Page:The web (1919).djvu/319

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telegram was received from his Board in Chicago stating that he was in good standing.

Another spectacular raid conducted by the Minneapolis Division was on the show lot of the Ringling Circus. Thirty men were taken into custody on charges of draft irregularities, and nearly all of these were inducted into the army. It was reported that resistance might be offered, and precautions had been taken in the arrangements for the raid. No difficulty was encountered, however, and later in the day the proprietor of the circus complimented us on the manner in which the round-up had been conducted.

A different type of raid was undertaken at the request of commandants of the various Army detachments in and near Minneapolis. They complained that a number of imposters in army uniforms were bringing discredit to the soldiery and requested that these be apprehended. There were so many soldiers on leave in Minneapolis at all hours that it had been found extremely difficult to identify the imposters, and so it was decided that with the coöperation of the various commandants a literal drag-net process should be resorted to on a given evening. Forces of operatives were stationed at opposite extremes of the central business district. More than two hundred men participated, squads being formed, and one squad being stationed at each end of each street. The operatives stopped every uniformed man who was encountered and demanded his pass. An even dozen uniformed men who did not have passes were picked up and turned over to Army and Navy authorities, who attended in automobiles. For a long time there was an entire absence of reports of offenses on the part of imposters in service uniforms.

Early in the summer a system of nightly A. P. L. patrols was established in the down-town section of Minneapolis. Operatives worked in squads of two or three men, some of them giving attention to draft evaders, others to the work-or-fight order, and others to bootleggers. Scarcely a night passed without a record of one or more important arrests, and the entire personnel of the League became intimately acquainted with the down-town business and social structures.