New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-02-21
MARY ANTIN STIRS
HEARERS TO TEARS
Weak and Emaciated, She
Fights Collapse to Make
Plea for Children.

A hush fell over the audience that
had come 70 hear Mary Antin IN the
Mitchell Kennerly Building, at 81 west
Fiftv-eighth Street, last night. Inc
speaker. the chairman announced, was
struggling 10 recover from oreaN-
down she had suffered as she entered
tbe doors Il vas the result OF e%-
treme overwork for the beneht OF
"those who knock at our gates during
the last few months.
And. few moments later. Mary. An
tin. weak and emaciated, struggled
across the platform, smiled feebiy ana
announced in wavering voice that
she would continue with her little talk
Just the same.
II was impossible Mt first. Miss An
tin held on tightly 70 the little taoie'
lest she should fall. In anxiety the
audience watched her, and the cha'r-
man. David Seabury. moved his chair
nearer TO her to catch her in case she
should faint. But Mary Antin had
come to talk. she told the audience,
end she was going to talk.
But please move nearer, she
headed. and she stopped a sob. men
v hen the audience had done quietly
as she had been requested, MISS Ahtih
smiled again and said: AT last, H.
may be said Of me that have moved
my audience
Time and again Miss Antin was or
the verge Of collapse. But 1t seemed
that tho courage Of her convictions
and the fire Of her arguments held up
the little, feverish woman. Her audi
once applauded her repeatedly, IL
seemed for the sake of hiding their
tears at the impassioned words. FOR
more than once Mary Antin moved her
hearers to the verge OF crying by her
impassioned appeals for the foreign
ers. "those who knock at our gates;
those who. according TO the. speaker.
who had herself knocked at the gates
of the New World not many years ago,
make the best American.
was to raise money to give educational
employment to girls and boys from
fourteen TO twenty years. II was TO
give her audience its moneys worth
that Miss Antn struggled with her
failing strength and finally partly con
ouered it. The lecture was under the
auspices of the Society of American
Renaissance
"If we only knew what democracy
really is" she said, "if we only knew
what democracy, which is Synonymous
TO America, really stands for; if we
could only burn every existing his
torical textbook, so that we might go
back TO original sources, to Jefferson
and Madison, Franklin and Madison,
and learn what they meant by de-
mocracy. Give every man chance -
that is democracy. You don't have to
make children in the settlements happy.
Please, please, let them be happy first
Remove child labor and terrible indus
trial conditions. =,
"You speak of German efficiency.
am sick Of hearing anything about it.
don't want to be put in order. want
to put myself In order. You can only
get efficiency when we, the people, have
worked il out for ourselves
At this point Miss Antin was forced
to stop. Her face, white with the
strain and pain she was enduring, was
turned aside so that her audience
should not see her suffering.
Look at the way the immigration
question has been handled" she con-
tinued. "Our Americans have been
afraid that the Anglo Saxon race would
be effaced by the entering of those
who knock at our gates AS if the
Lord God had come to the end of His
senses when He made the Anglo-SaXon
race.
"And my race Look at the way the
Jews are being prosecuted. Little
Jewish boys of Russia are sending
their pennies to the Russian war fund.
The women come to deposit their Jew
els after giving up their men. This
is what the Jews are doing. Read
the records OF the bloody fields where
they are being msssscred and tell me
what Is now being done for them