The St. Mary banner. (Franklin, Parish of St. Mary, La.) 1889-1931, 1919-03-08
: PRESIDENT |NvITESTEST
OF NATLON'S SENTIMENT
THROWS DOWN GAUNTLET TO
THOSE WHO DISTRUsT NEW
LEAGUE OF NATIONS.
MAKES ADDRESS IN BOSTON
All Europe, He Declares, Has Pinned
Its Hopes for Future Peace on
observation-disclosures
Fight on Issue.

Boston, Mass.-President Wilson will
fight at home as he has fought abroad
for a league OF nations. Returning from
France, and before responsive audience
that filled the biggest auditorium in Bos-
ton. Monday the president pictured the
old world fighting with stubborn des-
peration and expecting in the end nothing
better for the peoples than they had
known for centuries. He pictured the
American nation entering the lists with
new purpose-the freedom of man.
kind. The old world had caught the WIS.,
ion and any treaty of peace drawn other
wise than in the new spirit would be
nothing more, he asserted, than mod
ern scrap of paper" and the present
peace unless guaranteed by the united
forces Of the civilized world could not
stand a generation.
Bending over the speakers table, his
face set in tense lines and his right hand
clenched, the president exclaimed. ANY
man who thinks that America will take
part in giving the world any such rebuff
and disappointment as that does not
know America. l invite him to test the
sentiment of the nation
II have fighting blood in me-" he said
with apparent feeling, land it is some
times a delight to let it have scope, but
if it is challenge on this occasion, it
will be an indulgence
The text of the presidents address fol-
lows.
Text OF Speech.
Governor Coolidge, Mr. Mayor, Fellow
Citizens: l wonder if you are half as
glad to see me as / am to see you. 1t
warns my heart to see a great body of
my fellow citizens again, because in
some respects during the recent months
/ have been very lonely indeed without
your comradeship and counsel, and l
tried at every step of the work which
fell to me to recall what l was sure
would be your counsel with regard to the
great matters which were under consid-
Grafton.
II do not want you to think that have
not been appreciative of the extraordi-
narily generous reception which was
given to me on the other side, in saying
that it makes me very happy to get home
again. l do not mean to say that / was
not very deeply touched by the cries that
came from the great crowds on the other
side But l want to say to you in all
honesty that felt them to be a call of
greeting to you rather than to me.
Il did not feel that the greeting was
personal | had in my heart the over
browning pride of being your representa-
tive and of receiving the plaudits of men
everywhere who felt that your hearts
beat with theirs in the cause of liberty.
There was no mistaking the tone in the
voices of those great crowds. 1t was not
tone of mere greeting: it was not a tone
of mere generous welcome; it was the
calling of comrade to comrade, the cries
that come from men who say, We have
waited for this day when the friends of
n
shade hands. with us to see that new
world was constructed upon new basis
and foundation of justice and right
II can't tell you the inspiration that
came from the sentiments that come out
of those simple voices of the crowd. And
the proudest thing 1 have to report to
you is that this great country of ours is
trusted throughout the world.
II have not come to report the proceed
fngs or the results of the proceedings of
the peace conference; that would be pre-
mature. | can say that l have received
very happy impressions from this con-
ference; the impression that while there
are many differences of judgment while
there are some Emergencies of object,
there is, nevertheless, a spirit and a COM
mon realization of the necessity of set
ting up new standards of right in the
world.
Because the men who are in confer
ence in Paris realize as keenly as any
American can realize that they are not
the masters of their people; that they
are the servants Of their people and that
to new purpose and a new conception
of their power to realize that purpose,
and that no man dare go home from that
conference and report anything less no.
Ole than was expected of it.
1.-The conference seems to Won to go
slowly; from day to day in Paris it seems
to go slowly; but 1 wonder if you real
lie the complexity of the task which it
has undertaken. 1t seems as if the set
Elements of this war affect, and affect
directly, every great and, 1 sometimes
think every small nation in the world
and not one decision can prudently be
made which is not properly linked in
with the great series of other decisions |
which must accompany it. And it must |
be reckoned in with the final result if
the real quality and character of that |
result is to be properly judged.
what We are doing is to hear the |
whole case; hear 1t from the mouths of |
men most interested: hear it from those |
who are officially commissioned to state |
e; hear the rival claims; hear the claims |
mar MAJ AFFECT new nationalitfes. that af- |
rect new areas of the world, that affect /
new commercial and economic connec-
lions that have been established by the |
great world war through which we have
gone. And / have been struck by the |
noderateness of those who have repre-
,ented national claims. 1 can testify that |
have nowhere seen the CLEAN of pas
ZION. l have seen earnestness, 1 have
seen tears come to the eyes of men who |
plead for downtrodden people whom they
we're privileged to speak for; but they
we're not the tears of anguish; they were
he tears of ardent hope.
''And I don't see how any man can fail
o have been subdued by the pleas, sub
lued to this feeling. that he was not
here to assert an individual Judgment of
lis own, but to try to assist the cause
# humanity.
And in the midst Of it all every inter-
st seeks out first of all when it reaches |
Paris the representatives OF the United |
states. Why? Because-and / think I
IN stating the most wonderful fact in
there is no nation in
europe that suspects the motives of the
United States.