Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1918-07-02
FGrS5Qhted and FQrreGcb1Rg

That is highly significant statement of Secre-
tary Lansings declaring the position of Govern
ment to be that all branches of the Slav race
should be completely freed from German and Aus
tran rule This inclusive and emphatic pro-
nouncement following of kindred purport made
some weeks ago, answers once for all the German
assertion that the United States favors freedom for
Poland without regard for what befaIls the Czecho
Slovaks and Jugo-Slavs The object of that misrep-
resentatOn was to undermine the confidence which
millions of Slavs in Austria Hungary have in Amer
icas good will toward them. Repeatedly in the
last few months crowds have surged through the
streets of Bohemian towns, shouting the name of
Wilson and the United States in the breath
with demands for liberty and peace. Similar dem
onstrations have occurred in divers parts of the
Dual Monarchy whose non-Germanic and
Magyar peoples hope for Allied victory their
to liberation. These conditions evidently have
waxed alarming to the Austro-Hungarian Govern
ment so much that special campaign of propa-
ganda has been undertaken to bege Slavic distrust
of the Allies in general and the United States in
particular. But there can be installing the
American position Our Government holds that "all
branches of the Slav should be completely
freed from German and Austrian rule The carry
ing out of this principle to which friends of liberty
the world over subscribe, will mean not only the
independence of Poland but the emancipation of the
Czecho-Slovaks the Ruthenes, the Dalmatians and
the other oppressed peoples whom the Dual Mon
archy under German domination enfetters.
That will mean the dissolution of what
know Austria-Hungary; and that is what it
ought to There is justification for
a continuance of the Hapsburg dynasty than for
the Hohenzollern. In fact under the notorious
treaty which Emperor Charles recently signed at
mil
becomes Hohenzolern vassal and to all practical
intents is absorbed into the German empire. 1t
would be doubly wrong, therefore, to let the mil
lions of non-Germanic peoples, the Poles and
Czecho-Slovaks and other Slavs who constitute the
great majority of Austrias population, be handed
over chattels to the Kaiser and his conspiraors.
For the Allies to permit that monstrous wrong
would be to lose the golden chance of establishing
a peace that will endure For as certain Polands
just claim to independence goes unvindicated and
the rights of the other great Sav groups now under
German tyranny are denied, there will be another
before the ravages of this one are repaired.
There can be no lasting peace in Europe or in the
world until these matters are settled right. mo
peace can last or ought to last President Wilson
has inspringy declared, which does not recognize
and accept the principle that Governments derive
their powers from the consent of the governed and
that no right anywhere exists to hand peoples about
from sovereignty to sovereignty as II they were
property" But the Austro-H Hungarian monarchy
rests upon outrageous violations of that principle,
and Germany is bent upon destroying the freedom
of peoples altogether.
AS matter of both wisdom and justice, there
fore the Allies should see to it that the Slavs
freed from Teuton tyranny. The more widely and
clearly this becomes known, the more certain and
speedy will be the collapse of Hapsburg and Hohen-
zollern power in the Dual Monarchy and the
brighter also will be the prospect of an effective up
rising against German power in Russia.
If the old car hasn't been assassinated, he
holds the record for Russian officials who have sur
vived rumors.