large volume of public intelligence, virtue, and patriotism, was not willing to abandon the organization, and yield to the dominant Democratic party without a manly struggle to regain power. Their convention summoned to the lead and placed the banner in the hands of the zealous, gifted and eloquent Benjamin H. Hill. The Democratic party being in the ascendency, and having a redundancy of men among the old leaders who coveted the honor of being Governor, was greatly troubled in convention to unite on any one of the aspiring candidates for a nomination, James Gardner, Henry G. Lamar, Wm. H. Stiles, Hiram Warner, and John Henry Lumpkin, and a number of outstanding men, ready to accept a candidacy, under the usage of compromising disputes among prominent men by the nomination of a man not known as a candidate. James Gardner was heralded by a long and brilliant reputation as editor of The Constitutionalist newspaper at Augusta, and had contributed largely for many years to the Democratic victories of the State by his power as a political writer; had come in possession of fortune, and desired the honor of retiring under the eclat of a nomination by his party, for the highest office in the gift of the State. He was seconded and supported actively and unanimously, by the Democratic leaders in that part of the State. Henry G. Lamar is a man of ripe age, fair abilities, sterling integrity, high sense of personal honor, eminently patriotic, and sound in the Democratic faith, and true to the South, and the recipient of a powerful family influence as well as that of his life-long personal friendships among the public men in his part of the State. Hiram Warner came from the North in early youth, identified himself with the State, and has been a steady and reliable Democrat from that time to the present. In early life he served with distinction in the Legislature, and later he served as judge of his circuit, three terms, and a term of eight years as judge of the supreme court, in addition to his long and successful career when out of office as a lawyer in western Georgia. He also served with great ability as representative in the last Congress. And at different periods of life has been recommended for this office. His character for ability, fidelity, conservatism, and personal honesty gave him many strong friends and supporters for this nomination. William H. Stiles had been a member of Congress on the general Democratic ticket before the State was laid off into congressional districts; a minister to Austria four years, under President Polk, residing at Vienna, and is a man of erect form, pleasing person, courtly style, and polished manner of popular oratory; a true and chivalrous representative of southern Democracy, supported by the elegant and refined people of Savannah. John Henry, nephew to Wilson and Joseph Henry Lumpkin, son of an honest primitive Baptist preacher, George Lumpkin, came to Cherokee, Georgia, from Oglethorpe County, when young. Has been solicitor and judge of his circuit, and several times member of Congress, and has long been a Democratic leader of great personal cleverness and popularity in this part of the State. And in this contest for a nomination to the office, which, above all others, he has long coveted, he was the choice of this part of the State, with many warm supporters in other sections. While any one of them would have been an acceptable man to the people, the antagonisms between their friends in the convention were so strong as to prevent the nomination of either, and as a sequence to defeat them all. It resulted after a long session, and repeated fruitless ballotings, in throwing all overboard, and nominating by acclamation, upon the recommendation of a special select committee, the present Governor of Georgia, JOSEPH EMERSON BROWN, of whom my purpose to prosecute the history of the State will impose the most pleasant duty to write more at large. The friends and adherents of the defeated candidates, notwithstanding the evidences of discontent that at first gave encouragement to the opposition party under Mr. Hill, in the course of the canvass gradually yielded to Mr. Brown their cordial and united support, and the party of Mr. Hill, the Whig, American, or opposition party as it is called, voted for him as enthusiastically even in the face of admitted numerical strength in the Democratic ranks. The canvass was a heavy one for the candidates, and was conducted with great zeal and ability. Hill with incisive tactics, his stirring and impressive eloquence, appealed to the prejudices and the solidifying sentiments of his own party with a resume of its contests and achievements, and to the supposed disaffecting elements of the Democracy; arraigned the party which had been in power in the Union and in the State upon the current newspaper charges of maladministration and abuse of power and discretion. The administration of the Western & Atlantic railroad was reviewed with terrible scathing, because it was alleged that it had been used for party purposes and to promote favorites to the waste of public finances and the injury of the State. Brown with his perseverance, calmness, composure, and confidence as well as moral and physical courage, in his convincing reason and powerful argumentation addressed the assembled masses in every part of the State, and triumphantly defended the party who had committed the banner to his hand to lead. He defended the party with which he had been identified from his childhood, and whose principles were derived from and based upon the constitution itself—the party of a proud American ancestry, the projectors of Constitutional Liberty and the founders of Republican Government and makers of the Constitution itself-a party whose administrations had been the chief source of prosperity and development of a great country-the nursery and school of statesmen, and the champion of political justice and equality, and whose history was that of unrivalled progress and development, and under whose rule the United States had been the admiration of the world abroad, and had drawn contributions of people, of arts, science, and learning as well as of wealth, from all parts of the globe. A party whose triumphs were not of force or violence, but results of reason and intelligence, the force and effect of the love of truth and justice, and enlightened public opinion. His nomination was the defeat of the people's favorites in the different parts of the State where he was, as well as being a young man for so high a position, a personal stranger to the masses of the people. That the ardent friends of all the defeated aspirants should, before the election, yield in his favor, and join in full accord and give him a cordial and enthusiastic support, based on the sanction and conviction that he was the strongest as well as most suitable man of them all, is one of the features of |