South Bend news-times., 1920-02-01
America a Post War "BackSIider" and
Her Lost Place In the Eyes of Mankind

w IIH the breaking OF OF the senate treaty.
NJ conferences. the war clouds
gathering beyond the for two FIVE
ten years hence: England France Italy and Japan
inclined TO invite Germany to join them in
The League OF Nations program-leaving the United
quite alone IN the world-the attitude OF GER
tain OF foreign critics. challenging honor,
Is without excuse.
Quite as these critics have said OF us America
under majority rule OF States senate has
IN most inexcusable way repudiated our every
pretense with reference to purposes in entering
the war, and though 1t may very we'll
have # thrown into faces. the truth IS the
trut'2. It's good for the sometimes to have
TO bow 20 It swallow the shame that It unfods
With respect 10 standing by principles. and
justifying high ideals by conduct,
proving ourselves as unreliable as the fussy French
the raoid Russian. the turbulent Turk.
Our rational sentiment, indeed. in waves:
has It's high tide tide. like the waves OF
the This IS idle comment. our conduct
proves f. year or more ago and our great and
sloriou, country riding the Of a vave
of national idealism Now that wave seems 10 have
rolled by, and are wallcwinR in the trough Of t.
we the in a sort OF religious fervor
Then oome the peace-making. The same fervid
ieeasm that had saved civilization frog Prussian-
ism 'urned 20 the task of clinching the Victory
banding tho liberal nations together in some Fan
Tor nnu ,uaI helpfulness the prevention ~ fu-
ture vars. In the early deys OF the Paris confer
ireslism high. It still strong when the
president came back from Paris with the completed
treaty. but the decline had begun Today. you may
search through the Congressional Record or the
columns OF the American press, the public ad-
dresses OF leaders or opinion. with hne-tooth
comb. and hnd hardly a trace OF the unselhshness
broadmndedness and generosity that were so lately
in evidence.
In all this present discussion OF the peace treaty
there seldom word about the lofty purposes
aimed at supposedly at least. by the makers Of the
treaty. There is a major entiment for the League
OF Nations. but of It is put any longer on an
idealstio basis. All the talk. all the argument. is
assumed TO be practical There is great
wheming chorus. pouring in from the whole ma
ton and echoed in the senate: For heavens sake
-atify the treaty and let get to business"
What seemed an ark OF the covenant s con-
sidered almost obstacle. Idealistic theories and
formulas and associations to be swert aside. to
ready for the only thing anybody Interested
IN now-materiaI prosperity All the talk is of pro-
luction and trade and profits and rights The term
.idealist" has become a reproach.
This appearance, doubt is deceptive Surely
tuere stu much idealism left in the country OF
rhe sort that dominant year or two
ago. but the smon-pure ideaIsts, II there
any SUCH are suppresslng their natural i1cIinatons
-pL i4e HOilei anu COLueSCehulhB 10 use the areu-
ulcnts OF the selfish. the only hope OF getting
heir program put through Ideasm has to mas
querade as materiallsm. altrusrn as egosrn to ac-
.omplsh anything.
Surely this viii not last Nothing does. Our critics
are wrong in anticipating our derravity as ever
lasting The e-pendulum will swing again, and
sltruism gain the ascendency and the broad view
oe valued more than the narrow and the far
view more than the short one and the soul be es-
teemed higher than the body welfare OF
al mankind be reckoned at least important as
The welfare OF any part OF It. The American people
are not fundamentally materalistc Sooner or later
their spiritual will rise once more but just
now there are no signs OF t. Everything is business