The Story of the American Legion: The Birth of the Legion

by George Seay Wheat

Leavenworth (Kansas) Post, April 30, 1919.—... The character of the men of the American Army who are promoting it [the Legion] and the high ideals which it professes and proposes to maintain are a guaranty that it will be a power for helpful service in the common family of the nation.

The plan of organization sprang from the desire of serious and able men in the American Army to maintain the high ideals for which all of them have fought, to preserve the soldier comradeship and carry it over into civilian life as an element of broad helpfulness while keeping the record of the army free from the taint of selfish aims. It was also wisely intended to forestall by the creation of one big genuinely representative, nonpartisan and democratic body, the formation of numerous smaller organizations in various places by men intent on exploiting the soldier sentiment and the soldier vote for other than patriotic purposes.

New York Sun, April 11, 1919.—... The American Legion will do an indispensable service. We, who have lived up to the past few years in an agitation of protest against the pension grab must now make our minds over sufficiently to realize that in the new situation we run immediately into danger not of over-pensioning the veterans of to-day but of neglecting them.

The new organization must of course be nonpartisan and non-political. Precedent enough exists in the career of the Grand Army to make that clear. It should include and enjoy the guidance of the most influential military men. Politicians it will have at its service so long as it is well run and organized from within. Despite its proper political limitations, it should serve as the most salutary means to influence returned soldiers to cling to plain old Americanism, shed their martial acquirements and return to plain, praiseworthy citizenship.

Washington Star, April 10, 1919.—... The American Legion is to be welcomed as an agency for the promotion of the best in our national life. It will represent, with other things, the majesty of numbers. A great many men will be eligible to membership; and they will be young, and full of hope and purpose. And when they act together in matters within the scope of their organization they will represent a force to be reckoned with in the formulating of public policies.

Brooklyn Eagle, April 11, 1919.—Organization of "The American Legion" is going on rapidily in every State in the Union. Vast as was the mass of eligibles on which the Grand Army of the Republic could draw after the Civil War, it did not compare with the Legion's bulk of raw material. There will be a formal caucus on May 8th, at St. Louis, of a real representative character, in which it is said the enlisted men of the army and navy will have a majority. Lieutenant Colonel Henry L. Stimson, once Secretary of War, outlines the plan. He believes that this country's future hereafter is in the hands of the men below thirty years of age who fought this war. He trusts that the lesson in practical democracy afforded by military experience and the ideals of democracy emphasized by military enthusiasm may be kept permanently alive.

That this is the main hope of the more active organizers we have no doubt. Men like Major General O'Ryan, General Charles I. Debevoise, and Colonel Theodore Roosevelt and Colonel Robert Bacon would never think of making such a body a lever for pension legislation or an agency of politics. Yet the temptation to a divergence from the higher ideals is strong, and the rank and file may not be inclined to resist it.

St. Louis Globe-Democrat, April II, 1919.—... Such societies, it has been proved, are never partisan. They are invariably exponents of broad-gauge patriotism. That they have great political influence in a high national sense is true, but they have never misused it nor ever viewed their mission in a narrow spirit. They preserve the touch of the elbow throughout life, but only as thorough Americans, devoted first, last, and always to our common country.

St. Louis is proud to be selected as the place for the inauguration of this admirable and undoubtedly perpetual society. All wars are represented by societies formed by their veterans, and all alike have been truly and broadly patriotic. It will be the same with the new order, whose membership will, on the strength of numbers called to the colors, far exceed any former parallel. This event will be a datemark in our patriotic annals and in the progress of the nation.

Syracuse (N.Y.) Herald, April 13, 1919.—It has been earnestly stated, as might have been expected, that the American Legion will be strictly nonpartisan. That much might be inferred from the circumstance that one of the leading associates of Roosevelt in organizing the Legion is Lieutenant Colonel Bennett Clark, son of the late Democratic Speaker of the House of Representatives. Colonel Roosevelt is sufficient authority for the assurance that the movement is neither partisan nor political. He calls it "an association which will keep alive the principles of justice, freedom and democracy for which these veterans fought." Viewed in that sentimental, ethical and patriotic light, it is a commendable undertaking. The American people will wish it well, and be glad to see it flourish....