Show dispelling THE FOG by charles michelson now that we are at war nothing is of importance except the effort to win the struggle in the shortest possible time politics like every other non bel li gerent element in our system is out of the window the votes in the senate and house of representatives testify to the unity of our n nation a treacherous japan has at last rendered us that servia te for nowhere is there a dissenting voice to the verdict that retribution sw swift ift and total must be visited 0 on n the bandit asiatic country there are no longer among us or groups and not even individuals of the isolationist appeaser app caser or compromiser class it is interesting to compare the vote that commits us to this final determination of defense with tho the becis decisions ions of congress precedent to previous wars in inthe the war of 1812 for example the senates vote was 19 to 13 and in the house of representatives 49 members of a total of voted a the war the struggled struggle between the states was proceeded with without any declaration but the debates indicated anything but a unanimous vote the spanish american war was entered into by a viva voce vote and consequently no accurate comparisons pari sons can be made but the debates indicate that there were dissentient members in fact one eminent senator was referred satirically as aa the senator from spain in the first world war 6 senators voted in opposition to our going into it and 50 house members likewise voted in the negative the declaration against japan on the other hand recorded but a single vote of opposition that vote was cast by a gentle lady who voted the same way twenty tour four years ago it has been her creed that pacifism is a preeminent article of her faith and she could not vote for any war at any time or under any circumstance this time lime we are ready fortunately this emergency finds us more prepared than we have been at the onset of any international struggle the exigencies of the european war had already eau caus s ed us to turn our industrial system hysten over to the production of war var mi m i serials te rials to make us the arsenal of the worlds democracies we must now pay tribute to Pers ident roose jelfs prescience and determination which in the face of determined opposition brought us to our present state of preparedness where would we have been today if he had hesitated or faltered in h his is effort to bring to the people of cf this country a realization of the immensity of the peril that contented tented us the war in the pacific was none of our seeking we were patiently and honestly endeavoring to bring japan to a reasonable settlement of the differences between the two countries when she joined the axis japan became potentially our enemy and so we were striving without threats to persuade her away from that alliance when she fell upon our outposts killing hundreds of people and doing great damage to lo our equipment had we been that kind of a nation we had innumerable opportunities to do on a larger scale what she did to us the diplomatic cers she send over here to conduct peace negotiations tell us unofficial ly that the outrage was a greater shock and surprise to them than to anybody else that may be the truth or it may be just another example of japanese duplicity in any event we may be sure that in the conduct of this war we too can be and will do whatever is requisite to bring the struggle to a swift and victorious conclusion they have asked for war to the death and they are going to get it 1 they have put themselves outside the pale of decent responsible government and have adopted the hitler program of duplicity treaty violation and general atrocity so they have made the rules of the impending conflict and must abide by the consequences they have demonstrated their unfitness for the status of a world power and they thes will not be a world tower when this war is over |