The Pulaskian., 1917-04-06

warfare against mankind.
 Tt is a war against all nations American ships have been sunk. American lives taken, in ways which it has stirred us very deeply to learn of, but the ships and people of other neutral and friendly nations have been sunk and overwhelmed in the waters 1 in. the same way. There has been no discrimination. The challenge is t0 all mankind. Each nation must de- eide for itself how it will meet it. The choice we make for ourselves must be made with a moderation of counsel and a temperateness of judg- ment befftting our character and our motives as a nation. We must put excited feeling away Our motive will not be revenge or the victorious as- sertion of the physical might of the nation, but only the vindication of right, of human right, of which we are only a single champion.
 When I addressed the Congress on February 26 last, I thought that it would suffice to assert our neutral rights with arms, our right to use the seas against unlawful interfer- ence, our right to keep our people safe against unlawful violence. But armed neutrality, 1t now appears, is | impracticable. Because submarines are in effect outlaws, when used as the German submarines have been used against merchant shipping, it is | impossible to defend ships against their attacks as the law of nations has assumed that merchantmen would defend themselves against privateers or cruisers, visible craft giving chase upon the open sea. It is common pru- dence in such circumstances-grim ne cessity, indeed-to endeavor to de- stroy them before they have shown their own intention. They must be dealt with upon sight, if dealt with at all.
 Use All Resources To End War.
 s"The German government denies the right of neutrals to use arms at all within the areas of the sea which 1 it has prescribed, even in the defense of rights which no modern publicist has ever before questioned their right to defend. The intimation is conveyed that the armed guards which we have l placed on our merchant ships will be l treated as beyond the pale of law l and subject to be dealt with as pi- rates would be. Armed neutrality is intellectual enough at best; in such circumstances and in the face of such pretensions it is worse than ineffect- ual; it is likely only to produce what it was meant to prevent; it is prac- tically certain to draw us into the war without either tEe rights or the effect iveness of belligerents.
 There is one choice we cannot make, we are incapable of making: We will not choose the path of sub mission and suffer the most sacred rights of our nation and our people to be ignored or violated. The wrongs against which we now array ourselves are no common wrongs;, they cut to 1 the very roots of human life.
 What this will involve is clear. It will involve the utmost practical CO., operation in counsel and action with the governments now at war with Ger many and, as incident to that, the ex- tension to those governments of the most liberal financial credits, in or der that our resources may so far as possible be added to theirs.
 Tt will involve, also, of course, the granting of adequate credits to the government, sustained. hope, so far as they can equitably be sustained, by the present generation. by well-con- ceived taxation.
 T say sustained so far as may be equitable by taxation because it seems to me that it would be most unwise to base the credits which will now be necessary entirely on money borrow ed. It is our duty. I most respectfully urge, to protect our people so far as we may against the very serious hard ships and evils which would be likely to arise out of the imitation which would be produced by vast loans.
 "In carrying out the measures by | plished we should keep constantly in mind the wisdom of interfering as lit tie as possible in our own preparation and in the equipment of our own mil itary forces with the duty-for it will be very practical duty-of supplying the nations already at war with Ger many with the materials which they can obtain only from us or by our as sistance. They are in the field, and we should help them in every way to be effective there.
 'I shall take the liberty of suggest ing, through the several executive de partments of the government, for the consideration of your committees, measures for the accomplishment of the several objects I have mentioned
 We are at the beginning of an age in which it will be insisted that the