The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1903-05-30
AUTOMOBILE FACING.

The fatal results of the recent auto
mobile races in France have started an
endless amount OF comment and the
French and automobiles form a topic
for the St. Paul Dispatch:
The writer asserts that France has
always been willing to sacrifice lives in
the interests of scientific experiment,
whether political or inventive 1t was
Guizot, historian, who boosted that all
new ideas must pass through France
before they were disseminated through
the world It is we'll for the world.
Since somewhere it was necessary that
the automobile craze should reach its
height of speed and folly, should run its
course of destruction, it is we'll for the
rest of the world that France should
sacrifice herself, should sacrifice a score
of lives in one fell holocaust-for the
red devils licked up lives like flame
that the power and possibilities of the
automobile be demonstrated. They are
demonstrated. AS a destroyer of inno-
cent lives the automobile is brother TO
the suillotine-with this difference that
the red knife of the Terror descended on
the. necks of the noble while the wheels
of the red devils pass over the bodies
of the innocent Third Estate. There is,
however. this further resemblance that
the guillotine sometimes kicked" to
use gunpowder parlance. and destroyed
its Dantons, it's Robespierres, and the
automobiles sometimes kick and de-
stroys chaffeurs and owners.
The Paris Madrid race is off, due to
the sanity of the French government.
and it is not possible that any other
nation will permit such a death race on
any territory within the confines Of
civilization. When the mania for mob
ling becomes too strong it will be neces-
sary for those in league with the Red
Devil to go to some retired corner OF
Africa or Greenland and tear up the
Jungle and the Hottentots. the ice fields
and the Esquinaux. The zig" is GER
tainly u where man has some regard
for his fellow man, and where man
believes he should exert some control
over his uncontrolled fellows. Racing
is one of the ingrained human instincts.
1t viii not down for any Paris-Madrid
race and its consequences There re-
mains in the most adult breast the de-
sire to prove that he is better and
swifter than his fellows. Automobiling
has but thrown such rivalry into unde-
sirable prominence. 1t is true that the
I
this performance. But there would
have been races without the instigation
Of manufacturers. And there viii be
races But they viii not be on the open
road where every man, woman. child
and dog has a right to pursue his way
Of happiness. The pace that kills may
still be paced, for confined within a
safe speedway its disasters viii but de-
strOv The rllaniacs who play with death
But the highways Of the earth are not
for red devils. They are for humanity.
The automobile must be kept down,
speed must be regulated and fines and
1 imprisonment must be enforced. The
auto is a good thing and it has come
to stay. But it cannot be permitted to-
take the place of war and Malthusian~
ism in keeping down the population.
Eieetrccution is preferable to the car
Of the Juggernaut And unless the au-
tomobnists themself wish their ma
chine to be suppressed they must take
the initiative in keeping the machines
within bounds.