Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 288, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 December 1917 — SHOW YOUR FAITH IN AMERICA By THOMAS R. MARSHALL, Vice President of the United States. [ARTICLE]

SHOW YOUR FAITH IN AMERICA

By THOMAS R. MARSHALL, Vice President of the United States.

If we are standing In statecraft for ’the same things for which the NazaI rene stood in religion, then we ought I to be able to glean something from | the discussion of his followers. Pe-

ter and Paul grew acrimonious over the. relative merits of fuith and works and the, discussion ended with the somewhat caustic statentent, “Show me your faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my work*.* I We have been running up the American Flag at all the school houses In America; we have been rising with solemn [countenances whenever the “Star-Spangled Banner” is played, and we have proclaimed to tha world our never-ending allegiance to those great principles of democracy upon . which the republic was founded and is now supposed to rest. Now we have reach--ed the point where our faith is being put to the touchstone of our works and we are soon to find out whether this love w’hlch we profess for our institutions, our country, and our Flag, Is but a sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal or whether It is a great and vital inspiration of individual and national life.

Our young men, with a devotion unexampled In the history of the world, are laying aside all the-hopes of future years and are going gladly “somewhere 1q France” to offer, if need be, the last drop of blood In their veips as a free libation upon the altar of constitutional liberty. They: cannot go half-clad, half-fed, .unequipped orunassured that they wHI be properly looked after if disabled; > We did nit prepare. We thought there was no danger. And In one year there came upon us an outlay of entraofdlnary expense, which might have been prevented had we exercised foresight and courage, llttl?; by little, to get;ready. It is however, to hold post-mortem*. Thnpastt* the dead and eternal past This war must be fought and It must be financed In order to be fought ■ v My objection to Carnegie libraries Is not directed at Carnegie nor at libraries; it springs from a deep-rooted feeling lhat we dq not take real . interest in anything. Cor which ,we do not make some I do not -therefore, > want this war to be financed by those who are easily able to do so financially. •! want every man, woman and child la America, who has been waving the Flag, singing the “Star-Bpangled Banner,” and bragging about the glories of democracy,, to prove now by their works that they have, .a genuine faith U> the. American republic. That proof demands of all that we take enough of the war ob■Hgatlons efi this government tn waka us feel some sort of sacrifice for the cause in which each one of us prefesses to believe and doesbelleve.’--;