The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1903-07-08
ANNUAL NATIONAL DEBAUCH.
Discomfort and Annoyance of Other
People Is the Basis of Most of IL.

10 the Editor of the Indianapolis Journal:
-FOUR strong protest against our Fourth
Oh July barbarism is timely and il is
hoped, may prove serviceable This an
nuaily recurring horror is without the
shghtest pallation or excuse. The usual
apology made for II Is that boys must be
allowed their fun and that juvenile patriot
ism can only find an outlet through noise.
But little observation is needed to show
the falsity of this plea. The boys do not
get their fun simply by exploding their
powder. Nine-tenths of the enjoyment
comes from the discomfort caused to
others. Macaulay remarks In his history
that the old Puritans opposed bear-baiting
not because it gave pain to the bears but
because IL afforded pleasure to the spec
tators: The same low trait is manifest
s strati through o these discordant demon
selves, far from all nonparticipants, the
cannon-cracker fiends would soon weary of
thelr work 1t is in the Earring of passers-
py, the startling Of unsuspecting observ-
ers. the frightening of horses, that the
hoodlum. great and small, finds his de-
light. The small boy is an incipient
savage, who naturally delights in cruelty
and destruction. 1t is worthy of notice
that among savage races the prisoners are
always turned over for torture to the
women and children. When the street-car
rails are secretly sprinkled with dangerous
explosives, the hoodlums hiding near by
would have their joy greatly enhanced
should the cars be derailed and the occu-
pants more or less injured. If mere noise
were the object sought they could find it
Just as well by exploding their internal
machines in some back lot but you never
find a genuine hoodlum contented with so
tame pleasure as that. He pines for
fiercer joys. for dislocated ears, scorched
pressible delight of making everybody else
miserable
The whole business is truly fiendish and
disgrace to our national character. In
dependence was dearly won If il can only
be perpetuated by encouraging such bar
barrie displays and such degradation to
every human instinct III Dante could come
to life he might add a striking chapter to
his Inferno in the shape of a torture
chamber resounding with the decorating
deviltry of small boy or the grownup
hoodlum Well might the worst of crimi-
nails pray not to be turned over to the
mercy of these latest improved samples Of
the imps of the perverse. The country is
appalled, at the growth of the mob spirit
and its daily mediation TO lynchings. But
when our whole Juvenile population is
turned loose on the Fourth and invited to
a carnival of cruelty in all its forms, a
national school is established for the train
ing of actors in subsequent burnings at the
stake. The congental idiot, viewed abb
stractly, is not pleasing spectacle, but,
his pistols and other satanic contrivances.
he becomes a holy terror to all things
sought by educators of the race. Noise Is
barbarism; civilization Is repose, and a
prerequisite for its attainment Is an elm
nation from youth of its instructive pref
erence for the rude, the cruel and the de-
structive. Is IL not inconceivable that a
people like ours should longer endure this
intolerable nuisance? Protection for the
lives and limbs of our children and preven-
ton of millions of dollars of property loss
would seem TO be sufficient inducement,
IL we can find no higher, for sternly re-
pressing the whole abomination. The ac-
counts i'm the newspapers following the
Fourth read like reports of bloody battle.
If this holocaust. consisting of hundreds
of lives and thousands of MANNED does
not lead to radical reforms in the shape OF
repressive laws. IL is difficult to see what
stronger argument rs needed for giving
a permanent vacation to our national
school for encouraging noise creating
criminals and apothecsiz.ng cruelty
CHAS. Y. MATHEWS.
indianapolis. July &.