The Meridian times. (Meridian, Idaho) 1909-1938, 1917-06-22

all sorts of guises. but never with the /
terms disclosed which the German gov. /
eminent would be willing to accept |
That government has other valuable |
pawns in its hands besides those / have |
mentioned. 1t still holds a valuable |
part of France, though with slowly re- |
laxing grasp and practically the whole |
of Belgium. Its armies press close
upon Russia and oyerrun Poland at
their will. Ii cannot go further, it dare
not go back. 1t wishes to close its bar
gain before it is too late and it has
little left to offer for the pound of
flesh 1t will demand.
One Chance.
'eThe military masters under whom
Germany Is bleeding see very clearly
to what point fate has brought them
IL they fall back or are forced back an
inch, their power both abroad and al
home will fall to pieces like house
of cards. 1t is their power at home
they are thinking about now more than
their power abroad. 1t is that power
which is trembling under their very
feet; and deep fear has entered their
hearts. They have but one chance to
perpetuate their military power or
even their controlling political influ
ence
If they can secure peace now with
the immense advantages still in their
hands which they have up to this point
apparently gained, they will have jus
titled themselves before the German
people; they will have gained by force
what they promised to gain by it; an
immense expansion of German power,
| an immense enlargement of German
industrial and commercial opportuni-
| ties. Their prestige will be secure and
with their prestige their political pow
| er. If they failed, their people will
| thrust them aside; q government ac-
countable to the people themselves will
be set up in Germany as it has been
in England, in the United States, in
France and in all the great countries
of the modern time except Germany.
Ii they succeed, they are safe and Ger
many and the world are undone IL
they fail, Germany is saved and the
world will be at peace. If they sue
coed, America will fall within the
menace. We and all the rest of the
world must remain armed, as they will
remain and must make ready for the
next step in their aggression; If they
fail, the world may unite for peace
and Germany may be of the union.
! DO you not now understand the
new intrigue, the intrigue for peace
| and why the masters of Germany do
not hesitate TO use any agency that
promises to effect their purposes, the
deceit of the nations? Their present
particular aim is to deceive all those
who throughout the world stand for
the rights of peoples and the self gov
eminent of nations; for they see what
immense strength the forces of Justice
and of liberalism are gathering out of
this war. They are employing liberals
in their enterprise. They are using
men, in Germany and without, as their
spokesman, whom they have hitherto
despised and oppressed, using them
for their own destruction-Sociali
: the leaders of labor, the thinkers they
have hitherto sought to silence. Lee
e them once succeed and the men nov
: their tools will be ground to powde
n beneath the weight of the great mill
n tary empire they will have set up; tn
: revolutionists in Russia will be cut of
e from all succor or cooperation ii
/ western Europe and counter revolu
|. tion fostered and supported; German,
I herself will lose her chance of free
S dom. and all Europe will arm for tn,
i next, the final struggle.
l sThe sinister intrigue is being nc
less actively conducted in this country
than in Russia and in every country
in Europe to which the agents and
dupes of the imperial German govern
ment can getsaccess. That government
has many spokesman here, in places
high and low. They have learned dis
erection. They keep within the law. 1t
is opinion they utter now, not Sedition.
They proclaim the liberal purposes of
their masters; declare this a foreign
war which can set England at the cen
ter of the stage and talk of her ambi-
ton to assert economic dominion
Throughout the world; appeal to our
ancient tradition of isolation in the
politics of the nations; and seek to
undermine the government with false
professions of loyalty to it's prin-
ciples.
Mo Headway.
"But they will make mo headway.
The false betray themselves also in
every accent. 1t is only friends and
partiSanS of the German government
whom we have already identified who
utter these thinly disguised disloyal-
|
world and nowhere are they more
plainly seen than in the United States,
where we are accustomed to deal with
facts and not with sophistries and
the great fact that stands out above
all the rest is that this is a peoples
war, a war for freedom and justice
and self government among all the ma
tons of the world, war to make the
world safe for the peoples who live
upon it and have made ii their own
the German people themselves includ-
ed, and that with us rests the choice
to break through all these hypocrisies
and patent cheats and masks of brute
force and help set the world free, or
else stand aside and let it be dominant
ed long age through by sheer weight
of arms and the arbitrary choices of
self constituted masters, by the nation