New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-07-29
DR.. Wheeler Tells
Peoples Council
It Aids Kaiser
Pacifsts' Request ELECTS
Opinion That Its Measures
Are REASONABLE

Attacks on the pacifsts, who are de-
clared TO be playing Germany's game"
were received by them yesterday in re-
Spouse to their requests sent TO promi-
nent persons for opinions on the value
of the peace movement.
The Peoples Council. West Thir-
teenth Street. which claims to repre-
sent 100000 pacifsts in the United
States, wrote to DR.. Edward J. Wheeler,
editor Of Current Opinion" asking
him for an opinion on pacifist bro
chure by Rabbi Judah L. Magnes, which
is being widely circulated.
Mr.. Wheeler replied:
Believes Country Knows It's Mind
"To raise a general discussion Of
peace terms now, just as we are en-
tering the war, before We have struck
blow, before single arm Of our
service has been recruited to war
strength, seems strangely like one
more effort TO substitute unlimited de-
bate for decisive action.
81 think this country knows fairly
we'll what it is fighting for, and II any
man of intelligence doesn't know. it IS
highly probable that ne doesn't choose
to know. The time to discuss peace
terms may come when Germany has
withdrawn every one of her soldiers
from the invaded soil Of Belgium and
France-not before. l think that DR..
Magnes and the Peoples Council are,
consciously or unconsciously, playing
Germany's game in raising a protest at
this time against material force and
the war method.
"This sort of talk may sound exalted
and noble to ears in Berlin and
Heidelberg where DR.. Magnes pursued
his postgraduate studies), but IT
sounds ominously like treason here"
One paragraph in DR.. Magnes's docu-
ment, to which Mr.. Wheeler took ex-
ception, said:
"The oppressed and driven and help
less peoples of all belligerents-b be
they called autocracies or democracies
will not forget this crime against
them. The peoples of the world will
surely avenge this betrayal Of life"
Fl. A. Wise Wood Answers Baldwin
Roger ~ Baldwin, director of the
Civil Liberties Bureau, 70 Fifth Ave-
nue., is conducting a QUESTIONABLE as
to how the country should look upon
the conscientious objector. Henry A.
Wise Wood replied:
81 would say it Is my opinion that
these men should be compelled to
serve, by force il necessary. All in
society who are physically able to de-
fend il from destruction must be COM
PEELED so to defend 1t when the emer-
gency arises-and such an emergency
now confronts us. Those who at the
front refuse should be court-martialled
and shot; those who at home refuse
should be tried for treason and i'm
prisoned.
ALSO, / should like to point out to
you the damage that propaganda
like yours has done In Russia. There
recently men and women Ike those
composing your organization have had
full SWAY. with the result that must
Inevitably follow such leadership. that
of complete national disintegration.
With the Russian object lesson before
their eyes, | do not believe that you
will find many followers here-thst is,
among those who are normal mentally.
an conclusion, my dear sir, permit
me to say that / consider your propa-
ganda as perhaps the most insidiously
evil thing that Is crawling beneath the
foundations OF our national edfice. and
that shall spare no effort to crush
il. il I can"