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DECEMBER 13. 1922

Kirby in the New York World

INVISIBLE GOVERNMENT

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I

F there is one thing more than another that Americans require of their political affairs, it is that they should be open, aboveboard, and discussable by all. Invisible government and secret influences form the antithesis to democracy. We have and will maintain freedom of speech and of the press, subject only to the apothegm stated the other day in these columns, "Personal liberty ends where public injury begins." The most moderate programme put forth by defenders of the revived Ku Klux Klan shows its purpose to influence legislation, public opinion, and political elections. It has a right to do all this if it acts openly and fairly. It has no right to work secretly by underground methods to inflame racial and religious prejudice in order to bring about political or legislative action. this to a defender of the Klan, he replies, "Well, the Knights of Columbus do the same thing." We have seen no evidence of this; but, if it is so, then that or any other organization so acting is subject to precisely the same criticism. Meanwhile it is notorious and self-evident that the Klan cunningly tries to twist into one cord the three hateful strands of anti-Jewish, anti-Catholic, and antiNegro prejudice. Help yourself, in effect the Klan says, to your own special hatred! All this is distinctly un-Ameri

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There is no objection to secret societies in themselves. Any one can name offhand several that are admirable as sources of social enjoyment, of mutual benefit, of fraternal benevolence. Ceremony and ritual are attractive to many people, and it is true that many secret societies are not merely harmless, but beneficial. Yet, in order that the worthy associations should not be confounded with the objectionable, it is at least desirable that all should be registered with the State authorities and the names of their responsible officers be available for purposes of inquiry. Emphatically this is desirable in the case of an organization like the Ku Klux Klan, founded originally as an instrument of terrorism, and lately revived in an effort to foster race and religious animosity and to I throw the influence of its secretly banded members on this or that side of a political issue. We are not permitted to know when and why the Klan's influence is thus exerted, and in such a

THE HOODED COBRA

situation fair discussion is impossible. Just lately, for instance, one newspaper correspondent remarked:

One of the surprises of this year's election was the success of a candidate for Governor of Oregon, with Ku Klux support, and the adoption by the voters of that State of a law designed to do away with all private schools and all parochial schools at which a feature of the teaching is instruction in religious matters.

It may be that the Ku Klux Klan was influential in the election of a Governor in Oregon and in the adoption of the school law-and it may not; how can we tell what an oath-bound society has done? The same thing applies to the election of Senator Mayfield in Texas, "said to be" due to Klan efforts. We don't want "said to be" in American political life, we want open politics as well as open diplomacy.

When the present Klan revival was new, there were several acts of violence charged against local Klans. The National officers of the Klan in one or two

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instances expelled the local chapter; in other cases the Klan was declared to be wrongly accused. Thus was exposed instantly one danger attached to those who ride by night "to do justice to wrong-doers;" others may imitate them The from evil and personal motives. Klan saw the light; and it is fair to say that this sort of lynching à la masquerade seems to have ceased. There remains to the mystery-loving "joiners" the oddly mingled delight of mask, gown, and torch, with the joy of alliteration, and the inconsistent pleasure of seeing in newspapers flashlight photographs of their midnight ceremonies.

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effectively their ideas, but to put them in force by violence. In the course of his speech Mr. Lloyd said:

We want to organize so if you want to put a piece of propaganda in the hands of everybody in Milwaukee you can do it in three or four hours. If you want every Socialist in Milwaukee at a certain place at a certain time with a rifle in his hand or a bad egg, he will be there. We want a mobilization plan and an organization for the revolution. You want to get rifles, machine guns, field artillery, and the ammunition for it; you want to get dynamite. . . . You want to tell off the men who are to take the dynamite to the armory doors and blow them in and capture the guns and ammunition there so that the capitalists won't have any. Dynamite the doors of the banks to get the money to finance the revolution.

