The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1896-01-14
Of the comfort W. R. Goodwin can draw from
his "look at Mexieo.'


In these letters | have had occasion more
than once TO speak of comparisons. have said
mat comparison to be fair, should be equal
Inc countries set in contrast should have the
same, or nearly the same natural advantages
Oh SOIL, climate, race and the like. The preach
ers, however, fight shy of fair comparisons
Just as they fight shy of everything that is just.
Nothing delights them so much as TO compare
poor little Ecuador with these United States
and TO set plundered Ireland side by side with
her plunderer, England. Hence it is that the
safe in taking degraded" Mexico and pointing
Massachusetts.
In order to put on record his complete and
sublime ignorance Of history, Mr. Goodwin IA
Vors US with the following sentence:
Possibly Mexico was not settled by the best
blood of Spain She was coohzed hundred years
before Massachusetts and by spanards OF such
stock as Cervantes Cortez, Pizarro, Columbus,
Cordova, Xfmenes and Isabella. If that was not
GOOD blood, what was it?
1t passeth my comprehension why Mr.. Good
win left out Don Quixote Sancho Panza and
the Cid. Cervantes Isabella and Ximenes
never saw America, and the Goodwinese style
OF argument would prove that Massachusetts
was colonized by Englishmen of such stock as
John Dryden, Charles and Arch bishop Laud.
Mexico was colonized not with the best blood
the average blood of Spain. There is nothing
10 snow that the mass OF the Spanish colonists
GlheIed IN social degree from the mass OF the
English colonists or the mass OF the French
ana Mexico started equal.
ODDLY MASSACHUSETTS.
A very remarkable difference, however, was
developed from the start. The Massachusetts
people were ProtestantS OF the straightest sect.
the Spaniards were Catholics. The Pilgrims
were received by a peaceable, pure and simple
tribe OF Indians who dwelt round what is now
called Plymouth. In return for this hospi-
tahty the newcomers stole the land, cut down
the forest, and proclaimed il as a principle
mat Indians and wolves could be shot on sight.
IN Bancroft vol. III, p. 1886, Mr.. Goodwin viii
find how the government of Massachusetts, Of
tered Tor each Indian scalp, first a bounty OF
80 and afterward OF f100 or English money.
he Will remem Der how organized bands of
marauders led by preachers descended on the
indian villages and exterminsted the inhab-
Itants by the thousands. Let me quote from
letter written by the Hon. jeremiah S. Black
to Hon. James A Garfield and published in the
Congressional Record, Forty-seventh Congress,
special session OF Senate, vol. XII. No. 81, May
3. 1881, p 9. Speaking of the men OF Massa-
chusetts Mr.. Black writes:
Without cause or provocation, and without
notice or warning, they fell upon the PequOds,
massecred many OF them and made slaves of the
surVlVoEs, without distinction OF age or sex. About
700, including many women and children,
sent TO the West Indies and there sold on public
account, the proceeds being put in the colonial
treasury. Eight score of these unfortunate people
escaped from the putchery by flight and afterward
gave themselves up on the solemn promise of the
authorities that they should neither be put to
death nor enSlaved. The promise was broken with
little remorse as a modern abolitionist would
violate his oath to support the constitution. The
precious results OF the war; TO be lost by
an honest observance of their pledged faith. and
the victims OF this Infamous treachery all OF
them shipped to the Barbadoes and sold
or 'swapped for blackamoors." This practice
OF ensiaving their captives was uniform, covered
all cases. including women and children, well
as fighting men. When death put King Philip
beyond their reach they sent his wife and child
with the rest to be sold into slavery. The Indians
made bad slaves. They were hard to tame. They
escaped into the forest and had TO be hunted down,
brought back and branded. They never ceased to
be sullen and disobedient. The Africans always,
on the contrary, accepted the situation" were
easily domesticated and bore the yoke without
murmuring. For that reason it became a settled
rule OF public and private economy i'll Massachu-
sets TO exchange worthless Indians for valuable
negroes, cheating their West India customers in
every trade.
