Topic : Hate, hatred
Mississippi Spurning
A good bit of one-upmanship has transpired over the years between Trent Lott and Thad Cochran, the two Mississippians in this week’s showdown for Bob Dole’s job as Senate majority leader. But as Jackson columnist Bill Minor notes, their rivalry pales when compared with a feud waged six decades ago by two other Mississippi senators.
The nation knew the state’s junior senator, Theodore Bilbo, as a race-baiting demagogue, the author of a bill to ship blacks to Africa. But many Mississippians revered him as a champion of the poor and foe of the mighty. Others in the state despised him as a bribe-taking crook. One rival, preparing to discuss Bilbo in a stump speech, shed his coat and said, “Excuse me. I’m going to skin a skunk. Ladies had better leave.”
Mississippi’s senior senator, Pat Harrison, had helped engineer Franklin Roosevelt’s early New Deal. When the Senate majority leader’s job opened up in 1937, Harrison went after it. Nose counts put him in a tie with Kentucky’s Alben Barkley. Harrison’s campaign manager asked Bilbo to consider voting for his fellow Mississippian. Bilbo said he would if Harrison asked him to. That was a big if. Harrison loathed Bilbo and hadn’t spoken to him in years. The response was swift: “Tell the son of a bitch I wouldn’t speak to him even if it meant the presidency of the United States.”
When the ballots were in, Pat Harrison was a one-vote loser. But his reputation as the senator who wouldn’t speak to his home-state colleague remained intact.
A Father’s Will
One of the worst cases of hatred I have ever come across is found in a will written in 1935 by a Mr. Donohoe. It says, “Unto my two daughters, Frances Marie and Denise Victoria, by reason of their unfilial attitude toward a doting father, … I leave the sum of $1 to each and a father’s curse. May their lives be fraught with misery, unhappiness, and poignant sorrow. May their deaths be soon and of a lingering malignant and torturous nature.” The last line of the will is so vicious I shudder to quote it. It reads, “May their souls rest in hell and suffer the torments of the condemned for eternity.”
Hate is Like Acid
Hate is like acid. It can damage the vessel in which it is stored as well as destroy the object on which it is poured.
TNT
A man who hates to be slapped on the back packs his coat with TNT and waits for this man who always slaps his back. His idea is when he hits me I will get him, I’ll blow him up. Hate kills both the person who you hate, but also yourself as well.
Hating people is like burning down your own house to get rid of a rat.
H. E. Fosdick
