The Washington times., 1913-03-04
FAILURE OF THE POLICE.

humiliating necessity which compels admission that
the police service of this city acquitted itself with
peculiar discredt yesterday. IT..
The police arrangements for the splendid suffrage
pageant were nexcusably bad. The thing could not
have been done so badly, we confidently believe, in
any other city of the first class of the second class
in this country.
The ladies who came guests of Washington,
and who marched in the procession, are entitled to
know few facts about the situation as to policing.
When the request was first made for police pro-
lection, Major Richard Sylvester long Poo Bah Of
police in this town. replied that he could not guar
antee order and protection if the ladies marched on
Pennsylvania avenue. 1t was never made clear why
he was confident that he could protect parade on
March 4, but equally confident that ne could not look
after one on March 8. But that was his attitude.
At any rate, Major Sylvester's plea of incompe-
tence aroused very little sympathy and the President
of the United States word the sufTagists that
if the Washington police could not assure order,
Federal troops would be assigned to the task. The
result of this proposal was that the Police Depart
ment undertook it. ."FS ".r..'.
Undertook it, apparently, with no real purpose
of making good The performance of yesterday was
disgrace. Up about the Capitol, where the pageant
formed and started, arrangements were excellent
Congress was there, watching the performance. And
so far as Congress could see, everything was ex-
cellent
But as the marchers had passed q few
squares down the Avenue, they we're in an uncon-
trolled mob of hoodlums. This mob found no police
to restrain practically none-and did as It
pleased. The women were hooted, jeered, and in
suited Ribald and obscene remarks we're shouted
at them ndiscrininately
As the parade approached Newspaper Row-the
short section of Pennsylvania Avenue marked by the
Office buildings of the Post the STAR and The Times
there seemed manifest effort to improve condi-
tions. But it was too late. The surgng crowds of
unrestrained hoodlums had broken the parade into
sections; they could not be forced together again
after they entered this Of safety; and the
whole affair broke into ptfu demonstration of the
incapaciV not of the women who had staged the
magnificent spectacle but of the local police estab-
lishment.
1t will not do for the police and municipal au-
thorites to plead that they had not sufficient force
They knew how to get re-enforcements. When in
quries made about getting cavarymen to assist
the police, it explained that cavalrymen would
not be assigned unless their assistance was asked by
the District government or the police authority 1t
not asked.
Either the police authority did not care to give
IL
to foresee that it had real task to deal with.
We might accept the charitable theory Of unn-
telligence it not for the fact that utterly in
adequate re-enforcements had been requsitioned
Boy Scouts were distributed along the line of march,
to make pretense they made a heroic effort
it must be said-at coping with the crowds But the
same foresight that caused the Boy Scouts to be called
into service might reasonably have understood that
this was not child's play. The cavalry finally had
be called into service, and they did excellent work
1t is inconceivable that they not asked for in
time to make their services the guarantee of we'll
organized and properly directed parade.
This affair amounts to a scandal In any other
American city, it would cause a police revolution
1t ought to cause one here. In New York the suf-
fragists marched at nj ght, narrow and crowded
Fifth avenue yet they given perfect protection
and absolute security. 1t the fault of absolutely
nobody but the police that Washington did not do
well yesterday.
This is not the time to discuss other instances
of the remssness of our expensive police organiza-
ton. That discussion will come in due time. il
proper attention is given to the affair of yesterday
There ought to be instant move for inquiry to place
the responsibility for what happened. Major Syl-
vester's unwillingness from the very beginning to
allow the ladies to parade on Pennsylvania avenue
points to him tine gentleman who has the chief
explaining TO do.
In the realm of police authority, Major Sylvester
seems to entertain about the same sympathetic and
gallant attitude toward the ladies that Congressman
HeHin assumes toward suffrage. 1t does not occur
to us at the moment that the policing of this town
should be conducted by an officer who is unwilling
to protect women because they do not agree with
his precise views Of public policy.