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The Commoner
VOL. 16 NO. 3
lnfSoT tlioso modern federalists,
sifohgtli to your arm, and may you
bo right in adjudging that tho cry
has Hpont itsolf and that henceforth
tho tido will ho tho other way.
John P. Schoolerman, Mojito Vista,
Colo, J A voto o thin district went
80 por cent against preparedness, as
near as I can remember. Wo don't
need it, and tho people can not bo
humbugged into it.
A Commoner reader, of Ky., writes:
Humanity, I think wo will agree, is
above "honor," because it includes
honor, if for no nobler reason. Tho
congressional muss over travel rights
"rights" (!) when wo aro all so
journers at tho great Inn brings
out an equal fallacy, ignoring tho
rights to peaco of a hundred for the
right to travel of tho ono.
But tho hundred havo another
right ignored, a right granted them
under tho plain language of tho fod
oral constitution. This constitution
(Art. 1, sec. 8, ch. L5, and Art 4,
sec. 4) allows no pretext for war but
to "repel invasions." Nothing else.
Is fighting ovor honor, like French
duollsts or German university stu
dents, ropolling invasions? Othello
strangled an innocent woman ' for
honor "Nought did I in hato but all
In honor." This feudal survival is not
tho quality wo respect in a man who
koops his word and pays his debts.
Bluo jays screaming bloody murder
An Old
Publication
With a New
Point of View
Think of Harpor's Weekly not mere
ly as an old publication, but as an
Old Publication with a Now Point
of Vlow. Let tho namo and tho
phraso bocomo InsoVqratyy associ
ated In your mind: Harper's Weekly,
An Old Publication with a Now
Point of View. , j. i "
What the Phrase
Means to YOU
Tho solo boast thnt Harper's Weekly
had been published for nearly sixty
years might well mean llttlo to you.
Tho old aro not Inevitably lnterost
lns. But tho fact that, with all Its
years, Harpor's Weekly Is today
more alert, morn up-to-date, moro
varied than it has over been before,
una uuqucsuoneu signiucanco.
Nowadays, people of mental sub
stance realize tho Importance of
keeping clonoly In touch with affairs
ui mo uay. iiarper s wooKiy is
edited for thoso people Politics, tho
stago, sports, curront literature,
travel, motoring, and tho thousand
Ddd facets of American llfo aro all
Jcalt with In Its pages, by word
nd picture.
Put Harper's Weekly
To The Test
ff you aro ono of tho peoplo for
whom Harpor's Weekly Is made, put
it to tho tost. Tho coupon bolow
will bring It to you ovory week for
throo months.
from their lofty perches, thesd honor
editors always sound to mo. I no
ticed that when their own whip
crackers burned babes to cinders in
Ludlow a few years back, the heavens
on tho front pago wero sereno and
beautiful. I am myself a retired
naval officer, and havo not a thing to
say against any officer of the govern
ment. I havo a hole in mo to show
that I once took an oath to defend
tlio constitution. I believe that the
good, sound sense of tho framers of
that document is n thousand times
better to be followed than the spirit
nf nnniir-rln-Tilrm. Renel invasions.
It seems to me that you pacifists ar.o
missing a point here. The gods
lying threads to a web begun;
threads that lead on and on into a
maze of technicalities and pretexts.
"Not contentment," sang Nietzsche,
"but moro power. Not virtue, but
efficiency." Defense has become a
very, very big word;' rights and priv
ileges, honor and colonies and that
endless string of precedonts from
precedent from precedent that we
dignify by tho name of international
law. When some speculator Is
nabbed trying to slip into Germany
for war prices, "American Ship
Seized" from tho very same sheets
that havo been bewailing our lack of
a merchant marine! "American."
yea, when they want our brawn, but
if sho does get by and cleans up a
million, wo are never so necessary
when they cut tho melon. Wo might
try applying the principle of the hay
seed taxpayer who boarded a man-of-war,
knife out, to whittle off his
share. Big deviltries, sir, as you
know, are never done in the name of
the devil. They are done by people
who believe that thoy are God's in
struments as firmly as Americans
believe that millionaires are entitled
to our money. Tho President said at
New York, February 27, that "No
ono seriously supposes that the
United States needs to fear an in
vasion of its own territory." In a
noto to Austria, August, 1915, we
laid down the sound, noble principle
that the United States desires to
avbid menacing the peaco of the
world by the threat of its army and
navy. This seems to mo fb wov t
talk. Yet when we know -to a cer
tainty that 500,000,000 have failed
to keep tho peace by this prepared
ness system, good men vainly imagine
that 100,000,000 must now adopt it.
