The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1883-07-19
Build it Broad and Deem.

Post Auxiliaries, and it is of the opinion
that the proposed National Society should
be organized on that basis, but it has taken
pains at the same time to present the argu-
ments advanced in favor of making it an ex-
elusive society, and We give place, this week,
to long communication from Mrs. Charles,
In which the ACCESSIBILITY of limiting mem
bership to the immediate relatives of sol
diers is maintained with much spirit.
With all Difference, however, to the feel
ings Of those who think that only the
mothers, wives, widows, sisters and daugh-
tiers of our veterans should be permitted
to engage in Auxiliary work, we must say
that their reasoning is neither logical nor
In accordance with the facts of experience.
Let Us examine their arguments for mo-
ment. The favorite one seems to be drawn
from the examples of the Grand Army. Be-
cause that Order admits none but honorably
discharged soldiers of the late war, it is
claimed that the Auxiliaries should confine
their membership to the relatives of these
soldiers. Butwhy should the latter initiate
the former in this respect? The similitude
between them is only sentimental = not
actual-and the very reasons which justify
the exclusion of women from membership in
the G. A. r. might be quoted to show the
Il
idle to lilen the sympathy supposed to exist
between women whose husbands, or brothers,
or fathers served in the war, to the fraternity
existing among those who actually cam
paigned together. The former were not
banded together any more closely during the
war than now, and however cruel their ex-
periences and noble their sacrifices, it was as
individuals that they bore them and not as
an organized body sharing with each other in
common the good or i'll fortune of the time.
Mrs. Charles speaks of the " fraternity that
unites them, as by a wondrous band, through
the fact that their nearest and dearest fought
shoulder to shoulder'in the war, but she for
gets that while our veterans, fighting shout
der to shoulder at the front their mothers.
and wives, and sisters and daughters were
at home working shoulder to shoulder with
loyal women, who were not relatives of sol
| diers, in connection with such noble charities
as the Sanitary and Christian Commissions,
and that fact, it seems to US, constitute
much more vital bond of fraternity than the
one to which Mrs. Charles alludes.
And if they worked shoulder to shoulder
then, why should they not now? Is not the
object of their labors the same--the promo
ton of the happiness and comfort of the sol
der? There is no lint-picking to be done
now it is true, but there are the sick still to
be nursed, the homeless to be sheltered, the
hungry to be fed, the ragged to be clothed,
and are our veterans to be deprived of the
blessed ministrations that once were so
highly priced, just because some of our
loyal women cannot lay claim, twenty
years after the war, to being the kith
and kin of soldiers? What sort of an
Auxiliary would that be which should thus
indulge its pride at the expense of the sol
diers whose welfare it protested to cherish?
Was a soldier ever known, twenty years ago,
to question the family record Of the woman
whose loving hand soothed his aching brow,
or supplied him with the delicacies he
needed, or wrote those touching letters to
his dear ones, or ministered to his troubled
soul? Would one question it now? We do
not believe it. Our battle-scarred veterans
have it not in their kindly hearts to put
| such stigma upon any loyal woman. They
viii welcome her aid as gladly now as they
ever did. Nay, they do welcome it, and the
fact that the most fourishing Auxiliaries are
bership - those of Massachusetts,, for in
stance, while the most feeble and
exclude them unless they are relatives
of soldiers, furnishes a conclusive reply to
the assertion that exclusiveness is essential
to the maintenance of a National Society.
Common sense, justice patriotism, and true
fraternity all demand that the society should
be established ON the broad basis which ex-
perience has shown to be so conducive to the
success of The local Arxiliaries
THE removal of General Henry Harnden
from the office of collector of internal reye-
nue. at Madison, Wis, and the retention of
Leonard Lottridge, collector at SPARTA (an
inferior district, as collector of the CONSOLE
dated district, has justly excited great in
dignation among orr Western veterans
Every consideration of law and public policy
has been ignored in this removal It is an
inexcusable violation of sections 1854 and
1855 of the Revised Statutes, requiring pref
erence to be shown to all ex-soldiers in an.