrant  has  theretofore  supported 
his  wife  by  his  own  manual  or  mental  labor. 

2.  Whether  or  not  the  husband  or  wife,  or  both,  have  property,  the  income  from 
which  would  be  sufficient  to  support  the  wife  and  children,  if  any,  in  case  the 
husband  is  ordered  into  military  service. 

If  the  first  inquiry  shall  be  found  in  the  affirmative  and  the  second  in  the 
negative,  then  the  registrant  is  entitled  to  his  discharge  as  a  matter  of  law,  unless 
the  board  shall  further  find  as  a  fact : 

1.  That  the  parents  of  the  husband  or  wife  have  sufficient  property  to  support 
the  wife  and  children,  if  any,  during  the  absence  of  the  husband,  and 

2.  That  such  parents  have  signified  that  they  are  ready  to  voluntarily  under- 
take the  support  of  such  wife  and  children,  if  any. 

In  other  words,  the  burden  of  the  support  of  the  wife  and  children,  if  any, 
cannot  be  thrust  upon  the  parents  against  their  will,  under  the  law.  And  the 
burden  is  upon  the  Government  to  show  that  the  parents  are  both  able  and  willing 
to  undertake  this  support. 

The  above  principle  will  be  followed  by  you  in  all  future  cases  coming  before 
you.  With  respect  to  married  men  whose  claims  have  already  been  passed  upon 
by  you,  I  suggest  that  in  cases  where  the  above  principles  of  law  have  not  been 
applied,  and  where  in  your  opinion  real  hardships  will  be  imposed  by  sending  or 
keeping  these  men  in  the  service,  that  you  submit  the  facts  in  each  particular 
case  to  the  Adjutant  General  of  the  State,  who  will  then  determine  whether  or  not 
such  particular  cases  involving  great  hardships  should  be  reopened  and  determined 
in  the  light  of  the  principles  above  announced. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  337 

Kaleigh,  N".  C,  October  15,  1917. 

To  All  Members  of  the  State  Board  of  Agriculture: 

My  deae  Sib: — The  people  of  North  Carolina  have  been  called  upon  by  the 
Federal  Government  to  invest  twenty-seven  million  dollars  in  Liberty  Bonds,  this 
being  the  State's  proportion  of  the  second  three-billion-dollar  issue.  If  our  people 
fail  to  purchase  these  bonds  promptly  it  will  mean  that  North  Carolina  is  not 
doing  her  part  to  help  win  this  war — that  she  is  either  willfully  or  carelessly 
failing  to  carry  her  share  of  the  burden  the  war  imposes  upon  the  various  states. 
My  faith  in  their  patriotism  and  loyalty  refuses  to  permit  me  to  entertain  for  one 
moment  any  doubt  of  the  willingness  of  our  citizens  to  rise  to  this  emergency  if 
the  matter  is  properly  presented  to  them. 

However,  it  is  no  small  task  to  sell  $27,000,000  worth  of  Government  bonds, 
and  if  the  State's  proportion  is  to  be  taken  care  of,  every  citizen  must  do  his  part. 
It  is  neither  right  to  expect,  nor  safe  to  permit,  the  few  to  buy  all  of  these  bonds. 

I  therefore  earnestly  request  you,  as  a  member  of  the  State  Board  of  Agri- 
culture, to  bring  this  matter  to  the  attention  of  the  farmers  of  North  Carolina,  and 
use  all  your  influence  to  the  end  that  every  one  of  them  shall  buy  at  least  one 
Liberty  Bond.  The  percentage  of  increase  in  the  price  of  the  farmer's  products  as 
a  result  of  this  war  is  greater  perhaps  than  that  of  any  other  class  of  our  citizens. 
The  average  farmer  is  in  a  better  position  today  than  ever  before  to  make  a  safe 
and  profitable  investment  such  as  this. 

Moreover,  it  is  the  farmer's  patriotic  duty  to  buy  a  bond.  I  know  of  no  better 
way  by  which  he  can  serve  his  country  in  this  crisis.  If  we  are  to  fight  this  war 
to  a  successful  finish  these  bonds  must  be  sold.  In  the  prosecution  of  this  war 
money  is  just  as  necessary  as  men  and  munitions. 

The  offer  of  these  bonds  gives  the  farmer  a  magnificent  opportunity  to  take 
stock  in  his  Government.  If  he  is  wise  he  will  be  eager  to  grasp  this  opportunity, 
for  by  so  doing  he  will  help  to  insure  for  himself  and  his  children  a  continuation 
of  government  of  the  people,  by  the  people,  and  for  the  people. 

Please  do  all  in  your  power  to  bring  these  facts  home  to  the  farmers  of  North 
Carolina.  Let  them  know  that  the  bond  buyer  receives  as  well  as  gives.  He  not 
only  comes  to  the  aid  of  the  Government,  but  he  also  makes  a  good  interest-bearing 
investment.  The  bond  he  receives  is  the  safest  security  in  the  world,  because  the 
promise  to  pay  is  backed  by  the  faith  and  honor  of  the  United  States,  the  richest 
nation  in  the  world.  The  Government  of  the  United  States  has  never  failed  to 
pay  its  bonds  when  due,  and  never  will  fail.  The  great  corporations  and  rich 
individuals,  seeing  the  advantages  of  so  good  an  investment  and  responding  to 
the  patriotic  impulse,  are  investing  billions  in  war  bonds. 

Will  the  farmers  of  North  Carolina  be  less  patriotic?  Will  they  let  this 
opportunity  to  serve  and  to  save  pass  by  unheeded? 

I  have  called  upon  the  farmers  to  observe  Thrift  Month,  and  I  know  of  no 
better  way  for  them  to  do  so  than  by  purchasing  Liberty  Bonds.  I  want,  therefore, 
again  to  urge  you  to  cooperate  heartily  and  effectively  with  the  State  Liberty 
Loan  Committee  to  the  end  that  every  farmer  that  is  able  to  do  so  buys  at  least 
one  $50  Liberty  Bond.  Bespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

22 


398  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

[In  view  of  the  many  inquiries  received  at  this  office,  and  of  a  misunderstanding 
of  the  facts  that  seems  to  exist  in  some  quarters,  the  following  letter  which  the 
Governor  wrote  on  October  16th  to  Dr.  H.  Q.  Alexander,  President  of  the  Farmers' 
Union,  is  given  to  the  public,  October  24,  1917. — Note  by  Governor's  Secretary.] 

Dr.  H.  Q.  Alexander,  Kaleigh,  1ST.  C,  October  16,  1917. 

Matthews,  N.  C. 

My  dear  Dr.  Alexander: — Your  recent  letter  received,  and  I  intended  to 
reply  at  once,  but  unremitting  pressure  of  other  duties  made  it  impossible  for  me 
to  do  so. 

After  you  wrote  me  the  letter,  to  which  I  replied  from  Hendersonville,  and  in 
which  you  said  you  did  not  propose  to  make  any  more  war  speeches,  I  deemed  the 
incident  closed,  and  did  not  consider  that  the  situation  would  demand  any  further 
attention  at  my  hands. 

But  your  recent  letter  seems  to  treat  my  appointment  of  you  as  a  delegate  to 
the  National  Farmers'  Congress  as  some  sort  of  an  endorsement  of  your  attitude. 
This  view  of  your  appointment  seems  to  be  entertained  by  some  of  your  friends 
and  some  of  your  enemies.  Your  letter,  and  the  contention  of  the  friends  and 
enemies  above  mentioned,  make  it  proper  for  me  to  state  the  exact  facts.  The  rule 
in  this  office  is,  that  when  delegates  are  to  be  appointed  to  conventions  of  this  kind, 
the  head  of  the  department  of  the  State  Government  that  is  chiefly  interested  in 
the  subjects  that  will  come  before  the  convention  suggests  a  list  of  delegates  to  be 
sent,  and  this  list  is  rubber-stamped  in  the  office  of  the  Secretary  to  the  Governor 
without  being  brought  to  his  personal  attention.  This  is  precisely  what  occurred 
with  respect  to  the  list  of  delegates  recently  appointed  to  the  National  Farmers' 
Congress.  I  was  out  of  the  city  and  did  not  see  the  list  until  the  names  appeared 
in  the  papers. 

In  view  of  your  own  construction  of  this  appointment,  which,  as  above  stated, 
seems  to  be  shared  by  both  your  friends  and  your  enemies,  candor  compels  me  to 
say  to  you  that  I  have  never  dreamed  of  endorsing  your  attitude  toward  the 
Government  under  which  you  live  in  this  supreme  crisis.  On  the  other  hand,  I 
think,  and  have  not  hesitated  to  say,  that  you  are  fundamentally  and,  it  appears, 
hopelessly  wrong.  Your  views  on  economic  questions  are  as  unsound  and,  in  my 
opinion,  almost  as  hurtful  as  your  own  views  upon  the  war.  Instead  of  devoting 
your  splendid  energies  to  constructive  policies,  tending  to  improve  living  conditions 
among  our  population,  the  net  result  of  your  speeches  is  to  create  bitterness  and 
strife  instead  of  a  spirit  of  mutual  sympathy  and  helpfulness  between  the  farmers 
and  other  citizens  of  the  State.  Indeed,  you  seem  to  have  fallen  completely  under 
the  influence  of  those  two  arch  fanatics,  Tom  Watson  and  LaFollette,  and  in  this 
way  have  destroyed  your  power  to  effectively  help  the  people  whose  interest  you 
have  at  heart.  I  do  not  for  one  moment  question  the  sincerity  of  your  convictions, 
and  I  am  sure  that  you  will  not  question  mine,  but  the  fact  remains,  as  sad  as  it 
is  certain,  that  you  have  simply  thrown  away  a  great  opportunity  to  be  a  con- 
structive leader  in  the  public  thought  and  life  of  the  State. 

This  letter  is  not  confidential,  and  you  are  at  liberty  to  make  such  use  of  it  as 
you  may  deem  proper. 

Deeply  regretting  the  necessity  for  writing  you  in  this  wise,  I  beg  to  remain, 

Eespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  339 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  October  18,  1917. 
Mr.  W.  B.  Gibson, 

Chairman  Executive  Committee  State  Farmers'  Union, 
Statesville,  N.  C. 
I  am  not  a  member  of  the  Farmers'  Union,  and  have  no  disposition  to  even 
suggest  its  policies.  But  it  is  known  of  all  men  that  the  passion  of  this  admin- 
istration is  to  multiply  in  all  just  ways  the  profits  and  pleasures  of  farm  life. 
I  am  deeply  interested  in  every  agency  that  is  working  to  this  end.  I  therefore 
greatly  rejoice  that  your  executive  committee  has  unanimously  gone  on  record  in 
favor  of  a  ringing  resolution  of  loyalty  to  the  Government  in  the  great  crisis  that 
now  confronts  the  country.  It  seems  to  me  that  this  was  the  acme  of  wisdom  as 
well  as  patriotism,  and  the  action  of  your  committee  will  wonderfully  strengthen 
the  union  in  the  esteem  and  affection  of  all  good  men. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  K  C.,  October  19,  1917. 

My   dear   Sheriff: — The    amount    of   Liberty   Bonds    apportioned    for   your 

county  is  $ The  plan  of  campaign  contemplates  the  sale  of  one-third  of 

this  amount  in  fifty-  and  one-hundred-dollar  bonds.    This  is  the  particular  part  of 
the  work  you  are  asked  to  perform. 

I  want  to  again  thank  you  for  your  unselfish  and  patriotic  interest  in  this 
matter.  The  response  made  by  the  sheriffs  has  stirred  the  whole  State.  Everybody 
is  talking  about  how  magnificently  you  all  arose  to  the  emergency  of  the  hour. 
I  want  to  again  express  to  you  my  personal  gratitude  and  the  gratitude  of  the 
State  of  Worth  Carolina.  Do  not  weary  in  well  doing,  and  you  will  write  the 
name  of  North  Carolina  high  in  the  esteem  of  the  whole  Nation. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  October  31,  1917. 
To  All  Local  Exemption  Boards: 

You  are  directed  not  to  sign  any  paper  prepared  by  any  attorney-at-law,  nor  to 
consider  any  paper  prepared  by  any  attorney-at-law,  or  any  other  person  in  con- 
nection with  any  registrant  or  selected  man,  unless  such  paper  shall  contain  a 
statement  that  the  attorney  or  other  person  is  receiving  no  compensation  whatever 
for  services  in  behalf  of  said  registrant  or  selected  man. 

The  American  Bar  Association  has  passed  a  resolution  unanimously  that  it  is 
the  sense  of  the  association  that  no  attorney  should  make  any  charge  for  services 
rendered  a  registrant  or  selected  man,  and  has  taken  steps  to  have  such  service 
rendered  in  all  worthy  cases  by  reputable  attorneys  without  money  and  without 
price. 

The  North  Carolina  State  Council  of  National  Defense  has  taken  a  similar 
action  and  is  prepared  to  have  all  needful  services  rendered  a  registrant  or 
selected  man  without  cost  to  the  man  himself  or  to  any  members  of  his  family. 


340  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

An  attorney  is  a  sworn  officer  of  the  law,  and  his  first  duty  is  to  the  Government, 
and  that  duty  requires  him  to  advise  a  registrant  or  selected  man  that  he  is  not 
entitled  to  exemption,  if  such  be  the  law;  and  it  is  also  his  patriotic  duty  to 
prepare  any  paper  setting  forth  the  exact  facts  in  any  particular  case  for  a 
registrant  or  selected  man  and  submit  those  facts,  not  in  the  capacity  of  a  paid 
attorney,  but  as  a  patriotic  citizen,  to  exemption  boards.  In  every  county  in  the 
State  attorneys  will  be  called  upon  by  the  American  Bar  Association,  and  by  the 
State  Council  of  National  Defense,  to  render  legal  services,  and  they  will  be  glad 
to  do  it.  The  attorneys  of  North  Carolina  are  intensely  patriotic  and  the  ninety 
and  nine  of  them  will  cheerfully  perform  these  services  and  regard  it  as  a  patriotic 
privilege  to  do  so. 

I  have  notified  the  Adjutant  General  of  the  State  not  to  consider  affidavits 
prepared  by  attorneys  or  any  other  person  unless  these  affidavits  shall  contain  a 
statement  that  the  attorney  or  other  person  preparing  the  same  has  done  so  with- 
out receiving  or  expecting  to  receive  any  compensation  of  any  kind. 

You  will  please  give  this  communication  the  widest  publicity  possible  in  your 
county.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  November  22,  1917. 

To  the  County  Chairman  of  the  Council  of  National  Defense: 

Deae  Sie: — One  of  the  most  intelligent  officers  at  Camp  Sevier  has  recently 
written  a  letter  about  the  soldiers,  in  which  he  says : 

The  people  back  home  need  to  be  encouraged,  particularly  the  families  of 
these  men  who  are  in  the  service.  You  have  no  idea  of  the  large  numbers  of 
letters  coming  in  from  wives,  mothers  and  fathers,  telling  their  husbands 
and  sons  that  the  crops  which  they  left  in  the  fields  are  going  to  waste  for 
the  lack  of  labor  to  harvest  it;  that  the  children  are  hungry  because  there 
is  no  money  with  which  to  buy  provisions;  that  the  wife  is  sick  and  no  one 
to  look  after  her.  That  is  the  place  for  a  great  work.  The  men  here  do  not 
need  Christmas  presents  or  feasts.  They  are  all  well  cared  for,  have  their 
friends  and  acquaintances;  but  they  cannot  fully  devote  themselves  to  their 
work  because  they  are  thinking  continuously  of  the  dependents  back  home. 
Many  telegrams  come  each  day  telling  of  sickness.  The  greatest  work  that 
the  people  at  home  can  do  is  to  visit  the  families  of  men  who  are  away.  If 
they  need  the  necessities  of  life  or  a  doctor,  see  that  those  things  are  fur- 
nished. They  need  comforting  because  in  so  many  instances  it  is  the  first 
time  husband  and  wife  have  been  separated,  and  also  father  and  mother  and 
son.  They  can  hardly  endure  this  separation.  They  feel  as  if  they  have 
lost  all  there  is  in  the  world  for  them  to  look  to  in  time  of  trouble.  The  field 
is  unlimited,  and  you  cannot  imagine  what  joy  it  would  bring  to  the  hearts 
of  the  men  here  if  they  knew  there  was  a  little  Christmas  in  their  homes. 

I  think  it  is  of  the  first  importance  for  your  County  Council  to  read  this  letter 
carefully  and  take  steps  at  once  to  look  after  the  families  of  soldiers,  and  especially 
to  see  to  it  that  where  there  is  poverty  and  sickness  that  these  people  are  extended 
not  only  whatever  financial  aid  is  necessary,  but  also  given  human  sympathy. 
I  also  call  your  attention  to  the  allowance  made  by  the  Government  to  families 
of  dependents.  Many  of  these  dependents  do  not  know  how  to  make  their  claims 
against  the  Government   for   these   allowances,   and   I   suggest   that   you   get   the 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  341 

lawyers  of  the  county  to  prepare  whatever  papers  are  necessary  to  secure  these 
allowances  wherever  they  are  merited.  Please  give  to  the  extract  of  the  letter 
above  quoted  the  widest  publicity  possible  in  your  county. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  ST.  C,  January  5,  1918. 
To  All  Local  Exemption  Boards: 

Gentlemen  : — Complaints  are  constantly  coming  to  me  that  indicate  that 
dependents  of  soldiers  do  not  fully  understand  what  is  necessary  to  be  done  in 
order  to  secure  the  allowance  made  by  the  Government  to  such  dependents. 

In  the  case  of  a  wife  or  child  the  law  compels  an  allotment  of  a  portion  of  the 
soldier's  wages,  and  this  is  supplemented  by  a  schedule  of  allowances  with  which 
you  are  familiar. 

With  respect  to  dependents  other  than  wife  or  child  it  is  necessary  for  the 
soldier  himself  to  make  a  voluntary  allotment  of  his  pay  and  then  request  the 
additional  allowance  made  by  the  Government ;  in  other  words,  the  dependents 
must  seek  their  relief  through  the  soldier.  I  have  no  doubt  that  in  many  instances 
soldiers  are  collecting  their  entire  wages  and  sending  a  portion  of  these  to  their 
dependents.  This  is  a  fatal  mistake,  for  it  cuts  the  dependents  out  of  receiving 
anything  from  the  Government.  If  the  soldier  will  go  to  the  officer  in  camp  and 
make  an  allotment  of  his  wages  and  ask  that  the  additional  allowance  provided  by 
the  Government  be  sent  to  his  dependents,  this  will  be  done.  Please  give  this  the 
widest  publicity  possible  and  call  this  information  to  the  attention  of  all  de- 
pendents of  soldiers  in  your  county. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  January  17,  1918. 
New  York  Tribune, 

New  York  City. 
New  York  Times, 

New  York  City. 
New  York  American, 

New  York  City. 
In  order  to  form  an  opinion  worth  anything  upon  the  wisdom  or  unwisdom 
of  the  order  of  the  Fuel  Administrator  closing  down  certain  enterprises  for  period 
of  five  days,  one  must  know  as  much  as  the  Fuel  Administrator  knows,  as  much  as 
the  Secretary  of  War  knows,  and  as  much  as  the  President  knows  about  the  facts 
that,  in  their  opinion,  made  this  order  necessary.  I  am  not  in  possession  of  these 
facts  and,  therefore,  patriotism  requires  me  to  walk  by  faith  and  not  by  sight  in 
the  wisdom  of  the  men  selected  to  safeguard  the  highest  interests  of  the  Nation 
in  this  emergency. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


342  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Hon.  F.  M.  Simmons,  Ealeigh,  TS.  C,  February  2,  1918. 

Washington,  D.  C. 
Hon.  Claude  Kitchin, 
Washington,  D.  C. 

My  dear  Sie  : — Mr.  J.  E.  Latham  of  Greensboro  says  that  the  cotton  manu- 
facturers in  this  State  are  much  disturbed  over  the  movement  to  have  the  Govern- 
ment fix  the  price  of  cotton.  You  will  permit  me  to  say  that  in  my  opinion  such 
a  step  on  the  part  of  the  Government  would  be  the  acme  of  injustice  to  the  cotton 
farmers  and  to  the  manufacturers  in  this  State. 

In  1914  the  cotton  crop  was  planted  upon  the  basis  of  fifteen  cents.  Every 
farmer  who  planted  and  every  merchant  who  advanced  supplies  did  so  upon  the 
reasonable  expectation  that  as  much  as  fifteen  cents  per  pound  would  be  realized 
upon  the  cotton. 

Suddenly  the  world  war  broke  out  and  cotton  dropped  to  five  cents  per  pound. 
There  was  a  movement  started  to  get  the  Government  to  come  to  the  rescue  of 
the  cotton  states  and  fix  a  price  of  twelve  cents.  I  was  opposed  to  that  particular 
movement,  and  although  I  went  with  the  delegation  to  Washington,  I  declined  to 
speak  in  favor  of  this  measure,  which  was  backed  by  the  National  Farmers'  Union 
before  the  Congressional  Committee.  I  do  not  think  that  the  Government  ought 
to  go  into  the  business  of  fixing  prices. 

I  did  go  to  the  office  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  in  company  with  Mr. 
Clarence  Poe,  Dr.  Alexander,  Hon.  R.  N".  Page,  and  Senator  Overman,  and  I 
insisted  that  the  Government  ought  to  place  fifty  millions  of  dollars  in  the  banks 
in  the  cotton  states  and  authorize  the  banks  to  lend  this  money  on  cotton  in  such 
sums  as  the  banks  were  willing  to  risk.  This  the  Government  refused  to  do.  It 
refused  to  do  anything,  and  the  South  lost  a  half  billion  dollars  on  the  crop  for 
that  year.  Many  farmers  and  many  merchants  went  into  bankruptcy  on  this 
account ;  and  now  when  the  cotton  farmer  is  for  the  first  time  getting  any 
advantage  out  of  the  excessively  high  prices  brought  about  by  the  war,  I  do  not 
think  that  the  Government  ought  to  step  in  and  say  that  he  shall  not  receive  these 
prices.  Furthermore,  the  present  price  for  cotton  is  not  as  high  above  the  normal 
price  as  the  present  price  for  meat  and  flour  is  above  the  normal  price.  Therefore, 
until  the  time  comes  when  cotton  is  bringing  a  price  out  of  proportion  to  the 
prices  that  have  to  be  paid  by  the  cotton  farmer  for  the  things  he  buys,  there  is  no 
necessity  for  any  action  on  the  part  of  the  Government. 

I  deem  it  not  improper  to  add  that  in  my  opinion  if  anything  on  earth  could 
break  the  solid  South  wide  open  politically  it  would  be  some  action  of  this  kind 
on  the  part  of  the  Government.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Washington,  D.  C,  February  5,  1918. 
Hon.  T.  W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
My  dear  Governor  : — I  am  in  receipt  of  your  letter  of  the  2d  instant,  which 
I  have  read  with  very  great  interest. 

I  agree  with  you  entirely  that  nothing  could  be  more  inopportune,  unwise  and 
unjust  than  the  Government's  interfering  in  the  way  of  fixing  prices  for  cotton. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  343 

While  there  has  been  some  agitation  on  this  subject,  and  some  member  of  the 
House  has  introduced  a  bill,  I  do  not  expect  any  legislation  along  this  line,  and  I 
do  not  think  there  is  likely  to  be  any.     Certainly  such  an  attempt  would  meet 
with  very  serious  and  stubborn  opposition  in  both  Houses  of  Congress. 
With  assurances  of  high  esteem  and  best  wishes,  I  am, 

Very  sincerely  yours, 

F.  M.  Simmons. 

Raleigh,  N".  C,  February  6,  1918. 
Capt.  Jesse  D.  Burks, 

Ordnance  Reserve  Corps, 
Washington,  D.  C. 

Deab  Captain  Burks  : — With  respect  to  the  matter  upon  which  you  conferred 
with  me  this  morning,  I  do  not  hesitate  to  say  that  you  will  find  an  instant  and 
full  response  from  the  citizens  of  North  Carolina  to  anything  that  will  give  force 
and  effectiveness  to  the  military  activities  of  the  country.  Throughout  this  State 
there  is  already,  I  believe,  a  clear  recognition  of  the  fact  that  everything  that 
can  be  done  must  be  done  to  win  this  war,  and  that  private  interests  must  be  sub- 
ordinated to  this  one  dominant  purpose. 

North  Carolina  has  responded  enthusiastically  and  fully  to  every  appeal  that 
has  thus  far  been  made.  To  the  Liberty  Loans,  the  Red  Cross  drive,  the  Food 
Conservation  movement,  and  the  Selective  Draft,  our  people  have  given  their  un- 
hesitating and  undivided  support. 

I  understand  that  the  Ordnance  Department  now  asks  this  State  to  furnish 
its  proportion  of  high-grade  men  skilled  in  engineering  and  machine  work,  with 
a  view  to  speeding  up  the  production  of  artillery,  small  arms  and  ammunition. 

