The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1918-08-07

put on at popular prices" I suggested to
him. That wasn't the idea. That was
"commercialized." / spoke of the places
where the people of the neighborhood get
together and put on their own plays. That
didn't meet the need, either. They had
40 proper direction as to what sort OF
plays they ought to see. In Germany
apparently, the paternal government not
only gives the people its theatres but
selects it's plays for it. So when some
earnest German actors came to New YORK
and tried to raise fund by subscription
to substitute a theatre where the working
man could see the sort Of plays he ought
to see Dr. Rumely WAS its most ardent
advocate and opened the columns Of the
Mail to subscriptions to the fund.
In Germany, apparently, the paternal
government not only gives the people its
theatres but selects its plays for it. So
when some earnest German actors came To
New York and tried to raise fund by
subscription to subsidize a theatre where
the workingman could see the sort of plays
he ought to see DIR. Rumely was its most
ardent advocate and opened the columns
of the Mail to subscriptions to the fund.
German Tragedies Had No Appeal.
New York workingmen somehow didn't
take very kindly to dreary tragedies de-
picting the suffering of the peasant classes
in Germany hundred years ago. Even
the lure of ten cent tickets didn't make
the venture a success. l shall never for.
get the look of indignation on the face
of one young woman as she turned on her
escort in the lobby as they were leaving
the house and said -
"My God, Bill, who in - told you
this was a good show!'
That this sort of paternalism grew out
of and strengthened class distinctions, and
that class distinctions, with one class
doing the governing, were un-American,
lDr. Rumely could not or would not see.
1t is unnecessary to point out that he
did not get very far in the effort to i'm
nose kultur on New York in this fashion;
no farther than he did in the attempt to
distribute the Evening Mail over the
whole United States and make it the
great national newspaper. He wanted to
put the motto:-"What New York thinks
to-day the nation thinks tomorrow at
the top of the first page; he was only de-
tered by the most forceful opposition on
the part of every one else connected with
the paper to whom he confided this pur'
pose But when every other newspaper
in the United States was cutting off its
free list and disseminating the free ex'
change of copies with other papers, he
was enlarging the free list and the en
change list of the Mail in the hope, ap
parently that some of the propaganda
which other papers refused to buy through
the syndicate might strike root in fertile
soil through this means.
Favored Compulsory Service.
The national policy that DR.. RumelJ
strongly advocated was universal com
pulsory military service-not the selectiv'
draft system, which the American people
have so cheerfully accepted as an emer
gency war measure, but the same sort Of
military service that Prussianism imposes
upon the people of Germany. Every DO.
| d
is no doubt that Dr. Rumely believed il
this as the best possible system; it Il
German There is no doubt, however
that in advocating it he was playing Ger
manys game.
: Perhaps l overestimate Germany's ca
pacity to understand the psychology o
other peoples, but l think any one wht
knows what the temper of the American
people as a whole was with regard to thit
war up to the time we really got into j
: must realize that any serious attempt a
compulsory military service would have
swept the party advocating it from power
and that war preparations on any i'm
portant scale prior to actual hostilihe:
, would have been bitterly opposed by prob
, ably an overwhelming majority OF tn
people.
:, But, for one thing, it looked patriotic t
= advocate such things and furnish decen
t camoufiage behind which almost any
thing could conceal itself. For another
. thing, there always was the chance thai
! Iif enough newspapers and orators shouted
t loud enough the powers that be NIGH
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