The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, August 12, 1918, Page 6

(R — ’ 7y /'//44 Z A | 7 '///////// '%/// Nonpartisan Teader Official Magazine of the National Nonpartisan League—Every Week Entered as second-class matter September 8, 1915, Minnesota, under the Act of March 3, 1879, OLIVER S. MORRIS, Editor at the postoffice at St. Paul, PAUL GREER, ‘Associate Editor B. 0. FO8S, Art Editor, Advertising rates on application. Subscription, one year, in advance, $2.50; six months, $1.50. lease ‘do not make checks, drafts mor money orders payable to indi- viduals. Address all letters and make all remittances to The Nonpartisan er, Box 575, St. Paul, Minn. T 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 qmestion the reliability of any firm which patronizes our advertising -columns. i THE OLD GANG POLITICIANS \OEA OF HELL — TAR AND FEATHER ' IS SANITY RETURNING? : S THERE at last going to be a reaction against the breakdown of law and order? d are we as a people coming to our senses in regard to the widespread use of “disloyalty” charges and insinuations by politicians and newspapers for political pur- poses? With a fanatical, hate-filled press still spreading its poison, it may be too early to predict that the majority of free-born Amer- icans will actively fight these things which are undermining our democracy and setting neighbor against neighbor. But things are happening that presage a wholesome change in the attitude of the general public towards mob action and rioting, towards sinister use of the sedition law, fake disloyalty charges, persecution of farmer and labor organizations and use of patriotic activities to discredit liberal and demoeratic men and measures. - First there is the eloquent proclamation of President Wilson asking governors and peace officers and citizens of the states to prevent further lynchings, deportations, tar and feathering, law- less breaking up of peaceful, legitimate assemblages and other - acts that have put us on a level, as the president says, with the worst that we affect to despise in Prussianism. The president has been worried-about these things in America. He has shared with . every thoughtful person who loves our country and our free po- litical institutions a feeling of grave concern over these proofs that a large number of Americans are incapable of self-government and faithless to our splendid traditions of liberty -and fair play. At about the same time, Will H. Hays, chairman of the national Republican committee, told the New York state Republican conven- tion that he “wanted no more allegations from either side concern- ing disloyalty.” Republican machine leaders and candidates .in Minnesota and North Dakota, where the farmers’ League is active, have been the worst offenders in prostituting patriotic sentiment for political purposes, and they are virtually read out of the party by the national chairman’s statement. Last but not least is the positive announcement of the national Red Cross that that organization must not be used for political purposes, which will shut off the use of at least one necessary patriotic activity as a cover from which politicians in many in- stances have been striking at the organized farmers and at progres- sive and liberal men and measures. ; It may be too early to predict that American communities everywhere will heed these words of wisdom from the president and his aides and from other public men, but certainly they mark -the beginning of a change that ought to give heart to those who were fearing the further intensifying of hate, prejudice and hysteria during the war. The great heart and mind of the people are right. Some have only been misled by the paytrioteering of the politicians and profiteers and their newspaper supporters. A few, knowing the ‘menace of the blind spirit of intolerance and fanaticism they were stirring up, did it intentionally for sinister purposes. . Doubtless many actual pro-Germans. and disloyalists helped in the work, which for a time bid fair to discredit us and ‘individuals for political purposes, or against farmers’ organiza- . .commission. 4 Ty, 2 7 . 7 our cause in the eyes of the world and bring about '_a reign of terror and a factional strife at home which endangered our efficiency in the war. y ! A . - = P g yRYIUN COMING TO OUR SENSES ; THE committee on public information of the Montana Council A I S of Defense has just issued a statement that shows how the tide seems to be turning against the war hysteria which for a time promised to be a menace in America. The statement of the Montana council is that the charge of disloyalty against tions whose program is economic and not opposed to the war, “is itself traitorous.” . . : The North Dakota Council of Defense long ago took this same position. It got squarely back of a policy of sanity at home during the war, early in the game, but the North Dakota council, being made up of Nonpartisan league farmers, was called pro-German for this. The press sought to make out that in some way ‘Amer- icanism and anti-Germanism was connected with insanity and rioting, and the North Dakota council was therefore pro-German for sitting down on these things. Will Minnesota’s defense council, called the “public safety” commission, now take a position against rioting and persecution of farmers’ organizations? ‘Our guess is that it will not—at least not as long as Judge McGee, the man who aided Germany by telling congress the state was a seething hotbed of sedition, continues to dominate the governor of Minnesota and run the public safety <. 4+ [ =~ . NEW CONVERTS TO DEMOCRACY . O FIND a reactionary newspaper like the New York Times clamoring about making the world safe for democracy and throwing fits over the militarism of Germany and -the frightfulness of the kaiser is highly amusing. The liberals and progressives of America did not need this war to awaken them to the menace of German militarism and autocratic systems of gov: ernment, which give the kaiser and the military caste of Germany the power to drive humanity to slaughter to fill an ambition for world domination. R : ; S5 . What the Times is now telling about kaiserism and autocracy the liberals and progressives were telling a century ago, and ever since, WHILE UP TO VERY RECENTLY THE NEW YORK TIMES AND PAPERS OF ITS ILK WERE DOING ALL IN THEIR POWER TO GAIN THE RESPECT OF AMERICANS FOR GERMAN MILITARISM AND GERMAN AUTOCRACY. Before the war it was the libarals and radicals, and not the reactionaries like the Times, that were warning America of the menace of autoe- racy and militarism to the world’s peace and happiness. Sees Do you suppose it was one of the liberal papers of America that, in 1913, published the following editorial: st : It is through no mere desire to be complimentary, and it is by no confusion of the wish with the thought, that the two ex-presidents ; of the United States, the Duke of Argyll, Lord Blyth and Sir Gilbert Parker, Arthur von Gwinner, the financier; Alfred H. Fried, the Deace advocate; Andrew Carnegie, Hugo Munsterberg and Nicholas - Murray Butler agree in hailing the kaiser as “the greatest individual . force in the practical maintenance of peace in the world.” Their ' - opinions are backed by the evidence;-the testimony is full and complete. P This is from the New York Times of June, 1913—the New York Times, recent convert to the doctrine of “making-the world