The news scimitar. (Memphis, Tenn.) 1907-1926, 1920-01-16
SLACKERS.

Dear Sir-Swat the Stacker wherever
he is to be found trying to rear his cow
ardly head and take any prominent
place in the affairs of the country.
Recently a certain lawyer, well backed
politically, tried to run for a judgeship,
His war record bobbed up and he
couldn't gainsay it. He turned to the
right after he made first base in the
race, all through.
/ recall as a child having a certain
very successful business man pointed
out to me as having paid two substi-
tutes in the Civil war. l always re-
membered hat about him.. l could only
see him through that stigma.
OF course, now that it's all over and
settled, the slackers and dodgers have
the requisite amount of gall and ef-
willing and ready all the time, but the
old record, in black and white, in the
war department tells another story-a
more lasting and permanent n than
the word of all the evaders, dodgers and
towards in existence.
Recently one of the most notorious
slackers and draft evaders in Chatta-
nooga drifted down the sawdust trail
and shook Billy Sundays hand n the
newspapers were foolish enough to mem
ton his name, 1t sort of made real
Christians a little sore. He fooled no
one.
Jack Dempsey has been treated
mighty charitable for his contemplate
conduct. He is now coming into his
own, long overdue just deserts. He is
a Stacker, evader, dodger. The imper-
ishable old records. in black and white,
in the war department, settle that
question. II he was such a wonderful
fighting man, why didn't he join up,
whether or not he had dependents?
Uncle Sam would have made his de-
pendents allowances that, l shouldn't be
surprised, woul have equaled those he
made them. Carpenter started in at
about 20 cents a day, and made out all
right.
Dempsey could have, too. So could
every one of the physically fit. between
the ages of q and 81. 1t would have
involved sacrifices, but it was a period
of sacrifice for all true Americans.
There are only two real reasons for
not going, when called, that will hold
up consistently-the first is that one
he didn't car enough for his native land
to fight for it, Take your choice. They
both involve holding of ones nose, by
decent people.
The Stacker fixed himself so perma-
nently that he can't erase the stigma
and disgrace, If he lives to equal the
late Methuselah's years. He branded
himself. No one did it to him. The
slacker's thick hide meant more to him
than good repute, decency and citizen
ship. He forfeited his American ism
when he Stacked and lodged and begged
off and ducked into industries that ex-
emptedg him from fighting, and into
business he was new and strangely UNI
familiar with.
The Stacker fixed himself. Every one
of the tribe knows that someone in this
narrow little world knows he is a slack
err. That knowledge is not a pleasant
thing to carry around and every one of
the breed wished he could bury the
thought, it gnaws and bites him wheth-
err he admits it or not, and his oppor-
tunity to change his decision and do
his duty is gone, never to return again.
Every n wished he had gone, but
didn't start wishing it until lt;Ol, Nov.
II, 1918.
Dempsey has no more right to repre-
sent himself as the champion fighting
man Of the United States than Alexan-
der Berkman has.
He is not fit to be admitted into
France as an American citizen.
Why should he be permitted to even