Ashland tidings. [volume] (Ashland, Or.) 1876-1919, 1914-07-20
Ashland, Ore, Monday, July 20, IA
THE AUSTRIAN ASSASSINATION,

The assassination of Archduke
Francis Ferdinand d'Este, heir pre-
sumptive to the throne of Austria
Hungary, and his wife, the Princess
Won Hohenberg, while they were driv-
ing in the streets of the capital of
Bosnia, will shock the world. We
may expect a revival of stringent
laws against anarchists and re-
newal of precautions against assas-
sinations. But experience has shown
both to be futile. While it is posi-
BILE to guard against bands of assas-
sins and thwart plots in which many
persons participate, it is beyond hui
man power to prevent two or three
individuals who are victims Of pc
euliar type of insanity from carry
ing out plans they have secretly laid.
While the prevalence os assassination
in Russia has given some grounds for
a belief that political oppression is
responsible, our own experience
should warn us against such conclu-
sions. We lost three of our most
beloved presidents, Lincoln, Garfield
and Mckinley, through assassination
An attempt was made on the life of
President Jackson. A lunatic named
Weilbrenner tried to kill President
Roosevelt in September, 1908. Dur
ing the 1912 campaign another at
tempt was made on Colonel Rocse-
welt at Milwaukee. France lost Pres
ident Carnot by assassination. Every
nation has similarly suffered, and un-
successful attempts at one time and
another were made on Albert Ed
ward, Alfonso XII, Alfonso XIII, Bis
marck, Francis Joseph, Frederick
William w, George III, Henry w of
France, Isabella II, Lord Lytton, Ma
poleon l, Napoleon III, Pedro II of
Brazil, Queen Victoria, William l of
Prussia, William III of England. Two
New York mayors, Gaynor and Mitch
ell, have been attacked and one may
or of Chicago, Carter Harrison, was
killed.
Often there appears to be no dis
coverable motive for such attacks.
Archduke Ferdinand has generally
been highly esteemed. His refusal
to give up his morganatic wife, then
the Countess Sophia Chotek, won the
admiration of the world. While Aus
tria has been engaged in foreign diff
ficulties the last year or so, there has
apparently been internal calm. Aus
tria-Hungary is limited monarchy,
with a parliament in which Austria
and Hungary have equal representa-
tion. The two assassins were evil
IDENTIFY insane. They must have
known that whether they succeeded
or failed death would be their por-
ton. But for the intervention OF
the authorities against whom they
made war they would have been torn
TO pieces by the crowd of peasants
II capable of reasoning from expert
ence they must have known that the
assassination would only aggravate
conditions against which they pro.
tested.
Crazy as George III was, he sized
up the situation when he said that
his life was at the mercy of any man
willing to forfeit his own. The pos.
sibility of assassination is one of the
risks that every person of unusua
prominence must face, whether he
be an absolute monarch, president
mayor, governor or only distin
guished privete citizen. We deplor,
the fact the more because society Il
comparatively helpless. The ageC
emperor, Francis Joseph, has thu
sympathy of the world in his afflic
tion, doubly sore through the fac
that his own consort. Elizabeth, me
the same fate in September, 1898.