The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1891-09-28
THE PINKERTON ARMY.
A New York Paper Denounces the Prt-
vate Police Accumulation.


New York Commercial Advertiser.
Somewhere and soon a line must be drawn be-
tween the legitimate and illegiumate functions
of private police agency. 1t cannot be done
too soon for the public safety or too decisively
for the good OF the commonwealth. The pres
ent status of what may be called Pinkertonism
Is intolerable. 1t may be laid down as an indis-
putable proposition that American citizens will
not consent to physical assault at the hands of
anybody. Such assaults are committed from
time to time in Quarrels, and the law 80 dis
tinctly frowns on them as to prescribe penalties.
Occasionally they are made by uniformed off,
GERS of the law. In such a case the law stillsur-
rounds the person of the citizen with its pro-
tecting arm. The officer who is guilty of such
an assault is held responsible for his act, and
unless he can justify 1t by proving the necessity
for it he is as liable to prosecution as any or
binary mslefactor The idea of responsibility
pervades the entire police system. So it is,
again, with the state troops The responsibility
Tor calling out armed men to quell disturb
ance is vested in officials duly and directly re-
sponsible to the people.
But there has grown up in the midst Of as
quite another and armed system, responsible In
no way to the people, chartered In no way by
the people, and to a very great extent-how
great we have not yet found out-beyond the
control OF the people.
The Pinkerton police force is such an organf-
cation. Recent history is full OF suggestion as
to the latent dangers OF this private and IRE
sponsible constabulary. For the past six or
eight years it has played the part OF the Turkish
ianizaries to the sultans of corporate rapacity.
From the time when its armed men shot down
children in Jersey City to the recent occurrences
in Tennessee, "Pinkerton men," armed with re-
peating rifles and commanded by capitalists,
have replaced the constituted police and militia
over which the mayors and governors have con-
troll. During the long and dismal period of the
Hooking valley mining disturbances a force of
Pinkerton men, armed with Winchesters,
usurped the right to use force which the execu-
tive OF the third state in the Union declined to
exercise. And only few months ago, when
Governor Hill, in the capitol of the Empire
state, refused to call out troops to defend rail-
road property against imaginary attacks, there
was not wanting an army, uniformed, drilled
and heavily armed, TO obey the mandates of the
corporation against the people.
In slightly modified form the residents of
New York and Brooklyn have, within few
days, endured an experience OF the same kind.
Within the Enclosure of the Brooklyn Jockey
Club, but few miles from the city hall of the
metropolis, fifty armed men of the same organi-
Zation have executed martial law upon citizens
at the bidding OF horse owner engaged in q
private war with gamblers for his own profit.
This, 1t seems TO Us, is an intolerable condition
of affairs.
The very existence of a private organization
of armed men is imputation of inability
upon the part of the people to govern them
selves and maintain order through their law.
fully constituted police. The logical extreme of
tolerating organized force beyond the regulatlye
power OF law Is the surrender of law to force
If mere wealth, existing In a corporation or
individual, can, by an appeal to armed force.
coerce citizens beyond lawful limits, il coerces
law itself The Pinkerton army is menace to
self-government.
Mildly speaking, Pinkertonism in this sense
is most dangerous excreseence upon our civil
and military systems. So grave is it, indeed
that the subject has been considered in the
Legislatures of this and other states. The power
OF corporate wealth prevented the passage of
laws 10 remove it
But such laws must be passed. Csurpations
OF authority are progressive. They never stand
still Pinkertonism has grown from private
hunting for stolen property to private thief
taking; from that il has progressed 70 private
slaughtering of citizens In private wars. At the
same rate of development there must come
about at no distant date collision between the
public army of the commonwealth and the
private armies OF capital. Before that comes
about the people must act The next legisla.
ture must draw the teeth of this growing mon
ster while Il can