As  Governor  of  this  State  I  shall  aid  in  every  possible  way  in  calling  this  need 
to  the  attention  of  the  industrial  centers  of  North  Carolina.  You  may  rest 
assured  that  neither  the  rank  nor  file  nor  the  industrial  leaders  of  our  State  will 
fail  to  cooperate  in  a  call  so  urgent.  It  is  evident  that  the  production  of  munitions 
in  the  necessary  quantity  and  at  the  necessary  time  is  absolutely  indispensable  in 
the  present  national  crisis. 

In  your  behalf  and  through  you  in  behalf  of  the  common  cause  to  which  we 
are  all  committed,  I  therefore  bespeak  the  cordial  cooperation  of  our  people. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  February  7,  1918. 
New  York  World, 

New  York  City. 

You  are  in  the  habit  of  drafting  my  opinion  on  public  questions.  For  once 
I  am  going  to  volunteer  one. 

In  my  opinion  the  Senatorial  inquisition  of  the  War  Department  is  directly 
responsible  for  the  sinking  of  the  Tuscania.  They  put  Baker  on  the  rack  and 
tortured  out  of  him  a  confession  of  the  gigantic  movement  of  our  troops  across 
the  seas.  Then  the  enemy  knew  what  was  happening  and  the  submarines  lurked 
for  their  prey. 


344  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

This  whole  inquisition  is  bottomed  on  the  inordinate  vanity  of  a  few  senators 
who  seek  to  pose  as  the  saviors  of  the  Nation.  Their  bill  has  no  more  chance  to 
keep  out  of  the  Congressional  trash-pile  than  a  food  grafter  has  to  keep  out  of 
hell.    And  they  know  it.    And  yet  the  inquisition  continues.    Why? 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  February  7,  1918. 

To  Government  Appeal  Agents  in  North  Carolina: 

My  dear  Sir  : — You  are  hereby  directed  to  enter  an  appeal  in  behalf  of  the 
Government  in  the  following  cases : 

1.  In  every  case  where  a  single  man  is  not  placed  in  Class  1. 

2.  In  every  case  where  a  married  man  is  placed  in  Class  1. 

Please  acknowledge  the  receipt  of  this  letter,  and  let  me  understand  that  you 
propose  to  carry  out  strictly  these  instructions. 

In  giving  the  above  instructions  I  do  not  intend  to  say  that  there  are  no  cases 
in  which  an  unmarried  man  ought  not  to  be  placed  in  some  deferred  class,  but  I 
do  mean  to  say  that  it  is  the  settled  policy  of  the  Government  to  get  the  entire 
quota  in  the  next  call  from  single  men  if  possible,  and  if  a  single  man  is  not  put  in 
Class  1  the  reasons  for  failing  to  place  him  in  this  class  should  be  approved  both 
by  the  local  and  the  district  board. 

I  do  not  mean  to  say  that  there  are  not  some  married  men  who  should  be  placed 
in  Class  1,  but  it  is  the  policy  of  the  Government  not  to  place  married  men  in 
Class  1  unless  it  shall  affirmatively  appear  to  the  satisfaction  of  both  the  local  and 
district  board  that  such  married  man  does  not  support  his  family.  Of  course,  if 
a  married  man  is  not  in  the  habit  in  good  faith  of  doing  honest  work,  and  is  not 
in  good  faith  discharging  his  marital  obligations,  then  he  ought  to  be  placed  in  the 
very  forefront  of  Class  1. 

With  respect  to  men  who  have  married  since  May  18th  of  last  year,  the 
Secretary  of  War  has  recently  ruled  that  this  circumstance  requires  a  careful 
investigation  of  the  marriage,  and  if  it  appears  that  the  marriage  was  entered 
into  on  account  of  the  war,  then  the  married  man  ought  to  be  treated  as  a  single 
man  in  the  classification ;  but  if  it  appears  that  the  marriage  was  contracted  in 
good  faith  and  was  neither  contracted  nor  hastened  on  account  of  the  war,  then 
such  married  man  should  be  treated  like  any  other  married  man.  I  am  trying 
to  secure  absolute  uniformity  in  the  attitude  of  the  local  boards.  My  opinion  is 
that  about  90  per  cent  of  the  boards  are  following  strictly  the  rules  above  outlined, 
but  about  10  per  cent  of  them  do  not  seem  to  understand.  I  think  it  would  be 
well  for  you  to  take  this  letter  and  go  over  it  with  the  local  board,  to  the  end  that 
they  may  reclassify  all  cases  where  the  above  principles  have  not  been  applied. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  K  C,  February  8,  1918. 
To  All  Local  Boards: 

Gentlemen  : — I  enclose  you  herewith  copy  of  letter  I  am  today  sending  to  all 
Government  Appeal  Agents.  I  cannot  emphasize  too  strongly  that  it  is  the  fixed 
determination  of  the  Government  to  make  up  the  next  quota  out  of  single  men  and 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  345 

married  men  who  do  not  support  their  families.  No  others  should  be  placed  in 
Class  1.  If  you  gentlemen  will  follow  the  rules  laid  down  in  the  letter  to  the 
Government  Appeal  Agents  you  will  save  a  vast  amount  of  time  and  a  vast  amount 
of  irritation.  I  think  90  per  cent  of  the  boards  in  the  State  are  doing  this 
already,  but  out  of  an  abundance  of  caution  I  am  writing  to  all  boards. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  February  18,  1918. 
Mbs.  Clarence  Johnson, 

President  North  Carolina  Federation  Woman's  Clubs, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
My  deak  Mes.  Johnson  : — Permit  me  to  record  my  grateful  appreciation  of 
your  kindly  courtesy  in  asking  me  for  a  short  message  to  the  women  of  the  State. 
My  message  is  this : 

1.  The  Allies  are  fighting  for  the  sanctity  of  the  person  of  woman,  which 
sanctity  is  unknown  to  the  Hun. 

2.  The  Allies  are  fighting  that  motherhood  may  enter  into  its  just  rewards  and 
may  not  be  forever  impaled  on  Militarism's  iron  cross. 

3.  The  Allies  are  fighting  that  the  ideals  of  woman  may  live  and  brighten  and 
bless  the  earth.  Prussianism  is  the  incarnation  of  brute  force.  A  gun  is  its  god, 
and  its  boast  is  that  it  rules  with  blood  and  iron. 

The  might  of  woman  is  her_  gentleness.  Love  is  her  imperial  scepter,  and  she 
would  be  without  power  and  without  place  in  a  civilization  molded  by  force  and 
colored  by  fear. 

I  have  Abrahamic  faith  in  the  courage,  the  devotion  and  the  sympathetic 
spirit  of  the  women  of  ISTorth  Carolina.     With  them  to  see  their  duty  is  to  do  it. 

Just  two  things  I  would  emphasize  at  this  time : 

1.  Push  in  every  way  possible  the  sale  of  war  stamps.  This  means  more  for 
the  winning  of  the  war  and  the  rebuilding  of  the  State  after  the  war  than  any 
proposition  the  Government  has  yet  submitted.  Of  course,  the  Liberty  Loans  must 
not  be  forgotten,  but  of  necessity  they  are  purchased  by  the  few,  while  the  war 
stamps  open  the  door  of  service  to  the  ninety  and  nine. 

2.  Do  not  complain  about  anything  that  the  Government  may  do,  nor  permit 
any  one  else  to  complain  in  your  presence.  Carry  out  cheerfully  every  order  of 
the  Food  and  Fuel  Administrators  and  cooperate  with  every  movement  inaugu- 
rated by  the  Government  for  the  winning  of  the  war.  Of  necessity  there  is  much 
that  we  do  not  understand,  but  let's  cultivate  the  spirit  of  the  patriarch  when  he 
exclaimed,  "Though  He  slay  me,  yet  will  I  trust  Him." 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  April  16,  1918. 
Majoe  John  Wesley  Long,  M.D., 
Pinehurst,  N.  C. 
Please  express  to  the  doctors  my  deep  regret  that  vocal  chords  that  positively 
refuse  to  work  make  it  impossible  for  me  to  speak  to  them  tonight.     Our  North 
Carolina  doctors  have,  with  the  spirit  of  self-effacement  that  is  the  birthmark  of 


346  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

their  calling,  answered  the  call  of  the  Nation.  Dangers  and  difficulties  have  only 
served  to  stimulate  them  to  supreme  effort.  Their  record  compares  most  favorably 
with  that  of  any  state  in  the  Union,  both  with  respect  to  the  number  of  men  who 
have  enlisted  and  the  character  of  work  they  are  doing.  This  record  will  live  in 
history  as  an  enduring  monument  of  our  doctors'  passion  for  high  service.  Permit 
me  to  add  that  the  doctors  who  stay  at  home  are  doing  work  no  less  useful  and  no 
less  heroic  than  those  who  are  going  to  the  front.  Daily  they  do  battle  with  the 
unseen  forces  of  death  in  quiet  homes  and  in  remote  places,  knowing  that  victory 
and  defeat  will  alike  go  unheralded.  They  encounter  dangers  as  real  and  as 
numerous  as  their  brothers  who  give  first  aid  to  the  wounded  who  stagger  back 
from  No  Man's  Land.  These  men  at  home  have  rendered  indispensable  service 
on  local  exemption  boards  and  medical  advisory  boards.  This  is  hard,  unpopular 
work,  and  the  only  reward  in  sight  is  to  be  misrepresented  and  misunderstood. 
To  the  doctors  who  are  going  to  the  firing  line  and  to  those  who  are  keeping  the 
home  fires  burning,  I  wish  to  register  the  gratitude  of  this  dear  old  Common- 
wealth. 

One  thing  more  I  desire  to  say :  The  doctor  is  a  vital  force  in  molding  public 
opinion.  The  people  love  and  trust  their  doctor  more  than  they  do  any  other  man 
except  their  pastor.  It  follows  that  the  doctors  have  a  wonderful  opportunity  to 
make  plain  to  the  families  they  visit  the  supreme  necessity  for  and  the  everlasting 
righteousness  of  this  war.  Please  carry  into  every  home  the  solemn  truth  that 
while  the  war  is  going  to  cost  much  and  entail  infinite  pain,  yet,  like  the  surgeon's 
knife,  it  is  an  instrument  of  mercy  and  salvation,  and  that  the  only  cure  for  the 
cancer  of  autocracy  that  is  eating  its  way  into  the  heart  of  the  world  is  to  cut 
it  out.  T.  W.  Bickett, 

Governor. 

Surgeon-General  Wm.  C.  Gorgas,  Raleigh,  N.  C,  May  7,  1918. 

War  Department, 

Washington,  D.  C. 

My  dear  General  Gorgas  : — Upon  returning  to  the  office  this  morning  after  an 
absence  of  two  weeks  on  a  Liberty  Loan  campaign,  I  learn  that  Dr.  W.  S.  Rankin, 
who  is  at  the  head  of  the  North  Carolina  State  Department  of  Health,  has  volun- 
teered his  services  in  the  Medical  Reserve  Corps. 

I  desire  to  enter  an  emphatic  protest  against  his  application  being  honored. 
I  am  satisfied  that  Dr.  Rankin  is  making  this  application  because  he  has  been  so 
active  in  getting  physicians  to  enlist  in  the  Medical  Reserve  Corps  that  he  is 
afraid  that  some  criticism  would  be  made  of  him  because  he  failed  to  enlist 
himself. 

To  take  Dr.  Rankin  away  from  the  Health  Department  of  this  State  would  be 
an  irreparable  public  calamity.  I  simply  could  not  find  in  the  State  a  man  to  do 
the  work  which  he  has  so  well  in  hand.  I  am  also  of  opinion  that  he  can  really 
render  the  Government  better  service  by  keeping  on  his  present  job  and  giving 
the  Government  the  benefit  of  his  influence  than  he  could  by  being  detailed  for 
regular  army  work.  My  convictions  upon  this  subject  are  very  strong,  and  I 
earnestly  beg  you  to  write  Dr.  Rankin  a  letter  advising  him  that  he  can  be  of  more 
service  in  his  present  position  than  he  could  by  entering  the  army. 

"With  much  respect,  I  beg  to  remain, 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  347 

Raleigh,  K  C,  May  14,  1918. 

Pursuant  to  the  resolutions  adopted  by  the  North  Carolina  State  Medical 
Society  at  its  recent  meeting  at  Pinehurst,  I  hereby  appoint  the  following  Medical 
Optional  Selective  Draft  Commission ;  the  said  commission  being  authorized 
and  instructed  to  proceed  at  once  to  carry  out  the  provisions  of  said  resolutions, 
a  copy*  of  which  is  hereto  attached : 

Dr.  Cyrus  Thompson,  Jacksonville,  N.  C. 
Dr.  A.  W.  Knox,  Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Dr.  M.  L.  Stevens,  Asheville,  N.  C. 
Dr.  F.  R.  Harris,  Henderson,  N.  C. 
Dr.  R.  F.  Yarborough,  Louisburg,  N.  C. 

The  members  of  the  commission  are  requested  to  meet  in  Raleigh  on  Wednes- 
day, the  22d  day  of  May,  1918,  in  the  Senate  Chamber. 

Respectfully,  T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

*  [Resolution  not  found  among  Governor's  papers. — Editor.] 

Hon.  T.  W.  Bickett,  Jefferson,  N".  C,  June  4,  1918. 

Governor  of  North  Carolina, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

Dear  Sir  : — I  am  in  receipt  of  your  telegram  of  the  3d  instant  in  re  the  de- 
serters of  Ashe  County. 

I  beg  to  advise  that  to  date  sixteen  deserters  have  reported,  and  expressed  their 
desire  to  be  sent  to  the  camps  and  reinstated  in  the  army.  We  have  the  assurance 
that  at  least  four  more  will  report  on  or  before  Saturday  in  order  to  entrain 
Saturday  with  Captain  Mitchell,  who  is  here  from  Camp  Sevier.  Some  of  the 
men  are  out  of  the  State,  we  are  advised,  and  a  diligent  effort  is  being  made  by 
their  friends  to  communicate  with  them.  We  do  not  believe  there  will  be  a  deserter 
left  in  Ashe  County,  but  there  may  be  a  very  few  who  will  be  out  of  the  State  who 
cannot  be  communicated  with. 

In  reference  to  the  work  of  citizens  to  induce  these  men  to  voluntarily  report 
for  service,  John  P.  Hampton,  U.  S.  Deputy  Collector ;  J.  H.  Gentry  of  Lansing, 
W.  R.  Bauguess  of  Jefferson,  have  been  very  active.  Mr.  Hampton  has  worked  in 
his  community  in  Horse  Creek  and  has  been  of  great  benefit  in  the  work.  Mr. 
Bauguess  made  a  trip  to  the  Horse  Creek  and  Long  Branch  communities  and  with 
him  J.  H.  Gentry,  who  went  to  see  the  friends  and  relatives  of  the  boys,  and  their 
influence  and  that  of  Mr.  Hampton  induced  all  the  boys  in  that  section  to  report. 
I  myself  made  a  trip  to  that  community  and  talked  with  the  people  before  Mr. 
Bauguess  and  Mr.  Gentry  went,  and  all  of  us,  the  members  of  the  local  board, 
did  all  we  could  to  get  the  best  results.  Last  night  Mr.  Bauguess,  accompanied 
by  Captain  Mitchell,  went  to  the  Idlewild  section,  and  two  of  the  three  deserters 
in  that  section  reported  before  they  left.  The  third  is  said  to  be  in  Wilkes,  but 
the  boys  who  reported,  and  friends  and  relatives,  are  doing  their  utmost  to  get 
the  third  boy  in  that  section  to  report. 

The  boys  seem  to  be  enthusiastic  in  returning,  and  state  that  they  were  under 
misapprehensions,  stayed  over  their  time  with  their  people,  and  were  afraid  to 
return.     They  say  they  did  not  know  how  to  get  back  and  avoid  serious  conse- 


348  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

quences,  and  decided  to  stay  out.  Your  visit  and  the  visit  of  General  Young  had 
a  splendid  effect  upon  the  county.  Appreciation  is  expressed  everywhere,  and  the 
effect  will  be  lasting.  Very  truly  yours, 

W.  E.  McNeill, 
Chairman  Local  Board,  Ashe,  County. 

The  Adjutant  General,  June  14,  1918. 

Washington,  D.  C. 

My  deae  Geneeal  McCain  : — During  the  War  Between  the  States  there  were 
quite  a  number  of  desertions,  especially  during  the  last  two  years  of  the  war,  from 
the  Confederate  Army.  When  the  war  ended  the  Confederacy  was  gone,  and  of 
course  the  men  who  deserted  could  not  be  punished,  and  in  some  eases  they  were 
actually  rewarded  by  the  Government  through  pensions  or  otherwise. 

I  am  profoundly  convinced  that  one  of  the  causes  for  desertion  from  the  army 
by  North  Carolina  soldiers  at  this  time  is  the  belief  upon  the  part  of  the  men  who 
desert  that  if  they  can  succeed  in  hiding  until  the  present  war  is  over  that  the  end 
of  the  war  will  ipso  facto  put  an  end  to  all  efforts  to  arrest  and  punish  them  for 
desertion.  Therefore  quite  a  number  are  taking  the  chances.  If  these  men  were 
given  to  understand  that  the  Government  will  never  let  up  until  every  man  who 
deserts  from  the  army  is  arrested  and  punished,  there  would  be  fewer  desertions. 
Therefore  I  suggest  the  propriety  of  your  issuing  an  order  instructing  the  regi- 
mental and  company  officers  to  call  this  to  the  attention  of  all  the  men  as  they 
come  in,  and  give  them  to  understand  that  if  any  man  deserts  from  the  United 
States  Army  it  means  that  he  will  most  certainly  be  punished,  or  that  he  will  be  a 
fugitive  from  justice  the  balance  of  his  whole  life,  and  that  the  end  of  the  war 
will  have  no  effect  whatever  upon  the  activities  of  the  Government  in  running 
down  these  deserters.  If  you  see  fit  to  make  such  an  order  as  this  and  will  send 
me  a  copy  of  the  same  I  will  see  to  it  that  it  is  given  wide  publicity  in  those 
counties  in  North  Carolina  where  desertions  have  occurred. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Hon.  F.  M.  Simmons,  Raleigh,  N.  C,  June  26,  1918. 

United  States  Senate, 

Washington,  D.  C. 

Hon.  Lee  S.  Ovebman, 

United  States  Senate, 

Washington,  D.  C. 

My  deae  Senator  : — I  deem  it  my  duty  to  say  to  you  that  the  people  of  North 
Carolina  are  not  in  favor  of  extending  the  operations  of  the  Selective  Service  Law 
to  young  men  between  eighteen  and  twenty-one  years  of  age,  nor  are  they  in  favor 
of  extending  its  operations,  except  in  a  qualified  way,  to  men  between  the  ages  of 
thirty-one  and  forty-five. 

Our  people  are  willing  to  do  whatever  is  necessary  to  the  winning  of  this  war, 
hut  the  necessity  for  this  enlargement  of  the  operations  of  the  Selective  Service 
Law  at  the  present  time  is  not  apparent  to  the  people  of  this  State.    Upon  any  sort 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  349 

of  calculation  four  million  men  are  available  under  the  present  law,  and  it  would 
seem  to  be  an  utterly  useless  expense  and  irritation  to  bring  under  the  law  prac- 
tically all  able-bodied  citizens  until  we  have  at  least  three  million  men  in  France. 

I  think  that  all  of  our  people  would  favor  an  amendment  requiring  all  un- 
married men  between  the  ages  of  thirty-one  and  forty-five  to  register  and  to  be 
given  the  same  status  as  single  men  under  the  present  law.  This  would  make  a 
considerable  increase  in  the  number  of  men  available. 

I  think  also  that  our  people  would  favor  a  law  requiring  all  men  between 
thirty-one  and  forty-five  to  register,  with  a  proviso  that  whenever  it  appears  to  the 
local  boards  that  any  married  man  between  the  said  ages  of  thirty-one  and  forty- 
five  is  steadily  engaged  in  some  useful  employment,  such  married  man  would  not 
be  subject  to  military  service  under  the  law.  This  law  would  gather  in  the  idlers 
and  loafers  throughout  the  whole  country,  and  would  put  into  force  the  sentiment 
now  dominant  among  our  people  that  a  man  must  work  or  fight. 

I  am  writing  you  because  I  know  that  you  are  a  very  busy  man  with  little  time 
to  ascertain  the  sentiment  of  the  people  at  home,  and  because  I  am  sure  that  you 
always  welcome  a  frank  expression  of  this  sentiment. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Washington,  D.  C,  June  28,  1918. 

His  Excellency,  Honoeable  T.  W.  Bickett, 
Governor  of  North  Carolina, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

My  deae  Govebnob: — I  am  in  receipt  of  your  highly  esteemed  favor  of  the 
26th  instant  expressing  to  me  your  sentiment  and  what  in  your  opinion  is  the 
sentiment  of  the  people  of  North  Carolina  in  regard  to  extending  the  operations 
of  the  Selective  Service  Law  to  young  men  between  the  ages  of  eighteen  and 
twenty-one  and  also  between  the  ages  of  thirty-one  and  forty-five. 

I  thank  you  for  this  information  and  fully  agree  with  you  as  to  the  sentiment 
of  the  people  of  the  State  in  this  respect.  I  have  made  up  my  mind  as  to  the 
matter  of  extending  the  draft  age  limit  at  this  time  and  shall  not  vote  for  any 
amendment  to  draft  young  men  between  the  ages  of  eighteen  and  twenty-one  unless 
it  is  absolutely  necessary. 

I  am  rather  inclined  to  agree  with  you  that  we  should  pass  an  amendment 
requiring  all  unmarried  men  between  the  ages  of  thirty-one  and  forty-five  to 
register  and  be  given  the  same  status  as  single  men  under  the  present  law,  and 
that  all  married  men  between  the  said  ages  of  thirty-one  and  forty-five,  who  are 
steadily  engaged  in  some  useful  occupation,  should  not  be  subject  to  military 
service  under  the  law. 

I  thank  you,  Governor,  for  your  kindness  in  informing  me  as  to  the  sentiment 
of  the  people  of  our  State  in  regard  to  these  matters.  I  always  desire  as  far  as 
I  can  to  respond  to  the  sentiment  of  the  people  of  my  State,  and  there  is  no 
better  way  to  get  that  sentiment  than  through  the  great  Governor  of  a  great 
State.    I  always  welcome  such  communications  with  appreciation. 

Sincerely  yours, 

Lee  S.  Oveeman. 

P.  S. — Amendment  extending  draft  age  from  eighteen  to  forty-five  and  twenty 
to  forty  voted  down  today  by  a  very  large  majority. 


350  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

"Washington,  D.  C,  June  29,  1918. 
Hon.  T.  W.  Bickett, 

Governor  of  North  Carolina, 

Raleigh,  North  Carolina. 
My  deae  Governoe  : — I  acknowledge  receipt  of  your  letter  of  June  26th.  re- 
specting the  proposition  to  extend  the  age  limits  under  the  Selective  Service  Law. 
I  have  given  this  matter  very  serious  consideration.     My  opinion  is  that  Con- 
gress will  not  extend  the  age  limits  at  this  session. 

Please  accept  my  thanks  for  your  views  in  the  matter,  and  for  the  information 
contained  in  your  letter,  both  having  impressed  me. 

With  assurances  of  high  esteem  and  best  wishes,  I  am, 

Sincerely  yours, 

F.  M.  Simmons. 

Hon.  Newton  D.  Baker,  Raleigh,  N.  C,  July  10,  1918. 

Secretary  of  War, 

Washington,  D.  C. 
My  deab  Me.  Bakek  : — The  Adjutant  General  of  Worth  Carolina  reports  to  me 
that  there  are  quite  a  large  number  of  delinquents  and  deserters  in  this  State. 
I  think  that  a  number  of  causes  contribute  to  bring  about  this  situation. 

1.  Our  people  are  not  a  military  people.  They  are  not  accustomed  to  military 
discipline.  To  take  orders  from  any  one  is  foreign  to  their  experience  and  shocks 
their  sense  of  independence.  When  the  whole  Nation  is  suddenly  placed  upon  a 
military  basis  it  would  be  almost  miraculous  if  there  were  not  a  goodly  number 
of  cases  where  individuals  rebelled  against  this  new  authority. 

2.  All  along  the  mountain  ranges  from  Virginia  to  Alabama  there  was  con- 
siderable opposition  to  the  War  of  Secession.  Quite  a  number  of  people  in  these 
mountain  regions  joined  the  Union  Army  when  the  Southern  States  seceded. 
Quite  a  number  of  others  entered  the  Confederate  Army  under  protest.  During 
the  last  years  of  the  war  numbers  of  men  in  this  mountain  region  deserted  the 
Confederate  Army.  When  the  war  ended  the  Confederacy  had  been  wiped  off  the 
map,  and  there  was  no  government  left  with  power  to  punish  these  deserters. 
In  fact,  during  the  period  of  reconstruction  numbers  of  them  were  rewarded  with 
petty  local  offices,  and  numbers  drew  pensions  from  the  Federal  Government. 
A  great  many  of  the  desertions  in  North  Carolina  are  in  this  mountain  section, 
and  the  deserters  are  men  closely  related  to  or  affiliated  with  the  families  of  men 
who  deserted  the  Confederate  Army;  in  fact,  in  one  county,  I  am  informed  that 
every  deserter  is  either  the  son  or  the  grandson  of  a  man  who  deserted  the  Con- 
federate Army.  These  young  boys  have  been  led  to  believe  that  if  they  can  stay 
in  hiding  until  after  the  war  is  over  they  can  then  come  out  without  fear  of 
punishment  of  any  kind. 

