The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1886-04-29
MAST never did love an freshman. ]

MAST never did love an Irishman. In
fact his feeling toward the Celt is hostile
and he excludes every commendable trait
20 that the censurable ones may stand
out in bold relief. The last issue OF
Harper's Weekly has cartoon in which
Brother Jonathan lovingly hangs upon
the shoulders of Gladstone while he says:
'tBy giving the Irish their own country
to rule, you emancipate the whole world
and the United States in particular. A
ragged Irishman with cudgel in his
hand and fighting bend in his knees is
reading q placard inviting him to come
home and rule his own country. This is
the conception Of the typical Irishman in
the large cities: brutal rufflan; man
wholly devoid of refined sensibility, in
tent only upon being bully, a law-breaker
and terror to the authorities. This il
largely the American idea. Everything
Irish is of necessity bad, vicious, unculti-
vated, lawless and bad by nature and in
purpose. This is Nast's idea, and when
he seeks to represent an Irishman he
draws his inspiration from the foulest
and coarsest depths of his nature. What
is there in the Irish people which so
brutalizes the conception which an Amer
lean forms of thems Are they so def
Gent in intellectually that the animal
predomidates? Are they such inveterate
office seekers that their greed makes
them fit subjects for the lampooner and
the carricaturist? Throughout the United
States the democratic party has greater
number of voters which are Irish than it
has of any other foreign nationality
Has any one heard any very persistent
demands that the Irish be recognized, as
such, in the distribution of spoils since
the democratic advent to power Have
any important offices fallen to their share
in the allotment to the faithful "Seck
other cause for feud with Roderick
Dhu."
Mast would make John l.. Sullivan the
American representative OF the Irish
people, though he is no more Irish than
Calhoun, Jackson or O'Conor were. But
Nast's distorted view is in accordance
with prevailing American sentiment
The typical Irishman must be taken from
the lowest stratum so that the average
American may recognize his ideal.
Can the Irish people in America do
aught to correct this false estimate? They
can lay the axe to the root by not congre-
eating in large cities, and by giving less
attention to local politics. The cities of
New York and Chicago have done more
to beEttle the Irish character than have
all the bad deeds of Irishmen in all other
parts of the United States. Here the
Irishman is studied, call his faults OBJ
served, set in note book, learned and
conned by rote" to form a carricature for
the delectation of the American people.
Here is where the Irishman grows pie
thoric with rascality and sinks his man
hood in the mire of petty politics. Here
he is rioter, the vertebrae of mobs, the
tool of the INSCRIPTIONS politician, a
brawler, drunkard, the scandal of his
countrymen and curse to himself
There are no foreigners who provoke less
enmity than the Norwegians. AS rule
they come to western farms, let politics
alone and do not seek to obtrude their
views upon any one. If the Irish would
pattern after them in this respect the
black pencil of Mast would not pursue
them.