Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1922-03-29
WHEN ELAPPERS HELD A FORT
FROM WHICH MEN HAVE FLED
Government by censors and the Girls Of
Greenwich Village and the Last.
Ditch Fight for Anglo.
Saxon Liberty

let him pass. But the psychologists should
at once snatch up Commissioner Enright
and those of his policemen who polished up
their badges and hotfooted on Broadway and
in Greenwich Village to enforce the terms
Of a bill drawn by Mr.. McCuinness to PRO
hib't smoking by females in public restau-
rants. As drum majors in the onward march
Of reincarnated witchburners they are
well, they are superb.
Is It any worse for a woman to smoke in
a restaurant than to smoke cigarettes In
privacy? VIII the people who have gone
bit mad on the subject of social reform never
learn that It is wrong desires that trouble
the world and that you cannot club desire
out Of a mans head or a woman's; that a
moral equivalent for force Is as necessary to
better social order as II is in the scheme OF
international relations. and that you cannot
ever hope to cure a disease by merely sup.
pressing its symptoms?
Let us admit that il seems wrong for
women TO smoke in 4 public place. 1t seems
wrong because mankind continues to search
passionatefy amid all the wreckase of its
dreams for something to hold in reverence.
for something that seems better than itself,
and is forever trying desperately to
justify in its own mind the fine legend Of
women's higher place in the scheme Of life.
Can policemen with clubs help men in their
mystical quest for gods-or even goddesses-
to take the place Of those denied them by
the higher criticism? Hardly.
A moral equivalent for policemen clubs
is what We need and the reformers seem
unable to find it. So in their rage and zeal
they are willing to make us a Nation OF the
ruled rather than Nation of rulers.
The pretty happers In Greenwich Village
who greeted Enright's men with soprano
boots and blew smoke deiantly in the faces
of the policemen may not have reflected the
ideal Of feminine conduct applauded by an
older generation. But for dizzy minute
or two they became Public Figures of i'm
posing significance. They seemed to be
holding fort which most Of us in this sup
posedly free country have abandoned TO the
embittered fanatics of righteousness" They
were more dramatic than Paul Revere more
admirable than Clemenceau. For they gave
n new and piquant form and meaning to
question that for the moment overshadows
every other in the United States.
Gradually we have been abandoning Gov.
ernment by the People for Control by Gem
sors. A wave of intolerance has swept the
country like a pestilence. Acceptance Of
relationships. Of formal and informal taboos,
of this ban and that. has become the rule in
America. Official Judgment operates now
where personal opinion used to operate in
the direction Of private Affairs.
What the prophets and spokesmcn nf this
new intolerance seem to have forgotten is
that new experiment in human life and
government. out Of which all the hope and
vitality Of the great democracies sprang,
began when freedom Of action. thought and
conscience was first guaranteed to all men
The escape of race from tyranny was
accomplished only after centuries of fnry
and rebellion and blood letting. Ir was Il
triumph of that rage for Justice which
always has been the characteristic Of tn"
Anglo Saxon.
But tyranny is forever returning and OK
uerimentng in new guises. II comes a.
trusts. as censorships. in fanatical groups
or in agencies deliberately organized to limit
mems opportunities their freedom of action
and their freedom of thought. More recently
it has managed to usurp even some OF the
power of Government Men like Enright
and his police proclaim nothing more or less
than n belief In the failure and futility Of
the fundamental principles of all modern
government. They imply that people are
not fit to be masters Of their own wills.
1t is true that the right OF individual lib
crty is often abused. What great privileges
are not abused? And would it not be far
better 70 be patient. to be Of good faith and
to teach people rhGt 10 do mith their liberty
and orc them time 10 learn rather than 10
take their liberty 0ruy from them and 50
start a backward Increment Of social thought
and action touard the ancient past? Who
will assert that the progress of enlightened
opinion and OF social consciousness does not
Justify the continuance OF the democratic
experiment.
All the private and public agencies Of
social censorship, all the agencies now busly
engaged in establishing this taboo or that.
and all the forces that tend TO continue and
fix the Capitalization Of governmental au-
thority which was effected under the pres
sure of wars necessities are reminiscent not
Of democracy as we used TO know it, but of
the hcrling and the se-strppng, the
DEGREES from On High and the mass sup
preston which made Germany destcstablc
and finally impolent IN the modern world.
Some one has said that a nation that
fights victorious war inevitably and un-
consciously adopts the driving characteris-
tics OF the defeated adversary. He was no
mean prophet. The duty of all good citi-
GEMS said the Kaiser, ''is obedience"
Good citizens say the more radical and
aggressive social reformers. 'do as the law
tells them TO do and ask no questions"
Is It n virtue then, TO be servile of mind
and without the spirit Of protest or the habit
Of honest criticism? The first duty Of n
good citizen is more than obedience to law.
II A citizen is good he must be intelligent and
he must, above all things, protect his moral
rights and the institutions of government
carefully devised 20 help him In that essen
.-.l, unu'I In hetta.