3.  Cheap  two-by-four  politicians  in  every  section  of  the  State  cautiously  put 
out  the  suggestion  that  this  is  a  Democratic  war,  and  that  two  years  from  now  a 
Republican  will  be  elected  President  and  the  war  will  be  ended  and  a  general 
pardon  granted  to  all  delinquents  and  deserters. 

All  these  things  contribute  to  and  explain  the  desertions  that  have  taken  place 
in  North  Carolina.  I  am  doing  my  level  best  to  deal  with  this  situation  in  a  way 
that  will  induce  North  Carolina  delinquents  and  deserters  to  voluntarily  return 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  351 

to  their  commands.  I  am  profoundly  convinced  that  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten 
their  desertions  are  due  neither  to  cowardice  nor  to  lack  of  patriotism,  but  to 
ignorance  and  misinformation. 

There  was  a  recent  outbreak  in  Ashe  County  in  which  one  deserter  and  one 
civilian  were  killed.  I  went  to  Ashe  County  in  person,  talked  with  the  people  for 
two  hours  and  a  half  about  the  war,  and  the  result  of  the  visit  is  that  practically 
all  deserters  and  delinquents  in  that  county  have  voluntarily  come  in  and  gone 
back  to  their  commands.  In  each  case  I  gave  to  the  soldier  thus  voluntarily 
returning  a  letter  to  the  commanding  general  of  the  camp  begging  for  the  largest 
measure  of  mercy  possible,  and  recording  my  belief  that  these  men,  having  truly 
seen  the  error  of  their  way,  would  now  make  fine  soldiers  if  given  an  opportunity 
to  do  so. 

I  earnestly  hope  that  you  will  see  fit  to  direct  the  military  authorities  to  adopt 
a  policy  of  the  greatest  leniency  to  all  soldiers  thus  voluntarily  returning  to  camp. 
These  men  have  morally  and  spiritually  about  faced.  They  sorely  need  and,  in 
my  opinion,  deserve  another  chance. 

I  furthermore  suggest  that  you  direct  the  camp  officers  to  hereafter  give  to  the 
men,  as  they  are  drafted  in,  lectures  upon  the  moral  duties  of  a  soldier,  upon  the 
pains  and  penalties  of  desertion,  upon  the  moral  turpitude  involved  in  departing 
from  the  camp  without  leave,  and  have  them  especially  explain  to  the  soldiers 
from  the  South  the  difference  between  the  situation  that  will  confront  them  at  the 
end  of  this  war  and  the  situation  that  confronted  a  deserter  from  the  Confederate 
Army  at  the  end  of  the  Civil  War.  In  my  speech  in  Ashe  County  I  tried  to  make 
it  plain  that  at  the  end  of  this  war  Uncle  Sam  would  be  doing  business  at  the 
same  old  stand;  that  he  would  have  a  considerable  army  with  very  little  for  it  to 
do,  and  that  these  returning  soldiers  would  take  peculiar  pleasure  in  running 
down  and  bringing  to  justice  the  men  who  deserted  them  in  time  of  war. 

I  am  of  opinion  that  if  these  truths  should  be  impressed  upon  the  soldiers  when 
they  come  into  camp  the  number  of  desertions  would  be  greatly  reduced. 

Trusting  that  you  may  give  this  letter  serious  consideration  I  beg  to  remain, 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Hon.  Lee  S.  Overman,  Raleigh,  N".  C,  August  6,  1918. 

United  States  Senate, 

Washington,  D.  C. 

My  deae  Senator  Overman  : — Section  27  of  the  Selective  Service  regulations 
provides :  "The  governors  shall  be  charged  with  general  supervision  over  all 
matters  arising  in  the  execution  of  the  Selective  Draft  within  their  states." 

It  is  assumed  that  this  provision  was  made  because  the  governors  live  daily  in 
intimate  contact  with  the  people,  and  are  in  position  to  apply  rules  of  "common 
sense  and  sympathy"  in  the  administration  of  the  law  so  necessary  to  its  friction- 
less  enforcement.  I  have  faithfully  endeavored  to  discharge  the  duties  imposed 
on  me,  and  long  before  the  Selective  Service  bill  became  a  law  I  went  from  the 
mountains  to  the  sea  preaching  that  the  bill  embodied  the  very  essence  of  justice 
and  of  wisdom.  I  am  still  of  that  opinion.  It  is  the  very  fairest  and  wisest  law 
under  which  an  army  was  ever  raised. 

My  intimate  knowledge  of  the  actual  operations  of  the  law  and  of  the  attitude 
of  the  people  towards  its  enforcement  causes  me  to  view  with  grave  apprehension 


352  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

the  proposal  to  bring  within  its  purview  all  men  between  the  ages  of  eighteen 
and  forty-five.  The  one  supreme  necessity  for  the  successful  prosecution  of  the 
war  is  to  keep  the  people  solidly  behind  the  Government.  In  the  beginning  there 
was  a  vast  deal  of  hostility  to  the  Selective  Service  Law,  but  this  has  happily 
disappeared,  and  the  few  people  who  do  not  now  endorse  the  law  submit  to  it  in 
solemn  silence. 

I  am  fearful  that  a  blanket  extension  of  the  law  so  as  to  include  all  men 
between  the  ages  of  eighteen  and  forty-five  will  kindle  anew  the  fires  of  opposition 
and  result  in  more  embarrassment  than  benefit.  "With  the  utmost  deference  to  the 
War  Department,  and  with  the  unalterable  purpose  of  doing  everything  in  my 
power  to  enforce  whatever  law  the  Congress  may  in  its  wisdom  finally  enact, 
I  submit  that  the  amendment  as  reported  in  the  newspapers  is  unwise. 

1.  About  seventy-five  per  cent  of  the  people  of  North  Carolina  live  in  rural 
communities.  "We  are  essentially  an  agricultural  people.  Our  records  disclose 
that  out  of  this  rural  population  only  2,000  have  been  granted  deferred  classifi- 
cation on  agricultural  grounds.  The  boards  have  combed  the  farms  clean,  and  the 
shortage  of  farm  labor  at  the  present  time  is  acute.  The  crops  are  being  made 
this  year  largely  by  young  men  between  the  ages  of  eighteen  and  twenty-one. 
If  these  shall  be  taken  away  from  the  farms  I  am  at  a  loss  to  understand  how  our 
people  can  make  crops  next  year. 

2.  Seventy-five  per  cent  of  the  students  in  ou"r  colleges  are  between  the  ages  of 
eighteen  and  twenty-one.  The  enactment  of  the  proposed  law  would  close  down 
every  college  for  men  in  North  Carolina.  It  would  not  do  at  all  to  defer  college 
students  within  the  draft  age  and  fail  to  grant  a  like  deferment  to  farmers  and 
mechanics.  The  one  thing  that  has  reconciled  the  people  to  the  Draft  Law  is  that 
it  treats  everybody  alike.  The  law  is  the  incarnation  of  the  principle  of  equal 
and  exact  justice  to  all  and  special  privileges  to  none.  To  allow  a  man  to  escape 
from  going  to  war  whose  father  is  able  to  keep  him  in  a  first-class  college,  and 
send  to  the  war  the  neighbor  boy  who  follows  the  plow  would,  in  my  opinion, 
result  in  a  revolution  in  North  Carolina.  The  cry  would  go  up  from  the  moun- 
tains to  the  sea  that  all  that  was  necessary  to  keep  out  of  war  was  to  have  money 
enough  to  go  to  college.  I  notice  that  the  War  Department  has  announced  such 
a  policy  under  the  existing  law.  It  is  probable  that  no  tumult  would  arise  because 
of  the  comparatively  small  number  of  men  who  remain  in  college  after  they  are 
twenty-one,  but  it  simply  will  not  do  to  enact  a  law  that  a  man  can  go  to  college 
and  keep  out  of  the  war. 

3.  There  is  a  widespread  feeling  in  the  hearts  of  the  people,  the  very  univer- 
sality of  which  entitles  it  to  grave  consideration,  that  a  man  ought  not  to  be 
conscripted  before  he  is  old  enough  to  vote,  in  the  absence  of  a  very  pressing  and 
overwhelming  military  necessity. 

4.  I  seriously  doubt  the  fighting  value  of  the  average  man  over  forty  years 
of  age.  He  is  lacking  in  elasticity  and  in  the  power  to  endure  hardships.  I  think 
the  maximum  age  for  conscription  should  be  forty. 

5.  I  fail  to  see  the  pressing  and  overwhelming  military  necessity  that  would 
alone  justify  the  proposed  extension  in  the  minds  of  the  people.  Under  existing 
laws  practically  four  million  men  are  available,  and  to  these  will  be  yearly  added 
a  half  million  men  as  they  arrive  at  the  age  of  twenty-one,  so  that,  without  any 
amendment  to  the  law,  four  and  a  half  million  men  would  be  available  in  twelve 
months.  This  would  enable  us  to  put  three  and  a  half  million  men  "over  there" 
and  still  have  a  million  in  reserve. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  353 

6.  But  the  ranks  can  be  swelled  in  a  way  that  will  not  impose  serious  hard- 
ships and  that  will  tend  to  bring  the  law  into  favor  rather  than  into  disrepute 
among  the  people.  The  folks  down  home  would  look  kindly  on  the  following 
amendments : 

(1)  Place  in  Class  One,  under  existing  rules  and  regulations,  all  unmarried 
men  between  the  ages  of  eighteen  and  forty,  and  all  men  between  eighteen  and 
forty  who  are  not  engaged  in  some  useful  employment.  It  is  believed  that  such 
an  amendment  would  send  a  very  large  number  of  men  to  camp.  Every  idler  in 
the  whole  land  would  be  put  to  work,  and  no  families  would  be  broken  up  by 
taking  away  the  husband  and  father. 

7.  I  invite  your  very  special  and  earnest  attention  to  the  following  suggestion : 
If  Congress  should  deem  it  wise  to  require  all  men  between  the  ages  of  eighteen 

and  forty-five  to  register,  and  should  not  deem  it  wise  to  limit  the  application  of 
the  law  in  the  manner  set  out  in  the  sixth  paragraph  of  this  letter,  then  I  most 
earnestly  urge  upon  your  special  attention  the  following  plan : 

All  persons  brought  within  the  purview  of  the  Selective  Service  Law  by  the 
enactment  proposed  by  the  War  Department  should  be  called  to  service  in  the 
following  order,  and  this  should  be  written  in  the  law  itself : 

(1)  All  unmarried  men  between  the  ages  of  thirty-one  and  the  highest  age 
limit  fixed  by  the  law. 

(2)  All  men  between  twenty-one  and  twenty. 

(3)  All  men  between  twenty  and  nineteen. 

(4)  All  men  between  nineteen  and  eighteen. 

The  law  should  very  clearly  stipulate  that  no  registrants  under  twenty-one 
years  of  age  shall  be  called  until  the  registrants  in  Class  One  above  thirty-one 
years  of  age  are  exhausted,  and  that  no  registrants  less  than  twenty  years  old 
shall  be  called  until  all  the  registrants  twenty  years  old  and  over  in  Class  One  are 
exhausted,  and  this  order  should  be  observed  until  the  eighteen-year-old  regis- 
trants are  reached. 

I  deem  it  of  the  utmost  importance  that  the  law  should  stipulate  that  no 
registrants  under  the  proposed  amendment  shall  be  called  until  the  President  of  the 
United  States  shall  issue  his  proclamation  to  the  people  that  the  calling  of  these 
new  registrants  is  a  pressing  military  necessity,  and  this  proclamation  should  be 
required  with  respect  to  each  of  the  four  classes  above  mentioned;  that  is,  there 
should  be  a  separate  proclamation  calling  into  service  the  men  over  thirty-one, 
then  the  men  over  twenty,  then  the  men  over  nineteen,  and  then  the  men  eighteen 
years  of  age  and  over.  The  President  is  in  touch  with  the  civil  population.  He 
understands  the  necessities  of  civil  life,  and  the  people  would  have  the  utmost 
confidence  that  he  would  not  call  into  service  any  of  the  classes  above  named  until 
they  were  actually  needed  for  the  successful  prosecution  of  the  war. 

I  am  sending  copy  of  this  letter  to  both  of  our  Senators,  and  to  each  of  our 
Representatives  in  Congress.  I  think  I  properly  interpret  the  thought  of  our 
people  in  regard  to  this  situation.  The  President  himself  has  vast  respect  for 
what  the  people  are  thinking,  and  Congress  should  likewise  give  to  their  views 
the  most  serious  consideration. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

23 


354  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Salisbury,  T$.  C,  August  8,  1918. 
Hon.  T.  W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

Mt  deak  Governor  : — I  am  very  much  pleased  to  receive  your  highly  esteemed 
favor  of  the  6th  instant,  and  thank  you  for  giving  me  what  you  consider  is  the 
sentiment  of  our  people  in  regard  to  the  Draft  Bill.  Indeed,  I  am  always  glad  to 
hear  from  you,  and  will  thank  you  to  write  any  time  and  give  me  what  you  think 
is  the  sentiment  of  our  people  in  regard  to  important  legislation  pending  before 
Congress.  When  we  can  consistently  do  so  we  should  carry  out  the  will  of  the 
people  as  far  as  possible. 

Before  coming  home  I  was  of  the  opinion  that  we  should  not  draft  boys  under 
twenty-one  years  of  age.  I  have  no  objection  to  having  our  boys  between  the  ages 
of  eighteen  and  twenty-one  register,  but  do  not  think  they  should  be  available  for 
foreign  service  until  they  arrive  at  the  age  of  twenty-one.  I  agree  with  you  that 
we  ought  to  have  as  little  friction  as  possible.  I  find  our  people  have  never  been 
so  united  as  they  are  on  the  question  of  war.  What  a  pity  it  would  be  to 
unsettle  this  question  and  make  them  dissatisfied ! 

While  General  Crowder  is  a  very  clever  gentleman,  he  is  a  military  martinet. 
I  am  a  little  disappointed  that  Secretary  Baker  has  been  influenced  by  him.  He 
has  been  wanting  the  minimum  age  limit  eighteen  for  a  long  time,  but  Secretary 
Baker  would  not  yield,  but  it  seems  now  that  he  has  finally  done  so. 

I  agree  with  you  that  it  will  not  do  to  exempt  the  college  boy  and  take  the 
boys  who  are  not  able  to  attend  college.  It  will  be  very  unwise  to  make  any 
distinction  at  all.    What  we  do  must  fall  on  all  alike. 

I  am  not  inclined  to  leave  too  much  to  the  discretion  of  the  Bresident  in  these 
matters,  as  he  might  be  over-influenced  by  the  Secretary  of  War  and  his  Army 
chiefs.    I  think  we  should  fix  the  law  as  it  should  be. 

When  we  come  to  consider  this  bill  I  beg  to  assure  you  that  I  shall  be  very  glad 
to  consider  the  suggestions  you  make,  which  are  very  wise,  and  with  many  of 
which  I  agree. 

Again  thanking  you,  my  dear  Governor,  for  your  suggestions,  and  with  best 
wishes,  I  am,  Sincerely  yours,  Lee  S.  Overman. 

Washington,  D.  C,  August  10,  1918. 
Governor  Thomas  W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

My  dear  Governor  : — I  have  your  favor  of  August  6th,  and  am  very  much 
pleased  to  have  your  views  upon  a  proposed  amendment  to  the  Selective  Service 
Act.  I  have  heretofore  been  opposed  to  this  amendment,  especially  in  so  far  as 
it  proposes  to  reduce  the  draft  age. 

I  am  anxious  to  see  the  bill  itself,  and  to  study  all  of  its  provisions,  and  your 
views,  so  well  expressed  in  your  letter,  will  be  very  valuable  to  me. 

Of  course,  I  will  be  in  this  position :  that  it  will  be  claimed  that  it  is  necessary 
to  win  the  war,  and  if  so,  I  would  unhesitatingly  vote  for  an  amendment  of  the 
kind  proposed  by  the  Secretary  of  War,  and  would  feel  that  it  was  my  duty; 
if  not  necessary  to  win  the  war  I  do  not  wish  to  further  deplete  the  farms,  and 
especially  do  I  dislike  the  idea  of  taking  the  young  boys  from  eighteen  to  twenty- 
one.  I  hope  that  the  wisdom  of  Congress  may  work  this  out  so  as  to  secure  ample 
man  power  without  doing  this. 

With  my  sincere  regards,  I  am,  Zebulon  Weaver. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  355 

Laurel  Springs,  N.  C,  August  13,  1918. 
Governor  T.  W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
My  dear  Governor  : — Yours  of  August  6th  concerning  the  proposed  new  Draft 
Law  has  been  received  and  given  careful  attention.     I  wish  to  say  that  you  voice 
my  sentiments  in  this  matter  much  more  elegantly  than  I   could  express  them. 
I  am  deeply  convinced  that  it  would  be  a  grievous  blunder  if  not  a  fatal  mistake 
to  draft  children  into  military  service,  and  unless  I  see  the  matter  in  an  entirely 
different  light  from  the  way  it  has  yet  been  presented,  I  shall  be  compelled  to 
oppose  this  legislation,  much  as  I  deplore  opposing  anything  the  administration 
requests.  Yours  very  sincerely, 

R.  A.   DoiTGHTON. 

Hon.  Lee  S.  Overman,  Raleigh,  N".  C,  August  15,  1918. 

U.  S.  Senate, 

Washington,  D.  C. 

My  dear  Senator  : — Your  very  courteous  reception  of  the  suggestions  made  in 
my  letter  of  August  6th  leads  me  to  trespass  on  your  attention  once  more.  I  am 
sure  that  you  will  receive  this  letter  in  the  kindly  spirit  in  which  you  have  always 
considered  any  suggestions  that  I  have  seen  fit  to  make. 

It  seems  to  be  evident  that  the  Man  Power  Bill,  so  far  as  the  age  limits  are 
concerned,  will  pass,  and  I  do  not  believe  anything  could  be  accomplished  by 
opposing  the  main  features  of  the  bill;  but  I  do  not  think  that  a  vast  deal  can  be 
accomplished  by  your  preparing  an  amendment,  in  line  with  the  suggestions  con- 
tained in  the  seventh  paragraph  of  my  letter  of  August  6th,  which  paragraph  I 
here  repeat-  for  the  sake  of  your  convenience : 

If  Congress  should  deem  it  wise  to  require  all  men  between  the  ages  of 
eighteen  and  forty-five  to  register,  and  should  not  deem  it  wise  to  limit  the 
application  of  the  law  in  the  manner  set  out  in  the  6th  paragraph  of  this 
letter,  then  I  most  earnestly  urge  upon  your  special  attention  the  following 
plan: 

All  persons  brought  within  the  purview  of  the  Selective  Service  Law  by 
the  amendment  proposed  by  the  War  Department  should  be  called  to  service 
in  the  following  order,  and  this  should  be  written  in  the  law  itself: 

(1)  All  unmarried  men  between  the  ages  of  thirty-one  and  the  highest 
age  limit  fixed  by  the  law. 

(2)  All  men  between  twenty-one  and  twenty. 

(3)  All  men  between  twenty  and  nineteen. 

(4)  All  men  between  nineteen  and  eighteen. 

The  law  should  very  clearly  stipulate  that  no  registrants  under  twenty- 
one  years  of  age  shall  be  called  until  the  registrants  in  Class  One  above 
thirty-one  years  of  age  are  exhausted,  and  that  no  registrants  less  than 
twenty  years  old  shall  be  called  until  all  the  registrants  twenty  years  old 
and  over  in  Class  One  are  exhausted,  and  this  order  should  be  observed  until 
the  eighteen-year-old  registrants  are  reached. 

I  deem  it  of  the  utmost  importance  that  the  law  should  stipulate  that  no 
registrants  under  the  proposed  amendment  shall  be  called  until  the  President 
of  the  United  States  shall  issue  his  proclamation  to  the  people  that  the 
calling  of  these  new  registrants  is  a  pressing  military  necessity,  and  this 
proclamation  should  be  required  with  respect  to  each   of  the   four  classes 


356  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

above  mentioned;  that  is,  there  should  be  a  separate  proclamation  calling 
into  service  the  men  over  thirty-one,  then  the  men  over  twenty,  then  the 
men  over  nineteen,  and  the  men  eighteen  years  of  age  and  over.  The 
President  is  in  touch  with  the  civil  population.  He  understands  the  neces- 
sities of  civil  life,  and  the  people  would  have  the  utmost  confidence  that  he 
would  not  call  into  service  any  of  the  classes  above  named  until  they  were 
actually  needed  for  the  successful  prosecution  of  the  war. 

I  suggest  that  you  prepare  an  amendment  along  these  lines  and  take  it  direct 
to  the  President,  and  secure  his  approval  of  the  amendment,  so  that  when  you 
present  it  on  the  floor  of  the  Senate  you  will  be  in  a  position  to  state  that  the 
amendment  meets  with  the  approval  of  the  President.  Of  course,  you  may  deem  it 
wise  to  consult  with  Mr.  Chamberlain  and  the  Secretary  of  War  also.  This 
amendment  would  subtract  nothing  of  the  ultimate  efficiency  of  the  bill,  as  it 
would  place  all  these  men  at  the  disposal  of  the  Government  whenever  the  Govern- 
ment really  needs  them.  On  the  other  hand,  the  amendment  would  add  tremen- 
dously to  the  popularity  of  the  bill  amongst  the  people.  The  people  are  perfectly 
willing  to  send  all  the  men  to  France  that  it  is  necessary  to  send,  but  they  do  not 
want  these  men  called  until  they  are  necessary.  It  is  no  lack  of  confidence  in 
either  the  wisdom  or  the  integrity  of  the  "War  Department  to  say  that  the  people 
would  prefer  for  the  President  to  say  just  when  this  necessity  arises.  The  men  at 
the  head  of  the  War  Department  are  soldiers,  war  is  their  business,  and  there 
is  a  feeling  that  in  order  to  provide  an  overwhelming  military  equipment  men 
will  be  called  who  could  well  be  left  at  home.  This  fear  does  not  extend  to  the 
President.  He  is  in  touch  with  the  needs  of  civil  life,  and  the  people  understand 
that  he  is  not  going  to  disorganize  the  business  of  the  country  any  more  than  is 
absolutely  necessary  for  the  successful  prosecution  of  the  war.  I  believe  that  if 
you  will  get  right  behind  this  amendment  you  can  put  it  over,  and  I  know  that  it 
will  be  greeted  with  tremendous  satisfaction  by  the  people. 

I  sincerely  trust  that  you  will  see  fit  to  support  the  amendment  offered  by 
Senator  Reed,  making  eligible  for  commissions  in  the  army  all  volunteers  or 
drafted  men.  I  have  heard  a  great  many  people  say  that  the  Government  ought 
not  to  force  a  man  into  the  army  who  is  under  twenty-one  years  of  age  and  then, 
although  he  may  be  eminently  qualified,  refuse  to  grant  him  a  commission  because 
of  the  naked  fact  that  he  is  under  twenty-one  years  old.  The  feeling  is  that  the 
boy  ought  to  be  allowed  to  get  what  he  can. 

I  expect  to  be  in  Washington  one  day  next  week,  and  if  so,  I  would  very  much 
like  to  hear  the  debate  on  this  bill. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Washington,  D.  C.,  August  19,  1918. 
Honorable  T.  W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
My  dear  Governor  Bickett  : — Replying  to  yours  of  the  6th  instant,  I  will 
say  that  I  am  utterly  opposed  to  lowering  the  draft  age  to  eighteen  years.    Several 
weeks  ago  I  gave  out  a  statement  to  this  effect.    I  might  be  willing  to  compromise 
on  twenty  years  of  age,  but  would  prefer  not  to  go  below  twenty-one. 

There  is  widespread  opposition  in  Congress,  particularly  in  the  House,  to  the 
proposal  of  the  War  Department  drafting  boys  of  eighteen.     But  just  what  the 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  357 

result  will  be  it  is  impossible  to  predict  at  this  moment.  If  no  one  else  does  so, 
I  will  myself  introduce  an  amendment  providing  that  the  draft  shall  not  be  below 
twenty  years  of  age. 

Of  course,  I  would  be  willing  for  boys  of  eighteen  and  nineteen  to  receive 
military  training,  but  it  should  be  written  in  the  law  that  these  boys  could  not  be 
sent  to  do  overseas  military  duty  until  they  have  attained  the  age  of  twenty  years. 
My  views  are  fixed  on  this  question. 

With  much  respect,  I  beg  to  remain,  Yours  sincerely, 

Edwabd  W.  Pou. 

Hon.  Newton  D.  Baxbe,  Kaxeigh,  N.  C,  August  22,  1918. 

Secretary  of  War, 

Washington,  D.  C. 

My  dear  Me.  Baker: — Section  27  of  the  Selective  Service  regulations  imposes 
upon  the  governors  of  the  several  states  the  duty  of  enforcing  the  provisions  of 
the  Selective  Service  Law.  The  discharge  of  these  duties  has  kept  me  in  intimate 
contact  with  the  people,  and  I  think  I  am  in  a  position  to  fairly  interpret  their 
thought  with  respect  to  the  law. 

