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Page 67
Through all this storm and darkness, amid dissension and violence, one
man stood firm for the right, one wise big-souled man, the President of
the United States. In a clamour of tongues he heard the still small voice
within and laboured prodigiously to build up unity and save the nation.
Like Lincoln, he was loved and honoured even by his enemies.
It was my privilege to hear the great speech which the President of the
United States delivered in Chicago, November 29, 1921, a date which
Theodore Roosevelt has called the most memorable in American history. The
immense auditorium on the lake front, where once were the Michigan
Central tracks, was packed to suffocation. It is estimated that 40,000
men and women, representing every state and organisation in the Union,
heard this impassioned appeal for the nation, that will live in American
history along with Lincoln's Gettysburg address.
The President spoke first and did not remain to hear the other orators,
as he was leaving for Milwaukee, where he hoped to relieve a dangerous,
almost a revolutionary situation. He had been urged not to set foot in
this breeding place of sedition, but he replied that the citizens of
Milwaukee were his fellow countrymen, his brothers. They were dear to
him. They needed him. And he would not fail them.
In spite of this stirring cry from the heart, the audience seemed but
mildly affected and allowed the President to depart with only perfunctory
applause. There was no sign of success for his plea that the nation rouse
itself from its lethargy and send its sons unselfishly in voluntary
enlistment to drive the enemy from our shores. And there were resentful
murmurs when the President warned his hearers that compulsory military
service might be inevitable.
"Why shall the poor give their lives to save the rich?" answered Charles
Edward Russell, speaking for the socialists. "What have the rich ever
done for the poor except to exploit them and oppress them? Why should the
proletariat worry about the frontiers between nations? It's only a
question which tyrant has his heel on our necks. No! The labouring men of
America ask you to settle for them and for their children the frontiers
between poverty and riches. That's what they're ready to fight for, a
fair division of the products of toil, and, by God, they're going to have
it!"
One feature of the evening was a stirring address by the beautiful
Countess of Warwick, prominent in the feminist movement, who had come
over from England to speak for the Women's World Peace Federation.
"Women of America," said the Countess, "I appeal to you to save this
nation from further horrors of bloodshed. Rise up in the might of your
love and your womanhood and end this wholesale murder. Remember the great
war in Europe! What did it accomplish? Nothing except to fill millions of
graves with brave sons and beloved husbands. Nothing except to darken
millions of homes with sorrow. Nothing except to spread ruin and
desolation everywhere. Are you going to allow this ghastly business to be
repeated here?
"Women of America, I bring you greetings from the women of England, the
women of France, the women of Germany, who have joined this great
pacifist movement and whose voices sounding by millions can no longer be
stifled. Let the men hear and heed our cry. We say to them: 'Stop! Our
rights on this earth equal yours. We gave you birth, we fed you at the
breast, we guarded your tender years, and we notify you now that you
shall no longer kill and maim our husbands, our sons, our fathers, our
brothers, our lovers. It is in the power of women to drive war's hell
from the earth and, whatever the cost, we are going to do it.'"
"No! No!" came a tumult of cries from all parts of the hall.
"We believe in fighting to the last for our national existence,"
cried Mrs. John A. Logan, waving her hand, whereupon hundreds of
women patriots, Daughters of the American Revolution, suffrage and
anti-suffrage leaders, members of the Navy League, Red Cross workers,
sprang to their feet and screamed their enthusiasm for righteous war.
Among these I recognised Mrs. John A. Logan, Miss Mabel Boardman, Mrs.
Lindon Bates, Mrs. Mary S. Lockwood, Mrs. Seymour L. Cromwell, Miss Alice
Hill Chittenden, Mrs. Oliver Herford, Mrs. Hobart Chatfield-Taylor, Mrs.
John Temple Graves, Mrs. Edwin Gould, Mrs. George Dewey, Mrs. William
Cumming Story, Mrs. George Harvey, Mrs. Thomas A. Edison, Mrs. William C.
Potter, Miss Marie Van Vorst, Mrs. Arthur M. Dodge, Mrs. George J. Gould,
Mrs. T. J. Oakley Rhinelander, Mrs. W. K. Vanderbilt, Mrs. John Jacob
Astor, Mrs. Peter Cooper Hewitt, Mrs. M. Orme Wilson, Mrs. Simon Baruch,
Mrs. Oliver Herford, Mrs. Wm. Reynolds Brown, and Mrs. Douglas Robinson.
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