The Parma herald. (Parma, Idaho) 1903-1917, 1917-06-21

greater part of her immediate plan OF
conquest and now is negotiating new
intrigue of peace" designed to end
The war while her aggresslons are Sc
cure.
All the central empires, the presi-
dent declared, have been cemented in
TO one great autocracy ridden empire,
Throwing a broad belt of German
military power and political control
across the very center of Europe and
| beyond the Mediterranean into the
heart Of Asia. This achieved" he'said,
ut is easy to understand why Ger
many is fostering a propaganda for
an early peace.
"Peace, peace, peace, has been the
talk of her foreign office now for a
year and more" said the president. "a
little of the talk has been public, but
most Of It has been private. Through
| all sorts of channels 1t has come to me
and in all sorts of guises. The mill
tary masters under whom Germany is
bleeding see very clearly to what point
| fate has brought them. If they can
secure peace now with the immense
advantages still In their hands which
they have up to this point apparently
gained, they will have justified them
selves before the German people; they
will have gained by force what they
promised to gain by It."
| President ReIterates German Aggres-
sions.
The president recited again the Ger
man aggressions which drove the Unit
ed States to war. He declared the pur-
pose for which American soldiers now
carry the Stars and Stripes to Europe
for the first time in history are not
new to American traditions because
realization of Germany's war aims
must eventually mean the undoing of
the whole world. He spoke in full as
follows:
my Fellow Citizens: We meet to
celebrate flag day because this flag
which we honor and under which we
serve is the emblem of our unity, our
power, our thought and purpose as
nation. 1t has no other character than
that which we give 1t from generation
to generation. The choices are ours.
1t floats in majestic silence above the
hosts that execute those choices,
whether in peace or in war. And yet,
though silent, it speaks to us-speaks
to us of the past, of the men and wo-
men who went before us and of the
records they wrote upon it. We cele-
brate the day of its birth; and from
its birth until now it has witnessed
a great history, has floated on high the
symbol of great events, of great plan
of life worked out by q great people.
We are about to carry it into battle,
to lift it where 1t will draw the fire
OF our enemies. We are about to bid
thousands, hundreds of thousands, it
may be millions, of our men, the |
young, the strong, the capable men of
the nation, to go forth and die benearn |
1t on fields of blood far away-for |
whaty
"Must Use U. S. Flag as 1t Has Al
ways Been Used"
"For some unaccustomed thing? For |
something for which 1t has never |
sought the fire before? American az
mics were never before sent across
the seas. Why are they sent now?
For some new purpose, for which this
great flag has never been carried be-
fore, or for some Old mailiar, heroic
purpose for which it has seen men, its
own men, die on every battlefield upon
which Americans have borne arms
since the revolution?
"These are questions which must be
answered. We are Americans. We
in our turn serve America, and can
serve her with no private purpose. We
must use her flag as she has always
used it, We are accountable at the
bar of history and must plead in utter
frankness what purpose it is we seek |
to serve.
1T Is plain enough how we were
forced into the war. The eXtraOrdi- 5
nary insults and aggressions of the
imperial German government left us '
no self-reSpecting choice but to take ,
up arms in defense of our rights as a [
free people and of our honor as a !
sovereign government The military L
masters of Germany denied us the {
right to be neutral. They filled our L
communities with vicious c
spies and conSpirators and sought to /
corrupt the opinion of our people in 9
their own behalf. When they found
that they could not do that, their e
agents diligently spread sedition Il
us and sought TO draw our $
own citizens from their allegiance p
and some of those agents were men +,
with the official embassy II
Of the German government itself here ii
n our own capital. They sought by Iii
to destroy our industries and Il
arrest our commerce. "a
Tells of Trying to lncite Mexico. HI
"They tried to incite Mexico to take OF
~ arms against us and TO draw Japan al
nto hostile alliance with her-and te
hat not by indirectiOn, but by direct eI
from the foreign office in L
Berlin. They impudently denied us p;
he use of the high seas and repeat m
'dly executed their threat that they pa
would send to their death any of our la
'eople who ventured to approach the of
casts of Europe. And many of our NJ
wn people were corrupted Men be- til
AN to look upon their own neighbors ne
With suspicion and to wonder i'm their Ga
ot resentment and surprise whether lii
here was any community in which fl
oStile intrigue did not Turk. What
reat nation in such circumstances
iould not have taken up arms? Much G,
S we had desired peace, it was de- to
led us, and not of our own choice. If
his flag under which we serve would IN
ave been dishonOred had we with no
cid our hand. Of
But this is only part of the story. tn
We know now as clearly as we knew tn
efore we We're ourselves engaged that wi
'e are not the enemies of the Ger fe
IAN people and that they are not our he
nemipS They did nor orioino+o ,,. IL -