The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1925-10-09
Lords of the Earth

m HERE is Tar more serious side to Presl-
dent Coolldge's warning against toler-
than appears on the surface. Certainly
much more serious than we, in this country,
generally realize.
''The results of the war will be lost"
he said at Omaha land we shall only be
entering period of preparation for an
other conflict unless we can demobilize the
racial antagonisms, fears, hatreds and sus-
picions, and create an attitude of tolera-
ton in the public mind of the peoples of
the earth"
And then he added.
eff our country is to have any posi-
ton of leadership, I trust it may be in that
direction, and I believe that the place
where it should begin is at home"
All of us know, of course, Of the wave of
intolerance now sweeping this country Racial
and religious bigotry are on a rampage Laws
have been enacted taking from the citizens the
right even to talk as they think and, where the
law leaves off, all sorts Of organizations have
vidual and his conscience.
But that is not the phase of the problem
we would deal with here. We are developing
a national bigotry, national intolerance,
national better-than-thou attitude which, when
combined with certain other things for which
we are not so much to blame are building up
national peril of which few of us are clearly
aware.
Bruntly Americans are rapidly taking the
place in world opinion until recently held by
the overbearing Prussians We are being
spoken Of abroad as the ''lords of the earth, "
and with no intention to fatter, either. The
Moscow "Isviestia" speaks the Russian
thought when it says we are craftily "acquir-
ing world hegemony" Latin-American opinion
is largely that we are attempting an cover
lordship" in Mexico, Central and South Amer
lea. Japan pictures Uncle Sam as a fox-the
most evil of japanese spirits-and cartoons
him as "detestable brute" treading on the
Nipponese flag.
In Germany we are nearly always car
TONED as huge money-bag sitting as
bloated Gar on a skyscraper throne forcing
Our subjects-the other nations of the rid
to kneel in supplication before u.s. In France.
Italy and elsewhere it is the same old story.
while even England broadcasts the impression
over and over, like refrain, that she would
like to be generous with those who owe her. but
can't because the United States is pressing her
hard for it's pay
And so it goes, all over the world, while in
div1dual Americans, here and abroad, give the
impression of devil-may-care, newly-rich Doors,
extremely offensive to the average less fortu-
nate foreigner
One reason, Of course, for foreigners
everywhere feeling as they do about us is that
they nearly all owe us money. And the classics
have warned us that loan generally loses the
lender his friend This is the inevitable result
II the lender, at the same time, adopts an atti-
tude of superiority and intolerance.
Our newly acquired title of Chords of the
Earth makes our position unusually difficult
and, at the same time, most dangerous. Most
anything we do is apt to give offense where
none is intended.
'Noblesse oblige ''-greatness imposes OBJ
legations. We must remember this If we do
not, then indeed 'the results of the war will be
lost and we shall only be entering neriod If
preparation for another conflict" quite as the
President said