During a time of national tumult and fear, this legendary Kansas newspaperman’s words endure

Legendary Emporia Gazette editor William Allen White stands watch in the Kansas Statehouse through this one-ton limestone statue. (Sherman Smith/Kansas Reflector)

Opinion editor’s note: In the aftermath of conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s death, much conversation has focused on the role of speech. Politicians and commentators have criticized rhetoric used by those on the left and right. Kirk himself was an ardent debater, which makes his assassination even more chilling for those of us who believe our country depends upon the free and open exchange of ideas.

Some of the reaction to Kirk’s death has been outright scary, with social media calls for vengeance and retaliation (an arrest in the case was made Friday).

In this heated moment, I’d like to step back for our Sunday column space here at Kansas Reflector. Don’t worry, regular columnist Max McCoy will be back. We’re going to run a Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial written back in 1922.

At the time, railroad strikes threatened commerce across the United States. Striking workers faced violence, with at least 10 slain, and officials tried desperately to restore order. In Kansas, Gov. Henry Allen urged officials to criminally charge anyone who picketed in support. Emporia Gazette editor William Allen White promptly put up a small sign in his newspaper’s front window backing the strikers. He was arrested on June, making national news. While charges against him were dropped in December, the short piece he wrote about the situation on July 27, 1922, has endured.

Throughout the editorial, White deals with the most fundamental tensions in our democratic society: the freedom of speech, the fear of disorder and the worry that misguided ideas will triumph. The situation he faced differs from today, but his words struck me as worth a read.

.youtubeContainer { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; padding-top: 30px; height: 0; overflow: hidden; margin-bottom:12px; } .youtubeContainer iframe, .video-container object, .video-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100% !important; height: 100%; margin: 12px 0px !important; }

Kansas Humanities Council

To an anxious friend

You tell me that law is above freedom of utterance. And I reply that you can have no wise laws nor free entertainment of wise laws unless there is free expression of the wisdom of the people — and, alas, their folly with it. But if there is freedom, folly will die of its own poison, and the wisdom will survive. That is the history of the race. It is proof of man’s kinship with God. You say that freedom of utterance is not for time of stress, and I reply with the sad truth that only in time of stress is freedom of utterance in danger. No one questions it in calm days, because it is not needed. And the reverse is true also; only when free utterance is suppressed is it needed, and when it is needed, it is most vital to justice.

Peace is good. But if you are interested in peace through force and without free discussion — that is to say, free utterance decently and in order — your interest in justice is slight. And peace without justice is tyranny, no matter how you may sugarcoat it with expedience. This state today is in more danger from suppression than from violence, because, in the end, suppression leads to violence. Violence, indeed, is the child of suppression. Whoever pleads for justice helps to keep the peace; and whoever tramples on the plea for justice temperately made in the name of peace only outrages peace and kills something fine in the heart of man which God put there when we got our manhood. When that is killed, brute meets brute on each side of the line.

So, dear friend, put fear out of your heart. This nation will survive, this state will prosper, the orderly business of life will go forward if only men can speak in whatever way given them to utter what their hearts hold — by voice, by posted card, by letter, or by press. Reason has never failed men. Only force and repression have made the wrecks in the world.

William Allen White was the editor and publisher of the Emporia Gazette. The winner of two Pulitzer Prizes, he died in 1944. Through its opinion section, Kansas Reflector works to amplify the voices of people who are affected by public policies or excluded from public debate. Find information, including how to submit your own commentary, here.