The Birmingham age-herald., 1920-02-27
For the Good of
 the Community

WI the unrest that has existed in this country since the signing of the armlstlce and it has been ascribed to many causes One of the most generally advanced causes is the high cost of living. That may be a correct diagnosis of the disease, Ii It is a disease, but some writers on eco- monies contend that propaganda is at the bottom of 1t all.
 Propaganda is no new thing, but 1t has been more generally used and been more effective since the beginning of the World War than ever before, and 1t IS still used both by radicals and conservatives. One would destroy government; the other would suppress radical propaganda.
 In this country, which guarantees free dom of speech and liberty of the press there is no lawful means of suppressing propaganda, either in spoken or written words, so long as it is not sedltlous. And 1t is we'll that such IS the case.
 No republic, and for that matter, no monarchy can exist long and it's people be happy, that controls the utterances of the people and prescribes it's literature. There may be radicals who would tear down the government, but the vast majority of the people of any community or any nation, are sound at heart and may be trusted to do the right thing if given the opportunity to know the right. It is true of Blrmlng- ham and it is true of the United States
 There has been a great wave of radical ism spreading over the country in recent months. It has given much concern to the authorities of both state and nation.
 Radical literature and radical orators have spread their propaganda into every d. I >f +Lo1 ra tireless. resourceful and persistent in their work, but when met by solid truths pre- sented in understandable language the majority of the people will see and under stand and act for the best interests of the country.
 In an address recently delivered before the Women's City Club of New York, Frank I. Cobb, editor of the New York World, discussing propaganda and it's ef- feet, stated that:
 "The failures of popular government have always been failures of public oplr- ion-mostly of public opinion that was ill- informed, of public opinion that was de- nied the facts, of public opinion that was misguided by self-constituted masters. That will always remain a great menace, and public opinion is never to be safe guarded by trying to prevent it by law from coming into contact with heresy. There is no surer way to give those doc trines foothold than to prescribe them. It is not to the revolutionary doctrine which is shouted from the market place that is to be feared, but the revolutionary doctrine that is whispered everywhere in the ear of discontent and that can claim in it's favor the test of martyrdom.
 Justice Holmes of the United States Supreme Court, in dissenting opinion in sedition case short time ago stated that 'the best test of the truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market" That will al ways be the best test of truth.
 Radical propaganda, propaganda that is deemed dangerous to the stability of the nation and to the happiness of the people, can be met with the truth, and it is the duty of those who oppose such radical doctrines to see that the truth is taken to the people and put in competition with ssradicalism,' and the other "sms' that are supposed to carry danger to the re- public
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