New-York tribune., 1918-10-02
Gott in Camouhage!

The Kaiser is beginning to talk about
popularizing the German government.
With wry face as we'll as heavy heart
he is turning toward the people as the
last prop of his falling dynasty.
He says in his lugubrious note accept
ing Won Hertling's resignation: 1T is
therefore my will that the men who have
been borne up by the peoples trust shall
in wide extent cooperate in the rights
and duties of government"
ITO be borne up by the peoples trust
has hitherto been an absolute ban to rec
ognition in the conduct of the German
government. What statesman has ever
presented such claim when aspiring to
power or leadership under the German
or the Prussian regime? The Kaiser has
himself always been & divine right "bit-
ter ender." Only a few weeks ago in
the gun shops at Essen he was telling the
krupp workers: Each of us has re-
ceived his appointed task from on high.
You at your hammer, you at your lathe,
and I at my throne" Why, then, look
below for guidance? That savors of the
objectionable sin of doubt, "the greatest
ingatitude toward the Lord" against
which the All Highest of Potsdam also
thundered on that memorable occasion.
But now the Kaiser's faith in the Lord is
also shaken and he seeks counsel from
the spokesmen of the hitherto negligible
multitude. Whittier must he go for such
counsel? To Scheidemann, the majority
Socialist leader, and the other handy men
who acted as go-betweens in the corrup-
ton of the Boshevists and the betrayal
of the Russian proletariat? To Lede-
bour and Cohn, fluent and pestiferous
critics of the rape of Belgium and the
spoliation of Russia? To Liebknecht,
even if to secure the latter's service his
prison sentence for sedtious utterances
has to be commuted?
What other German politicians have
ever pretended "to be borne up by the
peoples trust? All the rest have cheer
fully accepted the principle of govern
ment from on high. They have always
gone hat in hand to the real source of
authority in Germanythe will and pre-
rogative of the Kaiser and encourage in
the Bundesrat of petty dukes and kings.
William II deludes himself if he thinks
the world innocent enough to be i'm
pressed by any "popularization" Of Ger
man government in which he himself
figures-any puppet show Of parliamen.
tarism for which he still pulls the strings.
Let Scheidemann succeed Won Hertling,
;,l>
knecht succeed Won Payer. The German
government will still be Hohenzollern-
ICED. The army will still be under the
exclusive control Of the same old supreme
war lord. Germany will remain what it
has been-an absolutism founded on
divine right, a medieval political sur
vival and a menace to the world
The Kaiser cannot camoufage himself
by gathering around him a set of So
cialist or Liberal manikins. The Allies
rightly refuse to discuss any sort of
peace terms with Hohenzolernism, which
has shown itself morally ossitied and in
capable of faith or truth.
If the German people, fearing an in
vasion of their soil and taste Of the
experience they have meted out to coun-
tries which they have occupied, want to
stage political revolution for the pur-
pose of placating Allied opinion, they
must begin at the top. They must cast
out the Hohenzollerns first. No German
revolution can mean anything which aims
merely at bestowing the Kaiser and his
egregious heir apparent in a nice peace
bombproof.