Article May 29, 1937 Issue

Signs of the Times

Topic: Memorial Day

with contributions from James Reid

[From the Pico Post, Los Angeles, California]

If we will but make it so, to us of today is given an opportunity to make this ... day more than it ever has been before. We can do more than simply lay flowers on the graves of our war dead; we can stand before those graves, if we will but do so, and solemnly promise that the thing which killed them shall not come again if true love of peace, true patriotism, and true devotion to their memory can prevail. They died, many of them, in the belief that they would be the last victims of this form of savagery—soldiers of every war have been told that it would be the last—and it lies within our power to keep that promise. ...

We can do this if we will but realize that war settles no problems; that war never builds but only destroys; that war is the greatest curse under which the race bends. Individual acts of heroism during warfare are many, but there is nothing heroic, glorious, or splendid about war. It is international murder—and when it is recognized as such we will have taken a mighty step toward its abolition.

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