The silver state. [volume] (Winnemucca, Nev.) 1909-1925, 1915-03-27
urgent APPEAL TO
AMERICAN WOMEN

At the outbreak OF the greatest dis
aster that has ever befallen human So
ciety, the instinct Of true womanhood
responded at once The blast of the
war trumpet sounded through the
world and the echo was the outcry Of
the women of all nations.
Don 'tiv
Don't kill!''
Don't send our sons, brothers,
husbands and fathers to the slaughter
housed
''Don' Z make women and children
the victim of the unspeakable horrors
that inevitably accompany the bloody
game of warl''
We, over there in Europe, knew that
oul voices could not carry far in the
midst of the deafening crash of a
down-breaking world. Martial law ST.
lenees not only men, but women too.
Martial law means the end of free
speech, free press and therefore even
free thought.
In that killing silence the women
OF all the war-cursed nations turned
to the new world. 1t turned to your
country which with its smiling, busy,
normal life, seems to be another plan
eft far removed from our world. A
world where men have ceased to be
teachers, artists, business men, think
ers and workers, and have become only
murderers and murdered. Ours is q
world where women have ceased to be
queens of the home, guardian an
gels, holy mothers, and "iewels
of the household y that men like to
call us, but are victims of the most
diabolical conditions women have ever
neen called upon to endure.
In our hour of unspeakable sorrow
we turned to your country No other
power in the world but your nation
your Congress and your government
alone can lead in the action that will
save the tattered remnant Of European
civilization The only organization
through which we could work was the
International Women S Suffrage asso-
citation Though international commu-
nication was terribly disorganized,
those suffrage organizations that could
he reached implored Mrs. Carrie Chap
man Gait to organize a movement for
mediation and sent me from my home
in Budapest to represent the women of
Europe and voice their plea for your
help to stop the war.
I On the eighteenth Of September last,
Mrs. Gait and | presented the petit
tion of the International Woman S
Suffrage association to your govern
ment asking that the power of the
| United States be used to force media
tion. This plea was signed by the wo-
men of seventeen European countries.
We We're received by President Wilson
and Secretary of State Bryan very cor
dially and they promised to give due
weight of consideration to our plea in
further action.
| Five months have passed since then,
and nothing has been done to stop the
war except the calling for a day of
prayer by President Wilson. Evidently
some influence stronger than the com
bined prayers of the people of the ma
tion and the anguished plea of all the
women of Europe has put a dead
weight on the conscience of those
whose mission it should have been to
save the world.
| Relief work has been used as drug
to hull to sleep the conscience that
could not shut out the horrors of war.
Can not the good people of America
who send food and money for war re-
| lief understand that every cent of mo-
ney ond every loaf of bread sent to
Europe now but permits the belligerent
governments to wage war so much
longer and more brutallys If you sent
no relief, the warning nations would
be compelled to spend part of their
war loans to care for their war vic
| tims but as long as you send relief
they will spend every penny for de-
| struction.
| 1t is astonishing to me that you
! Americans can not understand, you
who are so generous that will share
your last penny for war relief, that
Europe is not poor in money. Those
billions of dollars spent ON war and
destruction are not gone, they are in
the pockets of the army contractors
and bankers. Their pockets are heavy
with blood stained gold, let them pay
| for the relief of their victims. Re
member, please, that every penny sent
for relief but allows the money of Eu-
rope to concentrate in the pockets of
bankers and capitalists and this fact
must be reckoned with when peace
cones. Why not let the belligerent
governments pass relief loans along
with their war loans and extract by
taxation the money for relief from
those who fatten on war;
Of the Red Cross work the same
must be said. Where hundreds of
thousands of men are wounded the
handful of people you can send can
not care for the sick and MANNED. And
of what value if they could2 Every
man patched up must go back and
| fight until he falls or becomes utterly
useless for war and naturally for peace
later on. Red Cross work like relief
only helps to prolong the agony.
If you could put together all the
gold in your big, wonderful country,
and if you could send it all to Europe,
it would not bring back one single
one of those men whose rotting corpses
tester in that human slaughterhouse;
lit would not stop the butchery that
fertilizes the soil of Europe with hu-
man flesh and sows the seeds of death
and disease intead of wheat and corn.
1 4 ha