Convicted prisoners received in 1904 numbered 199,153. (Source: Encyclopedia of Social Reform, Funk & Wagnalls Co., New York, 1908, p. 336.) In England and Wales for the period 1904-1908 the average annual number of prisoners received under sentence of penal servitude was 187,000, or 545 in the 100,000 population. (Source: Webb, Augustus D., New Dictionary of Statistics, London, 1911, p. 170.) GERMANY. [Population, 1910, 64,925,993. Source: Statesman's Yearbook for 1914, p. 889.] Of the persons thus convicted, 49,697 were under 18 years of age, and 249,737 had been previously convicted. (Source: Statesman's Yearbook for 1914, p. 897.) FRANCE. [Population, 1906, 39,252,267. Source: Statesman's Yearbook for 1914, p. 812.] Source: Smith, Samuel George, p. 369. (Citing Annuaire statistique Republique Française, 1908, p. 76.) In 1906 the number of persons convicted before the various courts (exclusive of convicts under 16 and certain others) was 594,186. This number included 2,107 convicted before assize courts, 188,906 before correctional tribunals, and 403,173 before police courts. (Source: Statesman's Yearbook for 1914, p. 821.) Number of persons received each year into prisons and similar establishments during the period 1902–1906 averaged 368,000 a year. (Source: Webb, Augustus D. New Dictionary of Statistics. London, 1911, p. 173.) AUSTRIA. [Population, 1908, 28,324,940. Source: Statesman's Yearbook for 1914, p. 649.] Number in prison on December 31, 1908, was: Males, 7,184; females, 748; total, 7,932. (Source: Smith, Samuel George, p. 371. Citing Statesman's Yearbook for 1911, p. 603.) Source: Smith, Samuel George. (Citing Statesman's Yearbook for 1911, p. 617.) ITALY. [Population, 1911, 36,471,377. Source: Stateman's Yearbook for 1914, p. 1016.] The prison population, December 31, 1903, was 200 in the 100,000 population. Source: Webb, Augustus D. (New Dictionary of Statistics, London, 1911, p. 174.) BELGIUM. [Population, 1910, 7,423,784. Source: Statesman's Yearbook for 1914, p. 686.] In 1908 there were 734 inmates of central prisons, 4,175 of secondary prisons, and 142 of reformatories; total, 5,051. (Source: Statesman's Yearbook for 1914, p. 689.) In 1905 the number of persons before police tribunals charged with offenses was 171,000. (Source: Webb, Augustus D., New Dictionary of Statistics, London, 1911, p. 172.) SWITZERLAND. [Population, 1910: 3,741,971. Source: Statesman's Yearbook for 1914, p. 1332.] Males- Total. PRISON POPULATION DEC. 31, 1908. 3, 554 550 4, 104 Source: Smith, Samuel George, p. 363. (Citing Statesman's Yearbook for December 31, 1906, the number of prisoners was 4,000, or 114 in the 100.000 Chairman Committee on Military Affairs, United States Senate, Washington, D. C. MY DEAR SENATOR: I am not one of those called to testify before your sub- I was 24 years of age at the outbreak of the Civil War and have a vivid recol- The methods of individual development that characterize military training The argument for the military training of young men during their educational period is therefore twofold; it will develop them physically and morally as no other system of training can do, and it will be a most valuable auxiliary to the mental training now provided by our system of free education. It is because of the development it gives to the individual factor of citizenship and its enormous potentiality as a means of training in coordinate action that military training should be provided in the United States as the only sure defense of the Republic, as it was declared to be by Washington and his associates of the Revolutionary War, who had learned by sharp experience how little reliance for the public defense was to be placed on untrained and undisciplined hordes of armed men. The advantage of associated military and scholastic training for the development of capacity and the formation of character under the stimulus of high ideals is shown by the experiences of the graduates of our two national institutions-one at West Point and the other at Annapolis. That the military part of the education pursued at these two institutions does not develop a thirst for war is proven by the uniform experience of our history. There is not a single fact in our history suggesting that such wars that we have had were in any degree traceable to the action of our citizens trained for war. On the contrary, they have always been found to be those most averse to war and those most ready to guide the Nation on its return to paths of peace, from which it has departed by civilian mismanagement and misapprehension. It was the politicians of the North and South who brought on the country the horrors of the Civil War. It was two soldiers, fellow graduates of the Military Academy, comrades of the War in Mexico-Grant and Lee-who, meeting each other in friendly converse after four years of strenuous war and without a trace of bitterness in their intercourse, made possible the peace that has brought such prosperity to the united country. And, again, later on it was to one of these two representative heroes of war that we were indebted for preserving the peace with Great Britain, under circumstances of great provocation on our part a peace which has happily endured now for more than a century. That military training in youth imposes no burden of expense upon the country, but is, on the contrary, one of the most important factors in the increase of its wealth is subject to a mathematical demonstration. Col. F. N. Maude, C. B., who was a lecturer on military subjects and laws in two of the English universities, tells us, on the authority of Sir Joseph Whitworth, a great British manufacturer, that at the time Sir Joseph spoke-50 years ago-military training added 36 cents a week to the earning capacity of a laborer and extended his working period five years because of the knowledge he had acquired as to methods of effective cooperative work and the best means of retaining his health and strength. As a result of this, Col. Maude estimates that the military system of education