1980 8TH ST. 
 RiVKftsiDE, CALIF. 
 
 BaONSLNOVILTlES-GREETlNQ CAR
 
 The Trial of 
 
 SCOTT NEARING 
 
 and 
 
 THE AMERICAN 
 SOCIALIST SOCIETY 
 
 Pressing Judge -JULIUS M. MAYER 
 
 ATTORNEYS-. 
 
 for the Government For the Defense 
 
 EARI. B. BARNES SEYMOUR STEDMAN of Chicago 
 
 S. JOHN BLOCK of New York 
 WALTER NELLES of New Tfork 
 I. M. SACKIN o/Nnv York 
 
 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR 
 THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK 
 
 New York City 
 February 5th to 19th, 1919
 
 Copyright 1919 
 
 by The Rand School of Social Science 
 New York City 
 
 Strathmore Press, Inc. 
 New York City
 
 Introduction 
 
 The printed record of Scott Nearing's trial is of 
 genuine value, not only because of the defendant's 
 lucid exposition of the philosophy of Socialism, but 
 also because it presents an authentic record of an 
 American political trial. In the venerable court room 
 of the United States District Court, in the City of New 
 York, a prominent Socialist, a scholar and writer, was 
 on trial, ostensibly on the charge of a grave felony. 
 For days he spoke to twelve men "good and true," his 
 fellow citizens chosen to pass judgment on his guilt 
 or innocence, and to a judge officiating as the repre- 
 sentative incarnate of the austere majesty of American 
 law. He spoke technically in his own defense. But 
 he did not defend himself. His personal conduct and 
 motives, his personal interest and fate were barely 
 touched on. They were the merest incidents of the 
 trial. It was of larger and more vital things that 
 Scott Nearing spoke. He told of the wrongs and 
 sufferings of the world of labor, and exposed the or- 
 ganized crime of its oppressors. With uncontroverti- 
 ble facts and figures and irresistible logic he arraigned 
 the ruling classes of all countries as the authors re- 
 sponsible for the ruin of Europe and the misery of the 
 world. He spoke of the aspirations and ideals of the 
 submerged masses of the people everywhere, and of 
 their determined struggles to redeem mankind from 
 the age-long horrors of oppression and slaughter. He 
 expounded the gospel of International Socialism under 
 the solemn sanction of the formal oath and under the 
 partial guidance of the prosecuting attorney and the 
 presiding judge. He proved the red creed of human 
 
 3 
 
 2055046
 
 brotherhood in accordance with all the technical re- 
 quirements of legal procedure. 
 
 The trial of Scott Nearing was but one of many 
 similar performances enacted in the courts of the 
 United States during the war and after it. The trials 
 of Eugene V. Debs, Rose Pastor Stokes and Kate 
 Richards O'Hare; of Victor Berger, Adolph Germer 
 and other officials of the Socialist Party; of Max 
 Eastman and his co-workers on the staff of the 
 "Masses" ; the wholesale trials of the I. W. W. leaders, 
 were all in principle identical with that of Scott Near- 
 ing, and it was largely fortuitous that the latter was 
 acquitted, while all the former were convicted and 
 sentenced to savagely heavy prison terms. 
 
 Not a single enemy agent was convicted under the 
 provisions of the so-called Espionage Law, which was 
 ostensibly enacted to cope with the operations of the 
 German spy system in the United States during the 
 war, but more than one thousand prosecutions were 
 initiated under that act against radicals and pacifists. 
 And yet Thomas W. Gregory, the U. S. Attorney 
 General responsible for the prosecutions, solemnly and 
 seriously asserts that the persons so tried and con- 
 victed are "in no sense political prisoners." If the 
 term "political prisoner" as distinguished from the 
 common criminal convict denotes a person jailed for 
 the offense of holding and expressing political, social 
 or economic views opposed to those of the party in 
 control or classes in power, then the numerous persons 
 convicted individually and "en bloc" in political, eco- 
 nomic and religious groups, under the Espionage Law 
 and now held in federal prisons, are beyond cavil and 
 quibble political prisoners, and the prosecutions insti- 
 tuted under that act were and are political trials. 
 
 To judge from all indications these trials are only 
 the harbingers of an era of systematic governmental
 
 persecution of all radical opinion and radical move- 
 ments in the United States. Even before the sinister 
 Espionage Law has ceased to serve its purpose, new 
 laws, more candid and more drastic are proposed in 
 order to stifle the voice of the rising working class 
 rebellion, and where there is no convenient statute to 
 cover the persecution of radical dissenters with even 
 the most flimsy cloak of legality, our authorities na- 
 tional and local, have shown little hesitancy in sub- 
 stituting arbitrary might for legal warrant. In the 
 capitalist Soviets of America the dictature of the 
 bourgeoisie reigns supreme. 
 
 The era of wholesale and relentless persecution is 
 neither unexpected nor entirely unwelcome to the 
 Socialists of the United States. It is an unavoidable 
 phase of historic development through which the 
 Socialist movement of every advanced country has had 
 to pass. It marks a point in the N growth of the pro- 
 letarian sentiment of revolt which strikes the ruling 
 classes mad with fear and drives them to unreasoned 
 and frantic efforts to strangle an irresistible social and 
 intellectual tide by sheer brute force and physical vio- 
 lence. Such persecutions eventually collapse in the 
 inevitable reaction which they are bound to produce 
 against their own excesses. Their effect on -the So- 
 cialist movement is of infinite value in purifying, uni- 
 fying and extending the movement. 
 
 It is only a few decades since the government of the 
 autocrat of all Russia afforded the young and ideal- 
 istic Socialist propagandists of his empire the oppor- 
 tunity to preach the gospel of the Social revolution 
 through the medium of the famous political mass trials 
 of the seventies of the last century, and since he 
 adopted the policy of "crushing" Socialism by hanging, 
 exiling and imprisoning the Socialists. 
 
 It is barely a generation since the German Imperial
 
 Government under the leadership of the Iron Chan- 
 cellor inaugurated the twelve-year governmental cam- 
 paign for the suppression of Socialist propaganda 
 through the action of the courts and of the police. 
 
 Today the Romanoffs and the Hohenzollerns have 
 been swept into oblivion and their political, industrial 
 and military junkers shorn of their power. In Russia 
 the proletariat governs, and in Germany the contest 
 for the control of the former Empire lies solely be- 
 tween the Socialists of the different schools. 
 
 And now it is capitalist America that is undertaking 
 the hazardous task of destroying Socialism by force, 
 plunging into the adventure with all the enthusiasm of 
 boundless ignorance, with all the ruthlessness of 
 blinded hate and with defiant heedlessness of the 
 warnings of the past. 
 
 Verily the rulers can never learn the lessons of 
 history. 
 
 t MORRIS HILLQUIT. 
 
 Saranac Lake, March 12, 1919.
 
 The Indictment 
 
 Scott Nearingand the American Socialist Society were 
 indicted by a Federal Grand Jury in the District Court 
 of the United States for the Southern District of New 
 York in April, 1918. They were not tried until Feb- 
 ruary, 1919. The indictment contained four counts. 
 The first count charged that, while the United States 
 was at war with the Imperial German Government, 
 the defendants unlawfully conspired to violate the 
 provisions of Section 3 of Title 1 of the act of Con- 
 gress, approved on June 15th, 1917, commonly known 
 as the Espionage Law, by unlawfully agreeing to 
 cause and attempt to cause insubordination, disloyalty, 
 mutiny and refusal of duty in the military and naval 
 forces of the United States through the publication 
 of the pamphlet known as "The Great Madness." The 
 second count of the indictment charged that the de- 
 fendants conspired unlawfully and wilfully to obstruct 
 the recruiting and enlistment service of the United 
 States by the publication of said pamphlet. The third 
 count charged the defendants with attempting to cause 
 insubordination, disloyalty, mutiny and refusal of duty 
 in the military and naval forces of the United States 
 by the publication of the said pamphlet. And the 
 fourth count charged the defendants with unlawfully 
 obstructing the recruiting and enlistment service of 
 the United States by the publication of the pamphlet.
 
 The Jury 
 
 Thursday morning, February 6th, found the Federal 
 court room on the third floor of the old Post Office 
 Building filled with the talesmen from among whom 
 the Jury was to be selected. The members of the tale 
 were characteristic jurors; men of the type that have 
 been trying Espionage Act cases all over the United 
 States. 
 
 They were for the most part old, retired, comfort- 
 able men, men who had been well treated by life. 
 Most of them had struggled, but successfully. They 
 had won out in the brutal melee of industrialism and 
 by rising from its depths they had escaped many of 
 its worst consequences. 
 
 Thirty talesmen in all were examined in picking the 
 jury. The first was about 70 years of age; the second 
 about 55; the third about 50; and the fourth about 65; 
 the fifth gave his age as 38 ; the sixth gave his as 55 ; 
 the seventh was about the same age ; the eighth gave 
 his age as 59 ; the ninth stated his age as 38 ; the tenth 
 as 65; the eleventh as 60. These men were typical 
 as far as one could judge of the entire panel. 
 
 Most of the talesmen were foreign born and the 
 group contained a surprisingly large proportion of 
 Germans and Austrians. Among the first thirteen 
 talesmen examined seven were born in Germany or 
 in Austria. One of the talesmen came from Posen ; 
 another from Scotland ; a third from Berlin. 
 
 The talesmen examined were business men active 
 and retired. Not a single wage-earner appeared 
 among the first thirty names drawn. The first tales- 
 man examined was a real estate dealer; the second
 
 was a corporation official ; the third was a diamond 
 merchant; the fourth a retired merchant; the fifth a 
 steel contractor; the sixth a repairer of organs; the 
 seventh a retired grocer ; the eighth, retired ; the ninth, 
 a corporation official; the tenth, a retired merchant; 
 the eleventh, a retired jobber in foreign merchandise ; 
 the twelfth, a real estate man ; the thirteenth, a manu- 
 facturer of laces and embroidery ; the fourteenth, an 
 electrical jobber; the fifteenth, a retired contractor. 
 The list ran on in this way throughout the entire 
 thirty. 
 
 All of the talesmen, except two, expressed an utter 
 ignorance of Socialism and displayed a disinclination 
 to political action, which was truly astonishing. 
 Talesman Number 1, born in Scotland, stated that he 
 had "never voted in his life." Others voted but took 
 no interest in politics. A few were able to name the 
 candidates at the last election. 
 
 Most of the talesmen examined had heard of Social- 
 ism. One of them had read a dozen copies of the New 
 York Call. One or two of them had read, casually, 
 articles or books on Socialism. The member of the 
 tale who had read the Call on various occasions was 
 challenged by the Prosecution, which apparently re- 
 garded him as unfitted to sit on such a case. 
 
 Every member of the tale who was examined, stated 
 that he favored the entrance of the United States into 
 the war. All of the members were likewise in favor 
 of conscription as a method of raising an army, al- 
 though one or two were not particularly enthusiastic 
 on the subject of the draft. One answered that he was 
 in favor of conscription, but added "I don't believe 
 in having anything to do with it myself." Another 
 one stated, "As long as no one wanted to enlist that 
 was the only way to raise an army." Barring such 
 slight expressions of opinion, the sentiment of the Jury 
 
 10
 
 on this subject was unanimous. 
 
 After two days during which thirty persons were 
 examined the Jury was completed. It was constituted 
 as follows : 
 
 1. Irving D. Zimmer, 55 years of age, born in New 
 York ; a salesman for malted extracts. Mr. Zimmer, 
 who had a daughter in the service stated, "I would 
 have liked tc^keep out of it (the war) if we could, but 
 I did not see any way to keep out of it." He was "not 
 interested" in politics. To the question, "Have you 
 any near friends or relations, who happen to be Social- 
 ists?" he answered "No." Mr. Zimmer stated that he 
 owned some bonds. 
 
 2. Stanley R. Ketchem, about 50 years of age ; was 
 born in the United States. He was officially connected 
 with the Lackawanna-Wyoming Transit Co., the 
 Carolina-Tennessee Power Co., the Caroline Construc- 
 tion Co., the Union Metallurgical Co. 
 
 3. Gustave Gumpertz, retired, was formerly a man- 
 ufacturer of clothing. He had been retired for three 
 years. One of his sons had volunteered for the ser- 
 vice. Mr. Gumpertz was born in Alsace. He had 
 been in the United States for over 60 years. 
 
 4. Joseph Hecht, a steel contractor, 38 years of age, 
 had been associated with the National Iron and Steel 
 Co., for fifteen years. His company had had some war 
 contracts. Mr. Hecht was born in Austria, and stated 
 that he had read nothing on Socialism. 
 
 5. Samuel R. Welser, retired, was formerly a con- 
 tractor for electrical and metal \vork. Mr. Welser was 
 American born of American parents, and had lived in 
 New York for 40 years. He was about 60 years of 
 age. Asked about his property holdings, he replied 
 that he owned some stock. Asked whether they were 
 war stocks, he replied, that "there has been no increase 
 in dividends." During the war he was an active 
 
 11
 
 worker in the Red Cross. 
 
 6. William Edebohls, a retired grocer, born in Ger- 
 many, had been in the United States for over 40 years. 
 Mr. Edebohls was about 60 years of age. When asked 
 about the declaration of war he answered, "At the 
 time I did not think anything of it." A son was work- 
 ing in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Like the other mem- 
 bers of the panel, he had read little or nothing about 
 Socialism. 
 
 7. Sam Gordon, an importer and exporter of mer- 
 chandise, born in Russia and about 55 years of age. 
 When asked as to his reading, Mr. Gordon promptly 
 replied, "The Times and the Journal of Commerce." 
 
 8. Alfred W. Trotter, a civil and construction 
 engineer for more than 40 years ; president of a build- 
 ing company ; born in the United States ; 63 years of 
 age. Mr. Trotter was a veteran of the Seventh Regi- 
 ment; had read very little about Socialism, but pro- 
 fessed an interest in it. He stated it as his opinion 
 that Socialism would not work "because it was against 
 human nature." He added, that he would be inter- 
 ested to hear an exposition of the Socialist philosophy. 
 
 9. Solomon Marcus, a retired merchant; 65 years 
 of age; born in Russia; had been in the United States 
 since 1868. When asked as to his reading he answered, 
 "I don't read books." 
 
 10. Albert W. Walburn, retired, was president and 
 treasurer of a foundry and machine shop ; about 60 
 years of age. Mr. Walburn read the Tribune and the 
 Post regularly. He was interested in Socialism in a 
 casual way and had read one of Walling's books. He 
 could not remember the title. He was the only mem- 
 ber of the Jury who stated that he had read a book on 
 the subject of Socialism. Mr Walburn was born in 
 Pennsylvania and acted as a draft board registrar dur- 
 ing the war. 
 
 12
 
 11. Isaac Anhalt, a diamond broker of about 50 
 years of age. He had read nothing about Socialism; 
 was interested in the war and believed in conscription. 
 Mr. Anhalt was of German birth. 
 
 12. P. R. De Bracke, secretary of a chemical cor- 
 poration and stockholder of the same corporation. 
 Mr. De Bracke was born in Paris, and knew "very 
 little" about Socialism. In answer to the question, 
 "Have you any Socialist friends?" he replied, "No." 
 Mr. De Bracke stated his age as 38. 
 
 13
 
 The Government's Case 
 
 MR. BARNES: May it please your Honor, Mr. 
 Foreman and gentlemen of the jury, . . . the real issue 
 that you have to decide is not whether these defend- 
 ants are right in their economic theories, or whether 
 they are wrong. It does not make any difference. 
 The question is whether what they did was done with 
 a purpose which the law forbids. 
 
 This indictment was filed in the month of May, 
 1918, and brought, as are all indictments, by the grand 
 jury of the United States District Court. It is founded 
 upon one of the great war statutes that were enacted 
 by Congress shortly after the entrance of this country 
 into the war. It is filed upon a statute which is popu- 
 larly known as the Espionage Act, and which among 
 other things was enacted by Congress for the purpose 
 of insuring a successful raising of an army, and for 
 the purpose of preventing any obstruction, or any 
 effort made to impair the loyalty or the obedience or 
 the discipline of the army, or to demoralize it in any 
 way, shape or form. 
 
 On April 6, 1917, you will recall, Congress declared 
 that a state of war existed between this country and 
 Germany, and thereafter it took certain steps to insure 
 not only the vigorous prosecution of that war, but a 
 successful termination. 
 
 The first thing needed after a war is declared is 
 money. The next thing is men. The next thing, of 
 course, is ships and equipment. 
 
 As you will recall, immediately after the war was 
 declared, provisions were made for raising money, 
 and the first Liberty loan was authorized, and then 
 
 14
 
 in the middle of May, 1917, was passed the act known 
 as the Selective Service Act, also commonly called 
 the Conscription Act, although the act is more prop- 
 erly designated as a selective service act than as a 
 conscription act, and that act provided two ways for 
 raising an army, one by the process of selective ser- 
 vice, the taking of those men who could be spared, 
 between the ages of 21 and 30, and the other way, 
 and a way, however, which it is very important for 
 you to bear in mind in this case, was for the raising of 
 an army by voluntary enlistment, by taking men who 
 did not wait for the draft, but men who voluntarily 
 came forward to offer their services, and their lives, if 
 necessary, for the prosecution of the war. 
 
 That was May, 1917, that that law was passed, May 
 18, the law authorizing the raising of the army. On 
 June 15, 1917, there was passed the Espionage Act, 
 the act which we have to consider in this prosecution. 
 That act is the one upon which this indictment is 
 based. 
 
 The persons against whom this indictment is found 
 are two, one of them a natural person, like you and I, 
 and the other a corporation. So that while we see at 
 the defendants' table here only one person in the flesh, 
 you must remember always there is on trial here be- 
 fore you a corporeal body, an organization created by 
 the laws of the State of New York, which has been 
 indicted, and which has duly pleaded, and which is 
 duly represented by counsel. 
 
 The individual is Mr. Scott Nearing, a gentleman 
 who has been a member of the faculty of the Uni- 
 versity of Pennsylvania, and of Toledo. He has been 
 a lecturer and a writer upon economic subjects. 
 
 The corporation is The American Socialist Society, 
 and that is not to be confused with the Socialist Party, 
 which is a political organization, although we shall 
 
 15
 
 show you that no one may be a member of The Amer- 
 ican Socialist Society, this defendant, unless he is a 
 believer in the general doctrines of the Socialist Party. 
 
 This corporation runs, among its activities, a school 
 called The Rand School of Social Science, which oc- 
 cupies a building on 15th Street in this City, which I 
 believe is called the People's Home, and this school is 
 devoted, among other things, to the teaching and pro- 
 pagation of the theories of the socialist movement. 
 
 So please remember now and at all times that there 
 is before you on trial two persons one the individual 
 and the other the corporation. 
 
 The sections or provisions of the Espionage Act 
 upon which this indictment is based are Sections 3 and 
 4, and the first title, and the material parts of those 
 sections which are concerned in this prosecution are 
 as follows: 
 
 "Whoever, when the United States is at war, shall 
 wilfully cause or attempt to cause insubordination, 
 disloyalty, mutiny or refusal of duty in the military 
 or naval forces of the United States, or shall wilfully 
 obstruct the recruiting or enlistment service of the 
 United States, to the injury of the service, or of the 
 United States, shall be punished by a fine of not more 
 than $10,000 or imprisonment for not more than twenty 
 years, or both." 
 
 And this Section 4 provides that if two or more 
 persons conspire to violate the provisions of Sections 
 2 and 3 of this title, and what I just read to you was 
 in Section 3, and one or more of such persons does 
 any act to effect the object of the conspiracy, each of 
 the parties to such conspiracy shall be punished as in 
 said sections provided. 
 
 In other words, there are two offenses made by the 
 statute, or three, practically, that we are here r-nn- 
 cerned with. 
 
 16
 
 One is the attempt to cause disloyalty, insubordina- 
 tion, mutiny or refusal of duty in the military or the 
 naval forces of the country. 
 
 The second is obstructing the recruiting or enlist- 
 ment service of the United States, and the third is 
 conspiring to effect those objects. 
 
 You will notice that the penalty is one of very wide 
 scope. It is a punishment and a fine of not more than 
 $10,000. In other words, the fine may be imposed 
 from one dollar up to the limit of $10,000, or imprison- 
 ment for not more than twenty years. In other words, 
 if a verdict of guilty should be found, the court would 
 have the discretion to impose a sentence of from one 
 day in the custody of the Marshal up to as high as 
 twenty years. 
 
 This charge in this case concerns itself with the 
 publication, the writing, and the distribution of a 
 pamphlet consisting of some 44 pages called "The 
 Great Madness. A Victory for the American Plu- 
 tocracy." 
 
 It is claimed by the Government, and I think will 
 be conceded, that Mr. Scott Nearing is the author of 
 the pamphlet, and that it was published by and dis- 
 tributed by The Rand School of Social Science, which, 
 as I have pointed out, was an activity of the defendant, 
 The American Socialist Society. 
 
 The Government claims that when Mr. Nearing and 
 The Rand School collaborated in the writing and the 
 publication and the distribution of this pamphlet, that 
 they were acting together in a concerted plan to effect 
 a particular purpose. That is, they were both acting 
 together in concert, the one to write, the other to 
 publish and distribute. 
 
 The Government claims that this pamphlet was an 
 obstruction to the recruiting and enlistment service of 
 the United States, and that it was published and dis- 
 
 17
 
 tributed, with the intention, in the minds of Mr. Near- 
 ing and of the Society, if the Society may have a mind 
 but it was done with the intention of obstructing 
 the recruiting and enlistment service of the United 
 States, and with the intention of creating among our 
 soldiers a spirit of disloyalty and insubordination 
 sufficient to amount to an attempt, practically, to cause 
 disloyalty and insubordination and refusal of duty 
 among our soldiers. 
 
 Now, by obstruction, as I understand the law, we 
 do not mean necessarily the successful obstruction 
 we do not mean necessarily that any one man read this 
 book and decided that he would not obey the draft, 
 or that he would not enlist. It is not necessary, it is 
 not practicable for the Government to go out and find 
 men who would come here on the stand and say, "Yes, 
 I read this particular book, and it persuaded me not to 
 enlist," or "It persuaded me to attempt to evade the 
 draft," or "It persuaded me not to register for the 
 draft." 
 
 And by recruiting and enlistment service, we do not 
 mean exclusively the draft, but we mean all those 
 agencies of the Government which are used and em- 
 ployed in getting men to go into the army. 
 
 The Government will claim that the recruiting and 
 enlistment service embraces the appeal to the heart 
 that every citizen has, the feeling that every citizen 
 has, to fly to the defense of his country, and to enter 
 its service, and to give his all for the successful prose- 
 cution of a war, when it once has declared that war. 
 
 In other words, the recruiting and enlistment ser- 
 vice is everything, practically, that we have, both the 
 organized and instinctive natural appeal to men who 
 are citizens of a country to rally to its defense, to rally 
 to its colors, and to take their part in accomplishing 
 the objects for which it enters a war. 
 
 18
 
 It will be claimed by the government that this 
 pamphlet is an obstruction of those appeals, and that 
 it was designed and intended to dull the enthusiasm, 
 and that it was designed and purposed and intended 
 to persuade its readers that this was not a war for 
 which they should be prepared to offer their services 
 to the government. That it was a war which did not 
 concern them, a war in which their own true interests 
 would be best consulted by keeping out of, themselves. 
 
 It is that sort of an obstruction, to the recruiting 
 and enlistment service that the Government will con- 
 tend was caused by the particular pamphlet. 
 
 It will also be claimed and we will attempt to show 
 that from the statements and the arguments in this 
 pamphlet, distributed as it was at a time when the 
 draft was in course of operation ; at a time when you 
 would meet your neighbor on the street in civilian 
 clothes, and he would tell you he had registered, and 
 he expected to be called shortly it was distributed at 
 that time, that it was intended to cause those people 
 when they became soldiers to be disloyal and insub- 
 ordinate, and that the statements therein contained 
 are calculated that statements of that character are 
 calculated to make soldiers who would not be the loyal 
 and brave men that we wanted and that Congress 
 wanted in the army. 
 
 It is not contended by the Government that there 
 was any formal meeting between Mr. Nearing and the 
 directors of the American Socialist Society, at which 
 a resolution was passed that they would formally con- 
 spire together to obstruct the raising of the army and 
 so forth. It is claimed, though, that they were work- 
 ing together with a common object, using a common 
 means to accomplish this end, which Congress has 
 made a crime. 
 
 Now, we will show that the pamphlet was written 
 
 19
 
 by Mr. Nearing in the summer of 1917, after war had 
 been declared, and after the Selective Service Act was 
 passed, and after the Espionage Act was passed. 
 
 We will prove that there were two editions pub- 
 lished, each edition consisting of ten thousand copies, 
 and that it was distributed all over the United States 
 by the Rand School of Social Science, through its book 
 store called the Rand Book Store, which it maintained. 
 
 The hardest point always in any case of this kind is 
 proving the intent, proving what is in the mind of a 
 man when he does a particular act. That, of course, 
 as you can see, is something that is not capable of 
 photographic proof. We have no means yet of taking 
 a photograph of a man's mind to determine just what 
 he intended when he did a thing, so we have to resort 
 to certain rules, and certain lines of evidence which 
 will be resorted to in this case. 
 
 First, the ordinary rule that a man is presumed to 
 intend natural ordinary and reasonable consequences 
 of what he says and does. 
 
 Then we may look at and we will look at other 
 statements, other publications made by these defend- 
 ants at or about the time that this pamphlet was being 
 published and distributed, because that may give us a 
 line on what they had in mind at the time they were 
 doing this their other activities. 
 
 Then we shall endeavor to show the fact that Mr. 
 Nearing and the defendant, The American Socialist 
 Society, at this time were acting under the inspiration 
 of a declaration of a war policy adopted at a convention 
 of the Socialist Party held in St. Louis in April, 1917, 
 and ratified thereafter by a referendum of the party. 
 
 We have asked and you have heard a great many 
 questions of you gentlemen with regard to socialism 
 and socialists. Now, of course, you understand no- 
 body is being- prosecuted because he is a Socialist. 
 
 20
 
 That would be abhorent to our Constitution, and to 
 our conception of justice, to yours and to mine or to 
 anyone's, but we are interested in the belief and doc- 
 trine of these people and the acceptance of the Socialist 
 principles, if it throws any light upon what they in- 
 tended at the time they printed and distributed this 
 pamphlet, and it is for that reason that we shall look 
 at what was the well defined or the defined and ac- 
 cepted war policy of the Socialist Party, by reason of 
 the fact that these people are Socialists, and that they 
 did accept it. 
 
 We will show you that Mr. Nearing became an en- 
 rolled Socialist in the month of July, 1917, whereas 
 this war platform was adopted, the majority report 
 in April, 1917, and that Mr. Nearing then became a 
 Socialist, and we shall show you that the two of the 
 committee that adopted this particular war platform, 
 were directors of The American Socialist Society. 
 
 So that we will then feel that we are entitled to look 
 at this war platform to see what it pledges the Socialist 
 Party to do in connection with the war, as throwing 
 light upon what Mr. Nearing and the American Social- 
 ist Society had in mind when they did make this pub- 
 lication. 
 
 Now, Mr. Stedmanj of course, has very properly said 
 to you that because a man is opposed to a tariff, you 
 do not necessarily believe that a man is a smuggler, 
 and because a man is opposed to national prohibition, 
 you do not brand him as running a blind pig. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: Now, you see, Judge, they do 
 know that term here. Even the District Attorney 
 knows it. 
 
 THE COURT: He learned it from you. 
 
 MR. BARNES : I thought when you first used the 
 term "blind pig", that that was a term of opprobrium 
 for capitalists. 
 
 21
 
 MR. STEDMAN : We have better ones than that 
 for capitalists. 
 
 MR. BARNES : But, gentlemen, if you find a man 
 who says he is opposed to any protective tariff, and- 
 will never pay a penny of duty, and then you catch 
 him walking through the Customs House with his 
 pockets full of diamonds, you are entitled then to look 
 back at his activities to give you light as to whether 
 or not he intended to smuggle, or whether he denied 
 he had diamonds in his pocket, and so with the blind 
 pig, if you have a man who says that national prohibi- 
 tion is an outrage upon the rights of individuals, and 
 the rights of free men, and that he won't stand for it, 
 and he will oppose it, and then you thereafter see him 
 placing a twenty-cent piece right over a place where 
 there is a separate section or a compartment, you have 
 a right then to think, or to take into consideration his 
 declaration with regard to prohibition, so as to deter- 
 mine the question whether he is trying to get a drink, 
 or whether he is merely trying to buy* some cigars. 
 
 Gentlemen, something has been said about a fair 
 trial. We want a fair trial here. Mr. Stedman has 
 told you very truly that we are all a part of the Gov- 
 ernment ; I am a part of the Government, and he is a 
 part of the Government, and it is tremendously im- 
 portant to us all that we give fair trials to everybody. 
 He has told you the District Attorney does not want 
 innocent people convicted, and he is right, we do not, 
 and we are going to try to present the case just as 
 fairly as it is possible to present it, and to appeal to 
 your reason, and to appeal to your understanding, but, 
 gentlemen, when they ask for a fair trial for the de- 
 fendants, do not forget also that we are entitled to a 
 fair trial for the government. 
 
 We are entitled to your best judgment, and that is 
 all we want. That is all we ask for, and we are en- 
 
 22
 
 titled to that. We are entitled to a judgment in which 
 sympathy shall not play any part, and we are entitled 
 to a judgment in which the feeling, "Oh, well, the war 
 is over," shall not play any part, and both sides, both 
 the Government and the defendants, are entitled to 
 your attention, and I am sure they will get it, every 
 moment of the trial, and I know that we will have your 
 very best efforts to give us a just verdict. 
 
 23
 
 Scott Nearing's Direct 
 Testimony 
 
 Q. What is your name? 
 
 A. Scott Nearing. 
 
 Q. How old are you? 
 
 A. 35. 
 
 Q. Where were you born? 
 
 A. Morris Run, Pennsylvania. 
 
 Q. Your parents born in that state or were they 
 born elsewhere? 
 
 A. My father was born in New York and my 
 mother in New Jersey. 
 
 Q. Are you a man of German extraction? 
 
 A. My mother's family were Polish, her name was 
 Zabrisky; formerly it was Zabrouski, and my father's 
 name was Dutch, the family name was Van Neering. 
 
 Q. How long have they been in this country? 
 
 A. Both families have been here for 200 years. 
 
 Q. You are a married man? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Have you any children? 
 
 A. Two children. 
 
 Q. Their ages? 
 
 A. 4 and 6. 
 
 Q. Where did you attend school first? 
 
 A. I first attended school at Morris Run. 
 
 Q. Before I go into that, what business was your 
 father in? 
 
 A. He is a broker. 
 
 Q. Where? 
 
 A. New York. 
 
 24
 
 Q. What kind? 
 
 A. Stock broker. 
 
 Q. Now, have you any brothers? 
 
 A. Two. 
 
 Q. With reference to the army, will you state? 
 
 A. I have one brother in France in Bordeaux at 
 the present time and another brother who was in the 
 army but has been dismissed or discharged. 
 
 Q. Volunteers? 
 
 A. One volunteered and one was conscripted. 
 
 Q. You and your family are on good terms not- 
 withstanding your views on economics? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Will you state your general course of study and 
 work please? 
 
 A. I have attended school at Morris Run, Pennsyl- 
 vania, at Philadelphia, in the elementary grades, in 
 High School; I attended the Temple University, the 
 University of Pennsylvania, academic course, and the 
 University of Pennsylvania graduate school. 
 
 Q. That finished your career as a student in the 
 schools or being a pupil in the schools? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 O. What line of work or endeavor did you take up 
 then? 
 
 A. I was secretary of the Pennsylvania Child Labor 
 Committee from 1905 to 1907. 
 
 Q. How was that committee constituted? 
 
 A. It was a volunteer society of mostly political 
 people, liberals, I suppose, who were interested in the 
 child labor problem in Pennsylvania. At that time 
 Pennsylvania was the second largest manufacturing 
 state in the country and we had more working children 
 in Pennsylvania than in any other state in the United 
 States : in the mines and in the silk mills and in the 
 textile factories and the glass houses, particularly. 
 
 25
 
 At that time the age of child labor in Pennsylvania 
 was 13 and there was a very vigorous campaign to 
 arouse public sentiment to raise the age to 14 for day 
 work and 16 for night work. I was secretary of that 
 volunteer committee that was busy with that campaign. 
 
 Q. How long did you serve in that capacity? 
 
 A. Two years. 
 
 Q. Following that, what? 
 
 A. Following that I became a teacher in the Uni- 
 versity of Pennsylvania. 
 
 Q. What did you teach there? 
 
 A. I taught economics and sociology. 
 
 Q. How long did you continue in the university as 
 a teacher? 
 
 A. Nine years. During that same time I taught 
 three classes a week at Swarthmore College from about 
 1908 until about 1912. 
 
 Q. Did you write any books at that time? 
 
 A. A number, yes. 
 
 Q. Can you give us the names of some of them? 
 
 A. The first one was a book on economics which 
 was called "Elements of Economics" ; and I wrote that 
 in collaboration between myself and one of my fellow 
 instructors, F. D. Watson, who is now professor of 
 sociology and economics at Haverford. 
 
 The second book was my doctor's thesis, called 
 "Social Adjustment." 
 
 The third one was based on my experiences with the 
 Pennsylvania Child Labor Committee. 
 
 Q. Coming to the first one, did that have a general 
 circulation? 
 
 A. No, it was a text book, and used in colleges and 
 used to some extent in more advanced high school 
 classes. 
 
 Q. In what state? 
 
 A. Well, I cannot tell you as to what state. It was 
 
 26
 
 published by The Macmillan Company and circulated 
 throughout the country and in England because the 
 Macmillan Company is an English firm, and the Amer- 
 ican offices are the branch offices. 
 
 Q. Did you write any other books while you were 
 there ? 
 
 A. I mentioned "Social Adjustment." That was 
 my doctor's thesis. That was also published by the 
 Macmillan Company. 
 
 Then I wrote a book called "Solution of Child Labor 
 Problems" that was based on my experiences with the 
 Child Labor Committee. 
 
 And then the next one I wrote was a book called 
 "Social Religion." That was an attempt to apply the 
 principles which are laid down in "Social Adjust- 
 ments" to the ethical or religious field. 
 
 Then I wrote another book called "Social Sanity." 
 Which was an attempt to show that changes are 
 bound to occur and that if we are wise and foresighted, 
 and if we understand what is coming they can occur 
 sanely and intelligently and constructively; but that 
 if we are stupid and bigoted and refuse to see what is 
 coming, the changes may overtake and wreck our 
 civilization. 
 
 I tried to point out that the ruling class in society, 
 the people in charge and in control of any society 
 would do well to realize that progress is bound to be 
 made and would do well to study the problems of 
 progress and see that they were sane rather than the 
 chaotic progress. Changes will come anyway and the 
 question is whether they will come wisely or insanely. 
 
 Then this little book published by B. W. 
 Huebsch, called "The Super Race." That is a study 
 in the improvement of race standards, or improvement 
 of our racial stock. It is an attempt to show that peo- 
 ple can be better born if they exercise the wiser pro- 
 
 27
 
 visions, that we can become a better racial stock to 
 begin with. 
 
 Then the fourth book is one called "The New Edu- 
 cation"; and that was a book written and describing 
 some of the most promising educational experiments 
 that were being carried on in the United States at that 
 time. 
 
 I traveled all over the country and studied all of the 
 most progressive school systems and I wrote out a 
 series of chapters or articles they were both con- 
 cerning the new work that was being done in educa- 
 tion. 
 
 Then there was another series of five books, the 
 first one: "Wages in the United States." That was 
 an attempt to show what wages were being paid in 
 the United States and it was the first attempt, so far 
 as I know in the country, to study wages. 
 
 That was published in 1914. It was the first at- 
 tempt by any other than governmental authority 
 to study wages ; and the most astonishing thing about 
 the book, about the study, was the smallness of the 
 wages that were paid. The great majority of the 
 working people at that time got less than a decent 
 wage, nine-tenths of the men got less than $1,000 and 
 nine-tenths of the women got less than $600 a year. 
 And that held true both of the railroads, industries and 
 factories, all up through the line of industry at that 
 time. 
 
 That was the first of a series of five books dealing 
 with the question as to the income of the country as 
 it was at that time. 
 
 The second was a book called "Financing the Wage 
 Earner's Family" ; and that was a study of our stand- 
 ards of living. The study of wages was an attempt 
 to show how much the people got, and this study was 
 an attempt to show how much they needed in order to 
 
 28
 
 maintain physical health and social decency. 
 
 The conclusion from this study was that the ma- 
 jority of workers, both men and women, at that time, 
 1915, were getting less than a decent wage; that is 
 less than a wage which would enable them to maintain 
 physical health and social decency. 
 
 The third book in that series was a book called : 
 "Reducing the Cost of Living." That was an attempt 
 to show that even where men were getting compara- 
 tively good wages, their income was being cut down 
 by the increased higher prices. 
 
 This book was an attempt to indicate some of the 
 possible remedies for the high cost of living. 
 
 The fourth book in that series was a book called : 
 "Income." That was a study of the whole question of 
 income and as to how it was divided up between wage 
 earners and property owners. I tried to make one of 
 the points in that book which is one of the well known 
 points in the socialist doctrine, that there were only 
 two sources of income, or from which income can be 
 derived : 
 
 A man is paid because he works, as a man who works 
 on a railroad ; and a man is paid because he owns, as a 
 man who owns stocks and bonds in a railroad, and who 
 did nothing actively himself to give him that income. 
 And I tried to work out, using the word "income," to 
 see how it was divided between the two classes. 
 
 Q. Do you use it in illustration of a man who 
 worked on a railroad. Do you confine that to manual 
 work ? 
 
 A. Anybody that performs a social service, that 
 includes the president and everybody else on a railroad. 
 
 Q. In other words, your definition of work includes 
 the service rendered by the president, the manager 
 and by all who perform a service in the operation of 
 the enterprise, whether managerial or otherwise? 
 
 29
 
 A. Yes, who perform any useful service, social ser- 
 vice ; that includes also the man who plays the violin 
 and writes good poetry. 
 
 O. (By Mr. Barnes) : Does that include the lawyer? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: I hope not. 
 
 A. And the fifth book in that series was a book 
 called "Anthracite," which was a study of the anthra- 
 cite coal industry, in which I attempted to show by one 
 industry what I have been trying to show was common 
 to all others. I took up the matter of wages of a man 
 located in that region and in that industry, what is the 
 income from the anthracite coal industry and tried to 
 arrive at a conclusion as to the contention between the 
 miners and the operators and the general public, and 
 the conclusion was that the operators, the owners of 
 the mines, ten operating railroad companies which 
 owned over 96 per cent of the mines and wherever 
 there was an increase in wages which had been grant- 
 ed, it had been more than offset by the increase in the 
 cost of living; and the increase in wages was shoved 
 over by the operators in the form of increased prices 
 to the consumers; and while the operator made more 
 in dividends and the labor got some more in money 
 wages, the consumer always footed the bill. 
 
 And the last book was a book called "Poverty and 
 Riches," which was a book in which I attempted to 
 describe the results of our industrial system ; the re- 
 sults on a man who worked and the results on the 
 owner, the results in the form of poverty, the results 
 in the form of riches; and then I have a chapter on 
 industrial democracy. 
 
 That includes about all of them except a number of 
 pamphlets, about a half a dozen pamphlets. 
 
 Q. Will you name those? 
 
 A. "Work and Pay," "The Coal Question," "The 
 Menace of Militarism," "The Germs of War," "The 
 
 30
 
 Great Madness." I think that is all. 
 
 Q. How long did you serve in the University of 
 Pennsylvania? 
 
 A. Nine years. 
 
 O. When did you discontinue? 
 
 A. 1915, June 1915. 
 
 Q. In just a short way, what were the circum- 
 stances of the termination of your services? 
 
 A. Why 
 
 MR. BARNES : I do not think that we want to go 
 into Mr. Nearing's trouble with the university at that 
 time. 
 
 THE COURT : I don't think so either. 
 
 MR. BARNES: We will concede he left the uni- 
 versity. 
 
 THE COURT: He can say there was a difference 
 of opinion between him and the trustees. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: I want to bring it out so they 
 would not think he rifled the treasury or anything of 
 that sort. 
 
 Q. Where did you go from there? 
 
 A. University of Toledo. 
 
 Q. How long were you there? 
 
 A. Two years. 
 
 Q. Did you resign from the Toledo University? 
 
 A. I resigned, and my resignation was rejected, and 
 then the trustees "fired" me. 
 
 THE COURT: Is that an academic university? 
 
 THE WITNESS : The University of Toledo is a 
 municipal university. The University of Pennsylvania 
 was a state well, a semi-state university. The Uni- 
 versity of Pennsylvania had an appropriation of about 
 a million dollars a year from the state legislature, and 
 the University of Toledo was a different university, it 
 was maintained entirely by what you people here refer 
 to as the Board of Aldermen, and y^ere it was called 
 
 31
 
 the City Council. 
 
 The University of Pennsylvania had a board of 23 
 trustees, who were self-perpetuating, that is they 
 elected their own successors. 
 
 Q. That is the Board as to the University of Penn- 
 sylvania ? 
 
 A. Yes, and as to the University of Toledo, the 
 members were appointed by the mayor and confirmed 
 by the city council, so that the University of Toledo 
 was a much more democratic institution than the in- 
 stitution of Pennsylvania. 
 
 Q. Had you, prior to disassociating yourself or 
 having yourself disassociated from the Toledo Uni- 
 versity, given any addresses in reference to the war? 
 
 A. Quite a number. 
 
 Q. Will you state in just a terse way what was 
 the theory of your addresses on the subject of war? 
 
 A. The theory of my addresses on the subject was 
 the same as the theory that I had been working out 
 for a number of years. 
 
 When I went into the University I didn't have any 
 particular economic point of view. After two years 
 with the Pennsylvania Child Labor Committee I be- 
 came convinced of certain facts, and the foremost of 
 those was that under the present system the rule of 
 procedure is: "Let him take who has the power and 
 let him take who can," and "every man for himself, 
 and the devil take the last fellow." 
 
 Because in Pennsylvania, without any sense of 
 apology, the manufacturers, the miners, put youngsters 
 into their factories and mines who had no business to 
 work and ought to be in school, little boys and little 
 girls, and then proceeded to make profits out of them ; 
 and when we went to the legislature to try to get laws 
 keeping children under 14 out of mines and factories 
 
 MR. BARNES; I don't like to interrupt on this 
 
 32
 
 line, but we are not interested in the child labor ques- 
 tion here, and I have no objection to the witness stat- 
 ing his views ; but I don't think he should detail all the 
 work that he did and the fight that was had in Penn- 
 sylvania, all of it. 
 
 THE COURT : I quite agree with you. 
 
 MR. BARNES : All of us sympathize with the child 
 labor movement. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : All sympathize but we don't do 
 much ; that is the difference. 
 
 Q. Will you cut it right over to your addresses on 
 the war issue and take it from there if you can? 
 
 A. I think it was in the Fall of 1916 I delivered a 
 series of speeches on preparedness. At that time the 
 President had made a swing around the country and 
 he said that if those who disagreed with him had any 
 public sentiment on the other side, they should hire a 
 big hall and go out and get crowds. So we hired some 
 big halls and we went out and got big crowds in all 
 the cities, or most of the cities where he had spoken. 
 
 And during the series of addresses I made a talk on 
 the germs of war, and I afterward published that 
 speech in a pamphlet of the same title that was pub- 
 lished by a concern in St. Louis, I think in the late Fall 
 of 1916. Do you want me to tell what the theory 
 behind that is? 
 
 Q. Yes, you have now characterized your addresses, 
 and I want the theory that ran through them. 
 
 A. Well, the theory behind it, behind the "Germs 
 of War" was this: 
 
 That if a town was threatened by typhoid fever the 
 first thing you would want to know was what the 
 origin of the germs was, and having discovered the 
 origin or source of the difficulty, you would proceed to 
 correct it from the bottom up. 
 
 The war is a social disease, the most deadly of all 
 
 33
 
 our social diseases and if you want to know how to 
 stop war you have got to go to the bottom of the 
 thing and reach down to the germs or origin of war. 
 
 And then I took up the question of the origins of 
 war as it is taken up by Hobson in his "Imperialism" 
 and by F. C. Howe in his "Why War," or by H. N. 
 Brailsford in his "War of Steel and Gold." 
 
 I took up this theory, that in the modern economic 
 world there have been three important stages: 
 
 In the first place there was the stage when nations 
 reached out for colonies as Spain, Portugal, France 
 and the like ; 
 
 And then there was the stage when the nations 
 reached out for markets, and that has been the stage 
 of what we call capitalistic society. 
 
 In the last 100 years or 150 years the great nations 
 have been looking for markets, and they have had to 
 look for markets because the workers, who produce 
 the wealth, get less in wages than they produce in 
 value, that is, if a worker produces five pairs of shoes, 
 he gets two pairs or three pairs in wages. That is 
 what we call a subsistence or a necessary wage, and 
 then over and above that there will be a margin, and 
 that margin goes to the capitalist in rent, interest, 
 dividends and profits. 
 
 Now the capitalist can use only a certain amount of 
 that margin ; in the United States at the present time 
 there are about 35,000 individuals who receive over 
 $50,000 a year. 
 
 If a man spends $10,000 a year under modern condi- 
 tions he can live comfortably, he can have the comforts 
 and simple luxuries of life. 
 
 Now if a man lives comfortable under those circum- 
 stances, he would have $40,000 left over. 
 
 Now take the sixty-seven richest people in America 
 having a total income of $300,000,000 and $298,600,000 
 
 34
 
 of that is in the form of rent, interest, dividends and 
 profits, and $1,400,000 is in the form of salaries and 
 commissions. That is, there are salaries and commis- 
 sions averaging $20,000 a year apiece. 
 
 And over and above that, about 99 per cent of their 
 income is in interest, rent, dividends and profits. 
 
 Now that is the surplus over and above of what goes 
 back to the worker in the form of wages. 
 
 Now, I say if a man spends $10,000 or $15,000 on his 
 living that is all that he can spend and he must spend 
 the difference or at least put the difference in service 
 in some other way. There are two ways that he can 
 utilize it: 
 
 He can invest it at home or he can invest it abroad. 
 So long as there are investment opportunities at home, 
 the capitalist, or the man who gets the surplus, invests 
 that, we will say at home. When the time comes that 
 he can no longer invest it at home he has got to send 
 it abroad and that is what we mean by a search for 
 foreign markets. In China and South America and 
 portions of Africa there are unexploited resources : 
 gold mines and iron mines and the like and franchises, 
 trolley franchises and electric franchises, etc., and the 
 capitalist in America or any other capitalistic country 
 takes the surplus that has come to him and invests 
 that surplus in South America or China or Africa or 
 somewhere else. 
 
