Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1919-05-10
MEN WHO FOUGHT MlLlTARISM
MAY BE ASKED TO SUPPORT IT
Returning Soldiers Are Finding Proof
That Most of the Politicians
Remained at Home

A MBITIOuS politicians everywhere
are manifeSting an ominous interest
in the new American Legion, which has
! just been organized by returned service
men. who hope solidly to organize all Of
ticerS and men as fast as they return to
civil life.
There is nothing to indicate political
motive among the soldiers themselves.
Their movement was Il natural and
almost involuntary one at the beginning
But no one will suppose that political
| managers did not at once discern the
high potentality Of an organization
which appeals directly to the sentiment
of more than 100000 young men and
indirectly to many other millions Of men
and women voters.
1t was plain that particular appeal
would be made ready for the occasion.
The form of that appeal is now be-
coming apparent. Somewhere in the
high places there seems to be belief
that the returned soldiers will respond
most readily to doctrine of extensive
military preparedness preached as a
new political gospel in 1920.
A sort Of diluted Germanism charac-
terizes a good many of the speeches that
are being made in various parts of the
country by those who keep one eye on
the future and the other on the men who
are just leaving the army.
1t is questionable whether American
politicians were ever more obtuse than
they show themselves to be in this in
stance.
1t is reSrettable that professional poll
tlcos were so few in France. Had the men
who inspire party platforms ever lived
in dugout or endured a barrage or
gas wave; had they ever been permitted
to see the aftermath of high explosive
bombardment or a trench fight they
would be better fitted now to make a
decent and reasonable appeal to the
minds Of returned soldiers
1t -; fashionable to look with u sort Of
awe upon the homecoming service man
and TO regard him as mystery of sorts.
He is a new factor in American politics.
But he is not a mystery. He is an aver
age man made a little wiser and little
, more critical by hard and astonishing eX-
periences. In some ways he is different
from lilp IlPl WHO NelCOllt MN anu NOll-
der about his secret mind.
1t has always been observable. for eX-
ample. that such forbearancc and calm
| and charity as there was in the war was
to be found for the most part among the
men who fought hardest and suffered
most Soldiers at the front rarely par
| ticipated in the fashionable hatreds of
the last few years. Their own expert
ences helped them to better under
! standing of the general catastrophe. The
| best haters were at home in the leather
! chairs.
SO il was and so it is with the jingOes.
| Who remembers ever having met Il re-
| turned American soldier who consciously
assumed the heroic pose? The romantic
! glamour that still colors a stay at-home
| politicians conceptions of war and war
makers does not delude any man who saw
modern fighting.
Eve don't want to parade. We want
! to go home" That is the answer of a
! majority in almost every returning unit
when the prospect of a public review is
suggested by the officers. But the men
parade usually in a spirit of tolerant
| kindness, to do the home folks a good
| turn and give them thrill, even though
they themselves feel a bit bored and a
bit tired by the performance.
The fact of the matter is that under
the O. DIS of the service the free spirit
of these free men was voluntarily sub
ordinated but never quite submerged. We
hear great deal of the illiteracy found
in the new army after its organization
and often we fail to remember that, de-
| spite all, the American eXpeditionary
force was the most intelligent, the keen
est minded. the fastest thinking and the
cleanest army ever organized. 1t had
superb self-control because it was not d
driven mass that disintegrated and de,
scended to disorder and lawlessness al
the moment when authority was relaxed
or withdrawn. Each of its individual
units was animated by competent in
+ellipence. Within each soldier remained
the man who submitted his spirit to rig
orous discipline and gave up his inherited
freedom of action-yet remained always
the conscious observer and the intelli
oent critic of all that he saw and fell
and heard.
He saw things that will remain witt
him as long as his memory lasts. Wha
he may bring back in the way OF hopes
or determination or conviction to his owl
country it is hard to say as yet.
The homeward soldier is too glad to b.
critical now. The worst we have in tn
wav of speeches of welcome, the mos
dismal of political prospects, the dullest
witted politicians, seem SO much bette
than the things he has left that he feel
/, for the moment as if he had achieve
paradise. 1t is after he gets into civilia
! clothes and back to normal life with tim
to think and make assessments Of tn