The Billings gazette. [volume] (Billings, Mont.) 1896-1919, 1901-11-12
SEVERE BUT NECESSARY.


SEVERE BUT NECESSARY.
Minneapolis Journal: That small
band of persons who differ from the
great majority of the American peo-
pie as to the righteousness of the
work this nation is now doing in the
Philippines will be wildly agitated by
two measures being taken in those
distracted islands.
In hayward Samar there is being
applied the policy of devastation and
concentration.
The Philippine commission has just
enacted a law defining treason and
furnishing it with death.
The former is a strictly military
measure, made necessary by the pc
culiar conditions of warfare in Samar,
imposed by the insurgents themselves.
A foe that varies in guise from day
to day, being now an apparent amigo
and the next day a murderous bolo-
1ICA1l, GIL bC aSolGI Will II III LII
way. Harsh as it may seem, this pol
icy, in view Of the ruin wrought by in
cesse!tt guerrilla EHrfare, is humane
and inevitable if we are to accomplish
the task we have set ourselves to do.
The government of the Philippines is
in the hands of the governmental or
g%anization established by the sover-
eign power. Like any other govern
ment it has the right to defend itself
against internal enemies. The law of
treason is everywhere made for such
enemies, and the government of the
Philippines has many. The Ameri-
can government of the Philippines is
to be permanent. There is not the
slightest intention of withdrawing. 1t
is the business of that government
to establish and maintain public Or
der. 1t is confronted by a vast secret
society which %terrorizes the people,
keeps up a guerilla warfare, and, by
constant crimes against those who op.
pose or are not friendly to it, makes
almost impossible the success of the
work of ~pacification. No Kindergarten
methods will deal with such a criminal
secret society. The new law of
treason strikes directly at the root of
this baneful Katipunan society. We
infer from the all too brief reports
from Manila that the law looks upon
membership in such a society as trea-
son and Furnishes it with death. Death,
awful, horrible and painful, is the fate
the Katipunan mercilessly deals out to
all who fall under it's disfavor. AS
between the mild punishments infict-
ed by the Americans and the swift, Sc
cret and terrible vengeance of the
Katipunan, it is not hard for the peas
ant to choose. He therefore does the
bidding of the Katipunan.
Last Saturday Vice Governor Luke
Wright, in the public discussion of the
bill, said:
mo excuse exists for secret organ
izations. Their intent must be evil.
No matter what may have been the
opinion of the Filipinos regarding the
sovereignty of the American govern
ment, the 1act remains that the Amer
cans are here, and moreover here they
intend to stay"
Manila is said to be panic-stricken
because of the proposition to inflict
the death penalty for treason. 1t may
well be panic-stricken, and that state
of mind is proof of the necessity of
such severe measures, if there are
many people in Manila like that Senior
Rabela Reyes, a Spanish merchant,
who im%pudently asserted in the public
discussion of lii. XII above referred
to that there is no such thing as a
political crime. lie further %elucidated
his position by implying that the as
sassinations of King Humbert and
President Mckinley were not crimes
because they were political acts. Senior.
Reyes, says the cable, was invited
to take his seat. He ought also to be
invited to take his departure from the
Philippines.
Any person who doubts the wisdom
Of the steps now being taken to stamp
out the remnants of disorder left in
the wake of the military movements