 Ever since about the time of the Franco-Prussian 
 war we have been engaged in sending abroad the eco- 
 nomic surplus. That has been true of England, Bel- 
 gium, France and Germany, and to a small extent Italy 
 and since 1900 that has been true of the United States. 
 
 Now, you take the investment field like that in Mex- 
 ico, for example, around Tampico there are extensive 
 oil properties and of course there are large interests 
 in Mexico. 
 
 35
 
 On the one hand there is the Standard Oil Interests 
 and on the other hand the interests of S. Pierson & 
 Company, the English oil trust, if you could call it so ; 
 and these two interests both buy in Mexico oil lands 
 and sometimes they come into conflict, the English 
 Pound and the American Dollar both looking for the 
 same oil well. 
 
 In 1850, I think, Lord Palmerston, a British states- 
 man, enunciated the doctrine that the flag follows the 
 investor. The British Pound goes into Mexico and the 
 American Dollar goes into Mexico, and the British 
 flag follows the British Pound into Mexico and the 
 United States flag follows the American investor into 
 Mexico, and when the investor comes into conflict, 
 why the flags come into conflict. 
 
 And our theory, my theory, the socialist theory of 
 modern wars is that whenever you get these com- 
 mercial rivalries developed and established, the result 
 is bound to be war. 
 
 We have just seen an interesting illustration of that, 
 probably all of us have been following the end of the 
 war with great interest. The British called us in to 
 help them win the war and we went in and helped them 
 win the war and no sooner is the war over than they 
 declare an embargo on 40 different American articles, 
 and then in the United States Senate the day after, I 
 think it was Senator Lewis rose up in his place and 
 said "Let the British statesmen beware lest they re- 
 awaken the spirit of 1812." 
 
 And another senator, I think Senator Nelson, spoke 
 up and said something about "bloody reprisal." 
 
 Now, we are supposed to be on good terms with 
 Britain and Britain says "you cannot import articles 
 into Britain." And the American senator says "We 
 will make reprisals on Britain." And just as soon as 
 you get that kind of an economic conflict started, you 
 
 36
 
 have the germs of war. 
 
 And our theory is that as long as you follow the dog 
 eat dog philosophy in national or international affairs, 
 so long you will have wars that will be based primarily 
 upon the desires of commercial groups for aggrandize- 
 ment. 
 
 I have in my hand here an article written in 1915 
 by Prof. E. R. A. Seligman, professor of economics of 
 Columbia University. Professor Seligman has been, 
 so far as I know throughout the whole controversy, a 
 pro-war man, he is not a Socialist, he is an extremely 
 conservative man and has been conservative and has 
 taken the conservative position on the question of the 
 science of economics throughout this work which is 
 his specialty, and he has written a book called "Eco- 
 nomic Interpretation of History" which is one of the 
 standard works on that subject. 
 
 Professor Seligman, as I say, is a pro-war conserva- 
 tive. He says: 
 
 "While economic conditions indeed do not by any 
 means explain all national rivalry, they often illuminate 
 the dark recesses of history and afford on the whole 
 the most weighty and satisfactory interpretation of 
 modern national contests which are not clearly refer- 
 able to purely racial antagonisms alone." 
 
 Q. Let me ask you then, do you appreciate the fact 
 that racial antagonisms have, or are in effect in war? 
 
 A. Undoubtedly. 
 
 Q. And also religion may affect it? 
 
 A. Undoubtedly. 
 
 Q. And what you mean is the economic determina- 
 tion or principal factor in determining war? 
 
 A. Yes, the economic conditions of life determine 
 all the conditions of life. Just as roses and cabbages 
 grow in the same dirt, in the garden, so racial antagon- 
 isms and national antagonisms root back in the eco- 
 
 37
 
 nomic life. We all have to eat and dress. 
 
 Then Prof. Seligman in this article goes on and dis- 
 cusses this particular war and he shows how economic 
 factors have been at work, and then he says : 
 
 "To say then that either Great Britain or Germany 
 is responsible for the present war seems an unbeliev- 
 able and curiously short-sighted view of the situation. 
 Both countries know, all the countries of the world are 
 subject to the sweep of these mighty forces over which 
 they have but slight control, and by which they are 
 one and all pushed on with an inevitable fatality." 
 
 That is his thesis and that is the thesis of the Social- 
 ist Party, although Prof. Seligman is by no means a 
 socialist. 
 
 I have here another statement interesting and cor- 
 roborative of that point of view. This is some of the 
 material on which I was working when the "Great 
 Madness" was written and when the "Germs of War" 
 was written. 
 
 This is an excerpt from "Sea Power," a magazine 
 published by the Navy League in September, 1916. 
 
 This is the Navy League's creed : 
 
 "The Navy League believes that most modern wars 
 arise largely from our commercial rivalries. 
 
 "2. That we are now seizing the world's trade. 
 
 "3. That following the present war will come the 
 most drastic commercial readjustments and the most 
 dangerous rivalries ever known. 
 
 "4. That the United States will be the storm center 
 of these disturbances. 
 
 "5. That consequently it is our duty to guard our- 
 selves against these dangers while there is yet time." 
 
 And then in another of their magazines, "The Seven 
 Seas," another of their publications they say: 
 
 "Since the days of the wars, in the name of the 
 Prince of Peace, the battles between nations have ever 
 
 38
 
 been with them directly or indirectly a question ot 
 conquest." 
 
 Q. Where is that from? 
 
 A. That is from the Navy League, that is an 
 organization of the largest business interests in the 
 United States. 
 
 The Navy League theory is like Prof. Seligman's 
 theory and that is like the socialist theory. 
 
 Q. And that is the theory which you had in mind, 
 and which you were supporting in your "Great 
 Madness?" 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. Have you a copy of the "Germs of War" with 
 you? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Will you now take up the portions of that 
 which are distinguishable, in theory, from portions of 
 ''The Great Madness"? 
 
 A. The fourth section of the "Germs of War" is 
 headed "Treasonable Lying and War." 
 
 "Before human nature can be sufficiently embittered and 
 terrified to produce war between great nations, someone 
 must do a great deal of missionary work. The people must 
 be prepared for war. They must be appealed to, stirred up, 
 exasperated, enraged, infuriated. 
 
 "A thorough-going war spirit can be extracted from life 
 only after years of steeping and simmering. Children are 
 taught to hate. In their games they slaughter their foes 
 by name. Then school books teach them to hate, by dis- 
 torting the facts of history and by misrepresenting their 
 enemies. Their military drills and patriotic appeals teach 
 them to hate, by making them believe that their country is 
 the greatest, strongest country on earth, and their enemies' 
 country is the weakest and meanest. Their churches teach 
 them to hate by telling them that God is on their side, while 
 their enemies are in league with the devil. 
 
 "Thus steeped and schooled in hate, enthusiastic, patriotic 
 and ignorant, they go out to wage war against oppression in 
 the name of liberty. 
 
 39
 
 "The United States is now in the midst of a campaign of 
 misrepresentation, the like of which has never before been 
 undertaken in the history of the countrj r . For years, the 
 American reading public has been treated to a flood of sys- 
 tematic lying about Mexico. So serious did the situation 
 become that the President of the United States was finally 
 forced to issue a warning which was printed in the papers 
 March 26, 1916. Among other things the President charged 
 the great vested interests with a deliberate attempt to start 
 a war with Mexico by circulating false news through this 
 country. He said, "The object of this traffic in falsehood is 
 obvious. It is to create intolerable friction between the 
 Government of the United States and the de facto govern- 
 ment of Mexico for the purpose of bringing about interven- 
 tion in the interests of certain American owners of Mexican 
 properties." 
 
 "By way of further emphasis, the President added, 'The 
 people of the United States should know the sinister and 
 unscrupulous influences that are afoot, and should be on 
 their guard against crediting any story coming from the 
 border, and those who disseminate the news should make it 
 a matter of patriotism and of conscience to test the source 
 and authenticity of every report they receive from that 
 quarter.' 
 
 "Here is a deliberate statement made by the highest official 
 in the United States, that certain of the great vested inter- 
 ests are trying to stir up a war between the United States 
 and Mexico, in order to safeguard their properties and in- 
 crease their profits. 
 
 "The New York Times comments on the President's 
 statement in a way that indicates that the President would 
 have been justified in issuing his warning at any time within 
 the past six years. 
 
 " 'It is well known/ says the Times on Sunday, March 
 26th, 1916, 'that false reports about the hostility of Mexicans 
 to the American troops of the punitive expedition have been 
 freely circulated. Southern Texas has contained many 
 agencies for the spreading of reports calculated to involve 
 the United States in difficulties with Mexico since the very 
 beginning of the Madero revolution in 1910, and the methods 
 of the interventionists have been perfectly well known to 
 our government and the American newspapers.' 
 
 "If the Times is correct, and as one of the leading papers 
 of the country it is in a position to speak with authority, 
 
 40
 
 there have been six years of deliberate effort to start a war 
 between two peaceful countries, for the purpose of making 
 certain American investments in Mexico 'pay'. 
 
 "Here is a group of dynamiters who are trying to wreck, 
 not buildings but nations. Who can forget the wave of 
 frenzied criticism that swept over the United States when 
 the McNamara brothers were tried? They had destroyed 
 life and property! To the gallows with them! Since the 
 President spoke his warning against this group of buccaneers 
 who are seeking to embroil two nations that do not want 
 war, there has been only a feeble suggestion, in the daily 
 and weekly press, that an investigation be made, that the 
 offenders be discovered, tried for treason, and made to suffer 
 the penalty of their misdeeds. 
 
 "Compare this journalistic indifference to a monstrous 
 crime, with the attitude of the papers, toward preparedness. 
 With a few creditable exceptions, the newspapers of the 
 country, during the last year and a half, have come out 
 strong for preparedness and have deliberately suppressed 
 news of every description that bore on the other side of the 
 question. It is enlightening to have a managing editor say 
 to a committee of citizens interested in offsetting the wave 
 of preparedness hysteria 'We are not here to print your side 
 of the case, we are for preparedness. If you want space for 
 your side, buy it.' 
 
 "Here are strange doings! The President contenting him- 
 self with a warning against treasonable acts. The press of 
 a great country solid on one side of an issue of the most 
 momentous consequence to the future of the country, and 
 frankly refusing to print even the news on the other side. 
 Why are some people anxious to bring on Mexican Inter- 
 vention? Why is the American Press for preparedness and 
 pro-Ally?" 
 
 The next section, which I shall not read, is devoted 
 to social differences that led to war: race, nationality, 
 language and religion as differences that led to war ; 
 political causes of the war : 
 
 "The germs of war lie deep in the competition for eco- 
 nomic advantage that has plagued mankind for ages, and 
 that still rides like a nightmare on the neck of the human 
 race. 
 
 41
 
 "6 The Economics of War. 
 
 "Economic conflict has appeared in many forms. In the 
 early dawn of history men were fighting for the fertile val- 
 leys of the world, Ganges, the Nile, the Tigris. Race after 
 race swept down on the garden spots and drove out or en- 
 slaved those who held them. For ages, history was a record 
 of the campaign waged by vigorous hill-tribes against the 
 more cultured, richer and less vigorous valley tribes. Then 
 came the wars over trade-routes, and the struggle for the 
 control of sea-going commerce. And now, under the domina- 
 tion of an industrial system that is founded on the machine, 
 the factory, the railroad, the bank and the retail store comes 
 the international competition for foreign markets. 
 
 "The United States, despite its 'mind your own business' 
 traditions, is deeply involved with the other nations of the 
 world, in the struggle for foreign markets. Just now 'South 
 American Trade' is our watchword. 
 
 "Germany held the bulk of the South American trade be- 
 fore the war. England, Belgium and France had a share. 
 Until recent years the business interests of the United States 
 were so busy with the conquest of the continent and the de- 
 velopment of American resources that they had no time to 
 bother with outside sources of investment and profit. Now 
 that the important resources of the United States have been 
 brought under private ownership, the business interests are 
 turning eager eyes to Mexico, Cuba and Central and South 
 America. 
 
 "American business interests have entered the race to 
 secure their share of the unexploited resources and the un- 
 developed trade of 'backward' countries. They are hot on 
 the trail, but they must meet competition, and it is out of 
 such competition that international misunderstandings fre- 
 quently arise. 
 
 "Has it ever struck you as remarkable that the European 
 War, which began as a struggle between Serbia and Austria, 
 should have developed immediately into a war between 
 England and Germany? England and Germany are at war! 
 There is nothing in their past to explain the conflict. Eng- 
 land has fought battles with all of her principal Allies. It is 
 little more than fifty years since she waged a bitter war 
 against Russia. England and France are hereditary enemies. 
 England helped to sweep Spain from her position as a 
 
 42
 
 mistress of the world. So much for England's Allies. Now 
 as to her enemies. There has never been a war between 
 England and Germany. Always the two nations have been 
 friends. They have the same ancestors; the same traditions. 
 They fought side by side at Waterloo. England has never 
 come into conflict with Austria, though her interests have 
 been as opposite to the interests of Austria as they have 
 been to the interests of Russia. Despite these past relations 
 England, Russia and France are now Allies, and England 
 and Germany are the chief antagonists in the war. 
 
 "Why? 
 
 "Why should a war begun in Central Europe change so 
 quickly into a war between two friendly nations? Who 
 would have thought it? Who, but the student of the com- 
 petition between nations for the World's markets. 
 
 "7 War Business is Good Business. 
 
 "War business, or business war? There is nothing in a 
 name but there is a great deal in the connection that exists 
 between modern war and modern business. 
 
 "The modern war is a business proposition. 
 
 "The nation which prepares for war mobilizes munitions, 
 materials, money and men. The experience of the past few 
 months has showed that the hardest thing to get is muni- 
 tions and the easiest thing is men. 
 
 "Why are munitions so hard to get? Because in a modern 
 war the amount of munitions consumed in a single engage- 
 ment would have sufficed for an eighteenth century cam- 
 paign. There have been days during the present war, when 
 one side at one point in one battle front has fired a quarter 
 of a million shells per day, and continued this huge ex- 
 penditure day after day. This is a greater use of ammuni- 
 tion than was dreamed of ten years ago, even among mili- 
 tary experts. 
 
 "The peace footing of most nations has called for a com- 
 paratively small capital invested in munition factories. The 
 countries now at war multiplied their munitions capital many 
 times before they were on a war basis. This sudden in- 
 crease in a highly specialized industry and the economic 
 changes necessary to meet the situation, have called into 
 prominence a new arm of the military establishment. Today 
 the success or failure of the war is in the hands of the 
 
 43
 
 'Minister of Munitions,' who has leaped into a position of 
 supreme importance. 
 
 "Preparedness for the war involves munition-shops 
 woolen-mills, and stable credit before one regiment can 
 be put in the field. War today is largely a combination of 
 business organization and applied science. Men are inci- 
 dental. They direct the war machines. They are 'cannon 
 fodder.' They play almost the same role that machine hands 
 play in an up-to-date factory. 
 
 "Because of the business nature of up-to-date warfare 
 business thrives on a war just as a fire thrives on fuel. Dur- 
 ing peace times buyers are careful, they look the goods over, 
 and are slow in making up their minds. Peace times are 
 times of calm and deliberation. War times are times of 
 fever. Men's souls are aflame with patriotism, fear, blood- 
 lust and hate. 'Everything goes in war time,' and at hand- 
 some prices. 
 
 "The European War has been a wind-fall for the United 
 States. Not since the Civil War have there been such op- 
 portunities. Contracts are large, the need is pressing, price 
 is an incident, and even quality is sacrificed to speed. 
 
 "Since the outbreak of the European War, wealth has 
 piled up in the United States at an unheard of rate. There 
 have been immense increases in the prices of rubber, copper, 
 lead, zinc, petroleum, steel and other minerals, and like in- 
 creases in the prices that manufacturers have been able to 
 get for their products; the earnings of the munition factories 
 have been phenomenal as have the dividends paid by many 
 of the war trade industries. Export trade is at the highest 
 point in our history. The war in Europe is the greatest 
 boon that American business has perhaps ever experienced. 
 
 "America is enjoying real prosperity phenomenal pros- 
 perity. To the American business world the war has been 
 a Godsend. 
 
 "War a Godsend? 
 
 "Down below in the abyss from which America is drawing 
 her countless millions, there are other countless millions. 
 Cannons crash and guns splutter. Commands, shouts, cries, 
 curses, screams and groans fill the air. Broken bodies 
 writhe in agony. Other bodies lie still. Families are torn 
 forever asunder; homes are desolated; children are weeping 
 for their fathers, wives for their husbands and mothers for 
 their sons; villages lie in ashes and cities in ruins. Pesti- 
 lence creeps from house to house, and famine whines at the 
 
 44
 
 door. Death in every hideous shape stalks through the 
 war-torn countries. Nations heap up mountains of debt 
 that must crush joy out of Europe for fifty years. Through 
 the crevices and the yawning chasms of this frightful wreck- 
 age tiny yellow rivulets and large yellow streams make their 
 way, forming pools and little lakes in the hollows. Upon 
 these we fling ourselves in an estacy of mad joy, warning 
 all others back and crying 'Profit! Profit! Mine.' My very 
 own!' 
 
 "It is a commercial proposition with us. They are anxious 
 to buy. We sell. Business is good. What is it to us 
 whether they set the guns we make in trenches or put them 
 up as monuments in the public squares? We made the guns; 
 they bought them. They have what they wanted and we 
 have the cash! 
 
 "This is the point, exactly. War has become a matter of 
 business. War profits are large profits. So much the better. 
 We will make hay while the sun shines. 
 
 "But suppose the sun should cease to shine? Suppose 
 the war should stop tomorrow? What would become of 
 the hundreds of millions of capital that have been invested 
 in munitions plants? 
 
 "There is nothing easier. We must begin now to prepare 
 a market that may be used in just such an emergency. A 
 large navy, and a good-sized standing army will keep a good 
 deal of munitions capital busy, even in peace times. 
 
 "8. The War Makers. 
 
 "Those who benefit most immediately and most directly 
 by the war business are the makers of the munitions of war. 
 The munition makers or, more correctly the 'war makers,' 
 depend for their livelihood on fear, hatred, preparedness, 
 slaughter, desolation. 
 
 "The jackal is a prince, the vulture a gentleman, the 
 hyena a reputable citizen compared with these war traffick- 
 ers. God made the beasts and birds what they are; the 
 munition business is a man-made business. The quivering 
 flesh of nations is its food. There is more joy among the 
 makers of munitions over one nation at war than over fifty 
 nations at peace. These scavengers of civilization make 
 hell on earth and then fatten on the profits of their frightful 
 business. 
 
 45
 
 "If you want a picture of the work of the munition makers, 
 write to Congressman Clyde H. Tavenner, House of Repre- 
 sentatives, Washington, and ask for copies of his two 
 masterful speeches, "The World Wide War Trust" and 
 "The Navy League Unmasked." In the first of these speeches 
 Congressman Tavenner shows that the munition-makers 
 have received huge profits from the United States Gov- 
 ernment. Shrapnel that were manufactured in the Gov- 
 ernment arsenal for $7.94 were sold to Uncle Sam by the 
 munition makers for $17.50; time fuses were made for $2.92 
 and bought from the munition makers for $7.00; armor plate, 
 torpedo flasks, rotary drums all sold to the government for 
 far more than a reasonable profit on the cost of production. 
 
 "If it is true that we are now unprepared, argues Con- 
 gressman Tavenner, after spending six hundred millions in 
 the past five years on our navy; if we are unprepared and 
 spending half a billion each year on our war establishment, 
 there must be some reason. 'I believe,' he says, 'that these 
 officers who, in the expenditure of the people's money, have 
 been paying $115,075 for supplies which could have been 
 obtained for $58,246, should some,where or in some manner 
 be required to make a public accounting for their acts. 
 
 "Congressman Tavenner goes into the question of armor 
 plate manufacture, which he describes as 'one long scandal.' 
 He shows that nine official estimates place the cost of 
 making a ton of armor plate at $247.17. 'Yet since 1887 we 
 have purchased 217,398 tons of armor, paying the armor 
 ring an average of $440.04 per ton." Then he shows how 
 the armor plate makers of England, Germany, Austria, 
 France, Italy and the United States formed an armor plate 
 trust and he tells of the scandals in all of those countries 
 and Japan that arose out of the efforts of these war traffick- 
 ers to sell more armor and thus make more profits. 
 
 "He shows how the war makers manufacture news, mis- 
 represent events, publish false alarms, and create fear in 
 order to sell munitions. Case after case he cites, in which 
 European Governments explored the trail of the war makers, 
 and found them plotting and planning to create the same 
 kind of intolerable friction between European Governments 
 that the American interests referred to by the President 
 have been attempting to create between the United States 
 and Mexico. 
 
 "Most vital of all, he shows that while the United States 
 Government was experimenting with powder, and turning 
 
 46
 
 the results of their experiments over to a great American 
 firm of powder manufacturers, this American firm had a 
 contract with a German firm which required it to inform 
 the German firm of 'every improvement' in their process 
 of manufacture, and to keep them advised of the orders for 
 powder received 'from the Government of the United States, 
 or any other parties.' This firm was actually turning over 
 to the German firm full information regarding all of the 
 powder secrets and powder business of the United States 
 Government. 
 
 "Furthermore, Congressman Tavenner shows that a man 
 high in the military circles of the United States was for- 
 merly in partnership with one of the great munition firms, 
 and that one of these firms employs an Ex-Army Official 
 and Ex-Member of Congress to attend to its business in 
 Washington. So, page after page, the sickening recital 
 continues. 
 
 "The speech 'The Navy League Unmasked,' shows that 
 tnese same war makers, or their representatives run up and 
 down the land and, in the name of patriotism cry 'Prepare,' 
 well knowing that each dollar spent for preparedness is 
 money in their pockets. There is something sinister for the 
 future of the republic in this 'pocket-patriotism' or 'profits 
 patriotism' because, in the last analysis, it is no patriotism 
 at all. 
 
 "A group of Mexican bandits recently made a raid on a 
 town in the United States, killed United States citizens and 
 United States soldiers killed them with rifles and bullets 
 made in the United States. If war is declared tomorrow 
 between Mexico and the United States, these profit-patriots 
 would sell guns and munitions to the Mexicans as readily 
 as they shipped rotten meat to the American soldiers during 
 the Spanish-American War. Their country is capital. Their 
 religion is profit. Their God is gold. Yet they cry patri- 
 otism to a pathetically ignorant and patient citizenship 
 which is beginning to wonder whether there is not a need 
 for preparedness after all." 
 
 "9. The Wolf Struggle of Nations. 
 
 "England was the first nation to develop the modern 
 competitive factory industry. Her capitalists owned the 
 resources and the machines. They hired workers, paid them 
 less in wages than they created in product, and took the 
 
 47
 
 surplus (rent, interest, dividends, profits) for their own. 
 This surplus the owners could not consume, so they in- 
 vested it in new mills and mines at home. These new invest- 
 ments created new floods of surplus. The capitalists then 
 went abroad in search of investments. They found iron 
 ore in Cuba, and Chile, and oil in Mexico. German, English 
 and American capitalists invested their surplus there. There 
 was hard feeling, friction, conflict. Who was to exploit 
 their choice bits of the earth? 
 
 "Patriotic Germany was ready to protect the investments 
 of her capitalists. Patriotic England was willing to defend 
 her capitalists. ' A shot sounded from somewhere and 
 England and Germany were at war! 
 
 "Now the American capitalists, who are in charge of a 
 similar exploiting system, are actively engaged in their 
 efforts to lay their hands on Mexico and South America. 
 They are busy now, and it is Uncle Sam's turn to take a 
 hand. The war will end. No matter whether England or 
 Germany wins, the victor again will turn her attention to 
 Mexico and South America. 
 
 "The same international, economic competition, based on 
 exploitation at home and investment abroad, that drove 
 England and Germany into war will drive the United States 
 to war with the victor in the European conflict, no matter 
 which nation wins. The American papers talk glibly now 
 of sympathy with English ideals. Kaiserism they hate. 
 Therefore they are pro-ally. They forget that the Czar is 
 also pro-Ally, and Czarism is as repellent to American and 
 English ideals as Kaiserism ever hoped to be. 
 
 "The United States has fought two wars with England, 
 and been on the verge of two more. She has never fought 
 with Germany, but it will be as easy to create friction in 
 one case as in the other. If you do not believe it, read 
 current events; read history, and then put two and two 
 together. 
 
 "The conflict is inevitable! The United States is driving 
 fast toward war. Therefore, let us prepare! 
 
 "Just so! 
 
 "This is the real cause. 
 
 "Here are the germs of war, lurking in economic com- 
 petition between nations. 
 
 "Now we know why we are to prepare. Now we know 
 why ninety-five per cent, of the patriotism around the cam- 
 paign of the past year will be found among those who are 
 
 48
 
 benefited by things as they are and as they are to be, with 
 preparedness to back them. 
 
 "The American Exploiters are to continue their system 
 of exploitation; they are to take the surplus secured by this 
 exploitation; they are to invest this surplus for the purpose of 
 exploiting resources and people outside of United States and 
 the United States is to prepare to defend them in this new 
 exploiting venture. Thus preparedness is intended to back 
 up economic piracy. 
 
 "Do you object? 
 
 "Are you willing to pay higher prices, to add to the tax 
 rate, to pile up national debt, perhaps to give your son, 
 your brother, your husband, your father, in this holy cause 
 of economic exploitation? The oil interests, the copper 
 interests, the steel interests, the timber interests, the sugar 
 interests, are calling to you, 'Prepare! Prepare!' will you 
 not rush to their aid? 
 
 "You may hesitate unpatriotically, and question 'Why/ 
 you ask, 'do they not sell their surplus products at home? 
 There are many in the direst need here. Why not America 
 first?' Why not? Because the wages paid by these Amer- 
 ican exploiters to the American wage earners are so small 
 in comparison to their product, that they cannot buy back 
 what they made. The American wage scale stands between 
 the American worker and his product. Why are you not 
 satisfied? 
 
 "What, you still protest? Then know this. That in the 
 past, the American exploiters have been under a grave dis- 
 advantage as compared with their brothers abroad. They 
 alone, among the capitalists of the world, have had no great 
 standing army to protect their interests in their own coun- 
 try. Consequently malcontents and agitators have been able 
 to stir up revolts and cut profits. Stand aside! Let pre- 
 paredness become a reality and the vested interests of the 
 United States will have an army in the words of President 
 Wilson's last message, 'No longer than is actually and 
 continuously needed for the uses of days in which no ene- 
 mies move against us. Under no circumstances,' he says, 
 'will we maintain a standing army except for uses which are 
 as necessary in times of peace as in times of war.' " 
 
 "10. Defending American Ideals. 
 
 "A chorus of protest sounds, 'This preparedness is to 
 49
 
 defend American ideals, American homes, and American 
 lives against the invader.' 
 
 "Therefore, we must increase our navy and our army. 
 Therefore, we must spend more billions on war though we 
 were, at the beginning of the European war, spending a 
 larger portion of our national revenue on war than any other 
 great nation. Still we are 'defenseless' and 'utterly at the 
 mercy of a foreign foe.' 
 
 "If that is true, it might be sensible to ask what has 
 become of the four and a quarter billions that we have spent 
 during the past twenty years on the navy and the army. But 
 that is incidental. The real question is whether the most 
 threatening enemies of American ideals are in Berlin or in 
 New York. 
 
 "No one has yet invaded the United States. Those worthy 
 citizens who have looked under their beds for the Kaiser each 
 night during the past eighteen months have not seen him 
 once. The Japanese are thousands of miles from our shores. 
 England and France have not attacked us. Why then this 
 chorus of protest? 
 
 "Why Lawrence? 
 
 "Why Paterson? 
 
 "Why Little Falls? 
 
 "Why West Virginia? 
 
 "Why Colorado? 
 
 "Why Youngstown, and the copper strike, and the clothing 
 strikes, and the machinists strikes? 
 
 "Why this dissatisfaction? This unrest? This embryo 
 revolution? Can it be that the noisome tenement rookeries; 
 the squalid back alleys; the toiling children; the exploited 
 women; the long hours of high pressure work"; and the grind- 
 ing tyranny of unlimited industrial power have aroused the 
 American people to revolt? 
 
 "Note these biting phrases: 
 
 "1. Jobs uncertain; strikes; lay-offs and sickness. 
 
 "2. Promotion and advancement uncertain and slow. 
 
 "3. Favoritism and partiality are frequently shown. 
 
 "4. Pay small and limited while learning a trade. 
 
 "5. Same old, monotonous, tiresome grind every day. 
 
 "6. Stuffy, gloomy and uninteresting working places. 
 
 "7. When sick, your pay stops and doctor's bill begins. 
 
 "8. If disabled or injured you receive little or no pay. 
 
 "9. If you die your family gets only what you have saved 
 from your small wages. 
 
 50
 
 "10. Little CLEAR MONEY; nearly all your pay goes for 
 your living expenses. 
 
 "11. Old age, sickness, little money saved, your job goes 
 to a younger and more active man." 
 
 "Do you know where they came from? They were printed 
 on a circular issued by Uncle Sam, to explain why young 
 men should join the navy, and work for seventeen dollars a 
 month and board. 
 
 "American ideals? No. They are not included in the 
 description. That is not a picture of democracy, of oppor- 
 tunity, of liberty, and of justice. It does tell the story of 
 exploitation, and hopeless, intolerable human degradation. 
 
 "The Kaiser did not do that to us. No, nor did the 
 Mexicans, or the Japanese. Those unspeakable conditions 
 of American life, that may be met with in every great center 
 of industry, commerce and finance, from New York to San 
 Francisco, and from Chicago to New Orleans, are the pro- 
 duct of that same system of exploitation that we are now 
 patriotically preparing to defend in its policy of foreign ag- 
 gression." 
 
 This is the last section, section 11. 
 
 "11. Swat The Germ. 
 
 "No thinking man can be patriotic to such a scheme of 
 economic aggrandizement. No rational human being can 
 be expected to rush forward to the defense of the gang that 
 has already picked his pockets. 
 
 "We are intelligent. 
 
 "We use our minds. 
 
 "We are for peace. 
 
 "We are willing to prepare for peace. 
 
 "The means of preparedness are as obvious as they arc 
 unwelcome to the profit patriots. 
 
 "We are against war. We think we have found the germ, 
 of war. Then swat the germ! Let us here highly resolve 
 that we will devote our energy, our thought, our lives to the 
 work of destroying the germs of war. Joining hands, let 
 us declare that: 
 
 "1. War makers must go! Henceforth, all munitions shall 
 be made by the government. 
 
 "2. War profits must go! In case of war from this day 
 forward, every able-bodied man in the United States will 
 be put on the government pay-roll at $17.00 a month, and 
 
 51
 
 rent, interest, dividends, profits will cease until the war is 
 ended. 
 
 "3. Economic Exploitation must go! The land, the re- 
 sources, the public utilities, the social tools, must all be con- 
 trolled and managed socially, not for profits, but for service. 
 
 "These three steps we will take in order to destroy the 
 germs of war. Then having turned our backs on the outworn 
 things of the past, we will begin the work of true prepared- 
 ness for life, joy, hope, and the future. In furtherance of 
 this plan to make happy noble human beings: 
 
 "1. We will guarantee to every child the right to be well 
 born. 
 
 "2. We will guarantee to every child the right to enough 
 food, clothing and education to insure physical and mental 
 health and growth. 
 
 "3. We will guarantee to each adult the full product of his 
 labor. 
 
 "4. We will provide insurance against sickness, accident, 
 unemployment and death. 
 
 "5. We will give pensions against old age to every man 
 and woman who has done his share of the work of the 
 world. 
 
 "6. We will take for social purposes all social values, 
 whether in resources, in franchises, or in the product of any 
 human activity. 
 
 "7. And finally we will seek to guarantee equal oppor- 
 tunity to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness through 
 a government that restricts its activities to those necessary 
 to provide for securing the common weal." 
 
 Q. I think you have a letter, a copy of a letter to 
 the Toledo University that you referred to or that was 
 referred to by Mr. Barnes. 
 
 A. This is the letter that I wrote explaining my 
 position on militarism on March 10th, 1917, and also 
 in explanation of my relations with the Toledo Uni- 
 versity : 
 
 "During the past few days a number of prominent Toledo 
 citizens have made statements indicating that my further 
 continuance at Toledo University will prove detrimental to 
 the welfare of that institution. In order that the Board of 
 Directors may feel free to act for the best interests of the 
 
 52
 
 University, I have tendered my resignation to take effect at 
 their discretion. 
 
 "My utterances on the question of pacifism and patriotism 
 have let to the storm of criticism that have been excited 
 against me and against the University. May I take this op- 
 portunity to make clear my position? 
 
 "I am opposed to tyranny, despotism and irresponsible 
 power, whether vested in a king, kaiser or any other individ- 
 ual or group of individuals. 
 
 "I believe in the democracy and the brotherhood of all men. 
 No community can endure which ignores the Golden Rule, 
 the basic law of social life 'Each for all, and all for each.' 
 
 "Millions of people, the world over, are today seeking to 
 overthrow German militarism. There are two methods of 
 securing this result. The first way is to militarize all of the 
 great nations. I am opposed to this plan because I believe 
 that the dearest liberties, liberties of democracy must be sac- 
 rificed in the process. 
 
 "There is another method of overthrowing German mili- 
 tarism to promulgate a higher ideal than the ideal of mili- 
 tarism. 
 
 "Ideas and ideals are the most powerful and permanent 
 things in the world, as our own history shows. A century 
 and a half ago our ancestors immortalized themselves by 
 broaching the idea of political democracy to a king-ridden 
 world. Since that time, the idea has encircled the earth. 
 
 "The only possible way to save the present day world from 
 militarism is to cut to the root of the problem and establish 
 an industrial democracy, which, in its turn may prove a 
 beacon light to mankind. If we adopt militarism, we lower 
 ourselves to the level of German militarism. If we adopt 
 industrial democracy, we have an opportunity to raise them 
 to our new plane of justice and liberty. 
 
 "I oppose militarism because I believe it stands for the 
 brute in human nature, and that if we adopt it the democracy 
 is doomed. I hold to the doctrine, 'Peace on earth and good 
 will among men,' because I believe that only thus can the 
 spirit of man be emancipated and the human race be saved. 
 They that take the sword shall perish with the sword. It 
 is only those who are willing to overcome evil with good that 
 can attain to the full promise of manhood. 
 
 "I revere the government that represents democracy. I 
 honor the flag that stands for liberty and justice. So strong 
 is my feeling on this point that I resent seeing the govern- 
 
 53
 
 ment turned over to an irresponsible plutocracy, or an ir- 
 responsible bureaucracy just as I resent having the flag which 
 is the symbol of our democracy, used to cloak special priv- 
 ilege and shameless exploitation. 
 
 "Militarism is the madness of the past dragging us down 
 and destroying us. The spirit of brotherhood and good will 
 among men is the voice of the future, calling us to a higher 
 plane of life than humanity has ever known. To that future 
 I have dedicated my life, and so I purpose to continue to the 
 end of the chapter." 
 
 Q. That letter, I assume, was sent to the trustees 
 of the Toledo University? 
 
 A. It was sent to the press of Toledo. 
 
 Q. You used the term "plutocracy." Will you dis- 
 tinguish it as you use it in your work? 
 
 A. Plutocracy is a word of the same root mean- 
 ing as democracy; plutocracy means rule by those 
 who own wealth, whereas democracy means rule by 
 the people. Wherever the wealth owners rule there 
 you have plutocracy; wherever the people rule there 
 you have democracy. 
 
 Q. I wish you would give a definition as to your 
 understanding of the world "capitalist" or "capital- 
 ism" as you use it in this book. 
 
 A. The term "capitalist" I used means a person, 
 the major portion of whose income is derived from 
 rents, interest, dividends or profits. Therein, all capital- 
 ists are not necessarily plutocrats and all plutocrats 
 are not necessarily capitalists. 
 
 Now all economic control is in a very few hands 
 compared with the number of capitalists, that is, 
 people who receive their income through rents, inter- 
 est, dividends and profits. 
 
 Q. That is you think as an abstract proposition, 
 one receiving a profit may fill both positions, so far 
 as concrete cases are concerned, that is one man may 
 have a salary 
 
 54
 
 A. A man may have a salary and an income from 
 other sources at the same time. 
 
 Q. If you will now refer to "The Great Madness" 
 which has been offered here; will you state on what 
 you based the statements there, your conclusions? 
 
 I am directing you to recite for our information the 
 data on which you based that theoretical position 
 which you there state. 
 
 A. There are a number of kinds of data. In the 
 first place the data referring to the concentration of 
 industrial control. 
 
 Q. Will you refer to that data there if you have it, 
 upon what you acted in making that statement and 
 basing your opinion? 
 
 A. The trust movement, as such, ended about 1900, 
 with the Spanish-American War, and that produced 
 certain results, and I want to call your attention to 
 the kind of results that that produced. Here, for ex- 
 ample is The American Woolen Company as an 
 instance of business concentration. The American 
 Woolen Company has woolen mills as follows : Law- 
 rence, Massachusetts ; Blackstone, Massachusetts ; 
 Fulton, New York ; two at Fitchburg, Massachusetts ; 
 Providence, Rhode Island; Maynard, Massachusetts, 
 Dover, New Hampshire ; three at Lowell, Massachu- 
 setts ; Vasselborough, Maine ; Plymouth, Massachu- 
 setts ; Showhegan, Maine ; Fairville, Maine ; Harris- 
 ville, Rhode Island; Winooski, Vermont; Webster, 
 Massachusetts ; Dover, Maine ; Franklin, Massachu- 
 setts ; Enfield, New Hampshire two mills ; 
 
 Q. Can you give us the number of the balance 
 without enumerating them? 
 
 A. I have read half the page and it extends for 
 the rest and goes on over on the back. That type of 
 organization is a concentration under one head of a 
 large number of units like woolen mills and rolling 
 
 55
 
 mills or coke ovens. 
 
 Now there is another type of trustification or con- 
 centration, tor example that represented by the Inter- 
 national Harvester Company. They make harvesting- 
 machinery in four different cities. They have twine 
 mills in three different cities. They have iron mines, 
 coal mines and a steel plant, a saw-mill and they man- 
 ufacture gasoline engines, wagons, separators and so 
 forth in five cities. They own four railways. In other 
 words they owned different kinds of industries and 
 then they have one plant in Sweden, one in Denmark, 
 one in Norway, two in France, one in Germany, one 
 in Austria and one in Switzerland and two in Canada. 
 In other words, at that point industry breaks over the 
 boundaries of national lines and internationalizes 
 itself. 
 
 That is the second step in industry, concentration 
 
 Q. In the illustration that you have given it breaks 
 over a limited class of products and includes all? 
 
 A. Includes many products. 
 
 Q. Includes many other products? 
 
 A. Yes. As another illustration of the same kind 
 might be the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey. 
 This company owns 58 tank line steamers, it owns 
 refineries 13 refineries, two in Canada, one in 
 Mexico, one in Peru and the rest in different parts of 
 the United States. It owns a large system of pipe line 
 property; it has a number of accessory properties 
 where they maufacture cans, cases and so forth. Then 
 it controls The Imperial Oil Company, Ltd. with oil 
 wells in Trinidad, Mexico, Southern California and 
 Peru and controls a so-called plant in Montreal. It 
 has marketing stations' in Canada. Then it controls 
 other Companies which give it marketing facilities 
 and manufacturing facilities in Great Britain and in 
 seven of the other European countries, in Asia and 
 
 56
 
 Australasia and South Africa. In other words you have 
 there an illustration of an international economic unit. 
 
 After that movement had spent its force, or while 
 it was working itself out, there came the next step, 
 financial concentration. 
 
 I have here in my hand a copy of a chart from the 
 report of the Pujo Commission. 
 
 O. What commission was that? 
 
 A. That was a congressional commission appointed 
 in 1912 to investigate the concentration of control and 
 money and credit. It was a House of Representatives 
 commission and they summed up their work with this 
 chart. In the center of this chart there is J. P. Morgan 
 & Company ; Lee, Higginson & Company ; Kidder, 
 Peabody & Company; the Continental and Commer- 
 cial Trust Company ; The Illinois Trust & Savings ; 
 The Chicago National Bank, and then they have con- 
 nected with them I won't read all of these institu- 
 tions, but it is typical of the kind of financial control. 
 they have here a series of connections. They have 
 here the telegraph and the telephone industry. They 
 have here a series of manufacturing corporations like 
 the United States Steel, the American Radiator and 
 the United States Smelting & Refining Company and 
 the Baldwin Locomotive and the General Electric and 
 The Pullman Company and The International Har- 
 vester Company and a dozen smaller corporations ; 
 and then they have the railroads, the Great Northern, 
 the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy, the Northern 
 Pacific, etc., the Chesapeake and Ohio and the New 
 Haven and the New York Central. The Pennsylvania, 
 etc. Then they have the banks and trust companies, 
 The National Shawmut Bank, The First National 
 Bank, The Old Colony Trust Company, Chicago, New 
 York, Boston and a series of banks. Then they have 
 the insurance companies, the Equitable Life, The 
 
 57
 
 Mutual Life. Then they have the International Mer- 
 cantile Marine. 
 
 I have not read all of the names, there are a couple 
 of score there, but that illustrates what we call the 
 concentration of financial control and that is the latest 
 movement in concentration of business in the United 
 States. In addition to the old trust units, which were 
 individual businesses, really corelated, you now have 
 big banking institutions like J. P. Morgan & Company 
 reaching out into the railroads, insurance, banking, 
 manufacture, public utilities and the like and control- 
 ing vast pieces of property. I don't know how many 
 billions of control that represents, but you can judge 
 from the titles that I have read, that it is a very con- 
 siderable control. And it is that kind of a statement 
 that lead Mr. LaFollette in the senate to say that, 
 when he asserted that 100 men 
 
 Q. You can not say that unless you are quoting it. 
 I think, however, I am objecting in this instance for 
 you, Mr. Barnes. 
 
 THE COURT: Mr. Stedman; I want to ask the 
 witness a question on something he has already 
 spoken of. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: Yes, your Honor. 
 
 BY THE COURT: 
 
 Q. So as to get this clear, these definitions which 
 have been given, and in order that they may be in a 
 clear perspective in our minds : First, I understand 
 you defined plutocracy as a situation where the people 
 are ruled by those who own wealth? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Now, in that characterization or phrase "who 
 own wealth," whom do you include? Do you confine 
 that to a few large institutions and exclude a large 
 number of people who have some money or do you 
 include everybody who has some money or what? 
 
 58
 
 A. Well, on that definition I would not make any 
 difference. There is a difference between a man's 
 ruling because he is rich and a man's doing so because 
 he is a man; and it doesn't make any difference 
 whether there is a large or a small number so far as 
 the definition is concerned. Now, I believe the power 
 is exercised in the United States by a relatively small 
 number. However, as far as the definition of pluto- 
 cracy is concerned, it means that the authority of, that 
 is the control over society is concentrated in the hands 
 of people who control power because they possess 
 wealth. 
 
 Q. Now you have already given us your definition 
 as to plutocracy and how it is applied to more than 
 one particular kind or class of people? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Now in order that we may be clear as to the 
 meaning of that word from your point of view : 
 
 Do you include in that list say, a man who, by his 
 own efforts, either with his hands or with his brain or 
 both, at some stage of his life, gets to a point where 
 he owes no debts, where he is actively engaged in 
 some occupation which you would agree was socially 
 useful and where he has got net to his credit, in liqui- 
 dated cash or property of some kind, let us say 
 $10,000. Is he a member of the plutocracy within 
 your definition? 
 
 A. Probably not. The members of the plutocracy 
 within my definition are those which exercise an 
 active control over economic affairs. And you can 
 make your illustration even more extreme and take 
 the widows and orphans who hold railroad stock, they 
 are certainly not members of the plutocracy, although 
 they are capitalists in that they are getting their in- 
 come from interest and dividends and although they 
 exercise no control. 
 
 59
 
 We socialists believe that the right of power is an 
 economic power and we therefore believe that who- 
 ever owns the job and the products and the surplus 
 wealth will control ordinarily everything else in sight. 
 
 Now a small coterie of people in America own the 
 jobs of the rest. Now in a city like New York, I sup- 
 pose 90 per cent, of the people work on jobs owned 
 by somebody else. 
 
 In the second place the product in America is owned 
 by a small coterie of people. That is they own the 
 coal in transit, they own the steel in process of man- 
 ufacture, they own the wheat in process of trans- 
 formation into flour and so forth. The worker in 
 America, the ordinary worker works on a job owned 
 by somebody else. He works on a product owned by 
 somebody else ; the worker in a flour mill does not own 
 the wheat he works on, the worker in a silk mill does 
 not own the silk he works on and the worker in the 
 steel mill does not own the steel he works on. In 
 return for his labor he gets a wage and over and above 
 that there is a profit or surplus produced and that goes 
 to the owner of the job. So that the small group of 
 people in the United States who own the essential 
 jobs, resources, transportation, manufacturing, financ- 
 ing and merchandising, the small group which owns 
 those essential jobs own the jobs of the majority, own 
 the product and own the surplus created in industry. 
 
 Now given your ownership and the economic means 
 of livelihood and the rest naturally follows: 
 
 That is, the control by the plutocracy of the ma- 
 chinery of society. For example, the newspapers 
 depend on their advertising, the wealth owners adver- 
 tise in the newspapers and therefore the newspapers 
 are likely to do what the wealth owners want done. 
 The preparedness campaign was an excellent illustra- 
 tion of that. If a college wants to acquire a quarter 
 
 60
 
 of a million dollars they can not get it from working 
 people, they have got to go to a member of the plu- 
 tocracy, the owning class, to the people who have got 
 the quarter of a million dollars, and then as I know 
 in instance after instance they are good because they 
 want another quarter of a million later on and they 
 know where to go to get it. 
 
 BY MR. STEDMAN : 
 
 Q. What do you mean by "good?" 
 
 A. I will just illustrate by what one college presi- 
 dent said to me. He said : "Well, I got a quarter of 
 a million of dollars from a certain foundation," nam- 
 ing him ; he said : "I spent a year and a half in pre- 
 paring myself," and he said : "I was prepared on 
 every question that they could ask," and he knew the 
 man who was going to ask the questions and saw that 
 on every question he was prepared right. So that 
 when he came for his quarter of a million he was sure 
 that he was in perfect accord with the Foundation. 
 And then he said to me : "Do you know a professor 
 of sociology that I could get now? You understand 
 I don't want a wild-eyed radical, I want a sane safe 
 man." Now he was planning to go back for his next 
 quarter of a million and he would not have anybody 
 in his institution who would violate the spirit of the 
 Foundation that was to give him his quarter of a 
 million. Now that is just an illustration. That is not 
 bribery, that is not corruption, it is just a pervasive 
 influence that always goes out, goes forth and con- 
 trols, it is the influence which naturally comes from 
 those circumstances. 
 
