Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1899-09-15
England and the TransyaaI.

To the Editor OK the Dispatch:
While the world IS ablaze with pas
sionate contempt at the Dreyfus verdict,
promulgated by a French military court.
another drama IS being enacted In an
other part of the world far deeper in
its meaning and wider in it's scope for
while the one Is but the vile action of a
lot Of men who hold France in bondage
OF military despotism, the other is the
act OLA whole nation plotting the ruin
OF another. | speak of England and the
Transvaal republic. Britain desires to
build up an African empire to take the
place Of its tottering Asiatic giant 1t
wants no more or less than supremacy
from Cape to Nile All in its way must
succumb. For selfish purposes alone to
FOSTER this end is England now ready
to strike the blow at the Boer These
people, the pioneers Of the Cape Colony
which they left TO the British, rather
than resign their independence. who, I'm
Natal repeated their labor with like re-
suits and who finally sought homes ard
peace in the Valley Of the Naal. are
lovers Of liberty of true old Saxon blood,
and manliness-a peaceful people, who
follow the oxen and the plow, ask
ing for naught but freedom and in
dependence. At the liberty and indie
pendence of such a people is England
wanting 20 strike the dead blow The
pretext, the so-called disregard Of the
rights OF foreigners by the government
of the republic. is evident, for of these
very foreigners the Dutch and the Ger
mans have volunteered their services TO
the republic against England, and the
Portuguese and Italians have declared
neutrality IN case Of war. President
Kruger, Of the Transvaal, speaks to the
n m bfc In,
the Volksraad: Il have given them all
/ had to give-my coat. my vest, my
shirt-but now they ask my life; that is.
my country., that / cannot give; then
let God decide If even the claims of the
Citlanders were, from their point of
view, justified, has not a sovereign State
the right TO make its own laws and
bid them go elsewhere who are not
pleased with them? And England is
pushing the wal in the face of right and
justice. 1t Is sad there Is little sympa-
thy shown in this country for this sister
republic. The press at large. it seems.
would rather uphold the British. If in
the North, Imperialism. the fetch of
McKinleys people, benumbs the feeling
and dulls the sympathy Of republican
people in the South this should not be so.
our own struggle for independence. the
war of 1912, should recur to every Ameri-
can when he hears of this newest out
rage, planned by England, of the strug-
gle of a small but brave. people. against
a powerful enemy. Are we nothing but
an edition of Englishmen this side the
water ready to forget the past and a
docile pupil of that land that shed the
blood of our best men. and her imperial
istic policy? A protest on the part Of
this nation against the action of Eng
land i'm South Africa. would no doubt.
be very effective, and would prevent an
unjust war. but this protest could be
but a moral one; il must come from the
influential press and societies for, alas,
il could never come from the administra-
ton that has its whole arm in the equally
unfair Philippine middle.
X. II. SCHURICHT.