The American issue. [volume] (Westerville, Ohio) 1912-19??, 1918-12-27

Evidence at the Senate Hearing
Shows
They Were Chiefly Successful
With
Brewers, Pro-Beer Writers and
"Kulturists"
RANK AND FILE LOYAL
More Than 100000 of German
Extraction
And the Overwhelming Majority
True
Newspapers Involved in Inquiry
are Pro-Beer Advocates; No
Known Dry Involved

In the investigation by the United
States Senate of activities of the
brewers and German sympathizers in
behalf of the cause OF Germany, the
remarkable fact has been developed
that although there. are in the United
States 100000 persons OF German
birth or immediate German ancestry,
very few of such persons were in
volved in anything at all uniavorable
to the United States ard its allies.
In fact, the testimony given by
Captain George B. Lester and others
shows that only three classes of per-
sons were corrupted by German
propaganda efforts. These classes
were: Brewers and their ilk and de-
pendents, beer-newspapers and a few
old fossilized and kultured German
professors and preachers, to whom
sauer kraft, pretzels, beer, limburger
Cheese and the philosophy OF Nietsche
meant more than anything good could
have meant.
Not even the wet newspapers as a
class were involved, according to the
testimony. The papers prominently
mentioned in the investigation were
those whose editorial policy was one
OF endorsement of beer as a liquid
food, beer as the drink for the work.
men, and beer as a necessity in every
well-regulated household.
Attempts to influence the colored
people of the United States in favor
of the Germans we're unavailing.
though the agents of the kaiser tried
their hardest to exert such influence.
Attempts to stir up Japanese riots
on the Pacific coast failed. The
Mexico. border trouble netted the
German piotters nothing. In their ef
forts to. create religious and race pref
udice,; to stir up the workingmen and
to excite thousands of German-Ainer-
leans, the Hun schemers accomplish
ed mighty little. .,g.s .I 81
A lot of those men whose names
were in the list of potential friends
of the central powers have lost no
time in appearing before the Senate
committee to present albis. Nobody
WANTED to appear to be friendly to
such bunch as the Potsdam gang.
The brewers so far have failed, the
testimony shows, to clear their skirts,
and additional disclosures of brewery
activity are promised after the holi-
days.
1t must be admitted that the abso-
lutte connection between the beer pa
pers and the Hun propaganda has not
been clearly established. Nevertheless
il has been shown that newspaper
men who worked for the newspapers
in question, also were employed by
the German government at the same
time.
Activities of Bolo Pasha, put to
death as French traitor, in promot-
ing in the United States the financing
by the German government of the
Paris Journal, and which was describ-
ed as an attempt to form news al
lance between the Journal and Viii
liam Randolph Hearst's newspapers,
were recited to the committee by Al
fred L. Becker, deputy attorney gen
eral of New York state.
Some German Lutheran preachers
spread the doctrine promoted by the
German government both before and
after this country entered the war,
Captain Lester declared, and a few
: who continued these utterance after
Joining the army are now in prison.
Many church leaders recognized the
pro-German tendencies of the minis
tiers and tried assiduously to have
them removed, the officer explained.
1t is said that all of those ministers
were also beer apologists. Not a
known advocate of Prohibition has
been accused in the hearing.