Daily capital journal. (Salem, Oregon) 1903-1919, 1918-07-04

their lives and fortunes as they will,
as we'll as of the lives and fortunes
of every people who fall under their
power-go clothed with the
strange trappings and the primitive
authority of an age that is altogether
alien and hostile to their 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 one issue. The settlement
must be final There must be no com
promise. No halfway decision would
be tolerable. No halfway decision is
conceivable. These are the ends for
which the associated peoples CT the
world are fighting and which must be
conceded them before there can be
peace.
THE destruction of every arbi-
trary power any where that can sepa-
rately, secretly and of its single choice
disturb the peace of the world; or. if
1t cannot be presently destroyed at
the least its reduction to virtual impo-
tence.
o. The settlement of every ques
ton, whether of territory, of sovereign
ty, of economic arrangement or of po-
litical relationship, upon the basis of
the free acceptance of that settlement
by the people immediately concerned
and not upon the basis of the material
interests or advantage of another ma
Ition Or people which may desire diff
Iferent settlement for the sake of its
lown interior influence or mastery.
3-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 govern
the individual citizens of all modern
states in their relations with one an
other; to that end all promises and
covenants may be sacredly observed
no private plots or conspiracies hatch
FED, no selfish injuries wrought with
impunity, and a mutual trust estab-
hshed upon the handsome foundation
of mutual respect for right.
4-The establishment of an organi-
zation 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 readjustmcnt that can
not be amicably agreed upon by the
peoples directly concerned shall bc
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
by 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 de-
termination of what the thinking peo-
pie of the world desire, with their
longing hope for justice and for social
freedom and opportunity
| can fancy that the air of this
lplaee carries the accents Of such prin-
cipes with peculiar kindness. Here
were started forces which the great
nation against which they were pri-
marily directed at first regarded as
a revolt against its rightful authori-
ty but which it has long since seen TO
have been O step in the liberation OF
its own people as well as the people
of the UNITED States; and stand
here now to speak-speak proudly and
Al. II ~