Excerpt from "The Solid South" And the Afro-American Race Problem: Speech of Charles Francis Adams at the Academy of Music, Richmond, Va., Saturday Evening, 24 October, 1908 Lord Palmerston, as Premier of Great Britain, was wont to say that people talked of political landslides and overwhelming majori ties and all that sort of thing; but, for his own part, what he liked best was a strong Government confronted by a strong Opposition. Here, tersely put, lies the whole secret of a successful parliamentary, or representative government, - a vigorous Opposition facing a powerful Administration. But this is exactly what our country has not got now, has not had for thirty years, and, as I see it, is most unlikely to have just so long as there is a Solid South, the result of an abnormal political, social and industrial condition. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.