Government by Military Power
By L. A. S.
It is an unusual spectacle which the industrial conflict in Colorado is furnishing to the country at this time in the deportation of miners beyond the borders of the State as a punishment for their unionism; but so accustomed has the country become to unusual spectacles—spectacles out of keeping with the laws and institutions of republican government—that probably no great stir will be made over the anti-republican character of the proceeding. A number of union miners from the strike district—about seventy, it is stated—were put on a train under guard of a company of militia, taken eastward to the Kansas border, and when about half a mile beyond this line, were put off the train, without money or food, in a sparsely settled district, ordered not to return to Colorado, and then left to take care of themselves, the train with the soldiers returning whence it came. Many of these men left property, wives, and children behind them in Colorado. Some at least, it is stated, had not been guilty of any lawlessness, their offense being solely that they were members of the obnoxious unions. The men started eastward to reach some habitations where they might find food and shelter, but they had not proceeded far before they were met by the sheriff of the county, who forbade them to go farther into Kansas, and ordered them back to Colorado. There was nothing to do but obey his order and start back to the State whence they had just been deported. Manifestly, civil government does not exist in this country for the purpose of providing such incongruous spectacles. It does not exist for the purpose of telling men to get off the earth, or to do impossible things. Such acts are not done in the name of law, for there is no law6for them. There is nothing in the constitution or statutes of Colorado, which provides such a punishment for any crime, and nothing in either constitution or statutes which makes membership in a labor union a crime. The Constitution of the United States, after which those of the States are modeled, provides that “cruel and unusual punishments” shall not be inflicted on any person for crime. There are constitutional, legal methods of dealing with all crimes,—with assault, arson, riot, murder, or whatever other crime the miners are charged with,—and recourse should be had to these methods unless it is to be conceded that civil government in Colorado is a failure. The spectacle of men being ordered by regularly constituted officials in this republic, on the one hand to go out of a State, and on the other hand at the same time not to come out of it, is one that does not enhance the dignity of civil government in that section. There is in it rather a seeming confession of weakness—a confession that republican government, expressed by the calm, judicial exercise of legal authority and power, is not adequate in all cases for the preservation of law and order within the State. If republican government is indeed weak,—if something else than this has to be resorted to under conditions that may arise (and have in places already arisen),—what will it be? Are we yet to see in this country a government by arbitrary, dictatorial power, a monarchy, or a military despotism? We have come to a time when such questions are not far-fetched. The miners’ union has been lawless, it is true. It is to a certain degree at least responsible for the desperate crimes which have marked the contest between union members and mine owners in Colorado. But does this fact justify the deportation of union miners out of the State, their banishment from their homes, without the sanction of the State constitution and laws? Two wrongs do not make right; and no wrong is permanently remedied until it is remedied by right. Quiet has been restored in Colorado, but the cost remains to be counted.