Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1914-12-10
WAR BRINGS new
TASKS And DUTIES
President Points Out Big Prob
lens Which Confront
Congress.
MUST OPEN GATES OF TRADE
Ships to Garry Goods to Empty Mar
kets Is Imperative Necessity
Our National Defense Lies in
Our Citizenry-Need
Of Economy.

Washington, Dec. 8.-The new tasks
and duties imposed upon the United
States as a result Of the European war
occupied the greater portion Of Presi-
dent Wilson message to congress
read today before a joint session of
the two houses. The message follows:
Gentlemen Of the Congress:
The session upon which you are now
entering viii be the closing session of
the Sixtythird congress, a congress, I
venture to say, which will long be re-
membered for the great body Of
thoughtful and constructive work
which it has done, in loyal response
to the thought and needs of the coun-
try. I should like in this address to re-
view the notable record and try to
make adequate assessment of it; but
no doubt we stand too near the work
that has been done and are ourselves
too much part Of it to play the part of
historians toward ii. Moreover, our
thoughts are now more of the future
than of the past.
While We have worked at our tasks
of peace the circumstances of the
whole age have been altered by war.
What we have done for our own land
and our own people we did with the
best that was in US, whether of char
acter or of intelligence, with sober
enthusiasm and a confidence in the
principles upon which we were acting
which sustained us at every step of
the difficult undertaking; but it is
done. 1t has passed from our hands.
1t is now an established part of the
legislation of the country. It's useful
ness, its effects, viii disclose them
selves in experience. What chiefly
strikes US now, as we look about US
during these closing days of a year
which viii be forever memorable in
the history Of the world, is that we
face new tasks, have been facing them
these six months, must face them in
the months to come-face them with
out partisan feeling. like men who
have forgotten everything but a COM
mon duty and the fact that we are
representatives of a great people
whose thought is not of US but of what
America owes to herself and to all
mankind in such circumstances as
these upon which we look amazed and
anxious.
Europe Will Need Our Help.
War has interrupted the means of
trade not only but also the processes
of production. In Europe it is destroy
ing men and resources wholesale and
upon a scale unprecedented and ap-
pGlling. There is reason to fear that
the time is near, if it be not already
at hand, when several of the coun-
tries of Europe will find it difficult to
do for their people what they have
hitherto been always easily able to do,
many essential and fundamental
things. At any rate they will need our
help and our manifold services as they
have never needed them before; and
we should he ready, more fit and
ready than we have ever been.
1t is of equal consequence that the
nations whom Europe has usually sup
piled with innumerable articles of
manufacture and commerce can now
get only small part of what they for
merly imported and eagerly look to us
to supply their all but empty mar
kets. This is particularly true of our
own neighbors the states, great and
small of Central and South America.
Here are markets which we must sup
ply, and we must find the means of &C
ton. The United States, this great
people for whom we speak and act,
should be ready, as never before. to
serve itself and to serve mankind;
ready with its resources, its energies.
its forces of production, and its means
OF distribution
We Need Ships.
1t is a very. practical matter. a mat
ter of ways and means. We have the
resources. but are we fully ready to
use them? And if we can make ready
what we have, have we the means at
hand to distribute it? We are not fully
ready; neither have we the means of
distribution. We are willing, but we
are not fully able. We have the wish
to serve and to serve greatly, gener-
ously; but we are not prepared as We
should be. We are not ready to mo-
Billie our resources at once. We are
not prepared to use them Immediately
and at their best, without delay and
without waste.
To speak plainly we have grossly
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