Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1919-07-18
AFTER VICTORY

| lraCe relaJlOnS between tlS HSllloi'
states and their neighbors are crcum-
stances which may fairly be accepted as
indications of new epoch in history.
We shall hear less of Germany from
now on. We shall hear less about "the
Hun" A people vanquished or hard and
silently at work is less dramatic than
nation at grips with the world. But it
will be regrettable if the people of the
Allied nations dismiss Germany alto
! gether from their thoughts, because the
reactions of the next few years in coun-
try that is beginning life all over again
will be filled with significance for the rest
of mankind.
We have beaten the Germans, but in
one way we have done them a mighty
service. We have put them in the hard
est kind of school. We have forced
them into a situation that will involve
generations of mental and moral disci-
pline. They must cultivate the virtues of
patience and industry and self-reliance-
or perish.
Bolshevism has receded rapidly in
Germany. The country has new start
in the arts of politics and national admin
istration. Men suffer at the galley oar,
but they leave it with strong arms.
There is nothing in the terms of peace
that can prevent the new Germany from
achieving dignity and strength within
generation.
What is to happen in the meantime
with the Allied nations-and with the
United StateS-which have not the in
- II -, - ona ,,,J 70
soul searching that Germany has in
inherited from the general ruin?
Are they to grow soft and complacent?
Will they relax into political and eco
nomic recklessness?
Victory involves responsibilities
greater by far than the responsibilities
of defeat. The loser in fight has all to
gain. The winner has all to lose. If the
Germans emerge from their period of
enforced penance with a new political
consciousness and an enlightened sense of
the great opportunities sure to ensue
upon a humane and scientific political
administration in the modern state, they
may yet be glad that they lost the war.
And if the nations that defeated them
are content to rest upon the achievement
and to be satisfied with political pretenses
and platitudes and the old habits of
thought that permitted the dsbasement
of democratic government in the past,
their victory will be in the end, and de-
spite the league of nations, little better
than a disaster.
There is in England, apparently, some
recognition of this fact. The political
system and the party superstitions of
England will never be the same again.
The suggestion that Lloyd George in
tends to organize a new party, to group
the progressive minds of all the old fac
tions in a movement representative of
the general interest of the country rather
than the interests of restricted political
cliques sounds valid enough. If Lloyd
George doesn't attempt some such coup
another man will
Class and group interests in Great
Britain have to be reconciled and the
political genius of the English probably
will find means to that end. ireland will
be made content in one way or another.
One of the ambitions of British states
men is to formulate policies which will
free some of the far-off dominons of
their growing desire for independent ex-
istence and bind them anew to the mother
country 1t is clear that the British have
not stopped thinking and that they are
aware of crucial years Immediately
ahead.
In the United States most of the peo-
pie who presume to lead opinion seem
content with the knowledge that we are
the richest nation in the world But our
riches will not carry us far in peace and
safety if we proceed without enlight-
ened policies of government and better
conceptions of political aims and methods
at home. The sort Of party spirit that
has been rampant on both sides in Con-
gress, the obvious unfitness of many men
in high Offices, the fagrant development
of politics as business and gamble in
this country and the inefficiency of state
and municipal government; the aloofness
of the average influential politician from
knowledge of or interest in the concerns
of the vast majority of our people, are
things that have encouraged cynicism or
despair in great numbers of Americans
whose patriotism is not of the imitation
kind.
We shall have to revive our faith. We
shall have to be rid of the men in politics
who habituallv betray US. We shall have
to advance with the onward thought of
aspiring men or be left behind, at one
day or another, by the people whom we
defeated. The responsibility is not upon
any political party or any one man or set
of men. 1t is upon the people, who, if
they are to fulfill the duties of citizenship
in the great period of world reconstruc-
ton, must think of the country and of its
institutions first and of their political
parties afterward.