Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1919-08-25
HALF A LEAGUE is PREFERABLE
TO NONE-AND RENEWED CHAOS
The Senate, With All Its observations,
StII Moves With the Forward.
Farina Mind Of the World

the various issues raised by the covenant
and the peace treaty cannot safely b.
made into party issues or used as fuel
for emotional bonfires in 1920 A change
has come over Mr.. Lodge. A change has
| come over Mr.. Wilson. The White House
! meeting was amazingly friendly and con
! cilatory. The Republican group, if we
! are to judge by the present attitude of
influential leaders, is content to be rea-
sonablc, to accept what is mCritorious
in the Paris agreements and to let Mr..
Wilson win what honor he may in the
ultimate settlement. And, no matter
what may be done in the way of reserVa-
tions. there will be a league Of nations
and the United States will participate as
one of its powerful members.
That much is sure and, after the dust
clears, it will be plain that nothing else
greatly matters.
The reservations insisted upon by Mr.
Lodge and emphasized by the action of
the foreign relations committee on
Saturday can no longer be regarded as
mere obstacles placed by political strong
aims in the way of great purposes con-
ceived by an opposition President.
The Shantung deal and Article \
of the league constitution are the great
barriers before the treaty in the Senate.
Mr.. Wilson might have known that they
would raise storm. l. is hardly to be
believed that he hoped to have these de-
tails Of the Paris agreement accepted
without question.
The award of Shantung to Japan can
react upon intelligent opinion in China
and elsewhere for that mattCr-about as
the award of a vast region including the
site of independence Hall would react
on America if the award were made un-
der pressure of alien peoples to, let us
say, Mexico.
In Shantung Confucus was born and
the arts OF civilization in China had their
earliest development. The province is
thL richest in the empire. The railroad
privileges accorded to Japan give the
Japanese sort of commercial Gibraltar
in China. And it was the Chinese who
used to put their entire faith in America
and the Americans when it seemed as if
thew had no other friends in a predatory
world,
Article X is that clause in the
league constitution which, under the com
monest Interpretation, insures, through
the power of all the assembled nations,
the present political status of every gov
ernment in the league.
1t isn't a nice article.
Whatever reasonable reservation the
Senate may make in relation to Article
X will be welcomed by a good many
Americans who know that freedom is
something that yet may have to be
fought for in a good many parts of the
earth.
Who knows that the President in his
secret heart may not welcome definitions
of sort that were not possible or polite
in the feverish sessions at Paris?
What we are facing, then, is actually
a new beginning in world affairs. 1t is
not primarily upon statesmen or govern
ments that the greatest hopes for the
league of nations may rest, but upon an
enlightened public opinion everywhere;
upon the minds of peoples who have just
been acquiring wisdom through unex-
ampled travail.
In the uproar of criticism and conten-
ton we are likely to overlook the fact
that the league plan, no matter how IT
may emerge from the Senate, N ust still
have its major principles intact and i'm
movable.
There never will be again in the world
PROSTATE peoples or undeveloped areas,
IL ~, nd halplacc
to be fought over ruthlessly by warning
adventurers backed by rival empires.
The mandatory provisions of the league
and the undoubted moral obligations i'm
posed upon all nations that profess civil
lied standards eliminate these fundamen-
tai causes of war.
What the world would have been like
within few years had not that way been
found to protect the friendless and weak
peoples. civilized and uncivilized, it is
easy to imagine.
Europe is fluid. 1t is tired out
Coveted territories everywhere are open
to be taken by the first government
that happened to be conscenceless and
strong. A world court, such as the great
COUNCIL VI lHC lSdSuC VI idIlOIlS Will De,
offers the greatest protection of all to
nations that wish to live in peace. It
represents what promises to be a sue
cessful effort to eliminate old-fashioned
diplomacy and to drag the claims, hopes,
aspirations and affairs of each govern
ment out into the clear light of day in
any threatening emergency.
Thus it is that the sharpened critical
faculties of all peoples and their ques-
tioning intelligence may be directed in
an hour at any man or group disposed,
for one reason or another, to lead them
into war. 1t is commonly understood
that Mr. Wilson sacrificed much to keen
these great agencies of future peace in
tact and this may well be believed.
These have been educational years. Is
it too much to suppose that the people
| who lived and suffered through them