Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1920-03-11

presidents letter, written in re-
spouse to a request that he con-
fer with Senator Simmons, of
North Carolina, in charge of the
Democratic side of the senate in
current negotiations for treaty
compromise, follows in full:
My Dear Senator Hitchcock:
I understand that one or two
of your colleagues do me the
honor Of desiring to know what
my views are, with reference to
Article X of the League of Ma
tions and the effect upon the
league of the adoption of GER
tain proposed reservations to
that article. I welcome the OPP
portunity to throw any light 4
can upon subject which has
become so singularly beclouded !
by misapprehensions and misif- =
terpretations of every kind. III
There is no escaping the moral
obligations which are expected -
in positive terms in this article
of the covenant. We won NOR
al victory over Germany far
greater even than the military
victory won on the field of bat
tie, because the opinion of the
whole world swung to our sup
port of the nations associated
with us in the great struggle.
1t did SO because of our common
profession and promise that we
meant to establish IAN organi-
cation of peace which should
make it certain that the COM
bined power of free nations
would check every invasion of
right and serve to make peace
and justice the more secure by
affording a definite tribunal of
opinion to which all must sub
nit and by which every inter-
national readjustment that can
not be amicably agreed upon by
the peoples directly concerned
shall be sanctioned. This prom
Use and assurance were written
into the preliminaries and the
armiStice and into the prelimi-
naries Of the peace itself and
constitute one of the most Sa-
cred obligations ever assumed
by any nation or body of ma
lions. 1t is unthinkable that
America should set the exam
pie of ignoring such solemn
moral engagement.
Pledge to Soldiers
For MYSELF feel that I could
not look the soldiers of our gall
liant armies in the face again
If I did not do rything in
my power to remove every OBJ
stacle that lies in the way of
the adoption of This particu-
lar article of the covenant, be-
cause we made these pledges
to them as well as to the rest
Of the world and it was to this
cause they deemed themselves
devoted in q spirit Of crusaders.
I should be forever unfaiJhful
to them if I did not do my ut
most to fulfill the high purpose
for which they fought.
I think, my dear senator, we
can dismiss from our minds the
idea that it is necessary to stip-
ulate in connection with article
ten the constitutional methods
we should use in fulfilling our,
obligations under it. We gain
nothing by such stipu1a.'o ns and F.
secure nothing which is not al
ready secured. 1t was under
stood as a matter of course at
the conference in Paris that
whatever obligations any gov
eminent assumed or whatever
duties it undertook under the
treaty would of course have to
be fulfilled by it's usual and es-
tablished constitutional methods
of action. Once or twice in
meetings Of the conference, when
the treaty was under consider
alton, reservations" were made
to that effect by the represent
at;ves Of individual powers and
those reservations" were inva-
riably received in the way in
which men have who have met
for business and not for talk
always receive acts Of scrupu-
lous superiora gatiop-listened
to with Indifferent silence as
such men listen to what is a
matter of course and was not
necessary to say.
There can be no objection to
explaining again what our con-
stitutional method is and that
our congress alone can declare
war or determine the causes or
occasions for war, and that it
alone can authorize the use of
the armed forces of the United
States on land or on the sea.
But to make such a declaration
would certainly be o work of
supercorgation.
Curbs Imperialism
1 am sorry to say that the
reservations that have come
under my notice are, almost
without exception, not interpre-
tations of the articles to which
it is proposed to attach them,
but in effect virtual qualifications
Of those articles.
Any reservations which seek
to deprive the League of Ma
tons of the force of article ten
cuts at the very heart and life of
the covenant itself. Any League
of Nations which does not guar
antee as a matter of incontest-
abb eright the political independ-
ence and integrity of each of it's
members might be hardly more
than a futile scrap of paper, as
ineffective in opera ton as the
agreement between Belgium and
Germany which the Germans
violated in 1914. Article ten as
written into the treaty Of Ver-
sailles represents the renuncia-
ton by Great Britain and Japan
which before the war had begun
TO find so many interests in COM
mon in the Pacific; by France;
by Italy-hy all the great fight
ing powers of the world, of the