New-York tribune., 1918-09-20
"The Times" Unwrites 1t

1t is satisfaction to be able to an
nounce that The Times has unwritten
both Mondays EDITORIAL in which it en-
braced the Austrian proposal for a
secret peace parley, and Tuesdays edi-
torial, wherein it regretted the country's
prompt rejection of the enemys invita-
ton
In & third editorial yesterday it came
out sGuarely against negotiated peace,
sayingt "Negotiation means trade,
bargaining. There will be no trade, no
bargaining. with the criminal powers
which had long planned this war, which
began it and carried it on like outlaws.
In the end they will stand at the bar, and
will have to accept the sentence i'm
posed"
This it adds, has been its position al
ways
Yet on Monday it sad Owe cannot
imagine the invitation will be declined
When representatives of the belligerent
powers meet at the council table and
proceed to their confidential exchange of
views, to their respective statements of
terms, there is much antecedent proba-
bility that, after no considerable inter-
val, the formal meeting of peace commits
sioners will follow" On Tuesday it re-
gretted that an opportunity had been
lost to discover what terms the Central
Powers "Would consent to accept"
How can such phrases as
onfdentidI exchange of rieeUs
their respective statements of terms
terms the Central Po1rers ,Uould con-
sent to accept
on Monday and Tuesday be made to
reconcile themselves with the declaration
of yesterday that in the end the Grim
inal "will stand at the bar and will have
to accept the sentence imposed" and
that "there canbe no negotiated peace?
1t blames its own understanding, say
ing, in yesterdays repentance: "Thc
Times regarded the Austrian proposal
as confession of defeat; we construed
it as an offer of surrender"
But do you exchange confidential
views" with an enemy that has offered
to surrender, and debate with him the
We wish not to be unkind, but this is
a matter into which feelings of gen
eroslty toward a newspaper must not be
allowed to count too heavily. The Incl
dent was of international significance,
and but for the promptness with which
our government spoke it might have
done very great harm. British journal
lists in this country, by force of habit,
cabled The Times's Monday morning
editorial to London as an expression of
American sentiment, thereby producing
abroad bewildering and misleading ef
feet which had afterward to be over
come.
The truth is inevitable On Monday
The Times alone in this country was for
peace by negotiation. On Tuesday it
regretted that Austria's proposal had
been rejected. Yesterday, after over
whelming protests from the public and
from its own readers, it unwrote it's
words. In fairness it might have omitted
to say that "some of our readers and
good friends have very evidently mis-
understood a recent editorial article pub
lished in these columns"
And as a newspaper whose function
is to report public sentiment as matter
of news, it might have had the largeness
to print some of the letters with which
it was stormed by it's readers. We know
something about them, because many of
the writer's sent copies to The Tribune
Yesterday we printed few, not with
any enthusiasm for adding to the en-
barrassment or humiliation of The
Times, but because the peoples reaction
to its gesture of detection seemed to us
to be very significant news.