This man, the son of Henry D. Lloyd, the late economist and reformer, and thirty-eight others were indicted for conspiring to advocate the overthrow of the present form of government in America by violence, and to that end unlawfully and wickedly and feloniously to engage in various forms of propaganda, including selling and distributing books, aiding in the organization of the Communist Labor Party, assembling in meetings, and raising flags and banners and other insignia.

The indictment was in twelve counts and was brought under the law of the State of Illinois which makes such offenses punishable by imprisonment. That law was passed on June 28, 1919a few days more than five months after Lloyd's speech from which we have quoted. Of course neither he nor his fellow-conspirators were indicted for this speech. They were indicted and twenty of them were arrested, tried, and convicted for acts subsequent to the passing of the law. This speech of Lloyd's, however, together with other words and evidence as to the activities of some of the accused prior to the passage of the law, was introduced as evidence to show the intent of these men in advocating the doctrines that they did advocate after the passing of the law.

The jury was satisfied that the men they convicted were guilty of a conspiracy to overthrow by violence or other unlawful means the representative form of government now secured to American citizens.

Punishment of the convicted was deJayed by the elaborate technical objections of their counsel; so it was not until the latter part of November that Lloyd and some of his co-defendants began to serve their prison sentence. Almost immediately Governor Len Small, of Illinois, commuted the sentences and the men were released.

Probably this case would have gained

no such notoriety except for the fact that among those indicted was one man, Lloyd, who is reputed to be a millionaire, and another, John Reed, a Harvard graduate, who after the indietment died in Russia and is accounted as a hero by the Bolsheviki.

LEGALITY AND EXPEDIENCY

TH

HAT these men were legally convicted there can be no doubt. Every imaginable technical objection, as well as every effort which to a non-legal mind would seem reasonable, was employed by the counsel of the accused to prevent conviction. A reading of the case might suggest to a satirist a subject for an operetta as pertinent to the complexities of the law as Gilbert's "Pinafore" was pertinent to the official red tape of the British navy. Into these technical objections it is not necessary to go. It is sufficient to say that they were for the most part overruled by the trial Court and rendered unavailing by the Supreme Court of Illinois on appeal. The counsel for the accused petitioned the United States Supreme Court to act in the case, but Justice Sutherland refused a writ of error on the ground that the matter was one for the Illinois Supreme Court to Landle.

From the decision of the State Supreme Court one of the justices of that Court dissented on the ground that the so-called Overthrow Statute, which these men were convicted of violating, was "so vague and general and so clearly against the American doctrine of freedom of speech as to be held unconstitutional." In reaching this decision he was not swayed merely by Constitutional considerations, for he acknowledged that one question about which he was exercised was whether drastic penalty for these men was "the best way, from a public standpoint, to counteract the tendency of their views."

It was evidently because of doubt as to the justice and expediency of the law against the advocacy of violence that Governor Small released the prisoners. At any rate, in releasing them he said: "These men are not criminals." And he added that they had already suffered severely and that no great good could come from longer incarceration.

Very possibly in England these men would not have been imprisoned, or even tried. The length to which violent speech can go with impunity in that country often astonishes Americans. Conditions there, however, are not parallel to those here. National security in Great Britain does not rest upon loyalty to any theory of government; it rests upon the traditions of the British people. In this country loyalty is not to a tradition, but to an ideal, and to destroy that

loyalty is to destroy the substance of the Nation itself. To put a man like William Bross Lloyd in prison may not be the best way to safeguard the institutions which he attacks (and which, most illogically, he appeals to for refuge when he is caught trying to destroy them); but the instinct which frames laws against the activities of such foolish and reckless men is a sound instinct. Free governments have the right to protect themselves. The Lusk Law in New York, which puts all schools and schoolteachers under the burden of proving their loyalty, is an unwise if not unjust method of exercising that right; the Overthrow Statute of Illinois is not in the same category with the Lusk Law, and is much more defensible, but we are not convinced that the Overthrow Statute is in every respect a wise method. There are some objects which can best be obtained, not by repression, but by patient and wise education.

