Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1866-11-23
No More standing Armies.

One good effect that results from the
brief but fearful conflict just closed in Eu-
rope, is the general disposition it has devel-
oped to count the cost of war and wars pro-
vocatives, the standing armies, which in
that quarter of the globe alone, subtract 8,
100000 pair of stout arms from the indus
trial and productive labors of civilization,
at an annual direct cost of $4,000, 100000,
not to mention the tremendous indirect loss
that the lack of their activity occasions.
An English writer computes, that while the
whole income tax of great Britain and Ire
land amounts to S40,000,000 for the year
1865, Europe was impoverished by sixty
times the amount, sin order that count
less multitude of men might do nothing but
prepare to cut each others throats with the
utmost practical rapdity, and on the larg
est possible scale" Thus European nations
annually thrOtC array what would support
fifteen millions Of families IN The condition of
the ceU paid portion Of the English peasant
ry.
These appalling facts revived in the mem
ories of men by the summers slaughter of
25O.00O fellow creatures, and devastation of
the most fertile districts in SaXony and Bo-
hemia. are fixing universal attention and
for the credit of our time, and of the noble
profession of the press, be it said, that the
abest and most eloquent Journalists of the
Old World are loudly and earnestly plead
ing for the abolition of the bloody policy
that has disgraced the Christian Era and
modern civilization. 1t must be sadly con-
fessed that, thus far, there is no immediate
prospect of the governments needing the
wall of the people as it ascends to them
through the lips of the most enlightened of
their champions. Count Bismark is not
disarming. but is rather strengthening his
forces, while, at the same time, heaping up
all the money he can raise by tax, tribute or
war indemnity, in the Golfers of the State,
although the war has not very seriously de-
pleted them. He is contiscating horses, al
though the public stables are already full /;
he is making new needle guns in immense
quantities, and has ordered 100000 new o.
vercoats and 100000 pairs of gloves for the
winter, regarding the war as only suspend
ed because German unity is not yet COM
bletc. Russia, Austria, SaXony and France
have their military factories at work night
and day, and even Britain, of late so eX-
remely pacific, is arming all her forces on
both sides of the ocean, with brcech-loading
muskets. Still, this is nothing but carrying
out the old system of mutual terror. Each
offers the armaments of the other govern
ment as an excuse for what it is doing, in
the same breath expressing perfect will
ingness to disarm in concert with the rest.
Our own country has set the noble example
of actually doing what her European CO.
temporaries only half promise to do, and
her initiative is not lost upon the mass of
mankind. The topic is now so seriously
and strenously mooted that authority must,
sooner or later, listen and yield.
The most powerful article yet published,
on the right side cf this engrossing question,
is from the pen of Emile dc Girardin, in his
new. and well named paper "La Liberte."
1t is powerfully written with more than the
usual vehemence of that eminent writer,
and should be read wherever civilization
and religion have home. His title for his
grand philippe leader against the standing
armies, is "The Bloody Shambes." GLOW
ever overgrownn hesays, the standing arm
les in Europe may be, after all they are but
in the proportion of ] to 80, or millions of
soldiers out of 80 millions of inhabitants.
Let, then, all the men who hate murder rob-
berry and opposition, the men who think,
who preach, who write, who teach, unite
their eilorrs to our own, and, perhaps, it
will not be impossible to extricate Europe
from the bloody ditch dug for her by the
governments.
From all sides, in all free countries, in all
independent journals, in all assemblies with
n free rostrum in all churches that have a
christian pulpit, let the most energetic pro-
test raised by millions of voices, be heard,
Let these cries resound in every direction,
| Enough of blood split ! No more war
| No more standing armies No more mil
! itary recruitment by compulsion No more