The record-union., 1894-08-15
ExroLLING oRIMINALIrY.

EXTOLLING CRIMINALITY.
II stranger to the methods adopted
in defense of the accused in the train
wrecking case at Woodland were to read
the reports of certain of the envenomed
press he would be puzzled to know
whether the Southern Pacific Company
or the men accused of an awful crime are
on examination.
The appeals to prejudice, the assaults
upon the Government, the law and its
officers, the charges of corruption, OPP
preston and persecution, the exaltatlon
of lawlessness and the apologies for GRIM
inality practiced and preached during the
late strike, the attempt to lift that which
the law and humanity pronounce in
famous up to the level of manliness and
defensible action-au these thing have
characterized the progress Of the case
and have shamed the usual orderly pro-
cedure of law and tribunals of the law
and made self-respecting citizens wonder
if. after all, there is any human right
that may be asserted without the consent
and approval of the lawless.
An engineer in the employment of a
railroad company was brutally murdered
and train belonging 20 it and in charge
of United States authorities was crimi-
nally wrecked. If that railroad company
failed to bend its best energies to the
searching out of the misereants who did
the diabolicaI work and to prosecuting
vigorously to that END those accused of
the Infamous crime it would deserve the
contempt of mankind and be unworthy
the service of employees who peril their
lives in operating its trains.
An employer who would not engage in
ferreting out the assassin who does away
with his employe simply because he was
such employe, would be the object OF
public scorn and loathing. If the railroad
company in this case had taken no steps
to bring to bar whoever may be guilty in
crime of July 11th; if it had manifested
no concern in the matter, had offered no
reward, had employed no counsel and
put forth no energy to evolve the truth
and bring the guilty to punishment, the
envenomed hatred now manifest against
it for doing precisely what it ought TO do,
would be voiced in liatribes of abuse and
villifcation and scougings ofreproach for
unfeeIing, non-interest and cold-blooded
unconcern.
We apprehend, however, that dispas-
sionate judgment and cool reason will
rule when the hour passes, as it must in
which prejudice is appealed to in apollo
gizing for lawlessness, and exalting the
criminality INDUCED in during the strike
as manliness in the prosecution of boy
colt warfare as excusable tactics and de-
fensibles procedure in its promotion
entirely proper and correct conduct in
forwarding the unlawful seizure and
detention of anotherss property, in re-
cruiting armed bodies to resist the law
in coercing men out of employment and
threatening those who dared to seek it
in cowing communities, defying tht
Government and reviling its accredited
officers.
When the effortful attempt to diver
public judgment shall have ex
hausted itself, men and communities now
misled by passion and prejudice viii look
back with shame upon the present houl
of prejudice and misleading. For th.
cool judgment of the people viii domin
ate in the end and reason assert itself
Just at this time, if we are to believe
the embittered and biased reports pub
lished in, for instance, the San Francisco
Call. there was not only no crime com
naitted on the fateful 18th of July, but the
bare suggestion that murder was done
that the life was crushed out of poor
innocent human beings; that the laws OF
the land were violated and human rights
placed at mob mercy, is outrageous false
hood and offensive and criminal state
ment.
We apprehend that no man worthy the
name desires the innocent to be punished
nor yet that any human being not him
self accessory in thought or deed, desires
the guilty to escape. Let the Law take it'