New York Times
CHARGE GIGANTIC PLOTS TO
VIOLATE NEUTRALITY
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Federal Agents Working on Kayser Murder Say Allies and Teutons Are Both Guilty
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Special to the New York Times
CHICAGO, Sept 2 . — "Gigantic plots in violation of American neutrality, with two organizations of nation-wide extent in every large city, agents for dynamiting powder mills and arm plants, and recruiting officers secretly working in Chicago, New York, Cleveland and other Northern cities have been unearthed by Government agents."
This summary of the investigation started by the assassination of Edmund Kayser, the German pastor of Gary, Ind., was prepared for telegraphic report today for Washington by Federal agents here.
"There are unmistakably agents of warring Governments at work in America," admitted United States District Attorney Charles F. Clyne. "We have positive evidence against at least twenty Montenegrins who were at work among laborers of their own service in the Allies' armies. They made offers to many men to leave America and join the armies at war. Before they were detected they had secured a large number of recruits and had shipped them out of the country, if our information is correct."
Mr. Clyne refused to make further disclosures. It was learned in Federal circles, however, that more than a score of Government secret agents, now at work in Chicago and vicinity, had discovered:
That agents are continuously recruiting Americans for the British Navy and shipping them to Montreail,
That the rate of departure from Chicago within the last few weeks justifies the deduction that at least 10,000 Americans are now in the service of the Allies. The agents engaged in this service were connected directly with Allies' secret representatives in Gary, it is said.
A national peace movement that is now attracting attention by mass meetings, the issuance of press matter, and the delivery of speeches for the "freedom of the seas" is believed by the Governmetn to be financed by a foreign power to affect American sentiments.
The lavish expenditure of money by these agents of foreign Governments prompts the estimate by the Federal investigators that at least $1,000,000 has already been spent in filibustering and agitation.
