The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1917-04-20
PRESIDENTS
PROCLAMATION
EMPHASIZES The NEED OF GROWERS
CONCENTRATING THEIR ENERGIES
ON PLANTING CROPS SO The U. S.
MAY FEED Her ARMIES And PEOPLE
Who ARE FIGHTING GERMANY.
My Fellow-Countrymen

My Fellow-COuntrymen
! The entrance of our own beloved
country into the grim and terrible
war for democracy and human rights
which has shaken the world creates
SO many problems of national life and
action, which calls, for immediate
consideration and settlement, that l
hope you will permit me to address
to you a few words of earnest counsel
and appeal with regard to them.
We are rapidly putting our navy
upon an effective war footing and are
about to create and equip a great
army, but these are the simplest parts
of the great task to which we have
addressed ourselves. There is not a
single selfish element, so far as I can
see, in the cause We are fighting for
We are fighting for what we believe
and wish to be the rights of mankind
and for the future peace and security
of the world. To do this great thing
WOrthily and successfully We must de-
vote ourselves to the service without
regard to profit or material advan-
! tage and with an energy and intelli-
gence that will rise to the level of
the enterprise itself We must real
( ize to the full how great the task is
and how many things, how many
kinds and elements of capacity and
service and self-sacritice it involves.
These, then, are the things we must
do and do well, besides f1ghting-the
things without which mere fighting
would be fruitless.
We must supply abundant food for
ourselves and for our armies and our
seamen not only, but also for a large
part of the nations with whom we
have now made common cause, in
whose support and by whose sides we
shall be fighting.
! We must supply ships by the hun
dreds out Of our Sh1pyards to carry to
the other side of the sea, submarines
or no submarines, what will every
day be needed there and abundant ma
terials out of our fields and our mines
and our factories with which not only
to clOthe and equip our own forces
on land and sea but also to clothe and
support the people for whom the gal
liant fellows under arms can no longer
work, to help clothe and equip the
armies with which we are co-Operat-
ing in Europe and to keep the looms
and manufactures there in raw ma
| terials; coal to keep the fires going
in ships at sea and in the furnaces of
hundreds Of factories across the sea;
steel out Of which to make arms and
ammunition both here and there ::
rails for WOrn-out railways back of
the fighting fronts; locomotives and
rolling stock to take the place OF
those every day going to pieces;
mules, horses, cattle for labor and
for military service; everything with
which the people of England and
France and Italy and Russia have US
ually supplied themselves but cannot
now afford the men, the materials or
the machinery to make
1t is evident to every thinking man
that our industries on the farm, in
the shipyards, in the mines, in the
factories, must be made more prolific
and more efficient than ever, and that
they must be more economically man
aged and better adapted to the par
ticular requirements of our task than
they have been; and what ! want to
say IS that the men and the women
who devote their thought and their
energy to these things will be serving
the country and conducting the fight
for peace and freedom just as truly
and just as effectively as the men on
the battlefield or in the trenches.
The industrial forces of the coun-
try, men and women alike, will be a
great national, a great international,
service army-a notable and honored
host engaged in the service of the
nation and thn u-nrlH fhn pffninnf
friends and saviors of free men ev-
erywhere. Thousands, nay, hundreds
of thousands Of men otherwise liable
TO military service, will of right and
of necessity be excused from that ser
vice and assigned to the fundamental,
sustaining work of the fields and fac
tories and mines, and they will be as
much part of the great patriotic for
ces of the nation as the men under
fire.
take the liberty, therefore. of ad-
dressing this word to the farmers Of
the country and to all who work on
the farms: The supreme need of our
own nation and of the nations with
which we are cooperating is an
abundance of supplies, and especially
of fOodstuffs. The Importance of an
adequate food supply, especially for the
present year, is superlative. Without
abundant food, alike for the armies
and the peoples now at war, the whole
great enterprise upon which we have
embarked will break down and fail. |
The worlds food reserves are law |
Not only during the present emergen-
cy but for some time after peace shall !
have come both our own people and /
large proportion of the people of
Europe must rely upon the harvests /
In America. Upon the farmers of
this country, therefore, in large meas
ure, rests the fate of the war and the |
fate of the nations. May the nation
not count upon them to omit no step |
that will increase the production of
their land or that will bring about
the most effectual cooperation in the
sale and distribution of their pro-
ducts? The time is short. 1t is of
the most imperative Importance that
everything possible be done and done
Immediately to make sure of large
harVests. | call upon young men and
Old alike and upon the able-bodied
boys of the land to accept and act !
upon this duty-to turn in hosts to
the farms and make certain that no
pains and no labor is lacking in this
great matter.