The Northwest worker. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1915-1917, 1916-03-02
A JOHN BROW N
OF TODAY


William Allen White, the vigorous
editor of the Emporia CKas.) Gazette
achieved fame through his widely re-
printed editorial, What's the Matter
with Kansas" II was republican
utterance and gave Mr.. White seat
at the banquet board when the Ruszlts
and the Burtons and the Depews ct
al gathered to eXtol the virtues of
the COP. Mr. White wrote another
editorial surprising in power his pre-
vious effort. But, strange as Il may
seem. the Republican papers did not
reprint 1t, nor did he receive any in
vitations TO Republican banquets on
the strength of it. The fact that the
editorial in question was written sew
eral years ago does not lessen it's val
ne. Coming as It does from a staunch
Republican, we suggest that the read
er hand it to his local Republican edi-
tor with the request to print. Here
Is the remarkable editorial:
"EX-Vice President Fairbanks made
an able speech to celebrate the semi
| centennial of the battle fought at Os-
awatomie by old John Brown. A
/ great deal was said by the former
yice-president and by others about
the courage and the moral sense Of
John Brown. But if today some man
should rise up in this country and
take exactly the same stand John
Brown took, except on the propos-
ton that no man has right to take
the labor of others without giving so
ciety value received the excellent
Il gentlemen who are eXtolling John
Brown would brand his successor as
a Socialist. Yet that is the next step
in the fight for human freedom. The
John Brown of that fight is needed
Il just as the John Brown of the other
fight was needed. John Brown was
a rebel against existing laws. He at
tackled legal property. He melted Sc
dition and instruction. He preached
discomfort with a shotgun. But he
was right-right in spite of laws and
constitutions and organized society,
and men have made hero of him.
This is a queer world. If Mr..
Fairbanks and the honorables who
congregated in white shirts and high
hats at Osawatomie really admire
John Brown as much as they claim
to, why don't they cut loose from con-
ventional traditions as John Brown
did, and stand as John Brown stood,
against the wrong, even though gov
ernments and the forms and tradi-
tons of the world of society opposed
them? The whole world knows that
it is wrong for one man to make 9th
er men work for him, who has not
honestly obtained the money with
which to pay them. The whole world
knows that when a man gets money
without giving society adequate re-
tNi II iCi tiht illOllCy III iut SHAPE Vi
real service to the people, the man
has stolen the money. The whole
world knows that even though the
money is stolen legally it is held i'm
morally, and that the thief is a thief
in the sight of God and man. Old
John Brown knew this about the slave
holders. We today know it Of men
who gamble in stocks, of men who
water stocks, of men who operate in
the crooked paths of that part of high
finance which rests upon cheating
and lying and chicanery.
But we today lack the vigor of old
John Brown. And we who praise him
today would be shocked at living
man like him"
Every active Socialist, Mr.. White.
is a John Brown of Today" and is
thoroughly hated by the silk-hatted
gentry who gather at Osawatomie, oc-
casionally, to honor John Brown dead