The San Francisco call., 1895-12-18

breath has blighted and blasted every com
munity in which it has been permitted to
breathe =? Are those unnaturalized frebrands,
power which Senator Zach Chandler said the
other day we would yet have to fight, are these
the licensed ones to dictate to the American
people the policy they shall pursue toward any
class of citizens?
Down in South America there are brush vine
creeDers that cling to the mighty giants OF the
forest. At first they are harmless put in time
they garotte and stifle and choke and utterl-
destroy the forest giants that had braved the
storms and tempests OF centuries. The A. P. A.
parasite would prove equally destructive to
any Government which would allow itself to
be embraced in its deadly coils.
The A. P. A. would unchain again the tiger
OF intolerance and by fomentlng sectarian hate
would by creating distrust and arousing race
and religious hatreds finally dis rupt the Union.
The work of this organization is apparent
every day In this very City men have been
approached by its members and pressure used
to compel them to discharge their Catholic
employees. Girls, the only support of aged
they professed the Catholic faith. The
daughters OF men who fought and bled for the
Union have been turned out OF the public
schools by men, who, acting as trustees in
America, have only recently renounced their
allegiance to England. What are we to think
OF men calling themselves Americans skulking
around business houses TO find out the
religious complexion OF the employees and plot
ting for their removal?
1t was Catholic enterprise, Catholic genius
that devised, planned and carried to success.
cry. 1t was Catholic gold that equipped and
fitted out that little fleet. 1t was Catholic
sailors who manned it, and when it unfurled
its sails to catch the breeze and sailed out OF
that far-oh Spanish port it sailed under the
auspices of a Catholic King ana Queen, and it
was followed over the unknown seas through
unknown perils by the prayers ana the hopes
OF Catholic nation and Catholic world.
Our religion, we might claim, was the first
that entered the borders OF United States terri
tory. There is not foot OF its soil that has
not been trod upon by Catholic pioneers Five
years before the Pilgrim Fathers landed ut
Plymouth Rock bark chapels had been erected
in Maine by the fearless pioneer Jesuits-the
Imperial Guard OF the Catholic church, the
old guard that dies, but never surrenders.
White the Puritans OF New England were dis
putting about questions OF religious belief the
Jesuits, Brebe .Lallemand and others, were
traversing the principal rivers from Quebec to
Minnesota. Brave, fearless of danger, trusting
only in the Master, they sought out and
preached the unchange able truths of the
Catholic church to the warlike red men in the
heart of trackless forests.
They crossed the headwaters of the Hudson,
the Ohio the Wisconsin, and were the first white
men 10 look upon the face of the great Father of
Waters-the Mississippi. Undaunted by no
peril they penetrated regions known only 10
the savages, and hauled their birch canoes over
streams that now thrOb with the thunde- OF
steam engines and the industries of large and
populous cities.
Now, in answer to the baseless charges of
disloyalty that have been hurled ct us, and the
misreprese nations on this subject that have
l might ask who are the men who
nave built up this republic and made it the
great Nation that it is to-day? Has it been ex
clusively the work of one particular race or
creed? Did not Catholics take an honorable
and important part in is development? We're
they not as active as any others in defending
1T against and freeing it from foreign domina-
ton?
But coming down to a less remote periodic
a time within the memory of men still living
In the late Civil War, when the integrity of the
respond as readily as any other citizens to
Lincoln's call for troops? Didn't they muster,
don the blue and hurry to the front when the
tocsih o.,a OF WI, war sounded More than three
State OF Pennsylvania were Catholics. New |
York and Massachusetts, contributed more than |
half The Catholic church numbered more of
her sons among the volunteers who swelled |
the Union ranks than did any OF the sects in |
proportion to her numbers. She wound have |
been much stronger to-day had her sons been |
less patriotic or loved Americas institutions |
less.
Their services in the time OF their country's |
need, as we'll as the deeds of those Catholic |
coran, Ord and Rosecrans cold Kosy'3, who
commanded in the Southwestern the story of |
the Catholic soldiers loyalty, and will be held
IN grateful remembrance by generations yet to
come when the memory OF their traducers |
VIII VIII De buried In deep and deserved oblivion. |
Will Americans readily forget the famous |
charge of General Meagher's brigade against |
the blazing Southern batteries on Mary's |
Heights at fredericksburg, when. they left |
oyer 1000 of their dead and wounded on the |
field? These heroes gave such an evidence of |
their patriotism as to call forth the. praise of
even their hereditary foe-the London Times |
Are such men as these disloyal to the Repub- |
lie? Are the sons and relatives OF such men as |
these--great heroes, great soldiers, great |
patriots, great martyrs-to be shut out from |
every avenue of honor and profit? Are they to |
be prescribed and barred from holding Office at |
the command of modern Hessians, who |
generation ago were subjects OF that power |
which used every effort five and thirty years |
ago to drive the American flag from off the |
seas, whose gold flowed into the Golfers of the |
Confederacy under JEFF Davis and whose aid |
on land as we'll as on sea enabled him to pro- |
long that great internecine strife which cost |
the North and South so much blood and |
treasure? What proof have they ever given |
Of disinterested loyalty? Are not their hys- |
lerical shrieks for old glory-often In broken |
English-always mingled with cry for an |
Where were those noble patriots when their |
patriotism could have been of some service to |
the couptry2 Where was the thick-skulled |