Free trader-journal and Ottawa fair dealer. (Ottawa, Ill.) 1920-1927, 1920-03-15
WHERE DOES HE GET THAT
STUFF?

That is the question asked by tn,
average doughboy who went acros;
and saw service in the trenches ant
the real horrors OF the world wan
when he reads that portion Of Prcsi
dent Wilson's letter to Senator Hitch
cock in which he says:
IF Article X is not adopted and act
ed upon the governments which re
jcct it will think. be guilty of bad
faith to their people, whom they in
duced to make the infinite sacrifices
of the war by the pledges that they
would be fighting to redeem the
world from the old order of force and
aggression
In so far as this portion Of Presi-
dent Wilson'S letter refers to the
United States it is away over the
heads Of the average doughbOy and
OF the large majority of men who
who enlisted. And the same thing
applies to the men who were drafted
and entered the war with an equal
determination to win. The things
that the President 50 blandly asserts
were the great incentive to the fight
ing men of America We're but Incl
diets in the thing to be accomplished
They wanted to make the world safe
for democracy" but democracy to
them meant the United States the
democracy under which they lived
and for which they Were willing, ii
necessary, to make the supreme sac
ritce,
They entered the war willingly
in fact We're crazy to get into it
primarily to lick Germany. because
she had to be licked as a matter of
self protection for their own coun-
try. And the easiest and best time
to do the job was while they had
allies and would not be obliged to do
the job alone.
They had seen Belgium devastated
and outraged, France invaded and
Great Britain threatened, but eXccpt
in very rare instances even those
things brought few recruits 10 the
allies from the United States. But
when the submarine campaign de
stroycd American lives and German
plotting and the potentialittes of Ger.
man imperialism infringed American
freedom and threatened our future
peace. and the threat that later we
viii take care Of the United States"
became a possibility however re
mote-then it was the duughb0y arose
in his might, eager to enter the fray
and he entered it with but one thought
to clean up Hoinie" for what ne
had done and might do if NOT over
come,
He fought not FOR some altrustic
theory which might embrace the
world, but for the country in which
he lived, whose institutions he loved
and for whose honor and existence
he was, if necessary. willing to die.
There may have been remote cases
whore thought of the good of hui
manity as Il whole entered into the
calculation, but an overwhelmingly
large percentage of the Boys who
were ready and willing to give their
all ii called upon to do SO entered the
Tray for their own country for the
United States Of America to preserve
her honor, her institutions and her
traditions, Any other things which
might be accomplished by the down
fall Of German Imperialism Ger
many OF before and during the war
We're OF far minor importance. The
claim that the people were induced
to make the infinite sacrifices OF the
war by the pledges that they would
be lighting to redeem the world from
the old order of force and agrees.
ion is, in the language OF the great
American doughboy pure buak.'