Greatest National Guard Strength Information issued by the Militia. Bureau as this number goes to press shows that the August 31 enrollment of the National Guard aggregates 164,040, including 9,859 officers. This is the largest enrollment the National Guard has shown since its reorganization following the World War, and it is also larger than any strength credited to the National Guard at any period except during the few months. in 1917, preceding the draft of the Guard into federal service. The 27th Division led with an aggregate enrollment of 8,106, closely pressed by the 28th, enrolling 7,829, and the 38th carrying 7,783. The only completely organized division in the National Guard is the 27th in New York. The 28th in Pennsylvania is completely formed except for the Air Service, while the 37th (Ohio) still lacks six company units of completion. The 40th Division (California, Utah and Nevada) showed the smallest enrollment with 3,418. The headquarters of 6 divisions, 26th, 27th, 28th, 36th, 37th, and 38th, have been federally recognized. IT In the News T is within the memory of many of us, how numerous people proved by scientific calculations that no manmade craft could ever rise from the earth and fly. It is a far cry from those days to the happenings of last month at Dayton, when a 10-ton bomber, the largest flying machine in the world, took the air as gracefully as a bird leaves the ground and after a most successful thirty-minute flight came down as smoothly as a meadow lark. And apparently the end is not yet. have to offer is that of calling off the A concert. It seems that another leader could have been procured and the program gone ahead with. It is not often, on an occasion of this kind, that initiative and leadership is lacking. A lot of people missed a big bet. REPORT of the committee on American citizenship, submitted to the American Bar association in an nual meeting at Minneapolis, carries data relative to "red" activities that should give all good citizens pause and should stir them to rally against the advance of disturbing propaganda so indicated. The report places the number of radicals agitating for change in government from present form to some communistic variety at 1,500,000. The committee estimates expenditures for "red" propaganda in the past year at $3,000,000. known in the annals of travel. To maintain the attractiveness of our great outdoors we must defend our trails against the destructive invasion of commercialism, that prefers a trolley pole to a tree and can see naught in a mighty waterfall but hydroelectric power. So long as this is done the primeval beauty of our forests and mountains will remain undefiled. HEN a man or woman places W their signature to one of these "Anti-War" pledges circulated by a variety of pacifist organizations, the act should automatically operate to deprive that person of the rights of citizenship. A man who will not fight for his country and the woman who Vows that she will not do her bit in time of National emergency are not entitled to the benefits that this great Nation affords its people. I Remarkable War Prophecy W Capt. J. M. Scammell, O. R. C. HEN William Roscoe Thayer wrote in the American Historical Review for January, 1920, that "We can assert no more about the future than that it some time will be the present," he was in one sense right; but humanly speaking, he was wrong. His statement calls to mind the story of the counsel who found his client in jail and, upon hearing his story, said: "But, my good man, they can't put you in jail for that!" "I know it," said the prisoner, "but they did." "The sun will rise tomorrow, the seasons will follow each other in their immemorial circuit, and with hardly roticeable variations," said Mr. Thayer, "but we must not mistake our belief in the permanence of facts like these, for the, vague, elastic and unpredictable combinations in politics." But in one respect the combinations of politics are neither vague, elastic nor unpredictable: politicians invariably do the unthinkably stupid thing when it comes to the vital matter of war and peace. They are in so nervous a haste to secure peace that they have no time to discover how; they therefore choose. the obvious method and-plunge us into war. They ought to study military history. They don't. They do not study any history. They do not appear to study anything. Perhaps it is for this reason that they lend color to Mr. Thayer's statement. In February, 1782, William Pitt said: "Never was a time in the history of this country when from the situation in Europe, we might more reasonably expect fifteen years of peace than at the present moment." But instead of fifteen years of peace, England got twenty-three years of war. After the Peace of Amiens in 1802, so certair. were the politicians of its permanence that again they reduced the Royal Navy and discharged seamen and artificers. In 1854 the Crystal Palace was erected in London to commemorate the beginning of universal peace; the army was reduced and the Crimean War soon came. After the Crimea, the politicians were more certain than ever that it was the last war. So they reduced the military forces drastically. Eighteen months later the Indian Mutiny broke out. The government in a panic offered £15 per man as bounty to those whom it had just turned out. In France, on June 30, 1870, M. Ollivier declared that "At no epoch did the peace of Europe ever appear more assured." Lord Granville in England could see no cloud upon the horizon. Yet Bismarck, as he himself put it, was waving a red flag before the Gallic bull to drive him to desperation. Mr. Thayer recalled that situation. He noted, too, that in 1914 "We lived in the best possible of worlds, in which war could never take place. Nevertheless, war came, a frightful war, an atrocious war for which history has no parallel. I need not trace the steps which led to the convulsion, but the a-priorists owe it to mankind to ex |