The Washington herald., 1919-02-25
FULL TEXT OF
WILSON SPEECH
In BOSTON
CONTINUED FROM PAGE ONE.

A-NNA-AS II MN <AOD O-NS.
No assurance would be given to
a downtrodden people that they would
be safe. We set this nation up to
make men free and now we will make
men free.
What we are doing is to hear
the whole case; hear 1t from the
mouths of the men most interested;
hear IL from those who are offi-
cially commissioned to state it.;
hear rival claims; hear the claims
that affect new nationaIities; that
AFFECT new areas of the world; that
affect new commercial and econ
Cmic conditions that have been es-
tablished by the great world war
through which we have gone. And
l have been struck by the mod
Crateness of those who have repre-
sented national claims. l can tes-
tify that 1 have nowhere seen the
EIeam Of passion. | have seen earn
cstness, 1 have seen tears come to
the eyes Of men who plead for down.
trodden people whom they were
privileged to speak for; but they
were not the tears of anger, they
were the tears of ardent hope.
Il don't see how any man can fail
TO have been subdued by these pleas,
subdued to this feeling, that he was
not there to assert an individual
Judgment of his own, but to try to as
slst the cause OF humanity.
And in the midst of it all. every
interest seeks out, first Of all, when
it reaches Paris, the representatives
of the United States. Why? Because
and l think 1 am stating the most
wonderful fact I'm histOry-beCause
there is no nation in Europe that sus-
poets the motives of the United
States.
Was there ever so wonderful a
thing seen before? Was there ever
so moving a thing? Was there ever
any fact that SO bound the nation
that had won that esteem forever
to deserve it?
I would not have you understand
that the great men who represent
the other nations there in confer
ence are disesteemed by those who
know them. Quite the contrary.
But you understand that the nations
Of Europe have again and again
Clashed with one another in COM
petitive interests. II is impossible
for men to forget those sharp issues
that were drawn between them in
times past.
1T is impossible for men to be-
ieve that all ambitions have all of
sudden been fOregone. They re-
member territory that was coveted;
they remember rights that it was
attempted to eNtOrt; they remember
political ambitions which it was at
tempted to realiZe-and while they
believe that men have come into a
different temper. they cannot forget
these things. and so they do not re-
sort to one another for a dispassiOn-
ate view Of the matters in cOntrO-
vcrsy. They resort to that nation
which has won the enviable distinc-
tiOn of being regarded as the friend
Of mankind.
Whenever it is desired to send a
small force OF soldiers to occupy a
piece of territory where it is thought
nobody else will be welcome, they ask
for American soldiers. And where
other soldiers would be looked upon
with suspicion. and perhaps met with
resistance, the American soldier is
welcomed with acclaim
Il have had so many grounds for
pride on the other side of the water
that I am very thankful that they
are not grounds for personal pride
but for national pride. If they were
grounds for personal pride, I'd be the
most stuck-up man in the world. And
II has been an infinite pleasure to me
10 see those gallant soldiers of ours,
Of whom the Constitution OF the
United States made me the proud
commander. You may be proud oi
the Twenty-siXth Division, but
commanded the Twenty Divi,
SION daughter and applause. and see
what they did under my direction
And everybody praises the American
soldier with the feeling that in prais-
ing him he IS subtraCting from the
credit OF no one else.
Il have been searching for the
fundamental fact that converted
Europe to believe in US. Before this
war, Europe did not believe in US as
she does now. She did not believe
in US throughout the first three
Years of the war. She seems really
to have believed that we were hold
ing off because we thought we could
make more by staying out than by
corning in. And all of a sudden. in
a short eighteen months, the whole
verdict is reversed.
There can be but one explanation
for it. They saw what we did
that without making a single claim
We put all our men and all our
means at the disposal of those who
were fighting for their homes. in the
first instance, but for a cause. the
cause of human right and justice
and that VIC went in. not to sup
port their national claims. but to
I, fs,E,
held in common.
And when they saw that America
not only held ideals, but acted ideals.
they were converted to America and
became firm partisans Of those ideals.
II met group of scholars when I
WAS in Paris. Some gentlemen from
one OF the Greek universities, who
had come to see me, and in whose
presence, or rather in the presence
Of whose traditions of learning, I felt
very young indeed. And told them
that 7 had had one Of the delight
fuI revenges that sometimes comes
to man. All my life I have heard
men speak with a sort of condescen-
sion of idealists. and particularly Of
those separated, encloistered persons
whom they choose to term academic,
who were in the habit of utterinC
ideals in the free atmosphere when
they clash with nobody in particular.
And said I have had this sweet re-
vcnge. Speaking with perfect frank
ness in the name of the United States
] have uttered as the objects Of this
great war. ideals, and nothing but
ideals, and the war has been won bv
that inspiration. Men were fighting
with tense muscle and lowered head
until they came to realize those things
feeling they were fighting for their