New-York tribune., 1920-01-24
Hysteria Us. Thought
Words That Screen Absence OF
Logic and Facts
To the Editor Of The Tribune


To the Editor Of The Tribune.
Sir: May one of your readers express
his appreciation of your stand for
Americanism, and especially of your
able article in reply to the letter of
Richard Marlowe in this mornings
issue?
We must expect, I suppose for long
time, that hysteria will displace thought.
and that the words "Bolshevism" and
Socialism" will serve as useful smoke
screens to conceal the absence of a logi-
cal examination of the real facts and
issues.
OF course, the Socialists wish to
"overthrow the government" SO do all
radicals. But it is the height of absurd
ity to assert that all Socialists wish to
accomplish this by unlawful methods.
Indeed, most of the classic authorities
believe in the ultimate triumph Of
socialism through evolution 1t was
Dcbs, believe, who said, when candi-
date for President, in speech at the
Hippodrome, that it would come by the
gradual adoption of its principles one by
one by the other parties. He even
gloried in the growth of the trusts as
paving the way for the popular demand
for "the Corporation of the United
States
Do Speaker Sweet and the others
realize the logical outcome of their
policy of "drcct action? 1t seems to
be that any Representative who swears
allegiance to the Constitution is guilty
of sedition if he proposes any radical
change in that document The brewers
and heavy drinkers will tell you that
the liquor traffic was pillar of Ameri-
can freedom. We're the Senators who
voted for prohibition scditiouso And
slavery was expressly sanctioned by
the Constitution. and was the pillar of
the Southern industrial system Was
the Fourteenth Amendment scditious :?
All our recent health and welfare lcgis
latlon has overthrown the sacred eco
nomc principle Of laisscs faire and the
fundamental right of each citizen to do
as he plcascs with his own house. his
own garage and his own germs Have
our state legislators for generation
been Bolshevists?
The Socialists advocate the state own
crship of monopolics, the abolition Of
what they call "unearned income" per-
haps in an international state. tho state
care OF children perhaps in the aboli-
ton of the church and Of conscrption.
Whatever they believe in, five Assembly
districts, according to our method of
representation, believe in and desire to
bring about. They have given cxDres-
sion to their belief and desire in the
strictly American fashion-by the bal
lot, not by riots, or ooting. or SABOTAGE
Anarchy is the disbelief in and dis
loyalty to the government of the land
John Brown was an anarchist when he
attempted to abolish slavery by seizing
the arsenal at 1Iarpcr's Ferry. Lincoln
was not when he accomplished the same
revolutionary object by lawful means.
The Secretary Of State of Massachusetts
is an anarchist if he said, as reported,
of the Bolshcviks. pro Germans, traitors
or anybody else, "shoot them to-day and
try them Tomorrow The mobs who
lynch negroes are anarchists But the
man who votes for a candidate who be-
lieves in soviet government, the single
tax, the abolition of tobacco, the free
dom of Ireland no more army, the in
corporation of America into the British
Empire, or union with Germany,
China or Siam, is not an anarchist.
ANTI SOCIALIST.
New York, Jan. %, 1920.