Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1919-04-05
BREAD UPON THE WATERS
IN FROM THE PHILIPPINES
A Timely Lesson in Foreign Policy Game
With the Delegation Bearing the Fill.
pinos' Request for Independence

IF THE representatives of the Philip
pine Legislature had made their ap-
peal for freedom to the Peace Confer
ence rather than in Washington
yesterday they would have struck at the
place where their future destinies must
actually be determined. Unless decent
peace can be -lade, the pathways OF
weaker peoples will remain always, as
the President observes. perilous.
The incident in Washington and the
promise implied in Mr.. Wilson's letter,
read by Secretary Baker, should recall
to the conferees at Paris vivid sense of
their responsibilities. 1t gave the Presi-
dent an opportunity to remind the world
of the nature and extent of the issues
| waiting decision in Paris. 1t is character
istic of Mr.. Wilson that the opportunity
| was not neglected
The essential purpose of league of
nations is to insure the peace and safety
| of a people like the Filipinos. For peo-
| pies do not make war. Governments do
not make war if they are left to them
selves. 1t is the invisible forces that
exist too often above governments which
devise PHILOSOPHERS Of CONQUEST to harass
and destroy helpless peoples and uneX-
| plotted territory.
The present condition Of life and
| thought in the Philippines proves that
| we have so far been proof against this
sort of influence-the same influence that
30 hn vic n
| the Filipino delegation to Washington
symboizes a triumph of self-restralnt
and an achievement in friendship.
The purpose of the mandatory clause
in the Paris covenant is intended to elm
mate the ancient menace to small ma
tions. 1t goes to the very heart of wars
causes, because, if it is properly enforced,
| buccaneers of promotion and thugs Of
diplomacy can never again drag their
nations after them in wars that begin
with private ambition for supremacy in
undeveloped areas Of the earth.
Civilization will be permitted to ex-
pand peacefully as it has expanded in the
Philippine Islands. The Filipinos deserve
| their freedom But it is questionable
whether the United States can ever be
| relieved of the cost and the burden which
our responsibility to them has always
| entailed until their future is definitely as
sured under the system for which the
American delegates have waged an un-
eo, al fight at the Paris conference.
Certainly nothing could be more dra
matte in times like these than the tone
of the appeal sent by the Philippine
| Legislature to the American government
md the statement left for til" delegates
| nv Mr., Wilson Here was the revelation
| of an international policy which has al
WAYS run counter to the accepted rules of
national expansion and the old diplomacy.
All America has contributed to the
help of the Filipinos. Taft contributed
his patience and his gifted mind and the
wisdom of a good heart. Roosevelt ad-
bered to what he loved to call the square
deal But school teachers, engineers,
builders and soldiers gave to this people
some of the best years of their lives. The
government itself, has always interpreted
| in the islands the individual code of the
everyday American.
Mr.. Wilson, who has exalted the prin-
ciple of fair play as an international pol
lev, is not indulging in rhetorical felici-
ties when he insists that he tries only to
interpret the common thought of his
| country.
This national ideal, interna tionally ex-
pressed, has been sneered at often
enough. 1t has been blindly called altru-
| istic and visionary. 1t has been said that
| II wouldn't and couldn't work. Those who
called us mystical and impractical were
the practical men" in diplomacy, the
rainbow chasers who now stand harassed,
impotent and wholly desperate amid the
ruin that their own theories have made
of the old world.
Tn the light of recent events and for
our own guidance in the crises that are
to come it may be interesting to see
where our mysticism" ultimately leads.
"You have truly treated US as no nation
ever before treated another under its
sway" said the spokesman for the Philip
pine Congress.
The wise and sensitive mind Of China
has cherished for the United States moth
ing but confidence and endless esteem
since we refused to participate in the
shameful loot of the Boxer indemnities
| Cuba said she would fight upop our
side to the last man.
Is il nothing to have the confidence and
| II. f.;andshin of the whole world in n