Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker Politics volume 4 .djvu/302

290 pay the price, not only of blood, but of money, and that "with alacrity."

In Kansas, on a large scale, this Russia in America, this Privileged Class of despots in a democracy, wages war against freedom. It burns houses, destroys printing-presses, shoots men. There it was Missouri Ruffians, some of them members of Congress, an Ex-Senator or so, United-States soldiers, Southern immigrants, whom it furnishes with weapons, adorns with a legal collar, and then sets upon the people. Just now, the House of Representatives asks what force the Government has in Kansas, and what instructions have been given. The answer is, There is only a Lieutenant-Colonel's command there,—half a Regiment; the officer is ordered not to enforce the laws of the territorial legislature. This does not tell the whole story. The United- States Marshal does the bidding of the unlawful legislature which the Missourians elected: he calls out his posse comitatus, and the United-States Government furnishes them with weapons and authority. They are the provisional army in this civil war which the Government wages against the people. Look at this fact : slaveholders have hired immigrants to go from Alabama and South Carolina to Kansas, and fight the battle of Slavery. When Col. Beaufort's party, three or four hundred strong, arrived at Lawrence, they were too poor to pay for their first breakfast. What shall be done with them? They are draughted into the posse of the sheriff; and in the service of the Government, they burn the property and shoot the sons of New England: I need not dwell on these things. Every mail brings tidings of fresh wickedness committed in that ill-fated territory.

At Washington, on a small scale, this despotic power wages war against freedom. There it uses an arm of a different form,—the arm of an Honourable Ruffian, a member of Congress, a (Southern) "gentleman," a "man of property and standing," born of one of the "first families of South Carolina," a nephew (by marriage) of Senator Butler. He skulks about the purlieus of the Capitol, and twice seeks to waylay his victim, honourable, and suspecting no dishonour. But, failing of that meanness, the assassin, a bludgeon in his hand, pistols in his pocket, attended by his five friends, armed also with daggers and pistols.