The Union times. [volume] (Union, S.C.) 1894-1918, 1917-08-24
PATRIOTIC MEETING
HELD SATURDAY

like that? You would not stay off.
You would go on.
A young man came into my office
and said, Il don't believe in war, nor
in killing people,. 1 said to him, Nor
do I. Young man, you exercised the
great right of personal liberty in COM
ing here, you chose to exercise that
great right. Now you say to me that
you do not believe in our country's
cause when we are fighting for the
very privilege that you engaged in
coming here
every man that makes it less easy
for the cause we represent is some
thing of traitor"
| Hon. Sam ]. Nichols was next in
troduced and in part said:
when I received an invitation from
your committee to speak in Union
county at a patriotic celebration, /
was not at all surprised, because so
far as the record shows Union county
| is the only county in the United States
which furnished more than her quota
of men before the draft law was put
into effect, therefore you can see why
/ was not surprised that patriotic
meetings were to be held in your coun-
ty.
81 have spoken with much pride to
cabinet members, to senator's and to
members of the house about your rec
ord and before start my discussion
of the war proposition want to again
congratulate you upon the splendid
record that you have made.
81 feel that it is my duty today to
tell you why we were brought into
this war, because l think, possibly,
holding the position 1 do, that l am
more familiar with the situation than
some of you are. You know, and
know, that no man has fought harder
to keep this country out of the terrible
conflict across the water than our no
BILE president. Congress was behind
him in this matter, and to be perfectly |
frank with you some of us thought |
that we had suffered too much before |
this wjee man gave us tie No s s{Sp., |
IS sPIo bqgin with; when the EUsitaniaI
WIS sunk and our men; Yomen hnd
IN sdren were sent to the bottom of I
befed fof feS9iig - . y f9sident SAID
Hold! If there is any reasonable way
for Germany to explain this terrible |
tragedy, let's give them a chance to
do it, They tried to explain by say
ing that American citizens should not
travel on ships of belligerent ma
tion. We never conceded this propo-
sition for an instant, but we did, upon
their assurance, absolutely sworn to
by them, decide that we would await
developments and see whether or not
they would be true to their pledge and
not let the thing occur again. Num-
erous other cases of the same kind
happened and still we took their ex-
planation in each case, hoping almost
against nope that Germany really was
not trying to force us into the war.
"In the meantime Germany had the
effrontery to deliberately inform our
government that they intended to
sink, not only the ships of belligerent
nations, but the ships of the United
States, if they were caught in GER
tain zones, and Immediately after this
notification they started a wholesale
slaughter upon not only the property
of American citizens but the lives of
your people and mine. Even then,
although the whole country and the
whole world knew that we had every
justification for declaring war our
president desisted, but informed Ger
many that if these depredations con-
tinued we would have to declare
state of war.
"While all these murders were be-
ing perpetrated our secret service men
had of course been trying to keep up
with Germany and find out their real
intentions. At this juncture it devel-
oped, not by guess, but by direct writ
ten testimony, that Germany had
made proposition to Japan and Mex
leo to invade our country, murder our
citizens and take our property. They
had even gone so far'as to promise
Mexico the States of Texas, California
and New Mexico in case Germany,
with the assistance of Japan and Mex
leo, could conquer us.
"Have you ever heard of more
dastardly attempt to stab us in the
back? Here was Germany protesting
to be our friend and at the same time
trying to employ other nations to.
make war upon us. Even then after
knowing these facts, the president
gave Germany an opportunity to ex-
plain. He went a great deal further
than would have gone and great
deal further than the patriotic citizens
of Union county would have gone in
order to avoid this war.
"South Carolina has never sought
conflict. but no man can tell me truth
fully that South Carolina ever went
so far as to allow her most sacred
rights to be invaded without rising
mn to defend them. These matters