The Calumet news. [volume] (Calumet, Mich.) 1907-1938, 1911-12-15
ROOSEVELT ON
M'NAMARA CASE
Ex-President in Editorial in Out
look Scores Apologists Of
Dynamiters
LABOR MUST PURGE ITSELF
Rank and File Must Choose Lead
ers Who Respect Law
Denounoes So-Caled Political Social
lists Who Array Glasses Against
Each other.

New York, Dec Theodore Roose-
volt has an editorial article in the
current issue of The Outlook relat-
ing to the Mcnamara case. entitled
Murder is Murder" The article
says:
Not only laboring men. but busi-
ness men. capitalists, have at times
shown the worst form Of class consci-
oUsncss-that Of sinister and brutal
class selhshness i'm standing by Grim
nals simply because they were of
their own class. This has been done
by capitalists i'm the case Of capital
lists who have been guilty of brazen
corruption, and by laborers I'm the
case Of labor leaders who have been
guilty Of murderous violence. The two
.onenscs stand on a par from the
standpoint of damage TO the commun-
ity. In San Francisco i'm one municipal
contest the capitalists who desired to
be free from all check on corruption
and the labor leaders who desired to
be free from all check on lawless vio-
lence struck hands and elected their
ticket; and this proved I'm the end to
be last misfortune to San Fran
cisco, To the cause Of honest business.
and To the cause of honest labor.
Scores Mcnamara ApoIogsts.
Since the startling outcome of the
Mcnamara trial certain apologists of
these men have made themselves con-
spicuous by asserting that these de-
PRAYED criminals, who have on their
scared souls the murder of so many
innocent persons--all of them laboring
people, by the way-are victims. or
at worst fanatics, who should receive
because they were acting
I'm what they regarded as a war on
behalf of their class! The plea is mon
strous I'm its folly and its wickedness
IL is precisely the kind of plea some
times advanced on behalf of a crooked
man of great wealth caught bribing
he has to do it TO pro-
tect his business. We are not here
dealing with any of the kinds of Of
lenses incidental TO the sudden and
sweeping changes brought about by
modern industrial conditions into which
capitalists or labor men are sometimes
drawn without any very great con-
5cious moral turpitude on their part.
We are dealing with crimes as old as
The lawgiving from Sinai. with crimes
murder and theft-that have been
was formulated. The murders COM
nitted by men like the McNamaras. |
although nominally i'm the interest Of |
organized labor differ not one whit |
n moral culpability from those com |
nittcd by the Black Hand, or by any
1and of mere cut -throats, and are
'raught with an infinitely heavier men |
ice to society. Yet. great though the |
menace is to the community, the |
menace to the cause of honest organ |
zed labor is still greater, and no duty |
3 more imperatively laid on the lead
ers of labor than the duty of ahirma-
lively freeing themselves and their |
ollowers from the taint of response |
'ility for such criminals and such |
'rimes. The labor leaders who by their |
oud championship of the McNamaras |
as previously Of Meyer and Hay
vood-have succeeded in identifying |
hem with the cause of labor in the
yes Of the public have rendered an
vii service to that cause. Mr.. Debs |
nd the extremists of his type among
he so-called political Socialists-Gl
ay so-called because Debs and his
ollowers of the Emma Goldman kind |
re not Socialists at all i'm any true
onSc of the word, but mere meters
o murder and preachers Of applied |
the labor leaders aff-
lated with them, have always boast
d of the part they played i'm the
rial of Meyer and Haywood: and i'm
his case they repeated their familiar
actics, and held mass meetings and
broadcast papers and ad-
resscs I'm which they furiously de-
bounced the effort to bring wrong-do-
rs TO justice and sought TO arouse ev-
'ry evil class instinct against all who
lpheld the cause OF law or sought TO
mt a stop to assassination and muir
erous violence IL is worth noting
hat since Mcnamara confessed his
'uilt Mr. Meyer, the head Of what pur-
orts to be n labor organization. is re-
'orted IN the press as commenting up
n Il, not by denouncing Mcnamara
or having committed the murder. bu;
" denouncing him for having con-
essed it! Such denunciation is signi-
cant.
Should Choose Honest Leaders.
Murder is murder. and the foolish
or sinister wrong
oers who try to apologize for II as
n incident of labor warfare are not
My morally culpable but are enemies
{ the American people and. above
II. are enemies of American wage
rorkers. In honorable contrast to
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