Post 192

I think history is fascinating. I hate the discipline of history, and I severely doubt that I will take any more history classes than what I already have, but I love history. Because I am, in my intellectual pursuits, distrusting and cynical, I avoid reading history books of any kind as much as possible. But because I love history, I really enjoy reading historical books--that is, books from a given era talking about that era. Fewer degrees of separation that way. I think that's why my research assisting is so interesting to me.

Remember back in November when I quoted that old article that talked about the New Deal? Today's post is in a similar spirit, though the parallels with our day are not so obvious--are not, in fact, apparent, to my mind, at least I, for one, am oblivious to any that may exist. Today I will be quoting a book called The Web, written by Emerson Hough and published in 1919. The title page calls it, "A Revelation of Patriotism: The Web is published by authority of the National Directors of the American Protective League, a vast, silent, volunteer army organized with the approval and operated under the directions of the United States Department of Justice, Bureau of Investigation."

"What is the American Protective League?" you ask? It was an organization that was active in America during WWI. On page 163 of The Web, Hough says that "the American Protective League had no governmental or legal status, though strong as Gibraltar in governmental and legal sanction." That's all the introduction I feel inclined to give you.

And now I will proceed to quote a lengthy bit from the book. Why am I doing this? Am I feeling really political right now? No. Really, I just feel I have found proof of things I was ranting about nearly a year ago, namely that we don't need fiction to fill the role of producing shock because real life has way more wow-me to it. So next time you feel inclined to pick up a dystopic novel, don't go for 1984 or Fahrenheit 451 or Brave New World--pick up The Web and open your eyes to the fact that reality is far more interesting than fiction.

I don't know how easily you'll find this book in a library (it is very old, after all), but it can easily be downloaded in a variety of formats from archive.org, so no excuses.

Now, a long quote. Pages 163-166, to be precise.

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It is supposed that breaking and entering a man's home or office place without warrant is burglary. Granted. But the League has done that thousands of times and has never been detected! It is entirely naive and frank about that. It did not harm or unsettle any innocent man. It was after the guilty alone, and it was no time to mince matters or to pass fine phrases when the land was full of dangerous enemies in disguise. The League broke some little laws and precedents? Perhaps. But it upheld the great law under the great need of an unprecedented hour.

A man's private correspondence is supposed to be safe in his office files or vault. You suppose yours never was seen? Was it? Perhaps. It certainly was, if you were
known as a loyal citizen a true-blood American. But the League examined all of the personal and business correspondence of thousands of men who never were the wiser.

How could that be done ? Simply, as we shall see. Suppose there was a man, ostensibly a good business man, apparently a good citizen and a good American, but who at heart still was a good German as hundreds of thousands of such men living in America are this very day. This man has a big office in a down-town skyscraper. He is what the A. P. L. calls a "suspect." Let us call him Biedermacher.

About midnight or later, after all the tenants have gone home, you and I, who chance to be lieutenants and oper atives in the League, just chance in at the corridor of that building as we pass. We Just chance to find there the agent of the building who just chances also to wear the concealed badge of the A. P. L. You say to the agent of
the building, "I want to go through the papers of Biedermacher, Room 1117, in your building."

"John," the agent says to the janitor, "give me your keys, I've forgotten mine, and I want to go to my office a while with these gentlemen."

We three, openly, in fact, do go to Biedermacher's office. His desk is opened, his vault if need be it has been done a thousand times in every city of America. Certain letters or documents are found. They would be missed if taken away. What shall be done?

The operative takes from his pocket a curious little box-like instrument which he sets up on the table. He unscrews a light bulb, screws in the plug at the end of his long insulated wire. He has a perfectly effective electric camera.

One by one the essential papers of Biedermacher are photographed, page by page, and then returned to the files exactly--and that means exactly--in the place from which each was taken. The drawers and doors are locked again. Search has been made without a search warrant. The serving of a search warrant would have "queered" the whole case and would not have got the evidence. The camera film has it safe.

"Pretty wife and kids the fellow has," says the agent of the building, turning over the photographs which the simple and kindly Biedermacher, respected Board of Trade
broker, we will say, has in his desk. He turns them back again to exactly--exactly--the same position.

"Good night, John," he yawns to the janitor, when they meet him on the floor below. "Pretty late, isn't it?"

The three men pass out to the street and go home. Each of them in joining the League has sworn to break any social engagement to obey a call from the League headquarters at any hour of the day or night. Perhaps such engagements have been broken to-night by some or all of these three men. But no one has "broken and entered" Biedermacher's office.

In Central office some data are added to a card, cross-indexed by name and number also, and under a general guide. Some photostats, as these pictures are called, are put in the " case's " envelope. Nothing happens just yet. Biedermacher still is watched.

Then, one morning, an officer of the Department of Justice finds Mr. Biedermacher in his office. He takes from his pocket a folded paper and says, "In the name of the United States, I demand possession of a letter dated the 12th of last month, which you wrote to von Bernstorff in New York. I want a letter of the 15th of this month which you wrote to von Papen in Berlin. I want your list of the names of the United Sangerbund and German Brotherhood in America which you brought home from the last meeting. I want the papers showing the sums you have received from New York and Washington for your propaganda work here in this city. I want the letter received by you from seven Lutheran ministers in Wisconsin telling of their future addresses to the faithful."

"But, my God!" says Biedermacher, "what do you mean? I have no such letters here or anywhere else. I am innocent! I am as good an American as you are. I have bought a hundred thousand dollars' worth of Liberty bonds, some of each issue. My wife is in the Bed' Cross. I have a daughter in Y. W. C. A. I give to all the war charities. I am an American citizen. What do you mean by insulting me, sir?"

"John," says the officer to his drayman, "go to that desk. Take out all the papers in it. Here's the U. S. warrant, Mr. Biedermacher. Rope 'em up, John."

John ropes up the files, and the papers go in bulk to the office of the U. S. attorney on the case. Now, all the evidence is in possession of the Government, and the case is clear. Biedermacher is met quietly at the train when he tries to get out of town. Nothing gets into the papers. No one talks secrecy is the oath. But before long, the big Biedermacher offices are closed. Biedermacher's wife says her husband has gone south for his health. He has--to Oglethorpe.

You think this case imaginary, far-fetched, impossible? It is neither of the three. It is the truth. It shows how D. J. and A. P. L. worked together. This is a case which has happened not once but scores and hundreds of times. It is espionage, it is spy work, yes, and it has gone on to an extent of which the average American citizen, loyal or disloyal, has had no conception. It was, however, the espionage of a national self-defense. It was only in this way that the office and the mail and the home of the loyal citizen could be held inviolate. The web of the A. P. L. was precisely that of the submarine net. Invisible, it offered an apparently frail but actually efficient defense against the dastardly weapons of Germany. It must become plain at once that secret work such as this, carried on in such volume all across the country three million cases, involving an enormous mass of detail and an untold expenditure of time and energy, were disposed of meant system and organization to prevent over-lapping of work and consequent waste of time. It meant more than that there was needed also good judgment, individual shrewdness and of course, above all things, patience and hard work.