Decorah public opinion. (Decorah, Winneshiek County [Iowa]) 1895-1928, 1897-04-20


during summer vacation as during win
ter work. Beside that, many OF us
| have been paying taxes to city, and
state, and nation, for years, and while
we are indebted for the protection of
government, the government is indebt-
ed TO us for the honest support we
have rendered it. So l wish success
TO all earnest and competent men who
| appeal to city or state or nation for
a place to work. But how many men
i'll high place in city, and state, and
nation, are at their wits end to know
what TO do, when for some places there
are ten applicants and for others a
hundred! Perplexities arise from the
fact that citizens sign petitions with
| out reference to the qualifications or
the applicant for the places applied
for. You sign the application because
the applicant is your friend. People
sometimes want that for which they
have no qualification, as We hear peo-
| pie sing Il want to be an angel, when
they offer the poorest material posi-
bic for angelhood. Doors waiting to
be sent to foreign palaces as ambassa-
| doris, and men without any business
qualification wanting to be consuls to
| foreign ports, and illiterates, capable
| IN one letter of wrecking all the laws
| OF photography and syntaX, desiring
TO be put into positions where most OF
the work is done by correspondence.
! If 1iyinn hoI t, Ia, ,,Ia
in the world it is in those places where
patronage is distributed. In years
! gone by awful mistakes have been
made. Only God, who made the world
out of chaos, could, out of the crowd
ed pigeon-holes of public men, devel-
OPP symmetrical results. For this rea-
son pray Almighty God for all those
in authority.
Then there are the vaster perplexi-
ties OF our relations with foreign gov
ernments For directions in such af-
| fairs the God of Nations should be
| implored. The demand of the people
| is sometimes SO heated, so unwise.
/ that it must not be needed. Hark to
| the boom OF that gun which sends from
the American steamer San Jacinto a
| shot across the bow of the British
merchant steamer Trent, November 8,
| 1861. Two distinguished southerners,
with their secretaries and families, are
| on the way TO England and France to
| officially enlist them for the southern
| confederacy. After much protest the
| commit SinnprS who hn1 on, Jac lya oil 20
| England and France. surrendered and
were taken to Fort Warren, near Bos-
| ton. The capture was plain invasion
| of the laws of nations, and antagonistic
| To principle for the establishment of
which the United States government
had fought in other days. However,
| so great was the excitement that the
! secretary of the United States navy
wrote an applauditory letter to Captain
| Wilkes, commander of the San Jacinto
/ for his prompt and decisive action -
and the House of Representatives
| brave, adroit and patriotic conduct"
| and the millions of the north went
wild with enthusiasm. and all the news
papers and churches joined in the huz-
"a. England and France protested. the
| former demanding that unless the
distinguished prisoners should be sur
| rendered and apology made for insult
| TO the British flag within ten DAYS,
! Lord Lyons must return to London.
| taking all the archives of the British
| legation. War with England and
| France seemed inevitable, and war
with England and France at that time
would have made a restored American
nation impossible for long while. If
not forever. Then God came to the
rescue and helped the president and
his secretary of state Against the al
most unanimous sentiment of the peo-
pie of the north the distinguished con-
| federates were surrendered, the law of
nations was kept inviolate, the Lions
paw was not lifted 10 strike the Ea-
! giles beak, and perhaps the worst dis
aster of centuries was avoided.
| You see there are always i'm places
| of authority unbalanced men who want
war. because they do not realize what
war Is, or they are designing men. who
| want war for the same reason that
wreckers like hurricanes, and founder
| ing ships, because of what may float
ashore from the ruins. You see that
men who start wars never themselves
get hurt. They make the speeches and
! others make the self-sacrifices. No
tice that all those who instigated our
| civil war never as Il consequence got
| so much as a splinter under the
thumb-nail, and they all died peace
| fully in their beds. | had two friends
as thorough friends rs old men can
| be to young man-Wendell Phillips
and Robert Toombs. They were not
among those who expected anything
advantageous from the strife, but took
their positions conscientiOusly. They
both had as much to do with the start
ing of the war between the north and
the south as any other two men. A
million brave northern and southern
dead We're put in the grave trenches,
but the two illustrious and honest men
] have mentioned were in good health
long after the ending of things at APP
pomattox, and il those who advocated
measures recently that would have