The Glasgow courier., 1921-05-20
THE SLACKER LIST

Washington, May 17.-Special Cor
respondence - Vigorously upholdine
the action Of the War Department ir
publishing the names Of men shown or
the draft lists as probable slackers
the Republican Publicity Association
says in a statement issued today
through the President of the organi-
cation, Hon. Jonathan Bourne, Jr.:
"The New York World, leader of
the Democratic press, denounces the
Secretary of War for giving publicity
to the list of men subject to draft who
are now found to have been enlisted
or excused, and the World declares
that the Secretary presumes the men
to be guilty until proven innocent.
Well, if so, the Secretary of War is
fully justified. If man is summoned
to jury duty and when his name is
called he does not respond, the judge
issues a bench warrant for his ar
rest. His failure to respond is prima
facie evidence of guilt and the war
rant of arrest will be served and he
will be punished unless he can show
that he was innocent Of diSobeying
the summons.
But the Secretary Of War has not
declared all these men guilty. He has
expressly declared that there may be
errors in the list, but that after max
ing every effort humanity possible. and
after long delay in an endeavor TO
eliminate any name enormously on
the list, he is unable to find that any
of the men named were improperly in
cluded. He asks those named. If i'm
properly listed, to SO report. This is
the best he could do. To fail to pub
lish the list as he has now done. would
he dereliction of duty on the part
of the Secretary-a dereliction that
would be very properly censured by
the American Legion and by all the
men who faithfully responded to their
country's call.
'No man whose name is improperly
included in the list can justly COM
plain. He is partly at fault, for the
Department has made every possible
effort to locate him. Instead of COM
planning, he should thank the Secre-
tary of War for giving him the final
opportunity to get his name off the
list of deserters.
eve can imagine that sometime a
business man might have occasion to
visit his store late at night and while
there might be accosted by a police
man who threatened to arrest him
and would arrest him unless he could
identify himself and establish his right
to be in the store at an unseemly
hour. In such event, should or would
the owner of the store resent the ac-
ton of the officer and denounce the
act as presuming him to be guilty of
theft until he proved his innocence?
Not if he happened to be business
man of good sense. He would rather
thank the officer and say, 4 am glad
to have this assurance that you are
vigilent in the protection of my prop
erty. On some other occasion real
thief may be here, and then l shall
be glad that you are on the job
"That should and will be the atti-
tude of any reasonable man who is
improperly included in the draft evad-
ers list. He will write the Secretary,
you were mistaken this time, through
no fault Of yours, but l appreciate
your jealous effort to run down every
unpatriotic resident of the United
States. l am thus assured that in case
of another war and another call to
arms, all citizens will be treated alike,
and that the deserter will be brought
to Justice
"The War Department has done its
full duty ad deserves the commenda-
ton of the people of the United
States"