Little Falls herald. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1889-1950, 1915-12-10
been pro7Identially assigned to- it.

nave 0AO II 10y AAAAl!AA - - -
any immediate danger
arising out Of orr g 4 Is other
nations. We ares1t.6ee the /
nations Of the .worl NM -
son to hope that m que n con
troversy between this and other gov.
ernments will lead to any serious
breach Of amicable relations. grave. as
some differences of attitude and policy
have been, and may yet turn out to he.
l am sorry to say that the gravest
threats against our national peace and
safety have been uttered within our
own borders. There are citizens Of the !
United States, l blush to admit. born
under other dags, but welcomed under
our generous naturalization laws to the
full freedom and opportunity Of Amer
lea. who have poured the poison Of dis
loyalty into the very arteries of our
national life. who have sought to bring
the authority and good name Of our
government into contempt, to destroy
our industries wherever they thought
it effective. for their vindictive pur-
poses to strike at them and to debase
our politics to the uses Of foreign In
trigue. Their number is not great as
compared with the whole number of
those sturdy hosts by which our ma
ton has been enriched in recent gen.
erations out of virile foreign stocks.
but it is great enough to have brought
deep disgrace upon us and to have
made it necessary that We should
promptly make use Of processes of law
by which we may be purged of their
corrupt distempers.
America never witnessed anything
like this before. It never dreamed it
possible that men sworn into its own
citizenship, men drawn out of great
free stocks such as supplied some of
the best and strongest elements Of that
! little, but how heroic. nation that In
high day Of old staked its very life to
free itself from every ENHANCEMENT
| that had darkened the fortunes of the
older nations and set up new stand
ard here-that men Of such origins and
! such free choices of allegiance would
| ever turn in malign reaction against
the government and people who had
welcomed and nurtured them and seek
to make this proud country once more
a hotbed of European passion. A lit
tie while ago such thing would have
seemed incredible. Because it was in
credible we made no preparation for
it, We would have been almost
ashamed to prepare for it, as If we
were suspicious Of ourselves, our own
comrades and neighbours! But the ugly
and incredible thing has actually come
about. and we are without adequate
federal laws to deal with it. l urge
you to enact such laws at the earliest
possible moment and feel that in doing
so I am urging you to do nothing less
than save the honor and self respect
of the nation Such creatures Of pas
sion. disloyalty and anarchy must be
crushed out. They are not many. but
they are infinitely malignant. and the
hand of our: power should close over
them at once. They have formed plots
| o destroy property. they have entered
into conspiracies against the neutrality
Of the government, they have sought
to pry into every confidential trans
action Of tie government in order stt
serve interests alien to our own, 1t !:
possible to deal with these things very
ehectually. need not suggest thu
terms in which they may be dealt with
l. wish that it could be said that onl!
a few men, misled by mistaken sent
ments OF allegiance TO the government
under which they were born, had bee
guilty Of disturbing the self possession
and disappearing the temper am
principles Of the country during thes
days of terrible war, when 1t woul,
seem that every man who was truly1a
American would instinct1vely make i
his duty and his pride to keep tn
scales Of judgment even and prove him
self a partisan Of no nation but hi
own. But it cannot. There are som
men among Us and many residen
abroad who. though born and bred II
the United States and calling them
selves Americans, have %. torEpttel
themselves and their henor as citizen
as to put their passionate sympath.
with one or the other side In the grea
European conflict above their regar,
for the peace and. diRntty Of the Unite.
States. They also .peeach and practtc,
disloyalty. No laws I suppose, ca,
reach corruptions Of the mind ant
heart but should not speak Of other,
without also speaking OF these and ex
pressing the even deeper humiliation
and scorn which every self possessed
and thoughtfully patriotic American
must feel when he thinks of them an{
Of the discre1it they are daily bringin,
upon US.
What is more important is that thu
industries and resources Of the country
should be available and ready fol
mobilization. It is the more impera
lively necessary, therefore. that VIC
should promptly devise means for do
ing what we have not yet done-that
We should give intelligent federal aid
l