The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1908-05-29
JUSTICE BREWER ON THE WAR
FOLLY

enCe.l
At the close of our civil war W.
owed about S3,OO0.OOO,OOO. In the
twenty-five or thirty years following
that we paid two-thirds of that debt.
Since then. although during the last
ten years We have had unexampled
prosperity. We have not paid a dollar,
and we owe today. as We did at the
end of the Spanish war, S1,OOO,O0O,-
600.
How is this? | wrote to the chair
man of the appropriations committee
of the house and he gave me the ia
BILE from which | copied these figures.
In the last ten years the total appro-
priations for the army were 1919, O00,-
600. Of course omit giving anything
but round figures. This is exclusive
of pensions. For the prior ten years
the appropriations were only $245,-
100000. During the last ten years
the appropriations for the navy were
1907 100000. The ten years prior
i $685., 100000, or an excess in the ap-
preparations for the army and navy
during the last ten years over the
prior ten years of $1,119,OO0,O 900. That
is why we have not paid the national
debt
In all sincerity l want to ask you is
this nation any better with its magni-
ficent feet of ironclads and its larger
army than it would have been if it
had paid its national debt and stood
today as the one great nation on the
face of the earth not owing a dollar?
It costs to fire a single shell out of
those twelve-iRch guns as much as It
will cost to support an ordinary fam
lily for a year. and the trouble with
Japan at the close of its war with
Russia is that it is hampered with a
debt that it can hardly carry. Oar
great secretary of state at Rio de ia
metro pleaded for peace between the
nations of this continent
You may be able TO water stock
But you cannot water a debt, even I
national debt. The other day our great
president called a conference at Wash
ingtOn of governors to consider what
could be done to preserve our nation
al resources from destruction. The
surplus excess of our military and ma
val expenditure for the last ten years
would have reclaimed every arid acre
within the limits of the country,
would have given us magnificent ca
nails, stretching from the north to the
south. How is it we have not, when
times of peace came, as PROMPTLY as
possible paid our debts as we were in
structed by our first president?
We are told we must be ready foc
war; we are told that there are in
Vulnerable claims in behalf of our
citizens piled up in the state depart
mentS We have heard of the cruel
ties in the Congo country; we have
heard of the outrages charged to have
been perpetrated in Macedonia and
Armenia. We have heard the cry Of
the Jews of Russia that they were
prosecuted.
Has any ironclad moved in any d;
rection to put an end to those afro
cities?
Our genial friend, Secretary Taft,
said: ut is wise to send the fleet
around the Orient to put the ironclad
into the eyes of the Orientals."
The idea of putting an irOnclad into
Admiral TOgO's eyes does border on
the humorous. Why, the Japanese
know more about our fleets and our
ironclads and their equipment than
We do ourselves. and do not think
that We need to put ironclads into the
eyes of the Chinese.
| noticed the other day that Admir-
al Evans-weU, everybody likes him,
cannot help liking him; he is a bluff
old sailor, brave, true-but l see in
the paper that he says if there were
more ironclads and fewer statesmen
there would be less danger of war
Such logic as that is unanswerable. In
other words, if we had more guns and
fewer people to shoot them there
would be less shooting.
Every school in the country has its
military company. We are all crav-
ing for war, and we cannot be craving
for war and not have war. appeal to
a higher court and contend that the
principles of right and justice are
eternal and can be depended on. We
have recently passed a bill through
both hOuses-reSOlUtiOns, think-tO
restore to the coins "In God We
Trust" If we can trust him to see
that our dollars are paid, 1 think that
we can trust him to make good his
declarations in the Bible that right
eOusneSs will eXalt the nation; at any
1t