The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1914-10-11
A Flag Pole For
Hyphenated Americans.

The Saturday Evening Post recent
iy contained an editorial apropos Of
the position which the hyphenated
American assumes regarding the pres
ent European war. From that editorial
we quote as follows:
Whatever American citizen cherishes
2 hyphen in these days ought to take
1t off and have good look at it in the
cold light of facts. He is going COM
fortably to his business and pleasure
as usual, with nothing worse to fear
than punetured tire or a crowded
street car. II he has sons above
eighteen years of age he knows they
are sung at school or at home.
IT he were still under the flag to
which his hyphen sentimentality at
taches him he would probably have
comparatively little business left to
look after. A dark, chaotic welter
would constitute his outlook on the
hreadWlning side. Heartbreaking search
OF the lists of dead and wounded would
be his chief domestic occupation if he
had sons Of military age.
And all for nothing-alI for paper
oogHas of statecraft which have not
the least relation to his own real in
bors. If he were French or German,
austrian or Russian, or even British,
ne would be caught in the vast de-
struction wrought by failure of gov
eminent and civilization in Europe
The flag to the right Of his hyphen is
the only big one left that stands for
those things that make the lot of the
twentieth century Caucasian better
than that OF the sixteenth century In
dian.
Having looked at his hyphen in the
light of these facts, maybe he will stop
paraAlng it. This is the worst time
eh9re ever was to invite American ad-
Variation for any European system.
In the main this war proves the es-
sential solidarity Of the American pub
lie, and no one objects to any citizens
entertaining in private whatever sym
pathies he pleases; but if any excep-
tIonal citizen OF foreign birth or
foreign born parents feels so indissolu-
bly, welded to his hyphen that he must
flourish it in other peoples faces, the
logical course for him is to take the
next east-bound steamer and shoulder
a. musket.
All OF which IS well said. But an Am
erican who has evidently gotten a
long way off from his hyphenated an
cestry has elected some even better
advice from the Columbia, S. c., State.
This American writes:
am just a plain American, with
no ancestor on either side for more
than two hundred years who was not
born within the territory Of the thir-
teen original States.
Irish, Polish and English, and 7 am
anxious to learn from llypherated Am !
orleans how to use tie overworked |
dash in my own case
To this clearly patriotic but troubled
citizen, the State replies that he should !
stand his hyphen up perpendicularly |
and make a flag pole out of it. Con- |
tinuing, our South Carolina contem-
porary says:
Just as the rest OF the people Of this
country, his duty rs to that hyphen is !
plain He should turn it around till !
it assumes the perpendicular, and he +
should see to it that, once erected, it |
sways neither to the right nor to the ,
left, forwards nor backwards.
The idea is an excellent one and, to |
make it perfectly plain as well as
complete, we would suggest that to the
top Of this pole should be attached an |
American flag and that it be kept |
floating day and night as a constant /
reminder of the blessings enjoyed by |
the fortunate people whose undivided |
and unhyphenated allegiance it should |
have.