The General and the Coxeyite March
Major-General Nelson A. Miles visits Seattle's Rainier Club and scoffs at the 'Coxey Movement' of unemployed workers marching on Washington D.C.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Major-General Nelson A. Miles, the present commander of the division of the Missouri and prospective commander of the army of the United States, is at the Rainier on a pleasure tour of the Coast. To a reporter, Gen. Miles said: 'I do not think there is any need for apprehension of serious trouble on account of this so-called Coxey movement, not even if a million of his followers should march upon Washington City with the purpose of coercing congress. There are 11,000,000 other citizens of the United States who are law-abiding and will not tolerate any such proceedings, and who may be counted upon to uphold the character of our government. At present the army of the United States has nothing to do with the matter. The municipal authorities are now dealing with it.'
“I do not think there is any need for apprehension... not even if a million of his followers should march upon Washington City.”
This reflects the deep Gilded Age anxiety toward organized labor and the 'Industrial Armies' formed during the Panic of 1893. The tension between public dissent and state power remains a central theme in Seattle's political history.
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