This hysteria is ridiculous! Ridiculous, I tell you! To be aware of Communist Russia, yes, but to kill people just because they’re immigrants? This thought used to be unfathomable to any good citizen of the United States. But now… Now, I can hardly believe my own eyes and ears.
Look at the lot of you. Remember the Palmer Raids? You were so thirsty for justice and protection that you followed that over-ambitious man Palmer into jailing innocent people. Yes, innocent of any crime. You jailed them because you were afraid, afraid of the Reds, the Bolsheviks. But Lenin and his followers are a world away! Far overseas from here! How could they ever possibly harm you or our nation?
Take a moment and think of Sacco and Vanzetti. They were among the many people jailed without trial or fair cause. On April 15, 1920 two gunmen did rob and kill a guard and a postmaster of a shoe factory in South Braintree, Massachusetts. But what proof have you that these men, Sacco and Vanzetti, were the men who committed this crime? Absolutely none whatsoever. They died innocent men.
You also followed Palmer in deporting more than 500 immigrants back to their homelands, even though they were legal citizens. You even expelled your own New York State Assembly members just because they were socialists. What had they ever done to you to threaten you? Had they ever harmed you in any way, or given you reason to doubt their judgment. No, and yet you still expelled them.
As far as I can see, you are all just a bunch of scared children. You in no way act to disprove this to me, and most likely, many other people as well. You are afraid of something that will never happen in this beautiful country of ours. You are afraid of Lenin, and are taking it out on everyone around you. You are hitting at something in the dark that isn’t even trying to hit back. I think you should let well enough alone, make silent preparations for any attack you think might come, and let innocent people live their lives in safety and security. You are acting toward them as you are afraid the Communists will act toward you. And what does that make you? Don’t lead this country by fear, lead it by example. Let’s make this a country to be proud of.
Back to History Essays.
