Askov American., 1941-01-30


to spend for necessities and luxuries
which means a lower living standard
It is safe to say that there will be
no material reduction in national
taxes within the lifetime of anyone
now living. Not very pleasant
picture to contemplate.
The Dictator Bill.
H. R. 1776 is not lease-lend bill
as its proponents would have us be-
lieve. We are told that it would en-
power the President only to lease or
lend war equipment to Great Britain
and get the stuff, or its equivalent
back after the war.
The bill goes much further than
that. 1t authorizes the President,
without consulting Congress, to have
United States arsenals, shipyards
and factories make defense goods
for any country whose defense
the President deems vital to our
own defense . to sell, transfer,
lease, lend, or otherwise dispose
of any defense article i. to take
any payment, or no payment at
all, for such goods to spend
any amount of United States
money for defense in any way the
President sees fit.
The bill would give the President
virtual power to take us into war
on the side of any country or coun-
tries he thinks we should be allied
with, and to run our entire war eff
fort without consulting Congress as
to anything he sees fit to do. There
fore, the bill is a measure to make
the President dictator of the United
States, hence should be called the
dictator bill'' instead of the lease
lend bill. Passage in its present
form would jeopardize representative
government in America.
History Repeats Itself.
Back in the World war days those
of us who opposed Americas en-
trance into the war were called
pro-Huns, pro-Germans and even vile
and unprintable names. well recall
receiving a letter from st. Cloud,
shortly after my having voted against
war, informing me that if I ever
dared show my face on st. German
street would be ridden out Of town
on a rail. When the fever had sub
sided and we had taken inventory
of the dead and wounded, the costs
and effects, it was easy to see who
had been right and who had been
wrong but, unfortunately, it was too
late to undo the harm. Our dead
could not be resurrected, neither
could our wounded be made whole.
Today, "a years later, a poor de-
luded people, who seem incapable
of learning from the past, are again
denouncing as Fifth Columnists, pro-
Nazis, poltroons and towards, those
who refuse to believe that the safe
ty and perpetuity of the republic
rests upon the British navy, and be-
cause he was fortnight enough to
say just that to House committee
one day last week, Col. Lindbergh
is being held up to scorn and ridi-
cule by newspapers and individuals
who in saner moments would know
better. I should like to quote from
Woodrow Wilson on the subject of
a negotiated peace, and peace with
out victory. He said,
"They (negotiations) imply first of
all that it must be peace without
victory 4. am seeking only to face
realities and to face them without
any soft concealments. Victory
would mean peace forced upon the
loser, victor's terms imposed upon
the vanquished. 1t would be accepted
in humiliation, under duress, at an
intolerable sacrifice, and would leave
a sting, a resentment, bitter men,
ory, upon which terms of peace
would rest, not permanently, but
only as upon quicksand. Only a peace
between equals can last"
We must not become confused. This
is not our war. We did not declare
it, neither were we consulted by Eng
land and France when they declared
that war on September 3, 1899. Do
we want to join the mad nations of
Europe in their race for bankrupt
cy, chaos and anarchy? That, and only
that, is the question for the Ameri-
can people to decide.