The menace. [volume] (Aurora, Mo.) 1911-1920, 1918-06-29
A new PROPHET WITH
A FOOL PHILOSOPHY
Tells Others to Keep Their Mouths
Shut But Fails MiserabIy to
Practice What He breaches

vey OHlgglnS, VINO IepleSen.e
himself to be an associate
chairman of the Committee OF
Public information" is publish
ing a series of articles in The i
Post-Dispatch of st. Louis, Mo-,
on the program of scandal, by
which it is claimed that secret
agents of the kaiser are seeking
to SOW the seeds Of dissension
among the American people.
Some of his statements and
deductions are doubtless well
founded and should be given TO
the, public. Others are trivial and
misleading in their application,
while still others show an as
founding ignorance of the SUBJ
iects on which he writes and are
absolutely malicious in their
scope and effect. y
AS Mr. O'Higgins is one of
those unknown quantities who
have been thrown into the
limelight of late, and who will
probably pass on into a well
merited obscurity as suddenly as
he emerged from its shadows, we
should have passed his writings
unnoticed as we do much of
the well-intentioned literature
of the hour, except that in his
article published in the Post
Dispatch of June 9th, he pros
titutes his quasi official posi-
ton, and goes out of his way to
strike blow at what he terms
religious prejudices" and "the
religious question"
Why he should have done so
is not apparent unless we con-
slider the name "O'Higgins"
which indicates it's racial origin,
and the evident fact that the
part of the article referred to
plainly shows on which side of
the religious question" Mr..
O'Higgins belongs.
Said the Post-Dispatch:
Various persons and publications
that made a living out Of sectarian
animosities before the war are un-
consciously doing the work of the
enemy by assisting the spread Of anti
Catholic and anti-Protestant ISLANDERS.
They can only be stopped by an ap-
peal to public reprobation. They are
representing the trouble in Ireland
as purely religious trouble, and the
opposition to conscription in Quebec
as the same sort of thing. Even
Rudyard Kipling recently fell into
the trap and denounced the pope and
the Kaiser and the neutrals in one
breath. Such denunciations overlook
the fact that Cardinal Mercier, the
Catholic prelate of Belgium, has been
the most effective popular opponent
of the Kaiser that Europe has pro-
duced. This is a war of nations, not of
creeds. Prussia is as Protestant a
nation as England is, and Belgium
and Poland as Catholic as Austria.
Anyone who raises the religious ques-
tion in America today is acting as a
German agent, whether he knows il
or not, as truly as if he were blowing
up munition plants. All loyal citizens
should discourage him.
While, at first sight, this de-
mand for a cessation of the dis
cussion of religious questions
looks to be of general application
it is clear that it is aimed at
those who criticise in any man.
ner the Catholic church, its
leaders, or any of it's members
and that to do so is fragrant dis
loyalty to the government, and
must be suppressed.
A popular saying of monarch
ial times was, "The king can do
no wrong" That is, whatever the
B king does is right.
n The position of Mr. O'Higgins
undoubtedly is that whatever the
pope, the Catholic church gener.
ally, or any member of that
church says or does is right, and
to discuss it or to object to il
is rank disloyalty. In this posi-.
tion he is backed by every Cath
olic priest and paper in the land
AS to the philippe of this Mr.
O'Higgins the only "person and
publications that made living
out of sectarian animosities be.
fore the war;" that we know of
we're those engaged in sowing
the seeds of hatred of Protest.
antism and Protestants, in the
minds of their adherents, which
too often blossomed out in riots
and bloodshed. Does O'Higgins
refer to that? If so does he
censure or condemn the spirit
and practice?
The trouble in Ireland is &
racial and political. question ir
which unfortunately the Catholic
population Of the island is more