 If I go to a man and ask him for $100 why the very 
 first thing I want to do, I have got to get myself in 
 tune with his tune, or otherwise I won't get the $100. 
 We find the same thing in churches, when they want to 
 get the money to do anything for the churches, they 
 
 61
 
 go to the rich not to the good ; they have to go to 
 those who have it because if you are going to build, 
 for instance a pipe organ or to build an edifice or re- 
 carpet the church and you have got to have money 
 and the people who have the money are the people 
 that are the owners, the rich, the owners of wealth. 
 And in this same way with various other public 
 institutions. 
 
 THE EIGHTH JUROR: May I ask a question? 
 
 THE COURT: Yes. 
 
 BY THE JUROR: 
 
 Q. Would you consider any influence in this mat- 
 ter to be organized or unorganized in mentioning a 
 definition of plutocracy? 
 
 A. In part it is instinctive and unorganized, and in 
 part it is intelligent and very definitely organized. For 
 example, that chart shows you a number of things, 
 that part of it is very definitely organized for one 
 thing. There is an instinctive cohesion of wealth. By 
 the way, that phrase was used by Grover Cleveland. 
 There is an instinctive cohesion of wealth, what we 
 call a class consciousness or group consciousness as 
 sociologists put it, that is instinctive. Above that and 
 beyond it there is a very intelligent organized move- 
 ment or group. 
 
 Q. In sympathy? 
 
 A. Sympathetic. The sympathy is rather instinct- 
 ive, the organization is rather intellectual. 
 
 THE WITNESS : May I complete my answer on 
 the question of control? 
 
 BY MR. STEDMAN : 
 
 Q. Yes. 
 
 A. There is a clause here on page 7 about the con- 
 trol by the vested interests of natural resources, banks, 
 railroads, mines, factories, political parties, public of- 
 ficers, courts and court decisions and school systems, 
 
 62
 
 the press, the public, the movie business, the maga- 
 zines and so forth. I wanted to say just a word in that 
 connection : 
 
 Whoever holds the purse strings calls the tunes. So 
 also is it true, along that same line, that those who 
 hold the job, the product and the surplus, are able to 
 call the tune. 
 
 And now there is another and a very important fac- 
 tor in that connection. When a man who is studying 
 to be an engineer, or a man who is studying to be a 
 lawyer, goes to a university or a technical school, he 
 goes to a university or a technical school, as a rule, 
 that has got the money directly or indirectly from the 
 owning group, and that is the point of view that I 
 tried to indicate ; and therefore as a student, he is 
 trained up to be of a certain mind. When he gets out 
 of school, suppose he is a lawyer, he goes into the 
 practice of law. The successful lawyers today are 
 necessarily corporation lawyers because most all busi- 
 ness is corporation business and most law business is 
 corporation business. Therefore, if a man is success- 
 ful at the Bar, as a rule, probably in nine cases out of 
 ten, he is a corporation lawyer or he works for cor- 
 porations. He does that for a period of eight or ten 
 years. At the end of that time he gets to be a judge, 
 and the spirit, the attitude 
 
 O. Not all of them! 
 
 (Continuing) and the spirit, the attitude with 
 which he approaches his problem is not the spirit of 
 the man who has lived on $15 a week, it is not 
 the spirit of the labor unions, it is not the spirit or the 
 attitude of the working class, because his entire clien- 
 tele, his club life, his social life, has been entirely with 
 the other group, and therefore you get, unconsciously, 
 and I think most of this influence is unconscious in- 
 fluence, and you get newspaper men, lawyers, preach- 
 
 63
 
 ers, all of what we call the professional class, reflecting 
 the spirit of that control rather than the spirit of the 
 man who is working for $15 a week. 
 
 The way in which that works out in government is 
 very interestingly characterized by President Wilson. 
 I would like to say for the President, that President 
 Wilson is one of the best known historians and is one 
 of the most thoroughly grounded political scientists in 
 the United States. All of his life has been devoted to 
 study and investigation of these problems, and he is 
 eminently prepared as a student of the subject to give 
 utterances of value. He wrote a book called "The 
 New Freedom." 
 
 MR. BARNES : What was the date in which that 
 was written? 
 
 THE WITNESS: 1912. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : And republished in 1918. 
 
 (Continuing) "The masters of the government of the 
 United States are the combined capitalists and manufacturers 
 of the United States. It is written over every intimate page 
 of the records of Congress; it is written all through the 
 history of conferences at the White House; that the sug- 
 gestions of economic policy in this country have come from 
 one source, not from many sources. The benevolent guardi- 
 ans, the kind-hearted trustees who have taken the trouble of 
 government offices off our -hands, have become so conspicuous 
 that almost anybody can write out a list of them. They have 
 become so conspicuous that their names are mentioned upon 
 almost every political platform. The men who have under- 
 taken the interesting job of taking care of us do not force 
 us to requite them with anonymously directed gratitude. We 
 know them by name. 
 
 "Suppose you go to Washington and try to get at your 
 Government you will always find that while you are politely 
 listened to the men really consulted are the men who have 
 the biggest stake the big bankers, the big manufacturers, 
 the big masters of commerce, the heads of railroad corpora- 
 tions and of steamship corporations. 
 
 "I have no objection to these men being consulted because 
 they also, though they do not themselves seem to admit it, 
 
 64
 
 are part of the people of the United States, j)ut I do very 
 seriously object to these gentlemen being chiefly consulted 
 and particularly to their being exclusively consulted, for, if 
 the Government of the United States is to do the right thing 
 by the people of the United States it has got to do it directly 
 and not through the intermediation of these gentlemen. 
 Every time it has come to a critical question these gentlemen 
 have been yielded to and their demands treated as the de- 
 mands that should be followed as a matter of course. 
 
 "The Government of the United States is a foster-child 
 of the special interests. It is not allowed to have a will of 
 its own." 
 
 And I might say that we socialists believe that 
 under the capitalist system that must necessarily 
 follow. 
 
 MR. BARNES: That was before Mr. Wilson be- 
 came President of the United States? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: But I say he authorized an 
 edition in 1918, so that is one instance in which he did 
 not change his mind. 
 
 Q. Mr. Nearing, at the close of the session, you 
 were reading, as I recall, from Woodrow Wilson's 
 work Is there anything further you have to refer to 
 there ? 
 
 A. There is just one more point that I might raise, 
 in answer to one question that the Judge asked, and 
 that is, the income figures as published by the 
 United States Department of Internal Revenue. They 
 throw some light on the question as to how many 
 people are in on the game. In 1916-1917 out of 103,- 
 000,000 people, there were 121,691 who received in- 
 comes of $10,000 or over per year. That is a little 
 over one in a thousand. 
 
 There were 17,000 who received incomes of $50,000 
 or more per year out of a total of 103,000,000 people. 
 In other words the percentage of people who got 
 
 65
 
 large incomes and who get large incomes at the present 
 time, if you mean by "large" $10,000 or more, is one- 
 tenth of one per cent of the American people. 
 
 Now that is not a complete answer to the question, 
 but it does throw some light on the question. 
 
 BY THE COURT: 
 
 O. That has only to do with income? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. And not with capital? 
 
 A. That raises a question of how many people are 
 well to do. You asked whether that was a large num- 
 ber or small number, and it is, comparatively, a very 
 small number. 
 
 THE COURT: Let me ask you then, and I direct 
 my inquiry solely as to the meaning of words : 
 
 Q. In this second to the last paragraph of Section 
 1 on page 7 you use the word "Control" and so forth. 
 Now was control as used there, do you mean by that 
 intellectual control or what may be called "physical 
 control," or what? 
 
 A. I meant by that economic control through own- 
 ership and emotional control through sympathy and 
 intellectual control through conscious organizations, 
 all three. 
 
 Qf. Well now, let me ask you this : Eliminating 
 from your mind for the minute the courts of inferior 
 jurisdiction and directing your mind to the Supreme 
 Court of the United States, what did you mean by the 
 phrase, "And controlled by the vested interests of 
 
 courts and courts decisions," having in mind 
 
 now the Supreme Court of the United States? 
 
 A. I meant for example the constructions that have 
 been put upon the Fourteenth Amendment. As I un- 
 derstand the Fourteenth Amendment, it was made to 
 protect certain human rights. As it has been con- 
 strued, it has been construed to protect property 
 
 66
 
 rights; and I might say that at one time I made an 
 investigation of Supreme Court decisions, covering a 
 period of about 60 years, and I think that nine-tenths 
 of them are decisions regarding property. In the early 
 period they were decisions regarding personal rights. 
 In the latter period, the questions that were decided, 
 the most 6f them, that came before the Supreme Court, 
 have been, primarily, involving questions of property 
 rights. And I believe that the Supreme Court of the 
 United States has construed the Constitution in that 
 way, on the subject of property rights, and I believe 
 that as those constructions have gone, as in the case 
 of the Fourteenth Amendment, property rights have 
 been made superior to human rights or personal 
 rights. 
 
 O. You think that your conclusion, if I gather cor- 
 rectly, has a bearing on the control of the Supreme 
 Court by what you designate as the "vested interests"? 
 
 A. That comes, as I indicated this morning, or 
 tried to indicate, through the control of the schools 
 through which these men get their education ; through 
 the control of the principal sources of revenue, in the 
 law, so that these men, as a rule, in order to make a 
 living, as lawyers, must work for the corporations; it 
 does come through the control that is exercised by the 
 ruling class over its own membership. 
 
 The Supreme Court judges, as a rule I know of no 
 recent exceptions are selected from what you would 
 call the professional or ruling or dominating class in 
 the country ; and it is from the big business lawyers or 
 the lawyers of high professional standing that those 
 men are taken, whether they are lawyers or doctors or 
 newspaper men, they are all working under a system 
 that is dominated by an economic power, and all 
 working as a part of that system. 
 
 BY MR. STEDMAN: 
 
 67
 
 Q. You don't mean in that control that they go 
 around and impress them with any specific objective? 
 
 A. No. The control is exercised, as I say, through 
 the training, through the environment, the club life, 
 the personal association, the business relations, the 
 working associations of these men. 
 
 Q. And the habit of it all has developed? 
 
 A. And their habits of life have been influenced 
 greatly by their associations and is the product of 
 those associations. In other words, I believe that 
 bribery is a very crude and very seldom resorted to 
 method of control. The plutocracy does not control 
 through bribery except in a very minor number of 
 cases, it is quite negligible as a factor. The only con- 
 trol that is exercised is the control through social, 
 political and economic relationships. 
 
 Q. Directing the mind to sustain that system of 
 society? 
 
 A. And developing the psychology for sustaining 
 it. May I speak about this Section No. 2? 
 
 Q. Yes. 
 
 A. The second section of the pamphlet is an at- 
 tempt to describe the preparedness campaign, and in 
 writing that section I had in mind certain facts : For 
 example, at that time I was traveling a great deal 
 around the United States. Whenever they took me 
 into a hotel, to a hotel room, I found three books, one 
 a Bible given by the Gideon's, the second a book called 
 "Leading Opinions Regarding National Defense," by 
 Hudson Maxim, and third, a book called "Defenseless 
 America," by Hudson Maxim. 
 
 I don't know that they were in every hotel in the 
 United States, but I understand that they were to be 
 found in nearly every hotel. 
 
 And then, on the 22nd of March, 1916, the New York 
 State Chamber of Commerce published a statement, a 
 
 68
 
 report on "The Common Defense" : 
 
 "We have all declared the belief that the subject of 
 common defense is a business question and that busi- 
 ness methods and principles should be applied to it." 
 
 Q. What are you reading from? 
 
 A. This is the report from the New York Chamber 
 of Commerce entitled "A Report on the Common 
 Defense," published in 1916. 
 
 The chief source of information on this subject, 
 however, is contained in the reports of the Navy 
 League and The National Security League. 
 
 I have here in my hand a large number of their 
 pamphlets and I wish to refer shortly to certain pages 
 of this propaganda. 
 
 In June, 1915, the Navy League makes the state- 
 ment that "the secretary is assisted in his work of 
 organizing, publicity and patriotic agitation by a staff 
 of field secretaries whose duties are to establish local 
 organizations of the League upon a firm basis, to 
 distribute literature, arrange meetings, and give lec- 
 tures and addresses, mostly illustrated, before impor- 
 tant business, religious, social, educational and patri- 
 otic societies of the country." 
 
 At the annual meeting that same year they reported 
 that they had distributed pamphlets to the number of 
 over 500,000 copies. 
 
 Then they reported regarding a widespread cam- 
 paign in the colleges, which included organizations in 
 37 of the states, and a total membership at that time 
 of 70,000. 
 
 I want to refer particularly to the methods of pro- 
 paganda that the League employed. For example : 
 
 They state in October, 1915: "With an adequate 
 force, both naval and military, the United States will 
 be in a position not only to enforce the rights of a just 
 share of the world's commerce, but also they will be 
 
 69
 
 able to forward civilization by aiding other nations to 
 attain their share." 
 
 O. That is in October, 1915? 
 
 A. Yes, 1915. This is from the July issue, 1915: 
 
 "Do Americans realize that one of the reasons why we 
 must of necessity be intensely concerned in the submarine 
 and trade warfare now waged between Germany and the 
 allies is that in not having ships of our own with which to 
 carry our Four Billion Dollars worth of merchandise and the 
 German ships being unavailable, that we will lose over Two 
 Billion Dollars worth of export trade unless merchant ship- 
 ping of the allies are free and able to carry our goods? 
 
 "This question faces us squarely in this country: will we 
 continue to jeopardize our Four Billion Dollar trade with 
 the world by trusting to luck, fate or the good will of fighting 
 nations, which may have the shipping in which to carry our 
 goods to safety or destruction?" 
 
 Then in September, 1915, they said: 
 
 "German standards of militarism would, of course, be im- 
 possible among Anglo-Saxons, but this does not minimize 
 the fact that world empire is the only natural and logical aim 
 of a nation that desires to remain a nation." 
 
 Then in November, 1915 most of these quotations 
 are from "Seven Seas," one of the official publications 
 of The Navy League: 
 
 "We have now on our hands, what seems to be a white 
 elephant to some, a republican empire, and no longer such 
 a question of doubting whether or not, to have a navy as 
 large as England's. The navy, for a coast line such as the 
 United States possesses, a navy which could uphold the 
 Monroe Doctrine, now moribund, such a navy must be at 
 least twice the size of the British navy. And the first step 
 to be taken so as to secure that sized navy is for the American 
 citizens to shake off the timorous manner which is our char- 
 acteristic, in asserting our Federal rights. The Imperialism 
 of the American is a duty, a credit to humanity. He is the 
 highest type of imperial master. He makes beautiful the 
 land he touches, beautiful with moral and physical clean- 
 liness; which sounds rather prosaic, but is nevertheless the 
 principal of happiness for the savage if not for the imperialist. 
 England certainly owns or has in some way a very large 
 
 70
 
 portion of the Earth's land surface and practically has for 
 some time until quite recently controlled the oceans which 
 cover the hidden land surface. There should be no doubt 
 that even with all possible morals, it is the absolute right of 
 a nation to live to its full intensity, to expand, to found colo- 
 nies, to get richer and richer by any proper means such as 
 armed conquest, commerce, diplomacy." 
 
 Q. That is from what issue? 
 
 A. That is from November, 1915. This is from 
 February, 1916: 
 
 "The financier, the really great one, is worthy of his hire. 
 The pacifist, the professional politicians, though they 
 possess in their ranks, not a few able captains of industry, 
 considered it as being very dangerous to the country to allow 
 armament makers to have very large profits or to do any 
 lobbying or advertising. The pacifists make it a point to 
 arouse the ever latent prejudice against other peoples' pro- 
 fits, particularly when believed to be enormous. Democracy 
 has certain glorious advantages, but in matters relating to 
 foreign policy and particularly to war, it is extremely incom- 
 petent. If the incentive of great profits is not allowed to 
 serve as a motor to great firms, then those firms will not use 
 their full initiative and they will fall into mere shadows of 
 themselves. Very fortunately for themselves in Europe, all 
 the great powers were exceedingly liberal with their arma- 
 ment makers. The only escape we can possibly have from 
 the dreadful incapacity which hangs over us is for some 
 powerful and fearless group of individuals to prod the 
 delinquent, to offer the right people unlimited profits so that 
 they would make too much ammunition, too much navy, too 
 many flying machines all of which no government of a 
 democracy would do of its own accord." 
 
 Then in May, 1916, it says: 
 
 "There is only one leaven which can preserve the state and 
 the nation against death dealing inertia for lethargy, both 
 as to soul and body, and that level is a militarism of the 
 French variety." 
 
 This is from November, 1916: 
 
 "Has the administration given us the truth concerning con- 
 ditions in Mexico or does it regard the truth as too horrible, 
 too humiliating, too dangerous to be made public? From 
 
 71
 
 private sources we learn of the awful fate that has overtaken 
 many of our citizens who had the temerity to make their 
 homes in Mexico and who were unable or unwilling to 
 abandon their possessions and escape thence when the pro- 
 tection of the Government failed them. Why does not the 
 administration let it be known how many of these men were 
 murdered, how many of their wives and daughters outraged? 
 The facts must have been reported to our officials in Mexico 
 and by them to Washington. Above all. why was our Gov- 
 ernment unable or unwilling to protect its citizens as other 
 governments did theirs? We hear that American property 
 losses in Mexico amount to hundreds of millions. Are not 
 the American people interested in this? It is said that 
 French, British, German and other foreign property losses in 
 Mexico have amounted up to tens of millions, and it is 
 surmised that we, the American nation, \vill be held account- 
 able when these nations are free to see to it. Is there noth- 
 ing in this threatening danger that our people should know? 
 Are they not entitled to some warning regarding a condition 
 which might easily embroil us in war? 
 
 "To fulfill the requirement in its broad sense demands that 
 our army and navy, to defend the lives and property and 
 rights of American citizens everywhere, on land and sea. 
 An army for defense, in its broad sense, should be capable 
 of invading a foreign country and compelling respect for the 
 lives and rights of American citizens wherever they may be 
 jeopardized." 
 
 I would like to refer to just a paragraph of similar 
 propaganda by The National Security League. 
 
 Q. Why was the National Security League deemed 
 necessary by those responsible for its organization? 
 
 A. Because it seemed impossible, except by an 
 organized campaign of education on a huge scale to 
 make the people realize how deplorable our state of 
 unpreparedness and the dangers that surrounded us. 
 
 First, the League has built up an organization 
 of 100,000 members in every state of the union, with 
 nearly 200 organized branches in cities and towns, 
 each branch being a center for the dissemination of 
 preparedness sentiments. 
 
 72
 
 Second, it has secured the co-operation of 17 Gov- 
 ernors of states in appointing state committees on 
 national defense to co-operate with the league. 
 
 Third, it has distributed over six million pieces of 
 preparedness literature. 
 
 That illustrates the kind of material that was being 
 issued and to which I was referring in Section 2. 
 
 I would like, in that connection, to read from one 
 of Clyde H. Tavenner's speeches, "The Navy League 
 Unmasked." 
 
 Q. Speech delivered in the House of Congress? 
 
 A. The speech was delivered in the House of Rep- 
 resentatives on December 15th, 1915. Congressman 
 Tavenner makes the statement: "The Navy League 
 would appear to be a little more than a branch office 
 of the house of J. P. Morgan & Company," and then 
 he gives two pages of Navy League connections, and I 
 read just a few. 
 
 J. P. Morgan was formerly treasurer of the Navy 
 League and is now a director and contributor. 
 
 Herbert L. Satterlee, formerly Assistant Secretary 
 of the Navy Department and a brother-in-law of J. P. 
 Morgan was one of the incorporators and founders of 
 the Navy League. 
 
 The late J. P. Morgan was one of the founders and 
 principal contributors to The Navy League. 
 
 Edward T. Stotesbury, a member of the firm of J. P. 
 Morgan & Company and a director of the Baldwin 
 Locomotive Works and of 54 other corporations was 
 one of the honorary vice-presidents. 
 
 Robert Bacon, formerly Secretary of State and part- 
 ner of J. P. Morgan & Company, is a director of the 
 Navy League. 
 
 Henry C. Frick, a fellow director of J. P. Morgan & 
 Company and director of both the United States 
 Steel Corporation and the National City Bank of New 
 
 73
 
 York, is an honorary vice-president. 
 
 Jacob H. Scruff, director with J. P. Morgan in the 
 National City Bank of New York, a contributor, con- 
 tributed $1,000 in 1915 to The Navy League: 
 
 J. Ogden Armour, a director, with J. P. Morgan of 
 the National City Bank of New York, was one of the 
 committee, which under the auspices of The National 
 Security League, issued a statement certifying to 
 the patriotism of the Navy League. 
 
 Cleveland H. Dodge, a director of J. P. Morgan & 
 Company and the National City Bank, among other 
 corporations is also one of the vice-presidents. 
 
 And there is another page of about the same kind. 
 This is merely repetition. 
 
 And I desire to refer again to President Wilson's 
 statement, of which I have here an official copy from 
 the White House, in which he denounced those who 
 had been trying to stir up war between Mexico and 
 the United States I have already read that statement 
 and I do not think it is necessary to go into anything 
 further of detail. 
 
 In other words, the preparedness movement was a 
 movement by big business, or big business interests, 
 they were behind it and were working for it. and it got 
 to such a pitch that the President of the United States 
 had to call them down publicly, although he took no 
 further, action in the matter and I wrote Section 2 to 
 call your attention to the fact that the preparedness 
 campaign was waged by big business organizations 
 and was backed by big business machinery. 
 
 O. Now I presume you may refer to the third 
 section. 
 
 A. I wrote the third section for the purpose of 
 showing that the business interests, having succeeded 
 in stirring up public sentiment on preparedness, be- 
 came the patriots, the leading business men who had 
 
 74
 
 been owners of the United States resources and ma- 
 chinery and economic life, became the leading patriots, 
 and that they utilized this opportunity to carry on the 
 usual business activity of making profits. 
 
 I have here a bulletin of March 3rd, 1917, from the 
 Wall Street Digest: 
 
 "Whether the end of the war comes in the near future or 
 is delayed for a long time, the United States is definitely 
 committed to a preparedness campaign that must assure the 
 prosperity of American industries for a number of years to 
 come. * * * 
 
 "The severance of diplomatic relations meant, whether or 
 not it was followed by war, that the United States must make 
 ready for war and that it must make ready at the earliest 
 possible moment. Logically, this means that the vast stores 
 of military supplies to be purchased by the United States 
 Government would be paid for in readily negotiable American 
 money and not in promises to pay such as had been so largely 
 taken in exchange for the vast quantities of stores supplied 
 to the allied governments of Europe in the past 24 months. 
 
 "These facts were promptly recognized by the big 
 interests in Wall Street and those interests have been 
 steadily committed to the constructive side of the market 
 in recent weeks, as proved by the fact that while the 
 nation has been on the verge of war with thousands of timid 
 holders of securities seeking to liquidate their holdings, the 
 big interests have been accumulating, with the net result that 
 there has been a general advance in the active issues on the 
 New York Stock Exchange, and a somewhat smaller advance 
 in the stocks traded in on the New York Curb Market. 
 
 "The upward movement in the price of stocks dates from 
 the date that the German Ambassador at Washington was 
 handed his passports and although there have been slight 
 temporary reactions, the movement has been fairly continu- 
 ous from that day to this. 
 
 "In addition to the assurance of the prosperity ahead for 
 American industry through the placing of vast orders by 
 the Government to be paid for in American money, there 
 is still another phase of the situation that must not be over- 
 looked. The United States is now definitely committed to 
 the side of the Entente Allies. That makes the ultimate 
 victory assured. There comes the further certainty that they 
 
 75
 
 will be able to refund and eventually redeem their promises 
 to pay. Far sighted bankers and financiers were quick to 
 sense this situation, and they have been active in the stock 
 market during the past two weeks." 
 
 Q. What is the date of that? 
 
 A. That is March 3, 1917, one month before we 
 entered the war. 
 
 That is typical of a number of publications. I have 
 here a list of them (Indicating). 
 
 I have here a letter from the banking house of 
 Henry Clews & Company, which is dated December 
 23rd, 1916, and another October 14th, 1916, in which 
 they make exactly the same point. In other words 
 that was the general sentiment of the Wall Street 
 group. 
 
 Here is a publication called "Commerce & Finance" 
 dated May 23rd, 1917, wherein Mr. J. Ogden Armour 
 says: 
 
 "I consider the present the most auspicious period 
 from the standpoint of national prosperity in my mem- 
 ory." That characterized the same attitude. 
 
 I have here a number of clippings which I made at 
 that time. Here is one from "The Toledo Blade" of 
 May 19th, 1917, and a real estate dealer of Toledo says : 
 
 "The war will teach us a very valuable lesson, a more 
 valuable lesson than the Civil War brought. In real estate, 
 people are buying carefully, of course, and this is no more 
 than right, but they have plenty of money and are buying 
 in a goodly volume. From a business standpoint we have 
 much to gain and nothing to lose from this war." 
 
 Here is another excerpt or clipping from the same 
 paper of May 15th, 1917, and this is headed: "War 
 Prosperity." This is an advertisement by a leading 
 department store in Toledo. 
 
 "War Prosperity. England is prosperous, France 
 is prosperous, business in both countries is better than 
 it was before the war. The war has made work for 
 
 76
 
 everybody and puts hundreds of millions of dollars in 
 circulation." 
 
 There is another newspaper advertisement: "Take 
 Canada as an Example" and they show how prosper- 
 ous Canada has been. This is on the 22nd of May, 
 1917, and they go on and show how prosperous Canada 
 has been and show how we will be equally prosperous. 
 
 Q. What do you mean, by going into the war? 
 
 A. Yes. That general situation of profiteering 
 called for a statement from Mr. Wilson. That appears 
 in an official bulletin on July 12th, 1917, and this is 
 what the statement on profiteering is : 
 
 "We ought not to put the acceptance of such prices (for 
 necessities) on the ground of patriotism. Patriotism has 
 nothing to do with profits in a case like this. Patriotism and 
 profits ought never, in the present circumstances to be men- 
 tioned together. Patriotism leaves profits out of the ques- 
 tion. In these days of our supreme trial, when we are send- 
 ing hundreds of thousands of our young men across the seas 
 to serve a great cause, no true man who stays behind to work 
 for them and to sustain them by his labor will ask himself 
 what he is personally going to make out of that labor. No 
 true patriot will permit himself to take toll of their heroism 
 in money, or seek to grow rich by the shedding of their 
 blood. He will give as freely and with as unstained self- 
 sacrifice as they. When they are giving their lives will he 
 not at least give his money." 
 
 That was the President's appeal to the American 
 manufacturers and miners, specifically and generally 
 an appeal to the profiteers. It was called for by such 
 statements as I have made. 
 
 And here is a statement from the United States 
 Secretary of Agriculture dated May 9, 1917, in which 
 it accuses the food speculators not only of profiteering 
 but "I am told," he says, "that some of these men are 
 actually in Washington today conducting a lobby 
 against the request of President Wilson that Congress 
 empower him and his cabinet to take the necessary 
 
 77 *
 
 means to mobilize the agricultural resources of this 
 nation." 
 
 And then here I have a statement which I will not 
 read of the war profits made by these same American 
 patriots. That is, the men in The Navy League, the 
 men behind the Navy League, the big men behind the 
 National Security League had been making about a 
 billion dollars a year approximately in war profits 
 during the three years before we entered the war. 
 
 The point I wish to make is that on the 12th of 
 July the profiteering had got so bad that the President 
 was compelled to issue an appeal in which he asked 
 those patriots to leave profits out of account because 
 in spite of their blatant patriotism they had been 
 making a huge profit before we entered the war and 
 they continued to make them after we entered the war. 
 
 And in this next section, Section 3, I show that the 
 preparedness group was the same group that was in 
 it, to make war profits. The so-called patriots became 
 profiteers. 
 
 BY MR. STEDMAN: 
 
 Q. I think you can turn to No. 4. I think it is in 
 that where you used the phrase "preposterous phrase 
 'armed neutrality.' " I think it is in this publication. 
 In what sense did you mean "that preposterous 
 phrase" ? 
 
 A. Why, in the first place, 
 
 Q. Is that a phrase used by the President? It was, 
 was it not? 
 
 A. "Armed neutrality" in the first place there 
 practically is no such thing as "armed neutrality." 
 There you are facing this situation, that either you 
 are neutral in thought and in act, as Mr. Wilson asked 
 us to be at the beginning of the war, or else you go in 
 and become an ally of one side or the other. When 
 this phrase was used we were supplying arms and 
 
 78
 
 ammunitions and food and other contraband and non- 
 contraband to the allied governments and we were not 
 neutral in any extent in the matter except on the 
 merest technicality. And as Mr. La Follette pointed 
 out in his speech in the Senate : 
 
 "That armed neutrality for which the President 
 asked would lead inevitably to war," and in his speech 
 on the 2nd of April, Mr. Wilson admitted that when 
 he said "armed neutrality is ineffectual in fact at best. 
 It is likely only to produce what it was meant to pre- 
 vent." And as a matter of fact it did produce what it 
 was meant to prevent. It was preposterous in the 
 sense of its being an unreality. 
 
 Q. Referring now to Section 5: "The Traitors?" 
 
 A. Section 5 is the reverse of Section 3. Section 3 
 is headed "The Patriots" and Section 5 is headed "The 
 Traitors," and in both instances "patriots" and "trait- 
 ors" are quoted in the section. 
 
 The patriots, as I tried to point out, were the same 
 group that had engineered the preparedness campaign 
 and engineered it as they engineered everything for 
 profit. Now in Section 5 I am calling your attention 
 to the fact that there were people among the people in 
 the United States who held the opposite view, a num- 
 ber of them who expressed it, and several of them in 
 Congress who took issue with the majority of Con- 
 gress and with the President on this whole question. 
 
 Q. That is, opposed to the entrance into the war? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, opposing entering into the war. 
 
 Q. And armed neutrality? 
 
 A. And among them were the men who had stood 
 out conspicuously for years, as the champions of the 
 people's rights, and they were dubbed "traitors" by 
 the newspapers and by The Security League and by 
 the Defense Society and by The Navy League and 
 other organizations of that type simply because they 
 
 79
 
 took a point of view opposite to our entrance into the 
 war. 
 
 Q. Senator Norris among those? 
 
 A. Senator Norris was one of those. 
 
 Q. Recently re-elected a Senator? 
 
 A. Yes. Of the 33 Congressmen that took that 
 stand, 25 were re-elected. 
 
 Q. Thirty-three senators? 
 
 A. And representatives. 
 
 Q. And this paragraph is the exposition of their 
 views and your title is the title which was applied to 
 them by the press largely, rather than their own 
 constituents? 
 
 A. Yes, sir ; it was applied to them by the press 
 and by the spokesmen of the other side. 
 
 Q. Referring to Section 6, the second division. 
 
 A. That section refers to the actual process of our 
 going into the war. I call your attention in that sec- 
 tion to the fact that the situation of the Allies was 
 quite serious. On the 22nd of July, 1916, the banking 
 house of Henry Clews Company, in their circular, 
 stated that "the most influential factor in the security 
 markets at the present is the war financing of the 
 Allies. A new $100,000,000 French loan has been suc- 
 cessfully launched through a specially organized cor- 
 poration. It is expected to be followed by a huge 
 British war credit. How long Great Britain will be 
 able to stand this terrific strain no one knows, but her 
 resources are so vast that the end is by no means yet 
 in sight." 
 
 Now, as I state, in this section, nobody could tell 
 how serious or critical the situation of the Allies was : 
 but at that time there was a statement made in the 
 British House of Parliament, I think by Bonar Law, 
 that America entered the war when allied credit was 
 exhausted and certainly the economic situation of the 
 
 80
 
 Allies was extreme, being subjected as it was to the 
 effect of the submarine blockade. 
 
 Another point I tried to make in this connection 
 was that the American people had voted Mr. Wilson 
 in because he had "kept the faith of neutrality." 
 
 I have an advertisment here from the "Pittsburgh 
 Post" of November 6th, 1916, headed "Political Ad- 
 vertisement," and says : 
 
 "Are you working, not fighting, alive and happy, 
 not cannon fodder. Wilson and peace with honor or 
 Hughes with Roosevelt and war." 
 
 And then they have some other later ones that 
 appear : 
 
 "If you want war, vote for Hughes; if you want 
 peace with honor and continued prosperity, vote for 
 Wilson." 
 
 That was the day before election. The people of 
 the country very clearly answered to that mandate as 
 will be shown by the following figures. In the election 
 of 1916 Mr. Wilson got a plurality in California of 
 3,773. In the same state the Republican Governor got 
 296,815. In Kansas Mr. Wilson got 36,930 plurality. 
 In the same state the Republican Governor got 152,482. 
 In Minnesota Mr. Hughes got 392 plurality but the 
 Republican Governor got 153,729. 
 
 In other words, it is pretty clear that the people 
 sent Mr. Wilson back into office because he "kept the 
 faith of neutrality" and because he "kept us out of 
 war," and the billboards were covered at that time 
 with the statement that he had "kept us out of war." 
 And the people sent him back, and then next April we 
 went into the war. 
 
 Q. May I direct your attention, perhaps, to another 
 fact: In view of the introduction against the Rand 
 School of the "St. Louis War Program Proclamation" 
 which is in the book which has been submitted here, 
 
 81
 
 I will ask you this, Mr. Nearing: Isn't it a fact that 
 the socialist vote went down tremendously, due to the 
 socialists voting for President Wilson? 
 
 A. If I remember it, it fell off from a million to 
 600,000, and that would have been practically enough 
 to have elected Mr. Wilson. 
 
 MR. BARNES: Does Mr. Nearing say 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : That is where socialism got bit. 
 
 MR. BARNES: Does this witness claim to have 
 knowledge that the falling off of the socialist vote 
 was due to that? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : I am stating this now, being 
 that it is a well known fact, and the figures show it in 
 the books which you have put in evidence here. 
 
 MR. BARNES : It is in the book that we offered 
 that the Socialist Party vote fell off, it is not in the 
 book that it fell off due to Mr. Wilson or to any other 
 candidate. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : Everyone in the party knows it, 
 knew it at the time and knows it now. 
 
 MR. BARNES : If you have any witnesses to prove 
 that I would be glad to have you call them. 
 
 THE COURT : I think it is utterly immaterial to 
 the controversy we have here one way or the other. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : It is not in controversy here, 
 but I thought that you would agree to that, Mr. 
 Barnes, and I was simply calling attention to it ; I was 
 not trying to prove it. 
 
 A. There is one other point that I would like to 
 make in connection with this section, and that is the 
 point regarding the Council of National Defense. And 
 that illustrates as well as anything I know of, the way 
 in which a government under a capitalistic society is 
 compelled to depend upon the people there to do the 
 work. In the United States about nine-tenths of the 
 people are working people. All the professional peo- 
 
 82
 
 pie, all the managers, officials and heads of industry, 
 all of them together, do not make up more than one- 
 tenth of the population. In spite of that fact, the 
 Council of National Defense contains the names, al- 
 most exclusively, of business men. 
 
 I called attention particularly in the pamphlet to 
 the committee on oil and the committee on steel and 
 the like. 
 
 Q. I think there is one exception, the committee on 
 mines and mining? 
 
 A. I didn't remember that. 
 
 Q. I didn't know whether you have that in that 
 book or not, I call your attention to it that that is one 
 exception, and on it there were also a number of 
 experts. 
 
 MR. BARNES : A large percentage. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: A large percentage, yes. 
 
 A. (continuing). In their committees they were 
 forced to call on business men exclusively, so that the 
 active work of carrying on the war business was 
 thrown right into the hands of the same people that 
 had, during the past, managed business. Of necessity, 
 it had to be so, because there was nobody else who 
 knew the game. 
 
 Q. And you are citing that, are you, to give that 
 as a matter of information and not as a matter of 
 criticism? 
 
 A. That is unavoidable. It is our theory 
 
 Q. You are not criticising that for the method of 
 doing that way, I suppose? 
 
 A. I simply use it as an illustration of the way in 
 which the machinery of society must fall back on the 
 business mechanics. 
 
 Q. That is what I am referring to and is in other 
 words an explanation of the system that is obliged to 
 be used. Now you refer to Number 7, the Liberty 
 
 83
 
 Loan? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. You spoke down there of two subjects, first of 
 the financing of the war and its necessity? 
 
 A. In the first place the Liberty Loan in my judg- 
 ment was a or rather the method of the loan, the 
 way it was affected, in my judgment was the wrong 
 way of financing the war. At that time, along with 
 308 other professors of economics, I signed a memorial 
 to Congress and this is what we said : 
 
 "The taxation policy is practicable because the cur- 
 rent income of the people, in any case, must pay the 
 war expenditures. By every bond issue the Govern- 
 ment increases the prices it must pay and that in- 
 creases the need of more bonds. If conscription of 
 men is right, conscription of income is more so." 
 
 At that time that was the opinion of practically all 
 of the leading economists of the country and was 
 recognized as such. 
 
 Q. Will you name just a few of the 308, just gen- 
 erally, from one or two different universities? 
 
 A. I don't want to hit anybody in particular, be- 
 cause it is not the popular side now. 
 
 Q. All right, Mr. Nearing, their minds have changed 
 since then I mean their expressions of their minds 
 have changed since then. 
 
 A. These men represented all of the universities of 
 the United States. 
 
 Q. I say the doctors' minds or their expressions 
 have changed since then? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. And that is the reason for not mentioning them? 
 
 A. If I could mention them all, there would be 
 nothing invidious about it, but if I might name one or 
 two it would look bad for them. I don't want to take 
 the time to name the 308 names. 
 
 84
 
 Q. If Mr. Barnes wants to he can bring that out. 
 
 A. That time it was a generally recognized point 
 of view, at that time, I say, that the war should be 
 financed out of income and not by purchasing bonds 
 or by the issuing of bonds. 
 
 Q. What date was that? 
 
 A. Well, that was in the Spring and Summer. The 
 President in his message on the 6th of April, said : 
 "The war should be financed as largely as possible by 
 the current income." That is the theory on which the 
 economists of the country were united at that time. 
 We believed that it was better to pay as you go than 
 it was to pay your bills by borrowing and laying up 
 debts for another day. To pay as you go, that policy 
 is a safer business policy and a saner business policy, 
 and we thought it was a saner national policy. 
 
 Q. They were in line with what they understood 
 the President's suggestion to be? 
 
 A. He being one of the college fraternity, naturally 
 had that point of view. Then the other factor that 
 entered in there, in that same connection, was the 
 factor expressed in the editorial that I have here from 
 one of the Scripps-McRea papers of May 26th, 1916, in 
 the Public of October 22nd, 1915. The theory was that 
 if you bond at the present time you bind the future. 
 
 The attitude, however, taken by Congress is well 
 illustrated in this Revenue Bill this is the bill as it 
 was reported from the Committee on Ways and Means 
 on May 9th, 1917. On page 2 they say: 
 
 "Your Committee believes that the American people were 
 never in a more favorable condition to pay a reasonable 
 amount of taxes for war purposes in addition to those for 
 normal purposes than at the present time. Your Committee 
 has endeavored to distribute equitably this division of taxa- 
 tion and hope to leave the proposed tax so as to necessitate 
 as little readjustment and disturbance of the business as 
 possible." 
 
 85
 
 And the business interests took that point of view 
 that the war should be financed by bonds just as that 
 had been the same point of view in Europe. 
 
 Then we took to the issuing of those bonds, and that 
 is the particular point that I bring out in this section. 
 The business interests used the opportunity to get a 
 kind of a grip on their employees that they had never 
 had before. Up to that time they had never been placed 
 in a position where the employers could dictate to their 
 employees how they should spend their income. Form- 
 erly they paid them their salary, their money for their 
 labor and they had no further control of it. Under 
 the Liberty Loan scheme, it became possible for the 
 employer practically to compel his employees to buy 
 bonds, to be "patriotic" as he said, and he became the 
 center of the whole scheme, of the patriotism and the 
 criterion as to the patriotism and that is the reason 
 that I say there that this Liberty Loan, which is the 
 first Liberty Loan did more to bulwark the position 
 of Big Business as against the employee in their 
 business, than will ever be done for liberty in Europe, 
 because of the fact of the employer being placed in a 
 position where he could dictate to the employee re- 
 garding the spending of his own income. 
 
 And I know of a number of illustrations, I gave 
 several here, of men and women who were compelled 
 to buy Liberty Bonds whether they wanted to or 
 whether they were able to. 
 
 Q. Now, refer to No. 8. 
 
 A. That is the section on conscription? 
 
 Q. Yes. 
 
 A. I should like to refer in that connection first to 
 a speech made by Daniel Webster on the 9th of De- 
 cember, 1814. He starts out his speech by saying that 
 this is a departure from the American traditions. He 
 says: 
 
 86
 
 "Let us examine the nature and extent of the power which 
 is assumed by the various military measures before us. In 
 the present want of men and money, the secretary of war 
 has proposed to Congress a military conscription. 
 
 "For the conquest of Canada, the people will not enlist 
 and if they would the treasury is exhausted and they could 
 not pay. Conscription is chosen as the most promising in- 
 strument both of overcoming the reluctance to the service 
 and of subduing the difficulties which arise from the deficien- 
 cies of the exchequer." 
 
 "Is this," he said, "consistent with the character of a free 
 Government? Is this civil liberty? Is this the real character 
 of our Constitution? No, sir, indeed it is not. The Constitu- 
 tion is libelled, foully libelled, the people of this country has 
 not established for them such a fabric of despotism. The 
 conspirators and the others before us act on the opposite 
 principle. It is their task to raise arbitrary powers by con- 
 scription out of a plain written charter of national liberty. 
 It Is their pleasing duty to free us of the delusion, which we 
 have fondly cherished that we are the subjects of a mild, 
 free and limited Government, and to demonstrate by a regu- 
 lar chain of premises and conclusions that Government pos- 
 sesses over us a power more tyrannical, more arbitrary, 
 more dangerous, more allied to blood and murder, more full 
 of every form of mischief, more productive of every sort 
 of misery than has been exercised by any civilized govern- 
 ment with one exception in modern times." 
 
 And then he says: 
 
 "The Secretary of War has favored us with an argument 
 on the constitutionality of this power. If the Secretary of 
 War has proved the right of Congress to enact a law enforc- 
 ing a draft of men out of the militia into the regular army, 
 he will, at any time, be able to prove quite as clearly that 
 Congress has power to create a dictator. The arguments 
 that have helped him in one case will equally help him in 
 the other. 
 
 "A free Government, with arbitrary means to administer 
 it, is a contradiction; a free government, without adequate 
 provisions for personal security, is an absurdity; a free gov- 
 ernment with an uncontrolled power of military conscrip- 
 tion, is a solecism, at once the most ridiculous and abomin- 
 able that ever entered into the head of man." 
 
 87
 
 And then he ends up with a very brilliant appeal to 
 the Congress in which he says that if they enforce 
 conscription, it will be necessary for him to go back 
 and urge his constituents not to acknowledge the thing 
 or submit to the draft. 
 
 At the same time I collected a speech of the Honor- 
 able George Huddleston of Alabama, a member of 
 Congress, dated January 10th, 1917, on a subject en- 
 titled "Conscription is Undemocratic"; and a speech 
 by Champ Clark of Missouri, Speaker of the House of 
 Representatives. 
 
 Q. By the way, do you recall if it was in that 
 speech or at that time, his expression was given in 
 which he compared the conscript with the convict? I 
 don't mean in disparagement of him but in emphasiz- 
 ing the character of the service imposed. 
 
 A. "In the estimation of a Missourian there is no 
 appreciable line of difference between a conscript and 
 a convict." This is from the speech by Champ Clark. 
 
 Q. Was he the man who was a candidate for the 
 presidency before the Democratic Convention in Bal- 
 timore? 
 
 A. Yes. Here is the speech that Representative 
 Sherwood delivered, that I will not read to you, but 
 this is the same Isaac R. Sherwood of Ohio who was 
 in 42 battles of the Civil War and is the only fighting 
 general I believe that is still alive, and he took the 
 position of being absolutely opposed to conscription. 
 
 Q. Was he re-elected or has he been re-elected 
 since then? 
 
 A. He has been re-elected since then, yes. And 
 the Honorable William E. Mason took the same po- 
 sition. 
 
 Q. Do you know whether or not that is the same 
 Mr. William E. Mason who is now Congressman at 
 large for Illinois?
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Recently re-elected? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. That is last Fall? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. Previously a United States Senator and has 
 three or four sons who have volunteered in the army, 
 do you know that, are you familiar with that? 
 
 A. Yes. In other words, at that time, many of the 
 most prominent members in Congress took exactly the 
 same position that I did on the conscription law. They 
 were opposed to the conscription law. They did not 
 believe it belonged in the United States and they were 
 desperately in earnest and violent in their opposition 
 to it. 
 
 THE COURT: They took that position in the 
 course of the debate? 
 
 THE WITNESS : Yes. 
 
 Senator Mason has taken the position since then 
 and that only emphasizes the more the fact that the 
 things he said he thoroughly believed in. Not only, if 
 your Honor please, did he take opportunity to em- 
 phasize his views since then, but Senator Mason out- 
 side of Congress and in public assemblies and meetings 
 has done the same. And to show another fact, that 
 Congress, or the powers that be, were not exactly 
 satisfied with the law, the authorities required soldiers 
 as a general rule to sign a waiver before being deported 
 for foreign service. 
 
 THE COURT : That doesn't prove anything at all. 
 Senator Mason could do what he pleased. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : That is true. 
 
 THE COURT : The point of the thing is that all 
 these references as I understand, are here as to de- 
 bates in Congress and occurred before the passage of 
 the measure, isn't that so? 
 
 89
 
 MR. STEDMAN: Yes. 
 
 THE COURT: Very well. Now the article was 
 written after that act had become a law, was it not? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : That is correct. 
 
 A. At the same time the conscription was neces- 
 sary, however undesirable it might be. 
 
 I have in my hand here a statement of the enlist- 
 ments for the year 1916-1917. It is a table showing 
 the number of enlistments and re-enlistments monthly 
 in the line of the army. 
 
 MR. BARNES: What date, please? 
 
 THE COURT: Let us get the exact date, 1916- 
 1917, did you say? 
 
 THE WITNESS: Yes. 
 
 (Continuing) The United States entered the war 
 in April, 1917. In March, 1917, 6,000 enlistments. 
 April, 29,027; in May, 39,589; in June, 31,436. In 
 other words, even after the President's appeal which 
 he made immediately following the declaration of war, 
 even after the President's appeal, enlistments were 
 coming in only at the rate of about 30,000 a month or 
 360,000 a year. So that it was quite evident at that 
 time that through enlistment it would be impossible in 
 a reasonable time to raise an army adequate to the 
 carrying on of the war. Therefore, as I say, conscrip- 
 tion became necessary, however uncomfortable it 
 might be to some of the Americans. 
 
 However, if I might answer his Honor's question, 
 my own opinion about conscription was not altered 
 by the passage of the law. I still felt about conscrip- 
 tion as I did before the passage of the law and that is 
 the reason I wrote this pamphlet as I did. 
 
