Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1918-03-15
THE WAR, THE FARM
and THE FARMER
BY Herbert Quick

er has been the man who suffer,
most from war. All that he poss
esses lies out Of doors In plain sight
and is spoil of war-his house, his
grain, his livestock. But the farmer
everywhere Is q warrior when wal
Is the only thing which will make
and keep him free-either a warrior
or a serf. He is sometimes the last
to heat up; but he stays hot, and in
a long fight he is always found sturd-
lily carrying the battle across No
Mans Land to the foe, in the last
grim struggle.
This war was ut first hard to un-
1erstand. Nc armed foe invaded the
United States. The night skies were
not Redeemed by the burning byres
and farmsteads Of America. No rsfd-
ing parties harried us Of our cattle or
horses. No sabre-rattIers insulted
our women. We did not then know
that monster had arisen with a
thousand arms who could reach across
the seas and take from as three
fourths Of everything we grew with
out our being aware Of it, and who
could follow up his robbery with in
vasion. subjugatton and national
death.
What the Imperial German govern
ment offer.d the farmers Of Amer
lea In It's ruthless submarine warfare
was not the loss Of profits, but
slavery to the saber- rattiers Of Pots
dam, BY numbering the people who
take our products to market. By
all the laws of civilized warfare COM
MERGE under neutral flag was eree
from any hindrance except the legal
interference justified by war; but
the Germans not only stopped mer-
chant vessels, they sunk them with
out warning and without trace.
Having the right, according to the
laws of war, to take the sea with
his fleet and fight the thing out gun
to gun, but being afraid to do so for
fear he might lose his fleet, or I'M
able to stop the selling of our pro-
ducts to his enemies or to open his
own ports to us by fair means, he
declared his intention to do 1t by
the foulest methods ever resorted to
in war.
To have submitted would have cost
r,c drnr IL, procpor-itv hI1t tbot would
have been the least Of our loss. By
so doing we should have accepted
degradation. We should have ac-
copied, at the behest of a half craZed
autocrat in Europe, a lower standard
Of living in America. We should
have basely yielded up our birthrfght
as Americans. Peace at such price
would not be peace, but only pre-
paration for a future revolt against
subjugatfon Better any sort of war.
better war forever than that!
This, then, is the war in which
we are fighting. Whenever the time
comes tor new sacrifices, let us re-
member that we fght not only for
the liberty Of the Belgians. the
French, the Servians. the Rus
slams, the British, the Montenegrins,
the Roumanians, the Italians, but Of
all nations even Of the German pee
PIE themselves; and most Of all, for
our own liberties-for our freedom
todayi There 10 loss and sacrifice
In the war; but there would have
been far more in accepting the Ger
man terms. We should have lost
moro in money than we shall spend
In the war: and something far more
precious than money-ovr souls
This is the crucial year Of the war.
Our soidiers-hundreds OF thousands
of them-are in the trenches, and a
million more are ready to 60. The
whole burden Of carrying on our own
part in the war, and Of aiding our
sister nations in arms. rests on the
United States Treasury. Therefore
every cent we can raise and scrape
together belongs to the Treasury.
that our boys may come back 10 u
victorious. We can whip tho Ger
mar not with the money in our
pockets or our bank accounts but
with what we put into the Treasury
In subscriptions to Liberty Bonds!
Never since the Turks threatened
to overwhelm Europe, perhaps not
even then, was the world In such
danger as now. Germany Is not yet
defeated. We must defeat her this
year. We must withhold nothing
from the support Of the war. We
must give our sons. We must bring
forth food in abundance multiplying
our labor to that end. We must give
into the Treasury of the United
States. in subscriptions to Liberty
Bonds, every cent we can spare.
This summer the support of the
war Ia I'D to the farmers; and Uncls
Sam has never called upon the farm
ors In vain.