The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1898-09-13
MAGUIRE AND ANARCHY.

y
\ civilized world the announcement of the
assassination OF the Empress of Austria by the
hand OF anarchist the attention of the people OF
California is recalled again to the sympathy which
James G. Mcguire has always avowed for that class
OF criminals. 1t is moreover pertinent to the time
that this sympathy with ravenng cruelty and awless-
ness should be made the subject of public comment
for Mcguire is candidate for the Office OF Governor
and should he be elected would have in his power
to pardon the crimes OF such criminals and make
California during his term OF Office safe place for
their residence.
1t is notable that Maguires sympathy with anar-
chsts is close and strong that he has been
able to perceive any moral turpitude on their part
He has the other hand maintained that even when
they commit assassinatons they are justified so long
the persons assassnated selected from the Off
cial representatives of governments These sentiments
repulsive to Americans, and indeed to law-abding
men of all nations, were conspicuously asserted by
Mcguire during the debate on the immigration re-
strcton bill in the House of Representatives January
~ 1897.
In the course of the debate on that day Mcguire is
reported in the Congressional Record as having said
Gentlemen urge the passage of this bill as step in
the direction of excluding Anarchists Socialists and
Nhilists from this country. Assuming that it would
be right and desirable, though 1 do not admit it
tleSe
classes any of them from this country yet the
present bill does not tend to their exclusion They are
generally educated men, many of them holding uni
versity degrees whose offending consists of resistance
to tyranny which in the conditions under which they
live is obedience to God Who are the Nihilists?
They are the Democrats of Russia who are struggling
against almost hopeless odds to establish the natural
and inalenable rights of men in that country as
against the tyranny and false pretense of divine right
the part of the Gar"
This speech having been made as late as January OF
last year, after the anarchists had filled the world
with hideous record of crime running from the
assassination of the Gar to the blowing up of the
opera-house at Barcelona and causing the deaths OF
and women who had nothing whatever to do
with government shows that Magure's sympathy
with anarchy is not the result of any ignorance his
part of what anarchists desire or of the means by
which they hope to accomplish it
Anarchy and nihism matter OF fact are aim
ing not at the murder of crowned heads, but at the
destruction of society. The scoundrel who struck
down the venerable Empress Of Austria avowed that
at his first examination He disclaimed any animosty
toward either the Empress her husband the En-
peror. He had not gone to Switzerland to seek her
as victim. He stabbed her only because the oppor-
tunity offered. He boosted: eff all anarchists did
their duty as 1 have done mine, bourgeois society
would soon disappear"
The words should be remembered It is not against
royalty, imperialism or despotism that anarchy has
raised its hideous head and murderous hand but
against society 1t is antagonistc to social con-
dtons in America to those in Russia 1t has per-
petrated its crimes in Chicago ruthessly as in St
Petersburg
1t was one Of the purposes of the trainers of the
immigration restriction bill shut these decadent
wretches out of the United States Mcguire objected
to their exclusion He proclaimed his sympathy for
them. He raised in Congress a cry as violent as any
heard the sandlots in this city when agitation
at its worst and to-day he asks to be entrusted
with the enforcement of law in this State-to be
chosen its Governor