In  the  beginning  there  was  a  vast  deal  of  opposition,  vastly  more  than  the 
authorities  at  Washington  realized.  In  this  State  I  have  given  my  very  soul  to 
laying  before  the  people  the  everlasting  justice  and  wisdom  of  the  law.  I  did  this 
when  the  bill  was  first  proposed  in  Congress,  and  a  long,  long  time  before  it 
became  a  law. 

The  people  are  now,  in  the  main,  reconciled  to  the  law,  and  the  only  thing 
that  has  enabled  us  to  rally  them  to  the  support  of  the  law  is  that  it  is  absolutely 
no  respecter  of  persons,  but  treats  every  one  exactly  alike. 

I  have  read  with  grave  misgivings  the  proposition  to  take  young  men  who  are 
in  college  from  under  the  jurisdiction  of  the  local  and  district  boards,  and  keep 
them  in  college  for  special  training,  subject  to  the  call  of  the  Government.  I  deem 
it  my  duty  to  you  to  say  that  such  a  policy  would  in  North  Carolina  well-nigh 
breed  a  revolution.  I  have  talked  with  members  of  the  local  boards  and  with  the 
people  of  all  classes,  and  the  opinion  is  universal  that  such  a  policy  would  array 
the  rank  and  file  of  the  folks  against  the  law.  For  example:  A  is  a  small,  one- 
horse  farmer ;  he  has  a  son  and  is  utterly  unable  to  send  him  to  the  high  school 
or  to  a  college.  Indeed,  instead  of  being  able  to  spend  the  money  to  give  the  boy  a 
college  education,  he  feels  that  he  is  absolutely  bound  to  have  that  boy  in  order  to 
run  the  farm.  The  draft  law  stretches  out  its  hand  and  takes  that  boy  and  sends 
him  to  the  trenches  in  France.  On  the  opposite  side  of  the  road  lives  a  man  who 
is  a  ten-horse  farmer,  prosperous,  and  well  able  to  send  his  boy  to  the  university. 
The  draft  law  reaches  out  its  hand  and  takes  that  boy  and  sends  him  to  college  or 
keeps  him  there.  You  can  at  once  see  what  a  fierce  class  feeling  will  be  engendered 
by  a  policy  of  this  kind.  In  North  Carolina  a  howl  would  go  up  from  the 
mountains  to  the  sea  that  all  that  is  necessary  to  keep  a  man  out  of  the  war  is 
for  him  to  have  money  enough  to  go  to  college. 

I  do  not  underestimate  the  value  or  the  necessity  of  having  trained  men,  but 
the  one  thing  that  is  a  supreme  necessity  for  the  winning  of  this  war  is  to  keep  the 
ninety-nine  back  of  the  principles  of  the  Selective  Service  Law.  I  sincerely  trust 
that  no  policy  will  be  adopted  that  will  in  any  way  take  any  man  out  of  the 


358  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

jurisdiction  of  the  local  and  district  boards.  When  a  call  comes  for  a  quota  let 
every  man  who  is  registered,  whether  he  be  in  college  or  out,  be  subject  to  the 
call  and  be  sent  to  camp  in  his  due  order. 

I  am,  by  virtue  of  my  office,  chairman  of  the  board  of  trustees  of  the  Univer- 
sity of  this  State.  I  am  an  alumnus  of  another  college  in  the  State,  and  am 
deeply  interested  in  these  colleges;  but  no  matter  what  may  be  the  consequences 
temporarily  to  these  colleges,  the  Government  cannot  afford  to  make  any  distinc- 
tion in  favor  of  the  man  who  is  able  to  go  to  college  and  the  man  who  is  not.  In  all 
of  my  instructions  to  the  local  and  district  boards  I  have  emphasized  the  fact  that 
they  may  afford  to  make  a  mistake  in  keeping  the  son  of  a  poor  man  at  home, 
but  that  they  cannot  afford  to  make  a  mistake  in  keeping  the  son  of  a  rich  man 
at  home.  This  principle  applies  with  equal  force  to  the  policies  of  the  Govern- 
ment. Up  to  this  time  we  have  been  able  to  keep  down  the  cry  of  the  demagogue, 
that  this  is  the  rich  man's  war  and  the  poor  man's  fight.  There  has  been  nothing 
in  the  administration  of  the  law  upon  which  to  base  any  such  claim ;  but  if  the 
college  men  are  placed  in  a  class  by  themselves,  I  fail  to  see  how  we  can  meet  this 
charge  that  will  surely  be  made. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

P.  S. — As  I  am  in  frequent  and  direct  communication  with  General  Crowder, 
I  have  stated,  in  person,  to  him  the  substance  of  what  I  have  written  above  to  you. 

T.  W.  B. 


Hon.  Edward  W.  Pou,  Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  August  22,  1918. 

Washington,  D.  C. 

My  dear  Mr.  Pou : — -After  looking  more  carefully  into  the  situation,  and 
having  some  talk  with  those  who  know  most  about  the  military  status,  I  am  forced 
to  the  conclusion  that  it  would  be  unwise  to  oppose  the  administration  bill  in  so 
far  as  the  age  limits  are  concerned,  and  I  will  ask  you  not  to  consider  or  to  quote 
my  letter  of  the  6th  of  August  upon  that  phase  of  the  situation. 

I  do  think,  however,  that  it  is  of  the  utmost  importance  to  adopt  the  amend- 
ment made  by  the  House  committee,  which  is  in  exact  line  with  the  seventh  para- 
graph of  my  letter,  which  I  will  ask  you  to  carefully  re-read. 

My  belief  is  that  if  all  those  who  doubt  the  wisdom  of  the  bill  will  concentrate 
their  efforts  upon  this  amendment,  they  can  put  it  through.  The  War  Depart- 
ment says  that  it  is  the  purpose  of  the  Department  to  do  the  very  thing  that  the 
amendment  calls  for.  The  wisdom  in  this  order  of  calling  these  young  men  is 
plain,  and  I  know  that  it  will  tremendously  help  the  bill  in  the  minds  of  the 
people  if  this  amendment  shall  be  written  in  the  law.  I  suggest  that  you  take 
steps  to  marshal  all  the  forces  in  favor  of  this  amendment,  and  I  believe  that  you 
can  put  it  through.  I  suggest  that  you  see  the  President,  himself,  and  explain 
to  him  how  much  this  amendment  will  do  towards  reconciling  the  people  to  the 
main  principle  of  the  law,  and  secure  a  statement  from  him  that  the  amendment 
is  not  objectionable  to  him.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  359 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  August  28,  1918. 
General  E.  H.  Crowder, 
Washington,  D.  C. 
Considerable   excitement   developing   in  this   State  on   proposition   to   exempt 
college  students  from  the  operation  of  draft.     My  understanding  is  that  no  such 
purpose  is  contemplated.     I  think  it  is  of  the  utmost  importance  for  you  to  see 
to  it  that  students  in  college  are  just  as  liable  to  calls  from  local  and   district 
boards  as  any  other  class  of  people.     Letter  with  enclosures  follows. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  August  31,  1918. 
General  E.  H.  Crowder, 
Washington,  D.  C. 

My  dear  General  Crowder  : — I  wired  you  the  other  day  that  considerable 
excitement  was  developing  in  this  State  on  account  of  the  proposed  plan  of  the 
War  Department  to  take  from  under  the  jurisdiction  of  the  local  boards  young 
men  in  college.  The  Chief  Justice  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  our  State  has  written 
for  the  press  two  vigorous  articles  against  this  plan,  contending  that  it  is  the 
antipodes  of  Democracy.  The  President  of  our  State  University  has  written  an 
able  article  in  defense  of  the  plan,  maintaining  that  it  is  the  essence  of  Democracy. 
There  seems  to  be  considerable  confusion  in  the  public  mind  about  just  what  is 
proposed. 

My  own  opinion  is  that  the  absolutely  fair  and  wise  way  to  handle  this 
situation  is  to  make  every  registrant  subject  to  the  call  of  the  local  board,  and 
require  him  to  be  sent  to  the  training  camps  whenever  his  number  is  reached  after 
he  is  properly  classified.  When  the  registrants  reach  the  camps  let  the  military 
authorities,  through  a  process  of  selection,  send  such  men  to  the  colleges  for  special 
training  as  they  may  see  fit.  I  do  not  think  that  the  mere  fact  that  a  man  is  in 
college  ought  to  take  him  from  under  the  jurisdiction  of  the  local  boards,  and  I 
greatly  fear  that  to  do  so  would  produce  an  immense  amount  of  irritation  in  the 
administration  of  the  Selective  Draft  Law. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

New  York,  September  10,  1918. 
Governor  T.  W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Will   you    speak   highly    important    meeting    Denver,    September    twentieth  ? 
State  convention,  fifteen  thousand  people.    Mass-meeting,  night,  Albuquerque,  New 
Mexico,  twenty-third ;   Tucson,  Arizona,  twenty-fifth.      Exceedingly   anxious   for 
you.      Wire    acceptance    immediately    if    possible.      League    to    Enforce    Peace, 
number  seventy  Fifth  Avenue,  New  York.    All  expenses  paid. 

Henry  A.  Atkinson. 


360  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

[  Telegram] 

Kaleigh,  1ST.  C.,  September  13,  1918. 
Heney  A.  Atkinson, 

League  to  Enforce  Peace, 
New  York  City. 
I  greatly  appreciate  invitation  to  speak  in  Colorado,  Arizona,  and  New  Mexico, 
but  just  now  my  plain  duty  is  to  the  people  of  North  Carolina.  I  am  convinced 
that  the  highest  service  I  can  render  the  League  to  Enforce  Peace  is  to  keep 
North  Carolina  one  hundred  per  cent  efficient  in  the  work  of  winning  the  war. 
When  Prussianism  shall  have  been  utterly  destroyed  I  will  be  glad  to  speak  for  the 
wise  and  just  principles  of  our  League  from  the  rivers  to  the  ends  of  the  earth. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

Kaleigh,  N.  C,  September  29,  1918. 
The  President, 

Washington,  D.  C. 
Trust  that  you  will  revert  to  your  original  intention  to  fix  price  cotton  only  if 
full,  free  and  fair  inquiry  shows  it  to  be  desirable  and  feasible.  "War  Industries 
Board  undoubtedly  honest  in  their  position;  however,  their  training  and  environ- 
ment naturally  prejudices  the  farmer's  case.  Apparently  farmers  have  had  no 
adequate  representation.  Mills  were  permitted  to  make  unlimited  profits  for 
several  years,  and  the  margin  allowed  them  now  is  very  large.  Considering  these 
facts,  it  appears  undemocratic  to  stop  the  producer  from  securing  a  profit  that 
cannot  equal  what  has  been  allowed  the  manufacturer.  The  labor  income  of  the 
farmer  and  his  family  is  entitled  to  the  same  per  cent  of  increase  as  other  laborers 
have  received.  They  have  not  received  this  in  the  past,  and  are  not  now  in  the 
South.  If  full  and  impartial  investigation  shows  desirability  of  fixing  price  and 
necessity  is  fully  explained  and  put  at  fair  figure  no  one  can  justly  complain,  but 
producers  are  deeply  resentful  of  present  attitude  and  state  of  market.  Advance 
information  secured  by  individuals  indicates  very  unfortunate  situation. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

Washington,  D.  C,  September  26,  1918. 
Governor  T.  W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Telegram   received.      The   President   directs   me  to   assure   you   that   the   con- 
siderations which  you  urge  will  have  their  just  weight  in  determining  any  con- 
clusion that  may  be  arrived  at. 

J.  P.  Tumulty,  Secretary. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  361 

Washington,  D.  C,  October  5,  1918. 
Honorable  Thomas  W.  Bickett, 

Governor  of  North  Carolina, 

Raleigh,  North  Carolina. 
My  dear  Governor  Bickett  : — I  desire  to  take  this  opportunity  of  expressing 
my  appreciation  of  the  prompt  and  thorough  manner  in  which  the  registration 
of  September  12,  1918,  was  accomplished  in  your  State. 

The  local  board  within  your  State  which  shows  the  highest  percentage  in- 
crease in  registration  over  the  class  of  June  5,  1917,  is  Caldwell  County.  This 
local  board  registered  on  June  5,  1917,  399  men.  On  September  12,  1918,  its 
registration  totaled  1,913  men,  or  an  increase  of  464  per  cent  over  the  registration 
of  June  5,  1917.  Very  truly  yours, 

E.  H.  Crowder, 
Provost  Marshal-General. 

Raleigh,  N".  O,  October  7,  1918. 
General  E.  H.  Crowder, 

The  Provost  Marshal-General, 
Washington,  D.  C. 

My  dear  General  Crowder  : — I  deeply  appreciate  your  very  kind  letter  of 
October  5th,  with  reference  to  the  manner  in  which  the  registration  of  September 
12th  was  accomplished  in  North  Carolina. 

It  will  no  doubt  be  of  interest  to  you  to  learn  that  the  registration  was  effected 
at  practically  no  cost  to  the  Government.  Captain  McCargo  informs  me  that 
approximately  four  thousand  men  served  as  registrars,  and  that  only  seven  of 
them  are  asking  for  compensation  as  provided  by  law,  thus  making  the  total  cost 
less  than  $50. 

I  feel  very  grateful  to  the  people  of  this  State,  and  am  proud  of  them  for  the 
manner  in  which  they  responded  to  the  call  of  the  Government  on  this  occasion. 
And  I  am  sending  a  personal  letter  of  thanks  to  every  registrar. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  October  7,  1918. 
Hon.  Josephtjs  Daniels, 

Secretary  of  the  Navy, 

Washington,  D.  C. 
Respectfully  suggest  that  the  President's  reply  to  Germany  should  be  that  no 
peace  terms  can  be  considered  until  Germany  shall  actually  evacuate  all  territory 
she  has  seized  anywhere  during  this  war.  Germany  has  no  more  right  in  Belgium, 
France,  Russia,  and  Roumania  than  a  burglar  has  in  your  house,  and  no  con- 
ference should  be  held  until  she  gets  out  of  all  conquered  lands.  If  she  proposes 
to  get  out  at  once,  then  the  allied  armies  could  afford  not  to  attack  while  she  is 
voluntarily  withdrawing  to  her  own  territory.  This  proposition,  it  seems  to  me, 
will  test  Germany's  sincerity.  After  the  German  armies  are  back  on  German  soil 
we  can  then  take  up  and  consider  other  peace  terms. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


362  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

[  Telegram] 

New  York,  N.  Y.,  October  13,  1918. 
Thomas  W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Please  wire  collect  one  hundred  words  your  opinion  of  German  reply.     Should 
Allies  accept  it? 

New  York  American. 
[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  October  13,  1918. 
N.  Y.  American, 

New  York  City. 
I  interpret  Germany's  reply  as  an  unconditional  surrender  to  the  terms  of 
peace  repeatedly  and  consistently  prescribed  by  President  Wilson  and  repeatedly 
and  emphatically  endorsed  by  our  allies.  The  reply  is  a  humiliating  confession 
on  the  part  of  Germany  that  militarism  is  a  gigantic  and  bloody  failure  and 
has  been  beaten  to  the  dust.  This  unconditional  surrender  to  our  terms  of  peace 
secures  to  the  world  all  that  the  Allies  are  fighting  for  and  is  glorious  fruitage 
of  the  blood  of  our  slain.  The  President  of  the  United  States  has  a  truer  insight 
into  and  a  more  comprehensive  grasp  of  the  real  situation  than  any  living  man, 
and  I  have  the  faith  of  Abraham  that  he  will  deal  with  the  vast  and  vital  issues 
involved  in  a  way  that  will  satisfy  the  conscience  and  gladden  the  heart  of  the 
world. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  October  25,  1918. 
Hon.  William  H.  Taft, 

President,  League  to  Enforce  Peace, 
Yale  University, 

New  Haven,  Connecticut. 
The  repeated  assaults  of  Mr.  Roosevelt  on  the  basic  principles  of  the  League 
to  Enforce  Peace  call  for  a  vigorous  reply  from  you  as  president  of  the  League  if 
our  organization  is  expected  to  live.  Every  utterance  of  Mr.  Roosevelt  on  the 
subject  would  have  fitted  well  the  mouth  of  the  Kaiser  five  years  ago.  In  a  recent 
speech  Mr.  Roosevelt  said  that  we  should  so  develop  our  military  power  that  no 
nation  would  dare  to  look  cross-eyed  at  the  United  States.  This  is  the  very 
militarism  against  which  the  conscience  of  the  world  is  today  in  arms.  It  would 
be  Potsdamism  enthroned  at  Washington.  In  a  recent  editorial  in  the  Kansas 
City  Star,  Mr.  Roosevelt  endeavors  to  relegate  the  League  to  Enforce  Peace  to  the 
innocuous  position  of  a  molly-coddle  motto,  and  insists  that  when  the  real  affairs 
of  nations  are  to  be  settled  a  gun  still  is  and  of  right  ought  to  be  God.  Today  in 
a  telegram  to  Washington  he  makes  war  on  the  fourteen  articles  of  peace 
enumerated  by  the  President  before  Congress  in  January  and  thereafter  elaborated 
at  Mount  Vernon  on  July  4th,  and  in  New  York  on  September  27th.  When  the 
President  of  the  United  States  proclaimed  these  principles  and  conditions  of 
peace  they  were  treated  with  ill-concealed  contempt  by  the  Imperial  Government 
of  Germany,  but  were  hailed  with  joy  by  all  the  peoples  of  our  allies.     Time  and 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  363 

again  these  wise  and  just  principles  have  heen  endorsed  hy  our  allies  until  they 
have  come  to  be  regarded  as  a  new  Magna  Charta  for  the  whole  world.  But  as 
victory  comes  to  our  arms  in  the  field  and  when  it  is  perfectly  plain  that  the 
German  people  will  take  their  Government  into  their  own  hands,  or  that  our 
armed  forces  will  grind  to  powder  the  military  masters  of  Germany,  Mr.  Roosevelt 
comes  forward  and  asseverates  that  the  American  people  have  never  spoken,  and 
that  the  now  world-famous  fourteen  articles  should  be  treated  as  scraps  of  paper, 
and  that  only  hammering  of  guns  should  be  heard  when  we  come  to  settle  the 
peace  of  the  world  for  all  time.  This  is  Prussianism  to  the  bone.  I  would  under- 
take to  reply  to  Mr.  Roosevelt ;  but  I  endeavor  to  retain  my  sense  of  proportion,  and 
this  advises  me  that  you,  and  not  myself,  are  the  proper  person  to  defend  the  life 
of  the  League.  You  are  its  president,  and  as  chairman  of  the  North  Carolina 
Division  I  urge  you  to  telegraph  to  Washington  your  withering  condemnation  of 
the  utterances  of  Mr.  Roosevelt,  and  call  upon  Congress  to  stand  solidly  behind  the 
President  in  his  high  and  holy  purpose  to  make  the  League  of  Nations  the  most 
vital  part  of  the  great  treaty  that  will  be  written  when  the  German  people,  having 
swept  clean  their  own  house,  shall  accept  the  terms  and  conditions  of  peace  that 
have  already  been  dictated,  or  when  military  masters  of  Germany  shall  have  been 
forced  into  complete  and  unconditional  surrender. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
Chairman  of  the  N.  C.  Division  of  the  League  to  Enforce  Peace. 

Washington,  D.  C,  October  30,  1918. 
Me.  T.  W.  Bickett, 

Governor  and  Chairman,  N.  C.  Division  of  the  League  to  Enforce  Peace, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

My  deae  Goveenoe: — I  have  your  telegram  and  I  think  I  ought  to  answer  it, 
though  not  for  publication  unless  you  think  it  necessary.  The  truth  is  that  the 
President  does  not  favor  our  League  to  Enforce  Peace.  He  told  President  Lowell, 
of  Harvard,  and  me  that  fact  last  March.  The  truth  is  that  Mr.  Roosevelt  has 
come  around  to  favoring  the  League  to  Enforce  Peace,  provided  it  does  not  mean 
universal  disarmament.  I  find  myself  in  general  agreement  with  Mr.  Roosevelt 
on  this  subject.  Indeed,  more  than  I  would  with  President  Wilson,  who,  having 
announced  his  complete  acquiescence  in  the  principle  of  the  League,  advised  us  in 
the  conversation  to  which  I  referred  that  he  had  changed  his  mind.  So  far  as 
Mr.  Roosevelt's  opinion  is  concerned  on  the  fourteen  points  of  January  8th,  I  am 
largely  in  sympathy  with  him.  I  think  those  fourteen  points  cannot  be  made  the 
safe  basis  of  a  treaty  of  peace.  They  are  too  vague  and  indefinite.  They  would 
give  rise  to  as  many  disputes  as  the  present  war.  They  do  not  embrace  all  that 
our  allies  have  the  right  to  demand  and  they  embrace  some  things  that  our  allies 
would  not  concede.  Mr.  Wilson  has  not  consulted  our  Allies,  as  he  should.  He 
refuses  to  call  them  allies.  For  that  reason  I  am  sincerely  hopeful  that  a  Repub- 
lican Congress  will  be  returned  and  an  answer  given  to  his  unrepublican  and 
undemocratic  appeal  for  uncontrolled  and  despotic  power  during  the  life  of  the 
next  Congress.     His  reflection  on  the  Republican  minority  is  most  unjust. 

Now,  my  dear  Governor,  these  are  my  personal  opinions.  Therefore  I  did  not 
answer  your  telegram,  and  I  am  not  quite  sure  whether  you  expected  an  answer. 
However,  it  was  not  in  the  sending  of  the  telegram  that  the  importance  lay.  You 
are  at  liberty  to  publish  this  if  you  choose,  but  I  don't  insist  on  it. 

Sincerely  yours,  Wm.  H.  Taft. 


364  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

[Cablegram] 

London,  October  31,  1918. 
Governor  of  North  Carolina, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Proud  of  their  common  heritage  in  Raleigh's  name  and  fame,  British  and 
Americans  jointly  commemorating  Raleigh  tercentenary  at  Mansion  House,  send 
fraternal  greetings  to  citizens  of  North  Carolina. 

Gollancz,  Kings  College,  London. 

Raleigh,  NT.  C,  November  2,  1918. 
Hon.  Wm.  H.  Taft, 

Washington,  D.  C. 

My  dear  Mr.  Taft  : — I  thank  you  for  your  very  kind  and  courteous  letter  of 
the  30th  of  October  in  reply  to  my  telegram  of  recent  date. 

I  confess  that  the  letter  comes  to  me  as  a  distinct  surprise,  for  prior  to  its 
reception  I  would  have  gone  upon  the  witness  stand  and  testified  that  the  greatest 
enemy  of  the  League  to  Enforce  Peace  is  Mr.  Roosevelt,  based  upon  his  editorial 
of  October  16th  of  this  year  in  the  Kansas  City  Star,  and  I  would  have  further 
testified  on  oath  that  the  greatest  friend  of  the  League  to  Enforce  Peace  is  Mr. 
Wilson,  based  upon  his  New  York  speech  of  September  27th.  In  the  recent  dis- 
cussion of  the  Fourteen  Articles  I  have  not  seen  any  intimation  that  Mr.  Wilson 
intended  to  recede  from  the  position  that  he  took  in  his  New  York  speech,  in 
which  he  said  he  proposed  to  form  a  League  of  Nations  as  part  and  parcel  of  the 
treaty  of  peace.  To  my  mind  this  is  the  vital  question,  for  unless  the  League  of 
Nations  is  made  a  part  of  the  treaty  then,  in  my  opinion,  it  will  be  relegated  for 
the  next  ten  years  to  academic  discussion  on  chautauqua  platforms  and  in  high 
school  debating  societies. 

Of  course,  I  can  understand  how  differences  may  exist  as  to  just  how  far  we 
should  go,  but  if  we  want  to  get  anywhere  it  seems  to  me  that  the  thing  to  do  is  to 
line  up  behind  the  President.  The  processes  of  disarmament  will  necessarily  be 
slow,  but  that  is  the  ultimate  end  sought.  As  I  understand  it,  the  purpose  of  our 
League  is  to  put  war  out  of  business,  and  you  cannot  do  that  with  nations  armed 
to  their  teeth.  The  one  reason  for  the  existing  war  is  the  fact  that  Germany  was 
armed.  If  she  had  not  been  armed  she  would  not  have  dreamed  of  fighting.  You 
cannot  train  a  nation  of  men  to  fight  without  their  fighting,  and  it  is  my  opinion 
that  we  ought  to  go  just  as  far  towards  disarmament  as  practical  considerations 
will  admit.  Of  course,  it  cannot  be  done  in  a  day  nor  in  a  generation,  but  we  can 
set  that  up  as  the  ultimate  goal.  In  my  opinion  the  one  great  work  before  this 
century  is  to  make  the  public  conscience  as  sensitive  as  that  of  the  individual,  and 
to  compel  nations  to  observe  in  their  dealings  with  each  other  the  principles  of  the 
Ten  Commandments  and  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount.  I  may  do  him  an  injustice, 
but  judging  from  his  public  utterances,  Mr.  Roosevelt  is  today  closer  kin  to  the 
Kaiser  than  any  other  living  man. 