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the majority to withdraw from consideration, and from any practical chance of passage, the Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill.

We are not greatly concerned over the failure of the Anti-Lynching Bill to become a law. Even at best it would have been an experiment. We believe it is an experiment that ought to have been tried. It is a reproach to the whole American people that lynching, with the connivance of officers of the law, can continue in this country without any action on the part of the Nation itselt. If the States which have tolerated lynching in the past will eradicate it without Federal action, so much the better. But they have not eradicated it. Perhaps some better measure than the Dyer Bill can be devised. Perhaps it is necessary to wait until indignation against the lynching evil becomes so overwhelming that no reasonable doubt about National legislation can remain.

What does give us concern, and we believe should give all American citizens concern, however, is that a minority in the Senate can with impunity dictate to the Senate by means of such a filibuster as was employed by the Democrats with the approval of so conservative a leader as Senator Underwood. What the Democrats did was to interpose a practically endless series of frivolous motions. One motion, for instance, was to insert the chaplain's prayer. Another was to insert in the journal the time at which the President pro tempore of the Senate gave up the chair to Vice-President Coolidge. Another method was to insist upon the reading of the journal in full. Motions of this sort, which were frankly

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and obviously dilatory, were permitted. This sort of thing is outrageous. No legislative body ought to allow itself to be tied up by technical rules which can be employed for the prevention of the very purposes for which that legislative body exists-the consideration and discussion of legislative measures and action upon them.

HOW LONG?

FROM

ROM New York was drawn one-tenth of the A. E. F. Yet four years after the war not a single new Governmental hospital has been completed within the boundaries of New York State.

The Government was offered a free site for a tuberculosis hospital at Liberty, New York, a town which is equipped by climate and experience to care for patients in the best possible way. The Government refused this offer and proceeded to purchase a site for a hospital on the shores of the Hudson River at a cost of, we are told, $100,000. After the expenditure of many thousands in the building of foundations, the work on this hospital has been stopped. No one seems to know whether the work has been permanently abandoned or not. Letters to Washington result merely in arousing to renewed vigor the well-known bureaucratic game of "passing the buck."

We cite this case of the New York hospital merely because it seems typical of the whole method by which the problem of the veteran has been handled. If the Administration is wise, it will bend its utmost efforts to end the régime of broken promises, procrastination, and ineptitude which has marked the activity of the Veterans Bureau. If the Republican leaders are not convinced that the situation should be cleaned up for humanitarian reasons, they should at least show that they are aware of the fact that the hospital situation is full of political dynamite.

A WOMAN JUDGE

OF OHIO'S SUPREME COURT

NE of the notable incidents of the

Keystone

FLORENCE E. ALLEN, ELECTED JUDGE OF THE SUPREME COURT OF OHIO

pointed assistant prosecutor, and one year later was elected Common Pleas judge, in which position she has made a record for common sense, justice, and efficiency. Judge Allen did not enter the primaries, but was placed on the judicial ballot by petition as an independent candidate after Democrats and Republicans had nominated two candidates each."

In an article in the New York "Times" we are told that undoubtedly Judge Allen is the first woman judge to preside on the bench in a case of murder in the first degree and to sentence a man to the electric chair, the only death sentence pronounced in Cleveland for thirteen years. Another important and peculiar case tried before her, it is stated, was that of William H. McGannon, Chief Justice of the Municipal Court of Cleveland. Judge McGannon was tried for murder, acquitted, and then indicted on the charge of suborning perjury in the evidence at the first trial. He was tried for perjury before Judge Allen, toward whom he was so contemptuous during the trial that he was repeatedly reprimanded by the

ONE of the notable incide choice of Judge.

