Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1917-02-03
GERMANY FORCING
WAR, TAFT AYERS
If 1t Comes to Americans He
Asserts 1t Will Be Because of
German Defiance
0<AzE&AsyNASeL.


Washington, ID. c., Feb. 3.-EX-
President Taft prefaced a prepared
speech on the League to Enforce Peace
here last night with a reference to the
new German crises. declaring that il
the United States were drawn into
war, Germany would force it by her
defiance of plain principles of justice
and humanity which should obtain be-
| tween civilized nations. Mr.. Taft said:
The responsibility which now rests
on the President and Congress is very
heavy.
They should know and do know
! that the American people will back
them to the. end in their decision.
May God give them good deliver
ance."
The former President was speaking
before the Chamber of Commerce OF
the United States, answering particu-
/ larly criticisms OF Theodore Roosevelt,
/ William j. Bryan. Senator Borah ana
others of the league to enforce peace
! idea. President Wilson had intended
/ to be present, but sent word that owing
to the gravity of the war situation he
would be unable to attend.
Continuing, Mr.. Taft said:
! Crisis Emphasizes Need of League
II had prepared this address before
/ Germany startled this country and all
neutrals by her last note. The actual
dangers with which it brings us face
to face may seem to make what / have
| been discussing theoretical. tame and
| inappropriate. The truth is, however
that this great crisis only emphasizes
the Importance of the purpose and
! plan of the league in the future his
/ tory of this country.
| "Of all things, we would avoid war.
| We are not prepared for it. Its awful
consequences we know from Europe's
sufferings.
Our prayer is for some escape from
| it in this critical hour, if consistent
with our national honor. But we must
face the facts.
I'm her campaign against her ene-
mics Germany proposes ruthlessly to
/ of neutrals in fragrant violation of
their rights. She began with Belgium
! She now includes them all. Our ma
tional conscience is void of offense
against her. Her cruel and indie
fensible drowning without warning of
more than hundred innocent Ameri-
cans on the Lusitania we condoned, in
view of her pledge against a repe-
/ tition. That pledge is now withdrawn,
and she avows her purpose to resume
! her shocking course.
Germany Is Aggressor
"If war is to come between us, she
will be the unprovoked aggressor. We
would avoid being drawn into the
European vortex by every honorable
concession. If she forces us into it,
she will do so by her defiance of plain
principles of justice and humanity
which should obtain between civilized
nations.
I'm spite of her great strength and
marvellous efficiency, Germany's mani
fest weakness has been in a failure to
understand other peoples and to ap-
preciate the moral forces working in
them. She may not know the spirit of
the good-natured, tolerant, war-hating
giant she now challenges. She may
overestimate, as she has done before,
in the case of other nations. the in
fluence of sordid motives, of the inertia
of comfort and of dissentient elements
among us. which she may expect to
paralyze our actions. She may stir an
active patriotism in our people which
she does not suspect. She may shock
us into a real preparation for war and
the sacrifice it involves as nothing else
might.
"She may push us at once into a
League to Enforce a Just Peace. She
may force us into an organization of
our potential military strength on the
one hand, and into a moral leadership
in the maintenance of International
Justice on the other. Thenceforth our
isolation from the wars and welfare of
the rest of the world would be at an
end. When peace would come, the
eyes of our people, in spite of warn
ings of statesmen who are looking
backward, would be opened not only to
the wisdom, but to the necessity of
our leading the nations into a perma-
nent worlds league to enforce peace"
Replies to Roosevelt
Answering Roosevelt's criticism of
10 Iao - in, l.
pared speech:
With Difference to the ability of our
opponents to grasp our proposals by
! intuition, we submit that before they
are contemptuously rejected or scat
tered into bits by verbal lyddite they
are entitled to study.
"Mr. Roosevelt, apparently without
reading its proposals, denounced the
league as feeble folly and as promp pt-
ed by motives peculiarly base because
IL would enforce the judgment of
courts of arbitration. Then, upon
learning that the proposals do not in
volve enforcement of judgments, he
characterizes them as a 'flagrant de-
ception of the public Senator Borah
denounces the plan of the league to be
'heinous, immoral and vicious These
are three formidable adjectives, of
which one would seem adequate to
carry the argument. The senator, how
ever. qualities his words by disavowing
intention to assail individuals. The
senator should look to his laurels in
the field of verbal warfare and slaugh-
ter, because such leniency may exclude
him from the class of epithetical
statesmen"
THE purpose of the league" Mr.. Taft
explained. "is to organizeN the worlds
strength into an international police
to enforce a procedure with respect to
issues likely to lead to war. which will
prevent all wars but those which moth
ing can nreventn -