Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1918-07-05
Message From President VIII
son Read at Opening Exer-
CiSeS of Summer School for
Teachers at Athens

ATHENS, Ga, July 1.-THE reading
of a message from President Wilson TO
the teachers of Georgia in which the
natfon-s chief executive expressed the
great importance of the position held
by the teachers was one of the chief
features of the opening exercises Of the
University of Georgia summer school
here Monday night.
The letter was brought to Athens and
read by DR.. Stockton Arson, brother-in-
law of President Wilson and secretary
of the American Red Cross. The mes
sage follows:
Having myself been a teacher for
twenty-five years, l am glad to avail
myself of this occasion to greet my fell
low teachers, 10 congratulate you on
your opportunities for public service,
and to address a few words to you
with regard to the peculiarly solemn
public obligation which now rests upon
you.
May I not earnestly suggest to you
the necessity that you should, by study
and reflection, acquire a deep spiritual
understanding of the fundamental prin-
ciples of our government, whereof our
constitution is only a single, though
their chief expression, in order that you
may be the better able to communicate
the spirit of our institutions to your
pupils.
THE country must rely chiefly upon
you to interpret America to the children
Of the new generation, to make them
understand that it was by the law of
its own nature that this nation was
led into the world war, in order that
for all time to come the principles
which brought about its own birth
should be made secure, that it was no
new or strange doctrine which drew our
country into association with European
a IN,
rather a fulfillment and extension of
the principles for which Washington
Fought, necessary application, indeed,
OF those principles to new conditions
and to an age wherein it is no longer
possible for one nation to live apart and
to itself.
Under your instruction the children
should come to see that it was the
high logic of events and the providence
or God that the United States and Ger
many, the one the most consistent prac-
titioner of the new creed of mankind,
and the other the arch typo of auto
cratic oppression and injustice, whether
the new democracy or the old autocracy
should govern the world, and under
your instruction the children should be
made to understand the stern duty and
the supreme privilege which belong to
the United States of being chief inter-
prefer to the world of those democratic
principles which we believe constitute
the only force which can rid the world
of injustice and bring peace and happi-
ness to mankind.
THE object for which this war is
being waged with indescribable pain
and sacrifice cannot be kept secure in
the future unless the children of this
new generation, for whose sake the war
is in fact prosecuted. themselves under
stand democracy, not as a mere word
but as a living and vital thing. IT is
for them that the fruits of the sacri-
flee is made, and by them that the
fruits of the sacrifice must be gather
ed and safeguarded.
You who are in daily contact with
young minds have a unique opportunity
to instruct them in the true meaning of
such words as liberty and democracy,
to interpret phrases too often used light
ly or thoughtlessly, ana convert them
into realities which shall quicken the un-
Outstanding of your pupils and thereby
make them the more valiant and deter
mined defenders of the faith.
INSTRUCTION in patriotism has always
been a duty in American schools. II
is now more than ever duty to teach
a burning uncompromising patriotism
which will admit of no divided aIlegi-
ance, but demands all that the heart and
energy of the citizen can give, and at
the same time a patriotism so sure and
enlightened, so free of sham and sub
terfuge. that it leaves room for intelli-
gent sympathy with other peoples liv-
ing under other flags
"A due regard for the rights of other
nations is as necessary to enlightened
patriotism as an insistence upon the
rights of our own nation.
The meaning of this war and OF
Americas part in it is not fully compre-
hended unless we understand the claims
Of humanity as well as of our own coun-
try upon us.
att is our present glory that we are
battling for oppressed humanity every
where. as we'll as for our own rights,
and that America seeks no selfish ends.
(Signed) WOODROW WILSON"