The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1899-07-19
ARTHUR ROPES, General Editor.
Calling Guns and Christianity.

To charge the responsibility to those who
are constrained to doubt whether the gat
ling gun is the best instrument OF Chris
tianity and civilization, and whether ex'
termination is the best method of COM
mending free institutions to any people,
savage or civilized is a cheap and simple
way to stife unpleasant discussion.-Free
Press.
If its environment were different, or
if it had the courage of it's disgruntle-
ment, the Free Press would stand side
by side with the Evening Post of New
York and the Republican of Springfield
in the little squad Of anti-imperialist
papers. AS it is, the paper gets as close
to that squad as it really dares. Had
it's editor been appointed again to the
collectorship of the port of Burlington,
would the Free Press have INDUCED in
these occasional exhibitions of spleen
against the policy and course of the
administration?
The paragraph reprinted above is
from an editorial article arraigning the
government as the party responsible
for the existing war in the Philippines.
The extract printed above, and the en-
tire article, might have been written by
Erving Winslow, or any other one of
the anti-imperialist coterie that Is CIV
ing Boston an i'll odor of sedition and
general mental and moral foolishness.
The paragraph is intended to be Sc
we're and conclusive of the whole SUBJ
ject of the dealings with the Filipino
instruction. As matter of fact the
propositions suggested have bearing
on the subject only in the morbid i'm
aginings of the cult to which the Free
Press feels constrained to join itself.
On this continent, and in the regions
of this nation, from the day of the dis
covery OF America to the present time,
the gatling gun or its equivalent has
been an instrument of Christianity and
civilization, and there seemed to be no
alternative but to use it. Such has
been the case in all countries, from the
earliest times, and such was the case in
'Bible times" When Christian peo-
pie and the peaceful agencies of
Christianity and civilization have been
assailed by people savage or civilized,
the gatling gun or its predecessors,
which have been the only thing that
appeals to the respect of the savage and
barbarian, have been brought up to
enforce obedience to Christian teach
ings and the ways of civilized peoples.
1t doesn't alter the case to show that |
some people of Christian nations have
pursued unchristian methods in deal
ing with savage people. In America,
in Europe, Asia and Africa, the sword
or the gatling gun has opened the way
for the advance of Christianity and
civilization, and if the tribes against
which this agency has been invoked
have proven memorable, if they have
shown themselves incapable of "ben-
evoent assimilation determination
has been the only, the inevitable, and
therefore "the best method of COM
mending free institutions"-and what
the term implies-to any savage peo-
pie, or any people whose civilization is
deficient and will not yield to neces-
sary reconstruction.
This has been the way with the North
American Indian, the tribes of Asia
and Africa, and it will be the way with
the Filipinos. 1t is very late in the
century for the Free Press editor to
begin to get squeamish about gatling
guns and determination. He is to-day
enjoying the full benefit of these chris
tianizing and civilizng agencies. His
belated scruples sound considerably
more like insufferable cant than an
honest expression of rock-ribbed and
time-seasoned principles.