The Attempted Assassination.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume III, Issue 100, 10 September 1901, Page 3

The Attempted Assassination.

For the third time in American history the assassin's hand has been lifted against the President. The elected rulers of the groat Republic, instead of being safer from this form of attack than the hereditary monarohs of European kingdoms, are, if anything, m a greater danger, for in the past 112 years, since the election of the father of his oonntry to the post of President, two holders of that office have succumbed to the murderer's ballet. la that space of time two Czars of Bussia have died violent deaths, bat the record is not disputed by any other country. There are many living-yet who remember the horror that thrilled the English-speaking, world when the great abolitionist President, Abraham Lincoln, waff.shotin Washington theatre, at the same time that his son and hie foreign secretary, Mr Seward; was wounded by a assassin in we President's house.. Lincoln died on the following dayy, being spared the long days of-agony that'were the portion ql General .Garfield. The latter was , shot Jby #. r shfMo> fewver ' V ' ' y'i ' >,KI - " ' i% , ,

railway station, on July 2nd, 1881. I Che wounded President, who had , been elected only eight months, lingered for more than six weeks. At least one of the two ballets could not be extracted, and the Anglo-Saxon world watched in sympathy round the bedside of th< dying man, who made a brave struggle for life. Retribution followed the commission of both these crimes. Wilkes Booth, who escaped after firing the fatal shot, wa,s subsequently shot down in a farmyard, and Guiteau, who was captured at once, was executed about eleven months later, after every device to secure his release had betn exhausted by his^counsel. It is the penalty of the high estate of sovereigns and presidents to be the mark for the revolver of any madman—a madman none the less because his insanity may not be proved by the ordinary tests — who has agtievance against soaiety.' The man who shot President McEinley declares that be learned from Anarchist literature to believe - the American form of Government is wrong. He set about the task of reforming it by attempting to murder its chief officer, though he would have advanced as far in securing his object if he had emptied his pistol at George Washington's statue, possibly farther if he had shot a Tammany leader. The American constitution and Government are not affected in the least by the attempted or accomplished murder of the President. This latest crime is more on a line with Anarchist deeds in Europe than with the assassinations of Linooln and Garfield, though it does not appear to have been inspired by any suoh knot of Anarchists as from their safe asylu.4 in the United States planned and prooured the death of King Humbert last year. Naturally having no wish to become the subjects of repressive legislation, these disclaim all sympathy with the attack on President McEinley. In attempting tbe life of the President the man chose an easier victim than if he had resolved to remove the Ozar or the Kaiser, or, perhaps, even the King. All monarchs lay themselves open at times to such attacks. Be they never so carefully guarded, the Anarohist who oared nothing for his own life could, by the exercise of patience and carefully watching his opportunity, get near enough to any one of them to make a pistol shot dangerous. This is much more the case with the President of the United States, who is get-at-able to a degree undreamed of by European sovereigns. Anyone, we believe, can get to shake his band at the regular levees, and if Czo!gosz had wished to do so, he could have shot Mr McEinley in the White House itself. Under ordinary circumstances safety lies to a great extent in this freedom of intercourse, but it obviously give? the assassin every chance he requires. This latest incident may lead to a restriction in some degree of the opportunities afforded to the people of meeting the President, bat such a course would be very cautiously undertaken, for the Americans are very jealous of their democratic privileges, and Mr McEinley has already incurred some hostility by acts which some hold to savour too strongly of European ideas.—Press.