Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1919-05-23
GERMANY REFUSES TO SIGN TERMS
 OF PEACE TREATY
Declare Acceptance Means Destruction and Dishonor
 to Nation.

OcIAHiS Aucoudy, way ~ NSA many declines to sign the peace terms laid before it because they spell the economic destruction political dis honor and moral degredation of the entire German nation, not only for the present but also for still unborn i generations" was statement au- thorized by the cabinet this morning through the Associated Press. | These consequences must logl- cally follow acceptance of the peace conditions the American press has recognized without question" the statement continues. Howard them Germany took the standpoint that acceptance of such conditions could not be demanded and that the entente was unjustified in imposing such de- mands."
 | Germany has not only moral right to compliance with the general promises made it, but firmly grounded, definitely clearly defined claim according to the basic rules of international law, On all the entente powers and especially on the United States. A specific recognition of the fright of Germany and of the German peoples to peace of right, justice and reconciliation, instead of the lparagraphed song of hate which was written at Versailles, is contained in the note of the American secretary of state, Lansing of November 5, 1918.
 l Want Just Peace.
 "In it the secretary of state modi fled the Swiss minister in Washing ton internationally that the establish ed basis of President Wilson's IA points should be authoritative for the peace conditions.
 1 Secretary Lansing announced fur ther that the entente governments after careful consideration also were prepared to recognize the conditions |set up by President Wilson as the basis for the conclusion of peace. i "The declaration of rights eman- ating from these specific declarations of all the entente powers and the United States constitutes Germany's sole asset in the general moral break down of all - international policies which has found unsurpassable ex- pression in the Versailles terms. | "Germany answers them with it's juristic right in international law. Toward the pohtico-moral bankruptcy of Versailles the German nation stands as creditor with undeniable rights, and it is not in position to yield on this chief point. Germany concluded peace on the basis of President Wilson's IA points, which all America had made it's own, and all America, every individual, is respon- sible for the fulfillment of it's lclaims.
 l "It is not the German peoples bushes to indicate how it's rights shall be realized by the IA points, Tor especially by the note of Secretary Lansing. That, rather, is the task of those who constructed the IA points and brought them to acceptance, thereby inducing Germany to lay down her weapons. We do not believe that President Wilson, Secretary Lansing and the American people can take other than this German stand point, if they do not wish to do that which President Wilson in his message of December 4,1917 condemned cate gorically when he said:
 Demand Justice.
 "'We would dishonor our own cause if we treatd Germany any oth- CT than justly and in q bipartisan manner and did not insist upon jus tice toward all, no matter how the war ended. We demand nothing which we are not ready ourselves to admit "And the German people demand nothing more than that which Presi- ldent Wilson announced in his declara- |tion. We demand nothing more than that Americans place the IA points opposite the peace terms. We do not believe that any one in the- United States will they have the courage to Eclaim that there can be found in the peace conditions one single trace left of President Wilson's program. { "And here begins America's defin- lite duty to step in. America either must put it's IA points through or it must declare that it is unable to do so or that it does not want to do so, so that in no case may the world be Ter to believe that America desires to have the peace conditions count as President Wilson's 14,spoints.
 ! s Il.