"The Chicago Socialists.—That the Socialists of Chicago are arming and drilling . . . they intend to try the merit of the constitutional provision of the United States which guarantees to every citizen the right to keep and bear arms."

   The Chicago Socialists.—That the Socialists of Chicago are arming and drilling, one of their leaders, A.R. Parsons, frankly admits. He informs a reporter of the Tribune that they intend to try the merit of the constitutional provision of the United States which guarantees to every citizen the right to keep and bear arms. “At our mass meetings this summer,” he says, ” we shall carry our arms with us, and if the armed assassins and paid murderers employed by the capalistic class undertake to disperse and break up our meetings, as they did in such an outrageous manner last summer, they will meet foes worthy of their steel.” “In other words, you don’t propose to use the arms unless the other side become the aggressors?” ” We don’t propose to use arms unless they interfere with us and try to break up our meetings. But as to their being the aggressors, why, that’s what the capalists always are. They are always treating the working classes with violence. Isn’t starvation wages violence? Isn’t trampism violence? Isn’t depriving men by the hundred thousand of the right to live and support their families violence, and violence of the most infamous character? We simply resist. We protect ourselves. That’s all.”

[St. Landry Democrat, Opelousas, LA., Saturday, May 18, 1878. Volume 1. Number 18. Pg. 1]

 

Also See:

 

Socialism in America.