The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-11-28
A NEEDED REFORM.
why National Power Should he Used
to Protect Citizens.

| To the Editor of the indianapolis Journal
| The Journal was eminently right in saying
| that the government has no right under the
| Constitution to interfere in the administra-
| ton of justice in any State unless called
upon by the Governor or Legislature; but
| is there not a burning question back of that
which demands early and earnest consid-
Grafton? Ought not the Constitution be so
amended as to give 1T the same right to
enlist armies and levy war taxes in the
| defense of our own citizens, on every or
any square foot of American soil, as it has
so successfully exercised within the year
| in behalf of the oppressed in Cuba? Is the
reserved sovereignty of a State any more
sacred than the sovereignty of Spain, which
we defied? Are not the wrongs inflicted on
our own citizens, whom we may tax or
draft great as the wrongs the Cubans
! suffered? The only difference, if any, is in
the number of victims, ours having the adj
ditional bitterness of being inflicted by a
| Christian people, in the name of liberty,
and being apologzed for or defended by
synods. conferences and other church as
| SembieS.
L am not unapprised of the difficulty Of
amending our national Constitution. 1t IS
well that it is difficult, but it is not i'm
| pOSSiDlS- W. may never again De IN POSI-
ton TO command assent, as we did in the
late amendments very much in the spirit
| of the highwayman who demands your
money or your life, but am sure an amend
ment could be proposed which, in decade
or two, would receive the required ma
| jority, for States can keep on voting a
century; those who have once voted in the
affirmative having no right to reconsider
and recall their consent, while those that
at first refused may revote every day for
all time
| This is not race question or a political
! question, and the preacher was right who
In MS late Thanksgiving sermon, said it's
tap root finds its life in the States rights
| Eeresy, which the Journal practically adj
| mlts by assuming that it is one of the rights
Ine original sovereigntieS did not surrender
true IN the late outrages in the two Caro-
mas, poth race and politics were involved
| out IL aHects business as we'll as race and
| ponies; Who Is not Inundated every time
ne reads on a passing street car ''IT s
Mail" displayed conspicuously onlv To-
notify those who might, under some possible
| pFoVocatlon, wish to disturb the traffic that
the american eagle hoverS over that special
| DIT or property and protects it's owners
| whlle the half-starved toilers in the mines
nave no protection from that omnipotent
| 1orce. An individual or a mob dares not Law
! violent hands on postman in uniform lest
! ne ma himself before Judge Baker whose
tenure in office and whose court machinery
90 not depend upon the vote of the cuIprit
! ana ms pals, and who looks upon trans
| erosion from the standpoint Of cold law.
M vnl ga, looIpad who assaults private cti-
zen was. until lately, liable to go before a.
Judge McCray. You see the difference?
postmen are never molested, while life and
| lnp ana property are all unsafe under the
| iocai rights system. The State is COMPARE :
| uVely poWerless to protect either life or
property. because so much of the machinery
| OF detection and punishment is at the mercy
| of the law-breakers, as is seen in tho riotSs
IN North Carolina no more forcibly than in
me uenahce or law by the gamblers and
| saioon-keepers of indianapolis. These never
| tnink or defying so much of the law that
anects them as comes within Judge Bakers
4uris;oleton, while they pay little or no at
| lenlloh 10 what depends upon MaVOr Tag
gart and his appointees or any other local
authority.
-. Some time or other, but not Immediately,
| the american flag backed by American bay
| onetS, II necessary, will protect the Amer
!can cllzen IN every square inch of Amer
| eolored, and whether the question involved
| be race, political or property We responded
promptly to the demand upon us a few years
| worthless Italians at New Orleans but they
| were Italians, though worthless and the
| nag OF italy protected them our flag pro-
| tects every American, everywhere but in
| the United States, where enough state SOW
ereignty remains to defy it. This same
| criminal may have a change of venue but
| dttional county supremacy yet obtains A
| criminal may have a change of venue nut
the state must abide the decisions o. a court
/
| terrorized by it. The Ohio plan of filming the
| county for not preventing the crime is mer-
| cenary and can be of little profit whereas
TO clothe the court of St Joseph county with
| authority to try criminal for offenses COM
| mtted in Ripley county ever will be a
| guaranty of protection that no fine can af-
| ford.
In growing to this ideal-for it is to be an
evolution, not a revolution-race and polit-
| zeal considerations must be wholly elm
| mated. As to the race question. that Moses
TO the colored people Booker 7. Washing
ton, is leading heroically and wisely. In
time they will come to believe that a coll
ored man does net live only to vote but that
| IL is his right to work also in any and every
industry that can benefit mankind to go 10
| school and to church and be a man. but
time is an important factor in this achieve
ment Take time, be patient. and. above ALL
don't attempt to restrict the Nation to the
swaddling clothes of its infancy by pleading
the Constitution formed a hundred years
| ago does not allow this or that. The peo-
| pie are supreme, and they can unmake what
! their fathers made in blindness, and they
| will adapt the machinery of government to
| the wants of to-day. In the good time COM
| ing no Governor will drive hungry men
/ from their work at the instance of mob
nor will one shield mob and defy govern
| mental authority. u. L. SEE.
| Tpdi