 Q. That section there deals with the history of the 
 passage of the act? 
 
 A. Yes. I made the point here that three things 
 were necessary for the carrying but of this war in the 
 
 90
 
 United States: 
 
 Money, men and censorship, and that the adminis- 
 tration could not carry on a war withput money, men 
 and censorship. I talked about the matter of the 
 money, in the Liberty Loan, and I talked about the 
 getting of the men by conscription, and now as to 
 censorship, that will be taken up as indicated in the 
 next section. 
 
 Q. There was an agitation for a repeal of the con- 
 scription law after it was adopted, was there not? 
 
 A. There was agitation for the repeal of the law. 
 
 Q. The next you have is No. 9, Censorship. By 
 the way, referring there to paragraph 8, that is the 
 prior one, did you intend at that time to cause or 
 attempt to cause insubordination or disloyalty or re- 
 fusal of duty within the military and naval forces or 
 service of the United States? 
 
 A. I did not, I wanted the American people to 
 know 
 
 Q. I say, just a moment, just a second, I have 
 another question : Did you desire to obstruct the re- 
 cruiting and enlistment service of the United States 
 to the injury of the service of the United States? 
 
 A. I did not, I did not intend to do so. I wanted 
 the American people to understand what was going 
 on. 
 
 Q. As you understood it? 
 
 A. As I understood it. Now referring to No. 9, as 
 I said a moment ago, there were three things necessary 
 for the successful prosecution of the war; money, men 
 and censorship ; and I presented in these sections these 
 three matters. 
 
 It has been the attitude of the plutocrat for a long 
 time that we were suffering from an overdose of de- 
 mocracy in the United States : Too much free speech 
 and too much free press, and this war opening, gave 
 
 91
 
 them an opportunity to indict and convict labor agi- 
 tators and break up socialist and other radical meet- 
 ings, including meetings of the Non-Partisan League, 
 which was an avowedly patriotic organization. In 
 other words, it gave the plutocracy a chance to put a 
 gag on the kind of expression which would keep the 
 American democracy informed as to what was going 
 on. 
 
 O. On the substantive offenses now it is under 
 Section 3, the substantive offenses you are familiar 
 also with the fact that a postmaster general or a mail 
 clerk, or other postmaster, according to the determina- 
 tion in that section, may be able to decide as to the 
 mailability of certain mail matter, that is printed or 
 written matter, and decide that it is against this sec- 
 tion and stop its going through the mail ? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. When you mention the suppression of various 
 papers here did you know under what provision of the 
 law they were suppressed? 
 
 A. I understood that they were suppressed under 
 the provision which gives the postmaster a right to 
 declare any particular publication non-mailable. 
 
 Q. That is under the same act that this case is 
 under? 
 
 A. No, a later section of the same act. 
 
 Q. You have mentioned some socialist papers here 
 and then you have mentioned some which by the title 
 would not indicate their general character. Do you 
 know whether "The Rebel" of Texas was a socialist 
 paper or not? 
 
 A. I believe it was an agricultural paper. 
 
 Q. Do you know any others than those mentioned 
 here; do you recall any others? 
 
 A. There were between 75 and 100 in all, I think. 
 
 Q. Do you recall the names of them or of any 
 
 92
 
 others? 
 
 A. There was "The Truth" of Duluth, that was 
 suppressed. It was a labor paper. 
 
 Q. And the St. Louis "Labor," do you recall it? 
 
 A. The St. Louis "Labor" I think, also, was sup- 
 pressed. I don't remember off-hand any others that 
 were suppressed before the pamphlet was written. I 
 know that there are others that have been suppressed 
 since. 
 
 Q. Anything further you wish to add about Sec- 
 tion 9? 
 
 A. Except to comment on the fact that at this time 
 public meetings were very generally broken up. Free 
 speech was quite generally denied, and the freedom of 
 the press was very seriously curtailed. The Espionage 
 Act, as it relates to the freedom of the press, was very 
 drastic, more drastic I believe than that of any other 
 nations. 
 
 MR. BARNES: I think you are getting a little 
 beyond your depth there. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: Oh, no. 1 wouldn't say that. 
 
 MR. BARNES : Oh, yes you are. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: Not beyond the depth, but per- 
 haps beyond the technical range. 
 
 A. Might I say that in other nations the suppres- 
 sion is merely of a part of the papers? 
 
 MR. BARNES: You could say that that is your 
 understanding. 
 
 THE WITNESS : I have seen the papers. 
 
 MR. BARNES : Have you knowledge of all of the 
 laws? 
 
 THE WITNESS : No, I have not, but I have seen 
 the papers that have been given to the public for 
 public information. 
 
 y. They were simply striking out parts? 
 
 A. Taking out parts. 
 
 93
 
 Q. While papers in this country 
 
 A. Were suppressed, the whole publication. 
 
 Q. The whole paper was closed to the mails, that 
 is the entire mailing privilege was cancelled? 
 
 MR. BARNES : That is not true, Mr. Stedman. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: That is not correct? I think it 
 is quite correct. 
 
 MR. BARNES: You and I differ as to the law. 
 Why ask the witness to tell us what the law is? 
 
 Q. Mr. Nearing, referring to No. 11, I think you 
 will find that generally deals with the theories that 
 you have explained in some of the others, but perhaps 
 not? 
 
 A. I might say, Mr. Stedman, that I don't think 
 there is anything new in any of these last three 
 sections. 
 
 Q. I want to take up "The Menace of Militarism." 
 I call your attention to "The Menace of Militarism" 
 and particularly to the fourth section, only a portion 
 of which was read by Mr. Barnes, and confine your- 
 self to those portions of it that were offered. 
 
 MR. BARNES : I didn't think that I read any of 
 "The Menace of Militarism." 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : You offered it in evidence. 
 
 MR. BARNES : There is hardly anything in it that 
 is any different. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : If you want it out why all right, 
 I am willing. 
 
 MR. BARNES : It is all about on the same general 
 line. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: If I could know what counsel 
 is referring to or is going to refer to, I could have the 
 witness simply refer to that, if he is not going to use 
 it why I wouldn't spend any time on it. I am per- 
 fectly willing to omit the paper entirely without any 
 explanation of it. 
 
 94
 
 MR. BARNES : The chances are that I won't prob- 
 ably refer to it in my closing address. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : If you will give me that assur- 
 ance, I won't go into it. 
 
 MR. BARNES: I don't know what I might do 
 when I come to summing up. 
 
 Q. You have that paper there? 
 
 A. Yes. Might I call your attention in the first 
 place to the quotations on the front? 
 
 Q. Yes. 
 
 A. I have here a series of five quotations which 
 are used on the front page of "The Menace of Mili- 
 tarism." 
 
 "I have come to have a great and wholesome respect 
 for the facts." That is Woodrow Wilson, January 
 27th, 1917. 
 
 "If there is one thing that we love more deeply than 
 another in the United States, it is that every man 
 should have the privilege unmolested and uncriticised, 
 to utter the real convictions of his mind." Woodrow 
 Wilson, January 29th, 1916. 
 
 Q. You might state the place as the Soldiers' 
 Memorial Hall, Pittsburgh. 
 
 A. The Soldiers' Memorial Hall, Pittsburgh. 
 
 "I believe that the weakness of American character 
 is that there are so few growlers and kickers amongst 
 us." Woodrow Wilson in School Review, Volume 
 7, page 604. 
 
 "One thing this country never will endure is a sys- 
 tem than can be called militarism." Woodrow Wilson 
 at the Waldorf Astoria, New York, January 27th, 1917. 
 
 "We have forgotten the very principle of our origin 
 if we have forgotten how to object, how to resist, how 
 to agitate, how to pull down and build up, even to the 
 extent of revolutionary practices if it be necessary to 
 readjust matters." Woodrow Wilson in School 
 
 95
 
 Review, Volume 7, page 604. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : I don't know anything that can 
 be worse than that. 
 
 MR. BARNES: That only illustrates the old 
 maxim that the devil can cite the scriptures to his own 
 purposes. 
 
 O. Now on the interior of that page. 
 
 A. There are six definitions of militarism. My 
 own definition is that: 
 
 "Militarism is the sway of might, organized for 
 destruction. The militarist applauds the martial vir- 
 tues, urges military preparedness and military training, 
 glorifies war, defies victory; preaches that right must 
 depend upon might, and thus makes the war-man a 
 greater benefactor to his race than a peace-man." 
 
 Is it necessary to do any more than to refer to the 
 sections here? 
 
 Q. No, unless you have something particular in 
 mind, I want you to go to No. 4, because in that you 
 open with the following: 
 
 ''They lied to us ! Conscientiously, deliberately, 
 with premeditation and malice aforethought, they lied 
 to us! The shepherds of the flock, the bishops of 
 men's souls, the learned ones, the trusted ones " that 
 is the part that I refer to. Have you any explanation 
 to make in regard to that? 
 
 A. Do you wish me to read that section? 
 
 Q. Well, I don't know. This is offered in evidence 
 of course and it depends somewhat upon how long it 
 is. 
 
 A. It is pretty long. 
 
 Q. Just one portion of it, what I have reference 
 to particularly is, in stating "They lied to us." You 
 have stated, I believe, that there are different motives 
 in the war as you understood it. 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 96
 
 Q. And those which regarded, as you have men- 
 tioned heretofore, as unavoidable, and others that re- 
 garded it purely from the commercial standpoint. Of 
 course even then it was perhaps necessary. With that 
 in mind, do you remember what you did have in mind ? 
 
 A. This passage deals particularly with the news- 
 papers. On pages 18 and 19, I have the quotations 
 from the Congressional Record of February 9th, 1917, 
 a speech by Mr. Galloway of Texas, in which he 
 charges that the American newspapers were deliber- 
 ately subsidized in order to create certain results for 
 the great profit of the money-makers. 
 
 Q. Have you that portion of that you refer to be- 
 fore you? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. This is in Mr. Galloway's statement, 
 dated March, 1915: 
 
 "In March 1915, the J. P. Morgan Interests, the steel ship 
 building, the powder interests, and their subsidiary organ- 
 izations got together 12 men high up in the newspaper 
 world and employed them to select influential newspapers 
 in the United States and a sufficient number of them to 
 control generally the policy of the daily press of the United 
 States. These 12 men worked the problem out by selecting 
 179 newspapers, and then began by an elimination process 
 to retain only those necessary for the purpose of controlling 
 the general policy of the daily press throughout the country. 
 They found it was only necessary to purchase the control 
 of the greatest papers. The 25 papers were agreed upon, 
 emissaries were sent to purchase the policies, national and 
 international of these papers; and an agreement was reached. 
 The policy of the papers was bought, to be paid for by the 
 month; an editor was furnished for each paper to properly 
 supervise and edit information regarding the questions of 
 preparedness, militarism, financial policies and other things 
 of national and international nature considered vital to the 
 interests of the purchasers. 
 
 "This contract is in existence at the present time and it 
 accounts for the news columns of the daily press being 
 filled with all sorts of preparedness arguments and misrepre- 
 sentations as to the present conditions of the United States 
 
 97
 
 army and navy and the possibility and probability of the 
 United States being attacked by foreign foes." 
 
 Congressman Moore of Pennsylvania, on March 
 17th, 1917, offered a resolution to investigate the whole 
 matter, and the resolution, I believe, died in commit- 
 tee, at any rate it never came to the light of day. 
 
 Q. What date was that you said that was, sir? 
 
 A. March 17th, 1917, so that they could have aired 
 the thing or exposed the whole thing if they had 
 chosen to. In commenting on that I say: 
 
 "After all, the truth or falsity of these charges is of little 
 moment; the great outstanding bitter fact is that the news- 
 papers instead of informing us, lied to us, consistently." 
 
 Whether they were bought as Mr. Galloway con- 
 tends is not of any importance, they did misrepresent. 
 
 Then in the next section I call attention to the fact 
 that I studied the school-boards and the college trustee 
 boards and found from seven-eighths or nine-tenths 
 of their members were business or professional men, 
 and the other sections of the pamphlets, up to Section 
 9 are very similar to the sections of "The Great Mad- 
 ness" in the same respects. 
 
 Sections 9 and 10 vary and differ somewhat. I tried 
 to point out there that the policy of compelling the 
 friendship and the compelling of social organizations 
 through militarism is a mistaken policy. That the 
 purpose of social organization is to bring people to- 
 gether; that you can not bring people together with 
 a gun or a sword, you have got to bring them together 
 on some kind of a basis of co-operation. 
 
 Q. In the writing of these articles for the Rand 
 School what were the circumstances under which they 
 were ordered, if you recall ? 
 
 A. Well these, this kind of a thing is not ordered 
 as a rule. As a rule, whenever I get up an idea that 
 
 98
 
 seems worth working up, I work it up and then if one 
 publisher won't publish it, I try another. 
 
 Q. Did you have in mind at that time inducing 
 men who were in the service to assassinate their officers 
 or their superiors and causing mutiny on account of 
 the declaring of war, that they should go against their 
 superior officers? 
 
 A. I did not. I had the idea in mind first in writing 
 this pamphlet as in writing all my books, the one main 
 point of view that I believed in above all other things, 
 and that is the truth. That is, that I believed that most 
 of the people were not getting the truth and I believed 
 if they should have the entire truth which was not 
 being set forth and stated to them in the press, and I 
 considered it a responsibility, to tell them the truth. 
 These pamphlets were written for the purpose of pre- 
 senting one side of the general situation. 
 
 Q. Was it or was it not your intent in writing and 
 publishing the pamphlet "The Great Madness," and I 
 will even include the other literature, although that 
 may make the question objectionable, with the intent 
 of creating insubordination, disloyalty, refusal of duty 
 or mutiny in the military and naval forces of the 
 United States? 
 
 A. It was not. 
 
 Q. Answer that yes or no? 
 
 A. It was not. 
 
 Q. Was it your intent by writing "The Great Mad- 
 ness" or the other publications, to obstruct the recruit- 
 ing or enlistment service of the United States to the 
 injury of the service of the United States? 
 
 A. It was not. 
 
 Q. And was it your purpose or object to attempt 
 to create insubordination, disloyalty, refusal of duty 
 or mutiny within the military and naval forces of the 
 United States? 
 
 99
 
 A. It was not. Could I say one thing in that con- 
 nection? 
 
 Q. Yes. 
 
 A. Democracy is denned 
 
 THE COURT: He has told us about that. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : Unless he wants to explain his 
 answer. 
 
 A. May I explain my answer? 
 
 THE COURT : It will be elicited by a question. I 
 have been very liberal, as I think I ought to be in this, 
 but this will have to be elicited by questions. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : I do not recall anything further 
 that I have to ask Mr. Nearing. 
 
 100
 
 The Cross Examination 
 
 MR. BARNES: Referring to Exhibit No. 5, the 
 pamphlet "The Menace of Militarism," Mr. Nearing, 
 at whose request did you write that or how did you 
 happen to send that to the Rand School for publica- 
 tion? 
 
 A. At some time previous to the publication of 
 these two pamphlets, I can not say just when, I re- 
 member being in the Rand School and Mr. Karpf 
 asking me if I would write something for the school. 
 I replied that I would try. At that time or previous 
 to that time, since the entrance of the European 
 nations into the war I had been collecting a great deal 
 of material on the war, and our relation to the whole 
 situation. That was the thing then in my mind, it 
 was a thing on which I was speaking and writing, and 
 in the course of events I wrote up this material into 
 a couple of pamphlets and submitted them to the Rand 
 School. 
 
 Q. By the way, you know who selected the pic- 
 tures for the covers for The Menace of Militarism? 
 
 A. That I do not remember. 
 
 Q. You had nothing to do with that? 
 
 A. I can not say, but I am perfectly willing to take 
 responsibility for it. 
 
 Q. I don't want you to take any responsibility that 
 does not really belong to you. I want to know whether 
 you picked out this picture, or facsimile of Jesus Christ 
 being shot down by the soldiers in uniform, or sug- 
 gested that that be put upon the cover of the pamphlet. 
 
 A. I do not know. 
 
 Q. Now when did you start your activities in op- 
 position to the preparedness movement? 
 
 101
 
 A. Well, I can not remember definitely but it was 
 probably in the beginning of 1916. 
 
 Q. Was it prior to the swing around the country 
 that you said President Wilson made, or was it about 
 that time or afterwards? 
 
 A. Well, at that time the American Union against 
 Militarism organized a group of people to take that 
 swing, from the President's suggestion, and I was one 
 of the group, so that I must have engaged very actively 
 in the propaganda before that. However, my recollec- 
 tion on the point is not clear. 
 
 Q. And you joined the American Union against 
 Militarism? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, I did. 
 
 Q. Did you have any official position with the or- 
 ganization ? 
 
 A. I think I was at one time a member of the Exec- 
 utive Committee. 
 
 Q. Then the object of that organization, I suppose, 
 was to combat the preparedness movement? 
 
 A. Its object was what its name signified: It was 
 an organized effort to prevent the spirit of militarism 
 in America. 
 
 Q. Well, at that time it sprung into being, I think 
 you just testified about the time this preparedness 
 movement got under way? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, at the time the preparedness move- 
 ment was thoroughly under way, it would be at the 
 end of 1915, or thereabouts. 
 
 Q. Did you belong to any other organization of 
 the same character? 
 
 A. I think not. Do you mean previous to the writ- 
 ting of these pamphlets? 
 
 Q. No. About this time in 1915-1916 prior to our 
 entry into the war? 
 
 A. I think not. 
 
 102
 
 Q. Your method in writing these pamphlets and 
 the purpose of writing them was I suppose to open the 
 eyes of the people so that they would not follow into 
 the swing of the preparedness movement? 
 
 A. I wanted to show the people the real way to 
 prevent militarism and war. I did not believe that the 
 preparedness crowd knew the real way and therefore 
 I tried to present my side of the case. 
 
 Q. You didn't want them to follow the way urged 
 by the preparedness crowd? 
 
 A. I certainly did not. 
 
 Q. You did not want them to prepare for war by 
 large appropriations of money for munitions or for the 
 navy and so forth ? 
 
 A. I certainly did not. 
 
 Q. Or by military training or anything of that 
 sort? 
 
 A. Certainly not. 
 
 Q. Now after the severance of diplomatic relations 
 with Germany in 1917, Mr. Nearing, did you join or 
 belong to any other organizations whose purpose was 
 to prevent our entering war at that time? 
 
 A. The only other organization to which I be- 
 longed was the People's Council. Now whether that 
 was previous to the writing of these pamphlets or not 
 I don't remember. 
 
 Q. That was, however, after the war, wasn't it? 
 
 A. That was organized really it was organized 
 the first of September, 1917, in Chicago. 
 
 Q. And you had a preliminary organization? 
 
 A. It was organized I think on the 31st day of May, 
 1917, the preliminary organization. 
 
 Q. 1917? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. You did not belong to any of the Emergency 
 
 103
 
 Peace Federations' movements or anything of that 
 kind? 
 
 A. There were two organizations, The Emergency 
 Peace Federation and the American Neutral Confer- 
 ence Committee at that time. Whether my name is 
 on the letter-head of the Emergency Peace Federation 
 or not I don't remember, but if it is not I should have 
 been rather glad to have it there. 
 
 Q. We have found out in this city that the appear- 
 ing of a name on a letterhead does not necessarily 
 mean that the person belongs to an organization. So 
 far as you know you had nothing to do with that 
 society? 
 
 A. Yes, I spoke for them. 
 
 Q. Oh, you spoke for them? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. And you are then of course in sympathy with 
 their purposes for peace? 
 
 A. Certainly. 
 
 Q. You desired that we would not enter the war 
 against Germany even after the severance of diplo- 
 matic relations? 
 
 A. I desired that we should not enter into any war 
 and not this war. 
 
 Q. Do you remember the date on which Congress 
 passed the resolution recognizing that a state of war 
 existed with the German Empire? 
 
 A. April 6th, 1917. 
 
 Q. Now do you remember the date on which the 
 Seven Billion Dollar loan was passed or authorized? 
 
 A. I do not. 
 
 Q. About the end of April, wasn't it, 1917? 
 
 A. No answer. 
 
 Q. You have looked at the World Almanac? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, I have a copy. 
 
 Q. You recognize it as a dispenser of capitalistic 
 
 104
 
 information? 
 
 A. No answer. 
 
 Q. A reliable dispenser of information? 
 
 A. It is a reliable authority on points of this char- 
 acter, yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And it appears here from page 202 that this 
 statute became a law on April 24th, 1917. That is the 
 law under which the Liberty Loans were floated? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Did you engage in any active operation in op- 
 position to the passage of this act of April 24th, 1917 
 for raising money for the war? 
 
 A. I think I did. I think I made I think I remem- 
 ber making a speech in Newark, New Jersey, in which 
 I opposed the method of war finance used ; I certainly 
 felt opposed to that method of war finance. 
 
 Q. You felt opposed to any method of war financ- 
 ing? 
 
 A. I felt opposed to any war. 
 
 Q. Well, we were at war at this time when you say 
 you opposed the particular proposition that was then 
 before Congress, the raising of money by the issuance 
 of bonds. 
 
 A. Before we entered the war I believed that we 
 should keep out of it. After we got into the war, -I 
 believed that we should get out of it with as little 
 damage as possible and I regarded the issue of bonds 
 as a method of throwing the burden of the war over 
 onto the future. And I believed that the current in- 
 come in the present generation should pay the costs 
 of the war. 
 
 Q. Well, my question was directed as to whether 
 or not you took any active part in the opposition to 
 the Act of April 24th, 1917. I understood you to say 
 that you made a speech in Newark; was that correct? 
 
 A. I believe I made a speech I am sorry to appear 
 
 105
 
 not clear on these points, but I have made about 200 
 speeches a year in the past two years and I can not be 
 sure where and when I said these things. But I cer- 
 tainly may be understood as very emphatic in saying 
 that I was then and am now opposed to issuing bonds 
 as a method of raising revenue. 
 
 Q. Now, after this bill was passed, the next ques- 
 tion big question before Congress, was the selective 
 service act, was it not? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Did you take part in any opposition or any 
 movement to prevent the raising of an army? 
 
 A. I spoke against the passage of a conscription 
 act and wrote against it in these pamphlets. 
 
 Q. Now, at the time you made these speeches in 
 opposition to the passage of the Conscription Act, 
 were you speaking under the auspices of any society 
 then? 
 
 A. I probably spoke for the American Union 
 Against Militarism although I would not be sure. 
 
 Q. Where did you deliver those speeches? 
 
 A. Well, sir, I spoke all over the United States. 
 
 Q. That act was passed on the 18th of May, was 
 it not? 
 
 A. The conscription act? 
 
 Q. This selective this act or the conscription act? 
 
 A. I am not certain. 
 
 Q. About that date? 
 
 THE COURT : That was the date. 
 
 Q. That was the date. Are you familiar with its 
 provisions ? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. When did you make your arrangements to join 
 the Rand School faculty or give lectures to them dur- 
 ing the following season, about what date were those 
 arrangements made ? 
 
 106
 
 A. Well, I had been lecturing for them for two or 
 three years, and I do not remember. It was-taken for 
 granted that I would come back and lecture each year. 
 
 Q. Had you been lecturing for them in the same 
 with the same frequency prior to 1917, that you did 
 during the season of 1917 and 1918? 
 
 A. Well, no, because previous to that I had lived 
 in Philadelphia or in Toledo, and in the Fall of 1917, 
 I came to New York, and therefore I was able to give 
 more courses at the school than I had ever been able 
 to give before. 
 
 Q. You spoke about The People's Council; when 
 was the preliminary organization of The People's 
 Council arranged for? 
 
 A. May 31st, 1917. 
 
 Q. And were you one of the founders of that? 
 
 A. I was one of the speakers at their meeting and 
 I think I was a member of their executive committee 
 although I am not certain on that point. I certainly 
 approved of 
 
 Q. Didn't you become the chairman, practically? 
 
 A. September 16th, 1917. 
 
 Q. And you did prepare, did you not, an outline 
 for the organization of The People's Council? 
 
 A. I did. 
 
 Q. And what was the announced purpose of the 
 People's Council? 
 
 A. There were three different purposes : The first 
 one was to secure a statement of peace terms, of war 
 aims ; the second was to preserve civil liberties ; the 
 third, was to safeguard economic and industrial stand- 
 ards and rights. 
 
 Q. I call your attention to Bulletin No. 4 of The 
 People's Council which is dated September 1st, 1917 
 and I ask you if you are familiar with that address 
 signed by the executive committee? (Handing paper 
 
 107
 
 to witness.) Perhaps I am getting ahead of my story. 
 
 A. I just as leave answer your question. 
 
 Q. I know you would. When you say that the 
 immediate business of The People's Council, was not 
 for the opening of negotiations for peace, have you 
 any reference to any particular period of time? 
 
 A. Yes, you asked me about the plan that I drew 
 up in May. 
 
 Q. In May, oh, I see. The purpose was then of 
 having the country state their peace terms in order to 
 obtain peace, was it not? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, in order to bring about the beginning 
 of peace negotiations. 
 
 Q. What was the theory of the people in The 
 People's Conference, was not that something modeled 
 along the lines of the Working Men's Council of 
 Russia ? 
 
 A. The theory of The People's Council as I under- 
 stood it was that the Liberal and Radical elements of 
 the country should get together and express their 
 opinions in coherent form just as the banking and 
 business houses of the country had gotten together 
 in the preparedness campaign and expressed their 
 point of view. 
 
 Q. Well, doctor, is it also a fact, that they were 
 to be in continuous session, or it was to remain in con- 
 tinuous session during the war? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, I think we used the phrase in relation 
 to that as a "parliament of the people." That was a 
 phrase used by Mr. Wilson in the New Freedom. 
 
 Q. Did you join any other society springing up 
 after our entrance into the war? 
 
 A. I do not remember. I do not remember whether 
 I was a member of the executive committee of the 
 Civil Liberties Bureau at any time, I may have been, 
 but I am not certain. I might say that I joined the 
 
 108
 
 Socialist Party, is that what you are after? 
 
 Q. I am not after anything-. Did you don't call 
 the Socialist Party a party well, I am speaking really 
 with reference to parties that sprung up after the war ; 
 that was in existence before the war. What was this 
 National Civil Liberties Bureau, that you don't know 
 whether you were or were not a member of? 
 
 A. The National Civil Liberties Bureau, was an 
 organization of private citizens who believed that the 
 First Amendment to the Constitution should be en- 
 forced. 
 
 Q. We are not all constitutional lawyers, tell us 
 what the first amendment to the Constitution is? 
 
 A. Congress shall make no law respecting the es- 
 tablishment of religion or abridging the freedom of 
 speech or press or the rights of the people, to assemble 
 and petition Congress for a redress of their grievances. 
 
 Q. You say the National Civil Liberties Bureau, 
 devoted its activities to seeing that Congress should 
 not make such a law, or did it devote its activities to 
 opposing such laws as Congress had enacted that in 
 its judgment were in violation of that Amendment? 
 
 A. As I recollect, The National Civil Liberties 
 views at that time, they were devoted exclusively to 
 the protection of civil liberties as guaranteed under 
 that First Amendment. 
 
 Q. Its conception of that? 
 
 A. Yes, or understanding of it, yes, sir, and it reads 
 very plainly. 
 
 Q. And that embraced, did it not, handling cases 
 of the Conscientious Objector? 
 
 A. It did. 
 
 Q. And also of the soap-box orator? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. And the suppressions of newspapers 
 and the suppressions of assemblies and of the sup- 
 pression and prosecution of petitioners. 
 
 109
 
 Q. In fact, any curtailment of the ordinary civil 
 liberties which were enjoyed in times of peace. It 
 was the purpose of this society insofar as the curtail- 
 ment concerned the matters mentioned in the Amend- 
 ment to the Constitution, it was the purpose of this 
 Society to fight? 
 
 A. It was the purpose of the Society to insist upon 
 the enjoyment of the liberties guaranteed under the 
 Constitution. 
 
 Q. And it opposed any curtailment of the custom- 
 ary right of free speech and the customary right of 
 assemblage and those other things? 
 
 A. That is a negative purpose. Its purpose was 
 positive. It was to insist upon the rights of free speech 
 and free assemblage. 
 
 Q. When did you join the Socialist Party? 
 
 A. July 1st, 1917. I did not join before that time 
 because I had taught school up to that time and I 
 believed that a teacher should not be a propagandist. 
 
 Q. You are teaching school now? 
 
 A. Incidentally I am lecturing, yes. 
 
 Q. Is not lecturing teaching? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, and so is writing. 
 
 Q. Well, you did sign, then, I take it, an original 
 application just like this here? 
 
 A. I signed the application blank and I did join 
 the Socialist Party on the 1st of July, 1917. 
 
 MR. BARNES : I offer this in evidence. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: It is objected to as utterly in- 
 competent and immaterial. I do not see that it meets 
 any issue in this case, whether he joined that party or 
 the prohibition party. 
 
 THE COURT: What is the theory, Mr. Barnes? 
 
 MR. BARNES : The theory is that the gentleman 
 joined the Socialist Party and consented to the senti- 
 ments contained in the application which stated "in 
 
 110
 
 all my political actions as a member of the Socialist 
 Party, I agree to be guided by the constitution and 
 platform of that party," and we have shown what the 
 constitution and platform of the party were with re- 
 gard to war, and as adopted at the Convention in 
 April, 1917. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: I have the right to say some- 
 thing on it and before I do I have the right to see what 
 you are offering. I have not seen this card. 
 
 MR. BARNES: Have you never seen that before? 
 I am astonished. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : No, I never saw this card before 
 so your astonishment may continue. 
 
 Q. Now, then, you joined the Socialist Party on 
 the first of July; did you read the majority resolution 
 of that Party as promulgated at the St. Louis conven- 
 tion April, 1917? 
 
 A. I did. 
 
 Q. Did you approve of it? 
 
 A. With one exception I did and that one excep- 
 tion is the clause 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : Just one second, you are asked 
 a question that calls for yes or no answer to that ques- 
 tion. 
 
 MR. BARNES : However, I will not insist upon 
 my offer if Mr. Stedman insists on his objection, and 
 I insist on the witness' answering yes or no. 
 
 THE COURT: He said, "with one exception I 
 did," and that is an answer. 
 
 MR. BARNES : I am going to try to find out what 
 that exception is. 
 
 A. I will tell you what the exception was if you 
 want me to. 
 
 Q. I would rather come to it in my own good time. 
 
 A. I beg your pardon. 
 
 Q. Did you vote in favor of the adoption of the 
 
 111
 
 platform by the referendum? 
 
 A. I did not, and if I had been 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: Wait now, you have answered 
 the question. 
 
 MR. BARNES : Now, if the Court please, I don't 
 think it is proper for my adversary to get up here and 
 stop off this witness while he is under cross-examina- 
 tion. 
 
 THE COURT : The Government is right 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: The Government is right, yes, 
 to have an answer to his question, but I object to 
 volunteering answers, whether it is from my client or 
 another's. 
 
 THE COURT : Is that the conclusion of the volun- 
 teering, you don't Iike4t? You can move to strike it 
 out. 
 
 MR STEDMAN : And I do move to strike it out, 
 the volunteered part. 
 
 THE COURT : That is a classic method. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : I believe in the conscription sys- 
 tem, not the volunteer ! 
 
 Q. You say, Mr. Nearing, that while you did not 
 vote for the adopting of it, you would have done so 
 if you had been in Toledo at the present time? 
 
 A. If I had had an opportunity to have done so, I 
 certainly should have done so. 
 
 Q. The next thing, now, going back over some of 
 these have you a copy of the American Labor Year 
 Book? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, I have. Are you going to question me 
 on the majority platform question as it occurs in that 
 Labor Year Book? 
 
 Q. On the majority resolution in that Labor Year 
 Book. Now referring, Mr. Nearing, to page 50 of the 
 Year Book, the first paragraph : 
 
 "The Socialist Party of the United States in the 
 
 112
 
 present grave crisis, solemnly reaffirms its allegiance 
 to the principle of internationalism and working class 
 solidarity, the world over." What did you understand 
 by the principle of "internationalism and working class 
 solidarity the world over?" 
 
 A. Why, I understood that to be a declaration of 
 a social antagonism between the owning class and the 
 working class, and the desirability of the workers 
 standing by their own crowd. 
 
 Q. Reading further: "And proclaims its unalter- 
 able opposition to the war just declared by the Gov- 
 ernment of the United States." Did you approve of 
 that? 
 
 A. I did. 
 
 Q. And did that represent your individual position 
 during the Summer of 1917? 
 
 A. I was opposed to this war and all wars. 
 
 Q. And you were unalterably opposed to it? 
 
 A. Unalterably opposed to this war and to all wars. 
 
 Q. On the next page, on page 51, in the second 
 paragraph : "We therefore call upon the workers of 
 all countries to refuse support to their Governments 
 in their wars." Did you approve of that? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. I do not believe that a working man 
 has any right to fight in a capitalistic or any other 
 war. 
 
 Q. And you regard this as such a war? 
 
 A. As a capitalists' war, a war between capitalist 
 nations. 
 
 Q. And then just below that: "As against the 
 false doctrine of national patriotism." What did you 
 mean by that or what did you understand that meant? 
 
 A. I understood that whenever a man's fealty to 
 a group reaches a stage where it compels him to go 
 out and destroy another group, it is a false and perni- 
 cious and insidious social doctrine. That is the old 
 
 113
 
 standard of countries dealing with feudisms, and it is 
 the present standard that makes warfare between 
 nations and it is the disintegrating social influence 
 which we are trying to combat. 
 
 Q. That is whenever a man's fealty to his country, 
 that is to his own particular nation to which he be- 
 longs leads him to a point that he wants to go out and 
 whip the people belonging to another nation, you feel 
 that that is a false sentiment and doctrine? 
 
 A. Any social standard that leads one man to raise 
 his hand against in violence against any other man 
 is a false standard and doctrine. 
 
 Q. May a class war lead a man to raise his hand 
 in violence against the capitalistic class? 
 
 A. At that point I disapprove of it. 
 
 Q. At that point you are a pacifist socialist? 
 
 A. I am a pacifist, yes. 
 
 Q. You are a pacifist even to class struggles? 
 
 A. I am a pacifist in that I believe that no man has 
 a right to do violence to any other man. 
 
 Q. Even in a class struggle ? 
 
 A. Under no circumstances. 
 
 Q. Just below that, "in support of capitalism we 
 will not willingly give a single life or a single dollar." 
 Did you approve of that? 
 
 A. I did. I believed that workers had nothing in 
 common with the capitalist system. 
 
 Q. You mean as applied to the situation in 1917, 
 that that would mean that you would not volunteer 
 in the army and that you would not subscribe to liberty 
 loans and so forth? 
 
 A. I mean that I would not be willing to support 
 a capitalistic war. 
 
 Q. Can not you answer whether that meant those 
 specific things : volunteering in the army and subscrib- 
 ing to the liberty loans? 
 
 114
 
 A. Are vou asking what it meant to me? 
 
 Q. Yes.' 
 
 A. It meant to me that I would not volunteer for 
 the army and that I would not subscribe to liberty 
 bonds. 
 
 Q. And it was that position that you felt that other 
 persons should take? 
 
 A. Each man has a right to do to take his own 
 position. That was what that platform meant to me. 
 
 Q. And that is what you were working for? 
 
 A. That is the thing in which I believed and the 
 thing for which I am still working. 
 
 Q. And were working in 1917? 
 
 A. And was working in 1917, and before that. 
 
 BY THE COURT: 
 
 Q. Did that include a desire on your part to im- 
 press your views in that regard on others? 
 
 A. Only insofar as others were interested in my 
 views. 
 
 Q. Well, that answer is not very clear. You ex- 
 pressed certain views. Did you desire to impress 
 those views on others? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, else I should not have spoken and 
 written. I did not desire to force them upon others. 
 
 Q. I didn't say "force." I mean impress it on 
 others ? 
 
 A. Well, the word "impress" is not so clear. I 
 desired to place that before other people for their ac- 
 ceptance or rejection. 
 
 BY MR. BARNES : 
 
 Q. But you desired to persuade them to their ac- 
 ceptance did you not? 
 
 A. If possible, yes. That is the purpose of teach- 
 ing. 
 
 Q. Page 52 : "We brand the declaration of war by 
 our Government as a crime against the people of the 
 
 115
 
 United States and against the nations of the world." 
 Did you agree with that sentiment? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: I object to it as incompetent 
 upon any grounds, whether he agrees with it or not. 
 I object to it on the ground that it does not go to 
 motive, it does not go to intent and certainly does not 
 go to wilfulness and is certainly not an issue in this 
 case. It is of course perfectly apparent to me why he 
 is being asked these questions. 
 
 MR. BARNES: I am glad. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : And you are trying the Socialist 
 Party, that is what you are doing here, you are at- 
 tempting to try the Socialist Party. 
 
 MR. BARNES : Oh, no, not at all. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: And that is perfectly apparent 
 to me that that is what you are attempting to do. 
 
 THE COURT: I tried to make clear by previous 
 rulings the question now is merely calling for the 
 view of the defendant, but it does not call for an inter- 
 pretation of the language, because the language pre- 
 sumably is very simple and very clear. It is not, as 
 I view it in any manner, a trial of any party, it is a 
 search by the Government counsel on cross-examina- 
 tion under familiar rules, of the view of the defendant 
 on the question of intent, he having been permitted 
 and I think very properly so to explain the meaning 
 of the expressions in "The Great Madness." Now if it 
 does not call for a construction of the paper but simply 
 calls for a statement from the witness as to whether 
 he agreed with the statement or not, and as the state- 
 ment is entirely simple, I will allow the question. 
 
 A. I did ; I regard any declaration of war as a 
 crime against the human race. 
 
 Q. Now the next sentence : "In all modern history 
 there has been no war more unjustifiable than the war 
 in which we are about to engage." Did you agree 
 with that? 
 
 116
 
 A. I did, because the more intelligent people be- 
 come the less justifiable does war become. 
 
 Q. And the next sentence : "No greater dishonor 
 has ever been forced upon a people than that which 
 the capitalist class is forcing upon this nation against 
 its will." Did you agree with that sentiment? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. And the next sentence : "In harmony with 
 these principles, the Socialist Party emphatically re- 
 jects the proposal that in time of war the workers 
 should suspend their struggle for better conditions." 
 Did you agree with that? 
 
 A. Certainly, because I regard war as an incident 
 to the economic struggle, and the economic struggle 
 as fundamental and continuous. 
 
 Q. And the next clause : "The acute situation 
 created by war calls for an even more vigorous pro- 
 secution of the class struggle." Did you agree with 
 that? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, if you interpret the "class struggle" 
 to mean the struggle of the workers to better their 
 economic conditions under which they are laboring. 
 
 Q. That is a struggle against the capitalists? 
 
 A. A struggle against the capitalists. 
 
 Q. There are certain recommendations here : "We 
 recommend to the workers and pledge ourselves to 
 the following course of action : 
 
 1. Continuous, active and public opposition to the 
 war through demonstrations, mass petitions and all 
 other means within our power." Did you agree with 
 that? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. I believe that we should have used 
 all legal means to bring the war to a speedy conclu- 
 sion. 
 
 Q. Do you find anything in there about "legal 
 means," any limitations to "legal means?" 
 
 117
 
 A. It says "within our power," and the Socialist 
 Party has always taken the position that it acts with- 
 in the law. 
 
 Q. "Unyielding opposition to all proposed legis- 
 lation for military or industrial conscription. Should 
 such conscription be forced upon the people we pledge 
 ourselves to continuous efforts for the repeal of such 
 laws and to the support of all mass movements in op- 
 position to conscription." Did you approve of that? 
 
 A. So long as the "mass movements" were legal, 
 yes. 
 
 Q. What do you mean by "mass movements?" 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : I object if your Honor please, 
 a mass is always distinguishable from individual ac- 
 tion, it is plain from the language. 
 
 Q. You would like to explain what you mean by 
 mass movements, wouldn't you? 
 
 A. I would like to have an opportunity to answer 
 all of your questions fully and frankly. 
 
 Q. I think you are answering them very fully and 
 frankly. Now I am asking you, would not you like an 
 opportunity to tell these 12 gentlemen of the Jury 
 what you meant, what you understood by the meaning 
 of "mass movement" in opposition to conscription 
 when you approved of it? 
 
 A. You mean would I like to answer that ques- 
 tion? 
 
 Q. Yes. 
 
 A. I certainly would. 
 
 MR. BARNES: Now, Mr. Stedman, won't you 
 please let your client answer the question? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : My client will be retaining him 
 in a little while. 
 
 Q. Now tell us what you mean by "mass move- 
 ments" and what you understood "mass movements" 
 in opposition to conscription meant? 
 
 118
 
 THE COURT: Silence on the part of counsel? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : I said that my client would be 
 retaining him in a little while, your Honor. 
 
 MR. BARNES : The Court wants to know if you 
 withdraw your objection. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: No I think I shall let it stand. 
 
 THE COURT: Objection sustained. 
 
 MR. BARNES : You'd better get another lawyer. 
 
 Q. Now, Mr. Nearing, let us turn over to page 377, 
 where we have the "Socialist Party platform" and then 
 turn over particularly to the place with reference to 
 immediate program, and with particular reference to 
 paragraph No. 6 I will read the introduction first: 
 
 "The following are measures which we believe of 
 immediate practical importance and for which we 
 wage an especially energetic campaign. 
 
 "6. Resistance to compulsory military training and 
 to the conscription of life and labor." Did you approve 
 of that? 
 
 A. I did as a policy of objecting to a policy. In 
 other words, I thought the policy of military training 
 and the conscription of life and labor was a bad social 
 policy. 
 
 Q. And did you approve of the next paragraph : 
 
 "Repudiation of war debts?" 
 
 A. Emphatically, yes. 
 
 Q. Now you are familiar with the first liberty loan 
 campaign ? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And that took place during the first part of 
 June, 1917? 
 
 A. That, I do not remember. 
 
 Q. Well, it took place before you wrote this book? 
 
 A. It did. 
 
 Q. And you regarded the liberty loan, of course, 
 as a war debt? 
 
 119
 
 A. I regarded it as a war debt and as a financial 
 mistake. 
 
 Q. But it had a great many subscribers? 
 
 A. It had a great many. 
 
 Q. It had a great many. Do you approve of the 
 repudiation of that loan? 
 
 A. As a socialist, I approve of the confiscation of 
 all forms of property which enables one man to live 
 without work on another man's labor, and that in- 
 cludes the liberty loan or any other form of bonded 
 indebtedness. 
 
 Q. The question is whether you approved of the 
 repudiation of the loan, the loan having been floated 
 or made, or whatever you choose to call it, prior to the 
 writing or printing and distribution of "The Great 
 Madness." 
 
 THE WITNESS : Well, I was asked here sir, re- 
 garding this statement No. 7, "repudiation of war 
 debts." I regard that as the essential thing for all of 
 the peoples of the world to do, including the peoples 
 of the United States. 
 
 Q. The liberty loan was a war debt, was it not? 
 
 A. It was. 
 
 Q. And when you approved of this plank in the 
 "immediate program" you approved of the repudiation 
 of the liberty loan among other debts? 
 
 A. Of that and all other war debts, and all debts 
 of a similar nature. In other words, I am not object- 
 ing to that because they are war debts, I am objecting 
 to that because they are a form of property which en- 
 ables one man to live parasitically on another man's 
 labor. 
 
 Q. Now on the first page we have three quota- 
 tions, one from Mohammed and two from his Modern 
 Disciple John Reed. Did you select those quotations? 
 
 A. I did. I might say, sir, that the title of the 
 
 120
 
 pamphlet was suggested to me because of a speech by 
 President Wilson, at Kansas City, in which he said, 
 "madness has entered into all things," and that sug- 
 gested to me this title. 
 
 Q. Was he speaking of Europe or America at that 
 time? 
 
 A. He was speaking of Europe at that time. That 
 was before America got the madness. 
 
 Q. Now, at the end of the first paragraph you say, 
 this is on page 5: "The American plutocracy urged 
 the war, shouted for it, demanded it, insisted upon it 
 and finally got it." Now tell us just what you meant 
 by the American plutocracy as used in that sentence? 
 
 A. By the American plutocracy, I meant the small 
 group of men who exercise the authority in affairs of 
 economic, social and other forms of American life. 
 
 Q. Well, now, you say here, going back to page 5, 
 "American plutocracy urged the war, shouted for it, 
 demanded it, insisted upon it and finally got it" ; did 
 you mean by that, that for selfish reasons big business 
 wanted to have us get into the war? 
 
 A. Why, after a certain point, yes. That is after 
 the Big Business interests were so involved with the 
 Allied credit that nothing except our entrance into the 
 war would prevent the smash of the Allied credit ma- 
 chine. 
 
 Q. Now what date would you place that? 
 
 A. I read some documents yesterday which indi- 
 cated that it was some time along in the early part of 
 1917, or late 1916. It was very difficult then, to get 
 any information at all about the situation. 
 
 Q. This preparedness campaign you told us about 
 was in the Fall of 1916? 
 
 A. 1915-1916. 
 
 Q. At that stage do you think that Big Business 
 wanted us to get into the war? 
 
 121
 
 A. Probably not. 
 
 Q. Probably not? 
 
 A. Because at that time Big Business was pri- 
 marily interested in the South American and Central 
 American and West Indian markets. 
 
 Q. That is what it was after at that time ? 
 
 A. Yes, sir; that is at the time when President 
 Wilson, issued his Mexican manifesto to which I re- 
 ferred yesterday. 
 
 Q. You are satisfied that Big Business at that time 
 did not want us to go into the war? 
 
 A. No, I don't think it did, I don't think it was to 
 the interest of business men then to go into the war. 
 
 Q. And that is why you think they did not want 
 us to? 
 
 A. Well, as I regard the economic control, as I 
 say here in the pamphlet they are just like other peo- 
 ple, they are out to make profits and they will do the 
 thing that will make the most profit. 
 
 Q. That is what they are primarily out after? 
 
 A. They are primarily out for profits, they are not 
 in business for their health, as they say. 
 
 Q. Well, now, getting down to the Spring of 1917, 
 and the Fall of 1916; at that time was it your idea 
 that American big business wanted us to get into the 
 war? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, at the point where allied credit was 
 reaching the breaking point. 
 
 Q. And that it wanted us to get into the war for 
 their own selfish interests? 
 
 A. For their own selfish reasons? Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. Then you say, the business interests realize 
 that war is barbarous and they would avoid it if they 
 possibly could. They also believe that there are some 
 things worse than war : "the confiscation of special 
 privileges, the abolition of unearned income ; the over- 
 
 122
 
 throw of the economic parasitism; the establishment 
 of industrial democracy." That is your idea of why 
 the 2% of the people wanted us to go, or were willing 
 that we should go, into the war? 
 
 A. Not necessarily, that is my idea of the reason 
 why the plutocracy was willing to take war if neces- 
 sary. There is a definite ruling class psychology that 
 dominates not only the rulers themselves, but those 
 who work intimately with them in their affairs and 
 that includes the professional group very often. I 
 believe that the members of the capitalist class as a 
 rule would prefer war to the disestablishment of 
 capitalism. 
 
