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Ofye Jeffersonian
Vol. 14, No. 23
IN Parton’s “Life of Andrew Jackson.” it is
stated that John Hancock, Governor of
Massachusetts, originated the demand for the
Amendments which were almost immediately
made to the Constitution of the United States,
after it had been ratified.
Hancock had a vast deal to do with starting
the Revolutionary War, and his name —as all
patriots know—appears in the largest letters,
on the Declaration of Independence.
If he was the real author of our National
Bill of Rights, as Parton claims, our debt to
him is even larger than is generally supposed..
The acute question of today is, Can the Bill
of Rights stand against the usurpations of the
Federal Government ?
It cannot, unless the people show some
spirit.
The t venal daily press has been so full of
intimidations—threats to arrest, threats of
imprisonment, and threats of the penitentiary
•—that the average citizen is cowed.
That is the effect desired.
Those in power were putting upon the
country a revolutionary change of military
system, as Secretary Lansing admitted, and
it was necessary to terrorize its victims.
They must be made to feel that, if they
protested, they would be punished as crimi
nals.
Never during the darkest days of Recon-
A Few Simple Explanations ol Oar Reasons for
Sending Big Armies to Europe
r pHE New York papers inform us that
* 11,000,000 men registered for military
service, and that (he first Army that we send
to Europe will number 625,000.
Os course you will understand that we
Democrats don’t intend to let Roosevelt and
his volunteers go, at all.
We will send the patriots who enlisted to
avoid conscription, and then the other patriots
who registered because they had to and were
afraid not to.
This is no time nor occasion for us to fool
away the fleeting hours on Roosevelt volun
teers.
But it is a great comfort to know exactly
why we are going to send to Europe, at the
first go, a larger rorce than the combined
armies of Lee and Grant, Sherman and John
ston.
The explanation is being made in Wash
ington City, in New York, in several other
towns, in the religious conventions, in the
Weekly Steam-whistles; in the village pul
pits, in Congressional speeches, in special
articles, in daily editorials, in Billy Sunday’s
prayers, and. last but not least, in the barber
shops and drug-stores.
The unanimity which prevails among these
explanations is truly refreshing. It almost
causes one to rejoice at being alive. We in
voluntarily commiserate the" folks who are
THESE ARE YOUR LAWFUL RIGHTS
Thomson, Ga,, Thursday, June 14, 1917
struction, when military satraps governed
States, and the bayonet of the soldier gleamed
at every public assemblage, have I known
such a campaign of systematic suppression of
public opinion.
The tone of those who are in charge of
governmental machinery has been that of
employers to servants, lords to vassals, masters
to slaves.
As if the whole Supreme Civil Constitution
had been abolished, and Martial Law estab
lished throughout the Union, the common
citizen has been bullied, insulted, trodden
upon, with less regard for civic rights than
was shown at the most critical period of the
War between the States.
One could almost imagine that our country
had suddenly swapped places with Belgium,
and that a lot of German bosses were in
charge of the air'we breathe.
Private letters inform me that people are
actually afraid to sign a petition to the Gov
ernment., remonstrating against the despotic
Conscription Act.
More than 200 years ago. when English
liberties were yet the-'cause of bloody strug
gles between tyrannical kings and a people
determined, to rule themselves, this Right of
Petition was established.
To be exact, it was in the year 1088.
Since that time, it was never questioned,
too sick to listen and too deaf to hear.
I have already told you what the Southern
Baptist Convention said we were sending
troops to Europe for. According to Brother
Gambrell ct al. we will send conscripted sol
diers across the ocean, and keep them there in
the trenches, fighting with the armies of the
Allies, until we demolish autocracy and mili
tarism.
Why, everywhere!
Next came the President’s Memorial Day
address in Washington—whore the Vets went
unfed, and slept out doors, in the bleak
streets —in which we were told that our Gov
ernment wo dd not reach its “fruition,” until
it went abroad, “pouring out blood and
treasure,” to establish liberty for “mankind,”
throughout the world.
These declarations of the causes of war and
■of our benevolent intentions would seem to be
sufficiently clear and definite, but the ex
plainers are still explaining.
The more they say. the less I understand.
For instance, here are the New York
dailies, coming out with a fresh series*of ex
planations. the day after so many patriots
had registered so cheerfully, because the At
torney General and the District Attorneys
had drawn guns on them, as it were. * /
First, comes the Hon. Franklin Lane, mem
ber us the Cabinet, and perhaps the ablest
until now, when a supposed Jeffersonian
democrat occupies the seat of the mighty.
Isn't it almost unbelievable?
Could you have dreamed, this time last
year. that Wilson's Administration, asking
for a renewal of its lease of power, meant to
revolutionize your constitutional military sys
tem, and crush you into silent submission, by
a propaganda of threats, arrests, and bluffing
bravado ?
If at this time last year. The Jeffersonian
had accused Woodrow Wilson of harboring
in his mind, such a revolution as this, there
isn't a paper in all this land that wouldn't
have denounced me, even more bitterly than
they now do, for protesting against Me w<9-
lution.
What are the constitutional rights of the
people, which the Federal Government is for
bidden to take away?
It is a reproach to our system of education
that they are not known to every boy and
girl, every mail'and woman.
What person, inheriting priceless jewels—
from ancestors who won them in pain, ami
struggle, and bloody sacrifice—would remain
in ignorance of what those jewels are?
What citizen, the heir of liberties, without
which life is almost unbearable, can afford to
remain ignorant of his birthright ?
(continued on page two.)
man in the President’s official family.
In his eloquent and ringing speech to the
Home Club of his Interior Department,
Brother Lane fairly outstripped Brother
Gambrell, although Brother G. is very hard
to outstrip.
Brother Lane said—■
We are fighting Germany because in this war
feudalism is making its last stand against oncom
ing democracy. We see it now. This is a war
against an old spirit, an ancient, outworn spirit.
It is a war against feudalism, the right of the
castle on the hill to rule the village below, it is
a war for democracy, the right of all to be their
own masters.
“The right of all to be their own masters,”
is a very sacred right; and, according to the
report on compulsory registration, 11.000,000
Americans joyously' parted with that right,
on the sth ultimo, because of what Brother
Gregory and his District Attorneys, Marshals,
Deputies, &c., said they would do to the
brethren, unless they came forward and
registered.
lhese eleven million Americans—gently
persuaded to leave (he bushes and let them
selves be nicely tagged with visible and
tangible indicia of ebullient patriotism—are
now subject to lie “selected," and sent across
the pond, to make war upon “the ancient, out
(CONTINUED ON PACE THREE.)
Price, Five (dents