Page:Karl Liebknecht - Militarism (1917).djvu/173

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SOME CARDINAL SINS
141

effectively reinforce its "tone" by the sound of the cannon, the rattling of musketry and the swishing of the sabre, an accomplishment in which it still outstrips even the proletariat of America. The following facts are not only instructive in regard to the great importance which the methods of military recruiting and the disposition and training of troops have for their availability against the "interior" enemy. They often assume a peculiar character in consequence of the comparatively well-armed condition of the working-class, attributable to circumstances peculiar to America.

Beyond the ocean, as in Belgium, the period of the butchery of workingmen begins with the movement of the unemployed. On January 13, 1874, a strong police force pounced upon an unemployed demonstration without any provocation. Hundreds of severely wounded workmen remained on the battle-field of Tompkins Square, New York.

Then followed the dramatic events of the railroad strike in the month of July, 1877. Against the strikers of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad