Page:Anti Chinese Riots at Seattle.djvu/14

 afraid to do anything to check the tide of lawlessness. Professional men were afraid they would lose some of their clients. Merchants were fearful they would be boycotted. The merchants in the building in which Judge Burke had his office said he must vacate and leave the premises for fear the building would be fired or blown up. But the Judge stayed. He was one of the men who put down the mob.

The lawlessness here disclosed a situation not very creditable to certain men in official position,—one the Head of the Territory hesitated, about his policy; another, holding a command in the military, was proud his men carried empty guns and were cheered by the mob; another in a court of justice arrested men and put them under heavy bonds,—men who by their courage and devotion to duty saved the City from the lawless. Each one of these men who were arrested and put under bonds was at such a time worth a thousand such officials.

After tranquility had been restored, it was recognized that many of the Cadets attending the Territorial University were students whose homes and interests were in other parts of the State than at Seattle, but that when the supremacy of the law was threatened, they volunteered their services and helped the citizen soldiery of Seattle put down the mob.

Accordingly, and acting on the initiative of Col. G. O. Haller, a suitable flag, bearing on one side the inscription, “Tribute for Merit, Feb. 8th, 1886,” and on the reverse side, “Presented to the University Cadets of Seattle, Washington Territory,” was presented to the Cadets at Frye’s Opera House by General John Gibbon, U. S. A., and as that gentleman commanded the United States force sent here by the President and under martial law was in command of Seattle, had also been one of the big Generals of the Civil War and signed as a witness the surrender of General Lee at AppomatoxAppomattox [sic], and as his speech presenting the flag contains some declarations of sound sense on loyalty on the handling of law breakers, I herewith quote from it the following extracts:

“Young Gentlemen of the University Cadets: I address you as Gentlemen, for, although the uniform you wear is not as significant of gentleness as of force, the ideal soldier is always a gentleman, even when exercising the brutal forces of war.

“It is a necessity in every society, in order to protect itself against dishonesty, turbulence or vice, to organize force for use when needed * * * but it sometimes happens that or-