Tributes to President M’Kinley

     The President is dead! Into the quiet joy of a family reunion at a lovely New England home, a passing neighbor drops this distressing message. Yet the sun shines on, the sky is spotless blue, the river swings shiningly on its fair highway, the meadows are graciously green, the hills lift and fall in beauty, the whole world seems to rest and be glad for such a day. Yet the awful problem of national life and welfare is sprung upon us at a blow. The sweet poison is seething in the dangerous places among the people and eradication seems impossible without revolution. Let us take heart from the serene security of this scene from which we write! The dear people who lived here their pure lives sleep not far away. Their homes are holy forever. How inviolate their sanctity, how mighty their hold on the sources of life! All our [sic] over the land they look up to heaven to-day commanding safety. We believe this great people is vital enough and good enough to rid out this pestiferous element, to lift the wheat from the chaff, to separate good from evil, to put away the dangerous and criminal classes from touch with the healthy life of the people and to enforce laws of order, charity, justice, purity. [21][22]
     One thing must impress every mind this day, that it sometimes costs life to give life. The sacrifice of men should never be in vain; need never be, if we are wise, not even in war. The smiting of our President means opportunity; it calls for action; it summons to sternest duty. There is no call for vengeance on any man or class of men. God will take care of them; they invite their fate. But there is a stern sense of right and justice, of reserve and reason in self-protection. To this the whole nation will lend its gravest thought, give its soberest heed. The selfishness and cruelty of anarchy come out to sight. The vileness of the sentiments that are sown under the guise of friendship and good will for the people, is fully exposed. Let there be an end. Toleration can no further go. Freedom of speech that means license to invite murder has touched its limit. Liberty of asylum for criminals and assassins, for societies that encourage crime must be withdrawn. The associated anarchists must be treated as we treat the one guilty agent. The whole horrid crew of pirates that are here to plunder and prey at will must be swept up and put to hard labor for life—work which they dread and despise while they pretend to clamor for it—and that the brood shall not increase, the gates must be shut against all foreign importation. Right measures may be radical, but now is the time to be inflexibly and fearlessly right.