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Hellraisers Journal – Saturday December 31, 1921
Comrade Eugene V. Debs Will Continue to Wage War on War
From The Atlanta Tri-Weekly Journal of December 29, 1921:
SCENES AT THE FEDERAL PRISON ON CHRISTMAS DAY
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RELEASE OF DEBS IS NOW PERPLEXING TO ADMINISTRATION
Harding and Daugherty Are Not Sure It Was Wise
to Free Unconverted Radical
—————BY DAVID LAWRENCE
(Leased Wire Service to The Journal._
(Copyright, 1921.)WASHINGTON, Dec. 28.-Eugene V. Debs has left behind him here a trail of mingled emotions. The administration which set him free is somewhat sadder and wiser this morrow morn.
For both President Harding and Attorney General Daugherty, who have tried their gospel of “understanding” in trying to convert Debs to a life of peace instead of agitation are not so sure that they have succeeded. Their disposition is to say no more about the case and hope that Debs will not abuse the liberty that has been given him by becoming a center for more agitation, a rallying device for radicalism and professional exploitation of the working classes.
The Harding administration tried a unique experiment-one that has been clouded somewhat in mystery because of the very delicacy of the undertaking. It is a fact that Debs could have had a pardon long ago if he would have agreed to withdraw the views he expressed against this country’s entrance into the war…..
DEBS SAYS HE WILL WAGE WAR ON WAR
Washington, Dec. 27.-War against war is to occupy a great part of the future activities of Eugene V. Debs, freed from Atlanta penitentiary by executive clemency on Christmas day, according to his own announcement here today. The Socialist leader said he could make no concrete plans for the future until he reached his home in Terre Haute, Ind., for which he will leave Washington at 6:20 o’clock tonight.
Debs announced his determination to obtain if possible a vow from every man, woman and child in this country and every other country which he might visit, that they refuse to take up arms and go to war. But until world relations undergo a reformation, he asserted, wars would continue.
[He said:]
There will be war, in some form, and war growing progressively more and more destructive until a competitive world has been transformed into a co-operative world. Every war for trade sooner or later and inevitably becomes a war of blood.
