The Goodland republic. [volume] (Goodland, Kan.) 1891-1907, 1901-10-18

tatively, however, and under legal pro
test and contest instituted by the de-
appellants against the ruling /
Of the returning board, proceeded to /
intrench himself, not for a legal, but |
for physical, contest.
The executive Office was converted /
into an armed camp. a lawless body /
OF men was collected and brought to
Frankfort to serve as supports to two
or three companies OF militia, which,
differed by republicans exclusively,
were already assembled. The demo
cratic legislature became a prisoner in
its own capital, its members in immin-
ent peril Of their lives and its com
mittees chased about the streets by
squads Of soldiers. The court OF ap-
peals, warned of impending sssassins-
ton, had to come to Louisville to hold
its sessions, secure against threatened
murder and military surveillance. The
inevitable came to pass. All this array
OF force, with its menace Of death,
proving insufficient to Overawe the
democrats of the legislature, resort was
had to the final stroke Prearranged to
do its deadly work in this precise
event; and, a puff of smoke out Of
window Of the executive Office, occu-
pied by the republican governor and
his republican friends, William Goebel
is shot down in his tracks whilst on his
way to the discharge of his official
duties.
The executive building is immediate
Iy surrounded by troops. Access is de
MED the local constabulary. Martial
law supplants the civil law. The w it
of habeas corpus is ridiculed and de
MED. The legislature is suddenly and
violently dispersed. As suddenly, it is
called TO assemble, not in some one of
the many cities or towns in the state,
such as Louisville or Lexington, where
its proceedings would be unmOlested,
| but In an inaccessible village among
the mountains, whittier as might be
reasonably inferred, no democrat could
go without the risk of his life.
In the face of such Encouragement
the democrats pursued their contest
according to law, and, according to law,
it was awarded them by the highest
! tribunals in the land. Concurrent with
the final decision of the supreme court
\ of the United States in their favor, the
republican governor, who had held Of
fee only under a tentative title, sub
ject to after revision and decision, fed
from Kentucky to Indiana, having ar
ranged with the republican governor of
the latter state for a safe retreat. There
with one OF his associates, he remains
today, secure against arrest and extra
ditiOn.
These are the simple facts. They
are met by the republicans with no de-
NAL. But to parry them it is set up
that Goebel was a bad man, that the
GOebel law was a bad law, and that the
democrats of Kentucky are a bad lot
The present, like the last republican
governor Of Indiana, assumes that JUS
tice cannot be had of the Kentucky
courts of law. The present republican
president Of the United States is on
record as having, whilst governor OF
New York, made haste to guarantee
the Kentucky refugees the protection
of the Empire state. The Philadelphis
newspaper, largely owned and wholly
controlled by the republican post
master general of the United States
refers to the democrats of Kentucky as
"the GoebeI gang" and speaks of the
murdered governor of Kentucky as the
infamous Goebel." If all this be not
extenuating and justifying murder
what is it?
Much capital is sought to be made
out of certain indignant expressions il
rebuttal from certain Kentucky demo
Gratis. But what should be said Of the
cOndOnement of assassination sub
seribed to by the republican party
from the president of the United State,
down through the cabinet to the re
i. publican governor of Indiana, anC
thence to the republican press, which
in order to make its case, must needs
deliver an indictment against an entire
community, a whole people, and that
the fearing, brave and magnani
nous men and women Of Kentucky,
Are Kentuckians TO keep-silent whilst
such things 60 forward?
Heaven knows the Courier-Journal
has no wish to recall the incidents Of
this dreadful chapter of Kentucky his
tory. 1t did its best to defeat the
election law to which those incidents
we're the bloody climax 1t did not re
lax its efforts in this direction until
the law was repealed. Standing mid
way between two warning elements, il
exhausted its powers of paeification
and, forced by the course of events tC
choose between two combatsnts, the