Florence E. Allen as a Judge of the Ohio State Supreme Court. Judge Allen is the first woman to receive that honor in Ohio, and, so far as we know, is the first woman Supreme Court judge in any of the States. A well-informed correspondent sends us the following sketch of Judge Allen's career: "She was born in Salt Lake City, graduated from the Western Reserve University, and received her law degree from the New York University Law School; practiced

w in Cleveland for five years, was ap

He was ultimately convicted, and was sentenced by Judge Allen to ten years' imprisonment, with the remark that the law applied even more to judges than to other citizens, as judges were familiar with it.

In a statement made since her election Judge Allen says: "We conducted a campaign with very limited funds, without organization, and with the definite opposition of the two political parties. The issue of my election was not important; but the fact that 490,000 voters disregarded party lines and gave us

their support marks a real advance toward an independent judiciary."

An Ohio jurist and lawyer of distinction in a private letter to a member of The Outlook's staff indicates some regret that Judge Allen should be removed from the Common Pleas Court because there is great difficulty in obtaining judges of the right qualifications for that bench and Judge Allen has there made an excellent judge and one of ability and dignity. He gives his personal impression that Judge Allen was elected to the Supreme Court rather because she was a woman than because her special qualification for this position was greater than that of her opponent, Judge Hough, but admits that others might differ as to this.

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THE FREEDOM OF THE STRAITS

HE Lausanne Conference reached a

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when on December 4 Mr. Tchitcherin for Russia outlined the Soviet position as regards the straits of the Dardanelles and the control or freedom from control of the waters to the east, including the Sea of Marmora and the Black Sea. The Turkish delegates declined on that day to state their position, and thus the matter stands as this issue of The Outlook is going to press. It seems to be an open question whether the Turks will concur completely in the Russian views or whether Turkey is beginning to be a little distrustful of Russia, perhaps a little more receptive to the ideas of the Allies as to the Straits, and may therefore show a disposition to reason and a peaceful agreement.

In all this discussion we constantly hear the phrase, "The freedom of the Straits." What does it mean? Turkey, Russia, and the Allies all agree that there should be freedom of commerce through the Straits and the waters to the eastward. Turkey has claimed, and Russia now claims in behalf of what the Soviet considers Russia's interests as well as Turkey's, that Turkey should be treated as an independent, free, and equal nation and assumes from this that Turkey should have a right to fortify any part of Turkish territory, including that adjacent to the Straits. This would mean that no warship of the Allies could pass through the Straits in peace or in war without the specific consent of the Turkish Government, and this in turn means that, in case of serious trouble in the Near East, Great Britain, France, and Italy would be halted at the Straits just as the British navy and army were halted in the Great War.

Now there is a plausible and apparently logical argument for the view just stated. If Turkey, or, for that matter,

Russia, had a trustworthy, representative government; if either nation were now a good neighbor to the nations of western Europe; if the Turks were not muttering about the exclusion of all Christians from their territory, and practically demanding with Russia's aid to control the business and the in'ternational relations of the entire Near East-in such a case the claim might be considered reasonable.

What Russia demands is not freedom of the Straits, but unbridled power for Turkey, or Turkey and Russia combined. Great Britain has controlled the Straits of Gibraltar for over two hundred years, and she has never used that control to oppress other nations. Could Turkey be trusted in the same way as regards the straits of the Dardanelles? The Allies do not think so; the only question is, how far they are willing to go to prevent what would be a menace to their interests in the Near East and to the peace of Europe.

Mr. Tchitcherin, in his speech of December 4, demanded for Russia an absolutely closed waterway to warships, and in support of his demand stated, the despatches say, that Russia had suffered five years from an open waterway, during which time her Black Sea ports were bombarded and insurrections assisted in consequence, and that Russia could not and would not permit in the future England's hand to be at her throat. Furthermore, in answer to the British representative, Lord Curzon, Tchitcherin asked whether England "was at the table as arbiter of the world's destinies." Russia, he said, demanded that she be recognized as one of the great Powers, in complete equality with England, and did not recognize England as arbiter.

