Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1918-10-08

~ anu ready and willing also to
create In some v.rile fashion the only
fundamentally by which it can be
niaoe certain that the agreements of
.he peace will be honored and fulfilled.
THAT price is impartial justice in
every item of settlement, no matter
whose interest is crossed; not only
impartial justice, but also the salts
iactlon OF the several peoples whose
fortunes are dealt with. That indis-
pehsable fundamentally is a league
OF nations formed under covenants
that will be efficacious.
Without such instrumentality, by
"hlch The peace of the world can be
guaranteed, peace will rest in part
upon the word of outlaws and only
upon that word. For Germany will
nave to redeem her character, not only
py what happens at the peace table
but what follows.
And, as / see it, the constitution
OF that league of nations and the
clear definition of it's objects must be
part, is in a sense the most essen
tlal part, of the peace settlement it
self. 1t cannot be formed now. If
formed now, it would be merely new
alliance confined to the nations asso-
clated against a common enemy. 1t
IS not likely that it could be formed
after that settlement.
1t is necessary to guarantee the
peace, and the peace cannot be guar
anteed as an afterthought. The rea
son, to speak in plain terms again,
why 1t must be guaranteed. is that
there will be parties 70 the peace
whose promises have proved untrust-
worthy, and means must be found in
connection with the peace settlement
itself to remove that source of inse-
curity.
1T would be folly to leave the guar
antee to the subsequent voluntary &C
tlon OF the government we have seen
destroy Russia and deceive Roumania.
Particulars of Terms
These, then are some Of the par
ticulars, and l state them with the
greater confidence because can state
them authOritatively as representing
this governments Interpretation of
Its own duty with regard to peace:
FIRST - The impartial justice
meted out must involve no discrimina
ton between those to whom we wish
to be just and those to whom we do
not wish to be just. 1t must be JUS
tice that plays no favorites and knows
no standard but the equal rights of
the several peoples.
"SECOND-No special or separate
interest of any single nation or any
group of nations can be made the
basis of any part of the settlement
which is not consistent with the COM
mon interest of all.
"THIRD-There can be no leagues
or alliances or special covenants and
understandings within the general and
common family of the league of ma
tions.
"FOURTH-And more specifically,
there can be no special, selfish, eco
nomic combination within the league
and no employment of any force of
economic boycott for exclusion except
as the power of economic penalty by
exclusion from tie markets of the
world may be vested in the league of
nations itself as a means of discipline
and control.
"FIFTH-AH international agree
ments and treaties of every kind must
be made known in their entirety to
the rest of the world.
Special alliances and econmic rlv-
alries and hostilities have been the
prolific sources in the modern world
of the plans and passions that pro-
duce war. 1t would be an insincere
as well as insecure peace that did not
exclude them in definite and binding
terms.
National purposes have fallen more
and more into the background and the
common purpose of enlightened man
kind has taken their place.
"Plain workaday people have de
handed almost every time they came
together, and are still demanding, that
the leaders of their governments de-
clare to them plainly what it is-ex-
actIy what it is-that they are seek
ing in this war and what they think
the items of the final settlement should
be-
"They are not vet satisfied with
what they have been told. They still
what they ask for only in statesmen's
terms-only in the terms of territorial
arrangements and the divisions of
mower and not in terms of broad vision,
Justice and mercy and peace and the
satisfaction of those deep-seated long
SngS of oppressed and distracted men
and women and enslaved peoples that
seem to them the only things worth
fighting a war for that engulfs the
world.
"But I. for one, am glad to attempt
the answer again and again in the
hone that may make it clearer that
INV one thought is to satisfy those who
struggle in the ranks and are, perhaps
above ali others entitled TO reply
whose meaning no one can have any
excuse for misunderstanding, If he I'M
a, rstands the language in which it is
snoken or can get some one TO trans
late II correctly into his own.
"Peace drives can be effectively
utilized and silenced only by showing
t,at every victory of the nations asso-
ciated against Germany brings the na-
tions nearer the sort of peace which
viii bring security and reinsurance TO
oil peoples and make the recurrence of
another struggle of pitiless force and
rioodshed forever impossible and that
nothing else can.
Germany is constantly intimating
t,,e terms she will accept; and al
WAYS finds that the world does not
want terms. it wishes the final tri-
umph of justice and fair dealing"