The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-11-03
THE BOERs ARE WRONG.
A New Englander Objects to Recent
Comparison.

SOHphrlsOn.
To the Editor of the Standards
In recent editorial in your newspa
per upon the Transvaal war the areu-
ment was summed up with the words:
More and more pronounced is the re-
semblance between them (the Boers)
and the sturdy revolutionary heroes of
New England becoming"
AS a son of New England and a de-
scendant of one of those revolutionary
heroes who made Lexington and Bun
ker Hill era marking events, ] desire to
lodge an emphatic protest. The paral-
lei is loosely drawn and fails to eX-
press the truth. There is an identity
in words between the end sought by the
men of the American revolution and
those for which the Beers are fighting.
It is a struggle for liberty in both
cases. But there all resemblance ends.
The liberty that Warren died for and
for which Stark and Putnam fought
was different article from that which
Kruger and Joubert are striving to at
tain.
No taxation without representa- ton:
no government without consent of the
governed. free speech and free press,
the rule of the majority were the car
dinal doctrines, the immortal princi-
pies which inspired the sanguinary
struggle on New England soil
The liberty for which the Beers are
fighting is the liberty to violate every
single one of these axioms of republican
government. Taxation without repre-
sentation; government without consent
of the governed: the rule of an oligar-
chic minority and gagged press is the
tacitly avowed principles of the Boer
struggle. The liberty the Boer seeks
was called by another name by Adams,
Otis, Henry and jefferson. To them it
was tyranny of the basest sort. But to
certain classes of Americans of to-day,
disguised as liberty. the ugly fact as adj
vocated by Kruger and his unwashed
followers has a profound and unreason-
ing fascination. 1t is the kind of lib
erty which makes a majority of the peo-
pie pay seven-eighths of the taxes and
denies them the right of saying one
word al to its imposition or disposition.
The declara ton of independence would
have 10 be rewritten to harmonize with
the ideals of Kruger and his American
admirers.
Faulty as is the parallel between the
New England minute men and the
Beers, it does suggest true parallel
between the ends aimed at by Kruger
and George III. of unsavory memory.
He aimed at taxation without repre-
sentation and government without con-
sent as does Kruger now, and the idea
of majority rule was as abhorrent to
MN as II is TO IAFuSeT. II is Certainly
in order for American Krugerites to re-
wise their judgment of this much
abused king and make room for another
political patron saint. Kruger and
George III. travel in the same class.
The secret of the widespread SYM
pathy with the Beers is the traditional
and well-founded dislike of the English
which until recently, when England
needed American assistance, was COR
daily recprocated. But it is childish
folly to let prejudice discredit funda
mental American principles. In so far
| as England is fighting for the estab-
| lishment of our political doctrines. she
| deserves and should have our hearty
| sympathy.
In the struggle for national existence
| the Boer is doomed by an inevitable and
! memorable law Of nature. Inability
| to adapt herself to a new environment,
| to changing circumstances, to progress
| ing civilizati ton. is the death warrant
| of the Transvaal. We may regret it. as
we may the disappearance of the dino
| saurs, the mammoths the AZtecs and
| the Indians. but il still remains an I'M
| alterable, universal law and the pen
atty of ignoring it is annihilation.
| A NEW ENGIANDER