Pierre weekly free press. (Pierre, S.D.) 1889-19??, 1918-05-16
INTERESTS TRY TO
SUPPRESS LEAGUE
Big Business stirs up Violence in
Efforts to Head off Nom
partisans.

Unable to meet the National Non
partisan League on the ground Of
honest economic argument, and mn
able also to defend its own exploit
tation, Big Business in Minnesota is
trying to stop the rapid growth Of
the farmers organization by torment
ing mob violence and persnading
petty local politicians to promulgate
absurd DEGREES and Illegal orders
which forbid free speech and peace
full assemblage in open defiance to
the United States constitution.
This un-American conspiracy ap-
parently is melted by certain Big
Business heads-who are panicky be-
cause they see their profits threat
ened-and is tactily encouraged by
the governor OF the state, who refuses
to enforce the law and upholds lesser
officials who themselves connive at
law-breaking or even participate in
this illegal violence.
Profiteers incite LawIessness.
This carnival of violence has been
brought about by the complete over
throw of the Big Business political
machine in North Dakota. Minnesota
profiteers whose pocketbooks would
be hit if the League carried out its
promised program of state owned
flour mills, elevators, packing plants
and other public utilities are prepared
to fight to the last ditch to preserve
their profits.
Violence has been melted against
peaceful, l%aw-abiding citizens of Min
nesota, who dared spread the
Leagues doctrine of economic eman-
cipation. League members have been
mobbed for attempting to exercise
their right of peaceful assemblage.
Schools, churches and public halls
have been denied farmers and labor
ers. Sheriffs and gangsters have
trampled the constitutional rights Of
citizens of this state under their feet,
and have dispersed meetings and ma
l%iciously arrested members of the
League. Trumped-up charges have
been lodged against them and they
have been held in Jail like common
criminals. The tools of Big Business
have hesitated at little short of
murder in their campaign of intimi-
dalton.
Press Distorts Truth.
The subsidized press has in no IN
stance carried a true account of the
condition of affairs in Minnesota. It
calls the League a disloyal institu-
tion and It's members pro-German. 1t
Is silent on the memorable response
the League made to the Liberty Loan,
the Red Cross and the y. M. C. A..
fund. North Dakota, where the farm
ers are in complete control, oversub-
scribed it's Liberty Loan quota 70 per
cent. The same press ignores the
patriotic response made by the
League members when their country
needed men.
The most insidious attack that has
come from the hostile press have
been the false statements that farm
ers throughout Minnesota were op-
posing League meetings and request
ing the various county peace officers
to stop the gatherings. The con-
trary has been true in every in
stance. In the counties where the
League has been prosecuted by a
few self-appointed custoMiahs of the
public welfare a storm OF protest has
come from the farmer population.
The farmers want the Lengue. They
realize its benefits. In spite of the
organized effort to destroy it, they
voluntarily come into the organiza-
ton and array themselves against the
ranks of the privileged interests
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