adopted by Germany had added enormously to the wealth of the Empire during the 30 years previous to 1870, at which time he wrote. Col. Maude estimates that $6,500,000,000 has been expended on its military system, for which expenditure it received nearly sixfold return, the total amount of this return being estimated at $35,000,000,000. It would occupy too much of your time to set forth the argument by which Col. Maude reaches this conclusion, and I would suggest that you examine his book, which you will no doubt. find in the Congressional Library. Its title is, War and the World's Life, by Col. F. N. Maude, C. B., published by Smith, Elder & Co., London, England, in 1907. There can be no question that in the present war the German system of universal military training, which was in the beginning unpopular, has completely demonstrated its value and that it receives the approval of all classes of Germans, including the educational and religious classes. If Germany, through the efficiency of its aristocratic government has been able to develop such a system for aggression, is there any reason why we should not adopt it for a defense against possible aggression? The experiences of France, the experiences of Italy, both of which have so largely profited by a similar system, have shown that it does not tend to develop a warlike spirit in a nation. Still less would it be the case in the great American Republic, whose history conclusively demonstrates its devotion to peace and the recognition of all classes in the country of the subordination of the military to the civil power. Who can escape the significance of the absolute demonstration of this given at the time of the close of our Civil War, when so large a proportion of the population in both section of our country were trained soldiers possessing the physical power, if they had had the spirit, to overthrow the existing Government, as all foreign observers expected to see them do? The soldiers had found abundant cause in their experience to criticize the civil administration, from which they had suffered in many ways, but from what quarter came any hint of disloyalty to the Republic? There is abundant evidence to show that there is a ştrong movement throughout the country in favor of general military training for our young men. It requires only a study of the facts to make the demand for it universal among those not misled by the theories of nonresistance as a defense against the dangers which always threaten a defenseless people. "The wolf careth not how many sheep there be," and our wealth and numbers are negligible factors in considering the elements of national security. Very truly, yours, WM. CONANT CHURD. DETROIT, Mich., January 4, 1917. Hon. GEORGE E. CHAMBERLAIN, Chairman Senate Committee on Military Affairs, Senate Chamber, Washington, D. C. MY DEAR SIR: I am advised that the Senate Committee on Military Affairs is to hold public hearings on the matter of universal military training and service. On account of the exceedingly limited time during which these hearings are to be conducted, it is not possible for me to appear before your committee, as I have been asked by some friends to do. Therefore, I take the liberty of sending you some thoughts on the subject for what they may be worth. Many most important arguments bearing on universal compulsory military training and service are wrapped up in a careful letter which I wrote some 15 months ago to the Rev. Dr. Nehemiah Boynton, of Brooklyn, a warm personal friend of mine, because I was anxious to get in writing an accumulation on the general subject. I therefore take the liberty of inclosing to you a copy of that letter, which I ask, if consistent, be made a part of the record. Immediately after the Columbus raid, when the Government, in the greatest possible distress, was calling upon the Packard Motor Car Co. for motor trucks. and men to run them, to be instantly dispatched to Mexico to supply the United States troops who were in Mexico, and on short rations and forage at the far front, I went immediately to Mexico and went in with my camp wagon to Colonia Dublan, the expeditionary headquarters, along the route with the motor trucks employed in this transport. The impressions which I brought back with me were embodied in an interview to the New York Herald, a copy of which I also inclose to you herewith, in which I tried to make clear and emphatic the absolute, essential, basic necessity of universal compulsory military training and service, which I also ask, if consistent, be made a part of the record of the hearings. When I was a boy I had the very excellent good fortune of having a father 'who could afford to send me to a military preparatory school, and the benefits which I gained from that school have served me, so far through life, excellently well. I consider that it is a great advantage to have had even that limited military training at that early age; but I feel that such military training should be available, not merely to those boys who have parents of sufficient worldly means to provide them with what at the present time is that more or less expensive education-I feel that it is the duty of the Government to provide, within reach of every boy, that important military training, in his early youth, which will serve him so well through life and make him able to live better and be a more valuable unit in our national life. It is a great mistake, in my opinion, to confine the excellent education of West Point and Annapolis to merely the exceedingly limited few who are enabled to avail themselves of such valuable opportunities for education. That education is invaluable to America, even though it may be carried from those institutions of learning into civil life. It is not only invaluable to the individuals, but it is of immense value to America as a Nation. The youths educated at Annapolis and West Point learn to realize that they are not citizens of Michigan or citizens of California or New York or Texas, but that they are American citizens. |