The Socialist vote was about one-fifth of the total vote. It included most of those who wished the war stopped at once, this number being made up of professional pacifists, of red flag Anarchists, and of poor, ignorant people who pathetically believed that a Socialist mayor would somehow bring peace at once. But it also included its professional Socialists and poor, ignorant people who did not think of the war, but who pathetically believed that a Socialist mayor would somehow give them five-cent milk. The voters in New York City who wish immediate peace without any regard to national honor, or to what future horrors such a peace would bring, are certainly less than a fifth of the whole.
The vote was not anti-Administration. A far larger proportion of the supporters of the Administration voted for Mr. Hylan than for Mr. Mitchel, and officially the Administration was neutral between the two. A goodly number of pro-Germans supported Mr. Hylan, but he was also supported by a large number of entirely loyal men, and he himself, unlike the Socialist candidate, Mr. Hillquit, was avowedly for America against Germany, and for the prosecution of the war. The election in actual fact turned directly on local issues. New York occasionally witnesses an occasional insurrection of virtue, but the city has never in fifty years given a good administration a second term. The insurrection of virtue at one election is followed by a Tammany revival at the next.
The result of the election in New York City was not heartening to patriotic persons, but right next door, in the Connecticut congressional district which includes Bridgeport, a contest for a vacant congressional seat resulted in a way that speaks well for the Republic. The Republican candidate, Schuyler Merritt, a man of high probity and capacity, with a forward look in international affairs, came out in bold and straightforward fashion, saying he would support the President in all measures for the efficient prosecution of the war until victory came, that he would do all he could to prevent our again falling into the condition of shameful unpreparedness we had for three years occupied, and that he was for universal obligatory military training for our young men. He won by a majority much greater than that which his predecessor received at the time of the presidential election last year.
GERMAN HATRED OF AMERICA
November 13, 1917
There have recently been published various books by Americans who, during the Great War, have officially represented this country in Germany and in Belgium, when the Germans conquered it. Ambassador Gerard is one writer. Mr. Gibson, secretary of our legation at Brussels, is another. Mr. Curtis Roth, until recently vice-consul at Plauen, Saxony, is a third. Their testimony is of profound significance because of their official position and personal standing.
Two facts leap to the eye from their writings. The first is that the German people have stood practically united behind their Government in upholding and insisting upon the systematic infliction of hideous brutality upon their foes. With deliberate purpose the German Government has carried on a war of horror, a war of obscene cruelty, of wholesale slaughter, of foul treachery and bestiality, a war in which civilians, including women, children, nurses, doctors, and priests, as well as wounded soldiers, have been murdered wholesale. The German people have enthusiastically supported and approved their acts. Our war is as much with the German people as with their Government, and we should regard with loathing all Americans, whether men or women, who any way attempt to justify or defend Germany’s action. The Americans who so act are traitors to their country and to humanity at large.
The second fact is the extreme malevolence of hatred with which Germany regards America, a hatred which blossomed into full growth before we went to war, and which was immensely aggravated because of the contempt inspired by our tame submission to outrage for over two years. Mr. Roth’s testimony is peculiarly interesting. He shows that the Berlin Government actively stimulated the campaign of hatred and revenge against America, that the German people eagerly accepted the view that Americans were cowardly, avaricious, and effeminate, and that in Germany it was constantly announced that, sooner or later, there would be a day of reckoning when America would have to pay a huge indemnity or suffer the fate of Belgium.
Mr. Roth shows that the German people think exactly as their leaders think. They now hate and despise us Americans as they hate others of their foes. Says Mr. Roth:
They are resolved to make our country drink to the dregs out of the bitter cup of humiliation. Nothing do they find more despicable than our talk about peace, which they attribute to cowardice and flabbiness. They look on the American pacifist as a weakling, as a God-given tool in the hands of German interest.... The Germans, if possible, feel more bitterly towards Americans of German extraction than towards Americans of other lines of descent.