One hopeful sign for the Allies' contention is that Rumania and Bulgaria are adverse to the position which has, up to the date mentioned, been maintained by Turkey and Russia in regard to the Black Sea. Rumania and Bulgaria are opposed to militarizing the Black Sea and in favor of every possible extension there of the freedom of commerce.

The attitude of the Turks toward the peoples of western Europe is shown in their treatment of Christians in territory claimed by Turkey. The newspaper despatches say that the Turks have ordered out of their territory every Greek now living in it; that this, if completely carried out, will result in the banishment from Turkish territory of nearly two million Greeks since the beginning of the war; that between five hundred thousand and six hundred thousand Greeks now in Asia Minor were ordered to get out by November 30, and

that when this order was extended so as

to date December 15 Ismet Pasha said that if Greeks stayed after that date he could not be responsible for their safety

which, coming from a Turk as regards Greeks, is practically a threat of wholesale slaughter. The Turks even asked that the three hundred thousand Greeks in Constantinople should be compelled to move, but they may reconsider that demand.

All this, taken in connection with the wholesale migration of Greeks and other Christians from Western Thrace, has flooded nearby regions with great masses of people, mostly poor, many of them in distress and without any apparent economic future.

A country which will do this is not one to be treated as an equal by the great nations of western Europe.

THE VENGEANCE OF GREECE

TH

HE high political and military positions of the six men executed on November 28 in Athens, the inhumane circumstances of at least one of the executions, and the fact that the men were condemned by a court martial instead of a civil court stirred and startled readers the world over. Three of these men had been Premier (Gounaris, Protopapadakis, and Stratos), two others had been Cabinet Ministers (Theotokis and Baltazzis), and the sixth, General Hadjanestis, was in command of the Greek army so disgracefully routed by Kemal. naris was seriously ill when condemned; he was taken in an ambulance to the scene of execution and there was put upon his feet and shot, together with the other five.

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Essentially, these executions were an act of vengeance. They represented anger and shame endured by the people and army of Greece for being led into a trap. So far as the political culprits were concerned it is charged that they led Greece into this trap, not to restore peace or to defend Greece, but to save themselves from political downfall. Gou

The First of

MR. W. J. HENDERSON'S articles on the enjoyment of music will be published before the end of the year. It is entitled

"WHAT IS GOOD PIANOPLAYING?"

.

naris, whose illness made his execution so revolting, was perhaps the worst offender, for it was he who, more than any other man, was responsible for the driving out of Venizelos, the restoration of Constantine, and even for the vacillating, treacherous conduct of Greek policy which so long delayed the country from joining the Allies in the Great War. His fellow-Ministers who were shot were sharers in this tortuous and base political conduct.

For a time it seemed more than probable that Prince Andrew, a brother of ex-King Constantine, would share the fate of these six men. He was saved from death and allowed to go into exile only because of his humiliating plea that as a general he was a mere figurehead, knew practically nothing of military affairs, and did what he was told.

The Greek Revolutionary Committee, which ordered the courts martial and the executions, is now the only existing government of any real power in Athens. Great Britain promptly showed its disapproval of the bloodthirsty character of the act by breaking off diplomatic relations through the withdrawal of its Minister from Athens. It is intimated in London that it is expected that the Revolutionary Committee will soon give way to a more responsible government and that relations may then be resumed. The executions were denounced fiercely in the British Parliament. The new Labor leader, Mr. Ramsay Macdonald, is quoted as saying: "The executions represent acts that must shock the whole world. If these men were guilty of acts that would justify such punishment, the highest, most deliberate formalities should have been observed before the sentences were carried out." The Prime Minister, Mr. Bonar Law, said that the Greek Government had been previously warned that if the men were executed Great Britain would withdraw its representative. When this was done, he declared that "in taking this action his Majesty's Government was actuated by the general consideration that it is contrary to the practice of civilized governments to put to death outgoing Ministers on account of the failure of their policy."

Of course it was something more than failure of a policy that these men were charged with; but the trial and executions smack more of the Middle Ages than of the Twentieth Century.

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