The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1914-02-06
COURT MARTIAL
GOVERNMENT is
CONDEMNED

Washington, Feb. 6.-Governmentby
court martial in the recent strike in
the coal fields of West Virginia was
address to the senate today, as a
"blotch, isolated and infamous" on
the history Of that state. ..--~.. .
mo progress can be made, no ultt-
mate good accomplished in denying to
labor even in emergencies the well
guaranteed rights of American citi-
zenship,'' declared the senator, who
was a member of the committee Which
investigated conditions in he. Cabin
Creek region. while it may have the
effect through mere brute force of ap-
parently quelling for a time the dis
turbance, it divorces the citizens from
the state, it leaves resentment n re-
venge, bitterness and anarchy among
those without whose respect and de-
votion the government cannot live.
ON the other hand,if in the hours
of unclaimed passion, the government,
with fairness and equity, through an
ordinary channel gives men a hearing
before tribunals whose organizations
have been worked out through CEN
turtles of experience, it commands the
respect and, in the end, the obedience
Of all.
at is trifing with words, it is intel
| lectual hypocrisy, it is blind, infuriat-
ed madness to III about determining
guilt OF innocence in any other way
under our institutions than through
the courts and before a jury. And
| West Virginia owes it to herself, owes
it to the coming generations who are
yet to work in her limitless fields of
imprisoned wealth, owes it to her
| splendid and heroic men who organic
| ed the state and gave her place among
the loyal states of the union to retrace
this step n remove this blotch. iso-
lated and infamous, from her prece-
dents and in the future live up to the
splendid constitution which her early
statesmen n patriots formed"
Observation had taught him, Sena-
torJBorah said, that the vast majority
Of laboring men favored peaceful
methods in urging their purposes. La
Dor leaders who preached laWlessness
he branded as enemies to the man
who tolls and his wife and children;
to the great cause of better conditions,
better pay md happier homes.
IF u claim that this Is a govern
ment of order and law be anything
more than a Pharisaical display of a
wall-worn n ~diaphanous falsehood,'
he continued, then we must extend to
the men struggling in their limited
way lof the flSnLS OF LABOR, every rlgnt
and every guarantee embodied in the
great charter under which we live. Tn
most pronounced enemy to our form
of government that we can uncover is
the man who would seek to apply thu
constitution to n class and with.
hold it from another. These rights
cannot be denied to the men who la
Dor, to any man. without wreckine
our whole fabric of government from
turret to foundation stone."
Martial law, as known on the 9th.
er side of the water, unqualified an6
|imperious, the law of one will, on
brain, cannot exist under our form OF
government" the senator declared
1T is at war with it's spirit and il
defiance of its express terms. Thu
only martial law we know or car
properly know is in aid of the civil
authorities, in aid of the processes O!
the court and augmentive of the power
of the sheriff and his comitatus. Tha'
and that only is the extent to which
it may go and that is as far as it has
ever gone in what is now the United
States since the puny slaves of roya