The Sisseton weekly standard. (Sisseton, Roberts County, S.D.) 1892-1929, 1919-12-12
RECORD MISCONSTRUES
ARTICLE IN THE STANDARD

an article printed in the Standard a
couple of weeks ago under the head
ing of ''The Centralia Affair.". The
Record has misquoted the article and
is trying, so it seems to us, to make
capital out of it, The following is a
reprint of the article as printed in the
Standards
''The Ccntralia Affair
The city press and the department
of justice at Washington are in a
humiliating position over the shooting
at Centralia, Wash. We We're told at
first that there was a blind, stdpiu.
vicious assault on parade of march
ing soldiers. The department of JUS
tice acted as if this were the proved
fact. Those of us who do not sprinkle
salt on press reports naturally felt
pretty ndignant too.
But the local coroner's jury has
failed to fix responsibility for the kill
ings and has returned an open verdic.
1t could not do otherwise i'm the face
OF sworn testimony of men in the
parade that raid was made on the
workingmen's boarding house before
the shooting from it began DnNing
a temporary halt of the parade some
one suggested a raid on the. place.
II spoke up and said ! would lead
if enough would follow" testified
Doctor Frank BiclSford, one CT the
marchers, but before | could take
he lead there We're many ahead of
ne. Someone next to me put his
; foe; against the door a1I forced it
tIa'i. after which "A sho@ az of bullets
poured through the opening about
us"
If there We're criminals in the house
they should have been apprehended
by the police Otherwise their dwell
ling was sacred against mob violence
and i'm resisting the mob the occu-
pants We're merely defending them
selves.
The press has endeavored to keen
up the first false impression by
stories about desperate battles with
fugitives i'm the bad lands. There were
no battles. The posse met no one
who offered resistance, besieged de-
serted cabin and succeeded in killing
one of their own number.
The following appears i'm the
Record:
The editor of the Sisseton Stand
ard in the last issue of that paper
maintains that the recent shooting of
the American Legion men by reds, or
some other lawless element was en-
tirely justified. We wonder is there is
a single other person i'm Roberts
county that agrees with him. A
man is either insane. or criminal at
heart who will openly advocate such
anarchissic doctrine or attempt to
! justify assassination in any form. and
that is what thi, killing OF the soldier
boys amounted to. Suppose as Mr..
Smiley claims that some OF the boys
had attempted to break into this
boarding house. does that account for
men being in there armed with load
ed rifles? And does that mitigate the
crime of murder? From Mr.. Smiley's
utterances in this case we suspect
that the owners OF the Standard have
/; picked one of those rearing, tearing
l.bolshivike soap box orators instead of
tor"
The writeup on the "Centralia AZ
fair was taken from the Centralia
Coroner's verdict and is neither de-
Tending of accusing any one of the
murders committed in the Washing
to City.
The editor fthe Record must be
in the habit of misconstruing things
or his mental ability is very limited
BY the way he uses vindictive names
in his article he is trying to use
above phrases to create an impress.
sion.
He says we advocate anarchistio
doctrine. Does "anarchistic doctrine
mean the publishing of an open yer.
dict by coroner's jury, and trying
to find where to lay the blame of a
crime? The editor must have over
looked that part of the article tina,
says "lf there were criminals in the
house they should have been abpre.
hended by the police" Is that anar.
chistic doctrine? Why didn't oul
brother editor print the article he
| made SO much of, so those who read
cou Judge for themselves.
We believe Brother Harrington
knows we are not anarchists. /. w
VS. ETC., but he thinks he must de
something to please his masters.
It's Community Newspaper
| Don't call it country weekly blu,