New Britain herald., 1916-04-26
URGES PEACE BY FORCE OF ARMS
President Of Harvard Believes in
 Vigorous Methods

received a communication from Dr.. A. Lawrence Lowell, president of Har-
 yard university urging him to attend
 the first annual assemblage of the
 League to Enforce Peace, which will
 be held in Washington, D. C., on May
 26 and 27. Ex-President Taft is pres
 1dent of the league. pr. Lowell is
 chairman of the executive committee.
 If, however," pr. Lowell writes.
 you should be unable to attend the
 meeting, may we ask you to appoint
 other delegates to represent your in
 stltution, either from the faculty or
 from the board of trustees. We con-
 ceive the program of the League to
 Enforce Peace to be so fundamen
 to business, industrial and social fu-
 ture of our country, and to the part it
 must hereafter play in international
 affairs, that we consider it most desir-
 able that leaders of thought in every
 community, and especially in the high
 CT institutions of learning shall be full
 ly informed regarding the movement"
 It was Dr. Lowell, who with ex-
 President Taft and others inaugurated
 the league-to- to-enforce-peace move
 ment at the Independence hall meet
 ing last June, and it is understood that 1t was Harvard's president who orig
 mated the proposal that the joint armed forces of a league of nations be used against any signatory refusing to keep an agreement to submit a dis pute to a court of arbitration or coun- cil of conciliation before beginning hostilities or declaring war. This pro- poSal is the main feature of the leagues program.
 With Dr. Lowelrs letter was en- closed a pamphlet specially written by him for the league, some of the more striking paragraphs of which follow:
 The resolutions adopted at the meeting in Philadelphia in favor of a League to Enforce Peace are so con- else that a proper regard for public opinion requires those who are re- sponsible for them to explain and jus tify each proposition set forth. But before trying to do so it is we'll to re- move a misapprehension stating that the plan is not directed at stopping the present war. For any combination of neutral states to attempt to enforce peace upon both groups of belliger- ents would be an absurdity. The only way to intervene would obviously be to join one side or the other, and this might result in length ening instead of the war. There is little use in trying to stop a conflict after it has begun; but there Is much hope of diminishing the cases where inter national .dissentions shall hereafter lead to fighting; and it is against the of future wars that the pro- posed League to Enforce Peace is ex- aimed.
 But why should the United States join league to maintain peace over the world? Simply because it is for the interest of every country to pre- vent war anywhere and also duty of every great country to help in doing SO by all reasonable means. The pres ent conflict has shown that the trade, the manifold interests, nay more, the safety of citizens, of neutral states are profoundly affected by war on a large ] scale; that neutral rights are inevit- | ably imperiled, if not actually violat- 1 ed; and that there is always grave l danger of being drawn into the whirl pool. It has been our tradition that 1 the rectitude of our intentions, the l absence with us of foreign ambitions, and our distance from Europe,, would preserve us from complications aris ng there. But with the best inten- ions we were at last drawn into the wars of Napoleon, and for all practi- gal purposes we are much closer to Europe than We were then, while Flu 'opean nations have extended their ambitions more and more generally 1 over the whole face of the earth. The Atlantic takes less than a quarter of he time to cross than it did a cen ,ury ago, and a few years hence it nay be easy to drop incendiary bombs rom the sky on New York in forty eight hours, or for submarines in week or ten days to destroy our ;oastwse shipping and shell our sea- board towns. It would be satisfac- ory to have some security for the of peace, or at least against the danger of a sudden attack.
 So much for our interest in the pre- ervation of peace. Our duty 1s per 1aps, no less clear. The meaning of var has been brought wildly before us turing the past year. The acts it jus flies would. if done by the individual members of a community to one an other, be properly regarded as proof ,f a relapse into utter barbarlsm. Can we. or can any civilized nation, say hat such things are none of our at- airs as long as we do not ourselves suffer from them? Civilization Is a common product of enlightened peo- ,les. and to set it backward in any progressive country impairs it every ,: where. If a com bination of nations would prevent the horrors of war, can we reduce the chance of success py refusing to join it, even at some ex- oense in maintaining an approprlate military force, and at some risk to