The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1891-10-25
SEATTLE. SUNDAY, OCT. 20.
THE REAL DANGER.


suffrage as fraught with impending dam
ger; to prefgure anarchistic and socialistic
peris awaiting this republic at the hands
of the ignorant Masses" both native and
imported. Rev. DR.. Carlos Martyr, in
the current number of the Arena, bluntly
says that our danger today does not lie in
universal suffrage. and defines it as fol-
lows:
1t lies in the steady encroachments OF wealth,
In the multiplication OF monopoles, In the too
rapid growth OF fungus miIlionaires in the in
creasing number OF well-educated idlers, in the
sinister prominence of the saloon in politics, in
the tendency of the country to submit To
Bureaucracy, In the transformation of the
tional senate into club OF rich men, housed
and fed at the national expense, in the change
of the House of Representatives into a huddle
of clerks TO register the DEGREES of greedy cap
ital, in the chronic distrus: of the psople felt
among book ed ucated and professional men; in
word, in the appalling gravitation towards
government by "boodle" in the hands Of un-
scrupulous minorites-
The dangerous classes are motley
crowd. They include men that are rich
and men that are poor; men that are edu-
Gated and men that are illiterate; men
men that are high in social station and
men that squirm in the squalor of the
slums; men that are nominal leaders in
the churches and men that are the pagan
savages of our Christian civilization; men
that are frugal and abstemious; men that
are extravagant and drunken; they are pc
culiar to no one church, to no one party, to
al; L,k 81
found at the top or the bottom of society,
whether they roll in riches or flutter in
rags, they all sail under the same pirate
tlag-the pirate flag of selfish, ferocious
desire to feed on their fellows
through violence, robbery or fraud.
The Little butcher birds, and the screech
owls; the great bald eagles and the con-
Tors; the suckers; the bluefish and the
harks are all in the same business,
whether it is petty policy shop, a gilded
aro bank, Wall street stock swindle, a
oank broken from without by burglar, or
Il bank broken from within by its presi-
dent, a burglary or a breach of trust,
pickpocket or an administrator devouring
widows houses or snatching the bread
from the mouths OF orphan children.
This dangerous class is everywhere; its
representative is as changeful in color as a
chameleon; as versatile IN shape as Satan.
He may be a lawyer helping to wreck a
railroad or rescuing the wreckers from the
shadow of the penitentiary; he may be
judge accepting the wicked bride that buys
out the law; he may be hypocritical pull
piteer, cloaking himself with Christianity
in order that he may feed on the lambs of
his flock; an eloquent evangelist in speech,
a filthy traitor to righteousness In his secret
conduct and career. The common thought of
the dangerous classes are the poor and the
iliterate, but really society suffers more
from the organized piracy Of intelligence
that outwits the law than from the
turbulence of the so-called dangerous, be-
cause iliterate, class. This class of in
teliigent swindlers and educated CONNER
cial and industrial pirates includes the
vast tribe of fellows who burst banks, en-
bezzle their employers money. rob rail-
roads by selling stock short and then
stealing it for delivery, who suck all the
savings of the poor out of trust companies
as completely as a starish does the oyster
from his shell.
This large. influential, exceedingly de-
structive and dangerous class is not COM
posed of the poor, the turbulent and the
illiterate; it is made up of trained business
intelligence; it stands for superficial
petty aud purity of morals, for smooth,
plausible speech and manners, for excep-
tional powers Of persuasive conversation;
for thorough responsibility in society and
the church up 10 the hour when it is
known 1t is no longer respectable, because
il is no longer rich enough or influential
enough to smother its crimes and escape
punishment; it has lost its wallet, and is
therefore no longer worthy. The rascals
Of genius who have either the wit or the
good fortune TO escape the gsllows Of public
opinion and to bring into port without
mo!estation their vessels loaded to the gun
vale with pirate spoil, are the most dan
gerous class in the country, because they
are corporate rascals and pirates, who
threaten by their banded millions TO cap
ture congress and state legislatures and
make the laws of the land; fasten their
tentacles on courts and legislatures and
clutch the power TO throttle the life
out of individual competition. This
Is not large class; it is not poor
or illiterate, but il Is very dangerous
class; for it not only corrupts politics.
captures courts and banArupts individual
enterprise. but the spectacle Of its success
L. demoralizing to the growing youth of
the land. Tweed in prison was a solemn
warning; so was Napoleon on the barren
rock Of ST. Helena. but the jay Goulds of
the hour, bedecked with the jewels and
ROBBED in the royal purple of successful
scoundrelsm and commercial piracy is
not frightful example 10 avoid, but il Is
lovely lure and battle flag of booty and
beauty TO the many.
The really dangerous classes are Of res
pec;able origin, intelhgeg experience and
opportunities. They sometimes get into
prison but seldom stay there long; barney
and money soon breaks the bars for this
dangerous class, and they swell the crowd
o. cunning scoundrels who howl about