The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1919-09-06
No Real League Of Nations
 Unless United States Joins
President Declares That Country Must Make Choice Between Armed Isolation" and Peace ful Partnerships; Can Be Senior Member of The League or Stand Alone As Part
 of Armed Camp

l
 ! My Fellow -COuntrymeu: We have i met upon an occasion which is much too solemn to care how we look. CThis referred to a phOtOgrapher's attempt | to take a hashliEht before the Prcsi- | dent spokeD We ought to care how
 we think. And I have come here to- night to ask permission to discU-s with | you some of the very curious aberra- tiOns of thinking that have taken place in this country of late
 1 I have sOuFht---I think I have
 sought without prejudice---to under
 stand the point of view of the men
 who have been opposing the treaty and the covenant of the League of 1 Nations. Many of them are men
 whose judgment of a patriotic feeling | I have been accustomed to admire and respect. And yet l must admit to you, my fellOw-cOuntrymen that it is very hard for me to believe that they l have fOllOvez. their line of thinking 10 ! its logical and necessary conclusion, lbecause when you reflect upon their 1 position it is either that we ought to reject this treaty altogether or that
 We ought 10 change it in such Q way | as will make it necessary tO reopen negotiations with Germany and re- Iconsider the settlements of the peace | in many essential particulars
 1 We cannot do the latter alone, and l other nations will not join us in doing
 1t The only alternative is to reject i the peace and to do what some of our IfellOW COuntymen have been advising
 us to do; Stand alone in the world. l l suppose that most of you realize | that it is going to be very difficult for | the other nations that were engaged | in this war to get financially on their l feet again. I dare say you read the | other day the statement of MT. Her i bert HOOver's opinion, an opinion | which l always greatly respect. that 1 it will be necessary for the United 1 States Immediately to advance four 1 or five billion dollars for the rchab- l ilitation of credit and industry on the | other side of the water, and l must say to you that l learned nothing in | Paris which would leave me to doubt l that conclusion, and I think the state ment of the sum is a reasonable and l conservative statement
 | If the world is going banlzr7lDt. if 1 credit is going to be destroyed. if the l industry of the races of the gs0rld is | going to be interrupted. our market ! is confined to the United States, trade | will be impossible except within our | own borders. If we are to save our i own markets and rehabilitate our i own industries, we must save the financial situation of the world and | rehabilitate the markets of the | world
 Germany can't pay for this war | unless her industries are revived and the treaty of peace sets up great | commission, known as the Reparation i Commission, in which it was intend- 1 ed that there should be a member ] from the United States as wei as i from other countries, and the busi- l ness of this commission will be in 1 part to see that the industries of Ger
 many are revived in order that Ger many may pay this great debt which 1 she owes to civilization That Repa- ration Commission can determine the currents of trade, the condition of credit, of international credit; ir can determine how much Germany is go- ing to buy, where it is going to buy, and how it is going to pay for it.
 and if we must, to save ourselves, contribute to the financial rehabiIita- | t.On of the world, then without being members of this partnership we must put our money in the hands of those who want to get the markets that be- long to us
 That is what these gentlemen call playing lone hand. It is, indeed. playing a lone hand, it is playing hand that is frozen out We must 1 contribute the money which other na- tions are to use in order to rehabiI i itate their industry and credit, and we must make them our antagonists and rivals and not our partners Il
 put that proposition to any business man. young or old. in the United
 States and ask him how he likes it. and whether he considers that a
 useful way for the United States to stand alone.
 We have got to carry this burden of reconstruction. whether we will or
 not, or be ruined, and the question is, shall we carry it and be ruined anyhow, for that is what these gen
 tlemen propose, that at every point
 we shall be embarrassed by the whole
 financial affairs of the world being
 in the hands of other nations
 The men who propose these things
 do not understand the selfish inter
 ests of the United States. Because
 here is the rest of the picture: Hot
 rivals, burning suspicious. jealousies. i
 arrangements made everywhere if 1
 possible to shut us out, because if we
 won't come in as equals we ought to
 be shut out.
 As it stands now, evsry nation
 trusts us. They look to us. They
 long that we shall undertake any
 thing for their assistance rather than l
 that any other nation should under l
 ake it. And if we say that We are
 in this world to live by ourselves and 1
 get what we can get out of it by any
 selfish process, then the reaction will
 change the whole heart and a,titude
 of the world toward this great, free, |
 iustice-loving people, and after you
 have changed the attitude of the |
 world, what have you produced? !? |
 Peace? Why. my fellow citizens, is 1
 there any man here or any woman, |
 let me say, is there any child, who |
 does not know that the seed of war |
 in the modern world is industrial and |
 commercial rivalry?
 Ladies and gentlemen, I don't say |
 it because I am an American and my |
 heart is full of the same pride that |
 fills yours with regard to the power i
 and the spirit of this great nation. but |
 merely because it is a fact which I l
 think everybody would admit outside |
 1f iDs nf A mo