St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1917-01-27
Free and Safe.


ments and the cooperation of the
navies of the world in keeping the
seas at once free and safe. And the
question of limiting naval armament
opens the wider and perhaps more
difficult question of the limitation of
armies and of all programs of mill
tary preparation. O
Difficult and delicate as these
questions are, they must be faced
with the utmost candOr and decided
in a spirit of real accommodation if
peace is to come with healing in its
wings and come to stay. Peace can
not be had without concession and
sacrifice There can be no sense of
safety and equality among the ma
tons if great prepondering arma-
here and there to be built up and
maintained The statesmen of the
world must plan for peace and ma
tions must adjust and accommodate
their policy to it as they have plan
ned for war and made ready for pitt
less contest and rivalry. The ques-
ton of ornaments, whether on land
or sea, is the most Immediately and
intensely practical question connect
ed with the future fortunes OF ma
tions and of mankind.
"I~have spoken upon these great
matters without reserve and with the
utmost explicitness because 1t has
seemed to me to be necessary if the
worlds yearning desire for peace
was anywhere to find free voice and
utterance. Perhaps am the only
person in high authority amongst ali
the peoples in the world who is at
liberty to speak and hold nothing
back. l am speaking as an individu-
al, and yet 1 am speaking also, of
course, as the responsible head OF a
great government and l feel conf
dent that l have said what the peo-
ple of the United States would wish
me to say.
May l not add that I hope and
| believe that / am in effect speaking
| for liberals and friends of humanity
| in every nation and of every pro-
| gram of liberty? l would fain be-
lieve that l am speaking for the 81
| lent mass of mankind everywhere
who have as yet had no place or OPP
| portunity to speak their real hearts
out concerning the death and ruin
they see to have come already upon
! the persons and the homes they holo
most dear.
| "And in holding out the expecta-
| ton that the people and government
Of the United States will join thu
| other civilized nations of the Worl'
in guaranteeing the permanence OF
peace upon such terms as l have
named | speak with the greater bold
,ess and confidence because it Is
| clear to every man who can think
that there is in this promise nc
breach in either.our traditions or our
policy as a nation, but a fulfillmeni
rather, of all that we have professed
or striven for.
81 am proposing, as it were, that
the nations should, with one accord
adopt the doctrine of President Nor
roe as the doctrine of the world
That no nation should seek to ex'
tend it's policy over any other ma
ton or people, but that every people
should be It free to determine Its
own polity, it's own way of@develop'
ment, unhindered, unthreatened, I'M
afraid, the little along with the great
and powerful.
81 am proposing that all nations
henceforth avoid entangling alliances
which would draw them into compe
titions of power, catch them in me-
of intrigue and selfish rivalry, and
disturb their own affairs with infiu
ences intruded from without. There
10 M entaneling alliance in a cOncer
of power. When all unite to act II
the same sense and with the same
purpose all act in the common In
terest and are free to live their owl
lives under a common protection.
81 am proposing government b,
the consent of the governed; thai
freedom of the seas which in inter
national conference after conference
representatives of the United States
have argued with the eloquence O.
those wh6 are the convinced dis.
ciples of liberty; and that modera
ton of ornaments which makes o.
armies and navies Of power for order
merely, not an instrument of ag
erosion or of selfish violence.
"These are American principles
American policies. We can stane
for no others. And they are als<
the principles and policies of for
ward-looking men and women every
where, of every modern nation, o.
every enlightened community. The.
are the principles of mankind ano
must prevail"