"Senator Knox says that as this recommendation will be made with the consent of our representative on the council, we shall be in honor bound to accept the limit and bind ourselves. It is difficult to follow this reasoning. The body which is to accept the limitation is the Congress of the United States. Why should the Congress of the United States be bound by a representative selected by the President to represent the United States in this function, in respect to a matter of great importance under the control of Congress?

"That the United States should recognize the wisdom of a reduction of armament under a world plan for it seems manifest. Our national failing has been not to maintain enough armament. The argument of Mr. Knox involves the conclusion that the United States cannot enter into any agreement not to exceed a certain limit of armament. Since 1817 we have agreed by treaty with Great Britain not to have war ships on the lakes. The validity of that treaty has never been contested.

"There are other treaties of the same tenor. It is true that in the treaty of 1817 either party is able to withdraw from the treaty after a year's notice, but the principle would be the same whether it was a year or ten years. I quite agree that a period should be fixed either for expiration of the obligation or a withdrawal therefrom by a reasonable notice, but that we should have such an agreement it seems to me goes without saying, and I don't know anybody better able to make a just recommendation for our consideration than the Executive Council.

"Senator Knox conceives that there will be thrown upon the United States obligations in respect to the backward countries in Turkey and in Africa which formerly belonged to the Central Powers, because it would be obliged to govern as a mandatary under direction of the Executive Council and that the Executive Council might require the sending of American troops to these distant lands to die in an unwholesome climate and to expose themselves to all sorts of dangers in remote countries. It is a sufficient answer to this to say that

there is no obligation on the part of the United States to accept obligations as a mandatary. It does not covenant to do so and it is not likely to do so. If it did it would engage the country over which it was a mandatary with the fullest discretion. The high contracting parties would lay down rules in advance or the Executive Council would grant a charter under which the mandatary would discharge its trust, but the United States, not being obliged to act as a mandatary, would decline to accept any charter to which it objected. A mandatary is required to make a report at the end of a year to show that it has conformed to the limitations of the trust, but there is no power on the part of the Executive Council to direct the campaigns of a mandatary or to compel its armies to go into the dangers so eloquently pictured by Senator Knox.

"As long as all the branches of the government function as the constitution requires, with the discretion fixed in them by that instrument, the form of the government is not changed and the sovereignty is not given up. In the proper and true sense a lawful contract does not interfere with the liberty of the individual or the sovereignty of a nation when fully and freely entered into. The League does not intend to curtail the sovereignty of the United States. The sovereignty of the United States is a sovereignty consistent with the sovereignty of every other nation. It should be a sovereignty limited by international law and international morality. The League only furnishes the machinery by which this equal and just sovereignty among the nations may be preserved. It furnishes for that preservation the sanction of a loose agreement between the nations under which the united forces of the nations may be directed to restraining the abuses of sovereignty by any nation.

"Senator Knox criticises the League because it recognizes the possibility of war and proposes to use war to end war. Certainly there is no means of suppressing lawless violence but by lawful force, and any League which makes no provision for that method and does not recognize its validity would be futile. He points out that the plan for the

League is not warproof, and that war may come in spite of it. Then he describes the kind of League which he would frame, in which he provides a League which will involve the United States in quite as much war and in just as great a transfer of its sovereignty as he charges this covenant with doing.

"He proposes to have compulsory arbitration before an international court of international differences, excluding questions of policy. His court would not settle all differences likely to lead to war, for questions of policy, however, because non-justiciable, are just as likely to produce war as questions which are justiciable. Then he would declare war a crime, and any nation engaged in it other than in self-defence should be punished as an international criminal. Would not punishing a nation as a criminal be likely to involve war? The court would have the right to call on Powers constituting the League to enforce its decrees and awards by force and economic pressure. It

would be difficult to state a League more completely transferring sovereignty to an outside body and giving it power to involve us in war than the plan of Senator Knox. It is far more drastic and ambitious and derogates much more from national control than anything in this League. In contrast with it the present League is modest.