 Q. What political party advocated the calamities 
 that you mentioned here, that is: "industrial democ- 
 racy" and the "overthrow of economic parasitism," 
 and the "abolition of unearned income" and "confisca- 
 tion of special privileges?" 
 
 A. That is the platform of the Socialists the world 
 over. 
 
 Q. And it is a platform that is peculiar to the 
 Socialist Party, isn't it? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, that is what the Socialist Party stands 
 for: the disestablishment of the capitalistic system. 
 
 Q. Your argument was practically or is practically 
 that the capitalists, as a matter of fact, would welcome 
 a war to save them from the calamities denned by the 
 Socialist Party? 
 
 A. I say the capitalistic classes would undoubt- 
 edly ; and I believe that the capitalists did that in Ger- 
 many and in certain other European countries. 
 
 Q. You think they did it here? 
 
 A. No, the Socialist Party here is not a sufficient 
 factor to be dangerous in that sense. 
 
 Q. So that you do not feel that in this country the 
 capitalist class was afraid of the Socialist Party? 
 
 123
 
 A. Not yet. 
 
 Q. Not at that time ? 
 
 A. No, sir. 
 
 Q. I am speaking of 1917? 
 
 A. No, sir. 
 
 THE COURT: (Addressing spectators) Gentle- 
 men, let us not overstep the bounds of decorum. I 
 have stated before that I am pretty liberal, but you 
 can smile without making a noise about it. 
 
 Q. As a matter of fact, the Socialist Party had 
 been going backwards, had it not, for three or four 
 years, as far as membership was concerned, prior to 
 1917? 
 
 A. I can not answer that. I do not know. 
 
 Q. Look at your Year Book, page 336, and you will 
 find at the top of page 336, the percentage of socialist 
 vote of the total vote, and then in 1912 it was 5 9/10%, 
 whereas in 1916, it was only 3 2/10% ? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, that is when the Socialists voted for 
 Mr. Wilson because "he kept us out of the war." 
 
 Q. Do you mean to say the Socialists voted for 
 Mr. Wilson? 
 
 A. Many of them. 
 
 Q. Haven't you a rule in the Socialist Party, that 
 you have got to swear that you are going to stand by 
 the Socialist Party candidate, you are going to sup- 
 port the Party candidate? 
 
 A. That is like all other rules. 
 
 Q. You do not follow your own rules? 
 
 A. Well, we try to. 
 
 Q. Now further down on the same page: "The 
 wealth of the country was vast, enough to feed, clothe, 
 house and educate every boy and girl ; enough to give 
 all of the necessities and most of the simple comforts 
 of life to every family. The plutocrats were not inter- 
 ested in these matters however." Whom do you mean 
 
 124
 
 by the plutocrats when you say as you do there those 
 things and use that expression? 
 
 A. I mean the ruling power in the country. 
 
 Q. And you mean men of great wealth like Rocke- 
 feller? 
 
 A. I mean the men who were dominating and di- 
 recting economically, the public affairs. 
 
 Q. Do you mean to say that those men were not 
 interested in educational and charitable institutions? 
 
 A. Well, educational and charitable institutions 
 are merely plasters and poultices to keep this kind of 
 thing going. I do not regard the contributing to char- 
 ities as sympathetic; I just regard them as a sort of 
 social fire insurance. 
 
 Q. In other words, when you used that term "plu- 
 tocrats" and said that they were not interested in these 
 affairs, however, and after referring to food and cloth- 
 ing and housing and educating people, you meant 
 merely that they were not interested in doing it in 
 your particular way? 
 
 A. No, sir. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: Mr. Nearing, you answer so 
 quickly, I don't have a chance to object and I want to 
 make an objection to the last question. 
 
 I ask your Honor, that the witness' last answer be 
 stricken out, as I want a ruling on this line of ques- 
 tions, and I either get caught by the inability to tell 
 when the prosecution has finished a question, or by the 
 football rush of the witness to answer. 
 
 Q. On page 11 of the second paragraph you say: 
 "Aggressive Germany was the danger mark. It was 
 against her infamous desire to impose kultur upon the 
 world that America was urged to prepare herself. If 
 was for this purpose that the President signed a bill 
 during the Summer of 1916, appropriating $662,000,000 
 for the army and navy, a sum larger than had ever 
 
 125
 
 before been appropriated for war purposes by any 
 nation in times of peace. Well might LaFollette ex- 
 claim in his speech of July 19th to 20th, 1916, opposing 
 this appropriation : 'I object, Mr. President, to a 
 game, a plan, a conspiracy, to force upon this country 
 a big army and a big navy to use the treasury of the 
 country, and if need be, the lives of its people, to make 
 good the foreign speculations of a few unscrupulous 
 masters of finance.' " 
 
 Now that was of course after Mr. Tavenner had 
 made his speech and Mr. LaFollette had made his 
 objections, that Congress passed this legislation, was 
 it not? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And was it your idea that Congress, in passing 
 legislation and the President in signing it, were acting 
 in bad faith or that they were not intelligent enough 
 to see the real situation? 
 
 A. I disagree with them as a matter of policy. I 
 regarded this as the beginning of a system of mili- 
 tarism for the United States. I think that subsequent 
 events have more than justified my anticipation. 
 
 Q. You do not think though that they were act- 
 ing in bad faith? 
 
 A. No, I think they were acting as the imperialists 
 tried to get them to act. 
 
 Q. And you think they merely could not see 
 the real truth as you saw it? 
 
 A. I don't know whether they could see the real 
 truth or not; they were acting in conformity with im- 
 perialistic policy. 
 
 Q. And you think Congress and the President then 
 in passing this legislation were acting truly as to what 
 they really believed? 
 
 A. The President had declared emphatically again 
 and again against this kind of policy. 
 
 126
 
 Q. Can not you answer that question yes or no ? 
 
 A. I don't know whether he has changed his mind, 
 I am not the interpreter of the President's conscience 
 or my own. 
 
 Q. Then you don't know? 
 
 A. And I never impute or never made it a point to 
 give bad motives to people. 
 
 Q. You don't know? 
 
 A. I don't know anything about his motives. 
 
 Q. You haven't imputed bad motives to the pluto- 
 crats throughout this pamphlet? 
 
 A. I don't think so, I think I am characterizing 
 their actions. 
 
 Q. Did not you tell us a little while ago you didn't 
 think plutocrats were in business for anything except 
 what they could get out of it? 
 
 A. I think that the capitalist system is influenced 
 often and mostly by profits, and I think the plutocrats 
 as a whole are influenced similarly under a capitalistic 
 system. There seems to be no difference between 
 them in that way. 
 
 Q. And that is the only thing? 
 
 A. That is the major factor in controlling their 
 decisions. 
 
 Q. Is not that the only factor? 
 
 A. Certainly not. 
 
 Q. There are certain other factors? 
 
 A. There are certain other factors, but that is the 
 major factor : the economic factor is usually the major 
 factor in controlling public affairs. 
 
 Q. Now in the next chapter we deal with "patri- 
 ots" and on page 12 you say : "The price of flags rose 
 rapidly. Nevertheless the workers by hundreds of 
 thousands contributed," that all being in quotation 
 
 marks, "to provide flags for the establishments in 
 
 which they were employed. Men were discharged 
 
 127
 
 \ 
 
 when they refused to make such contributions." How 
 many instances now to your personal observation do 
 you know of men who were discharged from employ- 
 ment because they refused to contribute toward the 
 buying of a flag? 
 
 A. I knew of three men in one department of one 
 factory ; I knew of several scattered instances in other 
 shops and factories. 
 
 Q. Well, how many would you say, three men in 
 one department? 
 
 A. Perhaps a dozen instances come to my mind, 
 but this says that "men were discharged" and if two 
 of them had been discharged, that would have justified 
 that statement. 
 
 Q. You think that statement was then justified by 
 that? 
 
 A. I certainly do, if two only had been discharged. 
 "Two" is "men." 
 
 Q. Literally you are accurate. Now in the next 
 paragraph, doctor, you say: "The business interests 
 were in clover. After years of unpopularity, after 
 being forced to endure investigation, criticism and 
 antagonistic legislation, after being condemned by 
 even the conservative element in public life as a 
 menace to American progress and well being." Will 
 you name some of the members of the conservative 
 element in public life who denounced the business 
 interests as a menace to American progress and well 
 being? Give us the conservative ones, please. 
 
 A. I would say Mr. Cummins, Mr. Borah and Mr. 
 Roosevelt and Mr. Wilson particularly in those 
 phrases that I quoted from him yesterday. 
 
 Q. And those were the men whom you regarded as 
 the members of the conservative element in public 
 life? 
 
 A. Decidedly conservative. I would not call them 
 
 128
 
 Bourbons or Tories, but they are decidedly conserva- 
 tive. 
 
 Q. And a little later you say: "The plutocratic 
 brand of patriotism won the endorsement of the 
 press," enumerating a number of others. This "pluto- 
 cratic brand of patriotism," I wish you would dis- 
 tinguish that from the democratic brand of patriotism. 
 
 A. The plutocratic brand of patriotism was the 
 brand that made patriotism, loyalty to imperialistic 
 designs and the imperialistic policies, and having en- 
 tered on this propaganda campaign, it was one of the 
 avenues toward imperialism, and plutocrats and 
 patriotism mean loyalty to imperialistic policy and in 
 my judgment that is not patriotism at all. 
 
 Q. Then it is your judgment that the patriotism 
 advocated by the preparedness advocates, and the 
 patriotism advocated after we entered the war, by the 
 president, was this plutocratic brand of patriotism, 
 that is, a patriotism devoted to imperialistic policies of 
 this Government? 
 
 A. That brand of patriotism which is satisfactory 
 to J. P. Morgan & Company and the Standard Oil 
 Company and the United States Steel Corporation, is 
 plutocratic patriotism, and that was the brand to 
 which I am referring, and it is not the brand to which 
 I adhere or subscribe. 
 
 Q. That was also the brand that the country 
 adopted generally? 
 
 A. That was the brand ; yes, sir. 
 
 Q. That is the imperialistic brand, imperialistic 
 ideas? 
 
 A. The imperialistic the war is a part of the im- 
 perialistic policy. 
 
 Q. That is your idea then, that the support of the 
 war, just as the country has given it, is in support of 
 a war carrying out an imperialistic policy? 
 
 129
 
 A. Yes, the policy of imperialism. As far as the 
 rank and file of the people is concerned, they were 
 simply patriotic and ignorant, they were patriotic and 
 enthusiastic, and they did not understand what they 
 were trying to support. 
 
 Q. Now on the next page you say, at the bottom 
 of the page : 
 
 "The American plutocracy was magnified, deified 
 and consecrated to the task of making the world safe 
 for democracy. The brigands had turned saints, and 
 were conducting a campaign to raise $100,000.000 for 
 the Red Cross." 
 
 Did you contribute to the Red Cross? 
 
 A. I did not. 
 
 Q. Either before we went into the war or after? 
 
 A. I never contribute to any private or philanthro- 
 pic or charitable institution. I regard philanthropy 
 and charity in every form as merely making the great 
 crimes, the crying crimes of the capitalistic system 
 more endurable, and I do not care to help make it any 
 more endurable. I regard the Red Cross as a method 
 of making war more endurable and I do not care to 
 make war more endurable, because it is a crime. 
 
 Q. Was it your idea, will you say that this cam- 
 paign was directed by H. P. Davison, one of the lead- 
 ing members of the firm of J. P. Morgan & Company 
 was it your idea that his service in directing this 
 campaign was in pursuance of the plutocracy's con- 
 spiracy to draw us into the war? 
 
 A. No, sir. I make the point through this pamph- 
 let that the business interests fought for the war, and 
 when the war came on, the leading business men of 
 the country were put in charge of all of the important 
 ventures in which we were engaged, and this is one of 
 the ventures. 
 
 Q. Wasn't this before we went into the war that 
 
 130
 
 Mr. Davison took charge of the Red Cross? 
 
 A. No, I cannot answer that, I know he was in 
 it after we went into the war also. He may have taken 
 charge at any time before we went into the war. 
 That would merely prove that plutocracy was behind 
 the Red Cross, knowing that the firm of J. P. Morgan 
 & Company were engaged in these big business ven- 
 tures. That was a big venture in the Red Cross, as 
 the Red Cross is interested in this war and Big Busi- 
 ness is interested in the Red Cross as Big Business is 
 interested in the Charity Organization Society and 
 other philanthropic endeavors. 
 
 Q. On the next page, on page 14, in the third sen- 
 tence, under "Armed Neutrality" you say: 
 
 "Meanwhile the British fleet blockaded Germany, 
 closed the North Sea, sowed it with mines, and refused 
 to permit American manufacturers to sell goods to the 
 Central Powers. This constituted a brazen violation 
 of international law." 
 
 Was the blockade did you mean by that that you 
 declared that the blockade was a brazen violation of 
 international law? 
 
 A. No, but to sow the North Sea with mines was 
 a violation, as I understand international law. 
 
 Q. How do you know that those mines were sowed 
 there by the British fleet? 
 
 A. Well, you will find an excellent summary of 
 that according to the facts contained in the speech of 
 Senator LaFollette on April 4th, also in the speech of 
 General Sherwood, about that same time. I have the 
 speech here. 
 
 Q. That was the source of your information, was 
 it? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: The President stated it. 
 
 MR. BARNES: Mr. Stedman, please wait until 
 you are under oath. 
 
 131
 
 Q. That was the source of your information? 
 
 A. I don't remember sir, but these are authorities 
 upon which I would rest my case. 
 
 Q. Those are the authorities upon which you made 
 these statements? 
 
 A. I just I stated I would be glad to rest my case 
 on them. I cannot remember whether they were or 
 not. I have the reference here. I have got the reference 
 to the sources of information. 
 
 Q. Then do you declare that the blockade on Ger- 
 many was one of the brazen violations of international 
 law? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, I say so far as it was an effort to starve 
 the civilian population, I believed it was a violation 
 of international law as I understood it at that time. 
 
 Q. Don't you know that in the Civil War, the 
 North declared a blockade upon the South? 
 
 A. Did they do that in an effort to starve the 
 civilian population? 
 
 Q. I am not on the stand. I would like to say "yes" 
 to that, though. 
 
 A. I don't know sir, but if it did, I believe that con- 
 stituted a violation of the accepted common interna- 
 tional law, and if the law does not cover that it cer- 
 tainly should. 
 
 Q. Then you say you believe this is a violation of 
 international law? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. What investigation did you make of the sub- 
 ject before you wrote these words, "This constituted 
 a brazen violation of international law?" 
 
 A. Why, I stated two of my authorities, and I also 
 had a couple of courses of it in college, in international 
 law, and know something about it in a general way. 
 
 132
 
 Q. Now, Mr. Nearing, referring to page 19 of the 
 pamphlet, under the caption, of "The 2nd of April," 
 you state that in the Spring of 1917, the credit of the 
 Allies was strained to the breaking point and their 
 resources were at very low ebb. 
 
 What data did you have from which you came to 
 that upon which you based that statement? 
 
 A. I referred yesterday to a couple of letters by 
 a firm by the name of Henry Clews & Company. At 
 this time, the submarine sinkings, if I remember, 
 amounted to about 500,000 tons a month they were 
 sinking vessels faster than the British or the Allies 
 were building them, and we heard tales at this time, 
 that in England there was the necessity of putting the 
 population on a bread card system. And I might say 
 that I ordinarily read at least two financial papers 
 every week, and tried to keep in pretty close touch 
 with these changing situations. 
 
 Q. On page 20, the second paragraph, you say: 
 "The great neutral faced the test of possible commer- 
 cial disaster. A hundred millions of people in the 
 balance counted as nothing against the menace of eco- 
 nomic losses." Did you mean by that, that Congress 
 and President Wilson weighed economic losses 
 against the lives of one hundred millions of people 
 and decided in favor of avoiding economic losses? 
 
 A. I should not say against the lives of one hun- 
 dred million people. I should say against the well 
 being of the people; and I believe that the economic 
 considerations were primary. 
 
 Q. That is, they weighed the economic considera- 
 tions against the well being of one hundred millions of 
 people and decided in favor of the economic considera- 
 tions? 
 
 133
 
 A. Well, I cannot say whether they weighed it or 
 not, but I believe that the decision was in favor of 
 the economic considerations and against the people. 
 
 Q. Then you say, "The President without any 
 authority from Congress, armed the merchant ships 
 and gave Bernstorff his papers." As a matter of fact. 
 President Wilson gave von Bernstorff his papers some 
 time prior to that, in which the armed neutrality ques- 
 tion arose, didn't he? 
 
 A. Yes. That should probably have preceded the 
 other, preceded the giving of von Bernstorff his papers. 
 That should probably have come in before the armed 
 merchant ships subject. 
 
 Q. It should not even have come in this section 
 at all, should it, the "2nd of April ?" 
 
 A. Well, it is a section dealing with the events that 
 led up to that period. I think that it is the logical place 
 for it, yes. 
 
 Q. Do you remember the date that von Bernstorff 
 was given his papers? 
 
 A. I think it was in February, if I am not mistaken. 
 
 O. Then you say, "The business interests went 
 wild with joy." 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And the next portion of that, you quote from 
 "Finance and Commerce" of February 7, 1917, the 
 fact that flags were put out on Wall Street. As a matter 
 of fact, don't you know that the Stock Market took 
 a violent break at the time of the severance of diplo- 
 matic relations with Germany? 
 
 A. The fact to which I refer is contained in this 
 quotation from "Finance and Commerce" a Wall 
 Street publication. 
 
 Q. Cannot you answer my question, doctor : don't 
 you know, as a matter of fact, that the Stock Market 
 had a violent break upon the announcement of the 
 
 134
 
 severance of diplomatic relations with Germany? 
 
 A. I do not. 
 
 Q. Was it your idea that the reason why people 
 put out the flags in Wall Street, was because they 
 were glad that we were at war with Germany, or they 
 wanted to show their loyalty to this country? 
 
 A. I believed that the Wall Street interests, had 
 been trying very hard for months to get into the war, 
 and I believe that they were interested and missed no 
 opportunity to expend energy in getting this country 
 into the war. 
 
 Q. But you do make the statement that the reason 
 why Wall Street put out these flags was because it 
 was glad? 
 
 A. Yes, I say the business interests were wild with 
 joy, and that confirmed it. 
 
 Q. That showed their wildness of joy, by putting 
 out their flags as you have indicated? 
 
 A. Yes, as their publication says, "in twenty 
 minutes Wall Street, from Trinity Church to South 
 Street was bedecked like on a holiday." It was a 
 holiday for them. 
 
 O. Columbus Avenue was also bedecked, wasn't 
 it? 
 
 A. Within twenty minutes? I don't know. 
 
 Q. Within twenty-four hours? 
 
 A. I don't know ; I was not in New York at that 
 time. 
 
 Q. You didn't raise any flags where you were? 
 
 A. I beg your pardon? 
 
 Q. Were not there any flags raised where you 
 were? 
 
 A. Yes, but they were not in the way that is indi- 
 cated by the quotation here. This is a financial paper, 
 you know. 
 
 O. Now, turn to page 22, or rather to the bottom 
 
 135
 
 of page 21, you say: 
 
 "On April 6th, with the passage of the Resolution 
 declaring the existence of a state of war, the American 
 people found themselves in war, after returning a 
 party to power only five months before because it had 
 'kept us out of war' " and then you say : 
 
 "The people were not consulted, their wishes were 
 not considered." 
 
 "No popular referendum on the war was even pro- 
 posed by the Administration." 
 
 How many wars have we engaged in in our history? 
 
 A. I think five major wars. 
 
 Q. What were they? 
 
 A. The Revolutionary War, War of 1812, the 
 Mexican War, the Civil War, and the Spanish-Ameri- 
 can War. 
 
 Q. In the Revolutionary War was there any refer- 
 endum, popular referendum as to whether we would 
 go to war or not? 
 
 A. I should say that a revolution is a popular refer- 
 endum. 
 
 Q. Well, what did you mean by a popular refer- 
 endum, you meant a vote, didn't you? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Was there any vote taken in the Revolution 
 that you know of, as to whether or not we should have 
 a revolution? 
 
 A. I do not see how you can vote on a revolution, 
 Mr. Barnes. 
 
 Q. How many I am simply asking you whether 
 you know? 
 
 A. No, sir, I don't think so. 
 
 Q. What was the next one? 
 
 A. The War of 1812. 
 
 O. Was there a referendum on that? 
 
 A. No, sir. 
 
 136
 
 Q. What was the next oner 
 
 A. The Civil War. 
 
 Q. Any referendum on that? 
 
 A. No, sir. 
 
 Q. What was the next war? 
 
 A. Spanish-American War. 
 
 Q. Any referendum on that? 
 
 A. No, sir. 
 
 Q. You are familiar with the Constitution of the 
 United States, aren't you? 
 
 A. I am. 
 
 Q. And that it does not provide for a referendum 
 on the question of war? 
 
 A. No ; neither does it prohibit it. 
 
 Q. I asked you does it provide for a referendum? 
 
 A. It does not provide for it and it does not pro- 
 hibit it, sir. 
 
 Q. Does not it provide that war shall be declared 
 by Congress? 
 
 A. Yes, it does so provide, but this was declared 
 by the President. 
 
 Q. Was not this war declared by Congress? 
 
 A. No. sir, it was not declared by Congress. The 
 President said on April 2nd, four days before Congress 
 voted on the question, he said in his speech, "In the 
 war in which we are now engaged." 
 
 Q. But they did vote on it ultimately? 
 
 A. Yes ; ultimately, yes. 
 
 Q. From what you know of it, what was the vote 
 on it? 
 
 A. About twenty to one, something like that, I 
 understand. 
 
 Q. Then it was voted for by the Constitutional 
 representatives of the people of the United States? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. In Congress assembled? 
 
 137
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And the war was declared in the constitutional 
 manner by the representatives of the majority, the 
 overwhelming majority of the representatives of the 
 electorate, was it not? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, but they however, decided it previous 
 to a referendum. 
 
 Q. Is there any provision in the Constitution for 
 a referendum? 
 
 A. No, sir. 
 
 Q. About going to war? 
 
 A. I thought this war was more democratic be- 
 cause the President had said so. 
 
 Q. I see. 
 
 A. In other words, I believed that we might have 
 shown our good faith in democracy, by having a refer- 
 endum on it at this time. 
 
 Q. In other words, in your opinion, Mr. Nearing, 
 it would have been a nice thing, or a proper thing, or 
 an expedient thing, or a good thing, or a democratic 
 thing, to have declared this war in a different way 
 than the other wars had been declared? 
 
 A. In my judgment, if they had had a referendum 
 at this time, the vote would have been very over- 
 whelmingly against going into the war. 
 
 Q. In your judgment? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. The duly authorized representatives in Con- 
 gress assembled did not represent their constituents? 
 
 A. I believed they did not represent the body of 
 their constituents. 
 
 Q. That is your judgment? 
 
 A. They were whipped into line by methods which 
 were notorious at the time. 
 
 Q. That is your judgment? 
 
 A. No, that is something that was expressed in the 
 
 138
 
 newspapers, too. 
 
 Q. That is, newspaper stories? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Now a little further down on the same page you 
 say, speaking of the advisory commission to the coun- 
 sel, that it was the business interests that had in charge 
 this matter for the Government, you said, "The four 
 business men, constituting the majority, will have 
 practical charge of directing the expenditure of the 
 billions of dollars that the American people will put 
 into this war." 
 
 Does that occur to you as a remarkable provision or 
 an extraordinary provision, that business men should 
 be in charge of the expenditure of money? 
 
 A. No, unavoidably so under the present system. 
 
 Q. And didn't you think that that was much better 
 than having politicians have charge of it? 
 
 A. As to whether the thing was better or worse, I 
 would not judge. I would say it was not quite typical 
 to let business men have charge, for I do not think 
 that politicians were competent to have charge. 
 
 Q. You think the business men were more com- 
 petent? 
 
 A. Undoubtedly they knew the game. 
 
 Q. More competent, even, than college professors? 
 
 A. Undoubtedly. 
 
 Q. On the next pages, pages 23 and 24, you state 
 there the circumstances in which they are placed at 
 the head of these different committees, the committees 
 on express, committees on shoe and leather industry, 
 supplies, copper, etc., that the men selected to serve 
 did serve with the heads of the great businesses and 
 industries of that character. Don't you think that that 
 was a better way of doing it than to have the office 
 boys or the subordinates of those businesses in those 
 positions? 
 
 139
 
 A. I should have liked to have seen experts con- 
 tinued in charge by the Government, and some expert 
 engineers and expert scientists, non-controlling fac- 
 tors in the business. I should have liked to see 
 the labor unions represented in some cases, that would 
 have been a more democratic way because business 
 men make up about one-tenth of the population, and 
 the working people about nine-tenths. 
 
 Q. You did feel, however, did you not, that it was 
 more apt to be an efficiently conducted war, purely 
 from an efficient standpoint, understand, if the heads 
 of these great concerns served in these capacities? 
 
 A. Well, I should say that undoubtedly yes, as 
 they would conduct the war better for their own pur- 
 poses. There was a concrete instance brought up on 
 the Standard Oil Company 
 
 Q. I am speaking about the efficiency of the con- 
 duct of the work. 
 
 A. From the business standard, it would have un- 
 doubtedly been more efficient. 
 
 Q. That is what I mean. Now going over to the 
 Liberty Loan chapter on page 26, you say : 
 
 "Some day when all of the facts are collected, the 
 story of the sale of the Liberty Loan, will be told, and 
 it will be as hateful, as barbarous and as brutal as any 
 event since the war contracts of the Spanish-American 
 War." 
 
 What investigation did you make of the facts sur- 
 rounding the sale of the Liberty Loan? 
 
 A. Well, sir, that was a particularly sore subject 
 at that time in Toledo, where I was. I was in very 
 close touch with the labor unions over there, and I 
 knew a large number of the men and women who were 
 compelled to buy bonds against their own wishes. 
 
 Q. How many men did you know personally who 
 were compelled to buy bonds against their wishes? 
 
 140
 
 A. Well, I could not enumerate them. 
 
 Q. Well, is there a dozen, or was there a dozen? 
 
 A. Probably more than that. 
 
 Q. Were there twenty? 
 
 A. Possibly. I might also say that the New York 
 "Call" had very extended stories at the time, describing 
 such conditions. 
 
 Q. You do not consider that an authority? 
 
 A. Undoubtedly. 
 
 Q. Well, were there one hundred which you knew 
 personally, who were compelled to buy bonds? 
 
 A. Probably not. 
 
 Q. Probably not. How many were there subscrib- 
 ers to the loan? 
 
 A. Several millions. 
 
 Q. Several millions. And you have only given us 
 three instances here : one of a girl who worked as an 
 expert at $100 a month. What was her name? 
 
 A. I prefer not to state it. 
 
 Q. You know her? 
 
 A. I do. 
 
 Q. Did she live in Toledo? 
 
 A. In Pittsburgh. 
 
 Q. Pittsburgh? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. What does she work at? 
 
 A. She was an expert on adding machines. 
 
 Q. An expert on adding machines? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And she got $100 a month? 
 
 A. I believe so. 
 
 Q. And when she was approached she said if she 
 had to buy a bond, she would give up her job? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. Nobody ever said to her anything else on the 
 subject? 
 
 141
 
 A. Nothing more. 
 
 Q. Was that in your opinion a sample of a tr bar- 
 barous and hateful" coercion by the capitalistic class? 
 
 A. That was an excellent example of industrial 
 tyranny, only it didn't work out. 
 
 Q. Only it didn't work out. Now the next little 
 girl was one who was working for $7 a week? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. That was a pretty poor job? 
 
 A. That was a Department Store job. 
 
 Q. That is a pretty poor job? 
 
 A. Pretty poor? That was about the average for 
 a girl worker in the department stores. 
 
 Q. Do you know that girl? 
 
 A. I did not, but a friend of mine did know her in 
 Cleveland. 
 
 Q. And the friend of yours told you about it? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And they took two dollars a week from that 
 girl's salary? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. From that magnificent salary of $7 a week they 
 took the $2? 
 
 A. She subscribed two dollars. 
 
 Q. She subscribed two dollars? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. And then one day they took all the rest of it, 
 for the Red Cross? 
 
 A. She subscribed to the Red Cross that week. 
 
 Q. And she, I take it, with this magnificent job, 
 continued to work because she was afraid of losing it? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, she was rather a young girl, and for 
 a girl of her age, and experience, $7 a week was good 
 wages at that time. 
 
 Q. That was a good job, was it? 
 
 A. Well, it was about $7 a week at that time, which 
 
 142
 
 was about the average woman's wage. 
 
 Q. And the next one was a man with a family, 
 sick for three months, who was advised that it would 
 be wise for him to buy a liberty bond? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. Did you know that man? 
 
 A. I did, in Toledo. 
 
 Q. Did you know who advised him? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And did the man who advised him, advise him 
 it was a good thing, or bad, or what was the circum- 
 stances ? 
 
 A. It was his immediate superior in his depart- 
 ment. 
 
 Q. He came to him and told him that it would be 
 a good idea for him to buy a bond? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Is that all? 
 
 A. Bearing in mind, all the time, the fact that he 
 had ever before him what had happened to other peo- 
 ple who did not buy bonds, so he bought one. 
 
 Q. So that in that instance the man who was his 
 superior officer, or who was superior to him, came to 
 him and said, "I think it would be a good idea for 
 you to buy a bond?" 
 
 A. Something to that general effect. 
 
 Q. To the general effect? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, that is the idea, and that is conversa- 
 tion with the man who owns your job, remember that. 
 
 Q. Did the man who gave him this advice, know 
 about the fact of his financial difficulties? 
 
 A. I do not know. 
 
 Q. So far as you know, he was not aware of the 
 fact that this man was in debt, etc? 
 
 A. These matters are not taken into consideration 
 in these cases. 
 
 143
 
 Q. And they are not taken into consideration by 
 you in writing these things, in this pamphlet, are they, 
 that is you didn't make any investigation of those cir- 
 cumstances before writing this pamphlet? 
 
 A. I don't get you. I don't understand your ques- 
 tion. 
 
 Q. I say, you did not make any investigation of the 
 circumstances as to whether or not the man advised 
 the man who was advising this fellow to buy a bond, 
 knew of the man's finances, his financial position? 
 
 A. I did not. 
 
 Q. Before you wrote the pamphlet? 
 
 A. I did not. 
 
 Q. So that you base this statement, practically, 
 upon personal knowledge of possibly twenty to forty 
 or possibly one hundred cases? 
 
 A. And the stories that were being told. 
 
 Q. Whereas the total number of subscribers were 
 several millions? 
 
 A. And the stories that were being told in the 
 newspapers and the Socialist paper, and some of them 
 were in the New York "Call," and other papers that 
 were telling the truth at that time. 
 
 Q. You believe everything that you read in the 
 "Call?" 
 
 A. I don't believe everything I read in any news- 
 paper. 
 
 Q. Not even in the "Call?" 
 
 A. Not even in the "Call." 
 
 Q. Well, you must have felt very sorry for these 
 poor people all over the country who had been com- 
 pelled to buy bonds? 
 
 A. That is the reason I wrote this pamphlet. 
 
 Q. You felt very sorry for them ? 
 
 A. I thought that they had been seriously imposed 
 on, yes, sir. 
 
 144
 
 Q. And yet you wanted the Government to repu- 
 diate the bonds, didn't you? 
 
 A. Repudiation of bonds 
 
 Q. Didn't you want the Government to repudiate 
 the Liberty Loan, and didn't you so testify this morn- 
 ing? 
 
 A. I made no such statement, I said simply that 
 the Socialist Party believed in the repudiation of all 
 forms of indebtedness, and any indebtedness that en- 
 abled someone to live on other people's labors, and 
 that included any form of indebtedness, whether pub- 
 lic or private. 
 
 Q. And that involved these people whom you were 
 telling us about here, who were compelled to buy these 
 bonds ? And you would like to see a government in the 
 United States, that would repudiate the First Liberty 
 Loan, wouldn't you? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : I object. 
 
 A. That loan and all loans, public and private. 
 
 Q. In spite of the fact that that loan is held, as 
 you have testified it was your belief, by millions of 
 people who bought it under coercion? 
 
 A. A tiny fraction of it is held by them, the vast 
 majority of it is held by the rich people, in my judg- 
 ment. 
 
 These three and one-half per cent, bonds have been 
 bought up in the past months by the rich people from 
 those who originally bought them, bought up by these 
 wealthy people for the purpose of escaping taxation. 
 
 Q. And it was disposed of by these same people at 
 a pretty good figure, wasn't it? 
 
 A. Some of them were, I guess. 
 
 Q. Now on the next page, you state : 
 
 "When the Conscription Bill was introduced in the 
 Congress, there was a general feeing throughout the 
 
 145
 
 country that it would not pass. Even the press hesi- 
 tated, so un-American was this bill, which clearly vio- 
 lated the spirit of the Constitution, and the traditions 
 of American life." 
 
 Are you aware of the fact that the constitutionality 
 of the Selective Draft Act has been sustained by every 
 court before which it has been tried? 
 
 A. I am sir, but that does not in any way change 
 my opinion of the bill. 
 
 Q. You, of course, are not trained in the law? 
 
 A. No, sir, but I have read the Constitution. 
 
 Q. You read to us yesterday from the speech by 
 Daniel Webster, in the House of Representatives in 
 1814? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And Judge Mayer brought out that that speech 
 was made during a debate, the first day of the debate, 
 I believe, upon that bill? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. And Daniel Webster told them that 
 if they passed the bill he would go back and tell his 
 constituents to refuse to support it. 
 
 Q. He did? 
 
 A. He did. 
 
 Q. Were you under the impression you were fol- 
 lowing in the steps of Daniel Webster during the Sum- 
 mer of 1917? 
 
 A. No, sir, I was not under the impression that I 
 was impersonating Webster. But he was interpreting 
 the Constitution, as I understood the Constitution, and 
 I thought he was a good constitutional lawyer, and 
 knew what he was talking about, and it sounded 
 sensible to me, and I believed that it was sensible. 
 
 Q. Do you think it is the proper action for a man 
 to take, to go back to his constituents and tell them 
 not to obey anything that has become a law, that has 
 been passed by Congress? 
 
 146
 
 A. It is entirely up to the man himself, what he 
 shall do. 
 
 O. I say, do you approve of that? 
 
 A. Do you mean, did I approve of it in Daniel 
 Webster's case? 
 
 Q. Yes. 
 
 A. If I felt that way, I would do exactly the same 
 thing, in other words, I would live up to my beliefs. 
 
 BY THE COURT: 
 
 Q. The question that the District Attorney asked 
 you was whether you favored that position, if it was 
 so taken by Mr. Webster? 
 
 A. I answered, sir, that I believed that a man must 
 live up to his convictions, and that if Mr. Webster 
 believed that, it was up to him to go and do it. If you 
 ask me whether I would go home and urge my 
 constituents to violate the law, in that case I answer 
 I cannot tell ; as I feel at present I would not. 
 
 BY MR. BARNES: 
 
 Q. Let us have that speech of Daniel Webster. 
 I want to see the language he used. 
 
 A. "I would ask, sir, whether the supporters of these 
 measures have well weighed the difficulties of their under- 
 taking. Have they considered whether it will be found 
 easy to execute laws which bear such marks of despotism 
 on their front, and which will be so productive of every 
 thought and degree of misery in their execution? For one, 
 sir, I hesitate not to say that they cannot be executed. No 
 law professedly passed for the purpose of compelling a ser- 
 vice in the regular army, not any law, which under the color 
 of military draft shall compel men to serve in the army, 
 not for the emergencies mentioned in the constitution, but 
 for longer periods than for the general objects of the war, 
 can be carried into effect. The operation of measures thus 
 unconstitutional and illegal, ought to be prevented by a 
 resort to other measures which are both constitutional and 
 legal. It will be the solemn duty of the state governments 
 to protect their own authority over their own militia, and 
 to interpose between their citizens and arbitrary power. 
 
 147
 
 These are among the objects for which the state govern- 
 ments exist, and their highest obligations bind them to the 
 preservation of their own rights and liberties of their people. 
 I express the sentiments here, sir, because I shall express 
 them to my constituents. Both they and myself live under 
 a constitution which teaches us that 'the doctrine of firm 
 resistance against arbitrary power and oppression is absurd, 
 slavish, and destructive of the good and happiness of man- 
 kind' with the same earnestness with which I now exhort 
 you to forbear from these measures, I shall exhort them to 
 exercise their unquestionable right of providing for the 
 security of their liberties." 
 
 And as I understand that, he meant that he would 
 exhort his state government to oppose the national 
 government in the enforcement of this law. 
 
 Q. Well, did you understand him to mean by that, 
 that he would exhort them to refuse to obey the law, 
 or counsel them to fight it in a legal manner through 
 the courts? 
 
 THE WITNESS: May I see the pamphlet? 
 (handed witness). 
 
 "Laws, sir, of this nature can create nothing but oppo- 
 sition. If you scatter them abroad like the fabled 
 serpent's teeth, they will spring up into armed men. A 
 military force cannot be raised in this manner but by the 
 means of a military force. If the administration has found 
 that it cannot form an army without conscription, it w 11 
 find, if it venture on these experiments, that it cannot en- 
 force conscription without an army." 
 
 Now if that does not support my statement, then 
 the further statement that I read awhile ago, that 
 "these laws, if passed, cannot be executed," seems to 
 me does warrant the statement that I made that Mr. 
 Webster proposed to go back home and agitate for 
 resistance to this law. 
 
 Q. Now on page 29 you quote from the Chicago 
 Tribune of June 6th, the day following registration, 
 to the effect that the. "draft success puts new life in 
 New York market." Did you follow the prices on the 
 
 148
 
 Stock Market, or do you follow them, or have you fol- 
 lowed them during this period of time, from 1906 on 
 down to date? 
 
 A. To the present time? 
 
 Q. Yes. 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. You are aware, are you not, that prices of 
 stocks reached their highest point about the 1st of 
 December 1916? 
 
 A. Thereabouts, yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And that during December, Secretary Lansing 
 made a statement, that we were on the verge of war. 
 Do you remember that? 
 
 A. I don't recall that. No, sir. 
 
 Q. And that there was a break in the market im- 
 mediately following that statement? 
 
 A. I don't recall that incident. No, sir. 
 
 Q. Now is it not true there was a break in the 
 market about the 2nd of February, at the time of the 
 severing of the diplomatic relations? 
 
 A. I quoted this from the Wall Street Digest, yes- 
 terday, "The upward movement in the price of stocks 
 dates from the day that the German Ambassador at 
 Washington, was handed his passports and although 
 there have been slight temporary reactions, the move- 
 ment has been fairly continuous from that day to this." 
 
 Q. Was not there a break in the Stock Market, 
 quite a violent break on the date that the German Am- 
 bassador was handed his passports? 
 
 A. This, that I was quoting you here, was from the 
 official organ of the Street, and tells of the general 
 tendency of the stock. 
 
 Q. Was not there a violent break on that date, and 
 was not there a drop of ten points in Steel? 
 
 A. I don't remember that. 
 
 Q. You don't remember that? 
 
 140
 
 A. I don't remember that, I am simply quoting you 
 from this statement here. 
 
 Q. On page 39, the second paragraph, you say : 
 
 "By July, 1917, the billboard enlistment campaign was 
 couched in such words as 'The Regulars are in France, 
 Join them Now.' 'Enlist immediately so as to fight on 
 German and not on the United States soil.' The German 
 autocracy was on the defensive; the American plutocracy 
 had become the aggressor. The regular army had already 
 been transported four thousand miles and a conscript army 
 of a million men was in process of formation to wage an 
 aggressive war in the interests of the British ruling classes." 
 
 Now, up to this point, as I understood your argu- 
 ment, the war was in the interest of the American 
 ruling classes. Do you mean by that, that they were 
 mistaken, and it was for the British ruling classes, or 
 do you mean by that, that they were all working to- 
 gether? 
 
 A. I should say, sir, that the American banking and 
 financial interests came to the rescue of the British 
 banking and financial interests. 
 
 Q. So that the American plutocracy had got us 
 into this war and did it to help the British ruling 
 classes? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, they came to the rescue of the Birtish 
 financiers when they were at the breaking point, as 
 I stated at an earlier section. Certainly it was a dis- 
 tinct help to the ruling classes of Great Britain when 
 we joined hands with them. 
 
 BY THE COURT: 
 
 Q. Let me inject a question : When you wrote this 
 about this advertising as seen on these various bill- 
 boards, where was that? 
 
 A. That was in Toledo. 
 
 Q. I say, you had seen these billboards? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. Those billboards, putting- the matter briefly, 
 were appealing- to enlist? 
 
 150
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. That is to say, to enter voluntarily, as distin- 
 guished from entering under the Selective Service 
 Law? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 O. And were there many such billboards in 
 Toledo? 
 
 A. Well, they had one by the old post office and 
 one by the new post office. 
 
 Q. In other words, it was pretty generally plac- 
 arded? 
 
 A. Quite generally. 
 
 Q. Did they have recruiting stations? 
 
 A. Oh, yes, 
 
 Q. With men in the service of the Government, 
 endeavoring to get volunteers? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Did you hear addresses in public places by 
 civilians and soldiers, appealing to persons to enlist? 
 
 A. I don't think there were any such meetings 
 going on, no. 
 
 Q. There was a general campaign? 
 
 A. There was a billboard campaign. 
 
 Q. All over the town? 
 
 A. All over the city, and the reason that I put it 
 in here was because it was a campaign requesting men 
 to enlist for the foreign war. 
 
 Q. And before you wrote "The Great Madness" did 
 you see similar billboards in other parts of the coun- 
 try that you were in, do you claim that? 
 
 A. Probably, but I do not remember. 
 
 Q. You have no doubt they were in other parts of 
 the country? 
 
 A. I presume there were, yes. 
 
 BY MR. BARNES : 
 
 Q. Now the next chapter is on page 40, entitled, 
 
 151
 
 "Root and Balfour," and you speak there of it is near 
 the bottom of the page "Elihu Root was sent to the 
 democracy of Russia to warn them not to go too far 
 in the direction of their democratic ambitions and 
 ideals." You are referring there to the commission 
 that was sent over by the Federal Government, the 
 Federal Commission? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, to the Revolutionary Government. 
 
 Q. One of the members of the Commission was a 
 Socialist was he not, Mr. Russell? 
 
 A. He was, yes, sir. 
 
 Q. Now he was the candidate of the Socialist Party 
 for the Presidency of the United States, wasn't he? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : I beg your pardon, it was for 
 the Governorship of New York State. 
 
 Q. The Governorship of New York State? 
 
 A. He was. 
 
 Q. At any rate he was a prominent Socialist? 
 
 A. He was, yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And what information or data did you have, 
 what inside "dope" as we might say, Mr. Nearing, on 
 which you based your statements that Root was sent 
 there to warn them not to go too far in the direction 
 of their democratic ambitions and ideals? 
 
 A. Well, I had the speeches that Root and the 
 other members of the Commission are reported to have 
 made after they had got over there. 
 
 Q. Now at page 42 you were telling us what the 
 American business interests had won, you say : "They 
 had won the right to send a million Americans to the 
 trenches of France to fight for the poor Belgians, for 
 Lombard Street, Wall Street, and King George of 
 England." Lombard Street what do you infer by 
 that? 
 
 A. I mean the financial section of England. 
 
 Q. That is the Wall Street of England, I suppose? 
 
 152
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 O. And the next, you say in the next paragraph : 
 
 "They had established a spirit that permitted chil- 
 dren to go back into the factories from which years of 
 incessant labor had rescued them ; women to take 
 men's jobs at a fraction of the wage, and the standards 
 surrounding the labor of men to be lowered." 
 
 Now will you please tell us what data you based 
 that on? 
 
 A. I based that on the data well, there are three 
 different statements there. 
 
 Q. All right, take the first one : "Children to go 
 back into the factories." 
 
 A. The first statement, or rather the yes, the first 
 statement was based on the fact that immediately after 
 war was declared there was a general campaign in- 
 augrated all over the country in the big industrial 
 states, to abrogate the law, set aside the laws regard- 
 ing the work of women and children, and the Federal 
 Children's Bureau and the National Child Labor Com- 
 mittee both went into that question and both of them 
 made reports regarding the increase of the employ- 
 ment of children. 
 
 Concerning the second statement regarding the 
 wages of women, the committee presented data of the 
 situation in that regard, showing that women entered 
 into these various situations at a wage scale much 
 lower than that which was the standard wage of the 
 men. 
 
 And the statement as regards the excessive hours of 
 labor and the like, referred to war work that was being 
 done overtime. 
 
 Q. Now are you familiar with the article in the 
 American Labor Year Book of 1917-1918 at pages 16, 
 17 to 20, by Mr. Solon DeLeon, which covers these 
 particular questions? 
 
 A. No, sir, I am not familiar with it. 
 153
 
 Q. Well, are you familiar with the attitude taken 
 by President Wilson and by the Federal authorities 
 with regard to this lowering of standards of labor, and 
 the employment of child labor in the factories, and the 
 use of women at a fraction of the wage? You are 
 familiar with that? 
 
 A. As I recall, they were strongly opposed to it. 
 
 Q. They did successfully oppose it? 
 
 A. They did not successfully oppose it. 
 
 Q. They did as far as the Federal enactment was 
 concerned ? 
 
 A. They did not oppose it as far as the factories 
 were concerned. 
 
 Q. Did not they as far as the Federal law was con- 
 cerned ? 
 
 A. That I do not know ; but I know that statistics 
 have recently appeared covering that particular period, 
 showing that child labor has increased decidedly dur- 
 ing the war. I might also say that the minimum 
 standards of the working classes have been lowered 
 also. 
 
 Q. Do you know there has been any systematic 
 lowering of it ? 
 
 A. There has, yes, sir. 
 
 Q. In the factories, do you mean? 
 
 A. Yes, the child labor, especially in factories, has 
 increased greatly. 
 
 Q. Are you aware of the fact that Governor Whit- 
 man of New York vetoed a bill, the Brown Bill, on that 
 same subject? 
 
 A. I don't remember when he vetoed the bill. 
 
 Q. Then this article in the American Labor Year 
 Book which covers the period from March to Septem- 
 ber, is not, or is it, in your opinion, an exhaustive 
 statement of the legislation on these points? 
 
 A. Well, sir, I have not read it and I cannot say. 
 
 154
 
 Q. How many states were there that altered their 
 laws to your knowledge? 
 
 A. That I do not remember. 
 
 Q. Well, what States did? 
 
 A. I have not the data, I could not give you any 
 particular case. 
 
 Q. Of course the labor authorities did oppose it 
 vigorously, did they not? 
 
 A. Oh, yes, you mean the labor unions? 
 
 Q. Yes. 
 
 A. Well, I assume so, yes. 
 
 Q. Well, they did, didn't they? Don't you remem- 
 ber they did? 
 
 A. Well, there was opposition, I don't remember 
 whether they did it. 
 
 Q. Did you know that on April 7th, the Council 
 of National Defense approved resolutions drawn up 
 by the advisory committee on labor, of its advisory 
 commission, urging upon the legislatures of the States 
 as well as all administrative agencies charged with the 
 enforcement of labor and health laws, the great duty 
 of rigorously maintaining the existing safeguards as 
 to the health and the welfare of the workers; but also 
 urging upon the legislatures that before final adjourn- 
 ment they delegate to the Governors of their respec- 
 tive States, the power to suspend or modify restric- 
 tions contained in their labor laws, when requested by 
 the Council ? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: You are reading from page 
 what? 
 
