Goodwin's weekly : a thinking paper for thinking people. [volume], January 22, 1916, Image 1

About Goodwin's weekly : a thinking paper for thinking people. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1902-1919

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Vol. 26 8ALT LAKE CITY, UTAH, JANUARY 22, 1916 No 6 fl
j4i Independent Paper Published Under
:: the Management of J. T. Goodwin ::
, EDITORIALS B Y JUDGE C. C. GOOD WIN
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J Has Europe Gone Mad?
WHEN a mortal is too sorely tried he is liable
to lose his reason.
i Why should it not be the same way with na-
i tions? The nations of the old world have been
preparing for war for years. They have brought
to frightful perfection all the instruments of de
struction; they have been fighting on a scale never
dreamed of before now for nearly" eighteen
months until their soil is piled high with their
I dead; their homes are desolated; the accumula
tions of years have been swept away; one horror
has succeeded another, and now they are in what
seems to be a death-lock and the truth 13 forced
home upon them that there is not victory in sight
for any of them.
There are evidences in sight that there is a
breaking down in judgment in many places; that
under the fearful shock they are losing their reas
oning powers and are in imminent danger of hav-
ing their respective countries filled with lunatics.
The spectacle that the homes of the old world
presents is enough to unhinge the brains of strong
men; the vacant chairs, the empty cradles; the
mourning robes, the hungry women and children;
the broken hearts and devastated fields; who can
measure the cataclysm that has already broken
upon them? Who can begin to estimate when
there will be any surcease for the sorrow?
The most sinister feature of all is the apparent
effect thus far made upon the living. It seems to
bo an increase in the desire for vengeance. Each
U is charging the blame upon the other, and most
of the peace talk, so far, has been with the con
dition that no peace will be accepted that does
not include reparation for the losses thus far sus
tained. There is not a reference to "the everlast
ing Father and Prince of Peace." Ships are fall
ing from the clouds with their dead, the seas are
engulfing other ships with their dead, and on land
along a thousand miles of battle front the chariot
wheels of war are grinding their way over the
hearts of men till "all the earth wears the red
record lighted with cities aflame" and armies are
taking on the outward look of wild beasts bent
only upon destroying their kind.
Europe surely begins to take on the look of
having in the stress gone mad, and in such gi
gantic proportions that neutral nations will not
much longer be safe, but rather will all be sub
ject to such a scourge as Belgium and Poland
have already suffered.
The war has now extended until It is raging
around where the cradle of civilization was first
rocked; the savage tribes that have eucceed
1 ed the enlightened races that in that region began
the world's regeneration, are organizing and train-
ing and by nature are cruel as death itself. The
I scientists trace out the eras through which at in-
tervois the outer shell of the earth has been shat
tered and all animal life has perished under those
cataclysms which are called geological periods.
It begins to look in the old world as though an
other form of destruction had been decreed to ex
terminate men there.
The Limit Nearly Reached
PRESIDENT WILSON of the United States and
President Carranza of Mexico had better hurry
up or they both will have trouble. There are some
tens of thousands of men in Texas, New Mexico,
Arizona and California who would need but a
word to cause them to spring to arms, and to go
down and take the northern row of states in
Mexico and stop for good the atrocities that have
been prepetrated there day after day and week
after week for the past four years. Evidently
Villa is trying to bring on just such an interposi
tion. He hates Carranza with a nameless per
sonal hatred; in addition he sees no hope for his
country under Carranza's presidency; he knows
there is no hope for himself while Carranza is in
power and morally backed by the United States,
and he does not care what means are taken to
oust Carranza from his present rule. He is smart
enough to know that the men of the southwest are
heartily sick of the "watchful waiting" program
which President Wilson inaugurated long ago, and
he is trying his best evidently to invent atrocities
which will finally so enrage the people across the
border in the United States that they will spring
to arms with an irrepressible determination to
wreak vengeance on those scoundrels in Mexico
who are only not fit to govern themselves, but are
not fit to live. There is a double reason why
President Wilson should serve notice on Carranza
to establish order in those northern states at once,
and if he cannot, then the United States will. One
reason is that the United States has already post
poned interference too long, the other is that if
the war in Europe were to suddenly cease, there
would be imminent danger of a new alliance
across the sea involving those who are now friends
and enemies there for the purpose of taking and
partitioning Mexico, despite the United States:
for the subjects of half a dozen of those nations
have been despoiled in Mexico, and the United
States which has assumed the responsibility of
protecting them has utterly failed in keeping the
implied covenant.
