The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1914-10-16
UNITED STATES AS PEACE MAKER
Written By Kate Burr for the National Monthly.

The classic legend tells how Atlas bore the world on his shoulders.
 With all the powers of earth and aid at the beck of the armies ofkEu- rope, with sixteen to seventeen mil lions of men armed with rapid firing, self-repeating, death-mowing weap- ons of m odern warfare, with hundreds of dreadnoughts and cruisers guard ing the boundary seas, the world has entered upon a conflict and carnage impossible for. the on-loolzing mind to comprehend.
 The Imagination baIks at the crime of Europe with it's dreadful blood waste, money-waste, prop perty-waSte- worId-wastei
 In this unparalleled exigency, the United States and South America are destined, if probabilities count for any thing-to play the role of Atlas. They are the only great civilized regimes of the globe of which peace ! may be predicated as a. not irnposs1 ble permanency
 The foundations of American instru- mentality for the maintenance of such peace as the world has left, and the restoration of the peace it has lost have already been laid by President Wilson's far-sighted statesmanship His proclamation of neutrality was an admonition of sanity and wisdom
 
 in this country to interfere in Eu- ropes quarrel and to prevent any de- sign, abroad to use this nation as a | at's-paw.
 On Tuesday. September the fifteenth the United States, concluded through it's secretary of state a peace agree ! rnent with twenty-sx nations 1 This stupend ous work, formally con e1uded by Secretary Bryan with the 1 signing of the last four treaties with Great Britain, France, Spain and i China, is almost world wide in it's 1 sweep.
 Just as we have before us the great twenty-s nation agreement the marvel of anti-war achievement. The first of these treaties was signed August 2, 1913 The nations signing, have 8 population of more than a bil- lion units, out of an estimated popu- lation of one billion, seven hundred thousand individuals now tnhabitating the glob.
 These twenty-seven nations compass an area of thirty-five million out of the ffty-fve million. square miles ha;b- table on the globe. The combined Import trade of the treaty-countries amounts to eleven and a half billion dollars annually, and their united ex- port trade to more than ten billion | dollars yearly.
 The main object gained by this gi- gantic peace-plan is, to speak col | Eoqua1fy, time.
 Nations are only composite indi- vtdua1s and age observation has shown that Individuals when given l time to settle their differences gener- ally 'tcool off before blows are struck.
 Article First of the treaty plainly states this great first object. It is 1 quoted as follows: The High Con tracing Parties agree that all disputes between them of every nature wI1aa- soever, to the settlement of which previous arbitration treaties or agree ments do not apply in their terms or are not applied in fact shall, when i diplomatic methods of adjustment l have failed, be referred for fnvestfga i ton and report to a permanent Inter- national Commission and report to a permanent International Commission. l to be constituted in the mannerfpre- yscribed in the next succeeding article; | and they agree not to declare war or begin hostilities during such inves- l tigation and before the report is sub nnitetd.''
 The president of the United States has offered the media.tory offices of the great republic of the Western l Hemisphere to effect a reconciliation 1 between the warning powers. | Though this voice of conscience may for the time being, be drowned 1 by the c1arnor of contending armies it will yet be heard, and it's signi1- l canoe will be realized abroadS as it is here when this frenzy of strife is over | and doubtful issues and frightfuI car mage heve demonstrated to some or all of the ,combatants that arbitration can in no respect be so costly as war
 The eye of faith looks through the l thick veil of the future to the time when the mediation proposal of the president of the United States, and the splendid example of the Peace i Treaties ratified through the instru-
 mentality of Secretary Bryan, will | loom up as the grandly dominant fact of the era-tEle dove, bearing to the | Ark the olive branch of peace across
 the waterg waste of the subsiding
 de1uge
 Those who believe an ultimate solu- ton of the war problem by American