 MR. BARNES : Page 16, at the bottom of the page. 
 
 Q. Did you know that? 
 
 A. No, sir, I don't remember this, not these spe- 
 cific details. 
 
 Q. Did you know that on April 23rd the "Secre- 
 tary of Labor Wilson had a conference of Cabinet 
 
 155
 
 Officers and Labor representatives, explained the posi- 
 tion of the Council of National Defense to be that the 
 standards that have been established by law, by mutual 
 agreement or by custom, should not be changed at this 
 time." Did you know that? 
 
 A. I said that I knew that the Government took 
 that position, I didn't remember the specific details. 
 
 Q'. Did you know that Secretary Daniels had taken 
 the same position? 
 
 A. I do not remember the special officials. I know 
 the Government officially took that position. 
 
 BY THE COURT: 
 
 Q. Prior to your writing the publication, "The 
 Great Madness," did you know of any law that had 
 passed the Congress of the United States which in 
 any manner had changed the wage standards of labor- 
 ing people? 
 
 A. No, I believe Congress passed no such law. 
 
 BY MR. BARNES: 
 
 Q. As a matter of fact, Congress did pass a Child 
 Labor Law, did it not, which was afterwards declared 
 unconstitutional ? 
 
 A. I think that was passed before the 1916 Elec- 
 tion, because I think that the Democrats used that in 
 their election propaganda. 
 
 Q. I think you are right. It was before between 
 1914 and 1916? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, I think about in 1916. 
 
 Q. Now, at the bottom of page 43, Mr. Nearing, 
 you say, "Today, in all parts of the United States they 
 are banding themselves together politically and in- 
 dustrially. They are organizing. They propose to 
 make the world safe for democracy." Whom did 
 you mean by "they"? 
 
 A. That is answered in the paragraph above 
 "The People of the United States." 
 
 Q. The people of the United States? 
 156
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And to what political and industrial bands or 
 organizations do you refer when you said they were 
 organizing? 
 
 A. Why, I was referring to the growth at that time 
 of the Socialist Party in membership, it was growing 
 at that time, and to the growth of the trade unions, 
 they had grown, and they were growing a great deal 
 at that time, and have grown very much since, also 
 to the growth of the Non-Partisan League, the Farm- 
 ers' movement, which was growing very rapidly at 
 that time. 
 
 Q. Now you say at the top of the next page, "The 
 struggle must begin in the United States." Did you 
 mean by that, that the pressure of the plutocrats in 
 the United States was the first step that the people 
 were to take to make the world safe for democracy? 
 
 A. Yes, sir; if we are going to have democracy in 
 the world, we have got to begin at home and have it 
 at home. 
 
 Q. Did you mean that they should undertake that 
 immediately or that they should wait until the end of 
 the war? 
 
 A. Well, in my judgment, the war is an incident 
 to the economic conflict, because I believed the work- 
 ing class had to keep on, during the war and before 
 the war and after the war, in preserving their own 
 standards and safeguarding their own rights. 
 
 Q. You mean then that they should undertake that 
 while the war was on, or whether they should post- 
 pone it until the war was over? 
 
 A. Certainly, they should work at it all the time. 
 The problem of establishing industrial democracy is 
 a problem that goes on continually with the wage 
 earner; it has gone on before the war, it has gone on 
 during the war and it has gone on since. 
 
 157
 
 Q. And when you sent this manuscript, "The Great 
 Madness" to the Rand School, you realized if it was 
 published, it would be distributed and circulated, 
 didn't you? Throughout the country, didn't you? 
 
 A. Certainly. 
 
 Q. And that it would come into the hands of men 
 who were subject to induction into the army under 
 the Selective Service Act, men between twenty-one 
 and thirty? 
 
 A. I suppose so. 
 
 Q. And you wanted to persuade your readers to 
 your own point of view about the war, didn't you? 
 
 A. I wanted to present to my readers my opinion 
 regarding the whole incident of the war, yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And you did that for the purpose of persuading 
 them? 
 
 A. If they saw it my way, I expected them to ac- 
 cept it. 
 
 Q. And you wanted them to accept it, didn't you? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. You wanted them to believe this way, that this 
 was an unjust war, didn't you? 
 
 A. I wanted them to believe that this was a cap- 
 italist war. 
 
 Q. And that it was an unjust war? 
 
 A. As all wars are unjust, yes. 
 
 Q. You wanted them to believe that it was waged 
 in the interests of selfish plutocratic classes, didn't 
 
 you 
 
 A. Primarily so, yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And that it was not a war to make the world 
 safe for democracy, was not that what you wanted 
 them to believe, that it was not a war to make the 
 world safe for democracy? 
 
 A. I did not then believe that it was a war to make 
 the world safe for democracy, and I wanted other 
 
 158
 
 people to see that it was not a war to make the world 
 safe for democracy. 
 
 Q. You wanted these people to read your pamph- 
 lets? 
 
 A. I wanted the people to read the pamphlets and 
 realize that it was a war that was being continued by 
 the plutocrats, and for their own selfish ends to fasten 
 their hold on the American people. 
 
 Q. And you used the best arguments that occurred 
 to you to prove your point? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, I got the best data I could. 
 
 Q. Did it occur to you that you might persuade 
 some of your readers to your point of view? 
 
 A. I hoped somebody, after they read it, would see 
 my point of view. 
 
 Q. You thought they would, didn't you? 
 
 A. They usually do, some of them. 
 
 Q. You thought your arguments were pretty good, 
 didn't you? 
 
 A. I still think so, and I did then. 
 
 Q. Was it your belief, or was it not your belief, 
 that if it might persuade, that is, if you might persuade 
 by your pamphlets, some of these people to your point 
 of view with regard to the war, men who were within 
 the draft age, and who were subsequently inducted 
 into the army, that they would become insubordinate? 
 
 A. I should say on the contrary, sir, that the mil- 
 lions of socialists who fought in this war, and who 
 held that view, were not any less insubordinate than 
 the other fellows, certainly not more so. 
 
 Q. Yes, but I know, they were not American sol- 
 diers, were they? 
 
 A. No, but a Socialist is a Socialist, whether he 
 speaks American or French. The Socialists who had 
 been fighting in the war, to my knowledge, were just 
 as reliable as the other fellows they were fighting with 
 
 159
 
 in the war. I see no reason to believe that a man who 
 had these convictions would make any worse soldier 
 I think he would make a whole lot better brother for 
 the great brotherhood that is coming later on in the 
 world but I do not know that he would be any worse 
 as a soldier in this country. 
 
 Q. Don't you think and didn't you think that a 
 man believing this way, that the war was a selfish 
 capitalistic war for the capitalistic interests, and that 
 he was being brought into it, that he would be apt 
 to be disloyal to his country, in the sense of the word 
 ordinarily used, of the word disloyalty? 
 
 A. On the contrary, I know many men who were 
 drafted and went, and others that certainly had that 
 point of view in their minds. 
 
 Q. And you did hope, that by reading this, they 
 would get your point of view about the war then, and 
 then you say you think that they would be just as 
 loyal soldiers? 
 
 A. I was not attempting to make either loyal sol- 
 diers or disloyal soldiers. 
 
 Q. I didn't ask you that sir, I asked you whether 
 you gave any thought to the subject? 
 
 A. I don't recall that I did. 
 
 Q. Then you did not think anything about it? 
 
 A. I don't recall that I did. 
 
 Q. Did you not believe, Mr. Nearing, that this 
 pamphlet would probably fall into the hands of men 
 who were debating as to whether or not they would 
 enlist in the army, voluntarily? 
 x A. I had no such knowledge either way. 
 
 Q. Didn't you think about it? 
 
 A. I do not recall that I did. 
 
 Q. That never occurred to you, is that right, it 
 never occurred to you? 
 
 A. I don't recall that it did. I might say again, 
 
 160
 
 Mr. Barnes, that I wrote this pamphlet, to try to edu- 
 cate people. I had no particular point of view with 
 regard to men or persuading soldiers or anybody else, 
 I wanted the people to understand what was going on. 
 
 Q. But you would feel, would you not, that if this 
 were to fall into the hands of a man who was con- 
 templating enlisting, was turning the matter over in 
 his mind, and he was persuaded by your arguments, 
 he would not enlist, you feel that way about it? That 
 would be its natural effect, wouldn't it? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : I want to object to that as in- 
 competent, irrelevant and immaterial, and improper. 
 
 THE COURT: He may ask him if that was his 
 belief. Did you so believe? 
 
 THE WITNESS: I don't recall that I had any 
 such belief, no, sir. In other words, I was not aiming 
 this pamphlet particularly at the army. If I had been, 
 I would have printed a different kind of leaflet. I 
 would not have sold it through the Rand School where 
 it went out for general circulation to a very small num- 
 ber of people, about 20,000. 
 
 Q. Went out to a group of people, however, who 
 were subject to the draft? 
 
 A. Possibly. I was not in a position to know 
 whether they were or not, sir. 
 
 Q. To a group of people who would be eligible to 
 enlist? 
 
 A. Possibly. I was not in a position to know that 
 either, any more than I would know whether one of 
 my text-books would be read by man, woman or child, 
 whether they were under forty years of age, or over 
 forty years of age. 
 
 Q. Do not you know, that most of the Socialists in 
 this country are between the ages of 18 and 40 years? 
 
 A. I have not ever seen a statement as to their 
 ages. 
 
 161
 
 Q. Don't you know that as a matter of fact, that 
 most of the Socialists in this country are between 18 
 and 45? 
 
 A. Most of the people in this country are between 
 18 and 45. 
 
 Q. And most of the people who are in the circle 
 of your acquaintance are between the ages of 18 and 
 45? 
 
 A. I am also between 18 and 45. 
 
 Q. And so am I. 
 
 A. And most of your friends are between 18 and 
 45 then, I may assume. 
 
 Q. You still feel that you were right in the position 
 you took, in this pamphlet, Mr. Nearing? 
 
 A. I certainly believe I do believe that the Amer- 
 ican plutocracy wanted the war, and they advocated 
 it, and made the war, and they had the war, and it was 
 an imperialistic war, for the purpose of enhancing the 
 imperialistic point of view in the United States. 
 
 Q. You still believe, do you, that you were right 
 in the position that you took in this pamphlet? 
 
 A. That was the position of the pamphlet. 
 
 Q. Cannot you answer the question yes or no. 
 then? 
 
 A. Well, the trouble in answering a question like 
 that yes or no, is that my own position in the pamphlet 
 may be is not clear, and I wanted to state my position 
 in the pamphlet. 
 
 Q. You think that your position in the pamphlet 
 is not clear? 
 
 A. It seemed to me that it was, sir. 
 
 Q. I think it is very clear. You still believe you 
 were right in the efforts you made to spread this view 
 among the people during the Summer of 1917? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, I believe that is the correct view, for 
 the people of the United States to take. 
 
 162
 
 Q. You think you were right in spreading it? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: He has said so. 
 
 THE COURT: He has not yet. 
 
 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir, I thought I said yes. 
 
 O. Well, would you again, in case we had another 
 war, advise them in the same way? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: Oh, I object to that as highly 
 speculative as to whether he would do it again. 
 'THE COURT: Objection sustained. 
 
 MR. BARNES: That is all. 
 
 THE COURT : I will ask you a few questions so 
 that you may on redirect ask him any questions that 
 you desire. 
 
 BY THE COURT: 
 
 Q. Now, did you follow, that is, with reasonable 
 care, the different events, such as the declaration of 
 war and the passage of the selective draft act, etc.? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, I followed them very carefully. 
 
 Q. Very well. Now, of course, you realized, when 
 you wrote this pamphlet, that war had been declared, 
 on the 6th day of April 1917? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. You remembered, when the selective draft law 
 was passed and became an act? Perhaps I can help 
 you. Was it May 18, 1917? 
 
 A. Yes, I remember the 5th day of June was the 
 registration yes, May, 1917. 
 
 Q. And you remember that under the statute, the 
 5th day of June, 1917, was designated as the day for 
 registration of those subject to the draft under the 
 Presidential rules and proclamations? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And that the method of draft was, to briefly 
 state it, choose the men by numbers which were 
 chosen by lot? 
 
 A. Yes, sir.
 
 Q. And that there was an elaborate machinery, 
 which was arranged by the appropriate federal offi- 
 cials in respect to the induction of men into the army, 
 that is to say, local boards, district boards, and the 
 Provost Marshal's rules and regulations, and the like? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And do you know when the actual induction 
 into the army began under the selective draft law? 
 
 A. I do not remember, sir. 
 
 Q. Well, you recall it began, if my recollection 
 is right, in September, 1917, is that correct? 
 
 MR. BARNES: I think it is in August, probably 
 the end of August or beginning of September. 
 
 Q. Well, August or September, then you remem- 
 ber that, do you not? 
 
 A. I noticed it at the time ; I do not recall the date. 
 
 Q. Now intervening the time, between the passage 
 of the Selective Draft Act and the time that you wrote 
 "The Great Madness" had you noticed that there were 
 appeals for the enlistment and volunteer service I 
 think you gave some statement about that. 
 
 A. I noticed it, yes. 
 
 Q. And during that summer, where were you? In 
 the early part in Toledo and in the later part in Chau- 
 tauqua, New York? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. At some time, to some extent you knew, I as- 
 sume, that the Government was doing all in its power 
 to get men to go into the army forces, the military and 
 the naval, through the agency of voluntary enlistment, 
 did you not? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And that method was carried out by the bill- 
 board advertisement type of campaign that you have 
 referred to, and by public meetings, was it not? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 164
 
 Q. And at these public meetings, various persons 
 spoke to the point of endeavoring to have persons vol- 
 unteer and enlist? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. Did you know that while there was a general 
 concurrence in spirit and action throughout the coun- 
 try, of obedience to the Selective Service Act, that 
 there were some who were disposed to dispute it? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. Had you kept in touch, and any track of the 
 public trials of those who were charged with disobedi- 
 ence in one form or another of that act? 
 
 A. Why, I don't recall that any came before the 
 writing of this pamphlet. Of course, I have observed 
 the conscientious objector since, I don't know 
 whether the issue had been raised then or not. 
 
 Q. Well, there were some, but that is neither here 
 nor there. Well, did you know that there were those 
 throughout the country who were not obeying the 
 law, but who were acting in opposition to the act? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And did you have all of this information to 
 which I have referred in my questions, and which you 
 have answered, before you, or in your mind, at the 
 time that you wrote this pamphlet? 
 
 A. Probably, yes, sir. 
 
 Q. I mean to say, you were fully cognizant of that 
 situation? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And did you have any knowledge as to whether 
 there were any males of any age, who were in the 
 mental position of doubt in regard as to what course 
 they should pursue in respect of service in the army? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : That I want to object to as in- 
 competent. 
 
 THE COURT: He can say yes or no. 
 
 165
 
 MR. STEDMAN: Exception. 
 
 A. Yes, sir, I did know that fact. 
 
 Q. Had any such persons come within your per- 
 sonal observation? 
 
 A. They had. 
 
 Q. That is to say, you know actually, male human 
 beings who were, to put the matter in colloquial lan- 
 guage, "on the fence" as to service? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : Just a moment, do not answer 
 until I get a chance to object to the questions, espe- 
 cially those that relate to special incidents. I would 
 like to have the benefit of an objection to that last 
 answer if I may have, which I suppose will be over- 
 ruled and then I would like the benefit of an exception. 
 I am objecting to the special instance that may be in 
 a man's mind. 
 
 THE COURT: Very well. We will put it gen- 
 erally. 
 
 Q. What was your general information, of action 
 taken by John Jones, or by Peter Smith? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : The point I have in mind is this, 
 that a man might know someone among his acquaint- 
 ances, he might be writing a book, and he might im- 
 personate that man, and that would suggest the answer 
 to any such suggestion as that. 
 
 THE COURT : I think you may be right as to that 
 and that is the reason I changed the question to the 
 general question. 
 
 Q. Was it your belief at the time that there were 
 those in the country, repeating the colloquial expres- 
 sion, who were "on the fence" as to whether or not 
 they should volunteer and enlist in the armed forces 
 of the United States? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. That is your belief? 
 
 166
 
 A. Yes, sir, that there were such people. 
 
 Q. That there were such people? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Do you know whether or not there were people 
 who were, for one reason or another, resisting the 
 Selective Service Act, refusing, upon one ground or 
 another, to obey its provisions, insofar as induction 
 into the service was concerned? 
 
 A. Yes, I remember that particularly in the South- 
 west. 
 
 Q. You knew there were such? 
 
 A. There was such agitation. 
 
 Q. By knowing, of course, I mean in this case in- 
 formation that you gathered from reading the papers, 
 of conversations, or any other method of getting in- 
 formation? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. Did you believe at this time, that there were 
 people in the United States, who were resisting, I 
 don't mean resisting by argument, I mean actually re- 
 sisting by refusal to obey the selective service act upon 
 one ground or another? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, there were such, I believe, particularly 
 in the Southwest. There was a great deal of agitation 
 at that time. 
 
 Q. Did you have any such information, that is, of 
 such position on the part of the persons subject to the 
 provisions of the act in other parts v of the country? 
 
 A. I think the Becker trial took place in New York, 
 I don't remember when. I remember that specifically, 
 that is a case, but I do not remember whether there 
 were any other illustrations that came up at that time 
 or not. 
 
 Q. You are now referring to the trial of Becker 
 and Kramer? 
 
 A. Becker and Kramer. 
 
 167
 
 Q. Do you remember any other public trial ? 
 
 A. I suppose there were trials at the time, but I 
 have forgotten. 
 
 Q. There were, if I understand you correctly, at 
 the time you wrote "The Great Madness" that is, that 
 you knew that fact, that that was a fact at that time, 
 and it was your belief that there were in the country 
 those who opposed by refusal to obey the selective 
 draft act and those who were debating whether or not 
 they would volunteer or enlist in the armed forces ? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 DIRECT EXAMINATION BY MR. STEDMAN : 
 
 Q. You wrote that pamphlet when? 
 
 A. Probably in June, July, and August. 
 
 Q. The Becker trial took place in September, three 
 months after, so you did not have that in mind? 
 
 THE COURT : You are not correct as to that, you 
 are in error as to that statement. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: When was it? 
 
 THE COURT: The Becker trial took place in 
 July of 1917. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: What part of July, do you 
 know ? 
 
 THE COURT : It was either at the end of June or 
 the early part of July. 
 
 A. I might say, Mr. Stedman, that I do not recall 
 those events in the Summer in any clear sequence. I 
 remember instances, but I do not remember the se- 
 quence. 
 
 Q. The resistance in the Southwest, I suppose you 
 have in mind the instance in Oklahoma, haven't you? 
 
 A. I think it was in Oklahoma. 
 
 Q. Do you know when that took place? 
 
 A. I don't remember. 
 
 Q. You don't remember whether it was before this 
 pamphlet was ever printed or not, do you? 
 
 168
 
 A. No, sir. 
 
 Q. Do you recall now that you had that intent in 
 mind, at the time you were writing any part or portion 
 of "The Great Madness"? 
 
 A. No, sir. 
 
 Q. The registration was in June, on June 5th, and 
 the first call was in August. Let me ask you whether 
 the incident in Oklahoma of the dozen or two who had 
 resisted there, was not after the call? 
 
 A. Well, I do not know. I have no recollection as 
 to the exact date. I have a recollection that the papers 
 carried a great many stories, I think it was about 
 Arkansas and Oklahoma. I remember reading the 
 stories, but I do not remember the dates. 
 
 Q. Now then, referring to the people that you in- 
 quired about, who were "on the fence." Were they 
 on the fence, to your knowledge, because of any judg- 
 ment based upon the cause or the reasons of the war, 
 or because of conscientious doubts, or by reason of 
 fear or other things of that sort? 
 
 A. I knew a number of people who have since be- 
 come conscientious objectors, who were then not con- 
 scientious objectors. 
 
 Q. And a conscientious objector would not be 
 caused by your pamphlet? 
 
 A. I am saying, that I took the position through- 
 out of always refusing to advise anybody. I stated 
 and I stated this to Government agents, who came and 
 asked my advice, that I did not that I would not ad- 
 vise any other man as to a matter of conduct in so 
 important a case. I carried that to the extent of never 
 advising a man even to jeopardize his job. I think it 
 is up to a man to make up his own mind on those mat- 
 ters. I think it is a matter on which he must come to 
 his own conclusions. 
 
 Q. You stated something about some of your evi- 
 
 169
 
 dence, that is some of the facts upon which you based 
 your pamphlet, not being here. Was your home raided 
 or searched? 
 
 A. By a United States Government official, yes, 
 sir. 
 
 MR. BARNES: You mean raided? What do you 
 mean by raided? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : I mean you came in and helped 
 yourself without so much as an invitation, or a sug- 
 gestion that you were violating a man's home or his 
 castle. 
 
 MR. BARNES: I object to any such questions. I 
 object to the question and move to strike it out. I 
 understood the term "raided" as he was using it, 
 meant to convey, searched by virtue of a search war- 
 rant. 
 
 THE WITNESS : They brought a search warrant 
 with twenty-six sections in it, Mr. Barnes. 
 
 THE COURT: The question can be amended so 
 as to limit the answer. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : I will change the question. 
 
 MR. BARNES: Was your home searched under a 
 warrant ? 
 
 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir, with twenty-six sec- 
 tions in the warrant. 
 
 Q. They came there with a warrant? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. And they took away, did they take anything 
 away with them? 
 
 A. I was not home at the time, I was in Chautau- 
 qua at the time, and my home was in Toledo, and they 
 took away a great deal of stuff. 
 
 Q. Any data that was used for this? Have you 
 asked them to return any of it? 
 
 A. They returned the material, about three, or four 
 months ago, I think. 
 
 170
 
 Q. Well, have you had occasion to go over the data 
 since its return, since they have returned the material ? 
 
 A. The material that they returned? 
 
 Q. Yes. 
 
 A. I have not. 
 
 MR. BARNES: Was there any of the data that I 
 asked you for on cross-examination in this stuff that 
 the employees of the Government took away from 
 you? 
 
 THE WITNESS: Probably not. I would like to 
 say in reply to that question, Mr. Barnes, that in writ- 
 ing a pamphlet of this character, I ordinarily have a 
 number of reference works like statistics and abstracts 
 and the World Almanac and various other reference 
 works, to refer to, and when I get together a particular 
 body of information I cannot say two years afterwards 
 where I got it all. 
 
 Q. Your attention was called this morning to a 
 paragraph in the platform of the Socialist Party. That 
 is distinguishable from the proclamation and war pro- 
 gram, is it not? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. Do you know whether that section that was 
 referred to, upon bonds, was eliminated from that 
 platform? 
 
 MR. BARNES : That is objected to as incompetent, 
 irrelevant and immaterial. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: You have read it as though it 
 was a necessary document to be introduced in this 
 case. 
 
 MR. BARNES: I have read a portion of it, and 
 I have asked him if he agreed with these various parts, 
 and asked him for his frame of mind in regard to them, 
 and it is immaterial whether the party changed his po- 
 sition on that or not later; we went into it simply to 
 get his frame of mind in 1917. 
 
 171
 
 THE COURT : I agree with your proposition. At 
 the same time, in order to clear the proposition up, 
 I will allow the answer. 
 
 Q. I will just ask you, Mr. N earing, do you know 
 whether, as a matter of fact, when that was circulated 
 by the party, that clause was omitted? 
 
 A. I believe it was; yes. 
 
 Q. I understand you to say, in regard to Webster, 
 I understand that while you would not adopt that 
 course as you understand it, yet the man was to do 
 what he personally thought was right? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, I think one of the most important 
 things is that a man should live up to his convictions. 
 
 Q. At the time you wrote "The Great Madness" 
 do you recollect that "The American Socialist" had a 
 circulation of a couple of hundred thousand ? 
 
 A. Something like that, yes, sir. 
 
 Q. Do you recall at that time, that is in August 
 particularly, or July, there were a large number of 
 meetings, at least in the Middle West and the West, 
 and petitions requesting Congress to repeal the Selec- 
 tive Draft Law? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. Do you know whether the petitions were quite 
 general ? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Do you know whether the pages of that paper 
 are open to you ? 
 
 A. "The American Socialist?" 
 
 Q. Yes. 
 
 A. They were. 
 
 Q. You could have written a pamphlet against 
 conscription I mean in opposition to the draft law, 
 or in opposition to recruiting and enlistment, and also 
 to the creating of insubordination and disloyalty, and 
 assuming that that accorded with the views of the 
 
 172
 
 publisher, they would have furnished you the avenue 
 of publication, wouldn't they? 
 
 MR. BARNES: I certainly object to that ques- 
 tion. 
 
 THE COURT : I do not see how that is material. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : It has this significance, I want 
 to call attention to the facilities for publishing his 
 views in a way that it would have gotten before the 
 public in a paper where in a publication of 46 pages, 
 in a leaflet, it would not, naturally get so fully into 
 the hands of the people who would be likely to resist 
 the selective act, or enlistment. If that was his pur- 
 pose, it would be done by a circulating medium that 
 would have 200,000 readers at least, and not such a 
 limited number. 
 
 THE COURT: Objection sustained on the ground 
 it is immaterial. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: And argumentative. 
 
 THE COURT: I am glad you added another 
 ground. 
 
 Q. Were there other papers at the time that you 
 were writing for? 
 
 A. Well, I do not write for any paper regularly, 
 but I wrote at intervals for a number of them. 
 
 Q. And your "Great Madness" was sold for ten 
 cents a copy, wasn't it? 
 
 A. I believe so, yes, sir. 
 
 Q. Speaking of Child Labor Laws, there were 
 quite a number introduced, that is, bills to repeal the 
 operation of the Child Labor Laws, weren't there? 
 
 A. They were quite generally introduced, yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And it was during the war? 
 
 A. Immediately after it broke out. 
 
 Q. And the Child Labor Law was declared uncon- 
 stitutional, that is, the National Child Labor Law? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 173
 
 Q. That was the law to prohibit interstate com- 
 merce in child labor manufactured articles? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 MR. BARNES: But it will be re-enacted again, 
 though. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : Oh, no, it will be in quite a dif- 
 ferent form. 
 
 MR. BARNES : For the same purpose, however. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : The court has not passed on it 
 yet ; it may go the same way as the other. 
 
 Q. You were asked a question this morning and 
 I want to call your attention to what you were asked 
 in regard to some council here, some Workingmen's 
 Council, or People's Council, and Mr. Barnes inter- 
 jected, following it along with a question, and 
 asked you whether you had any relation or kinship 
 with the Workingmen and Soldiers' Council in Russia? 
 
 MR. BARNES: I do not mean to charge that it 
 had any immediate relation. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : Was of the same character and 
 kind. 
 
 MR. BARNES : That is what I meant, yes. 
 
 Q. Do you know of any analogy between the two? 
 
 A. Why, as I stated this morning 
 
 Q. First, I want to ask you were you a member 
 of any such council? 
 
 A. Of the People's Council? 
 
 Q. Called the Peoples' Council, and that had no re- 
 lation to any policy or program or anything in line 
 with the Soviets, did it? 
 
 A. Well, except that they advocated a certain line 
 of publicity with regard to : no annexations and no 
 indemnities, and free development of all peoples. That 
 is one of the planks in the Council, I believe, and that 
 was one of the planks in the Soviet Government plat- 
 form. 
 
 174
 
 Q. And if you recall, was not that adopted also and 
 has not it been adopted also by the Kerensky Govern- 
 ment? 
 
 A. Yes, it has, and by the Revolutionary Govern- 
 ment of Russia. 
 
 O. And that was adopted later in the phraseology, 
 that very phraseology, by the President? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Of no annexations and no punitive indemnities? 
 
 A. He used those phrases. 
 
 Q. And it started with the Socialist Party? 
 
 A. In the United States. 
 
 Q. And the Peoples' Council took it up, and then 
 the Russians, and then the President? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And yet it originated with the Socialist Party, 
 this very declaration? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And what I am directing your attention to is 
 this : the Soviets have an economic program and pur- 
 pose, and as I remember it, the Russian Government 
 was locally Soviet, or the all-Russian Soviet? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. Now has this People's Council anything, in any 
 character, kind or object with them? 
 
 A. No, sir. 
 
 Q. Does not deal with the economic problems at 
 all? 
 
 A. No, sir, it was a propaganda, organized for the 
 discussion of public policies. 
 
 Q. And those public policies were what? 
 
 A. As I stated them this morning. 
 
 Q. What were they, you may state them again? 
 
 A. I stated them this morning, and they were : to 
 state the terms of peace, upon which the allies were 
 willing to open negotiations ; second, to preserve the 
 
 175
 
 civil liberties ; and third, the maintenance of economic 
 and industrial standards. 
 
 Q. Do you recall that you were actually a member 
 of the Civil Liberties Bureau? 
 
 A. I do not, I think I told Mr. Barnes this morning 
 that I was not certain on that point. 
 
 THE COURT : Have you refreshed your recollec- 
 tion since recess on that? 
 
 THE WITNESS : Well, I have been told I tried 
 to look it up, but I was never officially connected with 
 the organization ; but I remember sitting in at some 
 of the executive committee meetings, probably unoffi- 
 cially. 
 
 Q. You understand, as a Socialist, or do you mean 
 as a Socialist, in using the term "resistance" the aban- 
 donment of the legal proceedings? 
 
 MR. BARNES : I object to that, if the Court please, 
 upon the same grounds. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: It does not come exactly the 
 same now, your Honor, because it has been brought 
 out now that the Socialist Party never used that plat- 
 form when they sent it out, not in the form that it was 
 read to the witness on cross-examination. 
 
 MR. BARNES: Well, I object to it. On cross- 
 examination I endeavored to get this witness's under- 
 standing of the platform and his counsel objected at 
 that time. Now his counsel is endeavoring to bring 
 it out, and I now must make the same objection. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: I will withdraw the question 
 and I will give you another chance to object again. I 
 will frame another question. 
 
 Q. Do you mean by the term "resistance" the forc- 
 ible and unlawful opposition to the execution of or 
 compliance with the law? 
 
 MR. BARNES: That is objected to. 
 
 THE COURT: Is the word "resistance" nsed in 
 
 176
 
 "The Great Madness" anywhere? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : No, it is used in the platform. 
 
 THE COURT: I understand, but I would allow 
 you to ask him to tell about that, if it occurred in "The 
 Great Madness." 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : I rather think it appears some- 
 where in "The Great Madness" but if "resistance" 
 doesn't appear there I am somewhat surprised that the 
 word is not there. 
 
 Q. Do you recall the word "resistance" occurring 
 there anywhere, Mr. Nearing? 
 
 A. I don't remember it. 
 
 Q. Well, find a page where that word is found, if 
 you can. 
 
 MR. BARNES : I don't think you will find it. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : If you say, Mr. Barnes, that the 
 word resistance was not used there in "Great Mad- 
 ness," very well. 
 
 MR. BARNES : I do not think it was. 
 
 A. It is on the title page of "The Menace of Mili- 
 tarism." 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : Good. You offered that in evi- 
 dence. Now, your Honor, I will repeat the question. 
 
 MR. BARNES : That is in a quotation from Wood- 
 row Wilson. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : Yes, and he adopts that phrase- 
 ology. 
 
 Q. I am not asking you what Mr. Wilson meant, 
 I cannot do that, but I will repeat the question that 
 I put to you before : Do you mean by "resistance" a 
 forcible resistance to the execution of the law or to 
 appeals to the law? 
 
 MR. BARNES: I object to what he means by 
 "resistance." If he wants to give his side of what he 
 thinks Woodrow Wilson meant, to express his idea 
 of this particular quotation, where he says, "if we 
 
 177
 
 have forgotten how to object, how to resist," etc. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: Of course, if you object, why 
 I am not asking him as you seem to think to put the 
 interpretation on what Woodrow Wilson had in mind. 
 I am not asking him to interpret Mr. Wilson's mind. 
 
 THE COURT : I do not see that the witness's de- 
 finition of "resistance" would be relevant to the con- 
 troversy unless it appeared in "The Great Madness," 
 or one of his other works. Or, unless in the course 
 of his examination he had taken some position as to 
 resistance. I do not understand that he did that. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN: What I am endeavoring to do, 
 of course, is apparent. The word "resistance" is used 
 in the document that goes before this jury. And it is 
 well enough for us to speculate on the distinction and 
 difference in a definite line of evidence, but the mean- 
 ing that a word may take on, even when special stress 
 is laid upon it, may be very different when it has not 
 been properly defined to begin with. It may take on 
 a different meaning, than it is likely to if the District 
 Attorney should argue in the future, that he was ad- 
 vocating "resistance to the law," and "resistance to 
 this and that and the other thing," his interpretation 
 of that term, and I want to show that the defendant 
 had by that, no such sinister meaning, but that 
 he meant open resistance by legal means, which 
 are open to any man under the constitution, and which 
 is not the sinister meaning which would be attempted 
 to be argued into it if we did not have the proper de- 
 finition before us. 
 
 MR. BARNES: The point about that is, that this 
 is a question that the witness had been questioned 
 about by the Government, and he testified to it before 
 lunch. After lunch I object to his telling about it 
 now. 
 
 Q. Do you believe in resistance to compulsory 
 
 178
 
 military training and to the conscription of life and 
 labor, resistance being an open and unlawful violation 
 of the law? 
 
 A. I do not. 
 
 Q. Mr. Barnes asked you whether you knew that 
 munition contracts were let to the lowest bidder. 
 I believe you answered and said that you did not know. 
 Is that the answer? 
 
 A. No, I did not know about the awarding of con- 
 tracts. 
 
 O. You were asked in regard to the referendum 
 taken as a result of our entrance into the war. Do 
 you know as a matter of fact, that public action or 
 referendums were taken, and that you have referred 
 to them? Let me call your attention, perhaps to two 
 instances where in Maine and Dakota referendums 
 were taken. 
 
 MR. BARNES: He mentioned those in his pam- 
 phlet. 
 
 A. Yes, they are in the pamphlet. 
 
 Q. They are in the pamphlet, I believe? 
 
 A. Yes. 
 
 Q. That was a postal card referendum taken by 
 Lundeen, for one 
 
 THE COURT: Those were unofficial? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : Those were unofficial, if your 
 Honor please. It was taken by sending a letter inclos- 
 ing a return postal card to the voters in the district and 
 getting returns. 
 
 Q. Are you familiar with that, how that is done? 
 
 A. There is a statement to that effect in "The Great 
 Madness." I recall that, and there were Minnesota, 
 and I think there was one in Massachusetts, one in 
 Ohio and one in Wisconsin, and I do not remember 
 the other instances, but they were overwhelmingly 
 against the entrance of the United States into the war. 
 
 179
 
 Q. Do you recall there was one in Maine also? 
 
 A. I do not remember that particularly. 
 
 BY THE COURT: 
 
 Q. Of course, in these unofficial referendums, you 
 don't know to whom they were sent, or how broad- 
 cast they were, or what, do you ? 
 
 A. No, there were quite a number of cases the 
 Congressmen sent took a section right out of his or 
 their constituency, and sent to every voter in that par- 
 ticular constituency. 
 
 Q. You do not know whether it was a Congress 
 district wide referendum, or the extent of it, or how 
 absolutely impartial it was? 
 
 A. In the case of Lundeen, he got 8,800 answers 
 back, I don't know how many he didn't get back, but 
 eight thousand of them were against entrance and 
 eight hundred in favor of it, a ratio of ten to one, as I 
 recall. 
 
 Q. You don't know how many people did not an- 
 swer the Congressman's letter, do you? 
 
 A. No, sir, no evidence on that point. 
 
 BY MR. STEDMAN : 
 
 Q. Do you know what total vote there is in Lun- 
 deen's district? 
 
 A. I do not. 
 
 BY THE COURT : 
 
 Q. Where did he come from? 
 
 A. Minnesota. 
 
 BY MR. STEDMAN: 
 
 Q. Speaking of the War of 1861, do you recall as 
 a matter of historical knowledge, that the issue of the 
 war was a political issue, prior to even the nomination 
 of Abraham Lincoln in the Douglas-Lincoln debates? 
 
 A. Yes, that was in 1858. 
 
 Q. That was the issue, wasn't it, throughout, the 
 North, made very clear at that time, and the anti- 
 
 180
 
 Secessionists of the North won that election, did they 
 not, that is, opposed to secession, in the North? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, in the electing of Mr. Lincoln, that was 
 won by those opposed to secession, yes. 
 
 Q. Mixed up of course with debate, that is, be- 
 tween those opposing and in favor of slavery? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And in the army that they were enlisting, there 
 were those who were not opposed to secession, but 
 those who went into the army because they were op- 
 posed to slavery? 
 
 A. Yes, sir, both of the issues were very promi- 
 nent in the enlistment campaigns. 
 
 Q. Some went in on the loyalty issue and the na- 
 tionalism issue, and others went in on the Bill of 
 Rights, or Civil Liberty issue, that is, one went in for 
 one reason and others went in for other reasons? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And in 1848 with Mexico, in that war, do you 
 recall that that was also a political campaign fought 
 out on that issue and that Lincoln was one of the oppo- 
 nents in carrying on the campaign against President 
 Polk, during that time? 
 
 A. During that war, yes. 
 
 Q. Do you remember before the entry into the war 
 there, that that was a campaign issue? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 Q. And it was developed through a desire for the 
 adding of one more State, that is one more of the 
 States to the one side, to strengthen and maintain its 
 economic position? 
 
 A. Yes, sir. 
 
 MR. BARNES : Do you mean does this witness 
 recall that fact? 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : No, does he know it as a matter 
 of historical information, of course you do, but the 
 
 181
 
 rest of us do not. 
 
 Q. And the war issue of 1916 to the extent that it 
 developed itself in the United States, placed the 
 Democratic candidate in the position of anti-war 
 candidate? 
 
 MR. BARNES: That is objected to on the ground 
 that it is argumentative and not proper. 
 
 THE COURT: Objection sustained. 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : I do not think of anything more, 
 I think that is all, Mr. Nearing. 
 
 MR. BARNES: That is all. 
 
 182
 
 Scott Nearing's Address 
 to the Jury 
 
 MR. NEARING: Gentlemen, I am on trial here be- 
 fore you, charged with obstructing the. recruiting and 
 enlistment service to the detriment of the service, to 
 the injury of the service, and with attempting and caus- 
 ing insubordination, disloyalty, mutiny and the refusal 
 of duty within the military and naval forces. 
 
 That is the charge of the indictment and that is the 
 charge upon which I am being tried. 
 
 The prosecution has not been able to show a single 
 instance in which recruiting was obstructed. They 
 have not been able to show a single instance in which 
 insubordination, disloyalty, and refusal of duty were 
 caused. 
 
 It has been seventeen or eighteen months since this 
 pamphlet was published. During that time there have 
 been about nineteen thousand copies of it loose in the 
 country, and the prosecution was unable to bring be- 
 fore you a: single instance where these things have actu- 
 ally occurred. 
 
 How then, do they seek to make out their case? Mr. 
 Barnes said, in his opening: 
 
 "It is not necessary for the Government to show 
 that there was an actual obstruction in the sense of a 
 physical obstruction ; it was not necessary for the Gov- 
 ernment to show actual mutiny and disloyalty, but the 
 publication of this book in itself is sufficient to result 
 in a conviction." 
 
 183
 
 In other words, the Government maintains that the 
 publication of this book, and the intent showed by the 
 publication of the book, and by their surrounding evi- 
 dence is sufficient to warrant a conviction. 
 
 So that the only act that is alleged against me is 
 an expression of my opinions : writing in this book and 
 expressing my opinions on the St. Louis Proclamation, 
 of the Socialist Party platform. 
 
 The act and the intent are both to be construed from 
 my expressions of opinion. It has not been shown 
 that I obstructed enlistment, that I tore down enlist- 
 ment posters, that I told men not to enlist, it has not 
 been shown that I went among soldiers and asked them 
 to mutiny, or to be disloyal or to refuse to perform 
 their duty, none of these things are shown. 
 
 I am charged with writing and having sent that 
 writing to a publisher and had it published. 
 
 I am charged, furthermore, with expressing fur- 
 ther and other opinions in the pamphlet on militarism 
 and in certain other ways, so that the whole crime of 
 which I am supposed to be according to the prosecu- 
 tion's case guilty, the whole crime consists in my 
 expression of opinion, and the intent which they pro- 
 pose to show, both arising out of my discussion of 
 public questions. 
 
 Now as to this book, you have heard it read or have 
 read it, and I suppose all of you have or have had or 
 will have copies. 
 
 This book was written in order to present a view 
 held by many people held by me among that num- 
 ber on the greatest public question that has come 
 before the American people, I suppose, since the Civil 
 War. 
 
 It is a book written on the greatest issue that we 
 have viewed in our generation. It was written 
 openly, sent to a publisher, sent to Washington and 
 
 184
 
 copyrighted and sent through the mails tnrougliout 
 August, September, October, November, December, 
 January, February and March and until the indict- 
 ment was found in April. 
 
 During all of those nine months, this pamphlet went 
 through the mails, and as some of you know, the Post 
 Office Department has been very rigorous in enforc- 
 ing its decisions with regard to unmailable matter; 
 and all through those nine months that pamphlet went 
 through the mail and it was never once stopped to our 
 knowledge. It w r as copyrighted, it was sent through 
 the mails for nine months, it was sold openly in the 
 Rand School bookstore and in other parts of the 
 United States. So far as I know, (and 1 am in touch 
 with the situation), it never was given away, but sold 
 for ten cents, openly, without any attempt at conceal- 
 ment. 
 
 In other words, gentlemen, I took on this great pub- 
 lic question, a certain position ; I presented my views 
 in this book, and I am indicted for writing the book 
 because the prosecution alleges it caused it was an 
 obstruction or it caused, or it was an attempt to cause 
 disloyalty and mutiny, therefore if I am convicted 
 under this indictment I will be convicted for an ex- 
 pression of my opinions. There is no other evidence 
 before you except my opinions. 
 
 The District Attorney has not shown a single act 
 except those involved in the expression of an opinion, 
 either on the witness stand or in the various writings 
 of mine which he has brought before you. 
 
 So that by convicting me for writing this book you 
 convict me for public discussion, and you draw my 
 intent from my discussion. On the same ground I 
 think all of the opponents of any administration dur- 
 ing the war might be convicted for opposing in any 
 way the administration, because in opposing an ad- 
 
 185
 
 ministration, any opposition to it tends to dampen the 
 ardor, and to hold back and to check enthusiasm. 
 
 All through my life, I have been interested in pre- 
 serving the institutions of democracy. That has been 
 one of the things, as I tried to point out on the wit- 
 ness stand, that seem to me fundamentally important. 
 I believe that democracy is a better form of social 
 organization than aristocracy, or monarchy or any 
 other form of Government that the world has ever 
 known. Discussion is one of the purposes of democ- 
 racy. Democracy means that a people talking a ques- 
 tion over, thinking it out and reaching a decision upon 
 it, may then register that decision. 
 
 The only way to have intelligent public opinion is 
 to have discussion, and the moment you check dis- 
 cussion you destroy democracy. 
 
 When any adminstration, whether in Russia or Ger- 
 many or England or the United States, stops any dis- 
 cussion and puts its opponents in jail, that has de- 
 stroyed the institution of democracy because democ- 
 racy rests on discussion; and the only way in which 
 we can preserve democracy is to reserve to every 
 citizen of the democracy the right to express the con- 
 victions that he has : the right to be right and the 
 right to be wrong. 
 
 The Constitution does not guarantee us only the 
 right to be correct, we have a right to be honest and 
 in error. And the views that I have expressed in this 
 pamphlet I expressed honestly. I believe they are 
 right. The future will show whether or not I was cor- 
 rect, but under the laws, as I understand it, and under 
 the Constitution as I understand it, every citizen in 
 this country has a right to express himself, subject 
 always to the law, subject always to the limitations 
 which the law prescribes, has a right to express him- 
 self on public questions. 
 
 186
 
 The moment any administration enters and shuts 
 down that right, that moment democracy ceases to 
 exist. 
 
 Now the principal question that enters into this 
 thing is the question of intent. Mr. Stedman, I 
 imagine, will talk to you about the law, or about the 
 legal consideration, and the Judge, I believe will 
 charge you with regard to the legal aspect of the prob- 
 lem of intent. 
 
 I am not a lawyer, and I cannot speak to you regard- 
 ing the legal phases of the case, but I should like to 
 say a few words about this problem of intent. 
 
 We have tried to produce evidence to prove to you 
 that for the last twelve or fifteen years I have been 
 a student of the institutions, standards and ideals of 
 American life. Ever since the time that I entered 
 college and indeed from the time I was in High School, 
 I have been profoundly interested in seeing a certain 
 thing done in the United States : I wanted to see 
 liberty first, because I believe liberty is fundamental 
 in society; then I wanted to see justice. I wanted to 
 see that people got opportunity, that the boys and 
 girls that were born had a chance to be well born and 
 well brought up. 
 
 And during these twelve or fifteen years I have been 
 busy with that problem; that has been the thing to 
 which I have devoted all of my life thus far; that is 
 the thing in which I have been profoundly interested 
 profoundly interested because I came to the belief 
 many years ago that with the resources of America 
 and the opportunities in America we could have a very 
 much finer and a very much higher standard of life 
 here than we actually have. 
 
 My studies and my investigations have led me to 
 certain conclusions : for example I believe that econo- 
 mic forces are fundamental forces. I tried to point 
 
 IV
 
 that out in the course of my testimony, just as plants 
 in a garden draw their nourishment from the dirt, so 
 men and women in a society draw their life from eco- 
 nomic sources. They eat, they wear clothes, they live 
 in their houses, and every time that the sun rises they 
 have got to do those things, we are thrown back to 
 that life. In the garden you get roses, you also get 
 lettuce and turnips, fruits of almost all kinds all pro- 
 ducts out of the same dirt. 
 
 And so in society you get different minds, different 
 thoughts, different ideas, different standards of life, 
 and they all reach back to the same dirt: to the food, 
 clothing, shelter, and the necessary economic things 
 of life. 
 
 If you cannot get these economic necessaries you 
 cannot live. Therefore in that sense, economics is 
 fundamental in the minds of people, so fundamental 
 that all through history, people have fought over the 
 river valleys, over the choice sections of the earth; 
 so important that today in the United States forty 
 million people are engaged in gainful occupations, 
 working for a living, because without work we cannot 
 live; without an economic background to our life we 
 cannot get anywhere. 
 
