Show Kathleen Norris Says Lets Let's Keep On Singing Oh Say Can You See Dell lOeU Syndicate Syndicate Service tJ tt t l l k j 7 e M 1 t I a JL t i I Was l Washington Washington's first firs congress was U so 0 hearted hall after the pf peace Ce that was made at 01 I Y Yorktown that hal it il was hard to 10 get leI a quorum together By KATHLEEN NORRIS r WO great men were born inthis in Two this month Perhaps the greatest the world has seen for or hundreds of years In vain one scans cans the lists of famous names from rom China India Russia Italy France ranee Germany England to find finda a patriot a statesman a humanitarian human human- arian tarlan with the vision and courage and nd patience that Lincoln and Washington Washington Wash Wash- ington possessed and whose fruits gave ave us the nation we are so proud to o call our own today There have been great soldiers great reat prime ministers in other countries But few of them have combined with their governing qualIties the finer qualities of heart and soul And few of them have had to face ace the personal and national perils that marked the careers of both our great Teat men They gave America that charac charac- that no other nations claim It t Is best called humanitarianism It t is I unique in the dealings of one nation with another and that particular par par- element is what makes us different and makes our history dif dif- ferent erent We are not an aggressive nation We are not seeking to dominate dominate domi nate other smaller nations and enIch enrich en en- rich Ich ourselves with their treasure No Indemnities Claimed After any unpleasantness whether it t be the great war of 1918 1914 or orthe orthe orthe the Spanish war or the injuries that were done us in China some 40 years ago we dont don't claim ties les We pay for what we take and after awhile give it back to its own people as a gift If nations borrow money from us in extremities we presently forgive them their defaulting default ing of the debt and a brotherly feeling feel ing log of sympathy in their fresh difficulties continues undisturbed Weare We Weare Weare are slow to make enemies among the nations because we are a corn com of them all the living exam exam- pie of the truth that all men are brothers and can live together in peace No other nation does this or ever has done this If It one of them conquers conquers con can quers a smaller or weaker people that people lives under heavy taxa taxa- tion From that moment it is a people ruled by its military betters it pays tribute its wealth and its treasure are poured into the coffers Golfers of the victors New World Era Our history began and a new world era began when a few men opposed apposed themselves to a supposedly irresistible and inexhaustible power and risked their lives to defend the principle that men are fit tit to rule themselves Washington's first congress con gress grass was so hearted half-hearted after the peace that was made at Yorktown that it was hard to get a quorum to gether gather On all sides he met scorn acorn doubt criticism indifference The Influential people were the Tories and they had every reason to feel for the first dozen years of Americas America's Amen Ameri cas ca's existence that this ridiculous experiment in democracy was bound to ignominious failure Two generations later it was for awkward gentle big Lincoln to hold the country together to keep us a nation still The echoes of that bitter bitter bit bit- ter struggle are still in our ears we are still a very baby among the rations at the age of one hundred ind nd sixty But we are the greatest of them all now end hardly aware yet of our own potentialities for future greatness We have our weak spots Our neglect neg lect of the financial safety of the a P f 1 t 22 old and helpless Our strikes Our dust bowl emigrants and illiterate mountain folk But the hopeful thing things Is s that we know it and In a fumbling fumbling fum fum- bling fashion are beginning to do something about it rather than accepting accepting ac ac- ac want squalor a fearful in infant infant In in- fant mortality disease crime as a apart apart apart part of the plan of Divine Providence Provi Provi- dence All Brothers Our mixed blood is at once our hope lope and our menace Our menace Because when thousands of foreign foreign- born jorn men and women are transplanted transplanted trans trans- planted to a new soil it takes them several generations to develop a loyalty loy toy alty to the new flag nag and to learn to toive live ive in freedom and comfort They see fortunes made by graft and theft and they are tempted beyond any strength that the poverty and restriction of their old lives had power to give them But year by year conditions and environment are improved and in hi another few years years say say or this difficulty that comes from pouring old wine into new bottles will be eradicated and we will become as law-abiding law as we are strong and rich and pow erful Our Oar Hope Here lIere Every woman who teaches her children the true history of America Amer ica tea gives them some idea of the potentialities still ahead of us under our own Constitution does her bit bitto bitto bitto to hasten that happy day The foaming yeast of mixed heritages herl heri mixed blood mixed ideals and customs may be our menace But Dut our hope springs from this very condition too The hope that we who are all neighbors whose forefathers forefathers fore fore- fathers came from Germany Italy France Spain as well as the two great streams from England and Ireland may show the quarrelling peoples of the world that there is nothing irreconcilable in a difference difference differ differ- ence of blood The lists of pupils in our schools show hundreds of names of Chinese Japanese Phill Phili- pino Indian and colored children every everyone one of them a good American now All are being blended and welded and reconciled under one flag nag teaching and helping each othen other oth er en by their very differences as well as by their common education and town and way of living Purchasing Power rower When a Japanese or Russian lam fame family ily fly living Dakota wants a roll of cotton i 1 es to the dime store and buys it When a Florida Negro housewife needs maple syrup she patronizes her chain store When a Maine farmer finds himself short of gasoline he stops at the nearest gas pump and his brother in Arizona would never think of going to war for fresh salmon he cant can't catch it it he is under privileged in not having havinga a salmon-run salmon of his own own But be he becan becan can buy It and buy It cheap and so instead of mobilizing he puts his hand in his pocket And his boys stay at home with him and their mother and grow to manhood In safety and marry and have farms and sons of their own in time and live in peace One Hundredth the Cost Why must nations own the sources of everything they need Unless all al nations are to be enemies that is an expensive and cumbersome idea A Aone At Atone Atone one tenth tenth one one one-hundredth one the cost of war any nation could buy buyas buyas as much oil or cotton or tin as she needed This is so obvious that i it is ridiculous to repeat it IL U It all our states are small nations as they are acknowledging in a crisis thi the paternal wisdom of a central government gOY eov- emment and if U In all these 48 Individual Individual In divisions division of our nation ev eVe every cry ery nation in the world Is II represented represented among the people and Inthe inthe In ir the local governments which they are and If 11 we in California have a comfortable feeling that such luch es as we haven't got are easily purchasable from our friendly neigh bors bore then why in the name of God God God- the th God of peace and brotherhood cant can't Europe do likewise |