Today -100: April 25, 1914: Of death-defying, motor cycle riding volunteers, gringos and their detractors, deliberate and needless raising of points of honor, and black judges

Admiral Badger says there have been 17 American and 321 Mexican dead so far in the not-war. The former is higher than the number of dead the US Navy lost in the Spanish-American War.

Charles W. Dempster, I think the former member of the Montana Legislature of that name, offers to raise “a regiment of death-defying, motor cycle riding volunteers”.

The American consulate at Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, is set on fire by federal troops, and in Mexico City riots against American businesses and shouts of “Death to the Gringos” are not uncommon. An attack on the American Club is said to have been led by members of the Mexican Congress.

Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan is arguing strenuously against plans to expand the war.

The Nation (the UK magazine, not the American one) condemns Wilson’s little war, which began “because some ceremonial detail is lacking in the ritual of an apology... This deliberate and needless raising of a point of honor is a lapse into barbaric morals which would be more natural in some Prussian Colonel in an Alsatian garrison than in a humanitarian President of a civilized republic.” An interesting comparison with the incidents in Zabern.

The National Association Opposed to Woman Suffrage passes a resolution: “That we believe in leaving the decision of the policy of peace or war to the men of the nation. In case of war we stand ready to render such service as women have always rendered in such emergency.”

Colorado militiamen capture Lynn and Aguilar, which the strikers abandoned. Scabs who were trapped inside the Empire Mine by the strikers are released. Funeral services are held for 14 victims of the Ludlow fire. Gov. Elias Ammons asks the federal government for troops, but is told there are none to spare, with Mexico and all. Perhaps he’d like some death-defying, motor cycle riding volunteers?

Robert Terrell, a negro, is confirmed by the Senate for a second 4-year term as a municipal judge in the District of Columbia. His nomination has been held up for two months by Southern senators. This is Wilson’s first successful negro appointment. Not that he’s been trying very hard.

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