The Brinkley argus., 1918-07-12
Why We Fight Because Germany for Years Has Been Making Secret, Preacher
 ous War on Us
By CLARENCE L. SPEED
Secretary of the War Com nittee of th'
 Union League Club of Chicago.

One of the deep, underlying reasons l not just a diplomatic pretext-why we are at war with Germany is that for a generation Germany has been making war on US. Germany has made this war not openly, bravely or but secretly, treacherously and consistently. She has sought to create race discord, to corrupt and de- file politicians and officeholders, and to create separate German communi- ties within our borders. She has poi soned the minds of children in our schools in an endeavor to make Ger mans of them instead of have them grow up into loyal American citizens. She has invaded the Sacredness of the pulpit itself in an endeavor to corrupt our people through the very leaders of morality to whom they are accus- toned to look for guidance.
 These may be startling assertions, but they are all true, as you shall see from the documents of the Germans themselves. We all knew that it was a German fleet which stripped for &C., ton when Dewey sailed into Manila bay. We all knew it was the Germans who sought to bring about European alliance against us when we were en- gagged in the war with Spain. Few of us relaized, however, that all these years Germany has been busy within our own borders, through editors, teachers and preachers, seeking to break down our national unity, so that when the time came it would be easy to defeat the United States in open warfare to set at naught our cherish ed Monroe doctrine, and to seize, in the Western hemisphere, anything that the land grabbing rulers of the German empire might desire.
 The climax of Germany's under handed war on the United States came in 1913, more than year before the outbreak of hostilities in Europe. This was the enactment of what is known as the Delbruck law, which provides that If an emigrant from Germany who is about to be naturalized makes application to German consul, he may retain his German citizenship even after he has become a citizen of his adopted country.
 In plain words, this law, and the ap' plication of it, mean just this:
 A German goes into court in this country and solemnly foreswears al l legiance to the kaiser and pledges his word-the temptation was to say "of honor''-that he will become Toy al citizen of the United States. Ther he slips around to the German consu and says:
 "You know I didn't mean that, a all. Those Americans are easy marks | and they feil for that stuff right off But you just put me down on your lis as a good, loyal German, and if tho time ever comes when I can prove it you can count on me"
 So the German consul puts his name down in the little card index of whicf 1 the Germans are so fond, and this man,-this creature who swears al l legience to the country which give: 1 him an opportunity to make a real nv 1 ing and to become somebody in thi' world, and at the same time swear' secretly to be true to Germany-l! turned loose to work his will, while | Americans go carelessly about theil l business and refuse to see the danger in the arrangement.
 Long before the passage of the Del bruck law, there was formed the We rein fur das DeutSchtum i'm Ausland- the Union for Germanism in Foreign Lands. This organization, officially fostered in Germany. issued a quarter 1 ly magazine. which in its very first IS sue. outlined it's aims as follows:
 "The purpose of this union is the preservation and promotion of the | Germanism of over 30000,000 people 1 Of German blood dwelling outside the ! German empire" All it aims to do yos1 see, is to keep Germans who come to this country from becoming Ameri- cans.
 Away back in 1890 the Alldeutschel Verband, or the Pan-German league was formed. It now consists of 26e chapters of which two now are-or at least were immediately before the war in the United States, one i'll New York and one in San Francisco. To quote from the Alldeutsche Blatter, its official publication. "thc Pan-Gcrman league is founded fer promoting Ger man National interests, both in Ger many and in foreign lands"
 A few thinking Americans knew all the time what was coming-what must come. But America, as q whole, went along in that carelessness and indifference with which 1t treats all things unpleasant, and allowed this German war on our most sacred insti- tutions to continue unchecked.
 So Germany stands today, with one foot on prostrate Belgium and the oth- CT on the neck of poor deluded Rus sia; with a bayonet planted in the heart of Serbia, and the point of its sword at the throat of Roumania, while it looks out over the vassal States of Bulgaria and Turkey to In dia opd tho Orient And as ii stands