Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1919-05-23
LEAGUE GETS
BAPTISM OF
SENATE FIRE
Bitter Denouncement by
Sherman Marks Open-
ing of Attack.

Washington, May 23.-The at
tack on the league of nations be
gan in the senate today with an adj
dress by Senator Sherman, Repub-
1ican of Illinois. bitterly criticizing
President Wilson for his conduct OF
the peace negotiations and de-
nouncing the league proposal as z
revolutionary attempt TO set up "a
parliament of nations controlled by
Aa> oligarchy."
National sovereignty would dis
appear under the league, the Illi-
nois senator declared, and liberties
won in centuries of struggle would
be lost forever Doomed with "the
curse of broken faith and shame
less perfidy from its inception and
BIRTH" the league, he predicted,
would become a gigantic ire brand
for world cOnfagration
Urges Pacts Separated.
Senator Sherman made his adj
dress in presenting a resolution
declaring it the sense of the SEN
ate that the league covenant should
be separated from the peace treaty
when the latter is submitted to the
senate for ratification. He charged
that covenant and treaty had been
closely interwoven in the final
draft for the deliberate purpose
of securing votes for the former
and argued that separate cOnsid-
Grafton would give an opportunity
for the senate and the house to
PASS a more sober bill.
He charged President Wilson
had broken faith with China. Po
land and Italy, had yielded to
GretG Britain'T; had endeavored
'to subvert the fundamental laws
of the republic; and had promised
to embark the United States on
policies that would require her to
send million soldiers abroad.
AsSails Authors of League.
THE American people" declared
the senator. have not yet fully
measured the unparalleled and
.aefocious character of the assault
made by the authors of the league
on American government and
American institutions. A more sin
lister assembly of men never
threatened the peace and safety of
our country than now demand that
unlimited powers over the lives
and fortunes of the American
people. be surrendered into their
keeping"
In revising the original covenant,
said Mr.. Sherman, the delegates at
Paris had improved only its gram
matical texture.
Like the original document it is
unamendable, omniscent and IN
fallible," ne said Again it must
be accepted as it flashes from the
summit where dwells the 1ncarnaJe
wisdom. it has become political
blasphemy to question, and treason
to try to understand Both the
~ariginaI and the amended leagues
impair the sovereignty of this re-
public and reduce it to vassal
state.
AltruiSm at Its Highest.
far above the human and common
sense. nor idealism SO deluded its
visionary worshippers. The goth
century does not call us to re-enacJ
the crusades. The misguided
imagination of intellectual per-
verts has wrought more evil than
the vicious propensities of the
criminal and the distorted images
of the insane. The man who
writes a book to portray a new and
perfect government, which he as
sures us that he has invented, is
more dangerous to mis- country
than the anarchist
Charges Socialism.
Colonel House foreshadowed
the destruction of constitutional
government in the United States
in his work of fiction published i'll
1912. This novel exhibits his dis
regard of law and his belief in
revolution. George d. Heron,
lately the presidents envoy to the
bolshevist government in Russia
says of the president in 1917. he
is a revolutionary beyond anything
his words reveal All five mem
bers tainted with Socialism. A
vast swarm of his appointees are
known to be open and avowed So
cialists. The administration of
Woodrow Wilson even under cOnsti-
tutional forms OF government is a
hybrid between a French revolution
and an oriental despotism. History
,woSId forget the reign of Caligula
In the excesses and foliies of the
American government operated
under the league of nations inter
preted by President Wilson AMI
Colonel House"