New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1920-07-11
Berlms Treatment Of MIR. Wilson
!. Declared to Have Changed
!. the President 5 Attitude


storf7 is q thoroughly competent
witness. He was in the thick Of
those dealings. He was a shrewd
observer and an adroit diplomat
Few Of the judgments expressed
in his correspondence with the Ger.
man Foreign Office missed the mark
Moreover, he had no grievance
against the President. He was, on
the whole, grateful for Mr.. Wilson'S
long continued attitude of "strict
neutrality" On this point Bern.
storff is specific. He says:
~ shall often have to return to
the developments after the S1st of
January, 1917, which made the Pres
ident our open enemy. If we wish
to be lovers of the truth we must
distinguish sharply between the two
periods before and after the 31st of
January, 1917. 1t is certain that
Mr.. Wilson was never even near to
being pro- German. By descent, edu-
cation and training he was uncon-
sciously much, too much, under the
English influence already mentioned.
But until the 31st Of January, 1917,
the President had striven to be
neutral. All his speeches testify to
this. No unneutral remark Of Mr..
Wilson, even in private, has ever
reached my ears. He always resisted
the pressure Of the Entente party,
in spite of the fact that he was al
most entirely surrounded by anti-Ger-
mans. The only one I could men
ton whose advice to the President
was always definitely neutral was
Colonel House"
Bernstorif had little personal &C.
cess to the President. Yet he had
more than most of the other diplo-
mats in Washington had. He en-
joyed, as he says, an intimate &C.
quaintance with Colonel House.
Contrary to the popular impression,
he favored Wilson's reelection in
1916. He had no sympathy with the
German-American leaders here who
supported Hughes. He makes it
clear that he looked on the Presi-
dents peace policy-especially his
mediation policy-as the helpful
complement Of his own policy Of
avoiding a rupture with the United
States at any cost. What he says
about Mr.. Wilson is thus freed from
any faint of personal malice.
Wilson a Pacifist
What was the Presidents first
reaction to the European war?
Everybody knows that Mr.. Wilson
was a convinced pacifist in senti-
ment, that he had the distaste of his
class and profession for anything
chat smacked Of militarism or mill
tary influences in government. He
had appointed as Secretary of State
a man of whom Bernstorff remarked
when he took over his post that so
long as he remained in Office "the
United States would never 70 to
war"
The Presidents neutrality proc
lanation of August, 1914, went out
of its way to warn Americans to
be impartial in thought as we'll as
in action" The President himself
could see no more "unrighteousness"
in the cause Of Germany than in the
cause of the Entente. He said that
he couldn't understand what the war
was about. He repudiated American
concern in what millions Of Ameri-
cans from the first regarded as
battle between absolutism and democ-
racy-between barbarism and civil
cation. In his first message to
Congress after the breaking out Of
the war he deprecated any prepara-
ton for defense (which would mean
merely that we had lost our self
possession, that we had been thrown
off our balance by war with which
we have nothing to do, whose causes
cannot touch us, whose very exist
ence affords US opportunities Of
friendship and disinterested service
which should make us ashamed of
any thought of hostility or fearful
preparation for trouble"
''We Are Not Concerned'
Even as late as May q, 1915, he
said in an address before the League
to Enforce Peace: with its 1.-THE
war's] causes and it's objects we
are not concerned"
The President manifestly expected
to be able to keep the United States
out of the war. In his "prepared-
ness" speech at Des Moines on
February l, 1916, he said:
81 call you to witness, my Ncouri
trymen, that I have spent every
thought and energy that has been
vouchsafed me in order to keep this
country out of war"