The daily Gate City and constitution-Democrat. (Keokuk, Iowa) 1916-1922, 1917-12-04
PRESIDENTS MESSAGE
BEFORE CONGRESS
Continued from page L.,

and Asia, from the impudent ant
alien dominion of the Prussisn mill
tary and commercial autocracy.
I'VE owe il, however, to ourseive:
to say that we do not wish In any
way to impair or to rearrange th'
Austro-Hungarian empire. 1t is ne
affair of ours what they do with theil
own life, either industriaily or Poilti
caliy. We do not purpose or desire
to dictate to them in any way. we
only desire TO see that their affairs
are left In their own hands, in all
matters, great or small. We shall
hope to secure fer the peoples OF the
Balkan peninsula and for the people
of the Turkish empire 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 attitude and purpose
with regard to Germany herself are
of a like kind. We intend no wrong
| against the German empire, no Inter
ference with her internal affairs. We
| should deem either the one or the
| other absolutely uniustifiable, abso-
| IuteIy contrary to the principles we
have professed to live by and to
| hold most sacred throughout our life
as a nation. The people of Germany
are being told by the men whom
they now permit to deceive them and
to act as their masters that they are.
fighting for the very life and exist
ence of their empire, war of des-
perate self defense against DELIBERATE
aggression. Nothing could be more
grossly or wantonIy false and we
must seek by the utmost openness
and candor as to our real aims to
convince them of its faIseness. We
are in fact fighting for their enamel
patton from fear, along with our own
from the fears as well as from the
fact of unjust attack by neighbors or
rivals or Sschemers after world en-
pire. No one is threatening the exist
ence or the independence of the
peaceful enterprises of the German
empire.
WORST THAT CAN HAPPEN.
"The worst that can happen to the
detriment Of the German people is
that, that il they should still, after
the war Is over, continue to be
obliged to- live under ambitious and
intriguing masters interested to dis
turb the peace of the world, men or
classes Of men whom the other
peoples Of the world could not trust,
1t might be impossible to admit them
to the partnership of nations which
must henceforth guarantee the
worlds peace. That partnership must
be a partnership of peoples, not a
mere partnership of governments.
at might be impossible, also, In
such untoward circumstances to ad-
NIT Germany to the free economic
intercourse which must inevitably
spring out Of the other partnerships
Of real peace. But there would be
no aggression in that; and such
situation, Inevitable because of dis
trust, would in the very nature of
things sooner or later cure itself, by
processes which would assuredIy set
in.
"The wrongs, the very deep
wrongs committed in this war, will
have to be righted. That, of course.
But they cannot and must not be
righted by the commission of similar
wrongs against Germany and her
allies. The world will not permit the
commission of similar wrongs as a
means of reparation and settlement.
Statesmen must by this time have
is everywhere Wide-aWake and fully
eomprehends the issues involved. No
representative of any seIf-governees
nation will dare disregard it by at
tempting any such covenants of sell
fishness and compromise as were
entered into at the congress of
Vienna. The thought of the plain
people here and everywhere through
out the world, the people who enjoy
no privilege and have very simple
and unsophisticated standards of
right and wrong, is the air all gov
ernments must henceforth breathe If
they would live. 1t is in the full
disclosing light of that thought that
all policies must be conceived and
executed in this midday hour of the
worlds life. German rulers have
been able to upset the peace Of the
world only because the German
people were not suffered under their
tutelage to share their comradeship
of the other peoples of the world
either in thought or in purpose. They
were allowed to have no opinion of
their own which might be set up as
a rule Of conduct for those who exer-
cised 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 con-
sciences of free men everywhere. Its
conclusions will run with those tides.
PEOPLE IN THE DARK.
"AlI those things have been true
from the very beginning Of this stu
pendous war; and cannot help
thinking that if they had been made
plain at the very outset the sympa-
thy and enthusiasm of the Russian
people might have been once for all
enlisted on the side of the allies.
suspicion and distrust .swept away
and real and lasting union of pur-
pose effected Had they 90 believed
these things at the very moment of
their revolution and had they been
confirmed in that belief since the I
sad reverses which have recently
marked the progress of their affairs (
towards an ordered and stable gov