To the President and People of the United States of North America!

We take the liberty of presenting to the careful and impartial consideration of the American people the following memorial:

On the 19th day of this month there shall take place with great pomp and unusual ostentation, in the City of Washington, the unveiling of the monument of Frederick II, King of Prussia, sent as a gift or rather forced upon our liberty-loving nation by the Emperor of Germany.

Strange indeed will be this sight, the only one of its kind. You, eighty-million liberty-loving citizens of this glorious republic whose forefathers shed blood on the battlefield so that they could throw off of themselves and at the same time off of you, their descendants, the shackles of despotic tyranny. We summon you today to bear witness that this abominable sight is nothing but a dishonor to the land made sacred by the blood of martyrs to 2liberty. Here, among you, there shall stand on this sacred land a monument to the honor of one of the worst enemies of the freedom of the people, whose name stands for a personification of absolute despotism.

From time immemorial all nations have erected monuments to honor the everlasting memory of individuals. Some monuments are erected by entire nations, we will say, collectively by their own impulses. Other monuments, again, happen to be thrust upon the people by despotic tyrants, for the glorification of themselves or their kind. To this last category of monuments belongs the monument of Frederick II. What sort of feeling, we ask, can be awakened in the American citizen or in any other liberty-loving person by the sight of the statue of this monarch? What virtues did he possess, either as a king or as a man, that would make him worthy of admiration and held as an example for American citizens? As a king, Frederick was the most autocratic tyrant that ever occupied a throne, and as a man he was minus all virtues, so that the historian stands appalled in the presence of his crimes and turns away from them in horror.

Known generally, are his dishonesty, faithlessness, treason, brutizhness, rapacity, and cruelty; they only awaken loathsomeness and disgust and never 3should be perpetuated in granite or bronze.

That he was a soldier and had enriched his Prussian possessions by robbery, plunder and with vile intrigues does not constitute a reason for the American people to honor him.

Our country does not give itself to honoring kings, princes, and potentates, as here we have a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. The American nation has nothing in common with monarchs who with the aid of power rule nations, and whose will stands as law.

It is contradictory to the spirit of our institutions to have erected in our midst statues of people who were enemies of the liberty of the people. The erecting of a monument to the memory of this absolute monarch constitutes a violation of our principles of liberty and offends the memory of every great hero who fought and shed blood for the freedom of this glorious republic. In your imagination, picture to yourself this potentate** who was the personification of despotic power; picture him well in your mind, with his low character, minus every moral foundation, a real blemish to humanity and, under this impression view this monument besides the statues of men of such 4measure as Washington, Jefferson, Patrick Henry, Steuben, La Fayette, and Franklin.

Arise you immortal spirits and with a great voice make a protest against this violation of principle, the principle for which you fought and were victorious!

The German emperor has truly shown a great lack of consideration and tact, when during a moment of enthusiasm he forced himself upon our republic with his gift, which he himself today in brighter moments and with consideration, must admit highly improper.

Grief fills our hearts when we consider that the government at Washington did not have enough courage to, in a diplomatic and still firm way, preventing a misunderstanding, have informed the offspring of Frederick II that this country is a country of freedom; that its citizens do not give themselves to honoring despotic tyrants and in regard to all that, his gift could not be accepted without violating the spirit of American liberty.

Although a mistake has been made, when the gift was accepted, nothing that might be said now can prevent this fatal, nonsensical state of affairs; 5nevertheless, we as citizens of this republic, and sons of unfortunate Poland, victims of greediness of despotic monarchs, cannot let this opportunity pass without raising our voices in solemn protest against this violation of the spirit of liberty, because we judge that in this country of free people there is no place for monuments of this character.

We call on all liberty-loving Americans to join their voices with ours so that we can show the foreign despots that liberty is not yet dead in this republic. Let them remember that forty years ago Napoleon III made a great mistake by violently thrusting upon the Mexican people an emperor in the person of the Austrian, Maximilian. His fate is known to the world. Let us, in this way, warn European despots that the nations living on this firm land of America have no employment, position, or place for kings, princes, or potentates, alive or in bronze, and that the American spirit of liberty hesitates and revolts against even the thought of honoring a despot.

We refer the honorable reader to the Biographical Sketches of Thomas Babington Macaulay: Frederick was rated to be as wicked as his father. The whole world looked upon the Prussian king as a statesman minus all morals and decency, a covetous plunderer, impudently false; and the entire world was not at all wrong in this judgment. On the head of Frederick lies the terrible 6responsibility for all the blood that was spilled in the war lasting so many years and in all parts of the world for the blood of Fontenoy, and for the blood of the Highlanders murdered at Culloden. Terrible results caused by his knavery and roguery were felt in countries where the name of Prussia was entirely unknown; and so that he could effectively rob his neighbors whom he solemnly promised to protect, the Blacks fought on the shores of Coromandel and the Indians massacred and scalped on the shores of the Great Lakes in North America.

** In Albert Sorel's Eastern Quest, translated from the French to the English language by F. C. Bramwell, we read on page 197: Frederick the Great conducted himself very uncivilly, in typical Prussian manner, not losing unnecessarily any time. Trying to give his acts of violence a legal pretense, he paid for everything he took with counterfeit money which he, in turn, would not accept in form of taxes for the treasuries of his states...Cynical elements of his character, which so often soiled and defiled his heroism, brings to naught his worth as a statesman.

Given in Chicago, Illinois, the 16th day of November, 1904. Polish Roman Catholic Union in the United States of North America. Offices: 540 Noble Street, Chicago, Illinois