The watchman and southron. [volume] (Sumter, S.C.) 1881-1930, 1917-02-10
The Call to Service.

In few weeks. perhaps days. al
most inevitably will come the call for
volunteers, and our country which has
striVen SO hard to avoid entrance into
the world war must draw sword and
bear it's part. There is little doubt
but that the remarkable man, who as
president has displayed moral colr-
age to resist the sarcasm and de.
nunciations of war jingoes and dela-
agogues, will with the same courage
throw the full force of the United
StateA into conflict which has been
forced upon it. Vain, indeed is the
expectation of those who believe
America will remain in passive inac-
tivity while other nations are bleeding
for the welfare of civilization, and
degenerate indeed is the manhood OF
the nation if it do not respond w u
alacrity to the sacrifice demanded.
If the egOtism of the German pen-
pie has kept that country out OF
Hympathy with the other nations aad
made their diplomacy failure, yet
they are q brave and able race and,
war is not with them but with the
system which they have, by some
strange freak of development, allow
cd to be shackled upon them.
The selfish man may say in his
heart we have no part in this, that
we should keep our ships at home
and refuse our citizens protection II
they travel into the zone of dangec.
He is blind. Admit the right of Ger
many to interdict our commerce and
deprive us now OF the rights Of neu-
trails which have been founded upon
the combined thought and experience
of mankind from time immemorial.
not only will our industries be paraly-
zed today, but the whole intercourse
Of the world in future years will re
placed at the mercy of any two littic
nations which may choose to fight and
set up zones of danger just so larecc
as they care to name them. If We
would refuse them such a right then,
it is but cowardice built upon a near
sighted selfishness which would per-
NIT us to fail now to contest for those
rights.
And while we enter the fight for
the right Of an open sea, we will soon
look back and wonder that our nation
could so long have avoided entrance e
into this conflict. 1t is the. same Old
struggle for principles for which our
fathers have so often battlcd, the di-
vine right of kings against the democ-
racy Of mankind. Germany stands to-
day as typifying two distinct policies.
empiricism against individualism and
expediency against right. Many mo-
tives have mingled in the strange al
liances of this world war, but the is
sue is clear, and a Germany victorious
would strike at the very heart of de-
mocracy. Strange it would have been
if America, the chief exponent and Cx-
ample of this doctrine, should have
remained in idleness while others
| fought and blcd for the princip' g
| Runnymede and Yorktown and WA
terloO must be fought again and
America must take her stand. If the
need shall come, then shall America rs
| stand upon the fields Of France with
the gallant sons of Gaul and the
stubborn men of Britain and the
blood Of our manhood shall mingje
| with theirs.
Our nation will enter the war with
out tumult and shouting nor with any
bitterness, but with clear vision OF
its purpose shall not turn back uutil
fultlllment of the end.
G. H. Wilson.
Sumter, s. c., Feb. 5, 1917.