Tulsa daily world. [volume] (Tulsa, Indian Territory [Okla.]) 1905-1919, 1917-12-05
Text of President Wilson's Address

pire the right and opportunity to
make their own lives safe. their own
fortunes secure against oppression or
injustice and from the dictation of
foreign courts or parties. And our at
t!t.de and purpose with regard ~
Germany herself are of a like kind.
We intend no wrong against the Ger
man empire, no Interference with her
internal affairs We should deem
either the one or the other absolutely
untustiflable. absolutely contrary to
the principles we have professed 10
live by and to hold most sacred thru
out our life as n nation.
German People Misicd
The people of Germany are being
told by tho men whom they now per-
NIT 10 deceive them and to act as their
masters. that they are fighting for the
very life and existence of their em-
'pire, war OF desperate self-defthse
against deliberate aggression. Nothing
could be more grossly or wIntonly
Use and We must seek by the utmost
openness and Candor as TO our real
aims as to convince them OF its false
ness. We are in fact fighting for
their emancipation from fear. along
with our own, from the fear as we'll as
from the fact OF UNJUST attack by
neighbors or rivals or schemers after
world empire, No one is threatening
the existence or the Independence or
the peaceful enterprise of the German
empire.
The worst Tint can happen to the
detrnient OF the German people Is
this, that If the should still, after the
war is over. continue to be obliged To
live under ambitious and intriguing
n 1sters interested to disturb the
peace of the world, men or classes OF
mer whom the other peoples of
the world could not trust 1t
might be impossible to admit
them to the partnership of ma
tiois which must henceforth Guaran'
tee the worlds peace. That partner
ship must be a partnership of peoples
not a mere partnership of govern
ments. 1t might be Impossible, also,
In such untuward circumstances, to
admit Germany to the free economic
spring out Of the other partnerships
of real peace. But there would be
no aggression in that and such sit
uation, Inevitable because or distrust,
would in the very nature of things.
sooner or later cure itself. by proc
csses which would assuredly set in.
The wrongs, the very deep wrongs,
committed in this war viii have TO
be righted That of course. But they
cannot and must not be righted by
the commission of similar wrongs
agarSt Germany and her allies. Tho
world will not permit the commission
of similar wrongs as means OF
repa ration and settlement. statesmen
must by this time have learned that
the opinion of the world Is every
where wide-aWake and fully compre-
hends the issues involved. NO repre-
sentative of any self-governed nation
will dare disregard it by attempting
any such covenants of selfishness and
compromise as were entered into az
the congress of Vienna
The thot of the plain people here
and everywhere thruout the world.
| the people who enjoy no privilege ana
have very simple and unsophisticated
standards of right and wrong, is the
air ell governments must henceforth
breathe, II they would live. 1t is In
the full disclosing light OF that thot
that all policies must be conceived ana
executed in this midday hour or the
worlds life.
Popular Mind Misdirected.
German rulers have been able to
upset the peace of the world only pe-
cause the German people were not sur
fered under their tutelage to share the
comradeship of the other peoples or
| the world either In thot or N purpose.
They were allowed to have no opinion
of their own which might be set up
as a rule of conduct for those who
exercised authority over them. But the
congress that concludes this war will
feel the full strength Of the tides that
run now in the hearts and consciences
of free men everywhere. Its conclu-
sions will run those tides.
All these things have been true from
the very beginning of this stupendous
war: and | cannot help thinking that
if they had been made plain at the
very outset the sympathy and enthu-
siasm of the Russian people might
have been once for all enlisted on the
side of the allies, suspicion and dis
trust swept away and real and last
| Ing union OF purpose effected. Had
| thev believed these things at the very
moment OF their revolution and had
| they been confirmed in that belief
since. the sad reverses which have re-
Gently marked the progress of their
affairs toward an ordered and sable
government Of free men might have
been averted. The Russian people
have been poisoned by the very same
!alsehoods that have kept the German
people in the dark and the poison has
been administered by the very same
hands. The only possible antidote Is