The Washington herald., 1919-03-23
FORGET THE RANCORS OF WAR
AND WIPE THE SLATE CLEAN
CONTINUED FROM PAGE ONE.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE ONE.
for born villains are even more viii
lainous in peace. when they are not
under stern military discipline.
Many Murders by Soldiers.
The German military police tell of
things done by German soldiers that
would leave, the imagination of our
most inventive reporters beggared: :
but does anyone suppose that the
French or British or italian mil
Itary police can present their tri-
bunals with much whittier gloves?
Only the other day II was report
ed as an ordinary item OF news that
the police force OF the American
army in France had to be reorgan-
lied because the French complained
that in the. Department of the Seine
alone thirty-four murders had been
committed by soldiers, in addition
to an unconscionable number of
quarrels pushed to bloodshed.
(This report was officially denied.
1t developed that practically all
these murders were committed by
Paris Apaches.-News Ed
II this is what less self controlled
members of responsible and civilized
communities do to their friends and
allies, what are they likely to do to
their enemies when their blood is
up?
We had better wipe the slate and
say no more about 1t: II is not
wholesome reading for our children.
and 1T will certainly not make the
work OF the Peace Conference any
easier.
No more. hope, need be said to
| check the cruder rancors of war
They are to be classed with rioting
and lo0ting as simple misconduct
disguised as patriotism.
I will not even press the case here
against that intellectual rioting and
looting. largely. I am sorry to say,
conducted by university professors
and men OF letters who ought to know
better, which Is so much worse be-
cause so much more lasting in its in
fection than mefc physical rioting
and looting.
| Most of its authors are by this time
ashamed of IL and their friends are
no more likely to hold them to ac-
count for their rawlings in the first
access OF war fever than for their ut
terances in delirium and other fever.
Belgium Not Really Neutral.
1t will have been noticed by my
| readers that in the first chapters OF
this series / have made out a much
better case for the German war pol
icy than any Germans have to my
knowledge made out for themselves.
In doing so l have acted only as a
British military surgeon acts when he
sets a broken leg of a German pris-
oner of war better than the German
could set 1t for himself. A surgeon
does the same for the English soldier,
and have done tie same for the
English case.
more sentimental and popular YER
sions of the English case are being
offered in all directions, but the diff
Guilty is that they are not true and
that IL they were put forward at the
Peace Conference the enemies Of
England could ride OF under the COW
er of the demonstration that they are
not true.
A capable advocate, when he is
convinced of the soundness of his
own case. always takes his oppon-
ent's case at its best. even If he has
to state it for him better than he
can state 1t himself. and he will
take especial care. when going into
court, to cry OF all claims that they
cannot be sustained, so as to avoid
refutations that would prejudice
those that can.
In our case the claim that Bel