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Page 68
When this storm had subsided, Henry Ford rose to renew the pacifist
attack.
"It shocks and grieves me," he began, "to find American women openly
advocating the killing of human beings."
"Where would your business be," yelled a voice in the gallery, "if George
Washington hadn't fought the War of the Revolution?"
This sally called forth such frantic cheers that Mr. Ford was unable to
make himself heard and sat down in confusion.
Other speakers were Jane Addams, Hudson Maxim, Bernard Ridder and William
Jennings Bryan. The audience sat listless as the old arguments and
recriminations, the old facts and fallacies, were laid before them. Like
the nation, they seemed plunged in a stupor of indifference. They were
asleep.
Then suddenly fell the bomb from heaven. It was during the mild applause
following Mr. Bryan's pacifist appeal, that I had a premonition of some
momentous happening. I was in the press gallery quite near to Theodore
Roosevelt, the next speaker, who was seated at the end of the platform,
busy with his notes, when a messenger came out from behind the stage and
handed the Colonel a telegram. As he read it I saw a startling change.
Roosevelt put aside his notes and a strange tense look came into his eyes
and, presently, when he rose to speak, I saw that his usually ruddy face
was ashen grey.
As Roosevelt rose, another messenger thrust a wet, ink-stained newspaper
into his hand.
"Ladies and gentlemen," he began, and in his first words there was a
sense of impending danger, "for reasons of the utmost importance I shall
not deliver the speech that I have prepared. I have a brief message, a
very grave message, that will reach your hearts more surely than any
words of mine. The deliberations of this great gathering have been taken
out of our hands. We have nothing more to discuss, for Almighty God has
spoken!
"My friends, the great man who was with us but now, the President of the
United States, has been assassinated."
No words can describe the scene that followed. A moment of smiting
silence, then madness, hysteria, women fainting, men clamouring and
cursing, and finally a vast upsurging of quickened souls, as the organ
pealed forth: "My Country, 'Tis of Thee," and forty thousand Americans
rose and sang their hearts out.
Then, in a silence of death, Roosevelt spoke again:
"Listen to the last words of the President of the United States: '_The
Union! The Flag!_' That is what he lived for and died for, that is what
he loved. '_The Union! The Flag!_'
"My friends, they say patriotism is dead in this land. They say we are
eaten up with love of money, tainted with a yellow streak that makes us
afraid to fight. It's a lie! I am ready to give every dollar I have in
the world to help save this nation and it's the same with you men. Am I
right?"
A roar of shouts and hysterical yells shook the building.
"I am sixty years old, but I'll fight in the trenches with my four sons
beside me and you men will do the same. Am I right?"
Again came a roar that could be heard across Chicago.
"We all make mistakes. I do nothing but make mistakes, but I'm sorry.
I have said hard things about public men, especially about
German-Americans, but I'm sorry."
With a noble gesture he turned to Bernard Ridder, who sprang to meet him,
his eyes blazing with loyalty.
"There are no German-Americans!" shouted Ridder. "We're all Americans!
Americans!"
He clasped Roosevelt's hand while the audience shouted its delight.
Quick on his feet came Charles Edward Russell, fired with the same
resistless patriotism.
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