Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1918-07-09
There Can Be No Compromise
With the Kaiser's Autocracy,
President Informs Diplomats

gagged, but many others also who
suffer under mastery, but cannot
act; peoples of many races and in
every part of. the wOrld-the peo-
pie Of stricken Russia still, among
the rest, though they are for the
moment unoTSanized and helpless.
Opposed to them, masters of many
armies, stand an isolated, friendless
group of governments who speak no
common purpose but only selfish
ambitions of their own by which
none can profit but themselves,
and whose peoples are fuel in
their hands; governments which fear
their people and yet are for the time
their sovereign lords making every
choice for them and disposing of
their lives and fortunes as they
will as well as of the lives and for
tunes of every people who fail un-
der their pOwer-governments
clothed with the strange trappings
and the primitive authority of an
age that is altogether alien and hos
tile to our own. The past and the
present are in deadly grapple and
the peoples of the world are being
done to death between them.
There can be but one issue. The
settlement must be final. There can
be no compromise. No halfway
decision would be tolerable. No
halfway decision is conceivable
These are the ends for which the
associated peoples of the world are
fighting and which must be conced-
ed them before there can be peace:
/. The destruction of every ar
bitrary power anywhere that can
separately, secretly, and of its sim
gle choice disturb the peace of the
world; or. If it cannot be present
ly destroyed, at the least it's reduc-
tion to virtual impotence.
>. The settlement of every ques-
tion. whether of territory. of SOW
ereignty. of economic arrangement,
or of political relationship. upon
the basis of the free acceptance of
that settlement by the people inn
mediately concerned, and not upon
the basis of the material interest
or advantage of any other nation
or people which may desire a diff
ferent settlement for the sake OF
it's own interior influence or mas
terry.
g. The consent of all nations to be
governed in their conduct towards
each other by the same principles
of honor and of respect for the
common law of civilized society
that governs the individual citizens
of all modern states in their re-
lations with one another. to the end
that all promises and covenants
may be sacredly observed. no pri-
vate plots or conspiracies Matched.
no selfish injuries wrought with
impunity, and a mutual trust es-
tablished upon the handsome foun-
dation of a mutual respect for the
right.
4. The establishment of an or
ganiZation of peace which shall
make it certain that the combined
power of free nations will check
every invasion of right and serve
to make peace and justice the
more secure by affording a definite
tribunal of opinion to which all
must submit and by which every
international reimbursement that
cannot be amicably agreed upon by
the peoples directly concerned shall
be sanctioned.
These great objects can be put
into a single sentence. What. we
seek is the reign of Law, based upon
the consent of the governed and
sustained by the organized opinion
of mankind
These great ends cannot be
achieved bv debating and seeking
to reconcile and accommodate what
statesmen may wish, with their
projects for balances of power and
of national opportunity. They can
be realized only by the determine
ton of what the thinking peoples
Of the world desire, with their long
ing hope for justice and for social
freedom and opportunity.
can fancy that the air of this
place carries the accents of such
principles with a peculiar kind
ness. Here were started forces
which the great nation against
which they were primarily directed
at first regarded as a revolt against
it's rightful authority but which ii
has long since seen to have been a
step in the liberation of it's own
people as we'll as of the people of
the United States, and I stand here
now to speak-spsak proudly and
with confident hope-of the spread
of this revolt. this liberation, to
the great stage of the world itself!
The blinded rulers Of Prussia have
reused forces they knew little Of
forces. which, once reused. can
never be crushed to earth again;
for they have at their heart an in
SEPARATION and a purpose which are
deathless and of the very stuff of
triumph!