"The supporters of the present Covenant do not profess it to be a perfect instrument. It does not profess to abolish war. It only adopts a somewhat crude machinery for making war impossible, and it furnishes a basis for the union of nations by which, if they are so minded, they can protect themselves against the recurrence of the disaster of such a war as that with which Europe has been devastated during the last four years. Experience under the League will doubtless suggest many improvements. But it is the first step that costs. Let us take it now when the whole world is yearning for it."

"It may be that there is less faith here [in Europe] in the language of the league of nations than President Wilson might hope. It is probable that Europe, with all its history, will remain skeptical to mere words as a guarantee of peace; but I do not think there is anywhere here any misunderstanding of the infinite value of a league of nations with the United States as one of the principal guarantors of its moral doctrines, otherwise unenforceable. . . . Without America the league of nations is a scrap of paper; with America it may be a symbol and a great first step, not merely toward peace between nations, but toward restoration of economic stability within the separate nations. It may be not merely a guarantee against a second coming of Germany, but also a barrier against the arrival of Bolshevism in at least three great Western nations."-Frank H. Simonds in New York Tribune.

"The argument that the covenant is vague can be advanced against all the great documents of history. The same assertion could be made with reference to Magna Charta, the Petition of Rights, the Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States. If President Wilson should suggest that we

ought to obey the Ten Commandments and the Golden Rule, there would be learned Senators who would argue that the doctrines are too vague to be understood and are certain to lead America into trouble. And I tremble to think what would happen to the Lord's Prayer if it were submitted to the Senate for ratification."-Homer S. Cummings, Chairman Democratic National Committee.

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"The League of Nations will not constitute a political sovereignty. It has but one object, the maintenance of peace by the substitution of justice for force in the determination of conflicts. It assumes power outside this object. In conceding to this international organization the powers necessary for the maintenance of peace the nations yield nothing of their own SOVereignty. When a citizen freely enters upon an engagement which he thinks in conformity with his interests and rights, do we say that he gives up his liberty? On the contrary he exercises it, determining the importance of the agreement he is making just as the party with whom he makes the contract exercises it on his part."-M. Léon Bourgeois, President of the Association Française pour la Societé des Nations.

with us in the war.' The attitude recommended by Washington was scrupulously maintained even under the pressure of the great conflict.

"Now, in the twinkling of an eye, while passion and emotion reign, the Washington policy is to be entirely laid aside and we are to enter upon a permanent and indissoluble alliance. That which we refuse to do in war we are to do in peace deliberately, coolly, and with no war exigency. Let us not overlook the profound gravity of this step.

"But if we put aside forever the Washington policy in regard to our foreign relations, we must always remember that it carries with it the corollary known as the Monroe Doctrine. Under the terms of this league draft reported by the committee to the Peace Conference the Monroe Doctrine disappears. It has been our cherished guide and guard for nearly a century. The Monroe Doctrine is based on the principle of self-preservation.

"It involves but one essential proposition -that the Americas should be separated from the interference of Europe and that American questions in all parts of this hemisphere should be settled by Americans alone.

"I have seen it said that the Monroe Doctrine is preserved under Article 10; that we do not abandon the Monroe Doctrine, we merely extend it to all the world. How any one can say this passes my comprehension. The Monroe Doctrine exists solely for the protection of the American Hemisphere, and to that hemisphere it was limited. If you extend it to all the world it ceases to exist, because it rests on nothing but the differentiation of the American Hemisphere from the rest of the world. Under this draft of the statutes of the League of Nations American questions and European questions are all alike put within the control and jurisdiction of the League. Europe will have the right to take part in the settlement of all American questions, and we, of course, shall have the right to take part in the settlement of all questions in Europe and Asia and Africa. Europe and Asia are to take part in

policing the American Continent and the Panama Canal, and in return we are to have, by way of compensation, the right to police the Balkans and Asia Minor when we are asked to do so.

"Perhaps the time has come when it is necessary to do this, but it is a very grave step, and I wish now merely to point out that the American people ought never to abandon the Washington policy and the Monroe Doctrine without being perfectly certain that they earnestly wish to do so.

