The Birmingham age-herald., 1917-11-12
MEN, WOMEN
 AND THINGS

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 They played big part in the birth of the American republic. For more than century this has been the land 1 of liberty, the land of equality, and the land of opportunity. but we are on the eve of still greater era, for to fulfill it's manifest destiny, 1t must be- come the land of obligation. 1 For a time the sinking of the Lusi- tania many Americans were consciously ashamed of the patient waiting of President Wilson, but new they are be- ginning to see that beneath his calm exterior, he was but waiting for the hour to strike at German aggression and Hohelzonern insolence.
 1 For 14o years we enjoyed liberty, for the same time we had equality, and now half century after the close of the ternity that nothing hereafter can ever dissolve, for in the face of the com mon foe, the north and the south have | coalesced, and the Blue and the Gray march side by side to preserve the honor of reunited country.
 
 was started on this line of thought by attending a dinner given recently at the Southern club In the interest Of the army Y. NJ. c A. work. I saw a clean shaved, clear-eyed, straight limbed young business man from New York as he stood and set forth what he was trying to do. He made no attempt at oratory, but in business like way gave facts and figures showing the worth of the Y. M. c. A. army activities. As I sat at an adjoining table, marked him well, and his manner, dress and speech set me to thinking, and my thoughts were pleasant for said to myself, at last the sense of obli- gation is getting hold of our best men in high places, and this war is going to be carried on with courage and in- telligence and patriotism.
 
 And no one who was present doubted for one moment but that the Y. M. c. A. was a forceful, wise and efficient organization and that the President and the high officials In the government were wise in asking 1t to assist them in it's great task of caring for the sol- dier and sailor boys.
 And who was the young man speak, ing? None other than William Sloane, the best type Of the educated, trained, and we'll placed New Yorker, who, real-. izing the opportunity, felt the obliga- ton and had left his great mercantile business to give his time to his country without remuneration or any thought of reward save the knowledge that he was being true to his call. Now what he is doing is what many others are doing all over the country.
 
 William Sloane of New York Is the chairman of the national war council Of the Y. M. c. A. which includes some of the biggest and brainiest men in America, and he is going over the land from city to city meeting the leading men of each community and telling them of the needs and tho plans whereby the great organization which he serves hopes to cope with the pressing situa- ton, which not only confronts America, but her allies.
 The national committee has not mapped out a little scheme but an in- ternational one that takes big money. nothing is left haphazard. but a care ful budget requiring the raising of a minimum of $35,000,Ooo with maximum of s5o,0oo,o00 was set forth in detail. the amounts of each nations requirements being given in detail, and the reason for the apportionment being explicitly set forth. By far the largest amount to be used for the care of the American soldiers and sailors.
 
 was interested, of course, in the special object for which MT. Sloane was pleading. but looking beneath his special plea for a special purpose. I saw deeper than the mere interest of the '. M. c. A., for he was but the incarnated spirit of obligation which is beginning to rest on Americans. We have seen this same
  Birmingham. As he spoke I watched Carson Adams listening intently to ev- cry word falling from his lips about service, and I thanked God for what Carson Adams had done in the way of making the men and women in the com munity feel their obligation to help win the war.
  I do not believe that an autocracy will in the end prove more effective than a democracy. It may prove swift CT, and for the time being more uni- tedly: but in the long run a nation of freemen fired with a sense of obliga-I ton will Tight steadier and stay In the game longer than men who are moved about as pawns in the war game of kings and emperors.
 This war is going to give us fellowship, as we have never known it before here in Birmingham, by making each one of us see our sense of obligation to our country and to .eouI city. The lesson we are learning is that big things, worth while things. can .only be accomplished by team work. Ikrejoice that we are learning to pull together Let's raise the s75,ooo that Chairman J. Frank Rushton is going tto ask us to do to carry on the army Y. M. c. A. cam paign