The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1918-07-26

i1a. recently here and there very fire.
quently shown its head amongst us.
not in any single sgis n, but in many
and widely separated parts of the
country. There have been many
lynchings, and every one of them has
been a blow at the heart of ordered
law and humane justice. No man who
loves America, no man who really
cares for her fame and honor and
character or who is truly loyal to her
institutions, can justify mob action
while the courts OF justice are open
and the governments of the states and
the nation are ready and able to do
their duty.
I'VE are at this very moment fight
ing lawless passion. Germany L1s
outlawed herself among the nations
because she has disregarded the
made lynchers of her armies. Lynch
ers emulate her disgraceful example
I, for my part, am anxious to see every
community in America rise above thai
level, with pride and a fixed resolu-
ton which no man or set of men can
afford to despise.
1--WE proudly claim to be the cham
pions of democracy. If we really are,
in deed and in truth, let US see to II
that we do not discredit our own. j
say plainly that every American who
takes part in the action of a mob or
true son of this great democracy, but
its betrayer, and does more to dis
credit her by that single disloyalty
to her standards of law and OF right
than the words of her statesmen or or
the sacrifices her heroic boys in
the trenches can do to make suffering
peoples believe her to be their saviour.
How shall we recommend democracy
to the acceptance of other peoples, II
we disgrace our own by proving that
it is, after all, no protection to the
weak? Every mob contributes to Ger
man lies about the United States what
her most gifted liars cannot improve
upon by the way of calumny. They
can at least say that such things can
not happen in Germany except in
times of revolution, when law is swept
away.
Asks All to Cooperate.
"I therefore very earnestly and
solemnly beg that the governors of
all the states, the law officers of every
community, and, above all, the men
and women of every community in the
United States, all who revere America
and wish to keep her name without
stain or reproach, will cooperate
not passively merely, but actively and
watchfully to make an end of this dis
graceful evil. 1t cannot live where the
community does not countenance it.
81 have called upon the nation to
put its great energy into this war and
it has sponded-responded with a
spirit and a genius for action that has
thrilled the world. 1 now call upon
it, upon its men and women every
where, to see to it that its laws are
kept inviolate. it's fame untarnished.
Let US show our utter contempt for
the things that have made this war
hideous among the wars and history
by showing how those who love liberty
and right and justice and are willing
to lay down their lives for them upon
foreign fields stand ready. also. to IL
lustrate to all mankind their loyalty
to the things at home which they
wish to see established everywhere as a
blessing and protection to the peo-
pies who have never known the privi-
1eges of liberty and self-government.
'I can never accept any man as a
champion of liberty either for our
selves or for the world who does not
reverence and obey the laws of our
own beloved land, whose laws we our
selves have made. He has adopted
the standards of the enemies of his
! country, whom he affects to despise.
"WOODROW WILSON,"