“I would like, if possible,” he said, “to have the attention for a few minutes of every man that is in this theater.  Intentionally or otherwise, and I think it was otherwise, the soldiers of Illinois have felt that I was not just to them in the remarks that I made bearing on the report of the Committee on the Next Meeting Place.  I meant to say, and I believe now that I did say, that if those banners that were hung in this theater had read, ’American Legion, Chicago’s soldiers invite you next November.’  Massachusetts’ answer would have been ‘Yes.’  I believe I said that.  The men of Illinois believe I did not say it.  The men of Illinois believe that when I sat down after making the few remarks I did, that I had a sardonic smile on my lips and they say that I have insulted them to the heart and I say to them:  ’If there is anything that I can say, anything that I can do, as soldier to soldier to remove from your mind, or from the minds of any man who may have been in this theater, any belief that there was any feeling except of highest admiration, the highest respect, and the deepest affection on the part of the soldiers of Massachusetts for the soldiers of Illinois, then I want to correct that impression, because I want you, the soldiers of Illinois, to know that we recognize in Massachusetts that no better soldiers wore the khaki, no better sailors wore the blue, than the men of Illinois.  My remarks were, as I stated, for the purpose of saying Massachusetts would, if no other State would, take such action to rebuke the city of Chicago; would say to Chicago that if it would have the right to invite Americans to meet in that city, first Americanize the City Hall.  That was my chief purpose of rising to my feet.  If Chicago’s soldiers, if Illinois’ soldiers still think that I have not made reparation for what they believe was the intention of my remarks, then I say to them that no higher respect, no deeper affection exists for them than in the hearts of the men of Massachusetts.”

Colonel Herbert’s assault upon Chicago’s mayor in itself is only half significant.  It is only wholly so when its reception is considered.  Colonel Herbert will have none of Chicago until it has purged itself of its municipal leader.  He remembered, perhaps, the assertion that it is “the sixth largest German city in the world.”  He might have said as much in a newspaper interview as he said on the floor of the caucus had he been asked about the Illinois city as a meeting place for soldiers, and, perhaps, the editor would have given to it a half column of space; in the larger dailies, less.  But when men of the army, navy, and marine corps, from every battlefield in France, from every State in the union, voice their approval so thunderously; when they stand on their seats and cheer; when they so positively overrule the recommendation of committeemen who have studiously considered the matter, presumably from all angles, it means much.  No wonder Metropolitan dailies devoted columns to it.