At present the point of view of a large proportion of Southern white people on the Negro question is adequately expressed by such men as Tillman, Jeff Davis, and Hoke Smith. They are the political leaders. Their policies are, in general, the policies adopted; they are the men elected to office. Even in the border states, where the coloured population is not so dense as in the black belt, the attitude of the politicians is much the same as it is in the black belt. So far as the Negro question is concerned, Governor Swanson of Virginia stands on practically the same platform as Tillman and Hoke Smith--though he has not found it necessary to express his views as vigorously. And the position of the black-belt states in regard to the disfranchisement of the Negro and the extension of "Jim Crow" laws is being accepted by the border state of Maryland and the Western state of Oklahoma. But there also exists, and particularly in Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Georgia, a vigorous minority point of view, which I have referred to in a former chapter as the "broadest and freest thought of the South." Although it has not yet attained political position, it is a party of ideas, force, convictions, with a definite constructive programme. To this constructive point of view I have been able, thus far, to refer only incidentally. In the present chapter I wish to consider some of the effects upon Southern life of the domination of the Negro as a political issue, and the result of the continued supremacy of leaders like Tillman. [Illustration: J. POPE BROWN of Pulaski County, Georgia] [Illustration: EX-GOVERNOR JAMES K. VARDAMAN of Mississippi] [Illustration: SENATOR JEFF DAVIS of Arkansas Photograph by Harris-Ewing] [Illustration: GOVERNOR HOKE SMITH of Georgia Copyright, 1906, by Hallen Studios] [Illustration: SENATOR B. R. TILLMAN of South Carolina Photograph by F. B. Johnston] [Illustration: EX-GOVERNOR W. J. NORTHEN of Georgia] In the next chapter, under the title "The New Southern Statesmanship," I shall outline the programme and recount the activities of the new Southern leaders. _The Most Sinister Form of Negro Domination_