Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1886-07-07
TIE Rat IN THE SHIP.

| At Fourth Oh July banquet In this city
on Monday distinguished orator, who has
held high position and whose scholarship
and forensic powers, wit and readiness are
matters of local pride. took occasion to de
clare that there is no danger from Com
munism, Anarchism or Socialism in this
country In effect he spoke in this strain;
There is nothing in it. These Com
munists and Anarchists are not even
menace. When one of them cuts up and
talks loud-mouthed, an American police
man catches him by the neck, he is popped
into Jail for disturbing the peace, and
there is an end of that revolution. All
this fear about the Socialists and Anarch-
lists is cultivated by the press. These
newspapers must have something to talk
about, and so they keep up the scare.
They say good many true things, but
they are all off on this scare Why,
a Communist can't breathe in the same
atmosphere with good American. There
is no sort of danger from them, or from
Socialists or Anarchists They can't hurt
or destroy this Government Why, talk
of these miserable fellows amounting to
anything in this great and glorious repub-
lie! Let there come assault upon the
homes and institutions of America and
then see how the men Of the nation will
rise together to repel it." And in that
strain the distinguished speaker continued
rightly, and not one whit exaggeratedly
clarifying this as the best and truest of
nations, with broadest blessings and most
benefcent showers of good for man. All
this sort of thing is well enough and true
enough, and fits into the post-prandiaI
eifusiveness of Independence Day ad-
mirably, but when it is conceded that this
is the best and strongest, most God-fayored,
impregnable and altogether desirable land
and government beneath the sun, having
the least to fear and the most to hope for,
does it follow that we are to take no ae-
count of the yermin which may infest it ?
Is it wise policy to ignore the rat in the
ship that may gnaw the hole that will
send the noble vessel to the bottom? Is it
nothing, nothing whatever, that nineteen
bleeding mangled forms and four dead
bodies, wearing the honored regalia of
official rank of the United States of Amer
lea, lay prone upon the pavements of the
Haymarket in Chicago in May, victims to
the dalnnable "talk' thatpropelled bomb
against the form of liberty? Does our
oratorical friend, whose patriotism is such
a shield and safeguard to him, really and
honestly mean to say that we need to give
no heed to the rodent that burrows in the
massive embankment and lets in the water
to food city? Does popping the wretch
ed ineitcr to murder, arson and robbery
into Jail for disturbing the peace compen-
safe for the unrest and distrust and
fear the rascal creates? Is it true or
not that this same press which "puts in
the sensational stuff about the Anarchists,
to fill up" correctly reports The doings of
these fellows, or is it fable, 4 fiction and
dream, that they march in the streets
behind the red symbol of rapine and
blood; that they preach defiance Of the
law our talented orator so ably represent?
Is it true or not, that they denounce the
officers of the peace stir the ignorant to
rioting iniiame the vicious to commit
crime manufacture dynamite bombs to
murder human beings; seek to assassinate
Presidents and Governors; denounce organ
lied society; declare domesticity cheat
and order to be tyranny? Is it not pos
slbie that these rats in the ship will breed
too fast? That these vicious rascals may
not contaminate our sons and daughters.
and lead them to less devoted and patr;
otto views of our form of government than
we entertain? Having such a glorious
| heritage, such bounteous endowments for
our nation from heaven itself, such bless
ings, such strength, such faith, such lofty
hopes, shall We tolerate the gnawing of
even feeble Anarchist rats beneath the
foundations, and permit this burrowing
vermin to possibly undermine the tower
ing fabric Of the republic? Is not this a
case where the ounce of prevention now
is really better than the pound of cure
hereafter?