J. H. Greene, M. D., Urbana, 111.:
Our President, for whom I entertain
the highest respect, has come before
the peoplo on tho question of 'pre
paredness. He asserts that it is es
sential to prepare at once against
contingent enemies, nobody knows
whom. If preparedness is as essen
tial as he seems to think, he certain
ly ought to be logical enough to take
nonuu uguumc uiose who havo al
ready declared war on the govern
ment. This would demand the im
mediate necessity of taking over cer
tain munition plants.
at tho same moment advocate a 'more
powerful military and naval equip
ment than either or both of them
together. And, if we drill an army
and build a navy, they must be
dreadful, as brutal and cruel as two
or three European armies and navies
combined. Nothing short of that
gives us protection.
Frank Stephens, Edge Moor, Del.:
I wish there were some way in which
I could express to you the certainty
of my conviction that you are auso
lutely right in your stand for Peace
as against "Preparedness."
J. H. Thormann, Cincinnati, O.:
The average newspapers did not per
mit the American public to form a
true and accurate opinion of your
practical foresight, but recently they
see you as the only real tower of
justice and strength for the good of
our country and the world at large.
Editorials do not sway people any
moro like they used to. The mental
ly blind have regained their inde
pendent vision. Still the enemies of
peace are now working harder than
ever. I meet the general public ev
ery day and feel convinced that both
your political friends and foes ap
preciate your timely stroke of policy
which kept us out of the whirlpool
of bloodstained battlefields. More
and moro they realize that the entire
world would have been turned into
a slaughterhouse without hope for
cessation. Senator Lodge tried to
belittle George Washington on the
22nd inst. and such men demand
that we sacrifice our national happi
ness for honor's sake when no honor
is at stake. I contend that citizens
who choose to travel upon a foreign
ship in preference to an American
ship are a dishonor to the rest of us
as they ignore our flag. They should
look for protection to the flag they
choose in preference to ours. A flag
that is good enough for them while
they accumulate American dollars is
good enough for them when they
cross the ocean to spend some of
them. May the Almighty give you
strength to hold in abeyance the
wish of the unscrupulous.
1
M. C. Stott, Boise, Ida.i I deeply
appreciate the great fight which The
Commoner makes in behalf of the
American peoplo as against the hun
gry trusts. Success to your efforts.
I have followed Mr. Bryan for twenty
years and have always found him to
oe on the side of the common people
and fighting in their interest.
ident Wilson, as a "preparedness"
propagandist, will not omit to advo
cate government manufacture of all
war-making instruments and all mu
nitions necessary to Complete pre
paredness. For this policy operative
might enable Uncle Sam to recruit
an army "adequate for defense"
without resorting to compulsory
methods. Our patriotic yeomanry
would be less averse to military ser
vices whon they knew that they were
enlisted to fight for Uncle Sam, and
with guns and munitions made by
Uncle Sam. Yes, take the private
profits out of "preparedness," and its
present most zealous advocates
would chloroform to death the
shameless sham. They would not
want to pay the tax, without pocket
ing the profits accruing from militarism.
J. J. Sanders, Florence, Ariz.: I
am "ferninst" committing our nation
to any policy savoring of old world
militarism. I have written my views
to Senator Ashurst. Herewith find
club of eight subscriptions to The
Commoner.
T. B. Nash, Nash, Okla.: Since we
seem determined to be prepared for
war and since, your other contributors
have failed to mention- it, I want to
call your attention to one item in the
program of preparedness that seems
to have been overlooked: this is a
supply of willow wood for artificial
limbs. Recent press dispatches carry
the statement that the supply of wil
low for this purpose has, become ex
hausted both in Europe and America.