You  will  pardon  me  for  adding  that,  with  the  profoundest  respect  for  your 
opinion,  I  find  myself  in  utter  disagreement  with  Mr.  Roosevelt,  and  I  think  his 
attack  upon  Mr.  Wilson  is  born  of  the  same  jealous  selfishness  as  his  attack  upon 
you  when  you  were  nominated  for  President  the  second  time  in  Chicago. 

With  much  respect,  I  beg  to  remain, 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  365 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  November  6,  1918. 
Governor  Hugh  L.  Dorset, 
Atlanta,  Ga. 
I    regret   other   engagements   make   it   impossible   for   me   to   attend   meeting. 
I  respectfully  suggest  that  governors  of  all  the  Southern  States  issue  joint  procla- 
mation advising  farmers  not  to  sell  cotton  for  less  than  thirty  cents  per  pound. 
Will  be  glad  to  cooperate  in  whatever  measures  are  agreed  on  at  meeting. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

New  York,  K  Y.,  November  12,  1918. 
Governor  Thos.  W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Earnestly  request  that  you  hold  in  confidence  and  suppress  publication  of  your 
correspondence  with  Mr.  Taft  until  we  can  have  conference,   and  urge  you  to 
provide   opportunity   for  conference   by   attending   executive    committee   meeting 
Saturday.    Believe  matter  can  be  so  handled  as  to  bring  about  cordial  and  unified 
cooperation  with  administration. 

"William  H.  Short. 

[  Telegram] 

Ealeigh,  N.  C,  November  15,  1918. 

Executive  Committee  League  to  Enforce  Peace, 
10  Fifth  Avenue, 

New  York  City. 
Regret  duties  here  make  it  impossible  to  attend  meeting.  Am  profoundly  con- 
vinced that  whatever  is  done  to  graft  the  principles  of  our  League  on  the  govern- 
ments of  the  world  must  be  done  at  the  Peace  Conference  soon  to  convene.  This 
is  our  opportunity  and  the  last  one  that  will  come  in  this  generation  to  get  every 
first-class  power  in  the  world  to  sign  a  document  that  will  send  militarism  to  the 
scrap-heap  for  all  time.  It  is  plain  as  day  that  the  only  way  to  secure  this 
glorious  consummation  is  to  throw  all  the  power  and  the  influence  of  our  League 
to  the  support  of  the  President  of  the  United  States  in  his  avowed  determination 
to  make  the  League  of  Nations  the  most  virile  factor  in  the  great  world  treaty  of 
peace.  Junkers,  dominated  by  avarice  or  ambition,  will  scheme  to  make  the 
League  of  Nations  a  toothless  baby.  It  is  our  duty  to  see  to  it  that  when  the 
treaty  is  written  the  League  of  Nations  will  stand  forth  as  the  giant  of  the  earth. 
Therefore  I  urge  the  executive  committee  to  pass  ringing  resolutions  pledging 
to  the  President  of  the  United  States  every  atom  of  influence  we  can  command  in 
support  of  the  principles  laid  down  by  the  President  in  his  New  York  speech  of 
September  twenty-seventh. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


366  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

New  York,  November  18,  1918. 
The  Hon.  Thomas  W.  Bickett, 
Governor's  Office, 

Raleigh,  N.  C. 
My  dear  Governor  Bickett  : — Your  telegram  addressed  to  the  executive 
committee  Saturday  created  a  profound  impression;  and  if  you  have  seen  the 
press  reports  of  the  meeting  you  already  know  that  the  committee  acted  as  you 
suggested  and  adopted  a  ringing  resolution  pledging  support  to  the  President  in 
the  establishment  of  a  League  of  Nations.  Some  of  the  New  York  papers  printed 
your  telegram  in  full. 

I  enclose  a  copy  of  the  executive  committee  resolution. 

Sincerely  yours, 

Allan  P.  Ames, 
Secretary  Committee  on  Information. 

[Copy] 

Whereas,  the  President  of  the  United  States  has  proposed  as  one  of  the  terms 
of  peace  that  a  League  of  Nations  be  organized,  and  this  proposal  has  been  adopted 
as  the  basis  of  the  armistice : 

Resolved,  That  the  League  to  Enforce  Peace  pledge  its  hearty  support  to  the 
President  in  the  establishment  of  such  a  League  of  Nations. 

Ealeigh,  N.  C,  November  16,  1918. 
Hon.  Franklin  K.  Lane, 

Secretary  of  the  Interior, 
Washington,  D.  C. 

My  dear  Mr.  Secretary  : — All  of  us  deeply  regretted  your  inability  to  attend 
the  meeting  of  the  Southern  Land  Congress  at  Savannah,  but  of  course  we  fully 
appreciated  the  tremendous  questions  that  held  you  in  Washington. 

I  made  a  talk  to  the  Congress,  and  as  it  was  prepared  primarily  for  your 
consideration,  I  am  handing  you  herewith  a  memorandum  of  my  remarks,  and  will 
be  glad  for  you  to  do  me  the  honor  of  reading  it. 

It  seems  to  me  that  the  immediate  end  sought  will  be  most  surely  reached  by 
the  immediate  establishment  by  the  Government,  without  financial  support  from 
the  states,  of  not  more  than  five  model  colonies  containing  two  hundred  and  fifty 
thousand  acres  of  land  each,  or  a  smaller  number  if,  in  your  judgment,  this  would 
be  best.  This  would  be  merely  the  first  phase  of  the  far-reaching  plans  you  have 
in  mind.     The  advantage  of  establishing  these  modern  colonies  are  many. 

1.  Whatever  is  done  for  the  soldier  must  be  done  quickly,  and  to  await  the 
action  of  the  states  would  largely  defeat  your  purpose  to  take  care  of  these 
soldiers  immediately  upon  their  arrival  home.  It  will  take  sixty  or  ninety  days 
to  get  your  bill  through  Congress.  By  that  time  the  legislatures  in  most  of  the 
states  will  have  adjourned,  or  will  be  in  the  midst  of  their  closing  days,  and  it 
will  be  impossible  to  get  action  by  these  legislatures  inside  of  two  years. 

2.  The  lawmaking  bodies  of  most  of  the  states  are  extremely  conservative. 
This  is  especially  true  in  the  South,  and  it  would  be  very  difficult  to  secure  state 
legislation  involving  the  expenditure  of  money  on  an  utterly  untried  plan.  But 
nothing  succeeds  like  success,  and  if  the  five  model  colonies  established  by  the 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  367 

General  Government  should  prove  a  success,  the  states  would  then  cheerfully  fall 
in  line.  I  am  profoundly  convinced  that  during  the  experimental  phase  of  the 
proposition  the  Government  will  have  to  shoulder  the  entire  responsibility. 

3.  Your  Department  would  be  utterly  unable  to  give  thorough  and  constant 
supervision  over  forty-eight  colonies  scattered  in  every  state  of  the  Union.  I  was 
deeply  impressed  with  the  vision  and  the  practical  common  sense  of  the  men  who 
represented  your  Department  at  Savannah.  I  am  satisfied  these  men  can  make 
a  small  number  of  model  colonies  a  big  success,  but  if  their  energies  should  be 
spread  over  forty-eight  states,  then  no  one  colony  would  get  the  full  benefit  of 
their  oversight. 

4.  By  limiting  the  number  of  colonies  you  can  select  lands  where  conditions 
are  ideal  and  where  success  will  be  a  practical  certainty,  and  this  can  be  done 
during  the  present  administration  in  such  a  convincing  fashion  that  no  subsequent 
administration  would  abandon  the  policy. 

Of  course,  the  second  phase  of  the  movement  would  open  the  door  to  all  the 
states  and  to  individuals  who,  under  the  sanction  of  the  state,  might  want  to 
go  into  copartnership  with  the  Government  and  put  up  the  lands  without  cost. 
This  would  follow  as  the  natural  sequence  of  success  in  the  first  phase. 

5.  By  providing  for  a  model  colony  in  the  different  sections  of  the  country, 
say,  one  in  the  far  West,  one  in  the  middle  West,  one  in  the  East,  one  on  the 
coastal  plain  of  the  South,  and  one  on  the  Gulf  coast,  political  and  sectional 
objections  to  the  scheme  would  be  largely  eliminated. 

As  applicable  to  the  whole  situation  that  now  confronts  you  with  respect  to 
this  movement,  I  submit  the  following  lines  from  Owen  Meredith : 

"But  he  who  seeks  one  thing  in  life,  and  but  one, 
May  hope  to  achieve  it  ere  life  be  done; 
But  he  who  seeks  all  things  where'er  he  goes, 
Only  reaps  from  the  hopes  which  around  him  he  sows 
A  harvest  of  barren  regrets." 

With  great  respect,  I  beg  to  remain, 

Bespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Kaleigh,  1ST.  C,  November  16,  1918. 
Hon.  Newton  D.  Baker, 
Secretary  of  War, 

Washington,  D.  C. 

My  dear  Mb.  Baker  : — Doubtless  you  are  deluged  with  suggestions  in  regard 
to  the  demobilization  of  the  Army.  I  am  beginning  to  be  deluged  with  applications 
from  friends  and  relatives  of  men  in  the  camps  in  this  country  asking  for  indi- 
vidual discharges.  You  can  readily  see  how  impossible  it  is  for  this  office  to 
handle  these  applications,  and,  indeed,  at  the  present  time  I  would  not  know  how 
to  even  start  in  any  given  case. 

Therefore,  I  earnestly  trust,  at  an  early  date,  you  will  promulgate  rules  and 
regulations  governing  the  discharges  of  men  in  camp  in  this  country.  It  seems 
to  me  that  a  certain  amount  of  judgment  and  discrimination  ought  to  be  used  in 
turning  the  men  loose,  just  as  it  was  used  in  calling  them  in.  I  suggest  that  the 
local  boards  might  be  used  in  this  connection,  that  is  to  say,  if  a  soldier  wants  a 


368  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

discharge  let  him  apply  to  his  commanding  officer  and  let  that  officer  at  once 
forward  his  card  to  the  Local  Exemption  Board  of  the  county  or  city  from  which 
the  soldier  comes,  and  let  that  board  find  certain  facts : 

1.  Whether  or  not  the  soldier  worked  steadily  before  he  entered  the  army. 

2.  Whether  or  not  there  is  a  job  awaiting  that  soldier  at  home.  The  indus- 
trious men  who  have  jobs  awaiting  them  ought  to  be  discharged  first,  and  if  any 
men  are  to  be  held  in  camps  for  any  considerable  period  then  the  men  ought  to  be 
held  who  do  not  want  to  work  or  whose  services  are  not  specially  needed. 

I  take  it  that  it  would  be  unfortunate  to  discharge  great  numbers  of  soldiers 
without  knowing  what  they  are  going  to  do,  or  where  they  could  get  anything  to 
do  after  being  discharged. 

I  simply  throw  the  suggestions  into  the  hopper,  knowing  that  if  the  main  prin- 
ciple appeals  to  you  the  details  can  be  worked  out  wisely  and  justly  in  your  De- 
partment. Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  November  19,  1918. 
Hon.  Robert  W.  Gobrell, 
Mayor, 

Winston-Salem,  N.  C. 
My  deab  Me.  Goeeell  : — I  desire  to  congratulate  you  and  all  the  officials  and 
law-abiding  citizens  of  Winston-Salem  on  the  intelligent  and  courageous  manner 
in  which  the  sanctity  of  the  law  was  upheld  in  the  recent  trouble  in  your  city. 
The  case  is  a  tragic  illustration  of  the  insanity  of  a  mob,  and  how  the  lives  of 
innocent  people  are  always  imperiled  when  the  mob  spirit  prevails.  It  is  to  be 
earnestly  hoped  that  all  the  people  of  the  State  will  learn  from  this  tragedy  that 
safety  for  the  innocent  can  only  be  assured  by  the  strict  observance  of  the  law. 
The  law  will  always  punish  any  man  who  violates  a  woman  in  North  Carolina, 
It  has  never  failed  to  do  it.  The  guilty  cannot  possibly  escape,  and  the  mob  so 
often  wreaks  its  vengeance,  intentionally  or  unintentionally,  upon  the  innocent. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  December  21,  1918. 
Goveenoe  Thos.  W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
My  deae  Goveenoe  : — As  county  superintendent  of  my  native  county  before 
I  was  twenty-one  years  of  age,  as  chairman  of  the  county  board  of  education, 
as  teacher  and  superintendent  of  city  public  schools,  as  teacher  and  dean  of  the 
State  Normal  and  Industrial  College,  as  State  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruc- 
tion for  the  past  seventeen  years,  I  have  been  in  public  service  and  have  felt  the 
weight  of  public  responsibility  continuously  for  thirty-seven  years.     I  have  had 
joy  in  the  service.    I  am  more  grateful  and  appreciative  than  I  can  ever  express 
in  word  or  act  for  the  measure  of  confidence,  support,  cooperation,  and  apprecia- 
tion— far  beyond  my  deserts — that  I  have  received  from  the  people  of  North 
Carolina  during  all  these  years.     I  need  a  rest  now.     I  hope  I  have  earned  it. 
I  have  had  scant  time,  especially  during  the  past  seventeen  busy  years,  to  give  to 
my  private  business.    It  needs  my  attention. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  369 

In  accordance  with  my  notification  to  you  last  summer,  I  beg,  therefore,  to 
tender  my  resignation  as  State  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction,  to  take 
effect  January  1,  1919.  Very  truly  yours, 

J.  Y.  Jotneb, 
State  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction. 

Db.  J.  Y.  Joyneb,  Raleigh,  N".  C,  December  21,  1918. 

State  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

My  deae  Doctor  Joyneb: — I  am  just  in  receipt  of  your  letter  of  this  date 
tendering  your  resignation,  effective  January  1st.  I  deeply  regret  that  the  State 
is  to  lose  the  benefit  of  your  services,  but  concur  in  the  opinion  that  you  have 
rightly  earned  a  period  of  rest. 

I  know  that  any  words  of  fulsome  praise  would  be  distasteful  to  you,  but, 
writing  with  rigid  conservatism,  I  am  constrained  to  say  that  during  the  seventeen 
years  you  have  been  State  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction  you  have  made 
a  noble  and  imperishable  contribution  to  the  intellectual  and  moral  life  of  the 
State. 

I  deem  it  not  improper  to  add  that  when  you  notified  me  last  summer  of  your 
intention  to  resign  the  first  of  January  I  at  once  offered  to  consult  with  you  about 
your  successor.  You  stated  that  you  would  prefer  that  I  should  not  do  so, 
as  you  did  not  desire  to  have  anything  whatever  to  do  with  naming  your 
successor.  Immediately  after  this  conversation  I  made  up  my  mind  to  appoint 
Dr.  E.  C.  Brooks  of  the  Chair  of  Education  in  Trinity  College,  and  at  once  went 
to  Dr.  Brooks  to  ascertain  whether  or  not  he  would  be  willing  to  accept  the 
appointment.  He  advised  me  that  he  would,  and  I  am  today  naming  him  as  your 
successor. 

With  sentiments  of  affectionate  esteem,  I  beg  to  remain, 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Db.  E.  C.  Beooks,  Raleigh,  K  C,  December  21,  1918. 

Trinity  College, 

Durham,  N.  C. 
My  deae  Db.  Beooks: — In  accordance  with  a  conversation  that  I  had  with 
you  last  summer,  I  beg  to  advise  you  that  Dr.  J.  Y.  Joyner  has  tendered  his 
resignation  as  State  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction,  effective  January  1st, 
and  I  am  sending  you  today  a  commission  as  his  successor,  to  take  effect  the  same 
date. 

Wishing  you  a  most  happy  Christmas,  I  beg  to  remain, 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

To  the  President  of  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 

This  is  to  certify  that  on  the  fifth  day  of  November,  nineteen  hundred  and 
eighteen,  Furnifold  M.  Simmons  was  duly  chosen  by  the  qualified  electors  of  the 
State  of  North  Carolina  a  Senator  from  said  State  to  represent  said  State  in  the 

24 


370  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

United  States  Senate  for  the  term  of  six  years,  beginning  on  the  fourth  day  of 
March,  nineteen  hundred  and  nineteen. 

Witness :     His    Excellency   our    Governor,    Thomas    Walter   Bickett, 
[gbeat     and  our  seal  hereto  affixed  at  Raleigh,  this  the  eleventh  day  of  January, 
seal]      in  the  year  of  our  Lord  nineteen  hundred  and  nineteen. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

J.  Beyan  Gbimes, 

Secretary  of  State. 

Hon.  M.  W.  Feeebee,  Raleigh,  N.  C,  February  8,  1919. 

Chairman  of  Senate  Committee  on  Public  Roads, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

My  deae  Senator: — I  see  in  the  morning  paper  that  the  Scales-Stevens  bill 
has  been  sent  back  to  your  committee  with  sixteen  amendments.  In  view  of  this 
status  of  the  bill  I  deem  it  not  improper  for  me  to  submit  several  suggestions  for 
the  consideration  of  your  committee. 

1.  The  bill  now  pending  in  Congress,  and  which  I  am  advised  will  in  all 
probability  be  enacted,  carries  an  appropriation  of  fifty  million  dollars  for  1919, 
seventy-five  millions  for  1920  and  seventy-five  millions  for  1921.  Under  this  bill 
and  the  Federal  law  that  is  already  in  force,  North  Carolina  will  receive  for  1919, 
$1,825,000;  for  1920,  $2,125,000;  and  for  1921,  $2,275,000,  making  a  total  of 
$6,225,000  under  the  present  and  proposed  Federal  laws. 

In  apportioning  this  money  to  the  State  the  Government  proceeds  upon  the 
principle  that  the  State  itself  must  manifest  a  substantial  interest  in  the  subject 
by  meeting  the  Federal  appropriation  dollar  for  dollar.  It  seems  to  me  that  this 
principle  ought  to  be  applied  to  some  extent,  at  least,  by  the  State  in  the  admin- 
istration of  this  fund  and  the  fund  it  is  proposed  to  raise  by  State  taxation. 
I  think  that  a  wise  and  just  policy  would  be  to  incorporate  in  the  proposed  road 
law  a  provision  requiring  the  community  or  county  through  which  the  road  is  to 
be  constructed  to  pay  one-fourth  of  the  cost,  the  State  paying  one-fourth,  and  the 
Federal  Government  one-half.     This  plan  has  several  advantages : 

1.  It  would  render  it  unnecessary  to  issue  any  State  bonds  at  all. 

2.  It  would  prevent  any  undue  scrambling  for  the  location  of  the  roads.  If  the 
county  that  gets  a  road  under  the  proposed  law  is  to  pay  not  one  cent  more  than 
a  county  that  gets  nothing,  then  every  county  in  the  State  will  be  convinced  that 
it  is  a  high  crime  not  to  run  the  road  through  that  particular  county. 

I  think  that  a  greater  distinction  should  be  made  between  the  light  cars  and 
heavy  cars  than  would  be  made  under  a  flat  horsepower  rule.  After  you  get  out 
of  the  Ford  class  of  car  the  weight  increases  much  more  rapidly  than  the  horse- 
power increases,  and  it  seems  to  me  that  it  would  be  eminently  fair  to  make  a  rate 
of,  say,  fifty  cents  per  horsepower  up  to  twenty-four  and  seventy-five  cents  per 
horsepower  above  that  figure.  This  rule  also  has  the  advantage  that  the  men 
who  own  and  operate  the  high-priced,  heavy  cars  are  much  more  able  to  pay  than 
the  men  who  own  cars  in  the  Ford  class. 

I  am  emphatically  of  opinion  that  the  Highway  Commission  ought  not  to  be 
limited  to  hard-surface  roads,  but  should  be  allowed  to  consult  their  own  judgment 
and  the  wishes  of  the  community  through  which  the  road  is  to  be  constructed  in 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  371 

determining  just  the  character  of  road  that  ought  to  be  built.  I  seriously  doubt 
whether  Worth  Carolina  is  in  a  financial  position  to  embark  on  a  policy  of  con- 
structing a  series  of  hard-surface  roads  connecting  all  the  county-seats  in  the 
State  and  costing  not  less  than  $20,000  per  mile.  We  can  build  in  North  Carolina 
a  perfectly  good  road  that  would  serve  the  people  ten  months  in  the  year  for  an 
average  not  greater  than  $2,000  per  mile.  There  may  be  some  wealthy  and  thickly 
populated  communities  that  would  be  interested  in  roads  costing  $20,000  per  mile, 
but  taking  the  State  as  a  whole,  this  cost  is  at  present  beyond  our  resources.  It 
would  cost  not  less  than  two  hundred  millions  of  dollars  to  give  to  the  State  a 
comprehensive  system  of  hard-surface  roads. 

I  think  that  the  provision  in  the  Stevens-Scales  bill  for  taking  over  certain 
roads  that  are  already  completed  and  paying  one-half  of  the  cost  of  the  same 
ought  to  be  very  greatly  modified;  certainly  no  money  ought  to  be  paid  out  in 
taking  over  roads  already  completed  until  we  have  gone  forward  in  the  con- 
struction of  new  roads  that  are  a  present  and  pressing  necessity.  Unless  some 
such  policy  as  this  should  be  adopted  we  might  spend  a  considerable  portion  of 
the  Federal  and  the  State  money  and  have  no  more  road  mileage  than  we  have 
at  the  present  time.  I  am  very  much  in  favor  of  the  State  doing  everything 
possible  to  encourage  good  roads,  but  in  my  opinion  it  would  be  very  unwise  for 
the  State  to  issue  bonds  for  the  construction  of  these  roads. 

Eespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Washington,  D.  C,  February  17,  1919. 
Honorable  Thomas  W.  Bickett, 

Governor  of  North  Carolina, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
My  dear  Governor  Bickett  : — There  has  been  sent  you  today,  under  separate 
cover,  an  autographed  copy  of  my  Second  Report  to  the  Secretary  of  War  on  the 
operations  of  the  Selective  Draft. 

I  have  sought  in  this  way  to  make  of  record  not  only  an  official  relation  which 
has  been  of  the  pleasantest  character  but,  as  well,  an  official  recognition  of  the 
indebtedness  of  the  National  Headquarters  to  you  for  your  faithful  and  self- 
sacrificing  devotion  to  a  patriotic  national  duty  in  the  administration  within  your 
State  of  the  Selective  Service  Law. 

Very  truly  yours, 

E.  H.  Crowder, 
Provost  Marshal-General. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  February  26,  1919. 
Hon.  F.  C.  Harding, 

Chairman  Senate  Committee  on  Education, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
My  dear  Sir  : — There  seems  to  be  some  confusion  about  my  position  upon  the 
Child  Labor  question,  and  I  desire  to  clear  this  up. 

In  my  Biennial  Message  to  the  General  Assembly  I  said: 

Coupled  with  and  as  a  part  of  the  compulsory  school  law  should  be  a 
child-labor  law.  The  first  sections  of  the  act  should  provide  for  compulsory 
attendance  upon  school;  the  latter  sections  should  make  it  unlawful  for  any 


372  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

mill  or  factory  to  employ  any  child  between  the  ages  of  eight  and  fourteen 
during  the  public  school  term.  Of  course  no  child  under  seventeen  can  be 
employed  under  existing  laws.  The  weakness  of  child-labor  legislation  has 
been  that  it  has  dealt  with  the  subject  only  in  a  negative  way.  It  has  de- 
clared that  the  child  shall  not  work,  but  has  not  concerned  itself  with  what 
the  child  shall  do.  The  treatment  of  the  problem  has  not  been  unlike  that 
of  the  mother  who  told  the  servant  to  go  out  in  the  yard  and  see  what  the 
children  were  doing  and  make  them  stop  it.  A  law  that  takes  the  child  out 
of  the  factory  and  dumps  it  into  the  street  is  hurtful  both  to  the  child  and 
to  society.  The  law  should  say  the  child  shall  not  work  and,  furthermore, 
that  he  shall  go  to  school.  In  fact,  the  law  should  be  primarily  a  part  of 
the  educational  policy  of  the  State  and  only  in  an  incidental  way  a  child- 
labor  law.  The  law  should  be  enforced  by  the  officers  of  the  educational  de- 
partment, and  it  should  be  the  duty  of  the  truant  officer  to  go  out  and  find 
the  child,  whether  in  a  factory  or  on  the  street,  and  place  him  in  school. 
Provision  might  be  made  with  proper  safeguards  for  permitting  a  child  be- 
tween twelve  and  fourteen  to  work  in  a  factory  after  the  public  school  term 
has  expired,  provided  a  certificate  can  be  obtained  showing  that  the  child 
had  actually  attended  the  school  during  the  entire  term. 

