Republican farmer., 1919-08-22
AMERICA MUST ENTER LEAGUE IN
 HIGHEST SPIRIT
Display of Half Hearted In terest Would Be Worse
 Than Withdrawal.

The real issue in the League of newspapers out of ten Con both sides) and ninteen speakers out of twenty make it out to be. It is not Shan tung, or the Monroe Doctrine, or en- tangling alliances. It is simply and solely the question, whether we shall enter the new international relations established by the war with whole heart and a will to make them sue cessful; or a half heart and will to let fate look after them.
 Whether we ratify the League or not makes little difference so far as our entanglement with Europe $ concerned. If Japan encroaches upon China; if Germany allies herself with Russia; If Italy and France quarrel over Asia Minor, we shall be, sooner or later, equally involved, whether we are a member of an effective League of Nations, or merely looking out for our own interests in our own old way, as hitherto.
 We cannot stand apart from the European mix-up; the question is ! how can we best safeguard our in terests in the international compli- cations that are surely coming. The League offers new machinery for peaceful settlement and the exercise of wise and powerful influence. It : is new machinery untried machin- cry, tentative machinery, but the de- sign is taken from successful ex- perirnents conducted in the Far and ! Near East, in South America and Canada, in the British Empire and among our own states. throughout ! the nineteenth century. The princi- ples upon which the League Is built have already in imperfect and minor applications averted more wars than 1 have been fought in the world since i the end of the Napoleonic era.
 ! The downright opponents of the | League offer nothing by way of sub- 1 stitute except confidence in the i scheme of alliances, balance of pow. CT, and protection by armament which a child of seven can see has i only one possible conclusion, inevi- | tably and always-war.
 But the downright opponents of the | League are growing fewer and are I more and more to be found among ! the ignorant. the prejudiced, the mil | itaristic, and the cynical. It is tht | qualified opponents of the League l who are now most dangerous, both tC | idealism and common sense. They arc l neither ignorant nor cynical. Theil
 desire, on the face of it, is reasona
 ble. They want a League remade il l the interests of America.
 All Americans want League mad, in the interests of America. Bu there is an indispensable quality tra such a League must possess. It mus be acceptable to Europe, and it mus [ only he htlt a la h1a f. us. It must have what we call in
 man morale behind 1t; 1t must hay, ! what we call in a document mora i influence. A League that has beer
 whittled to suit everyone, a Leagu
 qualified and amended until no on
 believes in it, is nothing but prett gesture.
 If the net result of the Senate
 action is hearty approval of the prin
 ciples of the League, and an expres
 sion of what the average America1
 undoubtedly feels, that a reign O
 violence that is worth fighting fo1
 then it makes little difference hoy
 many classifcations it adds, hoy
 many explanations of AEerica's jus
 ideas as to how the covenant shoul
 be carried cut in practice. But
 the Senate, by ill-advised amend
 ments, makes the reservations seer to be more important than tn
 League; if 1t lets us and Europe fec
 that the safety of the world is in finitely less important than the con
 venience of America, why then it wi
 commit what is for legislatures tn
 unforgivable sin; in a great crisis . will have sacrificed the future to tn ! present. If in the adoption of tn
  f pfcions, hesitancies, and grudging az i provals, if they do not express tn ] determination of Americans to mak
 sacrifies for peace after the war Q , we'll as in it. it will be a cold day fo i, America and the world. And hC
 days for many Senators will follow.