d in warfare against citizens of the United States on the
seas, and I take the liberty, for the present at least, of postponing a
discussion of our relations with the authorities at Vienna. We enter
this war only where we are clearly forced into it because there are no
other means of defending our rights.

It will be all the easier for us to conduct ourselves as belligerents in
a high spirit of right and fairness because we act without animus, not
in enmity towards a people or with the desire to bring any injury or
disadvantage upon them, but only in armed opposition to an irresponsible
government which has thrown aside all considerations of humanity and of
right and is running amuck. We are, let me say again, the sincere
friends of the German people, and shall desire nothing so much as the
early reestablishment of intimate relations of mutual advantage between
us,--however hard it may be for them, for the time being, to believe
that this is spoken from our hearts. We have borne with their present
government through all these bitter months because of that
friendship,--exercising a patience and forbearance which would otherwise
have been impossible. We shall, happily, still have an opportunity to
prove that friendship in our daily attitude and actions towards the
millions of men and women of German birth and native sympathy who live
amongst us and share our life, and we shall be proud to prove it towards
all who are in fact loyal to their neighbors and to the Government in
the hour of test. They are, most of them, as true and loyal Americans as
if they had never known any other fealty or allegiance. They will be
prompt to stand with us in rebuking and restraining the few who may be
of a different mind and purpose. If there should be disloyalty, it will
be dealt with with a firm hand of stern repression; but, if it lifts its
head at all, it will lift it only here and there and without countenance
except from a lawless and malignant few.

It is a distressing and oppressive duty, Gentlemen of the Congress,
which I have performed in thus addressing you. There are, it may be,
many months of fiery trial and sacrifice ahead of us. It is a fearful
thing to lead this great peaceful people into war, into the most
terrible and disastrous of all wars, civilization itself seeming to be
in the balance. But the right is more precious than peace, and we shall
fight for the things which we have always carried nearest our
hearts,--for de