The Bridgeport evening farmer. [volume] (Bridgeport, Conn.) 1866-1917, 1917-01-22
Text of Presidents
Address In Senate
CONTINUED from Page Onej

power to the authority and force of
other nations to guarantee peace and
justice throughout the world. Such a
/ settlement cannot now be long post
| poned. 1t is right that before it
| comes this government should frankly
formulate the conditions on which it
would feel justified i'll asking our peo-
pie to approve it's formal and solemn
adherence to a league for peace. I
am here to attempt to state those
conditions.
| 1.-THE present war must first be end
| ed; but we owe it to candor and to a
! just regard for the opinion Of man
i kind to say that so far as our par
| ticipation in guarantees of future
peace is concerned, it makes a great
| deal of difference in what way and
on what terms it is ended. The
treaties and agreements which bring
it to an end must embody terms which
will create a peace that is worth
guaranteeing and preserving, q peace
that will win the approval of man
kind not merely a peace that will
serve the several interests and imme-
| date aims of the nations engaged.
We shall have no voice in determining
q
shall, I fell sure, have a voice in de-
termining whether they shall be
made lasting or not by the guarantees
of universal covenant and our judg-
ment on what is fundamental and es-
sential as a condition precedent to
permanency should be spoken now
and not afterwards, when it may be
too late.
Covenant Of cooperative peace
that does not include the peoples OF
the new World can suffice to keep the
future safe against the war and yet
there is only one sort Of peace that
the peoples of America could join in
guaranteeing.
''The. elements Of that peace must
be elements that engage the conn
dence and satisfy the principles of the
American governments, elements con-
sistent with their political faith and
the practical convictions which the
peoples Of America have once for all
embraced and undertaken to defend.
81 do not mean to say that any
American government would throw
throw any obstacle in the way Of any
terms Of peace the governments now
at war might agree on or seek to up
set them when made, whatever they
might be. only take it for granted
that mere terms Of peace between
the belligerents viii not satisfy even
the belligerents themselves. Mere
agreements may not make peace Sc
cure. It will be absolutely necessary
that force be created as guarantor
of the permanency Of the settlement
80 much greater than the force Of
any nation now engaged or any al
lance hiterto formed or projected.
that no nation, no probable combin-
alton Of nations could face or with
stand it. If the peace presently to be
made is to endure 1t must be peace
made secure BIZ the organized major
force Of mankind.
1.-THE terms Of the immediate peace
agreed on will determine whether 1t
is q peace for which such guaran-
tee can be secured. The question on
which the whole future peace and
policy of the world depends Is this:
els the present war a struggle for
just and secure peace, or only for
| q new balance Of power? II 1T be
only struggle for a new balance OF
! power, who will guarantee, who can
guarantee, the stable equilibrium Of
the new arrangement? Only a tran
Gull Europe can be stable Europe.
There must be not only balances OF
power, but a community of power;
| not organized rivalries, but an or
ganized common peace.
Fortunately, we have received
very explicit assurances on this point.
The statement Of both the groups OF
i've q n.
| other have said, in terms that could
not be uninterrupted, that it was no
par tot the purposes they had in mind
| to crush their antagonists. But the
| implications of these assurances may
not be equally clear to all-nay not
| be the same on both sides OF the
water. I think it WI be serviceable
| II I attempt to set forth what we
| understand them to be.
They imply, first Of all, that 1t
must be a peace without victory. 1t
is not pleasant to soy this. beg that
| I may be permitted to put my own
Interpretation on it. and that I may
be understood that no other tnterpre-
tation was in my thought. I am seek
ing only to face realities and to face
them without soft concealments. Vic
tory would mean peace forced upon
the loser, victor's Terms imposed on
the vanquished. It would be accepted
| in humiliation, under duress, at an in
to1erable sacrifice, and would leave a
| sting, a resentment "a bitter memory
upon which terms Of peace would rest,
mot permanently, but only as upon
quicksands. Only a peace between
equals can last; only q peace the very
| principle Of which is equality and a
common participation in a common
benefit. The right state Of mind, the
right feeling between nations, is as
necessary for lasting peace as is the
| just settlement Of vexed questions of
territory or Of racial and national al
| legiance.
.'The equality Of nations upon which
peace must be founded, II it is to
last, must be an equality Of rights;
the guarantees exchanged must Meth
er recognize nor imply difference
between big nations and small, be-
| tween those that are powerful and
those that are right Right must be
based on the common strength, not
ON the individual strength of the ma
lions upon whose concert peace will
| depend. Equality of territory or OF
resources there Of course connot be;
| nor any other sort Of equality not
| gcxled in the ordinary peaceful and
legitimate development of the peoples
themselves. But no one asks or ex-
poets anything more than an equality
of rights. Mankind is looking now
for freedom Of life, not for equipoises
/ Of power.