FACTS ABOUT THE MISSISSIPPI CONTEST. By S. A. BEADLE. FACTS ABOUT THE MISSISSIPPI CONTEST By S. A. BEADLE. Mlay it please you Gentlemen of the Committee:—We wish to make a few remarks concerning the averments, allega¬ tions and representations made on behalf of the "Anti-Ad¬ ministration" Republicans of Mississippi. Responsive to the call of the National Republican Com- mittte the Republicans of the State of Mississippi held their precinct and ward meetings, and their County, District and State Conventions. Unfortunate for them, and all the cit¬ izens of the State, as to that matter, there was, from tht, beginning, injected into the question of selecting of dele¬ gates to the National Convention, caste distinction and race prejudice. Situated in a community where the dominant people, some of them, make a god of caste, and consider prejudice <* virtue, it is not surprising that there should arise friction between the favored and the less fortunate constituency oi the party; but that friction should take the course it has, was not thought by the most imaginary among us. We did not believe that armed force would be resorted to, in the mere election >of Republican delegates to the National Conven¬ tion ; in this we were mistaken; too true it is,, that those we had listed as friends, in a friendly rivally for preferment, have proven themselves our most inexorable and relentless foes. Without malice or ill will toward them, we strive to forget. Yet we must contend for the faith that is within us. The position of our opponents differs from ours in this; they, demanding control of party affairs and taking the cus¬ toms and usages of the community, which favor them, as a precedent, walk roughshod over every right common to the people, in the hope of securing that party control; we, con¬ scious of the environments that handicap us in the exercise of the franchise, but unable to subdue our faith in the better judgment of mankind, indulge the hope that right will reassert itself in thei revivification of those principles of the party which were, and are, the glory of its founders. We indulge ( 2 ) the further hope, that in coming beiore you we enter an al¬ titude whtire Christian religion and enlightened civilization, have so enlarged the sense of justice that impartial will be your consideration, of the question raised by our bill of jarticularsv concerning political matters in Mississippi. We contend that there should be no distinction among Republicans in the exercise of the franchise, that preferment for office should spring from virtue, honor, intelligence and a capacity to serve the party to the glorification of all the people; we cheerfully admit this; but that these qualifica¬ tions belong solely to the Lilly Whites, we deny. If Sirs, we cannot approach the altar of freedom in the temple of her adherents at what shrine shall we worship the goddess of Liberty? Did the people err when they met in their hamlets, vil¬ lages, towns and cities to, and did, cast their votes for the men of their choice? If there is-error in this; then your meeting here is a "comedy of errors." If the rignt is not still inherent in the people to select their rules, then we have fallen on evil times. We are admonished that you will be pressed to decide the issues between us upon the falacous arguments of the,com¬ munity in which we live: "That to do .justice to us will en¬ danger white supremacy." We deny this. We contend that right between man and man, people-and people, and na¬ tion and nation cannot endanger the legitimate possessions of any human being. We contend that the established rules of justice as brought to us from times immemorial is a bet¬ ter standard of measurement than any ever conceived caste and prejudice; that to base, a decision on these would be an abandonment of justice and an invitation to crime to place its crimson talons on the throat of innocense. The campaign for party principles, as we understand them, in Mississippi has been fought against odds. Our op¬ ponents, being as they claim, the leaguers of a candidate possessed of vast, limitless wealth, which he is spending with a lavished hand; and the vassals of the head, of a mighty people, who encourage them in their abandonment of party principles, have done those things which stagger confidence ( 3 ) in human nature unrestrained. We have charged and the charge is true, that Republicans were menaced by force of arms, in their efforts to exercise the franchise, on this occasion. The proof is evident and the presumption great that murder was in the mind ana heart of our opponents on the day of the convention. They ignored our party principles, they forgot the con¬ stitution and the law; free speech, pursuit of happiness and the right to live, with them, was but a fairy tale: usurpation was a more weighty affair; and, headed by our national com¬ mitteeman, the Federal office-holders, with a U. S. Marshal and a Deputy U. S. Marshal in their midst, their heads high in the air, exulting in the triumph of their usurpation they touched a treble chord, to the air of the "Star Spangled Ban¬ ner," and marched in pohipous glory by the armed guard into the convention hall. Then came the henchmen, our poor deluded brethren, who hope to gain their freedom by unhing¬ ing the knee and groveling in the dust, to become rivals in the licking of the feet of the triumphant; these saluting the armed guard in oriental fashion, moved at it were, cowering upon their haunches, into the convention. Then came the delegates to the convention in mass, that host of true and tried Republicans who, loyal to party principles and hopeful of success, by the suffrages of the people, came they, and ap¬ proached the door of the convention hall, only to be beaten back at the muzzles of guns in the' hands of inexorable and determined men. "What did they do?" What would you have done? What would any class 01 loyal citizens have done? Conceding that the upper story of the hall was meant by the call to be the place of meeting there was a technical advantage gained in having its possession; but no such spe¬ cific designation of place was made by the call. It was the delegates and not the place that made the convention; but giving the place every conceivable consideration delegates lawfully elected to hold a convention could not be deprived of that right by the want of that particular hall, or a ^ar¬ ticular room in that hall, if without their consent, over their protest and under duress they were kept from that partic¬ ular room. Nothing but their free and uncoersed assent (4) could lawfully deprive the accredited delegates from holding that convention. It seems to us that if the duress brought to bear was such that to resist it would have disturbed the public peace, the general welfare of the community would suggest the holding of the convention in another place and that a fair and impartial mind would approve of it. The will of the people, and not the place, should be subserved in the holding of the conven¬ tion. It seems to us that the holding of