Arizona weekly citizen. [volume] (Tucson, Ariz) 1880-1901, 1894-07-14
THE CRIMINAL CRANKS.

The New York Commercial Advertiser
has the following to say of criminal
cranks:
While it may be difficult for French
men. in the first spasm of indignation
over the strocity of yesterday at Lyons,
to forget that the assassin Santo is a
compatriot OF Orsini, the effect OF the
episode is not likely to be an increase of
international i'll feeling. 1t will instantly
be remembered that at the ceremonies in
which the murdered president was par
ticipatinp no more cordial sentiments
were expressed for the French Republic
and its illustrious head than those of
the italian consul, whose own premier,
Crispi, had only few days earlier mar
rowly escaped in Rome similar fate.
There is no more significance in this
assassination than in others of mod
ern times. 1t was not political; 1t was
diabolic. 1t Was committed by hu-
man devil, the type of whom is not
unknown among US. One such assas-
sinated Abraham Lincoln; another
butchered Garfield; another murdered
Garter Harrison. 1t is the same spirit
that blows up a Gar with dynamite,
sssassinstes three presidents and other
officials without number.
This wretch calls himself an Anarh-
list; perhaps he is: But he is not an as
ssssin because he is an Anarchist. de
joins the Anarchist forces. consisting OF
frantic criminals like himself, because
he is a criminal. He has no exclusive
land or nationality except the birthstone
lake. He may be organized in some
countries under different names, bat he
Is always the same in essence-the COM
binstion of folly with criminal pro-
pensity. He is simply mankind in its
original diabolical state.
A society that tolerates any large de-
gree of infection by this mental and
moral plague is manifestly in no small
danger. Whether it is despotism or a
republic, it is equally in jeopardy. No
system of government is safer than any
other which tolerstes the growth beneath
it Of unnumbered insane criminals and
permits them liberty Of movement. 1t
matters very little whether they act in
concert or independently; their very ex-
istence is menace. We have had ex-
perlence OF it in both forms, in the muir
ders in Washington and Chicago. as well
as in the Haymarket demonstration IN
the latter city.
In Europe these criminals are to some
extent organized, and if is possible that
this climax of organized criminality
will lead to organized resistance. Santos
bloody deed may have set back the
hands Of progress on the dial for fifty
years, for we are already reminded by
the British press Of MacRulay's sig
nifcant warning that if revolution
airy violence is allowed to proceed
unchecked at may be necessary to
destroy liberty in order to preserve
civilization" The murder Of NJ. Carnot
may result in closer intimacy of
European nations banded together for
the determination OF this common
enemy of civilization.
For ourselves the lesson is distinct.
Organization of such forms of crime has
not yet been effected here as in Europe
The conditions do not favor it. The
scoundrel-fool operates here alone, and
ss an individual he can be treated with
greater ease. We must see to il that
the insane impulse in him is checked by
object lessons. The licence given to in
sanity must be abrogated, the lines
drawn closer.