First and foremost, however, before the strength of any new issues can even be tested in this state, the "machine bosses" who have reigned supreme in Alabama for the last nineteen years must be dethroned. In the name of Democracy they have perverted every principle which the word represents, and by "bulldozing" and fraud, have constantly thwarted the will of the people at the ballot-box. They have inaugurated methods as corrupt and revolutionary as their despotic minds could conceive, that their dominancy of the common people, might be perpetuated with ease; they have shaken the very foundation of the sacred covenant of liberty, broken the peace, blighted the prosperity and threatened the homes of the people; they have also hastened the time when all good, liberty-loving and truly democratic citizens of this state must unite in re-establishing the fact that they are the equals of the "machine bosses," and that a majority should rule. When this is established in fact as well as in theory, then, and not until then, will the demands of the people, which are favored by a majority of the people, be enacted into law. Whether favoring or opposing the demands of the common people, all honest citizens should unite in an effort to secure to those favoring them, the right to have the issues that come before the people fairly tested by a free ballot and a fair count of the votes polled. Anything else is slavery, which will not be submitted to by the common people of Alabama. In the language of the greatest Alabamian of to-day, Capt. R. F. Kolb, the grandest Commoner of them all, whose every impulse is actuated by a desire to do service to his downtrodden fellow men: "The common people of Alabama believe that democracy means that the people shall rule. They now feel that a few political 'bosses' are undertaking to overthrow a republican form of government in this state. I warn the 'machine bosses' to stop and reflect. Don't trifle with these people longer. Let justice be done and sweet Peace will again spread her white wings over our beloved state." * * * * * Transcriber's note: Text in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_). Punctuation has been corrected without note. The following misprints have been corrected: "manmer" corrected to "manner" (page 14) "addresed" corrected to "addressed" (page 34) "day" corrected to "days" (page 34) "the the" corrected to "the" (page 37)