sense a pacifist, Emma Goldman was intensely opposed to
wars between nations. The very idea of human slaughter on the
battlefield appeared to her as barbaric and criminal. And to her the
culprit was the state. Without governments to lead their subjects to
battle wars would be as unthinkable as duels are now. "No war is
justified unless it be for the purpose of overthrowing the Capitalist
system and establishing industrial control for the working class."

Her first contact with war occurred in 1898, when the United States
attacked Spain. While she abominated the medieval monarchy which
oppressed the Cubans, she did not want our politicians and
industrialists to use the liberation of that island as a pretext for
their imperial aggrandizement. She therefore agitated against the war at
every one of her lectures, and did not cease to expose our imperialist
intentions until the end of the fighting. Fortunately for her, the
liberties of the people were not curbed as a result of the war, and the
police did not consider her lack of patriotism more provoking than her
advocacy of anarchism.

In 1914, when war broke out in Europe, she immediately perceived its
catastrophic nature and condemned its instigators as monstrous
criminals. Alexander Berkman, who had been enjoying uneasy liberty since
1906 and who worked closely with her despite their intermittent personal
and ideological differences, at once joined her in the attack. Both did
their utmost to rouse the people against our involvement. It was a hard
and increasingly thankless fight against deep-seated prejudices.
Consternation struck their hearts when they learned that Peter Kropotkin
and other eminent anarchists had embraced the cause of the Allies and
were participating in the propaganda campaign against Germany. Resolved
to retain their sanity in a world gone mad, they repudiated all
"warmongers" regardless of their previous professions and intensified
their efforts to keep the United States out of the European holocaust.

When events moved us in the direction of belligerency, the government
sought feverishly to regiment the nation for the war struggle. Emma,
Berkman, and numerous other radicals resisted this martial hysteria with
all the force at their command. _Mother Earth_ blasted the proponents of
preparedness in issue after issue and denounced the government for
trampling upon the Bill of Rights in its hypocritical pretence of making
the world safe for democracy.