Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1919-12-16
AMERICAN LEClON'S OWN
SAFETY VALVE Is TRUTH
with Facts Before Acts" as Slogan,
the New League of Veterans Gives
Another Proof Of Its Wisdom
and Hluh Patriotism

!
of the American Legion. The fine realities
! which give SAVIOR Of life are. in sense.
, almost cheapened by set formulas of
/ praise. Fervent oratory and decorative
! epithets often perilously approach bonn
! bast. The little catch in the throat. the
moistened eye and the tug at the heart
are the ingredients of the most spontane-
Gus eulogy and the sincerest.
But the mission of the Legion only
began with the war. The responsible
ties of the great army of American youth
were tragic. It is questionable, how
ever, whether they were, from certain
angles. any less heavy than they are in
the aftermath of the cataclysm when
high purposes are not tranSatable into
shot ard shell but into the sUbtler fac
tors Of peace.
A sense of these new and very different
obligations is happily manifest. There
have been many assurances cf this attl-
tude. but none which is at once more
inspiring and emphatically terse than
the motto, "Fects before acts" which
has been presented to the American posts
throughout the country,
The medium is the American Legion
weekly, which is out with an editorial.
! in no degree censorious and yet construc-
lively wise.
Legionares are urged to ''pass no
measure affecting their post or corainu-
| nitv" without the most careful consd
Grafton. "a matter of immediate local
Importance" runs the text, may be pre-
sented in such a manner as to arouse
your immediate sympathy. But,
if the public interest is involved,
every phase of the subject should be
thoroughly canvassed. DeLiber-
alton will prevent an ill-advised or pre-
mature action which might neutralize
local public sympathy and an interest
in the postt."
This is .he line of conduct which intel
! ligent persons rightly expected the Amer
lean Legion to pursue. 1t is the policy
which is known to be animating the
dominant powers in the organization of
veterans. It is carrying into the field
Of peace the ideals which triumphed in
the fields of war.
That these principles have. even be-
fore this official proclamation, been set
aside by the Legion is q fallacy. 1t is
an error however, which has been spread
through various agencies.
One is the reprehensible habit in some
quarters, which. we regret to say, are
! journalistic, to magnify certain records
| of hasty dictation on the part Of isolated
| Legion members as if those individuals
actually spoke for the whole organiza-
ton.
The other instrument for circulating
the misconception are Legion members
themselves who have been engaged in
sensational and showy acts subversive of
law and order. These men may have
been, and probably were, small fry in the
stirring clan of youth and valor.
1t is Just as unfair to blame the
| Legion as a whole for their conduct as it
would be to indict the whole American
nation for breach of the peace in a
southern town with lynching proclivities.
Nonetheless a fair-minded and dis
eliminating view Of the general stua-
ton cannot logically be made to include
condonement for offenses. The row
lately raised in Ithaca at the Kreisler
concert was not only an exhibition of
bad taste and bad manners; it was an
assumption of extra-legal prerogatives
on the part of the Legion members impli-
Gated.
. The machinery for justice exists in
this country. It's channels are clearly
defined and any invasion of them by
force savors of revolutionary tyranny
Mobs which, at the outset. reject legal
means to enforce their claims are never
right. They have forfeited their claims
to Justice in the hasty and unreasoning
resort to violence.
The Tucker episode in Reading is an
other of a series of incidents wherein
certain of the actors displayed sudden
surge of lawlessness, grounded, perhaps
in a passionate patriotism, but ill-con-
sidered and in spirit lawless, for all that
Irrespective of what Judge Rogers die
or did not say concerning the enlisted
men, the headlong rebuttal to his re
marks was calculated to obscure rather
than to clarity the case.
Safety-valves on impetuousness are
often needed by the majority of human
beings. The legionary is just like all o.
the rest of us. What has been add
tionally regrettable in his case is tina
the public has had a thoughtless ten
dency to applaud truculence if accom-
panied with Hag-waving. The fact is
however, that good causes are only dam
aged by bad methods.
! The Legion is tremendous novelty
II has no counterpart in American his
tory. The Grand Army of the Republic
does not furnish true comparison, sine
the body of Civil War veterans was mad