the convention in the building designated as the place, is all that could be asked. The contention over the meeting place of the convention, in the light of these facts, may well be dismissed,, as a mere nul- ity. If there were irregularities in the call of the convention, they, such as were not objected to afr the time, are waved by the partie's' appearance. The questions turns finally on the proposition, who were the delegates, they who were in the upper, or they who were in the lower, story of the hall? And upon the further ques¬ tion, that if both delegations were regular,, that is, if there was a split in the regular accredited delegations where was the majority? Your position as arbitrer of our fortunes, here, respects the question, where was the majority? They answer "our roll of delegates contain the majority. " We deny this and say that the basis of our denial is that fraud, duress, deceit, cunning intimidation and armed force entered into the making up of their roll, as will appear from the proofs filed with your Honorable Committee,, and the facts and circumstances con¬ nected with the matter. If these things be true the roll of the opposition cannot be considered; that they are true, the testimony preponderates in favor of the Anti-Administra¬ tion. We invite you to a careful consideration of the tes¬ timony, the facts and the circumstances in this matter; they show an alarming diminution of our party principles. We charge that the credential form ''Exhibit B," was designed for fraudulent purposes: if it is not denied the charge is confessed; if it is denied then we offer the testimony of many persons, the circumstances connected with the credential form, and the conduct of the State Executive and Credentials ( 5 ) Committee to show that it was so cltsigned, and that fraud was practiced under it. There were contests from ^all over the State excepting the First and Second Congressional Districts; not real con¬ tests,. but ficticious ones, gotten up in the interest of the "Ad¬ ministration" people for the purpose of giving the credential committeie a field of operation. The innocent and unsuspecting people, in the virginity of their simpleness wrote their credentials, as any honest per¬ son would have done, on pure, clean paper, or such paper as they had the emblem of their own thoughts, 'and sent them to the Secretary of the State Executive Committee, who was also a member of the Credential Committee, which was to make up the roll. The Secretary, Mr. T. V. McAllister, finding the insignia wanting on these credentials laid them away, a kind of treasure-trove of the waste basket, and waited the coming in of the insignia stamped credentials, of which the delegates-elect never heard until they were met at the door of the convention hall, with the intelligence that the contest had beien decided against them, and they were commanded to pass on and not attempt to go into said hall. The committee of five disposed of these contests in a short while. Some say in fifteen minutes, other say the committee was in session about an hour and while in session they did not open up a single case. Whether an hour or fifteen minutes were given to the two hundred or more con¬ tests it matters little. Certain it is that the time allot¬ ted to the hearing of contests was far too short, for judicial investigation. The fact of the matter is the cases were settled upon the coming in of the credential form marked "Ex¬ hibit B." There was no official notice of this form until the com¬ mittee, feigning to be holding a meeting to try contests, dis¬ closed the fact. The time of the holding of the session of the committee was also kept secret. There was absolutely no notice of the time when the committee would meet. "Why conceal the time of the meeting of the Credential Committee, if the intention was to render a fair and impartial verdict? Of what force would be a verdict procured without notice to the party against whom it was rendered? Such a course would shock the marble heart of tyrants and make Medusa ( 6 ) blush and yet this is what the credential committer of five- did. But if we must overlook this act of the committee, we hope indulgent charity wift not command us to forget that the committee was a partisan committee, that it was made up in the* entirety of "Administration" partisans, that most of the members of the committee were themselves contesting for seats in the convention. That the seat of L. B. Mose- ley, who was on the committee by proxy, T. V. McAllister,, from AYarren county, W. 0. Ligon, from Amite county, were contested, and yet they sat upon the committee, that is, they made up the roll of delegates, to the convention. In the light of these facts the roll presented by our op¬ ponents bristles with fraud, so much so that the burden of proof, shifts to them, suggesting the following questions: "Why was the credential form adopted? Why was it not made known to all the Republicans gen¬ erally that the form was adopted? By what authority was the form adopted? Why was it that the credential written on any other form¬ er kind of paper, with or without the insignia of the Stat# could not be useid? We think the facts, circumstances and affidavits before your honors clearly show that there was fraud practiced in the making up of the roll of thei convention presided over" by Mr. J. B. Yellowly. He who runs may read and the blind perceive these facts. A fair and judicial mina searching for trut"h cannot rely on the roll of our opponents- for light. Where else shall we go for it? The Congres¬ sional District Conventions, wherever controlled and dom¬ inated by them, is but a repetition of the State Convention and the, making up of the roll there. We cannot gtop with the District 'Conventions, the domination of the office-holder and the mob were there. We are persuaded that mobs, armed guards, officers with guns in their hands and such things are not necessary to the maintenance of majorities. It is a painful lack of votes that make these things necessary in elections. This you say is conclusion, not argument: perhaps so^ but we think it such a conclusion as the proof and the facts- warrant. There is another source of evidence: what say the people? The people everywhere say that the-State was Anti- ( 7 ) Administration, that almost to a man the rank and file of the Republicans, outside of official circles, were opposed to the "Administration" people.* That they elected "Anti- Administration" delegates to the District, State and National Conventions. We regret that we bring you nothing from the land South of the Ohio, but a contest; but the fault is not ours. We have been left to look after the skillet, in the rear camp, while our friends stormed the bulwarks of power for the perquisites of office, under the sub-rosa of the "Lilly White. " ""Whence comes the name?" We know not whether it is from the smoothe Italian hand, played in the framing of ex¬ cuses, or the white feather shown by them, when real fight for the principles of the party seems eimminent: but they are "