ASSASSINS AT WORK.

Taranaki Daily News, 18 February 1933, Page 6

ASSASSINS AT WORK.

The dastardly outrage at Miami is an indication of the penalties public men must accept as . part of leadership. Whether in countries where autocracy rules or in lands where democracy holds the reins there is always the fear that the work of the assassin may necessitate the rewriting of a chapter in history. Speculation as to what history might have been if freed of a particular murder is often fascinating. What, for instance,. would be the condition in Russia to-day had not a liberal-minded Emperor been blown to pieces sixty years ago? What would have been the internal history of the United States had Lincoln’s statesmanship and lofty purpose been available in the tragic years which followed the civil war? What, indeed, the history of the world if an Archduke had not been shot down by an assassin in Sarajevo nineteen years ago? It is curious that the United States has the worst of records for political murders among her highest executive officials. Three Presidents have been murdered, and it appears to have been more good fortune than anything else which prevented the President-elect, Mr. F. D. Roosevelt, being a fourth victim to the viciousness of the assassin. It will be a great relief to other nations, and particularly to the British Empire, that no shadow of blood has fallen accross what it is hoped will prove a new chapter of better economic relationships between the two greatest democracies the world has ever seen. Outbreaks against authority such as the one at Miami are usually due to lack of mental balance on the part of the perpetrator or use of him by more astute malevolence. Such crimes are part of the price paid for liberty in general. They call for the most searching inquiry and condign. punishment of the guilty, and there is no doubt this outrage will be dealt with accordingly.