The Montana courier. [volume] (Shelby, Mont.) 1922-192?, 1922-08-30

There is one young lad up there, deaf in one ear,
both hands gone, blind, yet he is studying law. He
has learned the typewriter, and he writes as fine
a letter as any one of you can do with your sight
[Applause.] They are all very much alive. They
have refused to be downed. They have tackled
their handicap with the same spirit and go and
dash that they bucked the stalemate Of the
trenches, and with a yell, Come on, boys, do you
want to live forever? sent the American spirit up
and down the allied lines to win the victory for
the world" [Applause.]
Here are some of the good things in the elo-
quent speech of this blind legislator speaking for
the blind ex-service men:
"We have been accustomed to believe the Euro
pean propaganda that everything overseas is far,
far better than our home product; that to produce
a soldier up to European grade, they must be
drilled year after year. But here were these raw
American boys performing deeds of judgment, de-
cision and valor that forced from their war-trained
allies and opponents the admission that they had
never seen or heard the like.
"a heroic soul here and there would have been
within the bounds of expectation, but the constant
grade of the whole product of the nation, drafted
and volunteers with whom you came in contact
there on the death fields could not but give you
pause and force the thinking mind to ask why a
nation had produced such universal phenomena.
'In touch with these wonderful men day after
day, in whom herosm was as common ds the dirt
under foot, comparing them with the other sol
diery, / was impelled to ask myself what made
this vast gap in the fortitude, courage, judgment,
between human individuals of the same civiliza-
ton, and the answer was driven in upon me that
the difference lay in their greater soul power,
because at last God had reared a government I'M
der which the soul, that thing akin to Him, could
grow a government whose aim was the develop
ment and fostering of initiative Of the individual,
where they had freedom to choose between right
and wrong; where any citizen could { pire to the
hiohpSt office in the land where religion was nm
hampered, their thoughts unrestrained, where they
dared to think and feel out loud; where equal Op-
portunity was their birthright, and no high wall Of
'Verboten' is endured; where each stands upon his
own resources, for what he is and what he can do,
and every man is the equal of his ~neighbor; where
the Stars :nd Stripes from the towers of our pub
lie schools speak the spirit of America and beckon
her children to a heart of understanding that can
discern between right and wrong.
ut is true the allies furnished the guns, but
America furnished the soul that won the war.
[Applause.] Until that soul was loosed in combat
upon the battle fields defeat of the allies was in
evitable. Paris had been ordered evacuated. Big
Bertha shells were bursting everywhere in the
streets. CONSERVATION prevailed. Lines of refu-
gees were dreaming from the city. A German
army, headed by the Prussian Guard and COM
manded by the crown prince, was advancing with
the steady precision of clockwork at the rate Of
to FIVE miles q day. German patrols had been
ShptuACu AlAiA Ola mlcS VI diiS. Lie 81
bombardment and onslaught Of the shock troops
had forced the French back and back until the
Germans, gaining possession Of the heights about
Belleau Wood, had cleared the roads for eight
miles in advance.
with their march unresisted for several miles
ahead, the Prussian Guard was ordered to put on
heir dress uniforms with spiked helmets. The
decked themselves In dress regalia with
,tarched bosom shirts. The Germans had no other
thought but that they were going triumphantly
nto Paris. The French believed 1t, the English
believed 1t, the Belglans believed 1t, the Italians
believed 1t. all the world believed 1t. But the boys
# four American regiments did not believe 1t. The
fifth and Sixth marines, the Ninth and Twenty
bird infantry of the Second division, being the
learest at hand, were crowded into trucks as close
is they could stand and hurried in the night to