In  making  the  recommendations  above  quoted  it  will  be  seen  at  once  tbat  I 
was  deeply  interested  in  keeping  the  child  in  school  as  well  as  out  of  the  factory. 
What  is  known  as  the  Connor-Saunders  bill  is  a  substantial  compliance  with  the 
spirit  of  my  message.  It  provides  for  a  commission  to  be  composed  of  the  State 
Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction,  the  Secretary  of  the  State  Board  of  Health 
and  the  Commissioner  of  Labor  and  Printing.  My  information  is  that  the  authors 
of  this  bill  are  willing  to  amend  it  so  that  the  inspector  shall  be  appointed  by  the 
entire  commission  and  not  by  any  member  of  the  same.  I  utterly  fail  to  see  any 
objection  to  the  Commissioner  of  Labor  and  Printing  being  a  member  of  this  Com- 
mission, and  in  view  of  the  turn  that  matters  have  taken  in  the  General  Assembly, 
I  deem  it  eminently  wise  and  proper  for  him  to  be  a  member  of  this  Commission 
and  to  be  the  executive  officer  of  the  Commission  as  outlined  in  the  bill.  I  have 
said  this  much  to  the  members  of  the  Legislative  Committee  of  the  North  Carolina 
Manufacturers  Association  and  to  the  members  of  the  General  Assembly  interested 
in  the  Neal  substitute.  I  respectfully  submit  that  in  view  of  the  legislative 
history  of  these  bills,  which  is  known  to  all  men,  it  would  be  unwise  and  unjust  to 
ignore  the  Department  of  Labor  in  this  matter. 

Eespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  K  C,  March  3,  1919. 
General  E.  H.  Crowder, 
Washington,  D.  0. 
So  far  as  I  am  able  to  ascertain,  the  press  and  public  in  North  Carolina  and 
the  General  Assembly  have  accepted  at  par  your  statement  about  the  newspaper 
clipping  which  appeared  in  your  second  report  to  the  Secretary  of  War.     It  is 
thought  by  all  to  be  a  most  regrettable  mistake,  but  public  opinion  acquits  you 
entirely  of  any  intention  to  make  any  reflection  on  North  Carolina,  and  appre- 
ciates your  purpose  to  make  any  possible  correction  of  the  record.     The  matter  is 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  373 

now  regarded  as  a  closed  incident.     A  full  statement  of  the  facts  with  respect  to 
delinquents  and  deserters  in  Western  North  Carolina  will  be  mailed  to  you. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  March  13,  1919. 
Me.  D.  E.  Henderson, 
Charlotte,  N.  C. 

My  deab  Me.  Henderson  : — The  General  Assembly  of  1919  created  "The 
North  Carolina  Memorial  Building  Commission,"  to  be  composed  of  the  Governor, 
the  President  of  the  Senate,  and  nine  other  persons  appointed  by  the  Governor. 
The  Commission  is  to  solicit  funds  and  to  erect  a  suitable  memorial  building 
to  the  North  Carolina  soldiers  who  participated  in  the  World  War.  The  Com- 
mission may  purchase  a  site  or,  with  the  consent  of  the  Council  of  State,  may  erect 
a  building  on  land  already  owned  by  the  State. 

I  have  selected  you  as  a  member  of  this  Commission,  and  earnestly  beg  you  to 
accept  the  appointment  and  do  what  you  can  to  carry  out  the  highly  commendable 
purpose  for  which  the  Commission  was  created.  There  will  be  a  meeting  of  the 
Commission  in  Raleigh  in  the  Senate  Chamber  on  Thursday,  the  20th  day  of 
March,  for  the  purpose  of  organizing  and  forming  plans  for  carrying  out  the 
work.     I  urge  you  to  attend  this  meeting. 

The  full  Commission,  in  addition  to  the  members  named  by  the  General 
Assembly,  is  as  follows : 

Mrs.  George  B.  Elliott Wilmington 

Mrs.  Felix  C.  Harvey Kinston 

Mrs.  R.  J.  Reynolds Winston-Salem 

D.  E.  Henderson Charlotte 

Judge  J.  C.  Pritchard Asheville 

E.  Carl  Duncan Raleigh 

W.  A.  Erwin Durham 

J.  C.  B.  Ehringhaus Elizabeth  City 

Lionel  Weil Goldsboro 

Sincerely  yours, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[Telegram] 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  April  4,  1919. 
Geneeal  Samuel  L.  Faison, 
60th  Brigade, 

Camp  Jackson,  S.  C. 
I  congratulate  you  and  the  officers  and  men  under  your  command  upon  the 
magnificent  record  you  have  made  in  France,  and  beg  to  assure  you  of  the  great 
joy  the  people  of  North  Carolina  feel  in  having  you  home  again. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


374  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  April  4,  1919. 
Col.  J.  Van  B.  Metts, 
119th  Infantry, 

Camp  Jackson,  S.  C. 
I  congratulate  you  and  the  officers  and  men  under  your  command  upon  the 
magnificent  record  you  have  made  in  France,  and  beg  to  assure  you  of  the  great 
joy  the  people  of  North  Carolina  feel  in  having  you  home  again. 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  April  7,  1919. 

To  the  Chairmen  of  Bureaus  for  Returning  Soldiers  and  Sailors: 

Dear  Sie  : — Our  soldiers  and  sailors  are  now  returning  home  in  great  numbers. 
We  are  receiving  them  with  open  arms  and  it  is  eminently  fitting  for  their  return 
to  be  celebrated  with  great  outbursts  of  patriotic  enthusiasm.  But  these  men 
cannot  live  on  cheers  and  music  and  flowers  and  kisses.  The  fairest  and  finest 
thing  we  can  do  for  them  is  to  see  to  it  that  every  man  of  them  at  once  gets  a 
good  job. 

I  want  every  town  and  county  in  North  Carolina  to  highly  resolve  that  no 
soldier  or  sailor  shall  be  denied  a  chance  to  make  a  decent  living.  Please  lay  this 
matter  on  the  hearts  of  your  people.  Make  it  a  matter  of  community  pride  and 
patriotism.  Let  each  community  be  very  sensitive  on  this  point.  Let  no  com- 
munity be  willing  for  another  community  to  provide  jobs  for  its  heroes. 

These  men  are  neither  afraid  nor  ashamed  to  work.  They  seek  no  charity — 
they  scorn  it.     They  want  a  job,  and  they  must  not  be  denied. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Rev.  Robert  B.  S.  Hammond,  Raleigh,  N.  C,  June  6,  1919. 

Bliss  Building, 

Washington,  D.  C. 

My  dear  Sir: — I  deeply  regret  that  I  was  out  of  the  city  when  your  party 
was  here  this  week  investigating  the  prohibition  situation. 

I  do  not  hesitate  to  say  that,  studied  from  any  angle,  prohibition  is  a  big 
success  in  North  Carolina.  It  has  been  in  force  for  ten  years,  and  during  these 
years  the  industrial  prosperity  of  the  State  has  been  remarkable.  No  other  decade 
in  our  history  can  compare  with  it. 

Without  doubt  it  has  come  to  stay  with  our  people.  When  the  issue  was  sub- 
mitted ten  years  ago  a  considerable  number  of  representative  people,  and  the 
ablest  newspaper  in  the  State  at  that  time,  opposed  the  measure.  This  opposition 
was  conscientious.  Today  not  a  single  representative  man  in  the  State  could  be 
induced  to  say  or  write  anything  against  prohibition.  It  has  touched  in  a  beneficial 
way  the  industrial,  the  educational,  and  the  social  life  of  the  State. 

Of  course  liquor  is  still  manufactured  and  sold  contrary  to  law.  You  cannot 
change  the  habits  of  centuries  in  a  day ;  but  I  am  persuaded  that  today  not  more 
than  ten  per  cent  as  much  liquor  is  consumed  by  the  people  of  North  Carolina  as 
was  consumed  before  the  prohibition  law  went  into  effect.     The  amount  consumed 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  375 

will  steadily  decrease,  and  when  a  generation  comes  on  that  has  never  seen  a 
legalized  saloon  or  distillery  the  consumption  of  liquor  will  reach  the  vanishing 
point.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  K  C,  June  19,  1919. 
Lieutenant  Caniff, 

Casino  Y.  M.  C.  A.  Hut, 
Newport  News,  Va. 
Please  convey  to  the  North  Carolina  soldiers  of  the  eighty-first  the  following 
message :  "Soldiers  of  the  Eighty-first  Division :  On  hehalf  of  the  people  of  North 
Carolina  I  welcome  you  home.  I  deeply  regret  that  it  is  impossible  for  me  per- 
sonally to  greet  every  one  of  you.  We  are  so  gratefully  proud  of  you;  proud  that 
you  went,  and  proud  that  you  have  returned  in  safety,  but  proudest  that  you  bring 
back  with  you  an  official  record  of  personal  purity  unsurpassed  by  any  army  in  any 
country  in  any  time.  For  us  you  answered  the  high  clear  call.  For  us  you  endured 
the  privations  of  the  camp.  For  us  you  braved  the  serpents  of  the  sea.  For  us 
you  made  the  long,  long  march.  I  voice  the  soul  of  North  Carolina  when  I  say, 
"God  bless  you,  every  one." 

T.  W.  Bickett, 

Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

Boston,  Mass.,  June  26,  1919. 
Governor  T.  W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Can  you  let  us  have  short  statement  by  return  mail  your  opinion  regarding 
consolidation  of  railroads  for  purposes  of  economical  operation,  thus  lowering  the 
price  of  transportation  to  the  traveling  and  shipping  public  and  eliminating  waste- 
ful competition? 

Citizens  National  Railroads  League, 

Equitable  Building. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  June  27,  1919. 
Citizens  National  Railroads  League, 
Equitable  Building, 
Boston,  Mass. 
Gentlemen  : — I  have  for  a  number  of  years  believed  that  the  entire  railroad 
system  of  the  country  should  be  operated  as  one.    A  railroad  is  a  natural  monopoly, 
and  when  this  is  true,  and  the  Government  regulates  the  charges,  all  thought  of 
competition  between  railroads  on   rates   should   at  once  be  dismissed.      There  is 
absolutely  no  reason  why  a  community  that  is  served  by  two  railroads,  or  more, 
should  get  a  rate  lower  than  a  community  served  by  one  railroad.     There  should 
be  competition  between  railroads  in  point  of  efficiency  only.     I  regret  that  I  do 
not  have  time  to  elaborate  these  convictions. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


376  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

Me.  J.  E.  S.  Thorpe,  Raleigh,  N".  C.,  June  28,  1919. 

Superintendent  TalJassee  Power  Company, 
Badin,  N.  C. 

My  dear  Sir: — I  am  in  receipt  of  a  letter  of  June  25th  from  Mr.  D.  L.  Goble, 
International  Representative  of  the  Brotherhood  of  Electrical  "Workers.  A  copy 
of  this  letter  appeared  in  the  News  and  Observer  this  morning,  and  I  assume  was 
sent  to  the  News  and  Observer  by  Mr.  Goble  or  some  one  representing  him. 
I  enclose  you  the  clipping  from  the  News  and  Observer,  which  also  contains  a 
notice  signed  by  you  to  the  effect  that  the  Tallassee  Power  Company  would  dismiss 
any  one  in  its  employ  who  joins  a  labor  union. 

I  deem  it  my  duty  to  call  your  attention  to  my  statement  of  May  30th  last, 
dealing  with  the  labor  troubles  in  Charlotte.  This  statement  appeared  in  all  of 
the  leading  papers  of  the  State  at  that  time,  and  I  assume  that  you  are  familiar 
with  it.    I  now  desire  to  reiterate  and  emphasize  the  position  then  taken. 

Boiled  down,  my  position  is  that  no  employer  has  a  moral  right  to  discharge  any 
man  because  he  sees  fit  to  join  a  labor  union,  and  no  laborer  has  a  moral  right  to 
quit  work  because  there  works  by  his  side  a  man  who  does  not  belong  to  a  labor 
union. 

There  is  no  written  law  to  prevent  an  employer  from  discharging  a  man  be- 
cause he  joins  a  union,  but  such  a  discharge  cannot  stand  the  acid  test  of  justice, 
and  injustice  can  never  score  a  permanent  success.  Capital  may  win  a  single 
battle  by  such  methods,  but  it  can  never  win  a  war. 

This  is  a  free  country,  and  every  man  must  be  allowed  to  exercise  his  own  free 
will  without  coercion  or  intimidation  in  joining  or  refusing  to  join  any  lawful 
organization. 

The  supreme  law  in  this  land  is  public  opinion,  and  that  public  opinion 
condemns  and  ought  to  condemn  the  employer  who  refuses  to  give  a  man  a  job 
because  he  belongs  to  a  union,  and  the  same  public  opinion  condemns  and  ought 
to  condemn  a  man  who  quits  or  refuses  to  take  a  job  because  of  the  presence  of 
some  man  who  does  not  belong  to  a  union. 

But  so  long  as  neither  side  resorts  to  violence  I  am  without  legal  power  to 
interfere.  If  either  an  employer  or  laborer  resorts  to  violence  then  it  becomes 
my  plain  duty  to  call  out  the  entire  military  and  police  force  of  the  State  to 
protect  the  life  and  property  of  our  citizens  and  preserve  peace  and  order.  This 
duty  I  shall  most  certainly  perform  without  fear  and  without  favor,  whether 
violence  be  used  by  capital  or  by  labor. 

This  is  as  much  as  I  am  called  on  to  say  or  do  as  the  Governor  of  Xorth  Caro- 
lina, but  as  a  citizen  of  the  State  I  am  deeply  concerned  in  its  permanent  peace 
and  happiness.  Therefore  I  am  moved  to  say  that  unless  there  be  enough  of 
wisdom  and  of  justice  in  our  borders  to  devise  and  put  into  execution  some  plan 
for  the  settlement  of  industrial  disputes  other  than  by  walkouts  and  lockouts, 
then  our  civilization  is  a  failure  and  industrial  chaos  stares  us  in  the  face. 

Labor,  capital  and  executive  ability  are  each  a  vital  necessity  to  every  indus- 
trial enterprise,  and  these  must  work  in  harmony  with  and  not  in  hostility  to 
each  other  if  the  business  is  to  be  conducted  on  bases  of  economy  and  efficiency. 
Unless  the  business  be  so  conducted  as  to  reduce  waste  to  a  minimum  and  to 
secure  the  largest  outcome  possible  from  a  given  amount  of  labor  and  of  capital, 
then  the  business  is  doomed  to  failure  and  will  soon  be  useless  to  both  labor  and 
capital. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  377 

The  Great  Teacher  pointed  out  the  folly  of  the  present  hostile  attitude  of 
capital  and  labor  when  he  said,  "A  house  divided  against  itself  cannot  stand." 
The  philosophy  of  the  Great  Apostle  to  the  Gentiles  applies  with  striking 
emphasis  to  the  industrial  disputes  of  the  hour.  "The  body  is  not  one  member, 
but  many.  The  eye  cannot  say  unto  the  hand,  I  have  no  need  of  thee,  nor  again 
the  head  to  the  feet,  I  have  no  need  of  you.  There  should  be  no  schism  in  the 
body,  but  the  members  should  have  the  same  care  one  for  another,  and  whether 
one  member  suffer  all  the  members  suffer  with  it,  or  one  member  be  honored  all 
the  members  rejoice  with  it." 

Labor  and  capital  are  parts  of  the  same  body  and  they  must  adjust  and  har- 
monize any  seeming  differences,  for  war  in  the  body  will  prove  fatal  to  all  its 
members. 

I  therefore  urge  labor  and  capital  in  Worth  Carolina  to  establish  in  every 
industrial  enterprise  an  organization  composed  of  all  the  men  who  have  an  interest 
in  the  permanent  success  of  that  enterprise.  Let  labor  and  capital  be  represented 
in  the  adjustment  of  every  question,  and  if  there  should  develop,  after  a  frank 
and  friendly  investigation  and  discussion,  an  irreconcilable  difference,  then  let 
that  difference  be  submitted  to  an  impartial  tribunal  enjoying  the  confidence  of 
all  the  men  interested  in  that  particular  enterprise. 

Such  a  plan  will  make  for  friendship,  for  happiness,  for  economy,  for  efficiency, 
for  the  betterment  of  every  human  being,  while  the  present  system  of  lockouts  and 
walkouts  makes  for  hostility,  for  unhappiness,  for  waste,  for  war,  and  for  the 
ultimate  ruin,  first  of  society,  and  then  of  the  individual. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C,  July  23,  1919. 
To  All  Prisoners  in  the  State  Prison: 

A  number  of  petitions  have  recently  come  before  me  for  pardon  of  prisoners 
in  the  State  Prison  where  a  pardon  would  have  been  granted  except  for  the  fact 
that  the  prisoner  is  in  Grade  C,  or  plain  B.  I  have  established  a  rule,  and  propose 
to  adhere  to  it,  that  I  will  not  grant  a  pardon  to  any  man  unless  he  is  in  Grade  A 
or  in  Grade  B  plus.  We  are  offering  to  prisoners  every  possible  inducement  to 
climb  into  these  upper  grades.  In  the  first  place,  the  State  pays  the  prisoner 
more  money  who  works  in  the  upper  grades ;  in  the  second  place,  you  wear  more 
attractive  clothes ;  in  the  third  place,  you  are  allowed  more  privileges ;  and  in  the 
fourth  place,  you  stand  an  infinitely  better  chance  of  receiving  a  pardon  when  your 
case  comes  on  for  consideration.  If,  in  the  face  of  all  these  inducements  to  be 
good  prisoners,  to  obey  the  rules  and  regulations  of  the  prison,  to  be  courteous 
and  considerate  of  officials  and  all  fellow  prisoners,  a  prisoner  persistently  refuses 
to  take  advantage  of  these  opportunities,  then  the  conclusion  is  irresistible  that 
if  turned  out  he  would  not  make  a  good  citizen,  but  would  be  a  menace  to  the 
peace  and  order  of  any  community  in  which  he  might  live. 

I  am  asking  the  Superintendent  of  the  State  Prison  to  have  copies  of  this 
notice  read  to  all  prisoners,  and  posted  in  the  Central  Prison  and  in  all  farms 
and  camps  where  State  prisoners  reside. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


378  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  August  11,  1919. 
Honobable  R.  B.  Glenn, 

Winston- Sal  em,  N.  C. 
At  a  meeting  of  the  State  Printing  Commission  this  morning  you  were  discussed 
at  length,  both  as  an  individual  and  as  Governor,  and  the  meeting  unanimously 
authorized  the  Secretary  to  wire  to  you  our  deep  and  lasting  love  and  admiration, 
with  the  hope  that  you  may  have  many,  many  more  birthdays. 

M.  L.  Shipman,  Secretary. 

T.    W.    BlCKETT. 

W.  P.  Wood. 
R.  B.  Lacy. 
E.  0.  Beooks. 


J.  S.  Manning. 


[  Telegram] 


Atlanta,  Ga.,  August  13,  1919. 
Governor  Thomas  W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Recognizing  the  grave  importance  of  the  present  economic  situation  throughout 
the  country  and  particularly  in  the  South,  I  am  asking  you  to  gather  with  the 
State  executives  of  Alabama,  Arkansas,  Florida,  Georgia,  Louisiana,  Mississippi, 
Missouri,  North  Carolina,  Oklahoma,  South  Carolina,  Tennessee,  and  Texas,  to 
join  with  me  in  issuing  the  accompanying  proclamation.     Feeling  as  I  do  that  a 
representative  gathering  of  the  people  of  the  South  for  a  frank  discussion  of  matters 
vital  to  our  future  existence  and  prosperity  will  be  of  material  benefit,  may  I  urge, 
therefore,  that  you  join  with  me  in  this  public  expression : 

A  PROCLAMATION 

Whereas,  the  President  of  the  United  States,  in  his  address  to  the  Con- 
gress of  the  United  States  on  August  S,  1919,  has  called  attention  to  grave 
conditions  of  distress  confronting  large  numbers  of  our  people  by  reason  of 
constantly  rising  living  costs  due  to  the  perversion  of  the  ordinary  laws  of 
supply  and  demand  and  to  the  activities  of  speculators  and  profiteers  in  the 
necessities  of  life;  and 

Whereas,  these  conditions  are  of  especial  concern  to  the  people  of  the 
Southern  States  in  view  of  their  absolute  dependence  upon  the  cotton 
industry  as  the  basis  of  their  well-being,  and  especially  in  view  of  the  fact 
that  cotton  prices  have  entirely  failed  to  keep  pace  with  the  prices  of  manu- 
factured products  and  other  commodities  which  they  must  buy: 

Therefore,  we,  as  governors  of  the  states  of  Alabama,  Arkansas,  Florida, 
Georgia,  Louisiana,  Mississippi,  Missouri,  North  Carolina,  Oklahoma,  South 
Carolina,  Tennessee,  and  Texas,  in  association  with  the  President  of  the 
American  Cotton  Association,  do  hereby  summon  representative  farmers, 
merchants,  bankers,  business  and  professional  men  from  our  several  states 
hereinbefore  mentioned  to  confer  together  in  the  city  of  Memphis,  Tennes- 
see, on  the  eighth  and  ninth  of  September  and  to  study  on  behalf  of  the 
people  of  the  South  ways  and  means  of  dealing  with  such  prices  as  they 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  379 

relate  to  the  life  and  comfort  of  our  people,  and  in  particular  to  study  such 
conditions  as  they  relate  to  the  cotton  industry  as  a  whole,  to  the  determina- 
tion of  a  fair  and  just  price  for  cotton  based  upon  considerations  of  supply 
and  demand  and  the  price  of  the  manufactured  products  of  cotton. 

Witness  our  hands  this  the  fifteenth  day  of  August,  nineteen  hundred 
nineteen. 

Please  wire  reply,  President  J.  S.  "Wannamaker,  American  Cotton  Association, 
Atlanta.  Hugh  M.  Dorset, 

Governor  of  Georgia. 

Ealeigh,  1ST.  O.j  August  14,  1919. 
Hon.  O.  Max  Gardner, 

Lieutenant-Governor  of  North  Carolina, 
Shelby,  N.  C. 
My  dear  Governor  : — I  have  the  honor  to  advise  you  that  Governor  Bickett 
left  today  for  Salt  Lake  City,  Utah,  to  attend  the  Conference  of  Governors  of  the 
United  States.  He  will  be  away  until  about  the  seventh  of  September,  1919. 
As  the  Governor  will  be  out  of  the  State  almost  the  entire  time  he  is  on  this  trip, 
he  directed  me  to  notify  you  and  request  that  you  give  me  your  itinerary  for  the 
next  month,  in  order  that  I  may  be  able  to  get  in  touch  with  you  should  a  situation 
arise  making  it  necessary  for  you  to  perform  the  duties  of  Governor  during  his 
absence  from  the  State. 

With  highest  regards,  I  am,  Yours  very  truly, 

Santford  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 

[  Telegram] 

Ealeigh,  K  C,  August  14,  1919. 
Hon.  Hugh  M.  Dorset, 

Governor  of  Georgia, 
Atlanta,  Ga. 
I  heartily  endorse  your  proclamation  and  gladly  join  you  in  it. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
Governor  of  North  Carolina. 

Ealeigh,  K  C,  August  14,  1919. 
General  B.  S.  Eotster, 
Adjutant  General, 

Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Dear  Sir: — I  am  leaving  the  State  today  to  be  absent  for  several  weeks,  and 
you  are  hereby  authorized  and  directed  to  call  out  troops  and  send  to  any  point 
in  the  State  of  North  Carolina  where  they  may  be  necessary  to  protect  life  and 
property,  or  the  peace  and  good  name  of  the  State. 

Eespectfully, 

T.  W".  Bickett, 
Governor  and  Commander-in-Chief. 


380  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

August  18,  1919. 
Colonel  Santford  Martin, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
My  dear  Colonel  : — Your  favor  of  the  14th  instant  has  just  been  received. 
In  the  event  an  occasion  should  arise  making  it  necessary  for  me  to  perform  the 
duties  of  Governor  during  the  absence  of  Governor  Bickett  from  the  State,  I 
suggest  that  you  communicate  with  my  secretary,  Miss  L.  B.  Miller,  of  Shelby,  who 
will  at  all  times  be  in  touch  with  me.     It  will  be  impossible  to  accurately  locate 
where  I  will  be  during  the  next  two  or  three  weeks,  but  Miss  Miller  will  at  all 
times  be  informed. 

Trusting  that  you  are  well,  and  with  best  wishes  and  sentiments  of  esteem, 
believe  me,  Very  truly  yours, 

0.  Max  Gardner. 

[  Telegram] 

Governor  T.  W.  Bickett,  Atlanta,  Ga.,  October  23,  1919. 

Executive  Department, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
News  reports  your  address  opening  North  Carolina  Fair  state  you  gave  details 
new  system  State  taxation  which  you  say  will  give  North  Carolina  lowest  tax 
rate  in  Union,  and  without  hardship  any  class  of  property.    Wish  you  would  mail 
me  at  once,  for  use  Sunday,  a  brief  summary  of  that  law  and  how  it  works. 

Clark  Howell, 
Editor  Atlanta  Constitution. 

Mr.  Clark  Howell,  Ealeigh,  N.  C,  October  24,  1919. 

Editor  Atlanta  Constitution, 
Atlanta,  Ga. 
My  dear  Mr.  Howell: — Your  telegram  of  October  23d  just  received. 
The  statement  made  in  address  opening  our   State  Fair  this  week  that  tax 
rates  in  North  Carolina  in  1920  will  be  materially  less  than  in  any  other  American 
state  was  based  upon  three  considerations : 

1.  Bulletin  of  the  TJ.  S.  Census  Department,  "Financial  Statistics  of  States," 
for  the  year  1919,  shows  governmental  costs  less  per  capita  in  North  Carolina 
than  any  other  state  except  South  Carolina,  and  equal  with  that  state. 

