The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1917-12-07
FIGHT TO VICTORY
DEMAND OF WILSON

1t until it is accomplished Every power
and resource we possess, whether OF men,
of money, or of materials, is being de-
voted and will continue to be devoted to
that purpose until 1t is achieved. Those
who, desire to bring peace about before
that purpose Is achieved | counsel TO
carry their advice elsewhere. We Will
not entertain 1t.
We shall regard the war as won only
when the German people say to U.S.
through properly accredited representa-
tives, that they are ready to agree 10
settlement based upon justice and the
have done. They have done wrong to
Belgium which must be repaired. They
have established a power over other lands
and peoples than their own-over the
great empire of Austria Hungary, over
hitherto free Balkan states, over Turkey
and within Asia-Which must be relin-
pushed.
ADMIRE INDUSTRY SKILL.
Germany's success by skill, by industry,
by knowledge, by enterprise. we did not
grudge or oppose, but admired, rather
She had built up fGr
the peace of the world We We're con-
tent to abide the rivalries of manurac-
ture, science and commerce that were In,
volved for us in her success and stana
or fall as we had or did not have the
brains and the initiative to surpass her.
But at the moment when she had con-
spicuously won her triumphs of peace she
threw them away, to establish in their
stead what the world will no longer per-
nit to be- established. military and po-
litical domination by arms, by which to
GUST where she could not excel the rivals
she most feared and hated.
The peace we make must remedy that
wrong. 1t must deliver the once far
northern France from the Prussian con-
quest and the Prussian menace, but IT
must also deliver the. peoples Of Aus
tria-Hungary, the peoples OF the Balkans
and Asia, from the impudent, and alien
dominion of the Prussian military and
commercial autocracy.
We owe it., however. to ourselves to
say that we do not wish in any way TO
impair or to rearrange the Austro- Hun
garian empire. It is no affair. of ours
what they do with their own life, either
industrially or politically. We do not
purpose or desire to dictate to them IN
any way. We only desire to see mat ina
in all matters, great or small. We shall
hope to secure for the peoples Of the
Balkan peninsula and for the people OF
the Turkish empire the right and oppor-
tunity. to make their own lives safe, their
own fortunes secure against oppression
or injustice and from the dictation OF
foreign courts or parties.
ATTITUDE TOWARD GERMANY.
And our attitude and purpose with re-
gard to Germany herself are of like
kind. We intend no wrong against the
German empire; no interference with her
internal affairs. We should deem either
the one or the other absolutely unjusti-
fable, absolutely contrary to the prin-
ciples we have professed to live by and
to hold most sacred throughout our life
as nation.
The people of Germany. are now being
told by the men who they now permit
to deceive them and to act as their mas
tiers that they are fighting for the very
of desperate self defense against DELHI
crate aggression. Nothing could be more
grossly or wantonly false, and we must
seek by the utmost openness and can
dor as to our real aims to convince them
of it's falseness. We are in fact fighting
for their emancipation from fear, along
with our own-from the fear as well as
from the fact of unjust attack by neigh
bors or rivals or schemers after world
empire. No one is threatening the ex-
istence or the independence or the peace
full enterprise Of the German empire.
The worst that can happen to the detri-
merN of the German people is this, that
If they should still, after the war Is over,
continue to be obligated to live under
ambitious and intriguing masters inter-
ested to disturb the peace Of the world,
men or classes of men whom the other
peoples of the world could not trust it
might be impossible to admit them to the
partnership Of nations which must hence
forth guarantee the worlds peace. That
partnership must be partnership of
peoples, not a mere partnership of gov
ernments. 1t might be impossible, also in
such untoward circumstances, to admit
Germany to the free economic intercourse
which must undoubtedly spring out of
there would be no aggression in that; and
such a situation, inevitable because of
distrust, would in the very nature Of
things sooner or later cure itself, by pro-
cesses which would assuredly set in.
RIGHTING OF WRONGS.
committed in this war will have to be
righted. That of course. But they can
not and must not be righted by the COM
mission of similar wrongs against Ger
many and her allies.
The world will not permit the commits.
sion Of similar wrongs as means Of
reparation and settlement. Statesmen
must by this time have4 learned that the
opinion of the world Is everywhere wide
awake and fully comprehends the issues
involved. No representative of any self
governed will dare disregard it by at
ness and compromise as were entered into
the congress of Vienna. The thought Of
the plain people here and everywhere
throughout the world, the people who en-
JOY nO privilege anu nave very SiHplc anu
unsophisticated standards of right and
wrong, is the air all governments must
henceforth breathe II they would live.
1t Is in the full disclosing light Of that
thought that all policies must be con-
ceived 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 the 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 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.
It's conclusions will run with those tides.
| TRUE FROM BEGINNING.
All these things have been true from
| the very beginning Of this stupendous
war, and I cannot help thinking that
| IL they had been made plain at the very
| outset the sympathy and enthusiasm OF
| the Russian people might have been once
for all enlisted on the side OF the al
| lies, suspicion and distrust swept away
| and real and lasting union OF purpose
effected. Had they believed these
| things at the very moment of their revo-
| luton, and had they been confirmed In
| that belief since, the sad reverses which
| have recently marked the progress Of
their affairs towards an ordered ano
| have been avoided. The Russian peo-
| ME have been poisoned by the very same
| falsehoods 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 the