Brownsville herald. [volume] (Brownsville, Tex.) 1910-current, 1917-05-24
Whose War Is This?
By Anna Steese Richardson
OF the v~igiIantes.

'.How can you LET your son enlist in this
war which has been forced upon Us by
rich men-Wall Streets war;"
"Wall Streets WARP
Thus i Meroz, shirk and Stacker of An
cient Israel, reincarnated as a modern
mother.
..What i this war to me and minei' she
demands. and in the same breath answers
"Nothing! This is Wall Streets war"
Did Wall Street back Germany in its
twenty years of intensive preparation to
make war on the worldf
Did Wall Street SOW seeds of hatred and
malice in the hearts of German schoolboys.
80 that when the kaiser called them to
farms, they answered, believing that all who
were not with German were accused of
fGode
Did Wall Street issue the diabolical or
der which sank the "Lu~sitania," an afro
city which ranks with the slaughter of the
Iinnoeents in Bethlehem and the unspeak-
able butcheries of st. Bartholomew Day
in PARISH
Did Wall Street dicker with Japan and
Mexico TO strike at America stealthily
while her statesmen were engaged in MAIN
tanning neutrality, peace with honorf
Did Wall Street finance the plotting of
Won Bernstein, Dumba, Dernburg and
Boy-Edi
No!
Be not deceived by the cleverly disguis-
ed propaganda of the enemy. Not Wall
lStreet, but your country calls for your
son.
This is Americas war of elf-defense,
forced upon her by an imperial paranoiac,
a kaiser who has inoculated his entire peo-
pie with the germ of lust to kill.
And this is your war, my friend-the
war of every woman for the safety and
sanctity of her body-and the body of her
daughter.
For as surely as the Teuton paranoiac
escapes his present keepers, Great Britain.
France and Italy, and runs amuek, so
surely will his mad, bloodshot eyes turn
toward peaceful, prosperous America. As
ruthlessly as he RACED cathedrals in Bel
Eeium, turned its harvest fields into pools
of blood. and raped its women, so would
he ravaee our industries. our cities, our
farms and our daughters. Let him defeat
England, and his fleets now chatting under
blockade in the North Sea, and his men
still drunk with victory in Europe, will
cross the Atlantic on the kaiscr's mission.
TO conquer and Prussianize the American
people.
No American mother bears a son to be a
soldier, but which one of Us could raise
her head, if she felt that her boy would not
die to protect her!
You will read that this war Is the last
Gigantic struggle of a hberty-loving world
against one-man power, of democracy
against autocracy. Your own son NAV
subscribe to this broad sentiment. But
behind his idealism, behind his belief that
America should fight on the side of hui
mainly, behind his patriotism and his en-
dorsement of every word in President Viii
sons declaration of war, lies the deep
personal conviction that he must 90 forth
to fight for the s~anctity of the American
home. lie may enlist with his eyes on
the Stars and Stripes, but his soul an
swered first the call to protect his mother,
his sister, his wife or his sweetheart from
the ruthlessness, the frightfullness and the
bestialty of an army which turned the
homes, the fields and the market places
pof peaceful Belgium into shambles from
which creep wan women-ghosts which will
haunt the pages Of history 30 long a. this
world shall last.
Your boys war-my boys WARRIOR
their country, for humanity, for You and
for me-for every American women.
God give them-and us-the strength TO
see it through!