Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1889-04-26
The Wonderful Power They Have,
Public and Private.

George KEENAN, in the Century.
There is probably no country in the world
where the public power occupies a wider field
plays more important part, or touches the
private personal life the citizen at more points
than 1t does in Russia. In a country like Eng
land or the United States. where the people are
the governing power, the functions of the po-
lice are simple and clearly defined, and are
limited, for the most part, to the prevention or
the detection of crime and the maintenance
of order in public places. In Russia. however
where the people are not the governing power,
but hold to that power the relation of an infant
ward to guardian, the police occupy a very
different and much more important position.
The theory upon which the government of
Russia proceeds is that the citizen not only is
Incapable of taking part in the management of
his country, his province, or his district but is
incompetent to manage even the affairs of his
own household, and that, from the time when
he leaves his cradle and begins the struggle of
life down to the time when his weary gray head
Is finally laid down under the sod, he must be
guided, directed, instructed restrained. re-
pressed. regulate ted. fenced in. fenced out,
braced up, kept down, and made to do gem
orally what somebody. else thinks is best for
him.
THE NATURAL OUTCOME
of this paternal theory of government is the
concentration of all administrative authority in
the hands of few high officials, and an enor-
nous extension of the police power Matters
that in other countries are left to the discretion
OF the individual citizen or to the Judgment of
a small group of citizens, are regulated in
Russia by the minister of the interior through
the imperial police. If you are Russian and
wish to establish newspaper. you must ask
the permission of the minister of the interior.
If you wish to open a Sunday school,
or any other sort of school, whether
in neglected slum of st. Petersburg or
in a native village in kamchatka. YOU must ask
the permission of the minister of public in
struction. If you wish to give a concert or to
get up tabeaux for the benefit of an orphan
asylum, you must ask permission of the nearest
representative of the minister of the interior,
then submit your program of exercises to a CEN
sor for approval or revision and finally hand
over the proceeds of the entertainment to the
police, to be embeZZed or given to the orphan
asylum, as may happen. If you wish to sell
newspapers on the street you must get permits
sion, be registered in the books of the police,
and
WEAR NUMBERED BRASS PLATE
as big as saucer around your neck If you
wish to open drug store, a printing Office a
photograph gallery, or a bookstore you must
get permission. If you are photographer
and desire to change the location of your place
OF business, you must get permission. If YOU
are student and go to a library to consult
Lyelrs principles of Geology" or Spencer's
''Social Statistics, you will find that YOU can
not even look at such dangerous and incendi-
airy volumes without special permission. If
you are a physician, you must get per-
mission before you can practice, and
then, If you do not wish to respond to calls in
the night, you must have permission to refuse
to go; furthermore, if you wish to prescribe
what are known in Russia as power
fully acting" medicines, you must have special
permission, or the druggist will not dare to fill
your prescriptions. II you are peasant and
wish to build bath-house on your premises
you must get permission. If you wish to thresh
out your grain in the evening by candle light
you must get permission or bride the police
Ii you wish to go more than Is miles away from
your home you must get permission. If you
are foreign traveller you must get permission
to come into the empire, permission to 60 out
of it, permission to remain in it longer than
six months, and must notify the police every
time you change your boarding place. In
short, you cannot live, move. or have your
being In the russian empire without permission.
A Texas steer lifted carriage and baby off
a street and over high fence in Denver with
out the least damage to either the infanto or the
carriage, and the little one seemed delighted
with the performance. 1t is not likely. how
ever, that this incident will make the Texas
steer popular as a child's nurse. To be sure
the steer wouldn't desert the baby in public
park, and let the hot sun shine in its face half
an hour while he-or it-fiirted with q park
policeman; but there are weighty reasons why
the animal will not be employed in that capac-
ity.-Norrist0,cn Herald
Wheer tho Loss Was.-Brown (speaking o
Henderson, who has made his appearance with
one OF those new-fangled surcingles around his
silk hat)-"Has Henderson lost his wife?"
Fogg--"No; he has only lost his senses."-
Boston Transcript