The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1917-09-20

many's predestined place the dominant politi-
cal and commercial power of the world. The first
result of the effort to assert this doctrine and i'm
pose it upon the rest of humanity, beating down
democratic institutions as England, America and
France have realized them, was to bring the
world to arms against Germany. The second
was to arouse worldwide distrust and hatred
of Germany and Germans that will not pass in a
hundred years.
The Kaiser, far from being an omnipotent be
ing, incapable of error, has Numbered incredibly
at every turn. He was misled for years by the
army of spies he maintained in this country into
believing that the Germans who migrated to the
United States to escape from Kaiserism were
ready to aid the Imperial German Government IN
it's schemes of world domination by taking orders
from Berlin whenever the fateful hour struck.
In other words, the German-American citizen
was, in the view of the Hohenzollern powers,
potential traitor to the land of his adoption,
ready at all times to welcome and assist the I'M
perial armies when they should undertake to add
the American Republic to German territory.
Here and there some mischief has been done
by German agents, but with the passing of Won
Bernstorf the Kaisers hope of an uprising of
former subjects of the imperial crown ended
The chief effect of the German propaganda IN
the United States has been to arouse suspicion
and luminosity against thousands of loyal Amer
lean citizens of German birth and antecedents
who, having enjoyed American liberty and prof
tied by American opportunities, have shown no
great anxiety to betray America into the kas-
ers hands, If the mad Hohenzollern had leaned
less confidently upon the hope that his former
subjects in America would support his cause we
should not now be at war with the Imperial Ger
man Government. If he had respected interna-
tional law and not directed his war of frlghtful-
ness against us, people who had no wish to wage
war against him, we should not now be preparing
to strike down his Prescriptions with every ounce
of power we possess. His attempt to block the
great sea-lanes to neutrals, his destruction Of
American lives and property merely as part OF
his policy of terrorism, made it incumbent upon
u.s. for our own protection and in the defense OF
humanity to sound the call to arms.
We fight first for the dignity, honor and Sc
curity of America; and incidental to this high
purpose is holy crusade in behalf of all free peo-
pies to protect them from the rapacity and cru
city of autocracy. If the Kaiser wins, the tide Of
civilization will be turned back thousand years.
The court house that stands in every American
county seat as the symbol and instrument of
Anglo-Saxon freedom and justice is menaced so
long as the autocratic Hohenzollern commands
an army. We fight for the cause that Christ,
the first great teacher of Democracy, preached
to lowly men, we defend in this ideals of
free government that have developed in the
course of mans long struggle for freedom, that
are marked by the great charter won at Runny-
mede, by the French revolution, by our own
struggle for independence, and by the war for a
slaveless America that ended at Appomattox.
Not our war? No man, woman or child in
America but is Immediately and personally con-
cerned in this fierce struggle. Caesarism and
Kaserism have rallied for last stand. The
Kaiser, cloaked and helmeted like character of
Wagnerian opera, is leading his hosts against
Twentieth Century Democracy. His case is des-
perate because he is we'll aware that when he
loses as he surely will lose, he and his kind pass
to the scrap heap forever. With us this is not
war for gain; it's purpose is to hold and make
unassailabe for all time what our fathers won
for us, and what it is solemn duty to pass on
to our children's children as their inaenable
heritage.
The blood shed in this struggle is upon the
Kaisers head. There will be no peace in this
world so long soldier or one battleship car
ries his pirate flag. We make war that all who
love liberty, honor, decency and mercy, no mat
ter where they live or under what flag, may lift
their faces in hope and be conscious of the JUS
tice of God.