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108 VIOLENCE AND THE LABOR MOVEMENT
in America and also for the practices of "popular justice"
that used to be a common feature of frontier life.
In the absence of a properly constituted legal machinery
groups of men undertake to shoot, hang, or burn those
whom they consider dangerous to the public weal. In
Russia it was inevitable that a terrorist movement should
arise. The courts were corrupt, the bureaucracy oppressive.
Furthermore, no form of freedom existed. Men
could neither speak nor write their views. They could
not assemble, and until recently they did not possess the
slightest voice in the affairs of government. Borne
down by a most hideous oppression, the terrorist was the
natural product. The same conditions have existed to
an extent in Italy, and probably no other country has
produced so many violent anarchists. Caserio, Luccheni,
Bresci, and Angiolillo have been mentioned, but there
are others, such as Santoro, Mantica, Benedicti, although
these latter are accused of being police agents. In Italy
the people have for centuries individually undertaken to
execute their conception of equity. Official justice was
Among all classes it has long
too costly to be available to the poor, and the courts
were too corrupt to render them justice. For centuries,
therefore, men have been considered justified in murdering
their personal enemies.
been customary to deal individually with those who have
committed certain crimes. The horrible legal conditions
existing in both Spain and Italy have developed
among these peoples the idea of "self-help." They have
taken law into their own hands, and, according to their
lights and passions, have meted out their rude justice.
Assassination has been defended in these countries, as
lynching has been defended recently, as some will remember,
by a most eminent American anarchist, the Governor
of South Carolina.