Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1918-04-04
GUN AND ROPEl

erals office, effervescing idly and in
unison about the very real menace Of
active pro-Germanism in the United
States and covering the real issue with
barrage of sounding words, are in
way to give the country an acute pain.
Laws at present in existence are ade-
| quate to hang or shoot every enemy
plotter and every one who giUes aid or
comfort TO plotter. These are simple
and explicit provisions in the criminal
code of the United States.
The espionage act, passed since the
nation went into the war, includes long
and elastic definitions to make the full
est punishment of serious war crimes
relatively easy matter. And yet Sena-
tor Poindexter rises with long amend
ment to punish with fines the use of
"profane, abusive, threatening, violent,
etc" language of a sort likely TO indi-
cate disloyalty and to suggest a series
of other provisions Of the exact sort that
never are and never can be enforced.
simultaneously the Attorney General in
yelled apology for the sorry failures
of the Department Of Justice declared
that more laws are needed to curb enemy
aliens.
The Department Of Justice, as a mat
ter of fact, has failed scandalously to
apply properly such restrictive meas
ures as are already in force. If the
charges repeatedly made against active
propagandists and spies in the United
States were proved the present statutes
are adequate TO make the death penalty
l,1,1 l., aao nNt,,b,,t,J Ir,
the editors Of the Philadelphia Tageblatt
were within the definition of treason
under the Federal code. And treason
in time of war is punishable by death.
The fantastic and altogether humiliat-
ing collapse of the Governments case
against the Tageblatt editors is indie
ative of a condition that is general
throughout the country. The water
front fires and grain burnings, explo-
sions and propaganda generally and the
increase of seditious activities may be
traced largely TO the obvious laxity and
ineficiency of the law department of
the Government.
Senator PoindeXter added nothing to
current estimates of his intelligence
when he grnvely suggested a series of
repressions which would be impossible
under any circumstances. What he sug-
gested would provide a superhuman
task for those departments of the Gov
ernment which, by their own confession
have been unable to grapple with prob
lens of the utmost simplicity and def
niteness. The dispatches said that he
STIRRED the patriotism of the Senate"
He may have done so. His deliverance
was of the sort that sounds well enough
in the oratorical manner. But the Sena-
tor didn't stir the nation unless it was
stirred to derision. His amendment to
the espionage act, like the apologies of
the Attorney General can serve merely
to delay a general realization of the
true difficulties. The active enemies of
the United States understand only force
and fear. And the Federal Government,
because of the deficiencies of its agents.
is either unable or unwilling to meet the
issue of enemy propaganda as it should
be met It is for this reason that intern
ment camps and Federal prisons are
being filled with men who would have
been shot or hanged before this if they
had been caught in any other warning
country. And the old system of political
patronage, which still fourishes in the
civil departments of the Government, is
responsible for a condition that adds
new perils to those that normally are the
lot of the military service The country
does not need new laws so much as it
needs proper enforcement of those
already in existence.
The United States had been at war for
half a year when Kaltschmidt, a CON
fessed pro-German plotter against the
Government, went boasting to jail under
a four years sentence. A man was
taken from the United States navy a
few months ago and convicted as a spy.
He has been interned Kurt Wilckins. a
former German cavalry officer, was
found gathering information for the |
German Government He was interned |
at a camp in Utah and later escaped |
He is still at large. A spy named
Sturzell was caught red-handed. He |
is now comfortably tucked away in |
Fort Oglethorpe. Spormann, another |
spy against whom there was direct evi- |
dence is in the Atlanta prison. These |
are but few instances in a list of hun
dreds. Have the usual political fears |
and considerations rotted out the con-
science Of the party men entrusted with |
the conduct of governmental affairs in |
isolated communities? Or are the local |
representatives of the Attorney Cen |
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