The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1899-10-15

1 A-t AISai anu tHe pONSAAui nav P-S-AAJ
of defenders. The world is full of sy-
cophants groveling at the feet Of might.
It is only fair and just that the cause
of the poor and the weak should be pre-
scented and that mankind should see the
other side.
For several years a systematic cam
paign has been carried on against the
Beers, if Sir William Vernon Harcourt
may be relied upon as an authority.
The civilized world has been flooded
with literature designed to discredit
the Beers and injure their cause. Ig-
norant and isolated they We're clearly
outmatched in such a conflict.
8 o 9
It appears from perusal of the lead
ing newspapers Of the United States
and from the utterances of public men
THAT those who lean to expansion by
| conquest in this country are those who
sympatglize most with England in the
pending conflict, and that those who
are opposed to forcible expansion are
able to see the other side. In order to
be fair and just one should lay aside
personal preferences, race sympathies
and political considerations. to judge
the case upon its merits and each party
to the controversy upon his record.
What is the excuse for war? Stripped
of all diplomatic verbiage the issue may
be boiled down to this: Have the Beers
the right to govern themselves and the
land they settled and appropriated with
as much right as England ever took a
foot OF African soil, in their own way
and after their own ideals, or should
England change the Boer government
to suit herself and her Subjects?
Great Britain assumes the right to in
terfere with the chosen lot OF the Dutch
peasants because their government is 1
crude and unsatisfactory to the Eng
lish and Americans who have settled
in the Transvaal; because the Beers
are ignorant and progressive; be-
cause the Beers have burdened' the
Outlanders with taxation; because the
right Of franchise has been denied the
Outlanders except under conditions
prescribed by the Rad; because the
Boer government is opposed to develop
ment and levies prohihitory taxes on
commerce ::
Let us review these complaints of the
English and ether differ
ences which the Beers were willing to
submit to an arbitration tribunal but
which Great Britain insists upon set
Ting in the cruel court of might.
What if the Boer government isn't
up to the British standard? 1t wasn't
established for the British race 1t
suits it's founders and their descend
ants. 1t has been the practice for civil
lied powers to seize and occupy terri
tories belonging to savage races, but in
such cases the people were noniads, fe-
rocious, immoral and lawless. if the
spoliation was sanctioned by the com
mon consent of humanity. This cannot
be said of the Beers They may be ig-
norant and non-progressive, but they
are generally honest, devout, industri-
Gus, and "grimly religious, as Sydney
Brooks says in his defense of the Eng
lfsh Great Britain has seized islands
and continents for the sake of civiliza-
ton and Christianity, and has substi-
tlIted garrison rule fer savage suprem-
acy with beneficial results to mankind
and to the inhabitants themselves, but
it can't be said in the Transvaal. The
people are sgrimly religious" they are
stubboInly honest; they have strong
sense of justice; they have demonstrat-
ed their knowledge of International de-
pertinent and nave never gone beyond
their border lines to make or seek
trouble; they have confined their OPP
preston of outsiders to legislation and
police regulations; they are strong in
domestic ties and love of country. This
too. is admitted by Mr.. Brooks, whose
presentation of the English side is
commended by the New York
Tribune, an English sympathizer5 as
one of the ablest yet published,
o @ 9
In this rugged race are found the
essential notions of morality" as we'll as
the germ of civilization. They are
primitive and non-progressive because
they are imbued with pious distrust
of rapid progress and the trim
mings Of modern civilization. They
sought a home in the wilderness as
monks seek the cloister to shut them
selves in from the world and. to keep
aloof from the temptations and follies
which more sophisticated people cannot
resist. Their oddities, aversion to book
learning and old fashioned ways please
them and may be adhered to as re-
ligious principle, something that should
not be inexplicable to these who know
the tragic story of this doomed race of
pioneers.
We are told that heavy burdens have
been placed upon the mining industry,
that prohibitory taxes have been levied
on commerce and development. This
is undoubtedly a correct representa-
ton of conditions in the Transvaal.
But there is a BoeT side to this con-
tention and it happens to be the hu-
man side. It was in obedience to the
Law Of self preservation that the Beers
took measures to discourage fmmigra-
ton. They scented danger to their in
dependence in the influx of foreigners.
Nor was it altogether a matter of in
tuition. Bitter experience had left its
memories. They had been driven into
unknown regions twice before. In the
interest of their independence they re-
PEELED the invasion as best they could,
but with the weapons of civilization,
with tyranny, with injustice, with eX-
tortion, but always backed by legisla-
ton and always with a wide open exit
for all foreigners who didn't like their
methods. Few states so threatened