Macon beacon. [volume] (Macon, Miss.) 1859-1995, 1918-06-14
The Supreme Issue

terest being taken in politics.
This is an unusual state of af.
fairs in Mississippi with the date
of the senatorial primary ONLY
two months away. For if there
is one thing above all others that
Mlssissippians like it is the game
of politics. At least this is com
monty the case. But lust now a
game of far greater interest is
being played, if we use such a
term, and the stake is not a poll
tical Office but the very existence
of civilization itself. It is well
that Mississippians are not too
much concerned with local affairs
IN such a crisis. With the future
of the world a gigantic question
mark Mississippians desire above
everything else to learn the
answer to that question.
Today, this very hour, two
great contending forces are bat
fling in a death struggle, each
determined on victory, each
ready to die if need be to attain
that victory. The one would
make Of the world a despotism
with might the supreme law, ii
would stamp out forever the
rights of the individual, making
the State the supreme authority.
not socialized State based on
the composite will of a free PEG
pie, but a monarchial State GOV
erned by a brutal war lord and q
gang of the most hellish cut
threats that ever sent their Ioor.
deluded subjects into battle. Tc
them nothing is holy, nothine
sacred. They show no mercy
they spare not the innocent anC :
the helpless. To them war j, l
a business. the chief business Of
their miserable careers. If to
win they deem it of benefit to
desecrate churches. outrage wo. !,
men, cruelty prisoners. cut off :
the arms of little children, they :
shrink not from these or any ;,
other horrors which they hope y,
will strike terror to the foe. =,
Liberty, so precious to the hearts ',
of the millions who have reioiced :, =
IN its beneficence, must be i
destroyed. The War Lord must :
rule the earth. Opposed to this y
mighty force of evil, there is an !,
army of men who have tasted of n
the sweet fruit of human liberty t;
and found that it is good. They h
represent the supremacy of the y !,
individual; that basal principle =,
OF democracy-the right of a II
free people to govern themselves.
They stand for the protection of S,
small nations against the ap. st
grandizement of the brutallv
strong, and they are determined u
by the help of a Just and merci- =,
full God that government of the 81
people, by the people and for the &C
people shall NOT perish from of
the earth. n(
In a world conflict between n
liberty and despotism it was in ra
evitable that the greatest nation CT
of earth, the United States of m
America, must sooner or later he
drawn into the struggle. For Of
this nation to have remained a ca
passive onlooker, with the fate ca
of civilization itself in the bal lie
ances would have been a crime III
against God and humanity. Self fe
preservation, if we were actuated ar
~ no higher motive, would have ga
that we help save pu
'thers in order to save ourselves. ~
OUR national honor, our national 10,
our national ideals, the els
cry existence of those glorious cit
which have given to lei
ur country all that is worth VIZ
reserving, demanded that the Iea
Militant forces of the greatest BE
loving nation the world ev'
as ever known should be hurled ne.
the most damnable Cco