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Vof. 14, No. 24
The Great War, and Some Facts for Your Consideration.
AT the close of the Civil War, 1866, the
Public Debt of the United'"States was
$2,783,425,789.21, very much less than three
billion dollars.
After four years of gigantic straggle, and
the maintenance of millions of soldiers in the'
field, the vast expenditure of all sorts of mili
tary supplies, from Manassas to Appomattox;
the payment of bounties, the creation of a
great navy, &c., the U. S. Government had
contracted a smaller debt than President Wil
son has put upon us, before a shot has been
fired!
In 1864, after three years of the colossal
"War between the States, the Lincoln Adminis
tration owed less than the “Liberty Loan,”
which Mr. McAdoo and his father-in-law
have hippodromed upon the country.
To be exact, the Public Debt in 1864 was
$1,740,690,489.49.
President Lincoln’s debt was about
equal to the amount of net profits which
the Morgan banks, the Steel Trust, the Pow
der Trust, the Meat Trust, the Oil Trust, and
a few other Jiberty-loving vultures have
made off this European War.
Now. if you are a person who thinks for
himself, and are not taken in by all the slush,
gush, bosh, and bull-wash that you get from
the daily papers, you will begin to wonder
why it is that President Lincoln’s debt, at the
end of a great war, amounted to less than
President Wilson’s, at the beginning of one.
The President Again Tries to Tell Why a Million Americans
Must be Slaughtered in Europe
NIEVER before lias there been so much
difficulty in explaining a great War.
It’s bad enough among the European na
tions, but worse here.
Austria says she went to war, because a
Bosnian Greek Catholic boy shot and killed
two Austrian Roman Catholics, at Serajevo,
in June 1914.
The Greek Catholics say that the Bosnian
boy had been made desperate by the bloody
wrongs inflicted upon his people by Austria,
and by the infamous Concordat of June 24th,
1914, which the Austrian Jesuits and the
Jesuit Pope forced upon Greek Catholic Ser
via.
The Kaiser says he jumped in, on Belgium
and France, because Russia and France were
about to jump on him.
Russia says she waded in, because Austria
was about to annihilate Greek Catholic Ser
via, in the same way that she had prostrated
Greek Catholic Bosnia and Herzegovina.
England says she made the plunge, because
she had guaranteed the integrity of Belgium,
and because she herself was menaced by the
Kaiser's ambition.
France says she had no alternative: she
fought to save her own life, when German
hosts were launched against her before she
had even drawn a sword.
Italy got into it, because she wants thos A
Thomson, Ga,, Thursday, June 21, 1917
The best history of our Civil War period
is that of James Ford Rhodes, published by
The Macmillan Company: in the 4th volume,
pages 236. and 7, you will find this statement,
which applies to the year 1863:
“Owing to the discouragement of defeats
in the field, the feeling of weariness at the
duration of the war, and the improved state
of business which opened many avenues of
lucrative employment, volunteering had prac
tically ceased.
To fill the armies, some measure of compul
sion was necessary The Conscription
Act now passed, &c.”
Consider this, thoughtfully. It was in the
Spring of 1863 that Congress at last adopted
Conscription, for the reason that the North
had become tired of the War, and dis
heartened by the almost unbroken victories
of the Confederate Armies.
The Government had issued nearly two
thousand million dollars of paper money: and
this increase of circulating currency had
made such an improvement in business, that
the profits of employment in peaceful voca
tions were more attractive than the bounties
for military service.
(The Wilson government does not issue an
increase of money: it issues bonds, to increase
the Public Debt.)
But how did the Conscription Act pan out?
provinces which Austria tore from her, years
ago; and because she is, on principles of self
preservation, mortally opposed to Papal aims
in precipitating the War.
Thus, you see, it is not easy to understand
the motives of all the European nations; but
when it comes to us. our best talkers stumble
about like men lost in a fog.
No two of them exactly agree; and any two
speeches of any one of them, are apt to dis
agree.
It would be comic, were it not so tragic.
Take the President, for example: is
floundering.
Have sou ever noticed a lawyer, pleading
a case in the court-room, when most of the
evidence and the better part of the law, were
against him?
Have you ever noticed how he bellows, and
sweats, and paws the atmosphere?
Lawyers present, who know what's the mat
ter with him, will smile on the sly, and say to
one another—-“ He’s laboring”
When he finishes, his face is red, he’s damp
with perspiration, his collar is limp, and his
handkerchief is wet: apt as not, he has lost
the case.
Professor Wilson is in just such a fix: he’s
laboring.
Not only do his speeches now differ from
How many soldiers did it send to the front?
On page 426 of the same volume the his
torian. Rhodes, answers the question:
’Tn his annual report to the President, the
Secretary of War said that the Conscription
Act had been enforced in twelve States, levy
ing 50,000 soldiers."
Fifty thousand men. for the whole year,
from March 1863 to March 1864 —a mere drop
in the bucket—and doubtless thousands of
those conscripts soon made for the swamps,
just as so many of our Southern conscripts
did.
Now let us turn to the responses made by
volunteers, or by the action of the States, to
President Lincoln’s various “calls:"
1861 —3 months’ men sff.ooo
1861 — 3 years’ men 500,000
1862 years’ men 300.000
1862—9 months’ men 300.000
1864 —3 years' men Feb 500.000
IS64 —3 years’ men March 200.000
1864 —3 years' men July 500,000
1864 —3 vears' men Dec 300.000
Total 2,675,000
Even this magnificent host of volunteers,
and State contributions, does not include the
militia which rushed to the front, when Lee
invaded Marvland and Pennsvlvania.
*. •
(continued on page two.)
those he made in October, but they differ from
those he made early in the'year, and they do
not now agree with each other.
If he has in his head a clear idea of why
we are to send a million of our boys to die in
foreign lands, that clear idea has not yet
found expression.
In last week’s Jeffersonian, you saw what
Mr. Lane, a member of the President's Cabi
net said in a set speech, which was reproduced
in Democratic organs that sneeze three times
every time the President takes snuff.
Mr. Secretary Lane —and an able brother
he is, too—said that we are going to send
Armies to Europe, because we cannot allow
Russia to grope around in a new, strange
democratic world; and that we cannot forget
what the ruthless Germans did to Liege, Lou
vain, and Cardinal Mercier; and that, more
over, it is time to have another round with
Mahomet.
Christendom hasn’t gone after the Prophet
since the English halted the Russians, close
to Constantinople, in 1898; and it is indeed
high time that we resume the chase, since
England got so rudely halted, close to Con*
stantinople, in 1915.
England wouldn't allow Russia to oust
Mahomet from Europe, in 1898; and Ger
many would not allow England* to do it, in
(continued on page three.) j
Price, Five Gents