 I believe that those economic forces which are so 
 fundamental have always shown themselves in soci- 
 ety, in struggles between the possessors and the dis- 
 possessed. Whoever possesses the resources and the 
 economic opportunities controls the means of life. 
 
 In the early years of American life, where every 
 man practically had a farm, or an opportunity to get 
 one, economic opportunity was widely distributed and 
 resources were free. You could go out to the border, 
 to the edge of civilization, out to the frontier world 
 and take a farm or take a piece of land. 
 
 About 1890 the resources in this country were ex- 
 
 188
 
 hausted. There were no more free resources : all the 
 important timber, all the important minerals, all the 
 important parts of the earth, practically, were taken 
 up ; and from that time until this, we have seen a grad- 
 ual widening chasm between those who possess the 
 necessities and those who do not. 
 
 When the Constitution of the United States was 
 drafted, Madison, Jefferson and other men, saw the 
 danger, and they tried to provide against it. They 
 were not successful. At the present time the owner- 
 ship of most of the United States is in the hands of 
 a tiny percentage of people. And here in the "City of 
 New York where the land alone is worth five thou- 
 sand millions of dollars, the improvements three 
 billions more, where we have over four billions of 
 dollars in our banks, savings banks and others, four 
 billion five hundred millions of bank deposits in this 
 City, and the Board of Education and the United 
 States Food Administration report 280,000 children in 
 the schools inadequately nourished to such an extent 
 that their health is injured: twenty-one and one-half 
 out of every hundred children in the City of New York 
 are seriously underfed. In this same City we have 
 people with incomes of five hundred thousand and a 
 million dollars a year; people who could live on five 
 thousand or ten thousand dollars, and have all the 
 comforts and luxuries, the simple luxuries of life. 
 
 Here we have on one hand a quarter of a million 
 hungry children, and on the other hand, half a billion 
 wealth in the hands of the few. 
 
 Lincoln, in speaking against Judge Douglas in 1858 
 on the slavery issue, said that no order of society can 
 last, in which one man can say to another man, "You 
 work and toil and earn bread, and I will eat it." Now 
 that is the society that we have established : one man 
 works for his living, another man owns property and
 
 from the rent and interest and dividends whieh he 
 gains out of his property ownership, he lives without 
 work, if he desires. 
 
 And another man creates the shoes and the clothes 
 and the food and the other good things that he uses, 
 and he has those things, possesses them, enjoys them, 
 without himself ever raising a finger to toil. 
 
 At the present time there are people at Palm Beach 
 who have never worked for their living. They are 
 down there living extravagantly and enjoying the soft 
 breezes, getting strength and health. 
 
 There are men and women here in New York who 
 have worked all their lives, been honest and sober and 
 tried to bring up families and today they cannot pay 
 the landlord and the grocer and the butcher and keep 
 their children healthy under this capitalistic system 
 although they are sober, earnest and honest, indus- 
 trious people, and all of it due to the fact of the eco- 
 nomic system under which they are living because the 
 wages that they get are not sufficient to buy the neces- 
 saries of life, as I tried to point out on the stand in 
 my discussion of the wages problem. 
 
 On the other hand there are people these people 
 who live in ease, comfort and luxury, who have never 
 raised a finger to produce one solitary article of food, 
 clothing or shelter, or luxury or any comforts, and this 
 is so all the time and my studies have taught me that 
 these conditions exist. You know them. No one who 
 has read or thought about the conditions in the United 
 States but knows that those conditions are true, 
 and I say to you gentlemen that as long as those things 
 are true, just so long will it be impossible for us to 
 have stable peace and order in our society. 
 
 No person is more anxious than I to have an or- 
 dered, well conducted society, but I do not believe 
 that it is possible to maintain order in society where 
 
 190
 
 one man or one group of men living without labor, 
 luxuriously, and another man, or group of men, in 
 spite of their most earnest efforts, are unable to pro- 
 vide their families with the necessaries of life. 
 
 In the past this same question has been raised and 
 in the past men have come to the decision and I 
 agree with that decision that the only way in which 
 we can have justice in the world is to have economic 
 justice. An economic justice is only possible where 
 the majority and not the minority, controls the neces- 
 saries of life. 
 
 If democracy means anything, it means that the 
 majority of people control the conditions of their own 
 life. In the United States, a tiny minority controls 
 economic affairs. And so long as one small group of 
 men own the jobs, own the products, and own the 
 surpluses of industry, so long will the majority be 
 unable to secure justice. And that is why I belieVe 
 that the majority of people must control in industry 
 and economic affairs as they are controlling in the 
 political affairs. That is why I believe that we must 
 have industrial democracy as well as political democ- 
 racy. 
 
 Now I say this, that all of these years I have been 
 studying such problems, and I have reached those 
 conclusions. My say-so on that is of no importance. 
 The existence in New York and other American cities 
 of starving children side by side with fabulous 
 wealth, and idle people, is the thing that should be 
 of profound concern to every person who lives, or 
 rather to the future of the society in which we live. 
 
 At various times, as we pointed out, I have written 
 down my conclusions in books. We had here the 
 other day a set of those books. Some of them are 
 purely statistical, full of tables and figures. Some of 
 them are text books, some are pamphlets like this 
 
 191
 
 "Great Madness." 
 
 Whenever I collected together a great body of in- 
 formation which seemed to me to be important, I 
 embodied it into a book, published it, and in some 
 cases I published it at my own expense. Statistical 
 books are extremely expensive, and if you sell one 
 thousand copies of a statistical book you are doing 
 very well. Publishers won't take them, and authors 
 have to pay the bill. 
 
 I published those books because I felt that as a 
 teacher, I had a certain obligation to the community 
 that paid my salary. I was working in the State, or 
 a semi-State University. I was working at a com- 
 paratively easy job. I had three months' vacation in 
 the Summer time. I had leisure during the year, and 
 I employed that leisure in working over social prob- 
 lems. 
 
 I believe that whenever any person gets anything 
 that might be of value to the other people in the com- 
 munity, that it is his obligation to turn that thing over 
 to the community : whether he is a scientist in physical 
 science, or a bacteriologist, a chemist or a scientist 
 in social science, and economics, or sociology, when 
 a man discovers a method of separating milk, or for 
 destroying the bacteria, harmful bacteria in milk, or 
 when he discovers a method of checking influenza, or 
 overcoming tuberculosis, and gives it to the world, 
 the world acclaims the gift, and its giver. 
 
 And so when a man discovers, or so-called science 
 discovers a method that will make people happier, give 
 them more opportunity, a greater liberty to enjoy 
 more social justice, I believe he has got exactly the 
 same obligation to state what he has found. If they 
 agree with him, well and good, if they don't agree 
 with him, he goes on to his own scientific problems. 
 
 I said there on the witness stand that five of these 
 
 192
 
 books dealt \vith distribution : A book on wages, a 
 book on the standard of living, a book on the cost 
 of living, a book on income and a book on anthracite 
 industry. 
 
 When I published those books I knew that no man 
 could take a stand that I took in those books, and 
 hold a job in an American University; and I published 
 them because I wanted the American people to know 
 the truth about the most fundamental economic ques- 
 tions before them today : the question of the distribu- 
 tion of wealth. 
 
 We have learned how to produce wealth in large 
 quantities, but we haven't yet learned how to distrib- 
 ute it, and I wanted the American people to know the 
 results of my studies and researches regarding the 
 distribution of wealth. 
 
 I published those books, and as we mutually agreed, 
 and I said in the course of my direct examination on 
 the stand, the university and I parted company. I 
 then went out to Toledo. After I had been there a 
 year and a half the question of preparedness came up. 
 I regarded the question of preparedness as a question 
 of fundamental importance to society. I knew who 
 was behind the preparedness campaign. I knew that 
 no man could hold a job in the American universities 
 and take the stand that I took on the preparedness 
 issue. I wrote the "Germs of War" and went all over 
 the United States, speaking on preparedness, and 
 speaking against preparedness. I spoke in favor of a 
 movement of preparedness that I believed will alone 
 safeguard business and justice among men. 
 
 The Toledo University and I parted company. Then 
 we entered the war, and I saw what I believed to be 
 a great menace to the liberties of the American peo- 
 ple, namely : the growing power of the plutocracy, the 
 growing power which it was gaining through the war, 
 
 193
 
 and so I wrote this book on the "Great Madness*' in 
 order to try to point out to the American people ex- 
 actly what was happening. 
 
 If you will notice, the book is not a denunciation 
 of our society, it is not a denunciation of our Govern- 
 ment, it is an exposition of certain events in terms of 
 their economic significance. I tried to show how the 
 economic control of the country, of the resources, 
 and of American life is manifesting itself all through 
 the social structure. I published that book, and here 
 we are. 
 
 For fifteen years I have been speaking and writing 
 and stating my views on public questions. I have 
 stated it openly, I have stated it as honestly as I could 
 state it ; I stated it to the University of Pennsylvania, 
 and I stated it at the University of Toledo, and I have 
 stated it since I left the University of Toledo. 
 
 If I intended to obstruct recruiting or enlist- 
 ments, if I had intended to interfere with the prosec- 
 ution and carrying on of the administrative policies 
 of the navy and army, either by creating insubordina- 
 tion and mutiny, or otherwise, I should have said so ; 
 I should not have written a fifty-page pamphlet and 
 sold it for ten cents each ; I should have gone out and 
 told the soldiers so, and I should have told the pros- 
 pective soldier so. Never in my life have I gone out 
 and done anything indirectly. If I have wanted to 
 say a thing, I have said it; if I have wanted to pre- 
 sent a matter I have presented it, and taken the con- 
 sequences. If I had wished in this case to obstruct or 
 to interfere, I should have obstructed and interfered 
 and taken the consequences. 
 
 The District Attorney was at considerable pains to 
 prove to you that I am a Socialist. He asked me ques- 
 tions about the St. Louis Platform. He asked me 
 questions about the Socialist Party Platform; many 
 
 194
 
 questions, in order to prove that I am a Socialist. I 
 am a Socialist. 
 
 I want to tell you something about what that 
 means: in the first place, I am an internationalist; 
 that is, I believe in the brotherhood of all men. In 
 the language of the Declaration of Independence, I 
 believe that all men are created equal, that they have 
 certain rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of hap- 
 piness. That holds true of the man that lives next 
 door to me, and it holds true of the man that lives 
 in South Africa, and the man that lives way over in 
 Asia. I believe in the Brotherhood of Man. 
 
 I believe that ultimately the whole world will be 
 federated together, just as these United States are 
 federated together. There was a time in the United 
 States when a man that lived in Georgia or Virginia, 
 or New York, was perfectly willing to quarrel with 
 a man who lived in Pennsylvania or Massachusetts 
 or in New Hampshire. If you asked a man a hundred 
 and fifty years ago where he was from, he said, I am 
 from Virginia; I am from Pennsylvania. He now 
 states, I am from the United States, not, I am from 
 the American Colonies. He was a Virginian first and 
 an American second. But that time has passed. 
 
 Today America is kept first, and Pennsylvania sec- 
 ond. And the time will come when the man from 
 North America and the man from Europe and the 
 man from Africa will say, I am a member of the human 
 race; and the human race has certain common inter- 
 ests, certain common obligations, and first among 
 them is the recognition of the fact of the universal 
 brotherhood of all men. 
 
 I am from the United States? Yes. I am from 
 New York? Yes. I am from Buffalo? Yes. I have 
 a home in Buffalo? Yes. I am loyal to my home? 
 Yes. To Buffalo? Yes. To New York? Yes. To 
 
 195
 
 the United States? Yes. And I am also loyal to my 
 fellow brother man. 
 
 In other words, we Socialists look forward to a time, 
 and certainly we are not alone in looking that way, 
 there are others who are not Socialists who agree with 
 us in this, we look forward to the time when the peo- 
 ples of all the world will join hands in common 
 brotherhood. And when we say we are international- 
 ists, that is what we mean. A man, yes, outside the 
 boundaries of certain nations, but within the greater 
 boundaries of the world, he is within the boundaries 
 of the whole world, and he is a member of the human 
 race. And we are internationalists, in the sense that 
 we believe in our obligations to our human brothers, 
 and that they are the supreme obligations of the world. 
 
 That does not make us any less loyal to our homes 
 or to our cities or our nations, but it does give us a 
 larger and a more comprehensive loyalty. 
 
 In the second place, believing that, I believe that we 
 can do the things that are necessary to bring human 
 brotherhood into reality. 
 
 What are the facts of international life : education 
 internationalizes, science internationalizes, commerce 
 internationalizes, industry internationalizes the pro- 
 cesses and the methods of ideas, arts and letters and 
 life, all internationalize. What then stands in the way 
 of human brotherhood? Why, the thing that stands 
 in the way is that fragment of nationalism, that still 
 remains, that fragment is capitalism. 
 
 And every nation, as I tried to point out in my tes- 
 timony, in every nation there is a little coterie of men 
 or interests who find it to their profit to keep national 
 animosities alive. The peoples of the world have no 
 animosities one against the other, but the rulers of the 
 world fan those animosities into flame : religious ha- 
 tred, class antagonism, national feeling, are all kept 
 
 196
 
 boiling and stirring in men's souls. 
 
 You go to a restaurant, or you go to the shop or you 
 go out on the street, and you will sit down together, 
 and you will work together with Irish and Austrian, 
 Italian and Slovak, side by side, elbow to elbow. The 
 peoples of the world have nothing against one another, 
 the people of the world have more in common than 
 they have in opposition. It is the economic barrier, it 
 is the economic division lines that create the difficulty. 
 
 And we Socialists, or I, rather, am interested and 
 that is the reason I am a Socialist in destroying those 
 economic division lines. How can that be done? I 
 believe there is only one. way. I believe that is the only 
 way to destroy these economic barriers and make in- 
 ternational life a reality, and that is, to give to those 
 who work the full product of their labor; instead of 
 having a man work for a part of what he creates, 
 turning the other part over in the form of interest, 
 rent and dividends to the owner of the job, I believe 
 that the worker, the man or woman who was render- 
 ing a socially useful service should get the full value 
 of his product. Then there would not be any surplus 
 to invest in foreign markets, and in foreign opportuni- 
 ties. Then there would not be any surplus to be used 
 by private individuals in the development of Mexico 
 or China or Argentine. 
 
 You say then that those countries would develop 
 more slowly. Perhaps. But when they did develop 
 that country it would come from within those coun- 
 tries and it would be for the benefit of those countries 
 and not for the benefit of some foreign capitalist. 
 
 I believe we will never solve our international dif- 
 ferences successfully until we have taken out of the 
 hands of individuals the right to invest surplus, the 
 right to utilize vast quantities of wealth in the way 
 that will create friction and ultimately international 
 
 107
 
 dissension and war between the different groups of 
 peoples. Therefore I am in favor of having the work- 
 ers own their own jobs. There is only one way to do 
 that now. 
 
 In early America, when there was no great aggre- 
 gation of wealth, when each man could own his farm, 
 he could own his job. At present the telephone system 
 is a system. The railroad system is a system. The 
 banking system is a system. The United States Steel 
 Corporation system is a system. No one man can own 
 his own job. You cannot own a rail, you cannot own 
 a link, you cannot own a piece of a system because if 
 you take out that piece, your system is cut. If you 
 take out a telephone exchange, you break down the 
 integrity of the telephone organization. 
 
 Therefore the only way in which one man can own 
 his job is to own it collectively, that is, the whole 
 system. So that we believe that all the people who 
 work should own the tools with which they work, just 
 as all the people of the United States own the harbor 
 of New York. I believe that all of the people of the 
 United States should own the railroads and the bank- 
 ing system and every great social product in its en- 
 tirety, just as they own the post office, just as they 
 own several great irrigation plants, and the Panama 
 Canal, and some other similar developments. 
 
 I believe the only solution, the only possible solution 
 is that the people, all of the people, that they may 
 have free economic life, is that they control the po- 
 litical life. 
 
 One hundred and fifty years ago they would have 
 laughed at the idea of having a political democracy. 
 
 Napoleon said a republic of twenty-six million souls 
 were folly. He sneered at the concept that people 
 could govern themselves politically. Today we are 
 beginning to wonder whether it will not be possible 
 
 198
 
 for people to govern themselves economically, and 
 today, as I hold, there are many who see here the 
 coining principle, the great proletariat control of eco- 
 nomic affairs, and who regard it as a ridiculously 
 absurd thing, an impossible thing, but as I say, de- 
 mocracy means control by the people, and I believe 
 in democracy, and I believe therefore in the control by 
 the people of the machinery of production. Just as I 
 believe they should control the city government, just 
 so I believe they should control the other branches of 
 life. Just as they control the political returns, just so 
 they should control the economic returns. 
 
 And so it seems to me there is no solution in any 
 other way than similarly to control economic problems 
 as we control political problems. They have both 
 national and international systems. 
 
 Some of you have noticed recently that the war is 
 over, but yet there is turmoil all over the earth : tur- 
 moil in Britain, turmoil in the United States ; strikes, 
 disturbances, and we are having very many problems 
 yet which have not been solved even though the war 
 be over. The solution of every problem depends on 
 its being settled right, nothing ever is settled until it 
 is settled right, that is, until it is settled to the best of 
 our belief, it is not settled; and I believe that the 
 Socialist philosophy presents to us the best avenue 
 along which to approach the settlement of these stu- 
 pendous problems of our economic life. 
 
 I do not say that the socialists have the entire 
 solution. I do not say that the socialists when they 
 come into power, as they surely will come into power, 
 will dispose of all the problems of the world. By no 
 means, as there will always be problems; but this we 
 believe, going forward step by step through mechanics, 
 and through chemistry, through applied science, we 
 are solving the problems of production and are able to 
 
 199
 
 turn the resources of nature into food and clothing 
 and shelter, and the other necessaries of life, so I be- 
 lieve society must solve the problem of distribution. 
 
 Facing all of these problems equitably, and in the 
 light of past experience, we believe that the only so- 
 lution is to turn these things over, that is, operate and 
 turn them over to the people who own them. 
 
 As I said the other day when I was on the witness 
 stand, that soap is made and it should be made to keep 
 people clean, and that if shoes are made they should 
 be made to protect people's feet. If food is produced 
 it should be produced to nourish the human body. But 
 as it is today, we are making soap for profit, we are 
 making shoes for profit, we are making food for profit. 
 The profiteering has become, and justly so, a word of 
 contempt and opprobrium, and profiteering lies at the 
 heart of the capitalistic system. 
 
 The present system was organized, that is, the 
 present system of industry was organized for profit 
 and not for the service of mankind; and I am one of 
 those who believe that you can never have an exact 
 solution of any social problem until you have the ma- 
 chinery organized for the benefit not of the very 
 few, but for the benefit or for the service of the great 
 masses of the people. In other words, as they said in 
 the eighteenth century, the greatest good to the great- 
 est number. That holds true of economic as well as 
 political questions. 
 
 The District Attorney also asked me a number of 
 questions concerning my attitude towards the war. I 
 wish he had put the Bible in evidence and asked me 
 what I thought about the phrase, "Thou shalt not 
 kill"; and about that other phrase, "Overcome evil 
 with good." But he didn't do that. I would have said 
 that I agreed with those phrases as I agreed with 
 many others. 
 
 200
 
 I told him that I believed this war was a capitalists' 
 war, that is, that I believed that it was a war between 
 capitalist nations. When the war broke out there 
 were no other kind of nations on earth than that kind 
 so that there could not be anything else but a war 
 between capitalist nations. By the capitalist nation 
 we mean a nation that is dependent upon a capitalist 
 system of production, production by means of ma- 
 chinery capital. 
 
 All the great nations of the world were capitalist 
 nations at the time the war broke out. The war was 
 necessarily a capitalists' war. A war between capi- 
 talist nations, and as we all know now, or think we 
 know, it was primarily a war over the trade routes to 
 Persia and Syria, or over the "Berlin to Bagdad Rail-' 
 road" if you like, to put it that way; a war open to 
 commercial and financial rights. 
 
 I read you the other day a number of statements 
 from the Navy League, and you will remember it is 
 an ultra-capitalist, an ultra-conservative organization, 
 in which they said exactly that thing which economists 
 have stated for so long a time ; students of history 
 have said it for a long time; the Navy League comes 
 forward and says the same thing; Mr. Wilson has 
 repeatedly stated, and I believe it was a war between 
 the capitalist nations and I believe it had as its chief 
 business certain benefits for small groups of capital- 
 ists. That does not mean that I believe the people 
 who entered the war, entered it for capitalist reasons. 
 Obviously they could not because they had no capital- 
 ist interests. The masses of people in all the countries 
 involved have no capitalist interest; they were being 
 exploited, they were being worked; theirs was the 
 loss, to their prejudice in all of the capitalist countries 
 of the world. They entered the war for what they 
 called patriotic reasons ; they were loyal to their 
 
 201
 
 country; they believed that they were defending their 
 country, their homes and their firesides and their 
 liberties, from invasion ; they entered it with enthusi- 
 asm, and they entered it honestly and sincerely, with 
 no capitalistic motives whatever; they entered it hon- 
 estly and sincerely, just as the nations entered it hon- 
 estly and sincerely with capitalistic motives. And I 
 honestly and sincerely believe that they sincerely and 
 honestly and patriotically and altruistically entered the 
 contest, that is, these people. So I say I believe it 
 was a capitalists' war, a war between capitalist nations 
 over financial and economic issues : coal, iron, trade, 
 investments, opportunities, and the Navy League 
 backs me up, and a lot of other authorities from that 
 side of the fence back me up. 
 
 I told the District Attorney on the stand that I was 
 opposed to all wars. I regard war as a social disease, 
 something that afflicts society, that curses people. I 
 do not suppose three people in a hundred like war. I 
 do not suppose that three people in a hundred want 
 war. There are some people who are pugnacious, and 
 who love to fight, for the sake of a fight, and they 
 might like war, but I do not believe there are three 
 people in a hundred, certainly not five in a hundred, 
 that do. 
 
 I believe the great majority of people agree with 
 me that war is a curse, an unmitigated curse. All the 
 things that come out of war come out in spite of war 
 and not because of it. 
 
 The democracy that has come into Europe, what- 
 ever it is called, has come in spite of the war and not 
 because of it. That would have come out in any case, 
 and we would have had it without the expenditure of 
 twenty million lives and a hundred and eighty billions 
 of wealth. 
 
 I regard war as a social disease, a social curse, and 
 
 202
 
 I believe that we should stamp war out. To my mind 
 the great curse of war is not that people are killed and 
 injured, not that property is destroyed. That happens 
 every day in peace times as well as in war times. To 
 my mind the great curse of war is that it is built on 
 fear and hate. 
 
 Now fear and hate are primitive passions; the sav- 
 ages in the woods are intimidated by fear and hate. 
 They do not belong in civilized society. In civilized 
 society, for fear and hate we substitute constructive 
 purposes and love. It is their positive virtues. When 
 we fear things, we draw back from them. When we 
 hate things, we want to destroy them. 
 
 In civilized society, instead of drawing away from 
 things, and wanting to destroy them, we want to pull 
 things together and build them up. Fear and hate 
 are negatives. Peace and love are positives, and form 
 the forces upon which civilization is built. And where 
 we have collectively fear and hate, it is a means of 
 menace to the order of the world. 
 
 Furthermore, during war, we ask people to go out 
 and deliberately injure their fellows. We ask a man 
 to go out and maim or kill another man against whom 
 he has not a solitary thing in the world, a man who 
 may be a good farmer, a good husband, a good son, and 
 a good worker, and a good citizen. Another man comes 
 out and shoots him down ; that is, he goes out and raises 
 his hand against his neighbor to do his neighbor dam- 
 age. That is the way society is destroyed. Whenever 
 you go out to pull things to pieces, whenever you go 
 out to injure anybody, you are going out to destroy 
 society. Society can never be built up unless you go 
 out to help your neighbors. 
 
 The principle, "each for all and all for each," is the 
 fundamental social principle. People must work to- 
 gether if they are going to get anywhere. War 
 
 203
 
 teaches people to go out and destroy other people and 
 to destroy other people's property. 
 
 And when Sherman said that war was hell, I believe 
 that he meant, or at least to me that means, that war 
 creates a hell inside of a man who goes to war. He is 
 going to work himself up into a passion of hatred 
 against somebody else, and that is hell. 
 
 The destruction of life and property is incidental. 
 The destructive forces that that puts into a man's soul 
 are fundamental. That is why I am opposed to all 
 wars, just as I am opposed to all violence. I don't 
 believe in any man having the right to go out and use 
 violence against another man. That is not the right 
 of one human being to have against the other, that is 
 not the way you get brotherhood. That is the reason 
 I told the District Attorney on the stand that I was 
 against all wars. I am against duelling; I am 
 against all violence of man against man, and war is 
 one of those methods of violence. 
 
 I believe war is barbaric, I believe it is primitive, I 
 believe it is a relic of a bygone age; I believe that 
 society will be destroyed if built up that way. That 
 is, I believe that they that take the sword must perish 
 by the sword; just as they that set out to assist 
 their neighbors are bound to build up a strong, co- 
 hesive united society. That is the field over which I 
 went in my direct testimony and in the cross-examina- 
 tion. 
 
 I have been a student of public affairs. I am a 
 Socialist. I am a pacifist. But I am not charged with 
 any of these things as offenses. On the other hand I 
 believe that as an American citizen I have a right to 
 discuss public questions. I think the Judge will charge 
 you so. I have a right to oppose the passage of a law. 
 I think the Judge will charge you so. I have a right 
 under the law, after the law is passed, to agitate for a 
 
 2*4
 
 development of public sentiment that will result in a 
 repeal of that law. I think the Judge will charge you 
 so. 
 
 In other words, as I said in the beginning, in a 
 democracy, if we are to have a democracy, as a student 
 of public affairs and as a Socialist and as a pacifist, I 
 have a right to express my opinions. I may be wrong, 
 utterly wrong, and nobody listen to me, nobody pay 
 any attention to me. I have a right to express my 
 opinions. 
 
 Gentlemen, I have been throughout my life as con- 
 sistent as I could be. I have spoken and written for 
 years, honestly and frankly. I went on the stand and 
 I spoke to you as honestly as I knew how. I answered 
 the District Attorney's questions as honestly and as 
 frankly as I could. I stand before you today as an 
 advocate of economic justice and world brotherhood, 
 and peace among all men. 
 
 And I wrote this pamphlet in the attempt to further 
 those ends. 
 
 I desire to say just one more thing: this is America 
 in which I am on trial, and America's proudest tradi- 
 tion is her tradition of liberty. For three hundred 
 years people have been coming to America: Puritans, 
 Pilgrims, Huguenots, Quakers, came over and formed 
 the Colonies. 
 
 Later, the Irish, the Scotch, the Germans, the Rus- 
 sians, the Italians, the Syrians came here, not because 
 of the hills and valleys, not because of the climate, not 
 because of the language, but because of the liberty of 
 America ; and the men who came here and the women 
 who came here in 1914, came here just as sincerely in 
 search of that liberty as the men and women who came 
 here in 1620. 
 
 For three hundred years the world has been looking 
 to America, and coming to America for liberty. That 
 
 205
 
 is the choicest and the greatest heritage, that which 
 Americans love. 
 
 What was it that these people sought to escape in 
 Europe? They sought to escape hunger, hardship, 
 misery, suffering, and poverty. They came over here 
 because they thought that the resources of America 
 would yield enough food and clothing and shelter to 
 feed and clothe and house every human being decently 
 and comfortably. 
 
 They came over from Europe to escape ignorance 
 and escape the darkness in which Europe had been 
 kept by these rulers. They came over here for en- 
 lightenment opportunity. Many of them came over 
 here because it gave them the only chance that the 
 world offered to express the truth, as they saw it. 
 They left Europe because they wanted to escape pre- 
 judice, bigotry, class antagonism and race hatred. 
 They came over here because they thought that here 
 they would find brotherhood among men, because they 
 thought that here all peoples were welcome to sit 
 down together and enjoy the opportunities that Amer- 
 ica offered. They left Europe because of its military 
 service, its wars, and the fear and hatred of war, that 
 is, that war engendered. They thought to come over 
 here and find peace and plenty. They left Europe be- 
 cause of tyranny and despotism ; the tyranny of the 
 landlord, the despotism of aristocracy and the owners 
 of the sources of life. 
 
 They came over here because they thought that here 
 they would find that every man had equal opportunity 
 for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. They 
 came here seeking that liberty of the body, the liberty 
 of the mind and the liberty of their heart and soul, and 
 Socialist liberty. That is the background of the coun- 
 try in which we are living. 
 
 206
 
 That is the thing of which America is proud and 
 for which America has stood; that is the thing for 
 which I believe America will stand today. 
 
 There is nothing unique in our wealth. Other na- 
 tions have wealth. There is nothing unique in our 
 material possessions. Other nations have material 
 possessions. But there was something unique in our 
 liberty. 
 
 As I said to you on the witness stand, I am an 
 American, my ancestors have been Americans for 
 tnore than* two hundred years. As an American I have 
 "certain rights and certain duties. Among my rights 
 under the first amendment to the Constitution are the 
 Tights of free speech and the free press; the right to 
 speak and print the convictions that I have. It was 
 "for those rights that our ancestors left Europe and 
 came here. It is for those rights that some of us are 
 contending today. 
 
 I care not for the prosperity of this country if we 
 are going to have gag laws. I care not for the wealth 
 of this country if we are going to be forbidden to have 
 free speech, and an opportunity for expressing our 
 minds and expressing our opinions and discussing the 
 great issues that are before us. 
 
 In the old times of the Czar, we did not protest 
 against Russia because she lacked wealth ; we protested 
 against her because she lacked liberty. 
 
 What was it that we found was lacking, or what 
 was it that we found against the Kaiser in Germany? 
 Was it that he was not a good business man? He was 
 an excellent business man. Was it because he was 
 not a good organizer? He was an excellent organizer. 
 What we had against this man was the fact that he 
 was a tyrant, that he trampled on the rights of other 
 people. 
 
 207
 
 They had wealth in Russia, they had prosperity in 
 Germany. In America we want liberty. And I believe 
 that as an American citizen, that is the dearest pos- 
 session for which I can contend. That is my right 
 constitutionally and legally. But if there were no 
 constitution and no law, it would be my right as a 
 member of a democratic society. 
 
 Furthermore, as a citizen, I have certain duties. 
 Citizenship involves duties as well as rights. If I saw 
 that your house were on fire, it would be my duty to 
 warn you and to try to put it out, that is, put out the 
 fire, and if I could not put out the fire, to save as much 
 of your goods and such of your family as I could save. 
 That would be my duty as a neighbor. 
 
 I have been a student of public affairs in this coun- 
 try for many years. I believe this country is in danger, 
 in dire peril. On the one hand I see imperialism, 
 militarism and war ahead of us. In our policy toward 
 Mexico, in the policy that we are developing under 
 the direction of preparedness advocates about which I 
 spoke last Friday, I see ahead of us imperialism and 
 militarism and war. 
 
 This is not the last war, there is another war, and 
 it will be a war between this nation and the nation 
 that succeeds in the present contention in Europe. 
 
 On the other hand, I see ahead of us in our indus- 
 trial life, exploitation, widespread, by the masters of 
 those who work for them. I see that exercised with 
 increasing tyranny, and I see ahead of us revolt. In 
 other words, to my mind, the outlook in America is 
 not bright, and I am upheld in that view by Senators, 
 by business men, by labor leaders, by all of the re- 
 sponsible authorities who are speaking today for 
 America's future. 
 
 There are clouds on the horizon. I believe America 
 is in peril and I believe that she is in peril from in- 
 
 208
 
 ternal disturbances; I believe that the danger lurks 
 within. And I believe it rests primarily in our unfair 
 and unjust system of distribution of wealth, and the 
 income of the country. 
 
 As I said a moment ago, that if your house were on 
 fire, it would be my duty as a neighbor to warn you 
 and to try to help you save your property. I say to 
 you now, that when I believe this nation is in danger, 
 when I believe that our country is in danger, our 
 common life and our common liberties are in peril, 
 then it is my duty to warn you, it is my duty to speak 
 out and to continue to speak out as long as I have an 
 opportunity to do so. 
 
 You will say, if you went into my house and saved 
 my goods, you might burn your hands, you might 
 injure your clothes. True. It would still be my duty 
 to risk my clothing and my hands in your service. 
 
 You will say if you speak out today against these 
 perils in the land, you may lose your job, you may 
 lose your liberty. And I answer you again that as a 
 citizen it is my sole obligation to speak out when I 
 see peril ahead, and stand the loss of position or of 
 liberty or any other loss that may be entailed in issu- 
 ing the necessary warning. 
 
 Gentlemen, I want to say to you that I want to see 
 America free. I want to see liberty, opportunity and 
 democracy here, as well as in every other country on 
 earth. As long as America is not free, you are not free 
 and I am not free. As long as any of us are in chains 
 in this land, we are all in chains. As long as any are 
 in ignorance in the land, we are in ignorance to that 
 extent. As long as anybody starves in the land, we 
 starve. As long as anybody suffers from despotism 
 and tyranny, we are all suffering from despotism and 
 tyranny. We belong to the body of this citizenship, 
 
 209
 
 and we suffer in common with it, and we benefit in 
 common with it. 
 
 As I said a moment ago, the only principle upon 
 which society can ever be built is the principle of each 
 for all, and all for each. The principle of union, the 
 principle of joint co-operative action for the benefit 
 and the service of all. 
 
 I believe that that action is the action of the people, 
 the action of the masses, of mankind, and that sooner 
 or later they will insist upon their rights. 
 
 As Lincoln said, "You can fool some of the people 
 all of the time and all of the people some of the time, 
 but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time." 
 
 The peoples all over the world are coming into their 
 own, they are going to come into their nvn more and 
 more as the years go by. They are goin^ to come into 
 their own in the United States, and what happens to 
 one of us is incidental to the great question of what 
 happens to all of us. 
 
 I have expressed my hopes, my ideals, my ambitions 
 for liberty in America, and for brotherhood and peace 
 among all people of the world. I have done what I 
 could, and for the time being the matter is in your 
 hands. 
 
 210
 
 Seymour Stedman's 
 Summing Up 
 
 MR. STEDMAN : May it please the Court and you 
 gentlemen of the jury, the evidence in this case is upon 
 a very wide range, all the way from the University 
 of Pennsylvania to international finance and politics; 
 from' the Mexican border to Bagdad, and in fact 
 we have been engaged in digging into all parts of the 
 world during the last two days to a certain extent; 
 and all the evidence that has been admitted as a legal 
 proposition and under your oaths as jurors has been 
 admitted solely to define and for the purpose of de- 
 ciding an issue within a very narrow compass. 
 
 The indictment in this case, with the counts which 
 have been submitted to you for your judgment, con- 
 sists of two charges against two individuals I am 
 speaking of the corporation as an individual the 
 charge against the Rand School is that it attempted, 
 wilfully attempted to cause insubordination, disloy- 
 alty, refusal of duty and mutiny within the military 
 and naval forces of the United States; and that the 
 Rand School I am not going to give it any other 
 name but its popular name now did obstruct the 
 recruiting and enlistment service of the United States. 
 
 These two charges against the Rand School are 
 predicated and based upon the pamphlet called "The 
 Great Madness." 
 
 The same two charges are made against Scott Near- 
 ing. You are to consider the evidence against each 
 
 211
 
 one separately and apart from the other. It is true 
 that you are to take cognizance of the fact that "The 
 Great Madness" was published by the Rand School, 
 but Nearing is not responsible for what may have been 
 in the mind of the Rand School and its officers ; neither 
 is the Rand School, for the purpose or what was in 
 the mind of Nearing. So that considering this as 
 jurors, they are two separate and distinct defendants, 
 taking the evidence that has been admitted as to each 
 separately, and determining from that the question of 
 guilt or innocence. 
 
 The Rand School was started some twelve years 
 ago, its principal donor at that time was a woman who 
 was generally known to the public Carrie Rand, and 
 who, I believe, was a pioneer abolitionist. They com- 
 menced in a private building, an old stone building, a 
 private residence. The scholarships continued to in- 
 crease, the classes grew, and in 1917, upon the expira- 
 tion of a lease to the place, there were some of them 
 who conducted who suggested that they should pur- 
 chase a new and a larger building. 
 
 The photographs which have been offered in evi- 
 dence here will picture to you the building which was 
 under contemplation and which is now the home of 
 the Rand School on 15th Street. 
 
 In 1917, during the summer and the late spring, the 
 entire forces of that organization were engaged in 
 sending out letters and communications for the pur- 
 pose of raising $60,000 or more. It was during that 
 time that a young man, who had charge of the book 
 department, was away on his vacation. Among those 
 who had addressed classes and had become instructors 
 in this institution were many who were very prominent 
 in the universities in this country. The courses of the 
 studies were somewhat extensive, running from his- 
 
 212
 
 tory to office technique, civics and literary lines, even 
 running classes in English for persons who were not 
 proficient in the English language. 
 
 They also had a big book department, the primary 
 object of which was to carry a class of alert literature, 
 and I mean by that a class of literature that might be 
 distinguished from Thackeray or some of the writers 
 whose books are only sold in large sets, and which 
 involve a great expenditure, in handling. The books 
 that they were handling were necessarily of a class 
 which were readily sold and where storage expenses 
 would not be great and the capital invested would be 
 very limited ; books which were popular. 
 
 There were contributors or writers of pamphlets 
 whom they recognized as men of authority and whose 
 views they generally understood, and whose manu- 
 scripts were accepted without challenge outside of per- 
 haps literary correction. 
 
 They issued a year book, and your attention has 
 been called to the year book of 1916, and also to the 
 year book of 1917 and 1918. Mr. Barnes referred to 
 that and quoted passages from that book, passages 
 from the St. Louis platform of the Socialist Party, 
 passages from the immediate program. You will find 
 a great deal more in that book. You will find quota- 
 tions from the jjtetforms and documents of various 
 political parties. Primarily, however, it is labor and 
 socialistic. 
 
 The book store was run for the purpose of selling 
 books on all sides of the subject. The fact that in the 
 Year Book they did not cover the ground of the World 
 Almanac or the Daily News Almanac or the statistical 
 record would prove nothing, because in that field there 
 was no function for them to perform and no particular 
 work, but there was something in the other. 
 
 213
 
 For instance, if you gather up some books and 
 look them over, you will find a record such as we find 
 on pages 16, 17, 18 and 19 here, and I call your atten- 
 tion to just a few instances. For instance, this page 
 contains the different bills introduced in the legislative 
 bodies throughout March, April, May, June, July and 
 August in 1917. That is the record of the bills intro- 
 duced to abolish child labor law restrictions and sus- 
 pending the limitation of the hours of labor for chil- 
 dren, and eliminating the restrictive conditions of 
 women's work and general reactionary legislation. 
 
 Now, it was a legitimate thing for the organization 
 to publish t\at book. To publish these things tabu- 
 lated in form so that anyone buying the book might 
 read it. That certainly does not determine any mental 
 attitude in opposition to recruiting or obstructing re- 
 cruiting or having a tendency to create insubordina- 
 tion and disloyalty. 
 
 Now the issuing of this pamphlet "The Great Mad- 
 ness" came about from the sending in of the manu- 
 script, the book being written probably during the 
 period that the selective draft law was in considera- 
 tion, was received by the society after the first of 
 August and published by them after the first of August 
 and circulated mostly of course after that. 
 
 The proprietor of the bookstore read portions of it 
 and recognized the fact that it would be a good seller. 
 It had Scott Nearing's name attached to it. And mark 
 you, gentlemen of the jury, this evidence comes from 
 the government's witnesses. They are to prove the 
 case against the defendants. And when they put wit- 
 nesses on the stand against the defendant called by 
 them, and their own witnesses testified that they had 
 no evil intent, they are precluded by that fact. In 
 other words, the evidence as to the Rand School cir- 
 
 214
 
 culating that, comes from the stand here and comes 
 here vouched for by the government, and when a law- 
 yer puts a witness on the stand, the prosecution or the 
 defense, he vouches he does not guarantee but he 
 vouches for the truthfulness of his statements. These 
 were not men produced by us but by the prosecution. 
 They put them on the stand and did that to show 
 the printing and circulation. They proved the con- 
 tents. Mr. Cohen, did you read it? Mr. some other 
 man, did you read it? Mrs. Mailly, did you read it? 
 What was the purpose of the examination? To show 
 knowledge. Yes, and coupled along with such knowl- 
 edge as they had, came the evidence that they did not 
 publish it for the purpose of obstructing the recruiting 
 and enlistment service, or for causing insubordination 
 and disloyalty. The government's witnesses exoner- 
 ated the defendant, this school. 
 
 The charge in the indictment in this case is confined 
 to the particular function named. We are not con- 
 cerned with what may be generally termed as a "state 
 of mind." The state of mind generally means nothing 
 when it comes to the proof of a prosecution in a crim- 
 inal case. The question as to whether the person 
 proposed the accomplishment of the criminal act 
 charged is material. Not only whether they proposed 
 to accomplish the result, but now what result they 
 intended to accomplish and pursued the course to ac- 
 complish that end. In other words, one is knowingly 
 and the other is intentionally. Intentionally, that is 
 with the purpose. Wilfully, that is, with complete 
 knowledge and a determination a will to act and ac- 
 complish the prohibited end. 
 
 Is there any evidence in this case that the Rand 
 School by publishing twenty thousand copies of a 56- 
 page pamphlet, in the face of issuing some 350,000 
 pieces of literature in a year, that these people were go- 
 
 215
 
 ing to jeopardize the life of their school, with these four 
 thousand pupils ; that they were going to take a chance 
 on going to the penitentiary by issuing a 56-page 
 pamphlet dealing with a theoretical cause of the war? 
 
 Nothing but a war mania could have brought about 
 a prosecution of that case before this jury or any jury, 
 and you know it. Some very stupid person, possibly, 
 might have issued a pamphlet of 56 pages to accom- 
 plish the result of that kind, but no one with brains, 
 no one like these people, would ever do it in the world. 
 If they wanted to obstruct the recruiting, do you sup- 
 pose they would issue a pamphlet of this kind? Do you 
 think they would have issued a theoretical document? 
 Not at all. 
 
 Let us see the document they might have issued : 
 Suppose it had been about four pages, and they said, 
 "Young men of America, you have been reading the 
 papers for the last four years for the last three years, 
 and you have read how heaps and heaps of men were 
 dead between the trenches, that is between the French 
 and German trenches, and how they poured oil on 
 them, and they burned them, and the smoke, the blue 
 smoke, the fumes went one way and the other, and the 
 odors and the stench from it, and the thousands and 
 thousands that are raving maniacs in Germany and in 
 France." 
 
 They would have pointed out the conditions that the 
 newspapers were calling their attention to day after 
 day; they would have called their attention to their 
 peaceful homes and their mothers and their brothers 
 and their sisters, and then the situation here. They 
 could have emphasized the fact that the traditions of 
 this country were to keep out of foreign alliances and 
 foreign intrigues. All the way from the pest house all 
 over the field they could have illustrated that the 
 whole of Europe was one great madhouse, and could 
 
 216
 
 have made references to arouse their passions and 
 their prejudices, and then said, "oung men, are you 
 going to enlist? We are civilized men. We are not 
 beasts that we should be crowded into such as that. 
 Young men, do not enlist. One will stand by the 
 other." 
 
 And they could have sent that out by the hundreds 
 of thousands they would have done so. That is what 
 I mean when I say that they would have done some- 
 thing active, something real in that line, if they had 
 intended any such thing. That is what these people 
 would have done, and that is what they would have 
 had the courage to do, if they had believed in and de- 
 sired that end. 
 
 We must judge men and women by three general 
 standards in a case of this kind : First, what was the 
 defendant's object? Second, the intelligence and ac- 
 complishments that they possessed and their ability 
 to accomplish that object. Third, the courage to carry 
 out that intent. 
 
 There is only one theory upon which you can as- 
 sume that these people committed the offense charged 
 here, and that is that they are arrant cowards, that they 
 did really believe that way, but they didn't have the 
 courage to do it. Maybe. But I submit that we have 
 created an issue here that does not sustain that theory. 
 We would not have published a document for that 
 purpose containing 56 pages, or a pamphlet such as 
 has been offered here, and the district attorney knows 
 that. He knows that very well. That is why he drew 
 an economic issue into this case and why the govern- 
 ment put in the other issue of bonds. That is a ques- 
 tion of taxation and the determining of the question of 
 the desirability of an action. 
 
 Hundreds of people differ on the question of raising 
 revenue by one method or another. President Wilson 
 
 217
 
 insisted that it should be paid for as we went along. 
 He changed his opinion on that, or perhaps if he didn't 
 change his opinion, he didn't continue to emphasize it, 
 because he saw that it was not perhaps a practical 
 proposition. 
 
 Now to take a few illustrations ! I venture to say 
 that in your experience, you never knew of a person 
 being tried for smuggling and evidence being permit- 
 ted to be introduced before the jury that they believed 
 in free trade. Counsel in answering that in his open- 
 ing, and I anticipated it, said : 
 
 "If a person believed in free trade and they said I 
 will not pay the tax, and then they were caught with 
 diamonds, walking through the revenue office, that 
 wovxld be competent evidence." 
 
 He put in his statement before you, "If they said I 
 will not pay the tax," and then "the diamonds were 
 found in the pocket, that would be a part of the trans- 
 action." 
 
 That is entirely a different thing. He may probably 
 tell you gentlemen when he sums up, that if a man 
 was opposed to the tariff, that that would be com- 
 petent evidence to prove as an element, that he was a 
 smuggler. That is the question; would it? 
 
 Suppose as opposed to a trust law, but believing that 
 trusts are the logical and natural growth of industrial 
 society and on a prosecution for forming a trust, the 
 prosecution called the man to the stand and you say, 
 "Mr. Roberts," or you say, "Mr. Rogers," or you use 
 any other name, "Mr. Harriman," or any other man : 
 "Do you believe in the organization of industry in its 
 highest trustified form? A. Yes." It is contended 
 that that is evidence to prove that they were parties 
 in forming an illegal combination. 
 
 We have had trust cases in the United States, a 
 great many of them, and in all States of the Union. 
 
 218
 
 If you can find one authority to show that any trust 
 magnate on the stand was ever asked such a question 
 and permitted to answer it, as an indication that he 
 was guilty of a crime, I will retire from this case and 
 ask my client to plead guilty. And yet that is pre- 
 cisely the question that is asked of him. 
 
 "You believe in war? No." That is a general state- 
 ment, a general theory, not a specific one. It is the 
 same as if a person believed in prohibition. I say, 
 "You believe in prohibition? A. Yes." All right. 
 Perhaps I had better say: "But you are opposed to 
 prohibition." Perhaps in these times that would be 
 more in point "Do you oppose prohibition? A. 
 Yes." Does that make you guilty of violating the law. 
 for importing liquors against the law? 
 
 Counsel in his opening statement said, "Why it is 
 true that if a man says 'I am going to violate the pro- 
 hibition law,' and then he puts a quarter on a dummy 
 that goes up and down, you can introduce evidence to 
 show that he was not intending to buy cigars." Natur- 
 ally, that is part of an immediate act. 
 
