Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 176, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 August 1918 — SOME POINTE ON GERMAN KULTUR [ARTICLE]

SOME POINTE ON GERMAN KULTUR

LOUIS TRACY IN THE SUNDAY CHICAGO TRIBUNE SPEAKS THUS. No review of our four years’ fight can omit a brief reference to that ill omened word kultur. According to the Hun, the whole quarrel hinges on the refusal of the democracies of the world to accept kultur. Very well. What is kultur? What are the bl esings it offers to all men and all woman, since it claims that immense prerogative, and nothing less? Prof, von Seyden in the Frankfurter Zeitung during the first fine frenzy of the war said: “The Germans are the elect people of the earth. They will accomplish their destiny, which is to rule the world and to guide all other nations for their common happiness.” Well, let us see what all this thunder means. I have here a table of the worst forms of crime committed in Geimany and England during the ten years 1897-1907: , EnoGermany. land Murder 350 97 Incest 573 56 Rapes 9,281 216 Unnatural crimes .... 841 290 Malicious and felonious w0unding..172,153 1,262 Malicious damage to property2s,7s9 350 Arson 610 287 I '• Totals 209,667 2,557 People of America, you fathers and mothers, wives, sisters, and sweethearts of the men you have sent to France, I ask you to study that table. Kultur should be known by its results, and, if benighted England can show such a case against enlightened Germany, is it not worth four y>ars, or, if need be, forty years of war to keep your country and ours clear of the virus of kultur? The answer is being given today whereever the Hun stands up against our soldiers. It is being dinned into hls> ears by high explosives and driven into his carcass by keen bayonets. When he heeds we will quit and not until he does heed—on his knees.