"Two other general propositions, and I shall proceed to examine these League articles in detail. In Article X we, in common, of course, with the other signatories and members of the projected League, guarantee the territorial integrity and the political independence of every member of the League. That means that we ultimately guarantee the independence and the boundaries, as now settled or as they may be settled by the treaty with Germany, of every nation on earth. If the United States agrees to guarantees of that sort we must maintain them. The word of the United States, her promise to guarantee the independence and the boundaries of any country, is just as sacred as her honor-far more important than the maintenance of every financial pledge, which the people of this country would never consent to break.

"I do not now say the time has not come when, in the interest of future peace, the American people may not decide that we ought to guarantee the territorial integrity of the far-flung British Empire, including her self-governing dominions and colonies, of the Balkan States, of China, or Japan, or of the French, Italian, and Portuguese colonies in Africa; but I do suggest that it is a very grave, a very perilous promise to make, because there is but one way by which such guarantees, if ever invoked, can be maintained, and that way is the way of force-whether military or economic force, it matters not. If we guarantee any country on the earth, no matter how small or how large, in its independence or its boundaries, that guarantee we must maintain at any cost when our word is once given, and we must be in constant possession of fleets and

armies capable of enforcing these guarantees at a moment's notice.

"There is no need of arguing whether there is to be compulsive force behind this league. It is there in article 10 absolutely and entirely by the mere fact of these guarantees. The ranks of the armies and the fleets of the navy made necessary by such pledges are to be filled and manned by the sons, husbands, and brothers of the people of America. I wish them carefully to consider, therefore, whether they are willing to have the youth of America ordered to war by other nations, without regard to what they or their representatives desire. I would have them determine, after much reflection, whether they are willing to have the United States forced into war by other nations against her own will.

"The second general proposition to which I would call attention is this: We now in this draft bind ourselves to submit every possible international dispute or difference either to the League court or to the control of the Executive Council of the League. That includes immigration, a very live question. Are we ready to give to other nations the power to say who shall come into the United States and become citizens of the Republic? If we are ready to do this, we are prepared to part with the most precious of sovereign rights, that which guards our existence and our character as a nation. Are we ready to leave it to other nations to determine whether we shall admit to the United States a flood of Japanese, Chinese, and Hindu labor? If we accept this plan for a League, this is precisely what we promise to do. Are we prepared to have a League of Nations, in which the United States has only one vote, open our doors if they see fit to any and all immigration from all parts of the world? Mr. Taft has announced that the question of immigration will go before the international tribunal, and says now that all organized labor is for the League. If American labor favors putting the restriction of immigration in the control of other nations, they must have radically changed their minds and abandoned their most cherished policy.

"The first and most practical question for

us to consider and decide is whether the terms of this committee draft of a constitution for the League of Nations really makes for harmony among the nations or will tend to produce dissension and controversy.

"Nothing so far as the creation of offices is concerned is omitted in Article 1, but nothing is said about how the delegates shall be chosen. This is left to each nation to determine, but I venture with all respect to suggest that delegates representing the United States ought to be selected by the people of the United States or appointed as ambassadors and consuls are appointed. They should never be allowed to be irresponsible personal agents..

"Article 3 provides that each high contracting party will have one vote. On the well settled principle of international law, that national sovereignty is equal to every other national sovereignty, the United States will have one vote and so will Siam. Article 3 is of the greatest possible importance, for it deals with the executive council. It shall consist of the United States, British Empire, France, Italy, and Japan, together with the representatives of four other member States. What other States shall be selected has not yet been disclosed.

"I assume, and I think I have the right to assume on the best authority, that there is no intention of making Germany one of the four additional members. I think it is probable Germany will have a period of probation before she is even admitted to the League, and that seems to me to be eminently wise.

"The provision that invitations shall be sent to every power to attend the meetings at which matters affecting its interest are discussed and that no decision will be taken unless such powers are invited, looks to having the executive council consider the affairs of every country in the world whether League members or not.

"Under Article 7, covering admission to the League, the assent of not less than twothirds of the States represented in the body of delegates is necessary and the membership is limited to 'fully self-governing countries, including dominions and colonies.' The inclusion of dominions and colonies, of