 If Nearing had said to anyone, when he sent this 
 manuscript, "I hope the people will read that SP they 
 will become insubordinate; I hope that people will 
 read that because I believe it will obstruct the recruit- 
 ing or enlistment service," that would be a part of the 
 proper evidence to produce here in regard to that 
 matter. 
 
 I want to suggest another illustration: We are 
 charged here with obstructing the recruiting and en- 
 listment service of the United States. That language 
 is fairly plain, and we have a right to assume that it is 
 written for the understanding of the average citizen 
 of the United States. We have a right to assume that 
 it is not simply a trick clause, to trick people. 
 
 219
 
 Now ,what do you understand by ''service"? And 
 I understand I may say that maybe the court will 
 disagree with me on my definition here. I am men- 
 tioning it particularly because it goes to the question 
 of wilfullness. 
 
 What do you understand by "service"? A person 
 who serves. What do you understand by the "civil 
 service"? The civil laws where political qualifications 
 are eliminated in favor of merit. Departments which 
 are operated by the city, state or the government; in 
 time of peace the United States can pass a law like this 
 one, and in that law say, "Whoever shall obstruct the 
 civil service of the government, the postal depart- 
 ment," or any other department, "shall be punished by 
 imprisonment from one to twenty years, or a fine of 
 from one to ten thousand dollars." 
 
 They can pass that precisely as this act, and instead 
 of putting in "army" put in "postal service," or "patent 
 office" or any other public department. 
 
 Now, if you can carry this question to a purely busi- 
 ness basis, in an act of that kind we will just reason 
 a little on that subject and see where it would lead us 
 to. 
 
 I am a young man on the street, and I am addressing 
 a meeting, and I say, "I would not recommend anyone 
 to enter the service of the United States or of the city. 
 You go into the civil service departments of the city 
 or the government and you will find men who started 
 there when they were young, and they have lost their 
 ambition. They finally reached the position where 
 they have not the courage to leave the service and 
 strike out for themselves. They are demoralized, de- 
 pendent upon their salary week by week, they became 
 a part of that machine, you cannot tear them out of it. 
 For that reason I would recommend that no man enter 
 
 220
 
 the postal service or patent office or any other civil 
 service department of the government." 
 
 Would I be obstructing it? According to the 
 construction which Mr. Barnes has placed upon 
 it today under this statute, I would be guilty 
 of a crime. Do you believe that liberty is so 
 absolutely paralyzed and dead in this country 
 that you could not make the remarks which I 
 have just mentioned? You do not. You know that 
 if a law of that kind were passed, that I would still have 
 a right to persuade an individual, and persuade a 
 group, not to enter the postal department or to enter 
 any of the City Hall positions, or to take a civil service 
 position, because the opportunities outside were bet- 
 ter. That would be a legitimate discussion. I would 
 be appealing to their judgment upon that proposition. 
 I would be appealing against the civil service law, 
 against the civil service department, against what 
 might be conceived by me as a sacrifice of their lives 
 in the civil service position for life. That would be 
 legitimate. 
 
 When this law was passed and the average man read 
 it he understood "service" to be exactly what the word 
 means in plain English, and in every single dictionary 
 that may be found in the English language. You can 
 not define service except on the theory that you are 
 serving someone, some group, or state or some indi- 
 vidual. 
 
 Counsel may suggest, that these are times of war, 
 and therefore a different rule applies. My answer is 
 that it does not apply; that the same rules of 
 law apply at one time as apply at another. He will 
 tell you that it was unnecessary to show actual ob- 
 struction. I say that it is. The indictment in this case 
 says they obstructed. It does not say that Nearing 
 attempted to obstruct. The indictment does not say 
 
 221
 
 that the Rand School attempted an obstruction; the 
 count under which they are charged there says that 
 they did, intending voluntarily to obstruct the recruit- 
 ing and enlistment service of the United States, and 
 it is necessary for them, under this count of the indict- 
 ment, to prove the obstruction, not that it was calcu- 
 lated to do that, not that it was possible, not that it 
 possibly might do something, or that the natural rea- 
 sonable possibility of creating an obstruction ; we are 
 charged here with an obstruction, and under that it 
 is necessary, in my judgment, to show by evidence 
 that warrants you in the belief beyond a reasonable 
 doubt, that there was an actual obstruction. 
 
 Counsel may contend and say, well, that which 
 would naturally lead a person, who was makir .g a rush 
 for a recruiting station, to hesitate, to pause, wjuld be 
 an obstruction. That is an interpretation which coun- 
 sel may place on it. It may be an interpretation which 
 the court may place on it. I will assume it was ex- 
 actly the argument or even that it is true. In other 
 words, I will assume that obstruction does not mean 
 an obstruction, but it means a mental condition where 
 a person hesitates when he is going, we will say, to 
 the recruiting station. Then I say that in that cate- 
 gory they proved nothing, they failed to prove it be- 
 cause they lack evidence, and it is merely a conclu- 
 sion they have been unable to prove that anyone was 
 actually affected that way. But his contention is that 
 they don't have to prove it because that is the natural 
 meaning and intent of those words. I reply, let us 
 assume that that is so. If in the course of nine or ten 
 months a leaflet has been out, and you find anyone 
 who has been affected by it, with the public forces at 
 the hand of the district attorney, the command of the 
 secret service and the government's police detectives, 
 and the men who are in private organizations in camps 
 
 222
 
 of these conscientious objectors, and they have found 
 no one during all that time who comes forward and 
 says, "I read it and I did not enlist." What would be 
 your natural inference ? What can you draw from that 
 except that it didn't have that effect? 
 
 In other words, if a man is five feet from a man and 
 he shoots forty shots at him, and he is a good shot, 
 and doesn't hit him, there is but one conclusion, and 
 that is, that he didn't intend to hit him. 
 
 If there are twenty thousand pamphlets going out 
 and not a single individual is brought in who is influ- 
 enced by it, the logic of it is that the persons that 
 read it never understood it in the way the prosecuting 
 attorney has understood it. And he will not bring in 
 any one here, he has not suggested that anyone was 
 influenced by it at all. 
 
 If you knew that the Postmaster of New York, or 
 that the Postmaster General with the' corps of officers 
 in his employ, was reading every particle of literature 
 that was in circulation, and especially that coming 
 from organizations that they regarded as not wholly 
 in favor of our interest in the war, and that those 
 articles were copyrighted, and that it went for one 
 month, for tw,^ months, for three months, for four 
 months, for five months, in fact from August to May, 
 without a single protest from the postal department, 
 would you regard that as a fair circumstance to indi- 
 cate that not only the defendants, but the government 
 departments did not regard it as violating this section ? 
 
 Counsel will argue that they are two different de- 
 partments. That is true. He will argue that one does 
 not necessarily have any control of the other. That 
 is true. He may suggest that Mr. Lamar is solicitor- 
 general for the Post Office, and that he has in his de- 
 partment, operating particularly on these matters 
 John Lord O'Brien, who is particularly in charge of 
 
 223
 
 those matters, and I say to you, if the men who are in 
 charge of the postal department, and are looking for 
 violations, did not find this criminal in its character, 
 it is a circumstance to be reckoned with in determining 
 the question of whether it was obviously and plainly 
 a violation of the law, and as to whether it came within 
 the provisions which are denounced by the act. 
 
 The first proposition that we called to your atten- 
 tion was this, whether you as jurors will consider that 
 the reasonable hypothesis of innocence, was not dis- 
 carded with the throwing out of the two counts which 
 were the first in the indictment in this case. However, 
 we are not concerned with that. We are concerned, 
 however, with the subject of a reasonable doubt. 
 
 We are concerned with the presumption of inno- 
 cence which surrounds the defendants in this case, and 
 that presumption if carried into this case negatives 
 the theory upon which they now ask for a conviction. 
 
 When I think of the evidence in this case in its 
 entirety, I find that it occurs to me that there are re- 
 latively few details to really argue. As I listened to 
 Mr. Nearing this morning while he was addressing 
 you, I was wondering how a man could address a jury, 
 discussing a general economic theory which he ad- 
 vanced so consistently and so consistent with the the- 
 ories which were advanced from the witness stand, 
 and yet leave any doubt in any juror's mind or a dis- 
 trict attorney's mind as to what his general bent was 
 and what his general purpose and object was. How 
 a person who has been so open, and so plain in his 
 statements, and the books which he has written, which 
 disclose his entire motive and his entire object and his 
 entire purpose could leave any question in the mind of 
 any man as to whether or not he intended to specifi- 
 cally do the thing which is charged in this case. If 
 
 224
 
 it were not that we were in war times a case of this 
 kind would never be brought, and I do not mean by 
 that, that if it were not for war there might be a 
 statute of this kind. But I do mean that when an in- 
 dictment was returned in this case, it was returned as 
 is plainly evident, to stop a certain line of discussion 
 and not because there was actually any faith in 
 the fact that a crime was committed, or a jury would 
 find that there had been a crime committed. 
 
 Mr. Barnes down in his heart does not believe that 
 there has been, that either of these defendants in this 
 case are guilty of the crime charged. He is perform- 
 ing his duty. He is clearing up the remnant cases that 
 were started in this court during the time when that 
 war was in its height, and in its progress, and when 
 they thought that someone might step over the border 
 line. He will never be able to suggest before you any 
 theory upon which intelligent men and intelligent 
 scholars and intelligent women would issue a docu- 
 ment of this kind and to accomplish the result which 
 he says they intended in this case. 
 
 The court will instruct you that motive does not 
 make any difference. That is, supposing he was inter- 
 ested in the child labor question. Supposing on that 
 question you can picture the children twelve years old 
 and thirteen years of age in the factories, which aroused 
 his thoughts and ambitions to change their mode of life. 
 You might even picture hundreds of them standing 
 here at the bar pleading for him who pleaded for them 
 when they were unable to speak for themselves, yet 
 that motive would not justify the acts charged here 
 because whether his object was to do good or bad, the 
 court may instruct you it makes no difference. We 
 will concede that for the sake of argument, but we then 
 meet the other : If that wasn't his purpose, what was 
 
 225
 
 it? Was it the purpose of the Rand School, when they 
 published this book, to cause that is was the result in- 
 subordination and obstruction or was that the object 
 of their conduct? 
 
 The fact that they were against the war is not evi- 
 dence that can be used against these gentlemen on 
 this issue. The issue is not that, and there is nothing 
 in the evidence here that he was or that the school 
 was, except "The Great Madness." There is nothing 
 in "The Great Madness" where there is any solicita- 
 tion or advice and I use "solicitation" and "advice" 
 because they were used in the indictment nothing 
 there about soliciting anyone to become insubordinate 
 or not to enlist. 
 
 What is their theory? Their theory is this: We 
 have gone into the language of the book. There is no 
 solicitation in the language of the book; there is no 
 advice given not to enlist, but did it have that effect? 
 
 First, in point, did it have that effect upon a person 
 who was predisposed not to enlist because that would 
 be monstrous, that would not be considerable? In 
 other words, a person who would issue a book describ- 
 ing the form and the method of the commission of a 
 murder, as a part of a story, and someone went and 
 took that and committed murder, you cannot hold the 
 man who wrote the book as guilty of murder, as that 
 is a part of his story. 
 
 If a person advances a theory and someone predis- 
 posed in the beginning says, that that forfeited him 
 in his belief not to do what he knew he should do, and 
 said that that deterred him from doing it, that would 
 then not be within the purview of the intent which we 
 are trying to prove here. It is not a matter of, did it 
 have that effect on anybody. It is this : What was the 
 
 226
 
 necessary and the natural effect of that book on the 
 average normal individual, and would it in such indi- 
 viduals result in obstruction? Would it on such officers 
 and persons in the service cause them to mutiny or to 
 be disloyal? 
 
 Now, if the effect must be upon the average human 
 being and not on one who is demented or predisposed, 
 then cannot you say, that they would be able to pro- 
 duce some witnesses, some one who would say that 
 they were affected by it? If the government had any 
 such, do you think for a moment that they would not 
 have been produced, if there had been the slightest 
 evidence of anybody that had been affected that way? 
 Would this have the effect upon thinking people, the 
 result of producing what the government claims was 
 calculated to be produced, would it have the result up- 
 on the average human being? And suppose there were 
 a thousand people in the country who had heard a cer- 
 tain thing, placed before them a certain idea, don't you 
 suppose that there would be at least a few persons of 
 those thousand who could be found who would testify 
 to that effect upon them, if it was calculated to have 
 effect upon anybody, and did have an effect upon any- 
 body? If that is so, would not there be one of them 
 here to prove this was a fact in at least one instance? 
 
 Gentlemen, I will hurry along. The Court will in- 
 struct you in this case as to the law, but I want to 
 return to the Rand School for a moment. 
 
 A corporation is responsible for the acts of its agent 
 within the rule of the real or implied scope of his au- 
 thority. In explanation of that let me say that if a 
 person is running a book store and an agent of the 
 book store went out and bought a ton of dynamite it 
 
 227
 
 would be perfectly apparent he would not be acting 
 within the scope of his authority. 
 
 So that if the man went out and made that purchase 
 for some purpose or other, that would not be in the 
 direct line of his work, that is, within the real author- 
 ity that he had, that would be an individual act of his. 
 That is, if a corporation does what it does, it has to do 
 that through its agents and board of directors. If 
 the board of directors had instructed him to go out 
 and perform some specific act, then that is within his 
 scope of authority, that is, within the authority dele- 
 gated to him by that board. 
 
 Now in this instance the boy who was in the book 
 store was not instructed by them to publish this par- 
 ticular thing, this particular book, in violation of law. 
 Now bear this thing in mind, that there were lawyers 
 on that board of directors : there was Mr. Hillquit at 
 one time ; and there were other men of affairs on that 
 board of directors, for instance, like Mr. Lee, an Alder- 
 man of the City of New York, was also associated with 
 them on that board, and he was the educational direc- 
 tor. All these persons were associated on that board. 
 
 Now unless they specifically directed the man to do 
 it, or if it was not within the implied scope of his au- 
 thority, they cannot be held liable for the character of 
 literature that they published. 
 
 In other words, suppose you went over to a pub- 
 lishing firm, like Houghton, MifHin Company, or some 
 man went over there and handed to a clerk a manu- 
 script of a book to have it published and the book was 
 a book on burglary and that book was published ; and 
 that book treated on methods of burglarizing the safe 
 in a bank, the use of various tools, electric torches and 
 electric drills and possible curtain effects to be used 
 in connection therewith, and all of those things, and 
 
 22S
 
 such a book was published by that concern, you could 
 easily see that the stockholders of that company could 
 not be held responsible unless this particular book and 
 its publications, that is, the contents of the book and 
 the authorization for the publication thereof had been 
 brought to their attention and they had passed upon 
 it before it was published. 
 
 Of course, along with that, if you found that they 
 had been publishing books or treatises on the art of 
 picking pockets and other crimes of that character, 
 then you might well say it is within the same class- 
 ification of books that they have been publishing and 
 you could well say that it was their design, and that 
 it was the same general purpose of their entire litera- 
 ture. 
 
 Now it will be pointed out that the general literature 
 published by the Rand School was for the purpose of 
 violating no law of the United States, military or 
 otherwise. And at this time it may be proper to call 
 your attention along with the other literature to which 
 I have referred, to the books that have been published 
 in opposition to socialism, to the fact that there were 
 publications put out by this book store in favor of the 
 war, that is, for the side of the propagandists also, 
 gotten out by those who were specifically in favor of 
 the war and its conduct, as well as those who were 
 opposed to it. 
 
 And in that connection I come to the "Menace of 
 Peace" by George D. Herron, and to a passage in that 
 book which says : 
 
 "A peace based upon a drawn battle between the 
 Germanic Powers and the Allies is nothing else than 
 the capitulation of the world to Prussian might and 
 mastery. And it would not only be a German triumph 
 that such a peace would procure, but a triumph im- 
 
 229
 
 measurably more terrible in its full and final results 
 than Germany could have won by force of arms, even 
 had they been successful. 
 
 "I believe I am safe in predicting that the victory 
 of the Allies will lead to the banishment of war from 
 our planet. But if Germany remains armed, the rest 
 of the world must remain armed also, and the arma- 
 ment increased instead of decreased. A defeated Ger- 
 many is the only condition of universal peace. A peace 
 that left Germany with her weapons in her hands 
 would be no peace but a preparation for wars im- 
 measurably more terrible than the one that now baffles 
 our hopes for humanity. Germany would soon be 
 ready to fight more advantageously than she is fight- 
 ing now; and, against the greater German menace, 
 England and France would be obliged to maintain the 
 large conscriptive armies their peoples detest. 
 
 "The present German mind is in truth the deadliest 
 enemy, the harshest and yet subtlest seducer that the 
 soul of the world has ever had to meet." 
 
 By the way, this that I am reading here is in italics. 
 
 "Say not we are the enemies of the German race 
 who thus speak. Not we, but themselves, are the real 
 enemies of the German peoples. We stand against 
 that for which Germany fights; we are against the 
 Prussian idea, against its power over Germany, 
 against its purpose to conquer; but for the German 
 peoples we wish only well. It is for their freedom as 
 well as for ours we contend, and contend with pain in 
 our hearts. Germany's true lovers are they who now 
 stand against her, they who make war upon the lie 
 that enslaves and slays her soul. The France that 
 Germany has invaded is sacrificing her sons for Ger- 
 
 230
 
 many as well as for herself. There are Germans, yes, 
 there are thousands of understanding Germans, who 
 are today praying for Germany's defeat as her only 
 hope of salvation. As Edward Bernstein has recently 
 said, 'Unless the war ends for Germany in definite 
 defeat' her middle class parties will 'by hook or crook' 
 maintain her existing militarism, and the menace of 
 German militarism means the eventual madness of 
 mankind. 
 
 "To me, there are no two ways, there is but one way 
 wherein believers in freedom and fraternity, or they 
 who hold to the true socialist faith, or the followers 
 of the faith that was in Christ, may consistently walk. 
 Before us, beckoning along that way, are the banners 
 of Alfred of England and Albert of Belgium. The 
 swords of Jeanne d'Arc and St. Louis are there ; and 
 the tread of the Garibaldians and the first French 
 Republicans. The voices of Milton and Mazzini and 
 Lincoln; and the visions of the Divine Assisian and 
 the Patmos Apostle." 
 
 This is a book of the style that they had on sale 
 there that was in favor of war, this was one among 
 many that they had. The point of it all is to show 
 that there was literature on both sides. They were not 
 asking people to their store to buy only one 
 specific line of literature, but they gave both kinds, 
 both sides, each was equally free to be purchased that 
 would throw light either on one side or the other of 
 the proposition. 
 
 Now you must believe that within Karpf's actual au- 
 thority now, that he published this pamphlet, and that 
 he published it with the intent of violating the law; 
 that they authorized him to violate the law and that 
 it was within the implied scope of his authority, one 
 of those two. That is, considering first the general 
 work and the general publishing that he got out, that 
 
 231
 
 they or he expected, and it was within their obvious 
 intention, that they were publishing the work quite in 
 violation of law. 
 
 Now as to reasonable doubt. Of course some of you 
 who have served on juries have had that explained. 
 Generally, courts define a reasonable doubt as a doubt 
 based on reason which you know. That has always ap- 
 pealed to me as not as clear as has been defined by 
 Chief Justice Field of the Supreme Court of Massach- 
 usetts, who defines reasonable doubt as a doubt which 
 would cause a reasonable and prudent man to pause 
 and hesitate in the greater affairs and transactions of 
 life. 
 
 Bear in mind, gentlemen, that the presumption of 
 innocence is always with the defendant and if, after 
 considering all the evidence any juror in his mind 
 pauses and hesitates as to what his verdict may be, 
 the law steps in and demands a verdict of not guilty. 
 
 Now I doubt not the Court will say to you and so 
 instruct you, that you have no right to conjure up 
 capricious doubts, fanciful theories, for the purpose of 
 creating doubt when no doubt should in fact exist. 
 That is true equally as to your duty after there is some 
 doubt. You should to conjure up capricious reasoning 
 or fanciful reasoning, for the purpose of destroying or 
 dispelling the doubt to try to say that there is no doubt 
 when there is. 
 
 That explanation works equally on both sides. 
 
 Now returning again for a moment to Nearing, be- 
 fore closing : the Army and Navy League issued leaf- 
 lets and issued their other publications, which were not 
 for general circulation. Mr. Nearing commented on 
 them and called your attention to them. The whole 
 tenor of their publications from beginning to end was 
 one of commercialism. In no instance in all that I read 
 from there did they maintain that their argument for 
 
 232
 
 preparedness was to secure or maintain human rights 
 permanently above all rights; neither was it even for 
 a localized national integrity. 
 
 Just one or two portions that I wish to read to you 
 from here: 
 
 "Do Americans realize that one of the reasons why 
 we must of necessity be intensely concerned in the 
 submarine and trade warfare now waged between 
 Germany and the Allies is that in not having any ships 
 of our own with which to carry our four billion dollars 
 worth of merchandise and the German ships being 
 unavailable, that we will lose our two billion dollars 
 worth of export trade unless merchant shipping of the 
 Allies are free and able to carry our goods?" 
 
 "This question faces us squarely in this country : 
 
 "Will we continue to jeopardize our four billion- 
 dollar trade with the world by trusting to luck, fate, 
 or the good will of fighting nations which may have 
 the shipping in which to carry our goods to safety 
 or destruction?" 
 
 Again we see the idea is to afford avenues for the 
 products of labor to be reinvested in foreign lands 
 another capitalistic outgrowth. 
 
 Then again : 
 
 "German standards of militarism would, of course, 
 be impossible among Anglo-Saxons " I don't know 
 why they so defined it, and limited it "but this does 
 not minimize the fact that world empire is the only 
 natural and logical aim of a nation that desires to 
 remain a nation. 
 
 "We have now on our hands, it seems to me, a white 
 elephant to some, a Republican Empire, and no longer 
 such a question of doubting whether or not to have a 
 navy as large as England's. The navy, for a coast 
 line such as the United States possesses, a navy which 
 could uphold the Monroe Doctrine, now moribund, 
 
 233
 
 such a navy must be at least twice the size of the 
 British navy. And the first step to be taken so as to 
 secure that sized navy is for the American citizen to 
 shake off the timorous manner which is our charac- 
 teristic, in asserting our Federal rights. The imper- 
 ialism of the American is a duty, a credit to humanity. 
 He is the highest type of imperial master. He makes 
 beautiful the land he touches, beautiful with moral and 
 the physical cleanliness which sounds rather prosaic 
 but is nevertheless the principal, happiness for the 
 savage if not for the imperialist." 
 
 We are getting now to where we are going to have 
 the savage in our midst satisfied. 
 
 "England certainly owns or has in some way a very 
 large portion of the earth's land surface and practi- 
 cally has for some time, until quite recently, controlled 
 the oceans which cover the hidden land surface. There 
 should be no doubt that even with all possible morals, 
 it is the absolute right of a nation to live to its full 
 intensity, to expand, to found colonies, to get richer 
 and richer by any proper means such as armed con- 
 quest, commerce, diplomacy." 
 
 In reply to this, when we are already developing 
 along those lines, with those theories advanced by 
 such governmental authorities as this that I have 
 quoted you, is it any wonder that Nearing, in reading 
 it, expressed his opinions as any American having the 
 good of his country at heart, of mankind at heart, 
 would have expressed them, or at least laid them be- 
 fore his countrymen for their consideration. The 
 same theory that the economic basis provided, he em- 
 phasizes. What is the difference? This: they are 
 publishing one for commercializing, and the other ar- 
 ticle, let me recall to you, was insisting upon this policy 
 so that there might be large dividends to munitions 
 manufacturers, etc. Their publication went out as a 
 
 234
 
 trade journal, to give information to those who were 
 guarding the commerce of the country, those who un- 
 derstood and are prosecuting or sustaining the indus- 
 trial institutions and welfare of the cuntry. 
 
 As against that, his goes to another class : they went 
 to the man on the street, to the man in the factory, or 
 the elevator, to the average man who has as much 
 right to have a full and complete knowledge of the 
 facts presented to his mind as any other man has. 
 
 The distinction between the autocracy and the de- 
 mocracy is the fact that the man on the street has a 
 right to all the facts necessary to judge, and after 
 forming his judgment to attempt to cause changes in 
 the opinion of those who are supposed to represent 
 him. 
 
 We believe, at least in theory, that our purpose of 
 having different parties is that a few men have not 
 the right by a chance of an election, to arrogate to 
 themselves the complete guiding of the destiny of the 
 American people, that they being wholly informed and 
 they having the facts and knowledge sufficient to 
 know to what extent their country and its systems and 
 policies are drafted that is the common people's right. 
 There can be no policy in a republican government 
 that is definite or settled, if the average man repre- 
 senting the minority of the people of the country, 
 has not the right to express his opinions based on all 
 of these general facts which are common knowledge, 
 and we claim that he has a right to urge his theories 
 to convince if he can, the people to his way of think- 
 ing. The moment you strike down the right of those 
 having theories to advance, to try to bring the majority 
 of the people to their way of thinking, you strike down 
 the right under the constitution of the minority to try 
 to have their opinions adopted by the majority. The 
 moment you destroy the privilege of a minority to 
 
 235
 
 speak, whether it is a single individual or a party, you 
 stop progress, and all chance of progress, and you 
 simply ossify and become fixed in character and type. 
 If they are not allowed to tell you what else they 
 believe, and to meet the objections to the existing 
 conditions, we would then have imperial America to 
 all intents and purposes. 
 
 I say even to you now, that I doubt not, once we 
 take the position, that if the system under which we 
 live is to prevail, America must be imperialistic, that 
 is indispensable and it must be so of necessity. 'There 
 is no other existence possible in the direction in which 
 she is leaning if her citizens do not have the oppor- 
 tunity of entering their objections, not only one or 
 two, but what occur to them by way of advocating 
 their theories. Because, in becoming imperialistic, 
 you begin investing entirely in foreign lands and the 
 time comes that the foreign fields of investment are 
 exhausted. Then what happens? They have been 
 deflecting your industry from the states, of Connecti- 
 cut, of Kentucky, of Maine, Washington, Florida, or 
 any other states of the Union, and the investments are 
 made in foreign lands and when you make your invest- 
 ments outside of any country, that is outside of one's 
 own country, there surely will come a time when those 
 investments will proceed still farther, just as you start 
 a current going from within, it keeps going and en- 
 larging until it gets to the coast, and then it goes over 
 the coast line, and then as it goes over the coast line 
 ultimately you run down to where you can go no fur- 
 ther, and in this case in your investments and exports. 
 If you go outside of your own states, it follows that 
 with the constant expansion, which is the only life 
 under which the socialists contend the country can 
 exist under what we speak of as the capitalistic system, 
 the point comes when you can go no further. It is 
 
 236
 
 there, where the Army and Navy League differ en- 
 tirely from Nearing. Nearing is stating a solution, 
 when you reach that point, and his is an attempt to 
 point that out before we reach it, that it may not come 
 to us unadvised. 
 
 I want to read a portion, a couple of paragraphs 
 here, beginning with the third book' in "Social Sanity," 
 which was an attempt to show by that book: 
 
 "That changes were bound to occur, and that if we 
 are wise and far-sighted, and if we understand what 
 is coming, they can occur sanely and intelligently and 
 constructively, but that if we are stupid and dogged, 
 and refuse to see what is coming, the changes come, 
 overtake and wreck our civilization." 
 
 That is not the language of a man who is reckless 
 of the law, reckless of his responsibility, or who be- 
 lieves in chaos or discord. That is not the language 
 of a man who is going out into the country counselling 
 and persuading or trying to get half a dozen soldiers 
 not to go into the army, not to go into the service 
 themselves, not with that sort of language ; nor is that 
 the language of a man who is going around to try to 
 induce a corporal to kill his captain or a private to kill 
 his colonel. An idiotic proposition of that kind is al- 
 most impossible for you gentlemen or for me to think 
 of, and think of this case seriously, for a moment. But 
 if we use the ordinary logic and reasoning that we use 
 in our ordinary affairs, you see how impossible it is 
 for us to think so. 
 
 Suppose that a man should come in here and state, 
 we will say into some railroad station or any other 
 place, and state that when the train comes in he is 
 going to stop the functioning of the government, he is 
 going to overcome the present government by stop- 
 ping the sale of postage stamps, and he is going to 
 urge that on the people. Such a proposition as that, 
 
 387
 
 such a suggestion as that would appeal to you as ut- 
 terly absurd and impossible. 
 
 The same proposition might be applied to the stop- 
 ping of men going into the police service or the secret 
 service, and he might take the position that he was 
 going in this way to overcome all the present forms 
 of government, especially the one under which he is 
 living. You gentlemen can see how absurd such a 
 proposition as that would be. 
 
 Right here you come and take up this proposition, 
 here a lone man, a lone individual, issues a pamphlet 
 for the purpose, it is claimed, of stopping voluntary 
 enlistments or recruiting in an army of five million 
 men, with the public sentiment and the public press 
 in thousands of papers large and small, and speakers 
 in the cities and the towns, all of them whooping it 
 up and declaring aloud the necessity for the war, and 
 against that public sentiment, against that press, 
 against all these periodicals, and against the stump 
 speeches, and the counselling of these thousands of 
 men, and against the private organizations that are 
 in existence in many of the states for the purpose of 
 rooting out pro-Germanism, etc., all over the country, 
 throughout every state and city, this man alone, with 
 the Rand School, publishes a couple of pamphlets for 
 the purpose of effectively stopping enlistment in the 
 army. I cannot conceive of anything more absurd. 
 It is too bad that Mark Twain is not alive now, he is 
 the man that really ought to defend a case of this kind. 
 
 "I tried to point out," says he "that the ruling class 
 in society, the people in charge and in control of any 
 society would do well to realize that progress is bound 
 to be made, and do well to study the problems of 
 progress and see that they were sane rather than the 
 chaotic progress. Changes will come anyway, and 
 
 238
 
 the question is whether they will come wisely or in- 
 sanely." 
 
 What do you think of a man writing like that? And 
 he writes like that before we are in our present situa- 
 tion, which is more or less serious. We all regret the 
 present industrial situation both in the United States 
 and in other countries. We live in a country where 
 suggestions from men of ideas are the foundation of 
 our government, and those ideas, whether lawful or 
 unlawful, the expression of them you can never pre- 
 vent except upon the theory of abolishing the govern- 
 ment's own act in passing the First Amendment to the 
 Constitution of the United States. You cannot sup- 
 press expression. The only thing you can do is drive 
 it into subterranean methods. No country has ever 
 succeeded except, perhaps, one, and that one existed 
 in the thirteenth century where the persecution was so 
 intense, that it practically destroyed their life, their 
 national life, and at the same time those with religious 
 views different from their own ; and yet in the end. 
 notwithstanding hundreds and hundreds were tortured, 
 buried, killed, yet the movement continued on until we 
 reached the point in the latter part of the eighteenth 
 century or even in the seventeenth century, that real 
 progress could only come from permitting men to dis- 
 cuss different subjects, especially those pertaining to 
 the state. 
 
 And along with that, let me mention another thing: 
 it may be suggested by counsel that the first amend- 
 ment is not an absolute license to say what you wish 
 or what you will. For instance, you cannot slander 
 a man or a woman, if you do, you are amenable for 
 that. That is not a parallel instance, nor a license for 
 any such action. 
 
 If, for instance I call a man a thief, and people know 
 of it, he is specifically injured by that. If I say "here
 
 is a storekeeper selling or putting sand in sugar," he 
 is specifically injured by that, and he may sue me for 
 it. If I say "this man is a leper," and he is shunned by 
 society, he may prosecute me. You know how that is, 
 and see the difference between that and discussing an 
 economic policy, yes, of course ; because there is no 
 special damage in discussing a general policy. 
 
 There may be the class damage. For instance, thou- 
 sands of men have their money invested in breweries 
 and distilleries throughout the United States. The 
 prohibition law is passed by legislative enactment, and 
 instantly that mass of property is destroyed or dam- 
 aged greatly, and that man may receive compensation 
 or those men may receive compensation, depending 
 upon whether or not in the Court of Claims, the Gov- 
 ernment recognizes it, and that is the way those ques- 
 tions are tested, when millions and millions of dollars' 
 worth of property are destroyed and w r iped out. That 
 is a class damage. 
 
 And men in business, they are buying and selling 
 goods, and the raising or lowering of tariff, along with 
 it the industry rises or falls; that is a class damage. 
 That is not a damage to a person. 
 
 So the suggestion that it does not guarantee free 
 expression may be true, but it does not apply to the 
 question of discussing a governmental policy. And 
 along with that proposition of the prohibition we have 
 it tallying to some extent with the theories which are 
 after all simply an analysis of events and conditions 
 and prospective conditions we have the theories ad- 
 vanced by the defendant. 
 
 A defendant can have any theory he wants, legally, 
 and if he believes that he can secure a majority of the 
 American people to agree with him, all well and good, 
 then his theory prevails. But if they disagree with him, 
 then we say he is not right, those who do not agree 
 
 240
 
 with him. We only know of one way of advance and 
 that is by getting the majority to agree with you. 
 That is his trouble. If he gets them, then it is done 
 that way, and in that way the majority of the people 
 believe in that theory which is not his theory today; 
 but the minority today fail to accept the theory of the 
 majority and reserve to themselves the right to still 
 convince the other people that they are wrong. 
 
 You cannot take away the right of the minority to- 
 day without realizing that tomorrow you may need 
 the minority. There is no chance that you will be in 
 the majority a day hence or a month hence or a year 
 hence, with the kaleidoscopic changes going on, no 
 man knows when his so-called status in a religious 
 sense or his ideas or his point of view may be attacked. 
 They may be modified by great changes that are com- 
 ing, and by important circumstances. 
 
 I mentioned the First Amendment to the Constitu- 
 tion quoted by the defendant not to antagonize the 
 theory of the law, which no doubt the Court will give 
 you, and when I say no doubt, of course no man can 
 guess exactly what the Court will give the jury, no 
 more than I can, counsel's argument, except with a 
 measured degree, he may say that the First Amend- 
 ment is not, and cannot be used by the defendant to 
 excuse the commission of a crime. That is true. 
 
 In other words, if Scott Nearing says, "I am going 
 to stop recruiting; I am going to obstruct the service; 
 I am going to create insubordination ; I am going to 
 protect myself under the First Amendment to the Con- 
 stitution" if that was in his mind of course he could 
 not use it; but if he believed in that, believed in it 
 with the faith which Americans for a long time had 
 in it, and were proud of it, and we were brought up 
 to be proud of it in our schools, we then would go to 
 the question as to whether or not he wilfully it would 
 
 241
 
 be an element in determining, whether he wilfully was 
 violating a law with which he is charged with a viola- 
 tion of here. If he had full faith in the fact, that is 
 if he thought that the interpretation of that gave him 
 the right to express his belief, then it would go to that. 
 In other words, to show that there was not a stubborn 
 and reckless attempt to break the law which he has 
 been charged with violating here. 
 
 In this case the minor act charged, the one that you 
 are to determine really by your verdict, so far as the 
 record is concerned, is limited ; and the other one is 
 quite broad ; that is the one to the degree of tolerance 
 which the American people propose now to show, and 
 which they must show now or show not at all, I 
 mean by that, you cannot make one degree of law dur- 
 ing war time and one during peace ; and we will show 
 in the other the degree to which the American people 
 reverence traditions of their country, and revere the 
 constitution. 
 
 I think, and I may say, to you gentlemen, that the 
 history of this country can hardly be written with- 
 out a list of the names of a few of my ancestors. I 
 think that the tradition of this country on the con- 
 scription law was the most alarming thing that had 
 taken place. What do we understand the word, tradi- 
 tion, to mean? It is the habit of thought. I still be- 
 lieve the ordinary man moves his body virtually by the 
 development of personal habits. He has a way of look- 
 ing when he is crossing the street. His feet move 
 habitually, he has learned it after a struggle, a con- 
 siderable struggle, when he was an infant ; he has cer- 
 tain habits of dress and in doing work; and it follows 
 a constant mental attitude w r hich was a habit as of the 
 people of this country for many, many years, that we 
 would not send an expeditionary force to any other 
 country; that European concerns were none of ours 
 
 242
 
 I don't say but what they may have been, but I am 
 showing what the thought generally was; that we did 
 not believe in standing armies and if an army were 
 needed we would simply call upon the States, and let 
 each State furnish its quota in such way as it might 
 be able. 
 
 England resisted conscription for years, for a long 
 time; Ireland resisted it, and England went about to 
 enforce it, but it was never enforced upon them. 
 Canada did not enforce conscription at all until after 
 we did it. Australia not at all. We changed almost 
 over night. Can you wonder that Lord Northcliffe 
 said about the American people, when looking at them 
 through a window of one of our buildings: "A most 
 docile people, a most docile people." 
 
 And when a nation breaks its habits so easily, it 
 indicates that there is a want in the measure of stabil- 
 ity which we ordinarily expect in an individual who 
 has fixed habits, and people who have kept true to 
 these traditions, that is, that the privilege and the 
 right of speaking should be protected completely un- 
 der the law. 
 
 We need never fear one great and substantial prin- 
 ciple and that is, say what you please, accept the law 
 as the majority declare it; that is, that power must 
 reside with a free and pure selection, with a full and 
 complete opportunity for every voter and every per- 
 son who should be a voter and by that I include the 
 women the right to express their opinions, and when 
 that law is made, you will accept and obey it, always 
 carrying with that the right to oppose that, to change 
 that, to remedy that, to modify or repeal it. With 
 that we will have absolute and final safety to our 
 course of progress and development, but the moment 
 you strike that down, you can measure almost in years, 
 the time when those who will have sown the wind will 
 
 243
 
 reap the whirlwind, that is inevitable. Neither can 
 any body or group of men belong in the majority who 
 attempt to hold up the rights of others and stifle 
 thought and growth of expressions of others. You can- 
 not do that, gentlemen, you cannot do it in conscience, 
 you cannot do it. 
 
 And still we have this question right here : this man 
 here has expressed his honest, conscientious view and 
 he is trying to carry out his theory of the economic 
 purposes and programme ; he is a member of a politi- 
 cal party which has millions and millions of men both 
 in the United States and other countries. As he de- 
 clared on the stand, they were in the army of 
 Germany and France, Italy and England, the soldiers 
 there were socialists, and had declared their belief as 
 such ; the Italian socialists believed that war was the 
 result of economic conflict, those in France the same 
 as those in Germany, as well as in other places, and 
 they believed that the economic support of economic 
 life of the nation \vas vital, and that economically you 
 can bring about changes. 
 
 It was absolutely after that kind of a declaration of 
 their feelings that industry and social conditions that 
 existed there could be changed by such methods, that 
 with that in their minds they went into the army and 
 the boys assumed, that is, those that went, that is the 
 youthful and younger members in the United States, 
 assumed that they had a right to know the truth. Is 
 it to our credit, that we equipped an army, or raised 
 an army by fancy fairy tales? Can we only depend 
 on the safety of this country by assuming that it is 
 quite proper to raise an army by half the facts and dis- 
 torted statements? If the facts were on the side of 
 those in opposition to Nearing, what have we to fear? 
 How many newspapers were denied the right to freely 
 print the facts? How many newspapers in Buffalo, 
 
 344
 
 Chicago, San Francisco, New Orleans, St. Paul hun- 
 dreds of them. How many magazines continuously 
 run off by the ream from the press, from the "Saturday 
 Post" to the "New Republic," one paper after another, 
 one magazine after another. The churches, the speak- 
 ers, the Congressmen, Senators, the President, if they 
 were right, don't you think they could tolerate one 
 man who was wrong? And if the one man is right 
 don't you think it is quite right that the majority 
 should begin to realize that they are wrong? 
 
 During the War of the Rebellion, the newspapers 
 criticised Abraham Lincoln, and there was talk, and 
 attempts made to take steps to suppress them and 
 by the way only one or two editions of one or two 
 papers were suppressed and he said "No, if they are 
 right, their opinions should prevail against mine, and 
 those associated with me; if they are wrong, then in 
 the course of time they will be discovered by the 
 people and it will do no harm." That is a safe prin- 
 ciple upon which to proceed. 
 
 Our country was not invaded, it was not in such 
 a grave difficulty as to warrant the arrest or indicting 
 of Scott Nearing in a case of this kind for the issuing 
 of a pamphlet of this kind of forty-four pages, and its 
 publication by the Rand School. A man with a wife 
 and with a couple of young children, four and six years 
 of age, is taking no chance, is not proposing to enter 
 the penitentiary and leave their happiness and their 
 home, he is not walking away from his fireside, he is 
 not walking away from his friends and leaving his 
 family surroundings and his friends and his associates 
 and writing a pamphlet committing an offense of this 
 kind, if it was an offense, as I stated before, if he in- 
 tended to do a thing like that he would have done it 
 directly and openly and it would have really resulted 
 in something, the actual commission of something, 
 
 245
 
 and there would have something actually resulted 
 therefrom, it would not have simply then been regarded 
 as a readable instrument. 
 
 The reasonable doubts that you are supposed and 
 required to have eliminated from your mind before 
 finding a verdict of guilty are not presumptions alone 
 of law, but they are human presumptions. They have 
 a deeper basis than merely legal form, humanity. It 
 is only by thinking of all of the facts surrounding a 
 given circumstance, a man does certain things, we 
 think of his family, his friends and society in arriving 
 at this question of presumption. It is by that that we 
 can measure their movements. 
 
 This is a case prosecuted in the name of the Gov- 
 ernment. I realize that oftentimes when a prosecu- 
 tion is made in the name of the Government, we are 
 very apt to think by reason of that fact that it leans, 
 or that the line draws slightly to the side of the Gov- 
 ernment not at all. 
 
 The millions and millions of people in the United 
 States, and the hundreds of thousands of soldiers in 
 the United States, are not after Scott Nearing for tell- 
 ing the truth in a pamphlet, they are not asking his 
 imprisonment in the penitentiary; and counsel in his 
 opening intimated that the punishment was for the 
 Court, that it might be from one day up to ten years, 
 with a fine of from one cent up to ten thousand dollars ; 
 but I tell you, and you know it for yourselves, that 
 upon a finding of guilty for this offense, it does not 
 mean an insignificant penalty at all. The penalty will 
 be measured by the gravity of the offense which your 
 verdict determines. Your verdict is not on an insig- 
 nificant proposition. It is determining whether dur- 
 ing a war these two parties, the school with its four 
 thousand pupils and its influence, its teachers, and 
 Scott Nearing with his friends and those with whom 
 
 246
 
 he is acquainted, whether they were engaged in com- 
 mitting a crime against the country by trying to de- 
 stroy the effectiveness of the internal management of 
 its army. Can you think of any greater crime in war 
 time than for men to try to induce privates to rebel 
 against their superiors? Cannot you see that that 
 would merit a severe punishment? Cannot you see? 
 Can you see anything more severe than such a situa- 
 tion, if you were raising an army, than to have some- 
 one go among them and stop them when the country 
 is trying to raise them, and try to obstruct those 
 efforts? The charge is grave, and the punishment will 
 be commensurate with that. 
 
 Assuming a logical application of punishment in 
 view of the charge which is made and I recall this 
 to your mind because counsel brought it out, other- 
 wise I would have said nothing about it because it is 
 not within the purview of an attorney to comment on 
 the punishment, as that is exclusively for the Court. 
 The grave consequences, though, of verdicts, is that 
 which would stimulate in the mind of a juryman al- 
 ways to be alert to the necessity of keeping the pre- 
 sumption of reasonable doubt alive and, gentlemen, 
 you are now in a position in this case to decide as 
 between the Government on the one hand and these 
 defendants on the other. 
 
 When counsel for the Government says it is of grave 
 concern to the Government, I join and say, sure it is, 
 yes, but I want to say that I would not expect and I 
 do not expect a verdict that is not warranted by what 
 has been presented to you, and I think that is well 
 stated, that it should raise a certain hesitancy in your 
 mind, on these facts that have been presented to you 
 here. 
 
 We are fighting under the theory that we want the 
 truth ; that we are entitled to the entire truth, when 
 
 247
 
 we make up our conclusions, and not that we should 
 be fed on half truths, and when we get an opinion from 
 what we have been able to ascertain as the truth, we 
 want the opportunity to express those opinions freely 
 that others may possibly see our view. We want the 
 information from all sources and to that we are en- 
 titled. The people are entitled to change their judg- 
 ment, for a judgment based on error and only half 
 the truth will never be a good judgment. We ask that 
 you say to the people of the United States by your 
 verdict in this case that its citizens have the right to 
 have the facts fully told, and to also vindicate the right 
 of the people to state their theoretical conclusions and 
 their ideas and their views and also that they should 
 not be imprisoned because of conscientiously and hon- 
 estly stating them, and because there may be some 
 speculation about someone having committed an 
 offense by a wrongful use of a phrase here and there. 
 You cannot stake the liberty of a nation, which is the 
 liberty of the press and the right to speak on possibil- 
 ities and the chance of someone being led astray by 
 the publication of a pamphlet or a leaflet or speech. 
 Take no such chance with it, gentlemen, and if there 
 is any leaning to be done, take no chance upon it, take 
 your chances upon the side of the freest possible ex- 
 pression of it, because only in that way can we be sure 
 that a man will not be carrying around harbored in 
 his heart vicious dislike towards the constitution or 
 to the form of the government under which he lives, 
 and that government will command the man's respect 
 which gives the greatest opportunity for praise and 
 blame, and no government, no country is entitled to 
 compliment if it does not rise to meet the light of cen- 
 sure or criticism. 
 
 248
 
 The Verdict 
 
 At the close of the trial and before the case was sub- 
 mitted to the jury, the Court (Judge Julius M. Mayer) 
 upon motion of the attorneys for the defendants, dis- 
 missed the first and second counts of the indictment, 
 holding that there had not been sufficient evidence 
 adduced to prove a conspiracy between the defendants. 
 The court submitted the case to the jury on the third 
 and fourth counts. The jury found Scott Nearing not 
 guilty and the American Socialist Society guilty on 
 the third and fourth counts. After the verdict had 
 been rendered the defendants' attorneys' motion to set 
 aside the verdict against the Society was granted as 
 to the third count and decision was reserved by the 
 Court upon the motion to set aside the verdict against 
 the Society as to the fourth count. Briefs were sub- 
 mitted on the motion and the Court later denied the 
 motion, at the same time writing an opinion. Upon 
 the day set for sentence, March 21st, 1919, the Court 
 imposed a fine of three thousand dollars against the 
 Society. The maximum fine provided by the Espion- 
 age Law is ten thousand dollars. The Court allowed 
 the attorneys for the Society until April 14th, 1919, 
 to submit a writ of error which the Court stated it 
 would allow, such a writ of error being a necessary 
 part of the procedure connected with an appeal either 
 to the United States Circuit Court of Appeals or to 
 the United States Supreme Court. The Court granted 
 a stay of execution on the fine until April 14, 1919, 
 without requiring the Society to file any security. 
 
 249
 
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