AN AMERICAN'S SCATHING IN DICTMENT.

Taihape Daily Times, Issue 219, 3 November 1916, Page 6

AN AMERICAN'S SCATHING IN DICTMENT.

It is safe to say that American opinion to-day is almost solidly pacifist. But there are cross-currents. A few months ago there appeared in "lieClure's Magazine"—a journal with a large circulation among the thinking classes —an extraordinary bitter article, entitled "Uncle Sham." I After mercilessly satirising the. attitude of Washington towards Ger- j man arrogance, the writer said: —"We. do keep out of the war. But how? By allowing other nations to massacre | our citizens; relinquishing one by one ; our inalienable rights—noisily and ! pompously relinquishing, but relin- : quishing none the less surely and cer- j tainly. "We keep out of a fight because every time our adversary advances we back up. They've backed us out of Mexico; the backed us orr the ocean. Already, in fact, if not in ■word, they've taken away the inalienable rights of Americans to travel on the high seas. If they wanted to take away their inalienable rights to the Atlantic seaboard it would be the same - thing. We'd retreat, holding our typewriter in one hand and writing notes on it with the other. If they -wanted the inalienable Middle West, it would be the same. And we'd fin- J ally wind up in an inalienable cyclone cellar in Sacramento, and if they wanted that, we'd pack up our typewriter and start swimming across the Pacific, the while writing a note about the inalienable rights of Americans to swim in the Pacific Ocean." Into these stinging phrases the writer has put what many of his countrymen are thinking. Though perhaps not earnest students of history, Amerians are familiar enough with the records of the past to be aware tha? peace cannot be permanently secured by timidity. They know, further, that j American prestige to-day has reachecr a lower ebb than ever before. They are determined to end the preset state of national unpreparedness "sy providing themselves with sufficient and efficient weapons on sea and j land. In short, it is evident that the thinking sections cf the American people are growing tired of "Uncle Sham" as their representative. Perhaps the most significant sign of all is the wosderful popularity of Colonel Roosevelt. Thanks to the party machine, he is out of the Presidential running, but it soon dawns upon the observer that "Teddy" is the one man whom the American people believe competent and resolute enough to pilot the Ship of State through the perilous shoals which beset ifs course at the present juncture.