"You have been long-suffering under the preachment that you must be assimilated, but we shall never descend to an inferior culture. We are giving to these people the benefits of German culture."
The outbreak of war made the Alliance an exceedingly important, if unwieldy, instrument for shaping public opinion. It promoted and sponsored a so-called National Embargo Conference in Chicago in 1915, working hand-in-glove with Labor's National Peace Council in an attempt to persuade Congress to pass a law forbidding the export of munitions. At every congressional election, particularly in such cities as Chicago, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, and St. Louis, the hand of Prussia was stirring about. When O. B. Colquitt, a former governor of Texas, decided to run for the Senate in late 1915, he corresponded with the editors of the Staats-Zeitung and a New York member of the Alliance for support from the German press and the German vote in his state.
The next year saw the approach of a presidential campaign, and the Alliance established a campaign headquarters in New York to dictate which candidates for United States offices should receive the solid German-American vote. Such candidates had to record themselves as opposed to the policies of the Administration. An effort was made to further the nomination of Champ Clark as the Democratic candidate, succeeding Wilson. A German professor, Leo Stern, superintendent of schools in Milwaukee, after a conference with Hexamer there, wrote to the New York headquarters approving the "Wisconsin plan" (Hexamer's) for swaying the Republican national convention. This plan set forth that "it is necessary that a portion of the delegations to the ... convention—a quarter to a third—shall consist of approved, distinguished German-Americans." The Alliance was bitterly opposed to Wilson, it hated the lashing tongue and the keen nose of Theodore Roosevelt, it distrusted Elihu Root, and deriving much of its income from the liquor business, it feared prohibition.
Politically the Alliance was constantly active. It supported in early 1916, through its friendly congressmen, the McLemore and Gore resolutions, the latter of which, according to Hexamer, deserved passage because it would—
"1. Refuse passports to Americans travelling on ships, of the belligerents.
"2. Place an embargo on contraband of war.
"3. Prohibit Federal Reserve Banks from subscribing to foreign loans." The Alliance's lobbyist called on Senators Stone, Gore, O'Gorman, Hitchcock (all of whom he reported as "opposed to Lansing"), Senator Smith of Arizona, Senators Kern, Martine, Lewis ("our friend"), Smith of Georgia, Works, Jones, Chamberlain, McCumber, Cummins, Borah and Clapp. Borah, he said, had "a fool idea about Americans going everywhere." In the House of Representatives he canvassed the Democratic and Republican leaders, Kitchin and Mann, and a group "all of whom want the freedom of the seas," which included Dillon of South Dakota, Bennett of New York, Smith of Buffalo, Kinchloe of New York, Shackleford of Missouri, and Staley and Decker of Kentucky. "I saw Padgett, chairman of the house naval affairs committee," he continued, "he will fall in line after a while.... I am working with Stephens of the House and Gore of the Senate to put their bills in one bill as a joint resolution. I have told them that my league would aid them in getting members of the House and the Senate, as well as helping them with propaganda (this was their suggestion)."
The resolutions failed.
All these activities cost money. The German Embassy through Dr. Albert furnished the headquarters of the Alliance with sufficient funds for its many purposes. Count von Bernstorff is alleged to have handled a large fund for bribery of American legislators, but the fact has never been established, beyond his request in January, 1917, for $50,000, for such purposes. It is a fact, however, that the National German-American Alliance collected a sum of $886,670 during the years 1914-1917 for the German Red Cross; this was turned over to von Bernstorff for transmission to Germany, and officers of the Alliance have admitted that of this sum about $700,000 was probably employed in propaganda by Dr. Dernburg and Dr. Meyer-Gerhardt, who posed as the head of the German Red Cross in America. Contributions to the German and Austrian relief funds came in as late as October, 1917, although no part of them were forwarded to Europe after the entrance of America into the war.