| Publication information |
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Source: Truth Seeker Source type: magazine Document type: letter to the editor Document title: “Agents and Principals” Author(s): Bierstein Date of publication: 26 October 1901 Volume number: 28 Issue number: 43 Pagination: 682 |
| Citation |
| Bierstein. “Agents and Principals.” Truth Seeker 26 Oct. 1901 v28n43: p. 682. |
| Transcription |
| full text |
| Keywords |
| McKinley assassination (religious interpretation); Leon Czolgosz (execution: personal response); C. C. Cline; C. C. Cline (public statements); William McKinley (presidential character: criticism); Theodore Roosevelt (political character); Theodore Roosevelt (assumption of presidency: personal response). |
| Named persons |
| Bierstein; C. C. Cline; James A. Garfield; Abraham Lincoln; William McKinley; Theodore Roosevelt. |
| Document |
Agents and Principals
.
Since I last wrote you God in his providence has
seen fit to permit the removal of our President. Some say that his slayer struck
not at the man, but at the government of which he was the chief agent; but if
this be so, will not the act of the state of New York on October 28 in striking
God’s chief agent dead be a blow aimed at God instead of at his agent? If God
would protect his agent in this matter, could that electrocution take place?
We are told that God holds the lightning in his hand; so does New York, but
can it be that she is mightier than God, who evidently would let that man live
longer if she would consent? Lest th[e]se suggestions should be imputed to a
Freethought source, will you allow me to quote a Nashville, Tenn., item?
“Was the Assassination of President McKinley the Will of God?” This was the subject of a sensational sermon delivered to-night by the Rev. C. C. Cline, pastor of one of the leading congregations of the city. He said the death was the will of God, as has been the displacement of four kings and rulers in the Bible times, and the assassination of Lincoln and Garfield.
He declared God was jealous of the poor and oppressed, and that President McKinley was a commercial President, harboring the corporations to the detriment of the masses. McKinley was weighed by God and found wanting. “He was abnormally a financial President—the best servant the corporations ever had in the White House. There is no use hanging Anarchists. Go to the hotbed of anarchy—plutocracy. Give the masses legislation, and not the few who work the masses.”
The Rev. Cline declared the President was controlled by corporate influences, and spoke in a sensational manner of his alleged friendship for Catholics. He said:
“Roosevelt steps in without complications or obligations to the Catholic force[.] We have an untrammeled President now[,] except for the one promise that he will carry out McKinley’s policies. I regret it.”
The Rev. Cline is a man of high standing, and his sermon will doubtless cause a sensation.
B.