The menace. [volume] (Aurora, Mo.) 1911-1920, 1919-10-18
DIET OF PAPAL EMPIRE AT WASHINGTON
GILBERT the Press Defense League
50 Bliss BuIdas Washington d. @.

TOl N SEPTEMBER "a and 25 the vast empire
W Of the Pope held in our national capital
I51lI brief but typical imperial diet. The meet
LSA ing was in some measure disappoint-
ment to the Oligarchy which rules the papal
hordes in this country under authority delegated
from the Vatican throne.
Some twenty-five thrones in the United
States were not represented at the diet at ALL
and the secular press at Washington relegated
the affair to the second or third pages, while the
press in other cities ignored it almost entirely.
This was humiliating in view of the fact that
Cardinal Mercier of Belgium, whom the Pope re-
buked for his resistance to the Hun invasion Of
his country, was present and was exploited to
the limit as drawing card and to obtain large
publicity for the diet.
Instead Of tying the press and time-serving
politicians more firmly to the chariot wheels of
the papal autOcrat, this fiascO indicated unmis-
takably that both press and politicians are again
mentally debating whether Rome or the people
will carry the next election and rule this nation.
They seem to be placing the odds on the people.
But the Roman Catholic papers for the first
week in October play up the Washington diet
with militant prominence. They try hard to
erect it into the dignity Of the plenary council it
was really intended to be-. In that connection,
The Baltimore Catholic Review reminds its read
ers that Cardinal Gibbons, who presided as spe-
cial representative of the Vatican throne over
the third and last plenary council Oh Baltimore
thirty-ive years ago, also presided over the diet
this year.
It should be remembered that in his capacity
of papal delegate to preside over the Baltimore
council, Gibbons delivered an official and ex-
tended written denuncation of Masonry scarcely
less vitriolic than that contained in the encyci-
cal Humanum Genus of Pope Leo XIII himself
the same year. The narrow, bigOted priest who
has SO long reigned over Baltimore as the chief
hindrance to its growth and decency has always
consistently opposed and denounced every fra
ternal and philanthropic body that champions
our schools, our popular sovereignty and our con-
stitutiOnal liberty. -,
The diet of Washington did his wish, no doubt,
when it took steps to fight the Smith-T0wner bill
now pending in congress to develop and improve
the public schools. That action is reported in
his own diocesan newspaper in these typically
evasive words:
Educational bills pending before con-
gress were very generally and earnestly dis
cussed and committee of bishops was ap-
pointed to represent the views of the Amer
ican hierarchy in as far as these bills might
affect Catholic educational interests.
Should the bishops appointed on that commit.
tee appear in person before either or both houses
lof congress or committees of those houses, Sena.
tors and Representatives should bear in mind
that the bishops come to them from thrones Of
an alien autocracy. No alien throne should have
any voice in shaping the affairs of this republic
least of all in the management Of its public
schools.
4 But public education is the one antidote fol
porery with its universal illiteracy and destitu
tion. For that reason Rome can never fOregO III
!, opportunity to rnalign and discredit our fire,
schools. The hundred papers Of the Roman hier