Notes from the Picket Line [excerpt]

WHO LIES?

     H. S. Canfield writing to the “Chicago American” from Buffalo, New York, Sept. 23, said the face of the assassin as he sat in the dock awaiting his trial and sentence, gave the lie to the statement of Isaak and Fox that Czolgosz impressed them as a “spy,” when seen by them in Chicago. Canfield thinks Isaak and Fox are deliberate liars, and Czolgosz a much injured man, by such imputation.
     Let us see: If Czolgosz had been a true friend to Anarchy and Anarchists, why should he try to involve Emma Goldman and her work in the odium and the peril consequent upon his attempt to kill McKinley? If he had been, as suspected by Isaak, a traitor and a spy he could not have served his purpose better than to kill McKinley and say Miss Goldman prompted him to the act.
     The trouble with Canfield is that he belongs to that class of human parasites knows as “space writers” on the great dailies. He gets paid by the space, by the number of inches, he can fill with matter that will tickle the unreasoning masses and bring patronage and money to the publisher. Like the paid lawyer he uses his brain powers for the fee he is to get if he wins the case of his client.
     Just now Canfield knows that the populace is hungry for blood; stirred to madness by the inflammatory appeals of the clergy and the subsidized organs of plutocracy and of imperialistic power—who all know their privileges would be gone if every man could be his own priest, his own lawyer and governor, such articles as that of Canfield are eagerly welcomed, and, inspired by them, such leaders of Chicago society as Pearce, Weinland and Meyers called loudly for volunteers to hang the imprisoned Isaak, Fox and others, against whom nothing whatever had been proved.
     Again I ask, “who lies?” and if in answer to these appeals to lynch law the mob were to hang innocent prisoners, who is it that would be morally responsible for their death?