Gentlemen:
Relative to the article on Miss Jane Addams which appeared in the issue of January 14th, may I draw attention to the extraordinary method the military gentleman took to discover her views on world peace; despite the fact that Miss Addams is constantly speaking on international affairs -- that she has written several books on the subject and various signed articles in magazines; they proceed as follows:
They find her a member of the general committee of an organization with headquarters in New York known as the Civil Liberties Union. The president, Rev. Harry Ward, Professor in the Union Theological Seminary of that city has written a pamphlet on free speech in which he discusses the Anglo-Saxon contention of ↑that↓ the "overt act" alone deserving punishment.
The military gentlemen select a paragraph from this pamphlet, take it out of its context, construe it as Miss Addams' sentiments, and upon that basis they denounce her as a red. In order to give this statement color -- no pun intended -- they refer to the defense fund raised by the Civil Liberties Union some years ago for Wm. Z. Foster and others involved in a raid in Michigan, but say nothing of the later activities of the Union such as the defense of Mr. Scopes at Dayton, Tennessee or the still more recent defense of the young colored physician in Detroit, Michigan.
The whole proceeding is so unconvincing, and so like an amateur detective story that I am quite sure that no one of your readers will be able to take it seriously.
Perhaps the crowning absurdity was the offer by Captain Hopkins to Miss Addams that if she would repudiate these statements made by Dr. Harry Ward in New York as to the historic basis of the Anglo-Saxon theory of free speech that he, Captain Hopkins "would never mention her again." Whether this was meant as a bribe or a threat or was an effort to dictate the organizations which Miss Addams is at liberty to join, it is hard to say.
Amelia Sears.
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