The Lakeland evening telegram. (Lakeland, Fla.) 1911-1922, 1918-01-11
THE AReuMENT7
(By E. E. Hartman of The
Vigilantes)

vice and someone else roared. Why?
They said it wasn't democratic to
have universal service. Nothing is
quite democratic except the volunteer
system. Show me!
Did you ever read of any more dem
ocratic people than the Puritans who
settled New England? Did you ever
hear of any municipal affairs being
carried any closer to the lines of pure
democracy than there? Can anything
be more democratic than the old town
meeting?
Were the defenders of the pioneer
settlements there and on evry from.
tir we ever had, volunteers, or did
universal service prevail? I lived on
the frontier in my youth and can an
swer my own question. When the
Sioux Indians went on the warpath
in Minnesota every man in the settle
ment had his part to do, and if he
failed if he had sat back and Wanted
for volunteer to do his shared fear
that he would have ceased to be a
denizen of that particular section
Universal service was the only thing
that kept our colonies alive. Univer.
sal service saved the day at New Ulm
When our country grew, her respon-
sibilities grew with her. She has in
creased nightly, but with this in
crease she has taken over duties she
never dreamed of when small and
weak. To handle these duties we
must make our methods more effici
ent and our strength CORRESPONDENCE
great. There is no use in trying to
lift corner of a ten story building
with burglars jimmy, but we can
set hydraulic jack under there and
boost 1t with ease. 1t is just as fool
ish to use the jimmy of volunteer ser
vice. but the hydraulic jack of univer
sal service can lift the load. Why?
Because that is what it is built for.
| once saw fire where it became
imperative that a certain wooden
building should be wrecked, to give
the fire department chance to fight
the fire. Two hundred men attacked
that building, men who had never
done work of that kind in their lives
They broke the glass in the windows
a useless waste, they ripped picture
holdings off the walls, they pulled the
pins in few hinges and carried out
the doors, buthe building itself still
stood. Then came force of twenty
men who had been trained to the
work. Their foreman bawled for the
police Ito hustle those Tfools out OF
there and give his men a chance.
The crowd was hutled, the men be-
gan. A section of the roof began to
lift and bulge, then it let 60 and slid
to the ground with smash. A side
OF the building, it was small, let 90
and Numbered down on top of the
wrecked roof. Section after section
was ripped loose from the other parts
and went crushing down. At last
only one wall stood and the twenty
men loosened wooden plate at the
bottom, set some poles against the
wall and rocked it to and fro.
"One-two, one-two, one and give
'er hell" yelled the foreman and that
last wall went fiat. Twenty men who
had been trained had done what two
hundred could not do without "the
know how" Then the firemen soaked
the flat pile and fought the fire to a
standstill
Invaders are coming! Call for vol
uhteers! You call and they come, a
disorganized, unskilled, undisciplined
mass, that could be pierced and de.
stroyed by tenth of their numbers
Of skilled men. What now? Ask the
invader to please wait while we train
our men? He'll do it, wont he? Yes,
he wont. He will walk right over the
volunteers and how the democratic"
adherents of the old system will wall
for trained help. AS for the time
used in training wouldn't take ten
thousand dollars for the training nv
boy got in the Naval Militia.