TO THE YOUTH OF AMERICA By Alexander Berkman

Tyranny must be opposed from the start

Autocracy, once secured in the saddle, is difficult to dislodge

If you believe that America is entering the war "to make democracy safe," then be a man and volunteer.

But if you know anything at all, then you should know that the cry of democracy is a lie and a snare for the unthinking. You should know that a republic is not synonymous with democracy and that America has never been a real democracy, but that it is the vilest plutocracyon the face of the globe.

If you can see, hear, feel, and think, you should know that King Dollar rules the United States, and that workers are robbed and exploited in this country to the heart's content of it's masters.

If you are not deaf, dumb, and blind, then you should know that the American bourgeois democracy and capitolistic civilization are the worst enemies of labor and progress, and that instead of protecting them, you should help fight to destroy them.

If you know this, you must also know that the workers of America have no enemy in the toilers of other countries. Indeed, the workers of Germany suffer as much from their exploiters and rulers as do the masses of America.

You should know that the interests of Labor are identical in all countries. Their cause is international.

Then why should they slaughter each other?

The workers of Germany have been misled by their rulers into donning the uniform and turning murders.

So have the workers of France, of Italy, and England been misled.

But why should *you*, men of America, allow yourselves to bemisled into murder or into being murdered?

If your blood must be shed, let it be in defence of your own interests, in the war of the workers against their despoilers, in the cause of real liberty and independence.