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70
THE FATHERLAND
IF YOU READ IT IN THE “WORLD” IT’S A FAKE
HE New York World exposures of German propaganda in the
United States created a ripple of excitement, and then died
away. Its attempts to create a nation-wide sensation were laughed
at by papers such as the St. Louis Globe-Democrat and Republic,
‘where the Pulitzer estate runs an annex to the World in the shape
of an afternoon paper.
Since the first day of the war the World has been foremost in
poisoning public opinion against everything German, although the
late Joseph Pulitzer owed his living to Germans in this country
when he arrived here, a poor immigrant from Hungary, and worked
as a reporter on the Westliche Port, St. Louis.
The World employed a correspondent named Alexander Powell, -
through whose reckless perversion of the truth the early stories of
German atrocities in Belgium gained their greatest headway. It was
the World which printed Powell’s notorious falsehood that the ad-
iutant of a commanding general, who was enjoying the hospitality
‘of a Belgian home during the occupation, had assaulted the daugh-
ter of the house and been shot dead by her brother. Not a word
of this atrocious falsehood appears in the official report of the Bel-
gian Commission, full of falsehoods as that report has been proven
to be.
We purpose to show that the World, which employed this un-
American correspondent, E. Alexander Powell, has persistently
spread fakes of German atrocities in order to create sympathy for
the Allies in the United States. His report of events taking place in
the market place of Brussels was so distorted that the American
Vice-Consul Va.n Hee, at Ghent, stated in writing that “there is not
a word of truth in the article.”
. This World representative is a professional propagandist in the
service of the Allies and the feted ally of the Eiffel Tower wireless
clique, which recently sent abroad the following statement:
“Alexander Powell, who was sent to Belgium as the corre-
spondent of the New York World, has collected his impressions
into a volume entitled ‘Fighting in Flanders.’ Powell states that
he arrived in Belgium without the slightest sympathy for any
of the belligerents, but that he was completely converted to the
Belgian cause by the spectacle of German atrocities in that coun-
try. As regards his testimony of the massacre of women, chil-
. dren and old men at Aerscliot and Vilvorde, his statements are
absolutely incontrovertible. At Vilvorde he saw the Germait
take an old man, hang him by the hands to the beams of his
home and then burn him alive.”
‘ Judicial Investigation of Its War Reports Prove Them to Be Deliberate Falsehoods in the Interest of the Allies
A court investigation was promptly instituted, with the result that
the World report was judicially branded with deliberate falsehood.
as the following testimony from the court proceedings will prove:
Xavier Buiseth, mayor of the toivii of Vilvorde, having been duly
sworn arid informed of the nature of the examination, testified:
“I was in Vilvorde throughout the war. I have had no occasion
in my capacity as mayor to complain of the conduct of the Germans.
In Houtham, a suburb of Vilvorde, several houses were burned and
several civilians were shot. But this occurred in the fighting be-
tween German and Belgian troops. -
“In every case of complaint the German commanders ordered an
investigation and directed the necessary punishment of soldiers vio-
lating orders. >
“I never heard of an old man being hanged by his hands from the
beams of his house and burned alive. Had such a thing occurred
it would have been immediately reported to me, as perfect order
prevailed in Vilvorde. I must, therefore, state that the report of
the American correspondent is not true.”
The next witness was the interpreter, Josef van Balbergh, of
Vilvorde:
“I reside in Vilvorde and have not left the town since the .war
commenced save for a few hours at a time. VVhen the troops began
to arrive I was employed as an interpreter by the town authorities.
I acted as intermediary between the town and military authorities,
and was placed at the disposal of the troops in the capacity of in-
terpreter. I would certainly have heard of it if any one in Vilvorde,
or its suburbs, especially an old man, had been hanged by his hands
from the beams of a house and burned to death by the Germans. I
am sure it is not true.
“Nor did I hear of any women and children and old men being
‘massacred’ in Vilvorde or its suburbs. In fact, no one in Vilvorde
was shot or otherwise killed. Nor were any women and children
killed in any of the suburbs by German troops. In the suburbs of
Houtliam and Konigsloo several residents were killed during the
fighting, but I am unable to testify whether they took part in thc
lighting or not."
The reader may judge for himself from this testimony of unim-
peacliable witnesses to what length the New York World will g0
‘0 Poison American sentiment. In whose interest is the World
working?
ELII-IU ROOT, 1914 AND 1915
THE vagaries of great men were strikingly illustrated in a recent
issue of Tm: FATIIERLAND in the parallel columns of quota-
tions from utterances by Prof. Chas. W. Eliot. In 1913 Prof. Eliot
was an enthusiastic pro-German. But as soon as the war broke out
he became as enthusiastically anti-German. In 1913 Germany was
the true home of "kultur," the source of universal enlightenment
and intellectual freedom, and in 1914 Germany is the residuary
legatee of Attila and the, home of despotism and darkness.
Prof. Eliot is an old man, in his dotage, and what is excusable in
senility is surely inconsistent in younger men supposed to be still
in possession of their rational faculties.
Col. Roosevelt, who has time and time again been accused by his
fellow-citizens of stealing the Panama Canal zone from Colombia,
and who, a little over a year ago, declared that the Kaiser had done
more to bring about peace between Russia and Japan than any other
man, has since had intermittent relapses into fits of abuse directed
against the Kaiser for invading Belgium, and is now busy raising
an army to rush to the aid of England as soon as Wall Street and
the Money Trust give the signal for war. Roosevelt and his
paladins, Root, Lodge, Bacon and the rest, are secretly agitating for
.war, and have promised that when England has been sutiiciently
weakened to need help, the United States will come to her rescue.
Mr. Elihu Root is one of those statesmen who change their opin-
ions with their cravats. On June 15th he made a violent attack on
Germany in addressing a crowd in Albany on the occasion of the
700th anniversary of the signing of Magna Carta. He, too, has
radically changed his views of right and wrong inside of one year.
While in June, 1915, he denounces Germany for entering Belgium.-
Germany could not have found a better plea in justification of her
invasion of Belgium than one made by Elihu Root in the spring Of
1914 (several months before the war). This plea was also madi
in an address which he delivered as President of the American So-
ciety of International Law, and printed in the July (1914) number
of the American Journal of Irzterizatiarial Law. VVe will draw the
deadly Darallcl on the great lawyer, for any disciple of Blackstone,
who can express two such radically different views on one subject
inside of a year and “get away with it," is certainly a great laW)’e"-
Elihu Root, 1914
(From the American Journal of Internalional Law, July.)
It is well understood that the right of self-protection may 31151
fregueritly does extend in its effect beyond the limits of the terri-
torial jurisdiction of the State exercising it. The strongest exam? 5
probably would be the mobilization of an army by another power
immediately across the frontier. Every act done by the other powef
may be withinjts own territory. Yet the country threatened by ti“
state of facts is justified in protecting itself by immediate war.
Elihu Root, 1915
(Albany Associated Press, June 15.)
. In attacking Belgium Germany returned to the theories of the an-
cients. that the State is not bound by rules of morality as are indi-
viduals. And opposite was the hope of mankind. The first theOfY
of the ancient republics, that the State is all in all, and that thc
individual derives his rights as a member, is the principle which
was applied. in Belgium. It is the principle which was applied to
the Lusitania. Its logical and inevitable result is that the State 15
freed from those rules of morality by which individual men aft?
bound. .FREDERIC Fmnxitn. Sciiiumizk. I
