The Topeka state journal., 1916-05-01
Colonel Roosevelt Points Out
Neglect of america.
War Would Teach Us Lessons
We Will Not Heed.
WE MUST Be A REAL NATION
Not Just Call Ourselves One,
Rough Rider Declares.
Prenaredness in Both Soul and
Body in q. S.

Chicago, May Middle west m
difference melted under the flre OF
RoOsevelt's personality during his sat
urdav visit here. Greeted by o'oOo per
sons at the La Sale street statoh on
his arrival at 9:45 a m, with cries oI
1--WE want Teddy" he was escorteu oy
a detail of police through cheerlhS
masses to an open automobile and es-
corted to his hotel amid a demonstra-
tfcn which friendly observers oe-
clared surpassed the reception accord-
ed here to President Wilson When ne
visited chicago recently on his pre-
paredness campaign.
Crowds lined the streets waving
small American flags as he rode BY
Thousands Of citizens-rnen ana Wo-
nen-are wearing consp1cuously dls-
played buttons bearing the inscription,
rRoosevelt and Safety
Addresses State Bar Association.
The climax to his visit came Satur-
day night when he delivered an ad-
dress on preparedness at the annual
banquet of the Illinois Bar association
Fifteen hundred of Illinois citizens
including Governor Dunno. heard his
address and stood on their rect ana
cheered the telling points.
1t was q brilliantly serious presen-
tation of the platform on which Col
onel Roosevelt stands before the
American people today.
-- His address follows:
Thought Day of Wars Past
A wear and three-quarters have
passed since the opening of the great
war All the outset our people were
stunned by the vastness and terror of
the crisis. We had been assured by
many competent persons that the day
of great wars had ended. that the
reign of violence was over. that the
enlightened public opinion of the
world would prevent the expressions
of weak nations. To be sure, there
was ample proof that none of these
assurances were true, and far-seeing
men did not believe them. But there
was good excuse for the mass of the
people being misled. Now. however,
there is none. War has been Waged
on a more colossal scale than ever be-
fore in the worlds history; and cynical
indifference to intel national morality
and willingness to trample on inof-
fensive peace-loving peoples who are
also helpless or uimid have been
shown on a greater scale than since the
close of the Napoleonic Wars over a
century ago. Alone of the great pow
erS, we have not been drawn into this
struggle. A tWo-fold duty was inn
posed upon us by the fact of our pros
perity and by tie fact of our momen-
tary immunity from danger. This two
fold duty was, first, to make our voice
felt for the weak who had been
wronged by the strong and for inter-
peace on terms of justice for all con-
cerned; and, second, Immediately and
in thOroughgOing fashion to. prepare
ourselves so that there might not be-
fall us on an even greater scale such
disaster as befelI Belgium. We have
+ credible to relate. we are not in any
substantial respect stronger at this
moment in soldiers or rifles, in seamen
or ships, because of any governmental
lyn IN -
war; and moreover we have seen every
device and provision designed by hu-
manitarians to protect international
right against international Wrongdoing
torn into shreds and have not so much
as Ventured to speak effectively one
word of protest. The result is that
every nation in the world now realizes
our weakness and that no nation in
the world believes in either our disin-
tereStednesS or our manlineSS The
effort to placate outside nations by be-
ing neutral between right and wrong,
and to gain good will along profess
sional pacifist lines by remaining help
less for self-defense, has resulted,
after two fatuouS years, in SO sha ping
affairs that the nations either already
feel, or are rapidly growing to feel for
us, not only dislike but contempt.
Face the Facts.
This is not a pleasant truth; but it is
the truth and as a people we will do
well to remember Emerson's saying
that in the long run the most unpleas-
ant truth is a safer travelling COM
paniOn than the pleaSanteSt falSehoOd.
Our duty is to face the facts and then
to take the thorough-going action
necessary in order to meet the situa-
tion that these facts disclose.
Our plain duty, infinitely our most
important duty, is the duty of pre-
paredness. Unless we prepare in ad-
vance we cannot when the crisis comes
be true to ourselves. If we cannot be
true to ourselves, it is absolutely GER
tain that we shall be false to every one
else. If we are not able to safeguard
our own national honor and interest
we shall make ourselves an object of
scorn and derision If we try to stand
up for the rights of others. We have
been sinking into the position of the
China of the Occident and we will do
well to remember that China-pacifist
China-has not only been helpless to
keep it own territory from spoliation
and its own people from subtugation
but has also been helpless to exert even
the most minute degree of influence
on behalf of right dealing among
other nations.
Take China View?
There are persons in this country
who openly advocate our taking the
position that China holds, the position
from which the best and wisest China
men are now painfully trying to raise
their land. Nothing that 1 can say
will influence the men and women
who take this view. The holding of
such a view is entirely incompatible
with the right to exercise the priv
ileges of f-government in democ-
racy, for self-government cannot per-
manenly exist among people in
capable of self defense
But 1 believe that the great major
ity of my fellow -countrymen. when
they finally take the trouble to think
on the problem at all, will refuse to
consent to or acquiesce in the Chinafi-
cation of this country. 1 believe that
they will refuse to follow those who
would make right helpless before