New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-05-08
AS Americans.

morning. In defiance not alone OF every
principle Of international law, but of
every dictate of common humanity, Amer
lean men, women and children, citizens Of
this neutral nation, have been exposed TO
death. have been actually murdered by
German war craft.
For this murder there is no justification
outside of that law of necessity paraded
by the German Chancellor in the opening
hours, when the first German regiments
rushed through Belgium to consecrate at
Louvain the work of German Kult,r. The
passengers, the American citizens, who
embarked upon the Lusitania were pro
tected by every rule and precedent of in,
ternational law. They journeyed to an
unblockaded port, and, thus journeying,
were entitled TO the protection supplied by
the rules of civilized warfare.
The vessel on which they sailed was a
fair prize for German warships. German
sea power was entitled to capture the Lu-
sitania if it could, to sink her if necessity
compelled. but not until every non-comba-
tant was taken from her decks, not until
the safety Of every life had been assured.
The proclamation Of a submarine block
AIDE issued by the German Admiralty was
a creation of Germans; it had no warrant
in international law, no defence in ordi-
nary humanity It was purely and simply
IAN advertisement that Germany purposed
to commit murder in certain waters; it
was a declaration foreshadowing assassi-
nation; but in law it was nothing.
Now. it seems. German naval officers
have carried out the threat Of the Ger
man government. American lives have
been imperilled, American lives have been
taken, sacrificed to the blood lust Of those
who dictate German policy and direct Ger
man action on land and on sea.
A few short weeks ago the American
!, government answered the German procla-
nation of a war zone" and a submarine
blockade with calm, fair warning Of
what would be the consequences Of the
destruction Of a single American life. In
the voice of friendship, without buster,
anger. threat, the will Of this nation was
conveyed to the German government.
To that warning Germany has now
made answer American citizens may
look for it not in the actual death list,
however great that may be, but in the
list of Americans sailing on the
Lusitania, all exposed to death by Ger
man action. Such survivors as there may
be owe their escape TO no German hands.
They have escaped the consenting muir
derers-that is all.
From this tragedy we shall now turn to
Washington. More than century ago,
when this nation was weak and its people
were lacking in all the resources Of a
great power, it made answer to the pirates
of the Barbary Coast who asserted a pre-
roeative less intolerable than that which
is now asserted in Berlin and executed
upon the high seas.
No voice will be raised, no effort will
be made, TO force the hand, TO hasten the
action, of the President of the United
States. But neither he nor any other Of
fetal in our government can mistake the
temper in which their fellow citizens will
wait. They will wait with the casualty
list in their hands. They will wait, forti-
fed each day and each hour by new evil
dence and fresh details of the manner
in which Americans, American women and
children, have been exposed to death by
German submarines.
II Germany murders Americans, turns
her artillery against neutral Americans,
sparing neither age nor sex, what worse
treatment can she reserve for an Ameri-
can nation resolved 10 defend its honor,
It's citizens, its women and its children
What can there be left for men or for
nations 70 do but 20 resort 70 that method
which in all ages has been the last resort
against tyranny and anarchy?
In sinking the Lusitania Germany has
turned a new page in history, in American
history. She has carried across the Allan
bic the spirit and the method written