Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1919-09-05
If the Treaty Is Rejected.

rAvE the Senators who are bent upon
II rejecting the Covenant of the League
- - of Nations and bringing to naught the
work of the Peace Conference counted the
cost of this policy, its cost to America In lost
friendships and to the world in shattered
hopes? 1t is easy to say that we snail i've
unto ourselves alone, Indifferent to the
troubles of other lands. (And just thls IN
affect is the counsel of the League opponents
But when we come to put the doctrine OF
SNUG selishness into practice, we snail nno
difficulties besetting us thicker than Egypt S
plaques.
We cannot hold aloof from the world S
problems however tight we may smut our
ewes and our heart In one role or another
we are going to be an actor on the eVenttul
stage not a cold on-looker. We tried the by
SANDERS part, and tried it to the last inch
of grievances patiently endured, in the late
war: but the very necessities OF conscience
and of national interest forced us into the
arena The practical question now is not
whether we shall live apart from the rest
of the world, but in what capacity and in what
character we shall move amidst its busy
scenes-as a co-worker in the cause of peace
and justice and progress, or as an embod1-
ment of selhShness and Suspicion unIflehuly
and unbefriended? &C..
Senators who urge rejection of the Peace
Treaty and the League Covenant are for the
latter course. They argue in substance,
though not in form, that inasmuch as we are
in suffering and restless world we should
cut connections Herewith and pass the time
prosperously in what they are pleased to call
splendid isolation We should take no re-
sponsibilities share no labors have no force
full convictions or vital sympathies in the COM
mon life of nations save at points where our
own purses and policies may be Immediately
concerned A practical people well may ask,
how would such policy pay? How would it
pay in commerce, in goodwill, in national
prestige and in national character?
( For the present, and probably for some
years to come, assured Of brisk foreign
trade simply because q war-drained world
must have our products. But how Will it be
with us in this matter when others have got
we'll on their feet again and competition
wakes keen? Sentiment, we may grant, has
no place in business, but as certain as human
nature is human nature, nation that does
nothing to help solve humanity's common
problems and bear it's common burdens will
lose the good will which is so essential to
all good business. Or if we continued I'M
waningly prosperous whilst our late associates
in war were left to struggle on alone, buying
our goods at high prices and borrowing our
money at snug interest rates, would not such
prosperity beget the very opposite of friend
ship in the hearts of those forced to deal
with us?
That isolation which kept us clean of the
Old Worlds foul politics was truly splendid"
But 1SOldLlOn LndC would Q6dQ6n us TO duty
and moral obligation would be drably in
glorious. ENHANCING alliances we should
shun as cautiously now as ever in the past;
but for deepest and highest interests
we dare not refuse to do a loyal part
by alliances which are disentangling. With
out some such form or process of inter-
national co-Working as the League of Nations
provides, the gordian knot of the world IS
troubles will grow ever more hopeless; war
will come more frequently and with more
horrid visage; civilization will lose it's fair
est towering and best fruitage; the earth,
to all highly human intents, will become
again without form and void" No balances
of power will keep international affairs in
equilibrium; over and over again that device
has been tried and proved fatally Intellectual.
A League of Nations also may end in failure,
but not until it has been fairly tried can we
say that it will; and not until have given
it a chance shall we be clear of responsibility.
If it does fail we assuredly shall be no worse
off than before If it succeeds-and certainly
the weight of competent opinion is hopefully
in its favor-what an Unreasonable service
will have been rendered mankind!
Whether it shall be tried or summarily re-
jected, whether it shall fail or succeed, de-
ponds chiefly upon the United States. For
If this nation rejects the League Covenant
there will be no alternative to a special al
lance by Britain, France and Italy, and per-
haps some of the lesser States. This will
leave Russia unaccounted for, or rather will
leave her an easy subject for future German
exploitation, and probably will predetermine
German-Russian-Japan coalition. What
hope would this leave world for unity and
peace? And how would it be with the United
States in her chill and friendless isolation
We could drift with a war-bent world, il
is true; we could build more monstrous
war machine than ever Prussia contrived; we
could stand the back-breaking cost of it al
longer, perhaps, than any other nation. But
at last would such world be worth living
in? If we can leave the future no happier
heritage than this will not our dead who
rest in France have died in vain? Those
Nho seek to defeat this Treaty and Covenant
of Peace have set their faces against the
plainest duty and the noblest vision that ever
fell upon America path