The crippling and maiming is not
half done in Europe yet and we are
just getting ready to do ours. After
the nation has taken a man from his
home,, put him in front of the enemy
and had him cut down to, just.a, torso,
surely lie Wuld .have 'a right to ex
pect that the government furnish
him enough material for an append
age or two. Gun factories and mu
nitions plants can be erected in a lit
tle time. We can build a battleship
in a year or two, but it takes time to
grow a willow tree. The President
says: "We should profit by our ob
servation of the immediate present."
Our most recent observation has been
the exhaustion of the supply of wil
low, and we hope the President will
give tins matter careful thought. As
an example to the rest of the country
he could have a willow grove planted
on the White House lawn; It would
: llAItPKU'S AYI3EKIV :
251 Fourth Ave., New York City ;
I encloso ono dollar ($1) for which
; pleaso sond mo Harper's Weekly for
; tlirdo months, In ncconlanco with !
.yourjtrlal offor in Tho Commoner.;
S Name !
."
s .Street ;.; :
:'. :
ii"ty :
: ;
SStato
I No subscriptions renewed at this rate :
J
P. J. Davenport, Abingdon, Va.:
I have three girls and two boys to be
cursed by turning this country into
a military camp with all its brutal
of ill' f?d ?am strongly in vor
n f, a"end'to-our-own-business"
policy that has made this nation the
envy of all Europe. We win 1 ave no
wars with foreign countries unless
wo bring them on ourselves. This
proposition is monstmn r 4i.
all "robber tariffs," free trade, trusts
monopolies and combines sink into
utter insignificance. All of them
combined can't destroy pur .institu
tions half as quick as the policy our
present administration is reported as
advocating, it is incomprehensible to
mo that a so-called Christian nation,
deploring what it terms German and
Austrian militarism, submarine mur
ders, and all that sort of stuff, could
John Aubrey Jones, San Francisco,
Cal.: I predict that, should the pres
ent congress enter upon deliberations
looking to the enactment of legisla
tion to take the profits out of "pre
paredness" and resultant war, by
providing for government manufac
ture of arms, munitions and warships
the mask would be off, and the
greatest beneficiaries from contracts
from Uncle Sam for war-making sup
plies would be exposed as "nrenarpd-
ness" patriots (? for revenue only
a la Hudson Maxim. For there
would undoubtedly be maintained at
Washington the most "insidious lob
by ' yet known, armed with unlimited
persuasion," to oppose, and if pos
sible, prevent, such legislation. And
this these "preparedness" shouters
w?uil ?0' desDite the fact that the
establishment and operation of gov
ernment plants essential to prepared
ness, would be the surest guaranty
T i'Artu"s woum ne attained
at the least cost and the minimum of
risk. Wherefore it would be revealed
to the people that the zeal of theso
patriots (?) was born very much
more of a burning desire to enrich
themselves at the expense of the peo
ple than to have the country actimllv
prepared to repel armed invaders It
is earnestly to be hoped that Pres-
HEALTH AND INCOME
Both Kept Up on Scientific Food
Good, sturdy health helps one a lot
to make money. With the loss of
health one's income is liable to
shrink, if not entirely dwindle away.
When a young lady has to make
her own living, good health is her
best asset.
"I am alone in the world," writes
a Chicago girl, "dependent on my
own efforts for my living, I am a
clerk, and through close application
to work and a boarding-house diet, I
became nervous, and got so bad off it
was almost impossible for me to keep
up in tho office.
"A friend suggested to me the idea
of trying Grape-Nuts food which I
did, making it a large part of at least
two meals a day.
"Today I am free from dyspepsia
and tho ills of an overworked and
improperly nourished brain and body.
To Grape-Nuts I owe the recovery of
my health, and the ability to retain
my position and income." "There's
a Reason." Name given by Postum
Co., Battle Creek, Mich.
Ever rend tho abovo letter? A new
ono appears from time to time. They
are genuine, true, and full of human
interest. ' ' '-
-4imlAuiJM
