The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-01-22
Chairman Senate Military Committee Advocates Mili-
 tary Duty by Everyone
SPEAKS BEFORE
 SECURITY LEAGUE
Chamberlain's Speech Comes as Cli- max of Day Marked by Plea After Plea to Arm the Nation-LOOk
 to the Orient With Alarm

Washington, January 2l.-Unversal mil itary service was proclaimed as the only real solution of Americas national de- fense problem tonight by Senator Cham berlain, chairman of the Senate military committee, in a speech before the Ma tional Security league. Recognizing that the people were not ready for such a step however, the senator said Secre- tary Garrison's continental army plan might be utilized to provide the force which the country must have to guar antee it's security as a world power, pro- teet the Panama canal and be ready to repel possible aggression from either Flu rope or Japan.
 Senator Chamberlain's speech came at the close of day and night crowded with plea after plea for the armng of the nation. Mayor John Purroy Mitchell of New York, who presided over the night session, threw the league into a tumult of applause by demanding adequate pro- tection for the country's metropolis. Sen ator Phelan of California spoke of "the Pacific peril' and appealed for prepared ness to meet possible attack from Japan.
 Day sessions of the league were fea- tured by speeches of Henry A. Wise Wood of New York; George Von l.. Meyer for mer Secretary of the Navy, and Represen- ta tive J. Hampton Moore of Pennsylvania, who criticized the administration de- fense programme as inadequate, and by Rear Admiral Colby M. Chester retired, who defended it.
 Senator Chamberlain expressed the opinion that universal military service of . fered the best solution of preparedness problems, but that the programme out lined by the administration might be ham mered into acceptable form
 NAVY ALSO BEHIND
 'I am not going to discuss the navy" said Senator Chamberlain. q want you to remember, however, that while it is conceded that our navy is deficient, it Is not so much because Congress has failed | to keep it up to a reasonable state of preparation, but because the other nations < of the earth have outstripped America \ in the race that she ought to win. We are not prepared at sea. We have not ' done our whole duty; and I do hope that \ in the very near future our navy, instead < of occupying fourth place. will occupy at { least somewhere near the first place among the navies of the world.
 If there had been no war in Europe I would still say there was necessity for preparedness for national defense. The American brain and the American en- ergy and the American money built a canal which absolutely changed the geog- raphy of the world. That fact alone was sufficient to have compelled the Ameri- ( can patroitic citizen to have seen to it that our country, having changed the map A of the world, should always be in posi- \ tion where no other power on the face of the earth could change the handwrit- ing of America across the Isthmus of ! Panama.
 But that is not all. The ringing mes sage of Monroe to the Congress of the N United States in 1923 served notice upon N the powers of the earth that America S was to be kept intact for Americans. There was no pussy-footed diplomacy about that method
 If we intend to do what Monroe said We ought to do, it is our duty to see to it that our country is prepared to carry