to follow, comprise: (a) The
Kaiser's threat, (b) Admiral Von Tirpitz's threat, (c) the blowing up
of American factories and death of American workingmen, (d) the
attempt to get us into war with Japan and Mexico, and (e) the spending
of the German government's money in an attempt to make our congressmen
vote as Germany wished.

[Illustration: President Wilson reading his War Message to Congress]

The Submarine War

Up to the time when the United States declared war, two hundred and
twenty-six Americans, men, women, and infants, had met their death
through the sinking of ships, torpedoed without warning, under orders
of the German government. These people were peaceable travelers, going
about their business on the high seas in passenger steamers owned by
private companies. According to the law observed by all nations up to
this time there was no more reason for them to fear danger from the
Germans than if they had been traveling on trains in South America or
Spain, or any other country not at war. The attack upon these ships,
to say nothing about the brutal and inhuman method of sinking them
without warning, was an act of war on the part of Germany against any
country whose citizens happened to be traveling on these ocean
steamers. That the action of the United States in calling the
submarine attacks an act of war was only justice is proved by the fact
that several other nations, who had nothing to gain by going to war
and had earnestly desired to remain neutral, took the same stand.
Brazil, Cuba, and several other South and Central American republics
found that they could not maintain their honor without declaring war
on Germany. German ambassadors and ministers have been dismissed from
practically every capital in Spanish America.

In Europe, also, neutral nations like Holland, Denmark, and Norway saw
their ships sunk and their citizens drowned. In spite of their wrongs,
however, the first two did not dare to declare war on Germany, as the
Germans would be able to throw a strong army across the border and
overrun each of these two little countries before the allies could
come to their help. With the fate of Belgium and Serbia before them,
the Danes and the Dutch swallowed their pride and sat helplessly by
while Germany killed their sailors and defenseless passengers. After
the failure of the Entente to protect Serbia and Roumania, no one
could blame Denmark and Holland.

Norway, too, was exposed to danger of a