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Public Opinion Throughout the Union
FILIPINOS NOT ANXIOUS.
There is apparently less anxiety in the Phil
ippines as to the date of independence for the
islands than there is in the United States. A
member of the. Filipino Assembly introduced
a resolution the other day instructing the del
egates at Washington to ask Congress how
long it would be befo re independence would be
granted. The re lution met with almost
unanimous ridicule and was at once withdrawn
without being voted upon. The Filipinos are
wiser than some of their professed friends in
this country. —Boston Herald.
CONVICT LEASE SYSTEM.
The convict lease system of this State is as
crude as an unfinished temple and places the
State almost if not quite in the attitude of
trafficking in human beings as conspicuously
as did individuals in ante-bellum days.
Our convicts are now taken and rented out
to work in lumber and turpentine camps, and
in many instances are no doubt cruelly treat
ed, almost to the point of murder, and of
course the State is responsible for it. They
are overworked and underfed, and nobody
seems to care, because they are people who
have been caught in their meannss —they are
convicts.
Thre is plenty the State can do with them
besides renting them. The roads of this State
are not by any means perfect. In many coun
ties some of them are nearly impassable, and
Whitfield is one. There are some good roads
in this county, and there are some mighty bad.
Suppose the convicts were worked on them.
Would it not be better, more humane, more
progressive, and would we not in a short time
have good roads'? —Dalton (Ga.) Citizen.
$800,000,000 A YEAR FOR DRINK.
