Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1921-03-04

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was bringing to the forld was expect
ed to be Gods peace. Prussia nism
lay crushed: brute force had failed
| utterly. The moral character of the
universe had been most signally vim
dicated. There was a universal vague
hope of a great moral peace, of a
new world order arising visibly and
Immediately on the ruins Of the old
| This hope was not a mere superficial
| sentiment. 1t was the intense express
| sion at the end of the war OF the in
| ner moral and spiritual force which
[ had upborne the peoples during the
dark night Of the war and had nerv-
ed them to an effort almost beyond
human strength. Surely, surely God
had been with them in that long
night of agony. His was the victory;
His should be the peace. And Presi-
| dent Wilson was looked upon as the
man to make this great peace. He
had voiced the great ideals of the
| new order; his great utterances had
become the contractual basis for the
armistice and the peace. The idealism
i Of Wilson would surely become the
reality of the new order of things in
the peace treaty.
In this atmosphere of extravagant,
almost frenzied expectation he ar
| rived at the Paris peace conference.
Without hesitation he plunged into
that inferno of human passions He
went down into the pit like second
Heracles to bring back the fair Alces-
tbs Of the worlds desire. There were
six months of agonized waiting, dur
ing which the world situation rapid
ly deteriorated. And then he emerg-
ed with the peace treaty. 1t was not
a Wilson peace, and he made a fatal
mistake in somehow giving the i'm
preston that the peace was in &C.
cord with his IA points and his vari-
GUS declarations. Not so the world
+, had understood him. This was q
Punic peace, the same sort of peace
as the victor had dictated to the van
pushed for thousands of years. It
was not Alcestis, it was a haggard
unlovely woman with features dis
torted with hatred, greed, and sell
fishness, and the little child that the
| woman carried was scarcely noticed.
Yet 1t was for the saving of the child
that Wilson had labored until he was
physical wreck. Let our other
great statesmen and leaders enjoy
their well-earned honors for their un-
questioned success at Paris. To
Woodrow Wilson. the apparent fail
ure. belongs the undying honor,
which will grow with the growing
centuries Of having saved the little
child that shall lead them yet" No
other statesman but Wilson could
have done 1t. And he did it.
The people, the common people of
all lands, did not understand the
significance of what happened. They
saw only that hard, unlovely Prus-
sian peace, and the great hope died
In their hearts. The great disillu-
sionment took its place. The most
receptive mood for new start the
world had been in for centuries
passed away. Faith In their govern
ors and leaders was largely destroy
ed, and the foundations of human
government were shaken in a way
which will be felt for generations.
The Paris peace lost an opportunity
as unique as the great war iself.
In destroying the moral idealism
born of the sacrifices of the war 1t
did almost as much as the war it.
| self in shattering the structure Of
Wootorn C1vaIivo <lOu
And the odium for all this fell es-
pecially on President Wilson. Round
him the hopes had conferred; round
him the disillusion and despair now
gathered. Popular opinion largely
held him responsible for the bitter
disappointment and grievous failure.
The cynics scoffed; his friends were
silenced in the universal disappont-
ment. Little or nothing had been ex-
pected from the other leaders: the
whole failure was put to the account
of Woodrow Wilson. And finally
America for reasons of her own join
ed the pack and at the end it was
his own people who tore him to
pieces.
Will this judgment, born of mo-
mentary disillusion and disappoint-
ment, stand in future, or will 1t