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cussion of objections would mean delay in negotiating the

peace.

Mr. Wilson gave most of his time and thought prior to his departure for the United States in February, 1919, to the revision of the plan of organization which he had prepared and to the conversion of the more influential members of the Conference to its support. While other questions vital to a preliminary peace treaty were brought up in the Council of Ten, he showed a disposition to keep them open and to avoid their settlement until the Covenant had been reported to the Conference. In this I could not conscientiously follow him. I felt that the policy was wholly wrong since it delayed the peace.

Though recognizing the President's views as to the relative importance of organizing a League and of restoring peace without delay, and suspecting that he purposed to use the impatience and fear of the delegates to break down objections to his plan of organization, I still hoped that the critical state of affairs in Europe might induce him to adopt another course. With that hope I began the preparation of a resolution to be laid before the Conference, which, if adopted, would appear in the preliminary treaty in the form of declarations which would constitute the bases of a future negotiation regarding a League of Nations.

At a conference on January 20 between the President and the American Commissioners, all being present except Colonel House, I asked the President if he did not think

that, in view of the shortness of time before he would be compelled to return to Washington on account of the approaching adjournment of Congress, it would be well to prepare a resolution of this sort and to have it adopted in order that it might clear the way for the determination of other matters which should be included in a preliminary treaty. From the point of view of policy I advanced the argument that a series of declarations would draw the fire of the opponents and critics of the League and would give opportunity for an expression of American public opinion which would make possible the final drafting of the charter of a League in a way to win the approval of the great mass of the American people and in all probability insure approval of the Covenant by the Senate of the United States.

In reviewing what took place at this conference I realize now, as I did not then, that it was impolitic for me to have presented an argument based on the assumption that changes in the President's plan might be necessary, as he might interpret my words to be another effort to revise the theory of his plan. At the time, however, I was so entirely convinced of the expediency of this course, from the President's own point of view as well as from the point of view of those who gave first place to restoring peace, that I believed he would see the advantage to be gained and would adopt the course suggested. I found that I was mistaken. Mr. Wilson without discussing the subject said that he did not think that a resolution of that sort was either necessary or advisable.

While this definite rejection of the proposal seemed to close the door to further effort in that direction, I decided to make another attempt before abandoning the plan. The next afternoon (January 21) at a meeting of the Council of Ten, the discussion developed in a way that gave me an excuse to present the proposal informally to the Council. The advantages to be gained by adopting the suggested action apparently appealed to the members, and their general approval of it impressed the President, for he asked me in an undertone if I had prepared the resolution. I replied that I had been working upon it, but had ceased when he said to me the day before that he did not think it necessary or advisable, adding that I would complete the draft if he wished me to do so. He said that he would be obliged to me if I would prepare one.

Encouraged by the support received in the Council and by the seeming willingness of the President to give the proposal consideration, I proceeded at once to draft a resolution.

The task was not an easy one because it would have been useless to insert in the document any declaration which seemed to be contradictory of the President's theory of an affirmative guaranty or which was not sufficiently broad to be interpreted in other terms in the event that American public opinion was decidedly opposed to his theory, as I felt that it would be. It was also desirable, from my point of view, that the resolution should contain a declaration in favor of the equality of nations or one which would pre

vent the establishment of an oligarchy of the Great Powers, and another declaration which would give proper place to the administration of legal justice in international disputes.

The handicaps and difficulties under which I labored are manifest, and the resolution as drafted indicates them in that it does not express as clearly and unequivocally as it would otherwise do the principles which formed the bases of the articles which I handed to the President on January 7 and which have already been quoted in extenso.

The text of the resolution, which was completed on the 22d, reads as follows:

"Resolved that the Conference makes the following declaration:

"That the preservation of international peace is the standing policy of civilization and to that end a league of nations should be organized to prevent international wars;

"That it is a fundamental principle of peace that all nations are equally entitled to the undisturbed possession of their respective territories, to the full exercise of their respective sovereignties, and to the use of the high seas as the common property of all peoples; and

"That it is the duty of all nations to engage by mutual

covenants

"(1) To safeguard from invasion the sovereign rights of one another;

"(2) To submit to arbitration all justiciable disputes which fail of settlement by diplomatic arrangement;

"(3) To submit to investigation by the league of nations all non-justiciable disputes which fail of settlement by diplomatic arrangement; and

(4) To abide by the award of an arbitral tribunal and to respect a report of the league of nations after investigation;

"That the nations should agree upon

"(1) A plan for general reduction of armaments on land and sea;

"(2) A plan for the restriction of enforced military service and the governmental regulation and control of the manufacture and sale of munitions of war;

"(3) Full publicity of all treaties and international agreements;

"(4) The equal application to all other nations of commercial and trade regulations and restrictions imposed by any nation; and

"(5) The proper regulation and control of new states pending complete independence and sovereignty."

This draft of a resolution was discussed with the other American Commissioners, and after some changes of a more or less minor character which it seemed advisable to make because of the appointment of a Commission on the League of Nations at a plenary session of the Conference on January 25, of which Commission President Wilson and Colonel House were the American members, I sent the draft to the President on the 31st, four days before the Commission held its first meeting in Colonel House's office at the Hôtel Crillon.

As the Sixty-Fifth Congress would come to an end on March 4, and as the interpretation which had been placed on certain provisions of the Federal Constitution required the presence of the Chief Executive in Washington during

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