We are always pleased to have industrious immigrants come among us. Plenty of work can be found by mechanics and laborers, and there is room in all our towns for more enterprising merchants and business men. There is one class, however, that we are opposed to, and have no disposition to hold out to them inducements to settle among us. This class is of that Propagandist school which in France and in parts of the United States, has and is seeking to sap the foundations of society. The socialist desires to destroy individual rights in property; and, if he is not a very intelligent and moral man—a rare thing,—we may have in him a neighbor who will rob and plunder us whenever he can get the chance; for he holds it as a primary principle in his creed, that no individual has a right to accumulate property for himself, and all above what is necessary to sustain him belongs to the rest of society.... Again, the socialist is an _abolitionist_ everywhere. He would not be less opposed to slavery by living in Texas than in France or in Ohio. It is part of his creed. Now, we are told that John Allen, of Ohio, and Mons. Victor Considerant, propose bringing out from France to western Texas a colony of socialists. This move, for the purpose of building up a sect opposed to our political institutions, may well be regarded with jealousy, and the founders may rely upon it that they will not be suffered to tamper with our institutions. The whole principle of colonization, where men of a peculiar caste in religion or politics seek to array themselves together in particular sections of the country, both as landholders and factionists, is at war with all the elements of society, and cannot be carried on without creating bitter and unrelenting prejudices and animosities among our native citizens. We note this advent of socialism in Texas as foreboding us no good; and we wish them to have a fair understanding before they reach our soil, that as a political sect, our whole people are against them.[5] The editorial just quoted was apparently read with wide interest all over Texas and the United States. Considerant, himself, read the article in New York and made a reply to the criticism; the _Washington Sentinel_ (Washington, D.C.) entered a long editorial in its column in support of the stand taken by the _Texas State Gazette_; and, as a further indication of interest, the writers of the editorial in the _Gazette_ received numerous letters praising them for the position which they had taken against the socialists.[6] The _Washington Sentinel_ stated that no paper had been more earnest in defending the rights of naturalized foreigners and in insisting upon the supremacy of the constitution than it had, but there were certain interferences that even it could not and would not submit to, and this interference was socialism.[7]