The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1901-09-12
HYsrERIA IND ANARCHY.

1t was inevitable that there should en-
| sue good deal of popular hysteria at
| tendant on the assassination of the pres
| ident. There has been a vast deal of it.
| expected quarters.
When man who wants to be regarded
as one of the leading Christian ministers
! in the country is heard crying aloud
! that the brains of the assassin should be
beaten out with the butts of million
pistols in the hands of a million Amer-
can men, or something just idiotic in
sentiment as that, of course there is
| serious danger of an outbreak of cpl
demic idiocy So, when United States
senators and congressman, and others
high in state Office are heard saying that
the case is one in which lynch law is
permissible, it becomes a little hard for
any man who really feels the depth of
the wrong that has been done to Ameri-
can institutions through the assault on
the president to hold himself down.
The certain recovery of the president
has done away with most of this sort of
thing. Men have come to their senses
in most cases. They are seeing the
shocking transaction in it's true bearings.
They recognize the truth that the case
is another assassination springing from
the same operating causes as marked
the death of Lincoln and Garfield In
each case there was the frenzied de-
generate, shooting at mark which he
| did not recognize the true nature Of and
Influenced by feelings which showed his
own debasement below the level of rea-
soning or responsible humanity There
was too, attachment to spurious polit-
zeal sentiment inevitably leading to vio-
lence on the part of those allowing
themselves to entertain it.
No man who allows himself to enter
tain any such ideas as have found express
sion in many of the daily newspapers
on the subject of the presidents assassi-
nation is very much more responsible
icy which leads to public violence is
mere justification of that which found
expression in the attempted murder of
Mr.. Mckinley. 1t is the same in princ1-
pie, and operates as surely to bring about
anarchy as the action of the assassin
1t can, however, be said that the depth
OF popular sentiment is more clearly
shown by these outbursts of folly than it
might be in any other way. The aver
age American is capable of keeping his
head on this or any other like occasion.
He looks at the crime committed as
being to some extent a concomitant of
the democratic system under which the
chief ruler of the country is personally
accessible to the humblest and the most
ignorant, as he is to the wisest and the
wealthiest in the land The moral de-
generates who yield to homicidal mania
are to be found in every form of society
They should, wherever discovered, be
treated as any other type of dangerous
lunatic is treated, if possible. But above
all things else society ought to address
itself to the proper punishment of those
who propagate the doctrines of social
chaos which inevitably appeal to the ma
lures of such human detectives.
We can pass over the current out
breaks of popular hysteria, conscious
that the American people are not easily
unbalanced, and that the soundness and
conservatism of the whole is sure to
offer a safe antidote to the radicalism
and folly Of the Individual.