The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1886-06-30


ST. Louis has been doing than to spend money
in preventing such disgraceful state of af
fairs. Pittsburg went through exactly the
same kind of experiment, and came out poorer
by million or more. and the effect is still
felt
1t is folly for any community, even for
time, to seem to favor any other than lawful
ing and employed. It never pays to advocate,
or allow to be advocated, the idea that these
things can be settled in any but lawful man
ner. Night does not make right, nor does it
arrive a. justice. A certain number of honest
workingmen may be transformed into mob
by the incendiary speeches of the professional
agitator, and do more harm in a day, or an
hour, than can be repaired in a month, or year.
1t is the plain duty Of the sober minded to
ever keep on the right side of these questions,
and to exercise an influence for good at all
times, though for time it may not appear to
be popular. The people of the city of Pitts
burg are still taxing themselves to pay the
more than million dollars that were destroyed
by the men who engaged in the riots of 1877
firm stand for the right previous to that
time would have saved all this, and the work
ingmen of that city would have been the
richer by that much had they not been per-
suaded to engage in destroying property.
Prompt and impartial enforcement of the law
would have saved that city all that, and would
have spared it the reputation for lawlessness
that still hurts it and keeps capital from in
vesting there. 1t is the same with the city of
East st. Louis. Had the people there stood
up for the law, and given all to understood
that rioting would not be tolerated, the diff
6culties that have beset the authorities of that
place would not be there. IF there were no
funds in the city treasury it would not follow
that there should be that degree of lawlessness
that renders life and property insecure. I. is
to the interest of all that the law be upheld
and respected at all times. The workingmen
of East st. Louis suffer by reason Of the fact
that they were led into the commission of acts
will seek investment elsewhere. The result
is that thousands of men have been, and will
be, deprived of profitable employment there
This is the history of all such cases, and it
will be the history Of Chicago, where they are
still sowing the whirlwind. The workingman
cannot afford to allow himself to be led into
the commission of acts that cannot be justi-
fled. Revenge for real or imaginary wrongs
will not pay half so well as decent and order
ly settlement of the same No man in any
community, from top to bottom, can afford to
encourage lawlessness in any other man. The
merchant who does so for the purpose of cur
rying favor with certain men, in the hope Of
securing their patronage in return, is unfit to
enjoy the patronage of honest men, and in the
end will be the loser, as he deserves tp-be
The working,nan cannot afford to lend his as
sistance to organized violence, for the reason
that all such outbreaks only 60 to destroy
business and to deprive him Of steady and
profitable employment. The law is the founda-
ton of prosperity and stability. 1t is the
corner stone of society, to remove which is to
destroy the superstructure. A reign of law
lessness will crush the life out of any town or
city that tolerates it.