BY J. C. MANNING PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR Copyright , 1893, By J. C. Manning. All Rights Reserved....

To the patriotic people of Alabama who demand “a free ballot and a fair count,” and believe in honest government, this little book is fraternally dedicated by the author....

Until recently, embracing the past several months, almost national attention has been centered upon the politics of Alabama. Notice was first attracted by the famous Kolb-Jones gubernatorial contest. This campaign was something novel in the South, for until then, there had not been, for years, any probability of defeat to the organized Democracy in Alabama. However, during the Kolb-Jones political fight, astute “organized” Democratic leaders soon expressed such grave apprehensions of the success

Excepting those who have resided in the South, few people outside have any true conception whatever, of what means a contest against the fixed ideas and established policies of the ruling element in this section. Not until recently have the searching currents of thought inundated, to a great and perceptible extent, the foundations of bitter prejudice that have been the main basis of the monster political structure which has towered in its glory in the South since the days of reconstruction. For

The rank and file of Democrats in Alabama, until recently, have blindly drifted along, neglecting every interest. Thinking of nothing else, scarcely, than “machine boss” protection from the near approach of some highly-pictured prospective woe, ever since before the late war, when slaveholders waved the party lash and popped the cracker of “secession or ruin,”—until now, when the sons of ex-slaveholders, and others that form the “domineering bossism” in Alabama, pop the cracker of “Democracy or

The people of Alabama were plunged into the bloody, surging sea of trouble in the sixties by the same extremist element in the South, which has more than once ruled more desperately than wisely, and is, in times of great emergency, scarcely conservative or sensible. The writer often imagines he can hear some of these same old blustering members of the ex-slave- and present office-holding hierarchy exciting the common people back before the sixties with their now “moss-covered” harangues, and won

Some species of the brute creation open their eyes in nine days, but some of the poor, blinded and burden-bearing creatures of humanity scarcely ever succeed in getting their eyes fully open to the light of God’s blessed bestowals to mankind. Others soon realize the repulsiveness of the black shadows that enthrall them and bite the dust in anguish in their struggle to be free. And often, when higher reason fails to prompt one to action, unsatiated appetite constitutes a never-failing reminder. A

The revolt of the common people of Alabama against the “machine bosses” is, simply speaking, a revolution against revolutionists; and the increasing strength of the former is rapidly developing the intolerant spirit of the latter. This savage-natured sentiment that has characterized the campaign policy of the Democratic party of the South in its treatment of the opposition, has often received the scathing criticism of many a caustic pen. Yet nothing too severe could be said in its condemnation.

“Bourbon” campaign intolerance, ballot-box stuffing and other similar crimes against human liberty have become a common practice in the political contests in Alabama. It is said frequently by the opposition in this state that one’s skill in fraudulent election manipulation wins promotion in the councils of the Democratic party. It is also not untrue that voters who have been accomplices in perpetrating election frauds have been rewarded with official positions “on account of efficient services r

The people of Alabama will no longer vote the Democratic ticket simply because the “antediluvian” leaders say so. They will no longer be intimidated by party threats, or blindly driven by party lash, but they are going to have a good reason for so doing, hereafter, before casting their votes for the party which has been in power in Alabama for eighteen years, during the whole of which time the people have grown poorer and poorer and no measures have been adopted or suggested for their relief. Th