The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1919-08-21
AMERICA MUST ENTER RLEAGUEI IN
 HIGHEST SPIRIT
Display of Half Hearted In terest Would Be Worse
 Than Withdrawal.

The real issue in the League of Nations controversy is not what nino newspapers out of ten Con both sides) and ninteen speakers out of twenty make it out to be. It is not Shan tung, or the Monroe Doctrine or en- tangling alliances. It is simply and solely the question, whether we shall enter the new international relations established by the war with a whole heart and a will to make them suc- cessful; or a half heart and a will to let fate look after them.
 Whether we ratify the League or not makes little difference so far as our entanglement with Europe IS concerned. If Japan encroaches upon China; if Germany allies herself with Russia; if Italy and France quarrel over Asia Minor, we shall be, sooner or later, equally involved, whether we are a member of an effective League of Nations, or merely looking out for our own interests in our own old way, as hitherto.
 We cannot stand apart from the European mix-up; the question is how can we best safeguard our in terests in the international compli- cations that are surely coming. The League offers new machinery for peaceful settlement and the exercise of wise and powerful influence. It is new machinery, untried machin- cry, tentative machinery, but the de- sign is taken from successful ex- periments conducted in the Far and Near East, in South America and Canada, in the British Empire and among our own states. throughout the nineteenth century. The princi- pies upon which the League is built have already in imperfect and minor applications averted more wars than have been fought in the world since the end of the Napoleonic era.
 The downright opponents of the League offer nothing by way of sub stitute except confidence in the scheme of alliances, balance of pow CT, and protection by armament which a child of seven can see has only one possible conclusion, inevi- tably and always-war.
 But the downright opponents of the League are growing fewer and are more and more to be found among the ignorant, the prejudiced, the mil itaristic, and the cynical. It is the qualified opponents of the League who are now most dangerous, both to idealism and common sense. They are neither ignorant nor cynical. Their desire. on the face of 1t, is reasona- ble. They want a League remade in the interests of America.
 All Americans want a League made in the interests of America. But there is an indispensable quality thai such a League must possess. It must be acceptable to Europe, and 1t must not only be, but seem, acceptable to us. It must have what we call in a man morale behind it; 1t must have what we call in a document moral | influence. A League that has been whittled to suit everyone, a League i qualified and amended until no one | believes in it, Is nothing but a pretty | gesture.
 If the net result of the Senate's | action is hearty approval of the prin. l ciples of the League, and an expres. sion of what the average American | undoubtedly feels, that a reign ot violence that is worth fighting for | then it makes little difference how
 many classifications it adds, how
 many explanations of Amarica's jus | ideas as to how the covenant should be carried out in practice. But i | the Senate,s by ill-advised amend
 ments, makes the reservations seen
 to be more important than thu League; if 1t lets us and Europe fee 1 that the safety of the world is in | finitely less important than. the con
 venience of America, why then it vii
 commit what Is for legislatures thu l unforgivable sin; in a great crisis 1 will have sacrificed the future to thi present. If in the adoption of tn League, the Senators give us only sus picions, hesitancies, and grudging ap provals, if they do not express tn, | determination of Americans to mak'
 sacrifies for peace after the war a well as in 1t 1t will be a cold day fo | America and the world. And ho 1 days for many Senators will follow.