NORTH CAROLINA. 



509 



mining showed an increase, there being 53 mines. 

 The market price of corundum had risen from 4 to 

 20 cents a pound, and there were 23 corundum mines 

 in operation. Three of the many talc mines pro- 

 duced 3,200,000 pounds. 



New Railways. Two new railroad companies, 

 to operate within the State, were incorporated this 

 year. The first, the Goldsboro, Snow Hill and 

 Eastern Railroad Company, was capitalized at 

 $800,000, with the privilege of increasing the capi- 

 talization. One terminus of this road will be at 

 Snow Hill, Greene County, and the other at Pan- 

 tego, Beaufort County, the road to be about 60 miles 

 long and to traverse parts of the counties of Greene, 

 Pitt, and Beaufort. The second, the Raleigh and 

 Cape Fear Railway Company, was capitalized at 

 $200,000, the road to extend from some point on 

 the North Carolina Railroad between the town of 

 Carey and the town of Garner, Wake County, to 

 some point on that portion of the Cape Fear river 

 which lies in the county of Harriett, 35 miles. 



Confederate Pensioners. The sum of $120,- 

 000 was available for pensions, being $18,000 more 

 than for 1897. There was a large increase in pen- 

 sioners, due to the number of applicants passed by 

 county boards. There were 131 first-class pension- 

 ers, an increase of 8 over 1897; 272 second-class, an 

 increase of 26 ; 393 third-class, an increase of 30 ; 

 1,963 fourth-class, an increase of 53 ; 2,681 widows, 

 a decrease of 59. The net increase of pensioners 

 over 1897 was 58. 



Decisions. In the case of Sophia A. Houston, 

 of Chatham County vs. Frank W. Thornton and 

 others, as directors of the People's National Bank 

 of Fayetteville, which went into the hands of a 

 receiver in January, 1891, the plaintiff alleged that 

 by the false statements of the bank's condition, 

 published by the defendants, she was induced to 

 buy 11 shares of the capital stock of the bank, which 

 stock became worthless through the gross negli- 

 gence of the defendants. The case was tried be- 

 fore the Chatham Superior Court, which rendered 

 judgment in favor of the plaintiff for the full amount 

 she paid for the stock, and interest thereon. From 

 this judgment tjie defendants appealed to the Su- 

 preme Court, which affirmed the judgment of the 

 lower tribunal. 



In the case of the State Treasurer vs. the Bank of 

 New Hanover, the court held that the relations ex- 

 isting between the parent bank and its branch (at 

 Wadesboro) were those of principal and agent ; that 

 all the assets of the agency belonged to the princi- 

 pal, and all the debts of the agency were debts of 

 the principal. 



In the case of Abram Carter vs. The Life Insur- 

 ance Company of Virginia, the court held that 

 where a life insurance company lends to a borrower 

 a sum of money at the full legal rate of interest, 



Sayable monthly, its repayment being secured by a 

 eed of trust, but also requires the borrower to 

 take an endowment policy in said company on his 

 life, the monthly premiums on which for life or a 

 term of years are also secured by the deed of trust, 

 the contract is usurious. 



The court decided against the Southern Railway 

 Company and the Raleigh and Augusta Air Line 

 Company for issuing free passes. These two cases 

 went up from Wake County Superior Court, which 

 had imposed a fine of $1,000 on each company. A 

 special Verdict was rendered in the lower court, the 

 jury finding that while the law had been violated 

 there had been no intent on the part of the officers of 

 the railroad companies to violate the law. In closing 

 its opinion the Supreme Court said : " In the face of 

 the clearly expressed provisions of the law, and in 

 the face of the repeated constructions of that part 

 of the Federal statutes regulating interstate com- 





merce, which is in precisely the same words in which 

 our statute is framed upon the point now before us, 

 the defendant took its chances. It has in doing so 

 violated the criminal law of the State and must 

 abide the consequences, as all others ought to do 

 who break the laws. It must be presumed that 

 common carriers know well what they are doing in 

 this matter. They are not, and neither do they 

 wish to be considered, charitable institutions ; they 

 are corporations formed for profit and gain ; and 

 whenever they grant a thing of value free trans- 

 portation to a passenger not embraced in the ex- 

 cepted classes specified in the act they must be 

 acting, as they think, on business principles, expect- 

 ing a return upon their investments. If, in pursu- 

 ing their business interests, they violate the law, 

 they must abide the result." Associate Justice 

 Douglas dissented from the opinion of the court. 



Race Troubles and State Election. In Sep- 

 tember, 1898, a staff correspondent of the Atlanta 

 " Constitution " dispatched to that paper a letter from 

 Raleigh, N. C., elaborating a charge which from 

 time to time had been less definitely made by va- 

 rious journals of the State namely, that it was the 

 purpose of the negroes to colonize and control 

 North Carolina: that it was the purpose of the 

 blacks thus to solve the race problem, by the estab- 

 lishment of a commonwealtti of their own. This 

 correspondent wrote : 



"It is no secret that colored leaders, ambitious 

 for their race, have matured in their minds a plan 

 by which they hope to obtain absolute control of 

 the legislative, judicial, and executive machinery, 

 and then to rapidly carry out a scheme of coloniza- 

 tion by which this will become a thoroughly negro 

 sovereign State, with that population in the major- 

 ity and furnishing all officials in the public service, 

 from United States Senators and Governors down 

 through judges, legislators, and solicitors, to the 

 last constable and janitor. If their plan succeeds, 

 North Carolina is to be the refuge of their people in 

 America. Their brethren from all the Southern 

 States will be invited to come here, cast their lot 

 among their fellows, and together to work out their 

 destiny in whatsoever degree of prosperity and ad- 

 vancement they may be able to achieve for them- 

 selves." 



The correspondent's letter was copied in all the 

 newspapers of the State, its argument being ap- 

 proved or ridiculed according to the political views 

 of the various editors, but by most of them it was 

 published as a startling revelation of facts. Com- 

 menting upon it. one journal said : 



"Almost immediately after the passage of the re- 

 construction acts, under which the Southern States 

 were readmitted into the Union, and by which civil 

 and political rights were conferred upon the negro, 

 there was a great influx of negroes into Washington 

 city, and the capital of the Union was fast becom- 

 ing the negro's political heaven. Why? It was 

 about this time that an act was passed by Congress 

 which gave to the citizens of the District of Colum- 

 bia the power to elect all the local officers of the 

 city of Washington. The people there had local 

 self-government, and the negro was as good as the 

 white man. The city government soon became so 

 corrupt and extravagant that Congress was forced 

 to repeal the act giving the people the right of local 

 self-government. What place is now to him what 

 Washington once was 1 What one State in all this 

 Union now holds out the inducement to enter her 

 citizenship and seek her political honors! What 

 State, and what State alone, is represented in the 

 Congress of the United States by a negro ? What 

 State, and what State alone, has registration laws 

 which make it easy for him to register, whether he 

 is a legal voter or not ? What State, and what 