2.  We  are  now  engaged  in  a  genuine  revaluation  of  all  property  in  the  State 
for  tax  purposes  for  the  year  1920  upon  the  basis  of  actual  100  per  cent  value, 
with  an  absolute  guarantee  that  every  tax  rate  levied  in  the  State,  including 
counties,  cities,  towns,  and  special  tax  districts,  shall  be  adjusted  to  the  new  basis 
of  property  values,  so  that  not  more  than  ten  per  cent  increase  in  revenue  can  be 
raised  in  1920  by  the  State,  the  counties,  cities,  towns,  and  special  tax  districts. 

3.  A  large  part  of  the  State's  revenue  is  collected  from  special  license  taxes, 
franchise  taxes,  and  taxes  upon  income  and  inheritance. 

The  combination  of  low  governmental  costs,  100  per  cent  property  values, 
a  fixed  limit  upon  rates,  and  a  large  revenue  from  other  sources  than  the  general 
property  tax  for  State  revenue  will  unquestionably  give  us  the  result  of  tax  rates 
on  property  in  this  State  in  1920  substantially  lower  than  will  be  found  in  any 
other  state.  Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  381 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  November  S,  1919. 
To  the  State  Board  of  Elections: 

Gentlemen  : — Honorable  Edwin  Yates  Webb,  a  duly  elected  member  of  the 
National  House  of  Representatives,  of  the  Ninth  Congressional  District  from 
North  Carolina,  has  filed  with  me  his  resignation  as  a  Member  of  Congress, 
effective  November  10,  1919. 

Now,  therefore,  in  compliance  with  the  duty  imposed  upon  me  by  law,  I 
authorize  and  direct  you  to  hold  a  special  election  to  fill  the  vacancy  in  Congress 
caused  by  the  resignation  of  Honorable  Edwin  Yates  Webb,  the  said  election  to 
be  held  on  Tuesday,  November  16,  1919. 

All  voters  in  the  Ninth  Congressional  District  are  hereby  notified  of  said 
election,  and  are  called  upon  to  turn  out  on  said  day,  and  then  and  there  vote  for 
a  representative  in  Congress.  The  said  election  shall  be  conducted  in  like  manner 
as  regular  elections. 

In  testimony  whereof,  I  have  hereunto  set  my  hand  and  caused  the 

[great     Great  Seal  of  the  State  to  be  affixed  this  the  eighth  day  of  November, 

seal]      in  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  nineteen,  and  of 

the  one  hundred  and  forty-fourth  year  of  our  American  Independence. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
By  the  Governor :  Governor. 

Santfoed  Martin, 

Private  Secretary. 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  December  5,  1919. 
Hon.  John  Underwood,  Mayor, 
Payetteville,  N.  C. 
I  deeply  regret  my  inability  to  reach  Fayetteville  today.     Please  say  to  General 
Pershing  for  me  that  the  whole  State  of  North  Carolina  feels  greatly  honored  to 
have  him  in  our  midst,  and  extends  to  him  a  loyal,  loving  welcome. 

T.  W.  Bickett, 

Governor. 

Hon.  Herbert  C.  Hoover,  Raleigh,  N.  C,  January  29,  1920. 

Shoreham  Hotel, 

Washington,  D.  C. 

My  dear  Sir  : — Some  time  before  the  New  York  World  made  its  now  famous 
pronouncement,  I  had  intended  writing  you  that  I  am  in  favor  of  the  Democratic 
Party  naming  you  as  its  choice  for  President.  I  am  satisfied  that  you  are  the  one 
man  who  fulfills  the  expectations  and  the  demands  of  the  hour. 

Neither  the  Penrose  nor  the  Bryan  school  of  thought  adequately  comprehends 
the  situation  that  now  confronts  America  and  the  whole  civilized  world.  Your 
record  during  the  war  and  your  recent  writings  convince  me  that  you  rightly 
interpret  the  existing  order  of  things,  and  as  President  would  safeguard  the 
fundamental  principles  of  our  American  form  of  government,  and  at  the  same  time 
meet  the  new  and  world-wide  obligations  we  recognized  and  assumed  when  we 
entered  the  World  War. 


382  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

In  its  finest  sense,  you  are  the  outstanding  Democrat  of  the  hour,  and  the 
logical  nominee  of  our  party.    I  am  for  you. 

I  enclose  an  editorial  from  the  Winston-Salem  Journal  which,  in  my  opinion, 
fairly  reflects  the  trend  of  the  best  thought  in  this  State.  "Winston-Salem  is  one 
of  our  largest  and  most  progressive  cities,  and  the  Journal  is  edited  by  Mr.  Sant- 
ford  Martin,  one  of  the  most  fearless  and  conscientious  editors  in  the  State,  and 
its  business  manager  is  Mr.  Frank  C.  Page,  a  son  of  our  late  Ambassador  to  the 
Court  of  St.  James. 

"With  great  respect,  I  beg  to  remain, 

Eespectfully, 

T.  "W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  February  3,  1920. 
The  Union  Signal, 
Evansion,  III. 
Mr.  Editor  : — Replying  to  your  inquiry  of  January  30th,  I  beg  to  say  that 
the  State  of  North  Carolina  went  dry  by  a  vote  of  the  people  on  the  first  day  of 
January,  1909.  For  eleven  years  we  have  lived  under  strict  prohibition  laws. 
When  the  question  was  submitted  to  the  people  in  1508,  a  number  of  leading 
newspapers  in  the  State  and  a  very  considerable  number  of  representative  men 
stubbornly  fought  the  proposition.  I  think  the  best  evidence  of  the  success  of 
prohibition  is  the  fact  that  today  not  a  single  newspaper  in  the  State  and  not  a 
single  representative  citizen  in  the  State  would  go  before  the  people  and  advocate 
a  repeal  of  the  law.  I  am  satisfied  that  the  people  do  not  consume  one-tenth  as 
much  intoxicating  liquors  as  they  did  before,  and  the  progress  of  the  State  along 
industrial  and  educational  lines  during  these  eleven  years  has  been  relatively  twice 
as  great  as  it  was  before  we  had  prohibition.  Morally,  intellectually,  and  indus- 
trially, prohibition  is  a  magnificent  asset  to  the  State  of  North  Carolina. 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  February  13,  1920. 

To  All  Private  Trained  Nurses  in  the  State: 

My  dear  Nurse  : — Influenza  and  its  attendant,  pneumonia,  which  last  fall  and 
winter  killed  nearly  fifteen  thousand  North  Carolinians,  is  again  abroad  in  the 
State. 

In  many  communities  medical  and  nursing  service  is  inadequate  to  meet  the 
needs  of  the  emergency  thus  produced.  In  some  communities  medical  and  nursing 
service  is  wholly  lacking.  There  are  sections  where  entire  families  in  a  neighbor- 
hood are  stricken  down  and  lie  sick  unto  death  without  even  those  ordinary 
attentions  for  their  comfort  and  welfare  that  kindly  neighbors  might  administer. 

Along  with  these  perilous  community  needs  there  must  be  hundreds  of  trained 
nurses  in  the  State  now  engaged  in  attending  private  cases.  Between  the  con- 
venience and  safety  of  individual  families  and  the  peril  of  stricken  communities 
the  sense  of  duty  of  private  nurses  must  be  very  uncertain  and  most  disturbing 
to  their  peace  of  mind.  Many  nurses  with  private  cases,  under  existing  circum- 
stances, perhaps  would  gladly  leave  to  their  State  the  responsibility  of  determining 
their  place  of  duty. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  383 

I  am  therefore,  in  the  public  interest  and  with  the  difficult  position  of  the 
private  nurse  in  mind,  writing  to  make  this  request  of  you :  that  if  you  are  now 
engaged  in  private  nursing,  you  will  fill  out  and  mail  to  me  the  enclosed  form, 
which,  as  you  will  observe,  leaves  the  determination  of  your  place  of  service  in  the 
present  emergency  not  to  yourself,  but  to  the  State,  and  relieves  you  of  all 
responsibility.  The  probabilities  are  that  not  more  than  fifty  nurses  from  among 
all  the  nurses  engaged  in  the  State  will  be  called — a  relatively  small  percentage 
of  the  total  nurses  at  work. 

In  this  emergency,  when  our  people  cry  out  for  help,  no  private  duty  should 
stand  in  the  way.  This  is  no  time  for  any  individual  or  family  to  retain  a  nurse 
for  private  duty  when  her  services  can  be  so  much  more  valuable;  nor  is  it  the 
time  for  any  nurse  to  remain  on  such  private  duty  when  she  can  possibly  be 
spared.  If  there  is  any  question  in  the  mind  of  the  nurse  as  to  which  is  the  more 
important,  her  duty  to  her  private  patient  or  her  duty  to  the  whole  people,  I  urge 
her  to  present  the  case  to  me  and  absolve  herself  of  the  responsibility  of  deciding. 

Eespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

Washington,  D.  C,  February  25,  1920. 
Hon.  Thomas  W.  Bickett,  Governor, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Governor  Milliken  of  Maine,  with  number  of  other  governors,  has  retained  Ex- 
Justice  Hughes  to  defend  right  of  state  to  ratify  eighteenth  amendment  Federal 
Constitution  against  attacks  State  Ehode  Island  and  liquor  people  New  Jersey, 
California,  etc.    About  twenty-two  governors  have  so  far  assented.     Wo  financial 
obligation  on  these  states  or  their  officers.    Judge  Hughes  ready  make  application 
file  brief,  but  we  are  all  anxious  have  as  many  ratifying  states  thus  represented 
as  possible.    Earnestly  hope  you  will  authorize  North  Carolina  be  included  under 
conditions  above  named,  and,  if  so,  please  wire  Judge  Charles  E.  Hughes,  96  Broad- 
way, New  York  City,  and  also  wire  me  here,  charges  collect. 

Edwin  C.  Dinwiddie. 

[  Telegram] 

Governor  T.  W.  Bickett,  Augusta,  Maine,  February  25,  1920. 

Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Referring  further  your  letter  January  twenty-sixth,  I  concur  heartily  in  your 
opinion  that  Rhode  Island's  suit  is  really  frivolous.  Yet  the  matter  is  to  be  argued 
on  its  merits  March  eighth,  and,  in  order  to  make  assurance  doubly  sure,  a 
majority  of  the  states  which  ratified  the  eighteenth  amendment  are  joining  in  the 
request  that  the  Supreme  Court  be  allowed  to  intervene  and  join  the  Government 
in  the  answer  to  this  suit.  Former  Justice  Charles  Evans  Hughes  of  New 
York  has  been  engaged  as  general  counsel  to  manage  the  case  and  make  oral 
arguments.  It  is  understood  that  Attorneys-General  of  individual  states  will  file 
briefs  and  be  entered  as  attorneys  of  record  if  they  desire.  In  these  circumstances 
would  you  not  feel  like  allowing  me  to  add  your  State  to  the  list  of  those  that  join 
in  this  matter?    Wo  expense  to  your  State  would  be  involved. 

Carl  E.  Milliken, 

Governor  of  Maine. 


384  PAPERS  OP  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  1ST.  0.,  February  26,  1920. 
Hon.  Charles  E.  Hughes, 

96  Broadway,  New  York  City. 
North  Carolina  desires  to  join  other  states  in  defense  of  right  of  states  to 
ratify  eighteenth   amendment   Federal   Constitution  against  attacks  by   State  of 
Rhode  Island  and  others.  T.  "W.  Bickett, 

Governor  of  North  Carolina. 

[  Telegram] 

Raleigh,  N.  C,  February  26,  1920. 
Hon.  Cabl  E.  Milliken, 
Governor  of  Maine, 
Augusta,  Me. 
North  Carolina  gladly  joins  other  states  in  defending  right  of  states  to  ratify 
eighteenth  amendment  against  attacks  made  by  Rhode  Island.    Am  wiring  Judge 
Hughes  today.  T.  W.  Bickett, 

Governor. 

Rockingham,  N.  C,  March  12,  1920. 
Goveenoe  Thomas  W.  Bickett, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

My  deae  Goveenoe  Bickett  : — In  reviewing  in  my  mind  the  outstanding 
features  of  your  administration,  it  seems  to  me  that  you  have  been  thinking  more 
about  whether  a  thing  is  right  than  whether  it  might  be  popular.  Your  great 
taxation  question  has  now  been  accepted  by  all  our  candidates,  and  the  people  are 
accepting  it  in  a  fine  spirit  everywhere.  This  must  be  gratifying  to  you,  as  it  is 
to  all  its  friends.  Now  that  discriminations  in  tax  burdens  are  in  process  of 
being  removed  and  the  tax  books  are  commencing  to  "Speak  the  truth,"  may  I 
not  hope  that  you  will  join  hands  with  those  of  us  who  favor  the  franchise  for 
women,  and  help  us  secure  for  them  a  tardy  justice? 

At  the  last  session  of  the  Legislature  the  Municipal  Bill  passed  the  Senate  by 
a  large  majority,  but  was  lost  in  the  House  by  only  a  few  votes.  In  order  to 
defeat  the  bill,  the  opposition  had  paired  at  least  one  member  of  the  House,  who 
was  sick  in  a  hospital,  so  that  his  vote  was  cast  against  the  bill,  when,  I  was 
informed,  he  would  have  voted  for  the  bill  had  he  been  able  to  be  there.  Those 
who  were  opposed  to  the  bill  refused  to  arrange  pairs  with  some  of  the  friends  of 
the  bill  who  were  also  sick  and  absent. 

The  revulsion  of  feeling  brought  about  by  these  conditions  was  so  strong  that 
one  of  the  most  prominent  leaders  of  the  House  who  was  opposed  to  the  bill 
offered  the  next  day  to  move  for  a  reconsideration  and  assured  me  that  we  could 
pass  the  bill  by  a  large  majority.  Unfortunately,  I  was  in  a  position  where  I 
could  not  take  advantage  of  this  change  in  feeling,  due  to  the  fact  that  one  of  the 
most  prominent  leaders  against  us  had  told  me  that  he  had  a  pressing  business 
engagement  in  New  York,  and  would  go  if  we  did  not  intend  to  open  up  the 
question  the  next  day.    I  told  him  to  go  ahead ;  so  it  could  not  be  reconsidered. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  385 

The  women  of  North  Carolina,  and,  I  believe,  the  men  who  have  supported 
their  cause,  have  played  the  game  like  sportsmen.  We  have  no  list  of  those  who 
have  stood  against  us  marked  for  slaughter.  We  have  considered  that  they  were 
honest  in  their  position ;  neither  have  we  a  very  bitter  taste  in  our  mouths  that  the 
nearly  dead  were  voted  against  us  when  they  had  told  us  if  they  were  alive  they 
would  vote  with  us.  All  of  these  things  come  in  each  day's  work,  and  this  great 
question  has  entered  upon  another  stage. 

The  ratification  of  the  Federal  amendment  now  challenges  our  attention.  Our 
party  must  come  out  squarely  on  one  side  or  the  other.  The  question  can  no  longer 
be  put  off — like  death — to  the  very  last  possible  moment. 

Knowing  your  love  for  a  square  deal,  I  am  persuaded  to  hope  that  you  may 
become  our  champion,  and  that  you  will  be  our  spokesman  before  the  State 
Convention. 

If  this  plea  appeals  to  you,  then  our  women,  who  have  no  other  thought  than 
to  help  their  brothers  in  the  building  of  a  State,  will  have  found  a  mighty 
champion. 

With  greatest  respect,  I  am,  Yours  truly, 

W.  N.  Everett. 

Kaleigh,  N.  C,  March  15,  1920. 
Me.  W.  N.  Everett, 

Rockingham,  N.  C. 

My  dear  Mr.  Everett  : — I  have  read  with  much  interest  your  letter  of  March 
twelfth. 

It  is  well  known  that  I  have  not  been  impressed  with  the  wisdom  of  or  the 
necessity  for  Woman  Suffrage  in  North  Carolina.  There  has  never  been  laid 
before  me  evidence  tending  to  show  that  a  majority  of  the  women  in  this  State 
desire  to  go  to  the  polls.  I  greatly  fear  that  the  women  who  desire  to  go  are  all 
unconsciously  offering  to  barter  a  very  precious  birthright  for  a  very  sorry  mess 
of  pottage. 

It  has  never  occurred  to  me  that  woman  would  hurt  politics,  but  I  have  been 
profoundly  disturbed  about  what  politics  might  do  to  woman.  My  attitude  has 
been  that  of  the  Western  cowboy  to  whom  a  woman  suffragist  said,  "We  want  to 
be  made  equal  to  the  men."  The  cowboy  lifted  his  sombrero,  bowed  low,  and  said, 
"And  why  does  my  lady  wish  to  come  down?" 

Again,  I  have  been  fearful  that  the  entrance  of  woman  into  politics  might 
disturb  the  peaceful  relations  that  now  exist  between  the  races  in  this  State,  and 
for  continuation  of  which  all  good  men  and  women  pray.  When  I  think  of  this 
phase  of  the  situation  I  am  haunted  by  the  lines  of  the  Scotch  bard: 

"But,  Och!    I  backward  cast  my  e'e 

On  prospects  drear; 
An'  forward,  though  I  canna  see, 
I  guess  an'  fear." 

These  fears  may  not  be  well  founded,  but  I  have  honestly  entertained  them, 
and  the  utmost  candor  requires  me  to  state  them. 

But,  my  dear  Mr.  Everett,  my  fears  do  not  blind  my  eyes,  and  I  clearly  see 
that  today  a  condition  and  not  a  theory  confronts  the  Democratic  Party  in  North 
Carolina.    Woman  Suffrage  is  coming.    It  is  as  irresistible  as  the  tides,  and  I  am 

25 


386  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICKETT 

convinced  that  it  is  the  part  of  wisdom  for  the  Democratic  Party  in  North  Carolina 
to  accept  it  gracefully. 

During  the  war  Dr.  Cyrus  Thompson  and  myself  were  making  some  patriotic 
speeches  up  in  the  mountains.  In  the  course  of  one  of  his  speeches  Dr.  Thompson 
said,  "I  have  reached  that  position  in  human  philosophy  where  I  have  learned 
to  accept  the  inevitable,  and  to  require  of  it  that  it  shall  give  me  pleasure." 
This  is  a  sentiment  worthy  of  Emerson,  and  is  applicable  to  the  condition  that 
today  confronts  the  people  of  Worth  Carolina.  Woman  Suffrage  is  inevitable. 
He  is  a  deaf  man  who  does  not  hear  the  swish  of  its  skirts.  He  is  a  blind  man  who 
does  not  see  its  legions  advancing  in  flouncing,  flowery  waves.  Gentlemen  of 
Tarheelia!  let's  be  good  sports  and  join  lustily  in  the  chorus,  "Come  along, 
Ladies !" 

Some  time  ago  I  definitely  decided  to  advise  the  General  Assembly  at  the 
special  session  in  July  to  ratify  the  Federal  amendment.  It  is  the  sensible  and 
the  graceful  thing  to  do.  It  follows  that  I  am  in  favor  of  the  Democratic  Con- 
vention endorsing  the  amendment  when  it  meets  in  April.  I  do  not  desire  to  go 
before  the  Convention  and  make  a  speech  on  the  subject,  but  I  am  giving  this 
letter  and  yours  to  the  press  in  order  that  my  views  may  be  known  to  all  the  people 
of  the  State.  Sincerely  yours, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Ealeigh,  N.  C,  April  15,  1920. 

Col.  Sib  Eeginald  Hennell,  C.V.O.,  O.B.E.,  D.S.O., 

Lt.  of  the  King's  Body  Guard  of  the  Yeomen  of  the  Guard, 
Friary  Court,  St.  James  Palace, 
London,  S.  W.  1. 
Dear  Sib: — In  behalf  of  the  State  of  North  Carolina  I  beg  to  acknowledge 
receipt  of  a  copy  of  "The  History  of  the  King's  Body  Guard  of  the  Yeomen  of 
the  Guard." 

The  workmanship  of  the  book  is  beautiful,  and  its  contents  are  of  peculiar 
interest  to  the  people  of  North  Carolina  on  account  of  the  fact  that  Sir  "Walter 
Baleigh  was  one  of  the  most  distinguished  Captains  of  the  Guard. 

The  book  will  be  carefully  preserved  in  the  Library  of  the  Historical  Commis- 
sion of  this  State,  and  will  constitute  one  more  link  in  the  long  chain  that  binds 
Great  Britain  and  North  Carolina  together  in  ties  of  mutual  affection  and  esteem. 
We  are  essentially  one  people,  one  in  blood,  one  in  language,  and  one  in  our 
conceptions  of  liberty  and  justice.  The  waves  may  now  and  then  clash,  but  the 
great  tides  of  American  and  British  thought  advance  side  by  side.  May  we  ever 
sing  in  our  hearts,  "Blest  be  the  tie  that  binds." 

I  beg  to  remain,  Sir,  with  assurances  of  great  esteem, 

Bespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett, 
Governor  of  North  Carolina. 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  387 

Hon.  Walter  Clakk,  Ealeigh,  N.  C,  June  4,  1920. 

Chief  Justice, 

Raleigh,  N.  C. 

My  dear  Judge  : — I  regret  that  you  will  not  be  able  to  accompany  me  to 
Norfolk  to  inspect  the  battleship  North  Carolina. 

I  beg  to  acknowledge  receipt  of  your  communication  in  regard  to  taxation  of 
all  the  property  owned  by  a  corporation,  and  also  the  taxation  of  the  shares  that 
represent  that  property.  With  the  utmost  deference  and  kindness  permit  me  to 
say  that  I  find  myself  in  total  disagreement  with  you  on  the  fundamental  prin- 
ciples involved.  The  system  of  taxation  advocated  by  you  would  completely 
paralyze  the  business  life  of  North  Carolina,  and  would  permanently  halt  the 
progress  of  the  State. 

Take  this  illustration :  Tou  and  your  two  sons  form  a  copartnership  for  the 
purpose  of  cultivating  lands  in  Halifax  County.  You  invest  $10,000  each  in 
lands  and  equipment,  making  a  total  of  $30,000  invested  in  the  partnership.  One 
day  you  meet  and  determine  that,  owing  to  the  uncertainty  of  life,  it  would  be 
wise  to  convert  this  partnership  into  a  corporation.  Tou  do  so  and  call  it  The 
Walter  Clark  Corporation.  Not  an  additional  dollar  is  invested  in  the  business. 
You  simply  change  the  methods  of  carrying  on  the  business  that  you  already  own. 
To  say  that  thereupon  you  would  have  to  pay  taxes  on  $60,000  instead  of  $30,000 
is  a  proposition  so  atrociously  unjust  as  to  shock  the  conscience  of  every  fair- 
thinking  man.  Eespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Ealeigh,  N.  C,  June  18,  1920. 
The  News  and  Observer, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

Mr.  Editor: — I  notice  in  your  issue  of  the  16th  a  short  article  written  by 
Eev.  John  E.  White,  essentially  and  eternally  of  North  Carolina,  but  temporarily 
residing  at  Anderson,  South  Carolina,  in  commendation  of  Prof.  William  E. 
Dodd's  recent  book  on  "Woodrow  Wilson  and  His  Work." 

It  so  happens  that  I  have  just  finished  reading  this  book,  and  no  one  who  i9 
interested  in  the  truth  about  Wilson  can  afford  to  miss  reading  this  book.  The 
forces  that  enter  into  the  intellectual  and  spiritual  constitution  of  Wilson  and  that 
bore  him  on  with  irresistible  power  are  clearly  analyzed  in  this  book,  and  when 
one  once  feels  the  sweep  of  these  forces  he  can  begin  to  understand  how  utterly 
impossible  it  is  for  Wilson  to  be  anything  else  than  the  man  he  is. 

Professor  Dodd  is  at  the  head  of  the  Department  of  American  History  in  the 
University  of  Chicago.  He  is  a  truly  great  historian,  and,  considering  the  author 
and  his  subject,  every  North  Carolinian  owes  it  to  his  own  education  to  read  this 
book.  Eespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


388  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

Raleigh,  1ST.  C.,  June  23,  1920. 
Hon.  J.  Crawford  Biggs, 

Manager  for  Hon.  0.  Max  Gardner, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
Hon.  Heriot  Clarkson, 

Manager  for  Hon.  Cameron  Morrison, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 

My  dear  Sirs  : — I  am  greatly  distressed  to  see  that  it  is  proposed  to  have  a 
joint  debate  between  the  two  candidates  for  the  Democratic  nomination  for 
Governor.  I  have  looked  at  the  question  from  every  angle,  and  fail  to  see  how  a 
single  atom  of  good  can  come  to  the  Democratic  Party  from  such  a  meeting.  On 
the  other  hand,  it  is  as  plain  as  day  that  a  maximum  amount  of  harm  must  result. 

Both  of  these  gentlemen  have  heretofore  been  recognized  as  able  and  honorable 
workers  in  the  ranks  of  the  Democratic  Party,  and  all  good  men  must  deplore  any 
attempt  to  besmirch  either  of  them  because  he  now  aspires  to  the  highest  honor 
in  the  gift  of  the  party. 

