The Hood River glacier. (Hood River, Or.) 1889-1933, 1917-09-06
WHAT AMERICANS
ARE FIGHTING FOR

cent issue of the New York Tribune:
1t is natural that Mr.. Root, newly
returned from Russia, with the condi-
tions in that country still fresh in his
mind. should utter fresh words of stern
and solemn warning to his country
men. What German agents accom-
plished in Russia they are seeking to
accomplish in the United States. The
confusion, disorder and anarchy which
German spies, agents, instruments,
have produced in the Muscovite nation
they are seeking to produce in the
Cn.ted States.
And in both nations the methods are
the same. While one group Of German
spies seeks to turn to German ends the
humanitarian and the pacifist, to make
use of the desire of men for peace, for
social progress. for moral and political
reform, another group is operating
amidst those for whom murder is the
approved method, and destruction,
blind, mad destruction, the sole proceed
ure.
In America as in Russia the Germans
are making one set of appeals to the
pacifiists and another to the |. w. w.
They ar0endeavoring on the one hand
to delude the honest, patriotic, ideal
istic elements, and on the other to
marshal and employ those who are the
natural enemies of law and order and
the sworn foes of all government. In
the senate the German agents speak
with the voice of the friends of hu-
manity, and i'm the mine and the work.
| chnn until tho tnnn of tho and
the road agent.
And the consequence of all this is
plain. Never since the Civil War has
there been such open and outspken dis
union in the country as today. Even
in the Civil War those who preached
disunion were not the spokesmen of an
alien nation. of foreign state, of a
different system of laws and hostile
form of government. They were
Americans, and they believed that for
American reasons certain things should
be changed. They were the descend
ants of the men who had shared with
| tn whole Thirteen Colonies the strug.
gle for freedom, and they remained
loyal to their conception of what that
freedom was.
Dub tilS NSiAhuii uSSiitb uiih oCl dtito
| in this country are not interested in
America. They are no more interesed
| in the safety or prosperity of the Unit
ed States than are those other German
agents in the security and progress of
the Russian people. Their interest,
their concern, their business, is to do
anything and everything that may aid
Germany, however much it Injuries the
United States.
Mark, too, how similar is the Ger
man method in Russia and the United
States. Russia. emerging from long
slavery, seeking to win clear of old
tyranny, abolishes the chains that have
| fettered free speech and free press.
Instantly the Germans seize upon free
speech and free press to disseminate
German arguments and under the cover
of the new liberty to seek to destroy
all Russian independence. Before the
revolution the Russian agents trafficked
with the ministers of the Gear, who
were prepared to betray the nations !;
they sought to make use of the fear of
the Gar and his monarchial associates,
the fear of revolution and of Russian
emancipation. to procure surrender
to Germany. When the Gar was over
thrown they turned to the new and
sought to use the revolution as they
had endeavored to employ the mon
archy.
In the United States we have the
tradition and the inheritance of free
press and of free speech. 1t is an An
glo-Saxon tradition, and we cling to
it as one of the foundations of our lib
erty. But behold, the Germans have
seized upon it as the best agency for
their own purpose. Like the cancer
that attacks vital organ of the body
and cannot be cut because to cut it
means to destroy the organ and kill
the sufferer. the Germans have seized
upon free speech and free press and
used them to destroy national unity and
national safety.
Because we permit free discussion in
and out of the press of all the national
and international questions, because we
believe that only in such discussion is
there safety, the German is able to
preach in scores of public places and
newspapers daily a gospel of sedition,
to disseminate treason and poison. We
are daily at the mercy of traitors, and
the policies of the government and the
safety of Americans at home and
abroad are impaired. Our system of a
free press was designed to permit all
men of our nation, all Americans, all
loyal citizens, to speak their mind and
to have all views expressed. But it
was based Upon the idea that all Amer
leans would be loyal to their conception
of American rights. The German
seizes upon this machinery and makes
it the deadliest of all his weapons for
undermining national unity, safety,
power for self defense, employs it to
utter treason and to foster disloyalty.
The greatest injury Germany has
done the United States is not in sink
ing the Lusitania or invading our
rights upon the high seas. The real
wrong is the attack upon our own unity,
the effort to destroy our national in
tegrity. not by assault from without,
but by intrigue from within. 1t is not
even by offering Texas and California
to the Mexicans and the Japanese that
Germany has sinned against us most
hagrantly. The real casus belli is
German performance within this nation.
The true injury is the attempt to de-
stroy us, to wreck the American Re-
public, as the Russian Republic has
been we'll nigh wrecked
And since we cannot abolish free
speech, surrender the liberty of the
press, abandon those institutions which
represent our civilization, there is left
no other sufficient weapon save only to
fight Germany in Europe until the
German peril in America is abolished.
There are some hundreds of thousands
of American citizens and of residents
within the United States who are loyal
not to the United States, but to the
German Empire. These hundreds of
thousands are being used steadily to
wreck this country, and they are being
used by the German government and
by those who make German policies.
This is one of the duly accepted details
of German foreign policy, and one may
read, if one chooses, the words of
Bernhard, written long before this
war, forecasting what the German ele-
ments within the United States would
do on behalf of Germany if war came.