Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 34, Number 13, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 October 1901 — ANARCHY'S KEYSTONE [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

ANARCHY'S KEYSTONE

IT IS ATHEISM, DECLARES SENATOR DOLLIVER. In an Eloquent Address the Fallacy and Viclonsness of this Unrighteous Institution Are Tolnted out by the Brilliant lowan. The eloquence of Senator Jonathan P. Dolliver of lowa was employed at the Chicago Auditorium in eulogy of President McKinley and denunciation of anarchy. The latter portion of his address, spoken at the Chicago memorial exercises, Is particularly worth reading and pondering over, and a liberal extract follows: There will be opportunity enough to make inquiry Jtfto the causes of the enormous offense against mankind in which the President of the United States was the victim. But it cannot be out of the way, even at such a time as this, to recognize that in the midst of modern society there are a thousand forces manifestly tending toward thk moral degradation out of which this wicked hand was raised to kill the chief magistrate of the American people. The government of the United States has given no attention, and the government of the several States but little, to the activity in many of our cities of organizations, inconsiderable in numbers, which boldly profess to seek the destruction of ail government and all law. * Their creed is openly written in many languages, Including our own, and its devotees the world over do not try to conceal the satisfaction which they take in these deeds of darkness. The crime of the 6th of September, though evidently committed under the influence if not the direction of others, easily baffles the courts, because, being without the common motives of murder, it leaves no tracks distinct enough to be followed, and for that reason escapes through the very tenderness of our system of jurisprudence toward persons accused on suspicious, however grave. McKinley’s Spotless Life. Whether the secret of this ghastly atrocity rests in the keeping of one man or many, we may never know, but if

the President was picked out by hidden councils for the fate which overtook him, there is a mournful satisfaction in the fact that in his life, as well as in his death, he represented American manhood at its best. I have studied with some degree of care such literature as the working creed of anarchy has given to the modern world, and in all the high places of the earth it could not have chosen a victim whose life among men made a more -complete answer to its incoherent program of envy and hatred and idleness and crime. Without intending to do so, it has strengthened the whole framework of the social system, not only by showing Its own face, but by lifting up before the eyes of all generations this choice and master spirit of our times, simple and beautiful in his life, lofty and serene in death. The creed of anarchy, in common with all kindred schools of morbid social science, teaches that only the children of the rich find their lives worth living under our institutions, and therefore, in order to emancipate the poor, these institutions must be overthrown The biography of William McKinley records the successful battle of at least one young man in the open arena of the world, and tells the story of his rise from the little school house, where be earned the money to complete his own education, to the 'highest civic distinction known among men. One life like that put into the light of day, where the young men of America can see it, will do more for the welfare of society than all the processions that »ver marched behind beer wagons through the streets of Chicago, carrying red flags, can ever do it harm. The creed of anarchy knows no country, feels in its withered heart no pulse of patriotism, sees under no skies the beauty of any flag—not even ours, that blessed symbol now draped in mourning which lights up this time of national affliction with the splendor of the great republic. The Creed of Rebellion. The creed of anarchy rebels against the state, and with infinite folly proposes that every man should be a law unto himself. It is more mischievous because more pretentious than the common levels as crime, for without disdaining the weapons of the ruffian it does not hesitate to seek shelter under the respectability that belongs to the student and the reformer. It ought not to be forgotten that these conspirators, working out their nefarious plans in secret, in the dens and caves of the earth, enjoy an unconscious co-opera-tion and side-partnership with every lawless influence which is abroad in the world. Legislators who betray the commonwealth, judges who poison the fountains of justice, municipal authorities which come to terms with crime—all these are regular contributors to the campaign fund of anarchy. That howling mass, whether in Kansas »r Alabama, that assembly of wild beasts, dancing in drunken carousal about the .ashes of some negro malefactor, is not contributing to the security of society; it la taking away from society the only security it has. It belongs to the unenrolled reserve corps of anarchy in the United States. Neither individuals nor corporations nor mobs can take the law Into their own hands without Identifying themselves with this more open but hard-