"In l643 Emanuel Downing, the foremost law
yer in the colony and leader of commanding IT,
duence, as we'll as high connections, made a writ
ten argument in favor of war with the Narragan-
sets. doubt, says he, If it be not synue in us,
having power in our hands, to suffer them mayn-
tayne the worship OF the devil, which their pow
Lord should deliver them into our hand, we might
easily have men, women and children to exchange
pliladge Tor US than wee conceive for do not see
how We can thrive until we get into a stock OF
slaves sufficient to do all our business"
The result OF such policy it is easy to fore
see. According 10 the census of 1890 there are
exactly 425 Indians lettin the Commonwealth
OF Massachusetts, where hundreds af thousands
lived in peace before the Pilgrims came.
THE CHURCH AND THE INDIANS.
When the Spaniards first came in contact
with the Indians they proceeded to treat them
exactly as the Pilgrim fathers die afterward
Every one knows the sad story OF Hispanfole
but not every one knows that the destruction OF
the mild and inoffensiye inhabitants of that
island proved the salvation of the race through
out all Spanish America. Greed and injustice
are the same in Catholics as in Protestants and
work the same evils through Spaniards as
through Englishmen. But there was this
difference: in Massachusetts, there was
no power to curb rapaci;y, in Spain
there was. In Massachusetts the Protestant
church gave her official sanction to the ex-
termination of the Indians; IN Spanish
America the Catholic church stood between
the invaders and their victims Seven years
after the establishment of Indian slavery in
Hispaniola the horrors of ii reused the church
to action. A Dominican monk, Antonio Monte
slno, claims the honor OF being the first advo-
cate of personal liberty on this side OF the
Atlantic. He was followed by Las Casas the
first priest ordained in America, who devoted
a long and laborious life to the protection of
the Indian. Then, as often since, political and
commercial interests were ranged on the side
of wrong, but Las Casas was not daunted. He
carried the story of Indian woe to the father of
Christendom, and in q magnificent bull, dated
1887 Pope PaulIlI proclaimed the doctrine that
the indians were freemen and entitled TO all
the rights OF freemen. 1--WE define and de-
clare" runs the conclusion of the bull, chat
the Indians and other races that may hereafter
be discovered by Christians, even though they
still remain pagans, can freely and lawfully
possess, use and enjoy their freedom and the
ownership OF their property, and must not be
reduced 10 slavery"
Hence it was that though the Spaniards con-
quered the country the inhabitants were
spared. Jealous missionaries went and dwelt
among them and reclaimed them from pagan
ism. These missionaries stood always for the
Indians rights. The sacrament of marriage
sanctified the union of the Spanish soldier with
his native wife and made ii indissoluble. The
tribes were taught there moral force in
the land to which the haughtiest conqueror was
compelled to bow. The cross was mightier
than the sword, and the shadow of the cross
has saved the aborigines. Protestant civiliza-
ton has reduced the number of Indians in
these United States to 100000. Catholic civil
ization has brought the blessings of the faith
to is 000, 900 who dwell in the homes of their
fathers, from the Rio Grande to Patagonia.
If Mr. Goodwin viii carefully compare the
godly and evangelical sentiments OF Emman-
uel Downing with the Popish doctrine as
enunciated by Paul III he will understand
how IL is that the population OF Massachusetts
is made up OF 2,215, 1873 whites and only 428
Indians, while the population of Mexico COM
prises A, 10000 pure Indians, 4,730.000 half
breeds and 100000 whites
MEXICO AND MASSACHUSETTS.
This is q fact which the preachers are very
careful to keep out of sight when they bid us
"look at Mexico" | wonder what kind of
showing progressive Massachusetts, would
make ii her two millions of whites were sub
merged in a colored population of nine mil
lions We have only to look to the degraded