In response to a call published in the Leader and signed by J. S. Cromwell, secretary, addressed to the Republicans of Tipton county, a few white Republicans met in the courthouse Saturday afternoon and elected W. E. Fryer as a delegate to the Republican State convention in Chattanooga April 14, and to the Congressional convention in Memphis May 1. W. A. Brown was elected alternate.
The call for the convention did not state the hours at which it was to be held. It is reliably reported that it was held under the auspices of John W. Farley, of Memphis, who had stated that he would be present at the convention, but telephoned this afternoon that he could not come to Covington. Farley evidently is very desirous of getting up a contesting delegation from Tipton county to the various Republican conventions in order to give his Shelby county contesting delegation a better chance to be seated.
The regular Republican executive committee of Tipton county, which is composed entirely of negroes, of which John Cole, colored, is chairman, and William Thompson, colored, is secretary, met in Covington 10 days ago, after due call and elected delegates to the Republican gubernatorial and congressional conventions. Eighty or 90 per cent [sic] of the Republican vote in Tipton county is cast by negroes, and according to party rules and regulations, the negro executive committee is the regular Tipton county Republican executive committee, as it has been in existence for a number of years and has been recognized at various party conventions.
The negroes state that they are getting weary of casting 80 or 90 per cent of the Republican votes in Tipton county and then are given scant or no recognition in the way of party honors in State conventions. Whenever there has been a test of strength in Republican mass conventions in Tipton county between the lily whites and the black and tans, the negroes have overwhelmed the whites.
[The Covington Leader, Covington, Tenn., April 1, 1920]
— Shared by John Shaw
Comment by John Shaw:
Regarding the all-Black executive committee of the Republican Party in Tipton County. Apparently the Republicans in Tipton had divided into two factions, the “Lily Whites” (who presumably favored expelling Blacks from the party) and the “Black and Tans” who were the Blacks who had maintained the Republican Party in Tipton after the fall of Reconstruction.