| OCR Text |
Show FOLLOWING UP REGISTRATION. I The attempt of the United States to register men of military age on a single day is a large undertaking, and it remains to be seen how completely it can be carried out. Manifestly men of intelligence and patriotism will present themselves at the registration booth. It will make war ! seem very close to them, but they will face it courageously. courage-ously. But there may be a good many who will not thus appear ap-pear on the registration day, in spite of the heavy penalties. penal-ties. These will be largely foreigners who as. yet know nothing about it or understand it only in an imperfect way. How far the registration officers will be able to get these names on that day remains to be seen. Apparently the government is going to depend in large measure upon state and local officials for the success suc-cess of the plan. The arrangements have been put together to-gether hurriedly, on account of the instant need for action. It is difficult to make anything, arranged on short notice, work to perfection. It would appear probably that results will vary in different dif-ferent states and localities. The difficulties are greatest where there are the most non-English speaking residents. Different states have different facilities for keeping touch with aliens. In some states there will be complete census cen-sus lists as recently of 1915, in others probably not since 1910. In many states the tax assessors will have complete lists, in others not. So far as possible a notice ought to be sent to every man between the required ages to come up-and register. Then it may take quite a campaign to round up ignorant foreieners and other laggards. The officers in charge should not assume that a list is complete until they have compared it with all sources of information and made every possible inquiry. |
