The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1921-02-17

happened IN other administrations Pres
ldent Wilson slowly comes back into the
mai picture after more than a year
OF enforced seclusion, and as he does so
congress rises Up to lombard him with
DlIlS and resolutions that on the one
hand are denounced as partisan andade
Tended on the other as merely the nat
ural discharge of legislative business
+, The house Of representatives wants to
Hnow in itemized detail Just how Mr.
Wilson disposed of the Sl50,000 900 fund
put at his disposal during the war and
used in part during the peace negotia-
tlons. The senatorial committees con
tinue to consider the rumors of cancel
ling foreign Indebtedness as serious and
take steps to prevent the treasury from
paying to the European governments
money already promised to them to
clear UP transactions entered into dur
ing the war. And the cables from Paris
tell of statements made TO the French
chamber of deputies to the effect that
large quantities of war supplies were
stolen not by the American authorities
but by Americans amounting approx
mately to S400,00000o.
The White house lets it be known
that there Is no objection to the itemiZ-
ing OF Mr.. Wilson's expenses in Paris.
1t Is natural that members of congress
most of whom have never been to Eu-
rope and know very little about in
teTnatlonaI conference and the courte
sizes demanded by one nation of another
should question items of entertainment
or even such confidential expenses as
may be incurred in protecting official
documents from the eager hands of Sc
cret agents of other countries, or in
le securing of confidential information
through purely American channels about
situations under discussion, such as the
number of men actually under arms in
the central empires and kindred ques
tiOns.
Although the Democrats endeavored to
show that the Republicans were trying
to harass Mr. Wilson and to intimate
hat he was personally eXtravagant or
| that the American peace commission
was badly managed the whole inquiry
members of congress with what took
place in Europe either during or after
the war.
Charles Grosvenor Dawes. formerly
brigadier general in the American eXpe
dictionary forces, had to use strong lang
uage to convince members of a house in
yestigating committee that expenditure
of money in France may at this date
seem to be eXtravagant, but it was nee
essaTv to win the war at any cOst-tO
spend the money and count the conse-
quences afterwards Very much the
same situation existed with all Ameri
can commissions abroad-so deeply con
centrated was everybody on the OBJ
iect sought that careful ADULTS and bust
ness like methods were difficult If not
impossible to establish. Some idea of
the general mess in which everything in
Europe was in the period Immediately
following the war, is given in the amaZ-
ing statements to the French deputies
about a theft of war supplies by Amer.
leans
Anybody who was in France in the
months Immediately following the arm
istice can testify to the utter careless
ness of the French authorities in hand
ling war supplies. The writer made a
tour of the war areas within fort
night after hostilities were ended and
millions of dollars worth of property
lay unguarded. So absorbed was every
body in the rehabilitation of troops and
so much property had been distributed,
without regard to whether it was owned
by the Americans or French or British
or Italians, that the task of protecting
it was almost entirely neglected. If
property was stolen by individual
Americans or any one else. the fault lay
entirely with the French authorities