There are numerous other changes which can be made almost as quickly and which tend logically toward the attainment of reasonable preparedness. Not the least of these would be to transfer the command of our state regiments from the hands of the governors to the Federal Government. This would result in the nationalization of the militia, and would be a distinct step in the right direction. It would allow the militia of the various States to serve their country directly and without the services of forty-eight middlemen. It would result in unification and standardization and in a more efficient body of trained civilian officers. To make the militia a national army would be a step toward making it a national army of the Swiss and Australian type.

To secure for the militia the best element of our population, the hard-working, clear-thinking, and truly patriotic citizens, two changes in our present methods are absolutely necessary: first, we must pay

adequate wages to our militia when in service, and, second, we must cease to demand of our state regiments that they render strike duty. This last is the chief obstacle to enlistment, for the better class of working-men will not volunteer for a service that may at some time oblige them to shoot down their fellow-workmen. To be a good citizen, a man must be a good soldier in time of war, and he must be an active participant in political and economic discussions in time of peace. But if he fulfils the second of these two requirements, he is and should be partizan; and if he is forced to perform the duties which properly belong to a state police force like the gendarmerie of France or the Royal Northwestern Mounted Police of Canada, he either hesitates to suppress his confederates or oppresses his antagonists. A good citizen may logically be a soldier or a policeman; he cannot justly be both at once. This is recognized in European armies, which have their own police forces, which as a rule do no fighting.

give the nation what the nation wants. The nation is much more on trial than he. The other members of the administration do not thus command public confidence; one especially mistrusts those who belong to the Bryan faction, of whom Josephus Daniels is only one example. He is an exceedingly shrewd and expert politician. It is a mistake to measure his general political ability by his ignorance of naval affairs. Few political tricks are unknown to this man who was a faithful follower of Bryan during sixteen unfruitful years. He is to be suspected of several clever ruses the object of which is to abate the public clamor for preparedness. During the last decade our naval policy has been renewed year by year. In that time we have built battle-ships at a rate of approximately two and a half a year, and we find that no single Congress has ever received credit for authorizing more than three capital ships. The keen political mind of Daniels evidently perceived a chance to befog the issue of 1916 by placing before Congress a bill demanding the

building of twenty battle-ships in the next eight years. He thus creates the impression that he is about to construct twenty battle-ships when, as a matter of fact, he is simply perpetuating for ten years to come the totally inadequate rate of the last decade!

His demand for fifty small so-called coast-defense submarines is equally inadequate. The day of toy submarines is past, and the era of submersible cruisers, which attack the enemy's battle-ships upon the high seas and voyage unaccompanied from the Kiel Canal to the Hellespont, has begun. Even Mr. Daniels must know that until we possess an adequate army the only way to protect ourselves from invasion is to dominate the ocean between us and our possible enemies, and that once. our fleet has been sunk or driven into harbors, no number of small submarines can prevent a landing from being made somewhere along our 5500 miles of coast line. Germany's fleet of submarines has yet to sink a British transport carrying troops to the ports of Calais and Boulogne, and even

if transports had been sunk, the landing of other troops would not have been prevented, for it is a soldier's duty to take risks. Moreover, the safe bases of the German submarines would within a week be destroyed by British landing parties were it not for the German army, which protects them.

Great Britain has been saved from invasion not by submarines, but by capital ships which control the seas. The same reasoning applies to America.

Dreadnoughts and super-dreadnoughts are technically classed as capital ships. These carry at least eight modern highpower big guns, and are able to steam twenty-one or more knots an hour. Of such ships Great Britain has forty-three, Germany twenty-six, and Japan twelve. We have only twelve at present in service. Sea control absolutely depends upon the possession of such ships. Our obsolete battle-ships, which carry four oldtype guns and steam only seventeen or eighteen knots, can in no way affect sea supremacy. Such ships are useless except to a navy which already controls the ocean, in which case they are of service

for patrol or blockade duty. The reason that capital ships are necessary to maintain sea control is explained by the simple fact that in battle a ship having great speed and long-range guns can choose and maintain just that distance which will permit it to pound a smaller ship to pieces, while remaining itself outside the range of that enemy's less powerful guns.

Although we possess some first-class capital ships, these would be almost hopelessly handicapped on account of our lack of proper auxiliaries. Four foreign nations each own battle-cruisers which carry eight high-power guns and can steam more than thirty-one knots an hour. We have no battle-cruisers either built or authorized. We have no scout cruisers less than ten years old. In the Battle of the North Sea the cruiser Blücher was sunk by the British because she could not exceed twenty-six knots an hour. We have no cruiser that can approach twenty-four. Although our navy-list contains the names of sixtytwo destroyers, a score of these were built fifteen years ago, and we have only three which can make more than thirty-one knots an hour. The enemy's battle

cruisers could run them down as a wolf runs down sheep.

Nine voters out of ten, however, are today fooled by such clever sophistry as that of Mr. Daniels. This will, we trust, by November, 1916, no longer be the case, for even to-day thousands of men of prominence and power who less than a year ago were indifferent or opposed to any increase of army or navy are to-day joining the general cry for an adequate defense which shall be in proportion to our wealth and population, and numbered with due regard to the dangers which now walk abroad. Six months ago any one who talked about a foe invading America was considered sensational; to-day the majority of our most thoughtful, educated citizens are ready to accept the possibility of war, and are eager to make due preparation to prevent it. They realize that the reconstruction of our army and our navy, even though it is attempted with vast appropriations of money and countless numbers of men, will not of necessity give us an effective army or an efficient navy. They are remembering that all the wars in history have proved that it is always organization and discipline that win against numbers. At this moment preparation for defense has already become in the minds of the majority the one great national problem, the rational solution of which will in the next few years elect Presidents, develop statesmen, and undermine many a popular politician. Even now laggards are running

to cover or hastening to enlist in the popular cause.

In the early forties, my great-uncle, George Bradburn, the anti-slavery orator, was often pelted with rotten eggs and cabbages because he spoke for abolition. On such occasions he used to cry: "Gentlemen, if you wish fame, join us now; tomorrow the cause will have grown popular, and even the rascals will be with us. The mob will then cheer what they now hiss." It is for our public men to concern themselves with the question of national defense now while their help is all important; to-morrow all creation will cry "Prepare!"

It is not alone the politicians who must concern themselves in the matter, but the citizens of the nation. National defense is every man's business and every man's duty. The fatal mistakes that Congress has heretofore made in managing military affairs, and the reckless waste of public funds voted for military equipment, would not have been possible if the public had taken greater personal interest in the army and navy and kept informed as to the use of national appropriations. Our army costs one hundred times as much per man available for defensive duty as the Swiss army, and is far less efficient and less ready for emergencies. For this the nation is now on trial.

If our present leaders will not make any of the basic moves which might lead to better things, if they will not national