Virginia free press. (Charlestown, Va. [W. Va.]) 1832-1916, 1915-06-03
Americas Challenge.

President Wilson has sent his mes
sage to Germany upon the events of
which the murder of the Lusitania's
passengers constitutes the climax. Its
character may disconcert some of those
who had off-bandedly .expunged its
authors name from the category of
virile craftsmanship. There is no sphere
in which misconception may have to be
risked and borne with such prolonged
patience for the sake of over ruling
objects as in the management of foreign
policy. The impression that DR.. Wilson
was weak man has had it's victims in
this country and its opponents in his
Justified by document in which ex-
pllcitness and reserve have thrown
their fullest strength into combination.
1t is tempting to recall what our poet
has said of Enghnd.e when England
grows polite. There is a deadly
suavity pervading tie Presidents Note
which will be more significant to the
wise than if it had emptied the whole
arsenal of defamation Smoother
steel never shone in the eye of an ex-
pectant duellist Only when men know
their own minds-and the minds of
their supporters can they enact the
full ritual of courtesy with the aplomb
and tranquility of which the President
acquits himself. The punctllious avoid
ance OF imputation, the studious as
eruption of a humane and enlightened
attitude" to the German Government,
the resolute assumption that the in
famies practised in it's interest were
the work of an insubordinatc agents
whom it must disavow-all these drive
the recipient with the surest forensic
art into position where he must either
bow to the sceptre of clvilisation or de-
clare himself an unequivocal outlaw.
President Wilson relates the features
and fruits of the Submarine block
AIDE" and says in effect to Germany:
N"These things are not done by Govern
ments to which the United States ex.
tends the comfy of recognition; they
are manifestly abhorred by all decency
of human instinct; that they have been
perpetrated by German Commanders
must be the outcome of individuality,
criminallty which the German, Govern
ment will desire to repudiate, and
against whose repetition it will offer
full guarantees: prompt assent to
these conclusions is confidently await. |
ed. /"
The German answer to this interroga-
tory can only be cessation of piracy or
an avowal that piracy is German
game. If the German Government is
not prepared to avail itself las there is
no reason to think it isl of the exculpa-
tions which the President offers at the
expense of its agents and to promise a
cessation of murder, it stands before
the world a murderer confessed, and
admits that it does not walk upon the
same plane of human action as civil
lied countries. That will be an in.
timation that Americans, as well as
other neutrals. are deliberately placed
within the scope of its ''frightfulness, ]"
and that it refuses respect to the rights
which the American Government holds
it unthinkable to leave undefended.
The temperate precision of DR.. Viii
sons language in the latter respect
admits of no misreading.. 1t endorses
the confidence of American citizens
that their own Government will sus.
tain them, land it assumes that Ger
many viii not calculate upon the omis-
NON of any word or act necessary" to
hat inalienable purpose.
The whole moral sense and honour of
his countrymen has been visibly rallied
'ehind the subdued explicitness of the
residents challenge. The patience j
nth which prcyocation has been en-