Either  Mr.  Morrison  or  Mr.  Gardner  will  be  the  Democratic  nominee  for 
Governor,  and  to  discredit  either  of  them  will  simply  supply  Republican  guns 
with  ammunition. 

There  is  no  blinking  the  fact  that  the  enemy  is  vastly  encouraged  and  is  gleeful 
over  the  prospect  of  lowering  Democratic  prestige  in  this  good  State.  We  need 
to  reserve  all  our  bullets  for  the  common  foe.  As  the  accredited  leader  of  the 
party  I  urge  you  gentlemen  to  at  once  call  off  this  meeting.  In  the  immortal 
language  of  the  beloved  Aycock,  I  say  to  you,  "The  Doones  are  in  the  valley — 
I  pray  you,  gentlemen,  train  your  guns  a  little  lower." 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

[  Telegram] 

"Washington,  D.  C,  June  24,  1920. 
Hon.  Thomas  W.  Bickett, 

Governor  of  North  Carolina, 
Raleigh,  N.  C. 
I  am  sure  I  need  not  point  out  to  you  the  critical  importance  of  the  action 
of  your  great  State  in  the  matter  of  the  Suffrage  Amendment. 

Woodrow  Wilson. 

Hon.  Woodrow  Wilson,  Raleigh,  !N".  C,  June  28,  1920. 

President  of  the  United  States, 
Washington,  D.  C. 
My  dear  Mr.  President  : — I  have  the  honor  to  acknowledge  receipt  of  your 
telegram  in  regard  to  the  Suffrage  Amendment.  While  the  telegram  does  not 
seem  to  call  for  a  reply,  I  deem  it  proper  to  say  that  on  March  15th,  of  this  year, 
I  gave  to  the  press  a  statement  that  while  I  was  not  personally  impressed  with 
either  the  wisdom  of  or  the  necessity  for  Woman  Suffrage  in  North  Carolina, 
I  recognized  its  coming  as  inevitable,  and  would  advise  the  special  session  of  our 


PUBLIC  LETTERS  AND  TELEGRAMS  389 

General  Assembly  that  the  sensible  and  graceful  thing  to  do  would  be  to  accept  the 
inevitable  and  promptly  ratify  the  amendment.     This  is  still  my  purpose. 
With  great  esteem,  I  beg  to  remain, 

Respectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 

Me.  John  S.  Wannamakee,  Raleigh,  N".  C,  November  8,  1920. 

President  American  Cotton  Association, 
St.  Matthews,  S.  C. 

My  deae  Mr.  Wannamakee: — Your  telegram  would  have  received  instant 
reply  but  for  my  absence  from  the  city. 

I  trust  it  is  not  necessary  to  say  that  I  deeply  deplore  the  tragic  situation 
that  confronts  our  cotton  and  tobacco  farmers,  and  am  in  favor  of  resorting  to 
every  possible  measure  that  promises  relief. 

To  work  and  to  pray  for  the  prosperity  and  the  happiness  of  the  farmer  is  no 
evidence  of  special  wisdom  or  virtue.  Any  man  with  sense  enough  to  be  allowed  to 
run  at  large  must  know  that  not  only  the  welfare,  but  the  very  life  of  the  Nation 
is  dependent  upon  a  prosperous  rural  population.  If  the  farmer  is  allowed  to  go 
to  the  devil,  hell  will  soon  be  the  portion  of  us  all. 

I  think  the  Federal  Reserve  Board  made  a  fundamental  mistake  in  its  inter- 
pretation of  the  present  crisis  in  the  cotton  market.  I  thoroughly  agree  with  the 
board  in  its  contention  that  it  cannot  interfere  with  the  law  of  supply  and 
demand.  Other  things  have  interfered  with  this  law.  Today  the  demand  for  cotton 
is  greater  than  the  supply.  There  is  today  a  shivering  cry  all  around  the  world 
for  more  cotton  than  the  world  contains.  The  international  financial  machinery 
necessary  to  transfer  the  cotton  from  those  who  have  it  over  here  to  those  who  need 
it  over  there  is  temporarily  out  of  gear.  It  is  the  duty  of  the  Federal  Board  to 
assist  the  farmer  to  hold  his  cotton,  not  from  the  market,  but  for  the  market. 

The  mills  in  this  country  are  abundantly  supplied  with  cotton  and  are  dis- 
tressed to  find  a  market  for  their  output.  The  world  sorely  needs  this  output,  but 
the  international  financial  machinery  necessary  to  the  transfer  of  the  goods  from 
the  mills  to  the  consumers  has  temporarily  broken  down.  The  exchange  market 
is  in  such  a  condition  that  France,  Italy  and  Germany  are  today  actually  paying 
more  for  cotton  on  a  basis  of  twenty-two  cents  than  they  paid  last  year  on  a  basis 
of  thirty-sis  cents.  Today,  for  the  equivalent  of  a  dollar  in  their  own  currency, 
France  gets  about  sixty  cents  worth  of  cotton,  Italy  about  thirty-three  cents  worth 
and  Germany  ten  cents  worth. 

There  can  be  no  active  demand  for  cotton  until  this  international  tangle  is 
straightened  out.  It  results  that  somebody  must  hold  the  cotton.  Every  consid- 
eration of  justice  and  sound  economics  requires  that  the  cotton  be  held  by  the  men 
who  produce  it.  If  it  is  not  held  by  the  farmer  it  will  be  held  by  men  who  con- 
tribute nothing  to  the  production  or  the  manufacture  of  cotton,  but  are  simply 
lucky  enough  to  have  ready  money  on  hand. 

For  these  reasons  I  think  the  Federal  Reserve  Board  and  the  Congress  ought 
to  be  urged  to  render  every  possible  assistance  to  the  farmer  to  hold  the  cotton 
until  the  world  that  is  in  such  tragic  need  of  cotton  is  in  a  position  to  take  it. 
It  cannot  be  too  often  repeated  and  emphasized  that  the  supply  of  cotton  is  not 
equal  to  the  human  demand  for  cotton,  but  the  trouble  is  that  the  law  of  supply  and 
demand  is  not  operative  because  of  the  dislocation  of  the  international  financial 
machinery. 


390  PAPERS  OF  THOMAS  WALTER  BICEETT 

It  would  be  the  acme  of  cruelty  and  unwisdom  to  force  the  cotton  on  a  market 
that  is  absolutely  dead.  The  only  hope  for  the  farmer  and  for  the  country  is  to 
hold  the  cotton  until  the  market  again  becomes  a  thing  of  life. 

Not  only  the  Government,  but  all  private  individuals  should  lend  a  helping 
hand  to  the  farmer  in  this  emergency.  This  is  not  charity — it  is  the  very  best 
business  policy — for  if  the  cotton  crop  should  be  dumped  on  a  dead  market  it 
would  ruin  as  many  merchants  and  manufacturers  as  farmers.  As  Patrick  Henry 
said  in  the  days  of  the  American  Eevolution:  "The  situation  is  one  in  which  if 
we  do  not  all  hang  together  we  will  hang  separately." 

Therefore,  let  every  community  mobilize  its  own  assets  and  extend  to  the 
farmer  every  possible  aid.  Of  course,  debts  must  be  paid,  but  every  indulgence 
consistent  with  staying  out  of  bankruptcy  should  be  granted.  This  indulgence 
should  be  granted  by  the  manufacturer  to  the  jobber,  by  the  jobber  to  the  merchant, 
by  the  merchant  to  the  farmer. 

I  do  not  believe  in  anything  that  savors  of  force  or  intimidation.  Night  riding 
and  gin  burning  are  as  silly  as  they  are  wicked.  The  best  remedy  is  the  common 
sense  and  mutual  sympathy  of  the  people  in  the  presence  of  a  common  disaster. 

I  regret  that  I  cannot  concur  in  the  suggestion  to  call  a  special  session  of  the 
Legislature  for  the  purpose  of  having  a  law  enacted  to  compel  a  reduction  of 
cotton  acreage  by  law.  I  am  profoundly  certain  the  General  Assembly  of  North 
Carolina  would  not  pass  any  such  law  if  it  should  be  convened.  In  my  Inaugural 
Address  as  Governor  I  stated  that  if  I  were  Czar  of  North  Carolina  instead  of 
Governor,  I  would  issue  an  edict  that  any  man  who  was  found  importing  into 
this  State  any  beef  or  bacon,  meal  or  flour,  grain  or  hay,  should  be  forthwith 
hanged  without  trial  by  jury  and  without  benefit  of  clergy.  This  would  be  a 
constructive  rather  than  a  destructive  remedy,  and  the  General  Assembly  would  be 
more  apt  to  enact  such  a  law  than  one  penalizing  the  farmer  for  growing  too  much 
cotton.  It  is  as  plain  as  day  that  if  the  farmers  of  the  cotton  belt  would  produce 
their  own  food  and  feed  crops,  then  they  would  always  be  in  a  position  to 
adequately  deal  with  an  emergency  like  the  one  that  now  confronts  us;  but  so 
long  as  cotton  farmers  line  up  in  a  fight  of  this  kind  with  empty  cribs  and  smoke- 
houses and  with  a  debt  on  the  crop  for  food  and  feed  supplies,  they  are  as  helpless 
as  the  man  who  goes  into  a  battle  with  an  empty  gun  in  his  hands. 

It  is  wholly  unnecessary  to  call  the  General  Assembly  together  to  pass  a  law 
granting  delays  in  the  payment  of  taxes.  The  State  levies  no  taxes  on  property 
this  year  to  run  the  State  Government,  and  as  to  local  taxes,  our  sheriffs  can  be 
relied  upon  to  grant  every  indulgence  consistent  with  the  actual  necessities  of  the 
local  communities. 

I  have  written  you  at  length  because  I  am  deeply  interested  in  the  subject. 
I  believe  that  by  throwing  into  the  breach  all  the  courage,  all  the  common  sense 
and  all  the  common  sympathy  of  our  people  we  can  substantially  improve  the 
distressing  situation  that  today  confronts  us. 

With  much  respect,  I  beg  to  remain, 

Eespectfully, 

T.  W.  Bickett,  Governor. 


INDEX 


Addresses,  159-266;  list  of,  160;  inaugural, 
3  ff. 

Agriculture,  5,  6,  7,  S,  9,  14,  16-18,  21-22, 
25-26,  31,  33,  46-48,  50-52,  64-70,  80,  81, 
106,  112,  119,  124,  127,  134,  140,  146,  165, 
166,  213,  271,  283,  326,  339,  342,  360,  365- 
367,  374,  378,  389;  Department  of,  14,  33, 
46-48;  Board  of,  64-70. 

Alamance  County,  mob  in,  315. 

Alexander,  Dr.  H.  Q.,  338. 

America,  and  England,  18,  182-183,  195-196; 
and  France,  155,  194;  and  Germany, 
194  ff.,  270,  323,  361. 

Americanism,  192  ff. 

Anti-trust  law,  11. 

Appeals  to  Public,  117-157;  list  of,  118. 

Appeal  Agents,  344. 

Appointments  and  Nominations,  21-22,  25- 
26,  50-52. 

Appropriations,  73. 

Artillery,  113th,  199. 

Army,  27,  42-45,  82-85,  98,  119-122,  128-129, 
132,  135,  145,  153,  156-157,  172,  199-200, 
204,  241,  325-375;  Service  in  recom- 
mended, 153. 

Armistice  Day,  107,  113. 

Ashe  County  Case,  172,  347. 

Atlantic,  help  for  town  of,  130. 

Automobiles,  37. 

Average  Citizen,  letter  to,  151. 

B 
Ballot,  short,  13,  32. 
Banks,  Land,  165. 
Bankers,  123. 
Beauty,  Address  on,  221. 
Bickett,  Mrs.  T.  W.,  144. 
Bickett,  Governor  T.  W.,  283,  286. 
Bolshevism,  1S9. 
Bonds,  23-25;  see  Liberty  Loan. 
Boundary,  Tennessee,  20-21. 
Boy,  Scouts,  103;  Working  reserves,  134. 
Brigade,  60th  Infantry,  373. 
Brooks,  E.  C,  369. 
Budget,  38;  Commission,  77. 


Capital,  10,  149. 
Carolina,  Ho,  for,  213. 


Caswell  Training  School,  42. 

Chain-gangs,  15. 

Charity,  Institutions  of,  268. 

Charities  and  Public  Welfare,  324. 

Charlotte,  trouble  at,  149. 

Child,  labor,  18-20,  30,  147,  371;   education 

and  welfare,  142,  147,  168;   relief,  114; 

the  illegitimate,  29. 
Churches,  143,  see  Liberty  Loan. 
Civic,  Righteousness,  229,  254;    Standards, 

259. 
Closets,  sanitary,  31. 
Cincinnati,  Society,  326. 
Colleges  and  War,  115,  359. 
Community,  government,  254  ff;  rural,  9. 
Compensation,  workmen's,  70-71. 
Confederacy,  212,  241. 
Conference  for  Social  Service,  167. 
Constitution,  4,  9,  37. 
Convicts,  33. 
Corporation  tax,  69. 
Cotton,  106,  112,  140,  146,  342,  360,  365,  378, 

389. 
Council  of  Defense,  328,  340. 
Country  Life,  164. 
Credit  unions,  6. 
Crop  Lien,  6,  16-18,  SO. 
Crowder,  42-45. 

D 

Demobilization,  367,  374. 

Democratic  platform,  277. 

Department,  State,  73. 

Deserters,  172,  348. 

Diplomatic  relations,  323. 

Doctors,  346. 

Dodd,  Dr.  W.  E.,  on  Wilson,  387. 

Domestic  Science,  5. 

Draft,  the,  42-44,  98,  121,  135,  172,  325,  327, 

331,  335,  336,  339,  344,  361,  371. 
Drinks,  Soft,  37. 

E 

Eighty-first  Division,  375. 
Efficiency,  State  and  National,  167. 
Education,  5-11,  23,  30,  115,  125,  139,  143, 
164,  189,  230,  237,  268,  279,  297,  318,  359. 
England,  18,  182-183. 
Extra  Session  General  Assembly,  111. 


392 


INDEX 


Factories,  3. 

Farmers,    life    of,    283;     loans    to,    7;     as 

owners,    3-4;     telephone    for,    8;     water 

power  for,  7. 
Federal  taxes,  26. 
Fire  prevention,  86,  104. 
Food,  6,  80,  119,  124,  127,  271,  326. 
Founders  Day  at  University,  161. 
France,  155,  194. 
Fuel,  91,  341. 

G 

General  Assembly,  messages  to,  1-77;    list 

of,  2;  111,  268,  279,  316. 
George  III,  182. 
Georgia  Memorial  Association,  address  to, 

202. 
Germany,  194,  270,  323,  361. 
Glenn,  Governor  R.  B.,  378. 
Good  Roads,  address,  247. 
Governors,  Conference,  379. 

H 

Health,  3,  12,  24,  31,  280,  283. 

Highways,  9,  48-50,  71-72. 

Holy  Land,  155. 

Home  Guards,  87. 

Homes,  16,  167,  170,  204,  268,  278. 

Honor,    A    Debt    of,     address,     202;     Our 

Sacred,  102. 
Hoover,  Herbert,  298,  381. 
Hospitals,  13. 

I 
Income  tax,  45-46,  66-67. 
Industrial  disputes,  296. 
Insane,  13,  34,  29,  172. 
Institutions,  State,  230  ff. 
Insurance  for  Soldiers,  128,  129,  145,  156- 

157. 

J 
Jerusalem,  97. 
Jews,  26,  97. 
Joyner,  J.  Y.,  368. 
Judges,  324. 

K 
Ku  Klux  Klan,  289. 


Labor,  10,  30-33,  70-71,  93,  133-136,  141,  149, 
186,  205,  254,  293,  318,  376. 

Land,  165,  366. 

Law,  child  labor,  30;  school,  30;  enforce- 
ment, 35,  108;   library,  20;   primary,  35. 

League  to  enforce  peace,  359,  363,  365. 


League  of  Nations,  28,  196,  208. 

Lee,  294  ff. 

Legislation,    284    ff;     for    negroes,    72-73; 

rural,  166. 
Letters  to  soldiers,  132. 
Letters  and  telegrams,  321-390. 
Liberty  Loan,  26,  88,  92,  99,  123,  141,  169, 

272,  329,  337,  339. 
Libraries,  24. 
Lincoln,  309. 

Living,  High  Cost  of,  104. 
Local  Boards,  331,  336,  339,  344. 
Louisana  Purchase,  196. 
Lynching,  330,  331. 

M 
Marines,  122. 

Maritime  Corporation,  289. 
Mass  Conscience,  254. 
Manufacturing,  10,  213. 
Medical  Draft  Commission,  347. 
Medicine,  37. 

Memorial   Building  Commission,  373. 
Memorial     Day     Address,     241;      Georgia 

Memorial,  202. 
Mental  Defectives,  29,  172. 
Messages   to   General   Assembly,   1-77;    list 

of,  2. 
Miliukoff,  324. 
Militia,  87,  334. 
Miners,  293. 
Model  Acre,  5. 
Monroe  Doctrine,  183,  196. 
Moores  Creek  Bridge,  181. 
Morrison  Campaign,  388. 
Moving  pictures,  8,  166. 
Munitions,  343. 

N 

National  Conference  on  Rural  Education, 
164. 

National  Guard,  82,  330;   see  also  Army. 

Navy,  119. 

Negroes,  72-73,  75,  216  ff,  270,  287,  291, 
297,  318,  330,  331. 

New  York  Times,  323. 

Nominations  and  Appointments,  21-22;  25- 
26,  50-52. 

North  Carolina,  loyalty  of,  270;  progress 
of,  213;  welcome,  199;  Battleship,  387; 
Society  of  Pennsylvania,  213;  in  addi- 
tion to  these  special  points  the  whole 
index  refers  to  North  Carolina. 

Nurses,  137,  383. 


INDEX 


393 


Officers,  State,  32. 
Orphans,  276. 
Overall  Club,  310. 


Pardons  and  Paroles,  319. 

Patriotism  and  Politics,  1S6. 

Pershing,  381. 

Peoria,  Illinois,  address,  191. 

Planting  Day,  81. 

Potatoes,  334. 

Prayer,  96. 

Press,  Statements  for,  267-320;  list  of,  268. 

Primary,  35. 

Prisons  and  Prisoners,  33,  316,  377. 

Proclamations,  79-115;  list  of,  80. 

Products  and  By-Products  of  war,  191. 

Profiteering,  104. 

Prohibition,  35,  41,  374,  382,  383. 

Proprietary  medicines,  12. 

Public  addresses,  159-266;  list  of,  160. 

Public  Instruction,  Superintendent,  368-369. 

Public  Letters  and  Telegrams,  321-390. 

R 

Reserves,  125;  Boy,  134. 

Race  relations,  216  ff. 

Railroads,  375. 

Rankin,  Dr.  W.  S.,  346. 

Reconstruction,  294. 

Record  of  General  Assembly,  268  ff;    279- 

286. 
Recruiting,  82  ff,  119,  122,  153. 
Red  Cross,  26,  84,  90,  94,  137,  329,  331. 
Registration,  98,  121,  138. 
Relief,  Atlantic,   130;    child,   114;    Jewish, 

26,  97. 
Reunion  30th  Division,  200. 
Revaluation,  40,  52-60,  67,  75-76,  210,  299. 
Righteousness,    Salvation    of,    209;    Civic, 

229. 
Roads,  8-9,  31,  48-50,  71-72,  247,  282,  370. 
Roosevelt,  105,  363  ff. 
Rotation  in  office,  12. 
Rural,    Communities,    9;    legislation,    166; 

life,    3;    schools,    8;    telephones,    S;    see 

also,  Agriculture;  Farms;  Education. 
Russia,  324. 

S 

Salaries,  63-64,  74-75;  teachers,  30,  147. 
Salvation  Army,  14S. 
Sanitation,  31;   see  Health. 
Schools,   189;    terms,   29;    compulsory,   30; 
system,  9;  see  also  Education. 


Selective  Service,  27,  98,  121,  172,  349-359. 

Sheep,  34. 

Sheriffs,  272. 

Social,  centers,  24;  purity,  170;  service, 
167;  vice,  168,  170;   welfare,  281. 

Soils,  4-5. 

Soldiers,  allotments,  341;  fees;  138; 
honor,  85;  insurance,  128,  129,  145,  156, 
157;  letters  to,  132;  morale,  132,  340; 
work  for,  204;  see  Army;  Draft;  Re- 
cruiting; Selective  Service. 

Solvent  Credits,  153,  305. 

Spencer,  186. 

State  College,  14,  46-48. 

State,  Departments,  73. 

State  Institutions,  23,  25,  230  ff. 

State  Officers,  32. 

State  Prison,  14-15. 

State  Salaries,  63-64,  74-75. 

Statements  and  Interviews,  267-320;  list  of, 
268. 

Submarines,  323. 

Suffrage,  60-63. 

Sunday  Schools,  139. 


Taxes,  7,  11,  16,  23-25,  34-38,  45-46,  52-69, 
75-77,  143,  148,  151-153,  165,  201,  209,  279, 
299,  309-316,  380;  assessors,  148;  Clark 
on,  311;  dog,  34;  exemptions,  7,  16,  37; 
income,  37,  45-46,  66-67;  poll,  37;  policy, 
66;  program,  11  ff;  report,  64-70;  system, 
201. 

Teachers,  30,  139,  147,  209,  318. 

Telegrams  and  Letters,  321-390. 

Telephones,  rural,  8. 

Tenancy,  3-4. 

Tennessee  Boundary,  21. 

Tenth  of  May,  241. 

Textiles,  11. 

Thanksgiving,  89,  101,  107,  113. 

Thirtieth  Division,  200. 

Thrift,  95,  109,  126,  128,  131,  335. 

Tie  That  Binds,  The,  164. 

Tobacco,  37. 

Traffic  Association,  152. 

Transportation,  110,  152. 

Triumph  of  English  People  at  Yorktown, 
181. 

Trucks,  Ship  by,  110. 

Tuscania,  telegram  on  sinking  of,  343. 

Tuskeegee,  297. 


394 


INDEX 


United  War  Work,  26. 

University  of  North  Carolina,  address  at, 

161. 

V 
Vagrancy,  133. 
Vice,  168,  170;  see  Social. 
Victory,  dash  for,  141. 
Victory  Loan,  102. 
Volunteers,  82,  119,  122. 
Voting,  12,  32,  38,  60-63,  186  ff;  see  Ballot; 

Suffrage;  Women. 

W 

War  Industries,  141. 

War  Savings,  26,  95,  128,  131,  133. 

War  Supplies,  324. 

War  Work  Campaign,  144. 

Warehouse  Act,  282. 

Water,  7,  10. 

Weights  and  Measures,  address,  259. 

Welfare  Institutions,  230. 

Woodrow  Wilson,  325. 

Winston-Salem  riot,  369. 

Women,  345,  384,  388;  clubs,  170;  suffrage, 
60-63,  319;  in  War,  27. 

Wood,  Gen.  Leonard,  327. 

Work,  135;  for  soldiers,  204;  compensa- 
tion, 70. 

World  Peace,  190. 

World,  N.  Y.,  323. 

World  War,  America's  reasons  for  enter- 
ing, 161,  175;  Atlanta  speech  on,  202; 
Harvest  of,  27  ff;  Products  of,  191; 
Statistics  of  North  Carolina  in,  26;  see — 
Addresses,  list  of;  Alexander;  America; 
Americanism;  Appeals  to  Public,  list  of; 


Appeal  Agents;  Artillery;  Army;  Armis- 
tice Day;  Ashe  County;  Bankers; 
Bickett;  Bolshevism;  Boy;  Brigade; 
Churches;  Cincinnati;  Colleges;  Council 
of  Defense;  Crowder;  Demobilization; 
Deserters;  Diplomatic;  Doctors;  Dodd; 
Draft;  Eighty-first ;  Education;  Eng- 
land; Food;  Founders;  France;  George 
III;  Georgia;  Germany;  Holy  Land; 
Home  Guards;  Honor;  Insurance; 
Jerusalem;  Jews;  Labor;  League;  Let- 
ters; Liberty  Loan;  Lincoln;  Living; 
Local  Board;  Louisiana;  Marine;  Medi- 
cal; Memorial;  Messages;  Miliukoff ; 
Militia;  Monroe  Doctrine;  Moores  Creek; 
Munitions;  National  Guard;  New  York 
Times;  North  Carolina;  Nurses;  Overall 
Club;  Patriotism;  Pershing;  Planting 
Day;  Potatoes;  Prayer;  Proclamations, 
list  of;  Products,  etc.;  Profiteering; 
Reserves;  Rankin;  Reconstruction;  Re- 
lief; Reunion;  Roosevelt ;  Russia;  Salva- 
tion Army;  Selective  Service;  Sheriffs; 
Soldiers;  Statements  and  Intervieios,  list 
of;  Submarines;  Telegrams;  Thanks- 
giving; Thirtieth  Division;  Thrift; 
Triumph;  Trucks;  Tuscania;  United; 
Vagrancy;  Victory;  Volunteers;  War; 
Y.  M.  C.  A.;  Yorktown;  Zion. 


Yeomen  of  the  Guard,  386. 
Y.  M.  C.  A.,  26,  88,  109. 
Yorktown,  IS,  195. 


Z 


Zion  movement,  156.