The Twin Falls times. [volume] (Twin Falls, Idaho) 1905-1916, 1914-03-27
MEXICo-vIEwED FROM TEXAS.

A drawback to most of the editorial
comment on the Mexican problem is
the fact that it is necessarily long
range comment, dependent for facts
and color on the press dispatches as
emanates from the state department.
But in Texas, once part of Mexico
and still in contact with it along eight
hundred miles of border-line, many of
the commentators have the advantage
of being virtual eye-witnesses of the
Mexican drama. Moreover, they have
learned to know the Mexican charac
ter in peace as we'll as in war, and
they are presumably in constant re-
ceipt of word-of-mouth information OF
minor but Illuminating nature. Tex
the bullets of the combatants across
the border. Texan ranches have been
raided from the Mexican side, and
horses and cattle Communicated for
the use of the Mexican fighters. 1t is,
therefore, not surprizing that Texas
has shown signs of chatting under the
administration policy Of watchfuL
waiting. Thus it was an El Paso mass
meeting that on the news of the Ben
ton killing, formulated and published
resolutions criticizing our state de-
partment for its weak and vacillat-
ing policy, accusing it of suppressing
facts about the true conditions there,
and asking for the abandonment of a
course that is ruinous TO all foreign
interests in Mexico and the Mexican
people themselves. And it is the
governor of Texas who, impatient of
Washington's slowness in getting at
the facts concerning the death of Cle-
mente Vergara, an American citizen,
Rangers into Mexico to arrest the
Federal soldiers accused of his MUIR
! der. An examination of the Texan
papers, moreover, seems to reveal an
underlying belief that the Mexican sit
uation will not yield to any solution
short of armed Intervention.
1T begins to look as if the only
way to 'pacify' Mexico is to repeat his
tory and pacify it in the way that the
province of Texas was pacified in
1885," remarks the Houston Post,
which is convinced that "the time has
come when our government must as
sert itself with more vigor" "Hesita-
| tion," it adds, merely strengthens the
| impression which exists in Mexico
that we are afraid to intervene, and as
that impression grows the lives and
property of American citizens and
other foreigners will be placed in
greater jeopardy" In another issue
the same paper reminds us that there
is no responsible government in north
Mexico, and that therefore, mo Amer
| lean or foreigner ought to be permit
! ted to be executed upon any preteXt
whatever without fair trial in the
presence of American representatives
1t is the Mexican way to kill those
whose removal is desired and to fix
the record so as to make the act APP
pear justified. That was done in the
case of Madero, and it was no doubt
done in the case of Benton. Just how
many Americans have been murdered
in that manner or imprisoned incom-
unicado will not be known until the
United States compels both sides to
observe strictly the personal and
! property rights of all foreigners.
THE Withholding of the body of
Benton is indicative Of what the pub
lie generally suspects, viz, that he
was murdered in cold blood and not
by firing squal after trial by court
martial. How many others have fallen
in the same way nobody knows, and il
is time that the Washington govern
ment is finding out.
Every American or foreigner con-
fined in Mexican dungeons at this
into custody of American consuls in
order that the facts surrounding their
arrest and incarceration may be fully
investigated. There is in no part OF
Mexico at THIS time a process of JUS
tice which civilized people can res
pect, and there will not be until the
present disordered conditions have
been remedied."
There comes time when patience
ceases to be a virtue, when charity
constitutes sin" says the Houston
Chronicle, which thinks that that hour
has struck in our dealings with Mexi-
co:
Our patience, charity, and candor
seem to have counted for naught. The
revolution still goes on. The Ameri-
can policy of kindness and forbear-