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HELEN KELLER FINDS DEFENSE PLANS BAD

Assails Preparedness Measures and Warns Toilers Against Proposed New Army.

2000 CHEER HER SPEECH

Proposes an International Association of Workers "to Destroy the War of the Trenches."

More than 2,000 men and women, who gathered in the Washington Irving High School last night to hear Helen Keller, under the auspices of the People's Forum, speak on "Militarism," cheered the deaf and blind lecturer when she said: "Let no workingman join the army that is to be organized by order of Congress!"

Miss Keller urged the futility of war as a means of settling nations' disputes, described the workingman as the tool of capital, said it made little difference to labor under what flag it toiled, and then launched into an attack on preparedness.

"As president Wilson pointed out in his message, the new Continental Army will defend the interests of the capitalists," she said. "It has already proved itself an enemy of liberty. It is an army that can be used to break strikes as well as to defend the people. You do not want that kind of preparedness. If Democratic measures of preparedness fail before the advance of a world empire, the workingman has nothing to fear.

"No conqueror will take his poverty from him. No conqueror will beat down his wages or wreck his unions more ruthlessly than his own fellow citizens of the capitalist class. Nor will a union of the capitalists of the world be able to oppress more than the masters of his own country have done. The worker has nothing to lose but his chains, and he has a world to win. We can win it all at once from a world empire.

"We lay plans for an army and navy big enough to scare the world. We do this in the face of history, which proves that wars cannot settle anything. In the past 3,000 years 8,000 treaties have been signed. Each was to remain in force forever. Their average length was two years. Do we hope that the eight thousand and first treaty will work a miracle?

"I look upon the world as my Fatherland, and every war has for me the horror of a family feud. I hold true patriotism to be the brotherhood and mutual service of all men. The preparedness I believe in is right thinking, efficiency, knowledge, and courage to follow the highest ideals. When true history replaces the lies and false teachings of the schools, the true call to patriotism will be a call to brotherhood, and not a call to arms.

"The militarists tell us that we must make our patriotism come to a halt at our boundary lines, and must build us a phalanx and an armada against the patriotism of all men that live under foreign flags. They tell us we must defend ourselves. But the measures of preparedness now before Congress provide for engines of attack as well as of defense. We are to build a greater navy and an army of a million men. These are instruments of attack.

"The best preparedness for defense is the preparedness America had before the civil war. Every man owned a gun and could shoot, and shoot straight. If Congress wants true preparedness for defense let it put a public shooting gallery within reach of every family. Let every man and woman in the country learn to shoot. That would not be militarism; it would be an effective means to safeguard the lives of the people.

"We need an international association of workers that will bring all the labor parties in all lands together as comrades. If the new international is made up of all unions, the old nationalism will disappear.

"Let them call us traitors and baptize our international with fire and blood. It shall court death rather than surrender to ruinous patriotism. There is place in the world today for a defiant union of all workers to destroy the war of the trenches and to end the paying of tribute by the workers of the world."

Miss Keller's power of enunciation has improved markedly in the past few years. She had an interpreter who repeated after her her sentences last night, but it was not difficult with eyes upon her face to follow her closely. Before she spoke her teacher, Mrs. John A. Macey, explained how she had taught the girl who was blind, deaf, and dumb to talk. The school auditorium was filled to capacity, and fully 2,000 filled Irving Place outside, clamoring for admittance. The audience, in which were many Socialists and other radicals, gave her a most enthusiastic reception, and she bowed graceful acknowledgment to the great applause.

She was interrupted once by a curious person who wanted to know, if she couldn't hear, how she could tell when she was applauded. She replied that she had ears in her feet, when her teacher explained the question. That she amplified by saying that she could feel the vibrations of the applause through her feet. Another wanted to know how she knew that the present industrial system was the unjust one she pictured. She said she knew it by knowing how the workers lived.

By resolution copies of Miss Keller's address will be sent to President Wilson and members of Congress.