Preparedness
THAT word "preparedness" is about the biggest
in our language. It means to be ready to meet
opposition.
As recently used it has only been applied to
meeting an attack from foreign powers, but that
does not begin to cover all its meaning. We put
a lock on the door in defense of po, '''bio burg
lars. That is one form of preparedness. We
put on mittens and mufflers when we go out into
zero weather, that is another form. We drain
stagnant ponds to discourage the fever that may
be waiting to mount on the wings of the malaria
and charge upon the health of the household.
Wo say the nation should be prepared, to eet
i .i i.i ni--. nil niiiijiiiii uisasssmss9mBmmm
any attack, but the states should likewise be pre-
pared. An idle and hungry man is a danger to a
state and the state should be prepared to give
such an one employment and wages for his work.
The pest that attacks fruit trees is a danger to
be promptly met. Some of our horticulturalists iH
have learned to be prepared against the spring il
frosts that may steal in and attack the orchards tl
when in bloom. il
The prudent man insures his house to he pre-
pared against fire. The prudent state sees to it H
that all the children are enrolled in the schools' H
as a means of preparedness against that very jH
worst enemy of man,' ignorance.
As it is often easier to prevent sickness than
to cure it, so a prudent city,, sees to it that the H
vices are not flaunted hvHhe faces of the chil- H
dren or vulgar plays or pictures presented. A H
humane city keeps tab on its poor to see that suf- H
fering is prevented and that there is not through H
want an incentive given to the very poor to com-
mit crime. H
Men, women and children are like birds. Some H
are dependent, others are like birds of pr6y, and H
when society is enlightened it sees to it that the jH
strong do not crush the weak. Thus wo see that H
the chief end of the enlightenment of the earth is H
to try to keep the world prepared against ene- B
mies. These enemies are cold and hunger and H
disease and sorrow and want as well as the strong ' M
hands that come to despoil their fellow men. M
Foreign powers do not often attempt an inva-
sion and conquest, but these other enemies are M
always on watch and ready to attack any weak H
place. M
When a cold wave is on the march and head- fH
ed this way, a ton of coal and a big box of food H
make a wonderful preparedness for a household ,. H
of poor women and children. Preparedness is a H
splendid thing for a nation, it is more splendid H
when all the people of the nation are prepared H
against idleness, ignorance, want and sorrow. H
Gerrran Trade Methods M
THE synopsis of the speech of Walter Runci- M
man delivered in tho British Commons M
a fortnight ago, as cabled, indicates that it was' M
a great and thoughtful speech. It outlined the M
course that Great Britain is pursuing with the J
purpose of being foremost in the world's trade M
when tho war closes. H
He foreshadowed the giving up of free trade H
in many ways, and said that Great Britain was H
gaining what Germany had lost in her South H
American trade since the war had come, and in H
the same connection a member from Glasgow '
expressed the belief that American competition JB
"never could take the complex, scientific and de- ,H
structive form of Germany's competition." vM
That ought to awaken in this country a desire" fl
to investigate what the German form is. 1H
So far as the world can see the great secret ttl
of the success of German trade is simply that' M
the German government and people are working ifl
hand in hand to secure the mastery of the world's II
trade, and at the same time turn everything pos-
sible to the benefit of the whole German people. '
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