Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1919-03-18
PROBLEMS OF CONFERENCE
Tangled Conditions In Europe Must
Be Untangled
Joint CONTROL NOT A SUCCESS

joint CONTROL NOT A success
Instructive Lesson in Contemporar,
History, Dealing With the Rehabili
tation of Various Decadent Nations
The question Of international con
troll is just now very much to the fore
through the proposals laid before tn,
Peace Conference to establish join
control, in the form of mandatories, O
certain enemy territories. The Allied
nations, moreover, are evidently not t
be daunted by the failure in the pas
to make of international control 6
success, but are resolved to put tt
the test its efficacy as a feature Of
Now World organization and govern.
ment, by applying it to the former
German colonies in Africa and the
Pacific, and more particularly to Eu.
ropean and Asiatic Turkey.
+ International control Of the Helles.
pont and Bosphorus and the confinine
of the Turkish state to the center Of
Asia Minor is so significant that al
the present stage it is impossible tc
gauge properly its importance. The
Eastern problem in modern times has
been primarily that of the fate Of
Turkey. On the occasion Of every
near eastern crisis, the question was
reiterated, Shall that country be pre-
served intact. or shall it be dismem-
bered? TO that never ending query
the delegates to the Peace Conference
seem about to give definitive answer
Setting aside at last the selfish ma
tional policies Of the countries inter
ested in preserving or destroying the
integrity Of Turkey, they have decid-
| ed upon its disintegration, and the
first step in that disintegration will
probably consist in proclaiming Con-
stantinople and the Dardanelles as
neutral territory under form Of in
ternational stewardship.
Defects OF Sontroi
/ The actual workings of information.
al control in the past have generally
been disappointing in their results. II
was only at the end Of the Napol.
comic wars that emperors, kings, and
statesmen began to think and talk Of
international organization instead oi
war and offensive alliances, as prac.
tical method of constructing and pro.
tecting international society. But
mingled with their hopes and theories
were disconcerting intrigues Of every
kind to defeat whatever political goot
there might be in their intentions, ant
It is not q little surprising that the
foster father Of the new and practica
system of regulating the affairs o
Europe should have been that unsta.
| BILE autocrat, the Gear Alexander o.
Russia. International control from thu
Thirst however, was doomed to failure
It had, in fact, no foundation upor
which to work. The parties Of the
European system" never troubled t.
consider the fundamental question o.
the constitution of international soci.
ETY.. Reform truly begins at home
and the affairs Of any nation withir
itself were never made the concern o.
any Of the signatories to internationa
control in the past. The state ol
affairs between nation and nation" as
Canning expressed 1t, must first bt
harmonized and correlated If peoples
are to act in concert for promoting Of
controlling the external needs of ma
tions, and are determined that there
shall be no return to
the good old rule,
The simple plan,
That they should take who have the
power
And they should keep who can.
The Congo Fiasco
To take concrete eases from our OWL
time. One of the. peculiar outcomes o.
the partition Of Africa was the forma'
tion of the so called international Afri'
can Association. 1t was the work Of
Leopold II of Belgium, man who was
greatly interested in the exploration
of the continent following the discov'
cries of travellers and missionaries like
Livingstone. In 1876 he called con.
ference Of the powers. AS result o.
it's deliberations, the association was
formed. It was to have it's seat in Brus'
sells. Frenchmen, Portuguese. Dutch
men, Germans and Belgians Joined II
the good work. Appropriation quickly
followed upon discovery. The African
Association appeared to have been los
sight Of except that it probably
exerted a restraining influence in pre-
venting the contestants from going tt
war. What the nations actually die
was to form a series of treaties among
themselves without consulting the ma.
tiyes. and to define the boundaries o.
their claims. Thus Africa became ar
annex of Europe, most of the treatie:
by which this annexation was effected
being made between 1884 and 1890.
Kings Personal Property
H. NJ. Stanley was nominally ar
emissary Of the international asso.
citation, and as such he made hundred:
of treaties with native chiefs anc
founded many stations in the Congo
basin. But his expenses were larSel!
borne by King Leopold II, and as tht
results proved, the Congo Free State
became an adjunct of the persona
| property Of the King before 1t wa:
made the property of the Belgian
state, and thus in almost every sense
it belied its name.
Owing in part to Portuguese oppo'
sition to the appropriation. of tht
Congo Hy Leopold, a general confer
ence was held in Berlin, attended b!
the representatives of all the states o.
Europe, also the United States
Though the existence of the Congo
Free State as an independent power
was recognized, it was evidently th'