The Governor of Idaho, Mr. Gooding, has already given him a good character. The man acknowledged his firm belief in the existence of a Supreme Being, which touched the governor's heart deeply. Does he not know that it has ever been the mission of the Supreme Being to serve as Impresario to Falsehood and Wretchedness?
The accusation against the three prisoners is the best affidavit of the miner magnates of the courageous stand of the Western Federation of Miners during the reign of terror of the money powers. For years everything was done to disrupt them, but without results. The latest outrage is a renewed and desperate attack on that labor organization. Are the working people of America going to look on coolly at a repetition of the Black Friday in Chicago? Perhaps there will also be a labor leader, á la Powderly, who will be willing to carry faggots to the stake? Or are they going to awaken from their lethargy, ere America becomes thoroughly Russified?
+A painting+ from the "good old times" represents two peasants wrangling about a cow. One holds on to the horns of the animal, the other tightly clutches its tail, a third figure is in a crouched position underneath. It is the lawyer milking the cow, while the other two are quarreling. Here we have the beauty of the representative system. While groups are bargaining about their rights, their official advisers and lawmakers are skimming the cream off the milk. Not justice, but social injustice is the incentive of these worthy gentlemen.
Human justice, and legal representation thereof, are two different things. One who seeks for a representation places his rights in the hands of another. He does not struggle for them himself, he must wait for a decision thereupon from such quarters as are never inspired by love for justice, but by personal gain and profit.
The working people are beginning to recognize this. It is also beginning to dawn upon them that they will have to be their own liberators. They have the power to refuse their material support to a society that degrades them into a state of slavery. This power was already recognized in 1789, when, at the French National Convention, Mirabeau thundered: "Look out! Do not enrage the common people, who produce everything, who only need to fold their arms to terrify you!"