Jasper County Democrat, Volume 19, Number 68, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 November 1916 — DISCUSSES THE GERMAN VOTE [ARTICLE]

DISCUSSES THE GERMAN VOTE

Albert Sahm Says Most of It Went for President. Wilson. Indianapolis, November 18.—At a meeting of the German-American Democratic club Thursday night, when the election of Woodrow Wilson and Thomas R. Marshall was celebrated, speakers of German extraction severely criticised the German press which had fought the re-election of President Wilson and German-Americans who had conducted a bitter campaign against him. Albert Sahm, president of the club, said a thorny path had been made for Americans of German blood who stood for “the starry flag first, last and all the time,” by German-Americans who used “poison and venom augmented by adroit Republicans whose every interest centered in the fleshpots and who were aided by those of German antecedents who saw an opportunity for a little brief notoriety.” The poison, he said, had so permeated every ramification of “so-called German society that when the campaign committee of this club started out it could not get a look-in.” But the campaign committee had persevered, he said, and was successful, most of the German vote going for Wilson. In Mr. Sahm’s opinion, local Democratic defeat was not due to the German vote. Henry Seyfried, a member of the park board and a member of the campaign committee of the club, denounced German-Americans whose first interest is in Germany and who are not patriotic Americans. He said some local men of German blood were anxious to get the “Red Eagle,” a decoration from the German emperor, and he said they were disloyal Americans who were reflecting against the great mass of loyal Americans of German blood. Addresses were made by Carl Viebahn, Philip Zoercher, Herman F. Adam, Adolph Emhardt, Jacob Vogel, Charles Treumper, P. J. Kelleher, William McGath, Chalmer Schlosser, Charles Stuckmeyer, John Leyendecker, George Kirkhoff and George Schauer. A committee was appointed to send a congratulatory message to Wilson and Marshall.