ly less odious attack upon the fortress o# thejocial order. The creed of anarchy teaches that popular government is a fraud and that en 4 actments made by the people for themselves are no more sacred than arbitrary decrees promulgated by tyrants andl enforced by bayonets. Anarchy says; “Vote no more.” The example of William McKinley, who in a public service of more than a quarter of a century, half of it in the field of controversial politics, never once disparaged the motives of those who did not agree with him, nor spoke an unkind word of an opponent, who allowed neither the cares of business nor the fatigue of travel to nullify his influence as a citizen, and never failed at any election to stand uncovered before the ballot box in the precinct where he had the right to vote, already has familiarized his countrymen with the higher ideals of civic duty which dedicate the heart and brain and conscience of America to an intelligent interest in public affairs. The creed of anarchy despises the obligations of the marriage contract, impeaches the integrity of domestic life, enters into the homes of the people to pull down their altars and subject the family relation, which is the chief bond of society, to the caprices of the loafer and the libertine. In all these things it has an alliance, implied if not expressed, with every variation of that rotten publia opinion which in many American State* has turned the court of equity into a doily scene of perjury and treason against the hearthstones of the community, a treason so flagrant that a year ago, for the accommodation of a single man, the Legislature of Florida was induced to descend below the level of all paganisms and all barbarisms by so amebding the laws of divorce as to permit a winter resident to legally desert the wife of his youth, not on account-of any fault of hers, but because of the pathetic burdens Avhich she bore. I count it of infinite value to every decent form of civilization that against this background of unworthy living, from the front porch of a little cottage covered with vines, yonder at Canton, the outline sketch of two lives has been thrown, so beautiful in their loyalty to one another that good men everywhere stand in silence before it, while the womanhood of the world, seeing the knightliness of love which alters not, draw near, from stations high and low, to salute the picture with the benediction of their tears.

Atheism Its Keystone. The fatal word in the creed of anarchy is “atheism.” Until that word is spoken, until all sense of the moral government of the universe and the spiritual significance of human life is lost, it is impossible to conceive, much less to execute, ths malignant propaganda against the rights of mankind. It is not necessary to think or speak unkindly of the noted men, many of them living a life of scholarly seclusion, remote from the practical, everyday problems which confront the police of all countries, who in the last generation have made the most influential contributions to the speculative literature of atheism. I doubt whether their influence will be permanent, either for good or evil. No man who brings nothing with him except a blind faith in natural laws, which nobody made and nobody administers, will ever find a permanent discipleship in a world like this. It is their misfortune that their works have had the most influence among those who have been least able to understand them. I look upon it at least as a passing misfortune for us that they have been translated into the language of common life by a famous American, now dead and gone, who in the days of his strength was the most captivating popular orator who ever spoke our tongue. On taking the chair as president of the American Secular Union he uttered these words: “Away with the old nonsense about free moral agency; a man is no more responsible for his character than for his height; for his conduct than for his dreams.” It requires no very deep investigation to find in such a sentiment the seed of all anarchies, beginning' with the bombshells in the streets of Chicago and ending with chaos come again. Goine to a Better Country.

In order to get the benefit of thegreatest of all markets. British manufacturers are establishing plants in the United States. Roosevelt on Protection. Here again we have got to remember that our first duty is to our own people; and yet that we can best get Justice by doing justice. We must continue the policy that has been so brilliantly successful in the past, and so shape our economic system as to give every advantage to the sjdll, energy hnd intelligence of our farmers, merchants, manufacturers and wage-work-ers; and yet we must also remember, In dealing with other nations, that benefits must be given when benefits are sought. It Is not possible to dogmatize as to the exact way of attaining this end, for the exact conditions cannot be foretold. In the long run, one of our prime needs is stability and continuity of economic policy; and yet, through treaty or by direct legislation. It may at least In certain cases become advantageous to supplement our present policy by a system of reciprocal benefit and obligation.—Vice President Roosevelt, In Minneapolis speech. An office seeker’s life Is checkered with appointments and disappointments.

SENATOR J. P. DOLLIVER.