Arizona republican., 1902-03-29
PHOENIX, ARIz., MARCH 2s. 1902

The Republican, we believe, was the first paper in the country to urge that
 congress should enact PROTECTING a law making an at THE tempt on the life oi PRESIDENT the president punish
 able by death. This merely happened to be the fact. how ever, as the people of the United States were practically a unit for such a law, and so expressed themselves as soon as the announcement went out and that the assassin could not receive more than ten years in the peniten- tiary. The text of the bill as adopted in the senate shows that congress is ii close touch with public sentiment oH the subject. The bill reads:
 Any person who shall wilfully kill or cause the death of the president CT vice president of the United States, or any officer thereof upon whom the pow CTS and duties of the president may de- volve under the constitution and laws, or who shall wilfully cause the death of the sovereign or chief magistrate of any foreign country, shall be punished with death.
 That any person who shall attempt to commit either Of the offenses men, toned in the foregoing section shall be punished with death.
 That any person who shall instigate, advise or counsel the killing of the president or vice president of the United States or any officer thereof up on whom the powers and duties of the president may devolve under the con- stitution and laws, or shall conspire with any other to accomplish the same. or who shall instigate, advise. or coun- sel the killing of the sovereign or chief magistrate of any foreign country, or shall conspire with any other person 70 accomplish the same shall be punished by imprisonment not exceeding twenty years.
 That any person who has conspired as aforesaid may be indicted and con- victed separately. although the other party or parties to the conspiracy are not indicted or convicted.
 That any person who shall, by spoken words, or by written or printed words, uttered or published, threaten to kill or advise or instigate another to kill the president or vice president of the United States, or any officer thereof upon whom the powers and duties of the office of president of the United States may devolve under the consti- tuition and laws, shall be punished by Imprisonment not exceeding ten years.
 That any person who shall wilfully and knowingly aid in the escape from punishment of any person guilty of either of the offenses mentioned in the foregoing sections shall be deemed an accomplice after the fact, and shall ba punished as if a principal, although the other party or parties to said offenst shall not be indicted or convicted.
 That the secretary of war is author ized and directed to select and detail from the regular army a sufficien; number of officers and men to guar1 and protect the person of the president of the United States without any un- necessary display.
 And the secretary of war is author ized and directed to make special rules and regulations as to dress, arms and equipment and duties of said guard and shall publish only such parts of said rules and regulations as he may deem proper.
 That the additional expense of such guard so detailed shall be paid out oi the treasury, on accounts to be certified by the secretary of war to the secretary of the treasury.
 It is difficult to understand why there should have been so much dis cussion and qulbbling over the wording Of this bill Senator Patterson c1 Colorado and a few other democratic senators strenuously sought to strike out the word ''instigate'' from the frs line of the third paragraph, claiming that some court might admit of sucf a liberal construction of it's meaning a: to open a wide door for injury to inno cent citizens who might be accused o inStigating the murder of a president But it is safe to assume, we think that no American who minds his busi ness will ever have occasion to defenf himself from a charge of .'instigating such a crime. And the presence oI this little word in the law should prove a wholesome restraint on anarchist, jawsmiths and the more vicious of tn yellow journals.