The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, March 18, 1918, Page 4

% . . % //////,,//5 vé////// /@//// onpartigin Rader Official Magazine of the National Nonpartisan League—Every Weck Entered as second-class matter September 8, 1915, at the postoffice at St. Paul, Minnesota, under the Act of March 3, 18179. OLIVER S. MORRIS, EDITOR Advertising rates on application. months, $1.50. St. Paul, Minn. Subscription, one year, in advance, $2.50; six Communications should be addressed to the Nonpartisan Leader, Box 575, MEMBER OF AUDIT BUREAU OF CIRCULATIONS THE S. C. BECKWITH SPECIAL AGENCY, Advertising Representatives, New York, Chicago, St. Louis, Detroit, Kansas City. Quack, fraudulent and irresponsible firms are not knowingly advertised, and we will take it as a favor if any readers will advise us promptly should they have occasion to doubt or question the reliability of any firm which patronizes our advertising columns. AN IMPERIALIST SPEAKS ONPARTISAN league members need not feel hurt because they are called Bolsheviki and pacifists on account of their 2 position on the war, which coincides exactly with President Wilson’s statements of war aims. They need not, for Presi- dent Wilson himself is now being called these same names by the imperialistic war party in the United States—the party which objects to having this merely a war “for justice and democracy, and would make it a war for conquest, annexation, commercial ad- vantage and for the benefit of war profiteers at home. i The Leader has repeatedly said that the presi- dent’s statement of war aims is a hard thing for big business and the money kings and their press in this country to swallow. These interests and their newspapers objected first to a statement of war aims being made, knowing if it were made by a statesman like Wilson it would not serve their purposes. And when the president did make a statement, they heartily disapproved of it, al- though their opposition has not been expressed very openly until recently. However, the im- perialistic war party in the United States, allied as it is with those interests that would use the war to halt necessary political and economic re-- forms and social adjustments which were under way before this nation entered the struggle, are . now speaking more openly. Their view of Presi- dent Wilson’s war program—of his war for de- mocracy—is well summarized in the following quotation from the speech of James M. Beck, at a recent meeting in New York: Nothing more unfortunate than President Wil- son’s war statements has happened since we entered the war. If the president will eliminate from his counsels the intriguers, the pacifists, the doctrin- aires and the intellectual Bolsheviki, he will confirm the confidence which his countrymen have so fully and ungrudgingly given him. If the war is to be com- promised by diplomatic finesse, if it is,to be settled on the basis of four innocuous and almost’meaning- less principles, then all the dead will have died in vain. There you have it. The president, lifie‘ the Nonpartisan league members, who are in agree- ment with him on his war aims, is a Bolsheviki and a pacifist. His declarations for a war for democracy, minus territorial or commercial con- quest, are “innocuous and almost meaningless principles.” We agree they are meaningless to Mr. Beck and the imperialistic war party for which he speaks. They can not conceive of a war that does not have for its object the conquest of crushed peoples or the making of money for a few individuals through the capture of foreign markets at the point of the bayonet. But to the great majority of the people of America, Presi- dent Wilson’s war statements do mean something, and they thank God for them. g ., Mr. Beck and those for whom he speaks con- sider that when American soldiers die in France, shedding their . blood for world liberty and democracy, they “will have died in vain.” But they would not be dying in vain, thinks Mr. Beck, if the}r blood was shed for such sordid things as conquest and exploi- tation of other nations, or to make money and gain position and " PAGE ‘FOUR - P ; power for commercial and money kings. Mr. Beck ought to live in Germany and be chief.adviser to the kaiser. ANOTHER BLOW AT MOB RULE ATRIOTIC American citizens will support Governor Lowden of Illinois in his recent proclamation demanding that peace officers of the state suppress the lawlessness that has stained the fair name of Illinois and has violated the spirit and letter of President Wilson’s specific injurictions. ; For some time mobs in Illinois have been taking the law into their own hands by summarily dealing with persons charged with being pro-German or disloyal. This is anarchy, and is no more justified on the ground that it is done in the interests of “loyalty” or “patriotism” than if it were done on the ground of religion or any other ground. - The laws and constitution are still in force, and the courts are still running. These are the bulwarks of law and order and their orderly process should not be interfered with or their functions usurped by private citizens. President Wilson has truly said that America’s cause is so just, so honest, so remote from base motives and self-interest, that we can well take a manly part in the war without hate and rancor running riot at home. The president’s splendid statement on law- lessness and mob rule made to the American Federation of Labor convention a few months ago ought to be enough to prevent thoughtless citizens from trying to take the law into their own hands, and now also we have the statesmanlike proclamation of the governor of Illinois, which the governors of some other states we know of would do well to copy. Governor Lowden says: I have had on several occasions recently to say to sheriffs and other police officials that order must be preserved within their several jurisdictions. I want now to emphasize this to all peace of- ficers of this state. Mob rule will not be tolerated in any part of the state, even though such mob rule - acts in the name of loyalty to the government. If it can not secure a due and orderly government at home, how can it expect to win battles abroad? WHY THE BOLSHEVIKI GOT POWER STATESMEN and other students of the Rus- sian situation now state frankly that a great diplomatic error was made in the fail- ure of the United States and the allied na- tions to issue a clear concrete statement of war aims earlier than. it was done. . Arno Dosch- Fleurot, well known French correspondent at Petrograd, writing for American newspapers, is one of those who takes this view. He states that, had the allies issued their war aim statement earlier, the Kerensky government would not have fallen, as it would have been able to have kept the people of Russia back of it in its desire to prosecute the war. Arno Dosch-Fleurot says: If the allies had had any conception of what the people were thinking in Russia, they would have done one thing at all cost. They would have called the conference on the aims of the war. Not to do it . was diplomatic stupidity. And, if by not doing it, they handed the Bolsheviki ammunition to use against Kerensky, thereby causing his downfall, they have, as I say, only themselves to thank. One of the things that made it impossible for an earlier statement of war aims to be made by .the United States and its European allies was the attitude of the American press. No sooner had the progressives and liberals in the United States pointed out the necessity for a statement of war aims thqn the press raised its unanimous voice against it, on the ground that a demand for a statement of war aims was giving comfort to Ger- many and bordered on sedition. The progressive and liberal press, which wanted a statement of war aims, had to combat these papers, which represented the big interests of the United States and the imperialistic war party, and it was not until some months had passed that liberals were successful in swinging enough sentiment in this country to their side to ing statement of war aims. Ruséia. might have been saved for ‘the allied possible to have press of the United States during the first months that the United States was in the war. The Nonpartisan league in June, 1917, adopted resolutions backing the Kerensky government f : peace, which has’ since been adopted by President Wil:oTul?Igg ,enable President Wilson to make his epoch-mak- muzzled the imperialistic_.