Daily capital journal. (Salem, Oregon) 1903-1919, 1919-09-06

place in the world where a small grouI
of men could use their fellow citizens a:
pawns in game; that there was NJ
place in the world where small grouE
of men, without consulting their reIfov
J citizens, could send their fellow citizen.
TO the battlefield and to deal III accom-
plishing something dynastic, some polit
ical plan that had been conceived il
private, some object that had ben pre-
pared for by universal, world wide intri
que. That is what we wanted to a..
complish.
| "The most startling that that de
/ veloped itself at the opening of our par
ticipatior in this war was not the mill
tary preparation Of Germany-we rel.
familiar with that, though we had beer
dreaming that she would not use it--bu
her political preparation. To find that
every community in the civilized worlc
was penetrated by her Intrigue. The
German people did not know that, but il
was known in Wilhelmstrasse, where the
central offices of the German govern
ment were. and Wilhelmstrasse was tht
master of the German people; aud thi,
war, my fellow citizens, has emaaci
pated the German people as well as the
rest of the world
"We don't want to see anything like
that done again. because we know thai
democracy will only have to destroy
that form Of governments and if We
DON DESTROY it now, the job is still to
be done. and by combination Of all
the great fighting peples of the world rc
see to it that the aggressive purpose OF
such government cannot be realized, to
make it no longer worth while for little
groups of men to contrive the down.
| fall in civilization in private confer.
ence
But i want TO say something about
that. That has different aspect, and
perhaps you will regard it as q slight
depression from the discussion which
am asking you to be patiert enough tc
follow.
My fellow citizens, it does not make
any difference what kind Of minority
govern you, if it is a minority. And
the thing we must see to is that no mi
nority anywhere masters the majority
That is at the heart, my fellow citizens
of the tragical things that arc happen.
ing in that great country which we long
to help and can find no way that is er.
feet to help-I mean the great realm
Of Russia. The men who are now meas
ureably in control of the affairs OF
Russia represent nobody, but themselves
They have again and again been cnal-
lenged to call constitutional eonven-
tioA. They have again and again been
challenged to prove that they mad some
kind OF 4 mandate even from a single
class Of their fellow citizens. And they
dared not attempt it, they have no MAJ,
date from anybody. There are only 81
of them, l am told, and there were more
81 mea who used to control the desti-
nies OF Europe from Wilhelmstrasse.
There is closer monopoly Of power in
Petrograd and Moscow than there ever
was in Berlin, and the thing that is in
tolerable is not that the Russian people
are having their way, but that another
group of men, more cruel than the czar
himself, is controlling the destinics of
that great people. And l want to say
here and now that tim against the con-
troll of any minority anywhere. Search
your own economic history and what you
been uneasy about Now and again you
have said there were small groups of
capitalists who were controlling the in
dustry and therefore the development
of the United Ststes.
Seriously, my fellow citizens, if that
is so (and sometimes have feared that
it was), we must break up that monop-
oily. | am not now saying that there is
any group of four fellow citizens who
are consciously doing anything off the
kind, l am saying that these allegat-
tions must be proved. But if it is
proved that any class, any group, any
where, is without the suffrages of their
fellow citizen in control of our affairs
then am with you to destroy the pow
er of that group We have got to be
frank with ourselves, however. If we
de not allow minority government in
Germany, We must see to it that we do
not have it in the United States. If
YOU do not want little groups of selfish
men to plot the future of Europe, W.,
must not allow little groups of selfish
men to plot the future of America. Any
man that speaks for a class must prove
that he also speaks for all his fellow
|eitizens and for mankind; and then we
win listen to him.
''The most difficult thing in a de-
mocracy, my fellow citizens, is to get
classes, where they unfortunately exist,
to understand one another and unfse
and yet YOU have not got a great de-
moeracy until they do understand one
Ianother and unite. So that if we are
for seeing that there are no more czars
and no more kaisers, then let us do a
thorough job and see that nothing OF
that sert occurs anywhere.
Then there was another thing we
wanted to do, my fellow citizens, that
lis done in this document. We wanted
to see that helpless people were no.
where in the world put at the mercy of
unscrupulous enemies and masters
There is one pitiful example which is in
the hearts of all of us. / mean the
example of Armenia. There arc CHRIS
tian people, helpless at the mercy of a
Turkish government which thought IL
in service of God TO destroy them and
at this moment, my fellow citizen, 1t is