New-York tribune., 1919-11-18

y
Eitchcock said:
president Wilson has read and con-
sidered the Lodge reservations. He
regards them as notification of the
ftreaty. If the treaty is ratified with
I the Lodge reservations he will decline
to accept them"
No reason is given for the con-
Illusion that the reservations nullify
she treaty--no argument is made.
#he President is satisfied with a
here oracuIar assertion He asks
he country to accept his apse dirit
- 1t is superf1uous to enumerate
Sgain the various steps by which the
President has made a mess Of the
treaty or to describe the knife
Ihrusts which have made a colossal
bash of the hope of the world.
This country and the world are
familiar with the record of how the
President refused to take counsel;
pf how he arrived in Europe with
put a plan; Of how he adopted the
theory, now an admitted blunder, of
nniting in one instrument the dis
tinct problems Of settling one war
and of creating safeguards for
future peace; of how he boasted he
had SO cunningly arranged matters
that the covenant could not have
separate consideration, and that the
Senate must accept covenant
secretly written or not have peace
at all; of how he revealed his am
bition to be the sole treaty-making
power, whereas the Constitution
sprovides he shall have partners
3of how in one breath he has con-
ceded the just basis Of the demand
for reservations and in the next
has said he would not accept them.
| But even more reprehensible and
5njurious has been a policy of mis-
representation to browbeat the
covenant through. The issues have
been, first, as to whether this coun-
TRY should candidly announce that
lit did not surrender it's indepen-
ldence, which the President on this
side says has not been done, but
(which on the other side he has
opened to doubt; and, second, as to
what department or departments of
government at Washington should
say when our obligations required
US to act.
On no better foundation than
pleas that our diplomacy should be
open and that the limitations of the
j Constitution could not be set aside
men have been called pygmics, lack
/ ing vision, and have been subjected
Il to all manner of vitriolic vitupera-
It tion. They have been assailed with
/ the false charges that they opposed
| the league of peace ideal and wished d
\ this country to pursue policy of
II selfish soul-killing aloofness. Think
!, of Senators Lodge and Knox, life
Il long advocates of league of
4 peace principles, being thus pill
4 loried! And in behalf of one who
\ q short time ago was so little con-
| cerned about world responsibilities
| that he permitted his campaign
managers to advocate his reelection
on the ground that he had pre-
vented our assuming the burden of
perfectly plain world responsible
ties. Is it strange that those meanly
assailed have not always turned the
other cheek and sometimes have been
stung to retort in kind?
It cannot be said with too much
emphasis that this Senate majority
is not engaged in killing the league
Of peace. Its leaders are not urg-
ing national isolation. They do not
menace the league as a going con-
Germ. 1t will function better with
tie reservations than without them.
Nor is there unwillingness to accept
compromise. Senator Knox no
longer urges that treaty and cove
lnant be separated, as they should