WAR CLOUDS HOVER
Gloria was splendidly successful in her undertaking and within two
weeks she was ready to place at Philip's disposal an amount far in
excess of anything he had anticipated.
"It was so easy that I have a feeling akin to disappointment that I did
not have to work harder," she wrote in her note to Philip announcing the
result. "When I explained the purpose and the importance of the outcome,
almost everyone approached seemed eager to have a share in the
undertaking."
In his reply of thanks, Philip said, "The sum you have realized is far
beyond any figure I had in mind. With what we have collected throughout
the country, it is entirely sufficient, I think, to effect a preliminary
organization, both political and military. If the final result is to be
civil war, then the states that cast their fortunes with ours, will, of
necessity, undertake the further financing of the struggle."
Philip worked assiduously upon his organization. It was first intended
to make it political and educational, but when the defiant tone of
Selwyn, Thor and Rockland was struck, and their evident intention of
using force became apparent, he almost wholly changed it into a military
organization. His central bureau was now in touch with every state, and
he found in the West a grim determination to bring matters to a
conclusion as speedily as possible.
On the other hand, he was sparring for time. He knew his various groups
were in no condition to be pitted against any considerable number of
trained regulars. He hoped, too, that actual conflict would be avoided,
and that a solution could be arrived at when the forthcoming election
for representatives occurred.
It was evident that a large majority of the people were with them: the
problem was to get a fair and legal expression of opinion. As yet, there
was no indication that this would not be granted.
The preparations on both sides became so open, that there was no longer
any effort to work under cover. Philip cautioned his adherents against
committing any overt act. He was sure that the administration forces
would seize the slightest pretext to precipitate action, and that, at
this time, would give them an enormous advantage.
He himself trained the men in his immediate locality, and he also had
the organization throughout the country trained, but without guns. The
use of guns would not have been permitted except to regular authorized
militia. The drilling was done with wooden guns, each man hewing out a
stick to the size and shape of a modern rifle. At his home, carefully
concealed, each man had his rifle.
And then came the election. Troops were at the polls and a free ballot
was denied. It was the last straw. Citizens gathering after nightfall in
order to protest were told to disperse immediately, and upon refusal,
were fired upon. The next morning showed a death roll in the large
centers of population that was appalling.
Wisconsin was the state in which there was the largest percentage of the
citizenship unfavorable to the administration and to the interests.
Iowa, Minnesota and Nebraska were closely following.
Philip concluded to make his stand in the West, and he therefore ordered
the men in every organization east of the Mississippi to foregather at
once at Madison, and to report to him there. He was in constant touch
with those Governors who were in sympathy with the progressive or
insurgent cause, and he wired the Governor of Wisconsin, in cipher,
informing him of his intentions.
As yet travel had not been seriously interrupted, though business was
largely at a standstill, and there was an ominous quiet over the land.
The opposition misinterpreted this, and thought that the people had been
frightened by the unexpected show of force. Philip knew differently, and
he also knew that civil war had begun. He communicated his plans to no
one, but he had the campaign well laid out. It was his intention to
concentrate in Wisconsin as large a force as could be gotten from his
followers east and south of that state, and to concentrate again near
Des Moines every man west of Illinois whom he could enlist. It was his
purpose then to advance simultaneously both bodies of troops upon
Chicago.
In the south there had developed a singular inertia. Neither side
counted upon material help or opposition there.
The great conflict covering the years from 1860 to 1865 was still more
than a memory, though but few living had taken part in it. The victors
in that mighty struggle thought they had been magnanimous to the
defeated but the well-informed Southerner knew that they had been made
to pay the most stupendous penalty ever exacted in modern times. At one
stroke of the pen, two thousand millions of their property was taken
from them. A pension system was then inaugurated that taxed the
resources of the Nation to pay. By the year 1927 more than five thousand
millions had gone to those who were of the winning side. Of this the
South was taxed her part, receiving nothing in return.
Cynical Europe said that the North would have it appear that a war had
been fought for human freedom, whereas it seemed that it was fought for
money. It forgot the many brave and patriotic men who enlisted because
they held the Union to be one and indissoluble, and were willing to
sacrifice their lives to make it so, and around whom a willing and
grateful government threw its protecting arms. And it confused those
deserving citizens with the unworthy many, whom pension agents and
office seekers had debauched at the expense of the Nation. Then, too,
the South remembered that one of the immediate results of emancipation
was that millions of ignorant and indigent people were thrown upon the
charity and protection of the Southern people, to care for and to
educate. In some states sixty per cent. of the population were negroes,
and they were as helpless as children and proved a heavy burden upon the
forty per cent. of whites.
In rural populations more schoolhouses had to be maintained, and more
teachers employed for the number taught, and the percentage of children
per capita was larger than in cities. Then, of necessity, separate
schools had to be maintained. So, altogether, the load was a heavy one
for an impoverished people to carry.
The humane, the wise, the patriotic thing to have done, was for the
Nation to have assumed the responsibility of the education of the
negroes for at least one generation.
What a contrast we see in England's treatment of the Boers. After a long
and bloody war, which drew heavily upon the lives and treasures of the
Nation, England's first act was to make an enormous grant to the
conquered Boers, that they might have every facility to regain their
shattered fortunes, and bring order and prosperity to their distracted
land.
We see the contrast again in that for nearly a half century after the
Civil War was over, no Southerner was considered eligible for the
Presidency.
On the other hand, within a few years after the African Revolution
ended, a Boer General, who had fought throughout the war with vigor and
distinction, was proposed and elected Premier of the United Colonies.
Consequently, while sympathizing with the effort to overthrow Selwyn's
government, the South moved slowly and with circumspection.