Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1919-02-07

another still. the relatively old whis-
per that the British have remained
hypocriticaI. And out OF exactly this
sort of mixture grows the impress
SION one gathers over and over again
IN the American press: that the Paris
conference is after all q altering
place of the old reactionary apotia-
tors and diplomats who behind q
facade of idealism are doing the same
Old thing in the same old way. This
Like Poaiticsl convsntion.
But ii ~. wsrt1 reeaasfns asAin that
the Paris conference is very. like an
American political convention-th hat just
as all party bosses used to gather, and
still do gather, just as political bargains
OF machine character are discussed and
contemplated, these things happen in
always when public sentiment is
awake. a convention, in spite of ma
chine politicians who have< the ap-
petite but no courage, terminated
forms, and side by side with all this
bargaining. of which the Syrian epi-
sode is an example, one can feel and
one can count on an infinite number
of cases in which the claims of the
old sort. greatly pressed in the be-
ginning, are being modified or aban-
doned. Practical principles are be-
ing formulated, which, If they ever are
adopted. as I believe they viii be,
win in the future limit exactly the
evils of which. have spoken.
You may believe in Paris and find evil
dence to support the belief that nothing
has been changed in European diplo-
macy and methods since the days OF
Machiavelli or Metternich. and you may
find proof of it in score of questions Of
which the Syrian and Adriatic problems
are perhaps the most impressive. You
will find many people impressed by these
things to the extent of believing that
the taint of the old order runs through
everything in the new conference.
am sure that volumes of testimony will
go back to America that nothing honest
Or real can be expected in this Paris at
mosphere.
But by contract it has now become
reasonably certain that the people of
Syria will be permitted to decide their
own fate, which never could have hap
pened at the congress OF Vienna or at
the congress of Berlin. 1t is becoming
fairly clear that all the little politicians
with their petty bargainings are going
to miss the big prizes and that. in a
word, things that they are working for
are not coming off. The bargain which
the British made with France and then
abandoned to sell the same goods to the
Arabs does not express the present
spirit or temper of the English people;
nor do I believe for single moment
that the demand made by certain sec
tons Of Frenchmen in the matter of
Syria expresses the real charS cter of
French spirit at the present day8
do not see much difference between
the French and the British aims in this
respect, except that the British have
been fortunate enough to fortify their
policy after the event by the fact that it
falls in with the new principles. But
the big thing seems to me first that the
job isn't going to be done, and, second,
that this is the first time in the world
that it could have been prevented.
The thing that I am trying to say to
nay American readers is that the world
peace conference, like a national po-
litical convention in its day-t day
procedure, particularly before the
main tasks are undertaken, does not
give any true index of the real forces
which are going to control it or the
real results which are going to be
.l,s