But the foregoing mild report does not tell the full story in all of its acrimonious vehemence. A local agricultural journal came out in red head-lines across its cover page, “Iowa’s Reign of Terror!” The editor, in that and subsequent issues, printed perhaps 50,000 words of condemnation of those not included among his own constituents, sidetracking alfalfa and Holsteins wholly for the time. He says:
To-day in Iowa there is a veritable reign of terror, which has been encouraged among ignorant and irresponsible people, by men and organizations who should and do know better, but who are playing upon passion and prejudice for ulterior purposes. More harm is resulting from this assumption of authority by private individuals, without the shadow of moral or legal right, than by all the pro-German propaganda or real disloyalty in the state. And the worst of it is that it defeats the very purpose which is used to excuse it—the purpose of uniting all our citizens whole-heartedly and sincerely behind the Government’s war aims. Already this rule of passion, freed from legal restraint, has resulted in the excess of mob violence, of injustice and wrongs towards loyal and patriotic citizens, whose whole lives will be embittered by the brutal intolerance of a few. Our boasted freedom and liberty and love of fair play are being made the victims of methods no better than those of the despoilers of Belgium, from which they differ not in quality but only in degree.
Right to-day in Iowa, men in positions of leadership and responsibility are fomenting and encouraging this spirit of mob rule and terrorism, which is wholly outside the pale of law, and which will result in such a spirit of lawlessness that we will all pay dearly for it in the years to come. The Greater Iowa Association and its allied organizations are among those which are helping to create this atmosphere of dangerous suspicion and distrust, especially towards farmers’ organizations in Iowa, which is bound to result in bloodshed and lynch-law if it is not quickly checked. The Greater Iowa Association boasts in its monthly publication that it has already spent $20,000 in helping to put down the Bolsheviki of Iowa (its usual expression for the loyal and conservative farmers of this state) and that it will spend $180,000 more (a total of $200,000) for this purpose if necessary. Its sentiments are approved and applauded by its sycophant organizations, such as the Des Moines Chamber of Commerce, in its official monthly bulletin, which it proclaims is “the mouthpiece for Des Moines.”
Tut, tut! Obviously, Mason City leads directly into a pretty political mess. Willy-nilly, friends of the A. P. L., if not members of the Non-Partisan League, are pushed into ranks assigned to enemies. We may mildly animadvert on the fact that it is the members of the Non-Partisan League who largely buy the journal from which the foregoing quotation is made. It has had a long and honorable history, but is perhaps not so disinterested as the A. P. L. It does not, however, go to war with the A. P. L. so much as with the Greater Iowa Association, which presently voted the editor out of membership. The American Protective League might have been drawn into politics if it had lived much longer—perforce would be and ought to be drawn. One thing is sure, if a man must cater in business to a class which has disloyalty inborn and ingrained, that man is not catering to America and a great future for her.
It is all a question of the high heart of the gentleman unafraid—individual courage, clear-headedness, honest self-searching. That is as true for the native born as for the naturalized citizen. Perhaps for all these warring Iowans, some of whom were zealous and interested, there might very well, in these grave, troubled days of our country and of all the world, be put on the wall of our house the old Bible motto: “Blessed are the pure in heart.”
You ask, indeed, what shall we do with all these chameleon propagandists, these foreigners? How shall we classify them—as Americans or as enemies? Who is the American?
It is simple to answer that. It is he who himself knows in his own soul whether or not he is done with the damnable hyphen which has almost ruined America, and yet may do so. Liberty Bonds and public speaking do not prove Americanism. Not even service stars in a window make a man American. Blessed are the pure in heart, of Mason City or of Des Moines, of the Greater Iowa Association or the Non-Partisan League, of the Peoples’ Council, of the A. P. L., or of German or American birth. And when individual American courage is common enough to make a man fight pro-Germanism until it is dead forever, one thinks we shall indeed see God manifested again in the great civilization which once was promised for America. It can be had now in only one way, and that way will cost dear. If you are interested in your son’s future, see to it that he—and you yourself—shall be pure in heart. We want and will have no others for Americans to-day or to-morrow.
CHAPTER VII
THE GERMAN SPY CASES
The Great Spy Cases—Details of German Propaganda—Finances and Personnel of German Forces in America—The Diplomatic Fiasco—Notorious Figures of Alien Espionage Uncovered—The Senate Judicial Investigation.
To gain any adequate idea of the amount of the activities which centered in New York would mean the following out of countless concealed threads leading all over the world and covering the United States like a net. We never knew until we were well into this war that, long before we dreamed of war, our country was infested by vast numbers of the paid spies of Germany; that these worked under a well-established, and now well-known, organization; that the highest German diplomatic representatives were a part of the system; that leading financial figures of New York were figures in it also, and that the whole intricate machine was differentiated like a great and well-ordered business undertaking. It was an elaborate organization for the betrayal of a country; and that organization, like the armed forces of Germany in the field, was beaten and broken only by the loyal men of America, resolved once more that a government of the people should not perish from the earth.