Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1922-09-09
SSEMBLY OF LEAGUE
is SHOWING VITALITY
By Edgar AnseU Mowrer

BY Edgar Ansell MOWrer
(Snrcial Cable 10 The Atlanta journal and
Chicago Daily News-CopyriGht. 1922.D
GENEVA, Sept. 7.-Surprising vi
tally flashed from the League of
Nations assembly session Wednes-
day in the words of Robert Cecil
Sweeping aside the clouds of detail
which threaten to hamper the work,
Lord Robert, though paying ample
tribute to past action, invited the
delegates to consider the world crisis
of which the mournful Austrian
problem is only a single CHASTITY
phase; in other words, he invited the
assembly to take up the Preparations
question. The league having provid-
ed itself with the indispensable or
ganization the time had come for it
to shoulder it's full responsibilities
and attempt to justify the vast faith
which the common people still have
in it.
eff we risk nothing" said Lord
Robert, 1--WE shall gain nothing.
Sooner or later, the league must take
it's full responsibility and become
all or nothing"
By this he clearly meant that
either the league must accept the
responsibilities encumbent up the
worlds highest moral tribunal or it
will revert to the position of a de-
batting society as it's enemies like to
call it. The essence of the state is
force. The league today abhors,
lacks and could not WELD physical
force and hence it cannot be consid-
cred a super-state in any sense nor
could it become such without depart
ing from the principles of pure per-
suasion which President Augustine
Edwards so strongly upheld.
Three years of experience has
shown that individual nations are
Itreluctant to accept opprobrium by
refusing to heed the leagues deci-
sion. Modern nations hesitate to
give the appearance Of outlawing
themselves from the realm of con-
science. Thus it is possible for the
league to WELD an ever-growing in.
fiuence and proceed from one small
task, well done, to another.
1t is entirely true that the league
is merely an emanation of the gov
ernments composing it, but the diff
ference between the collective at
mosphere of Geneva" and the fierce
distrust which characterizes other
international conferences or the
meetings of the supreme council
strikes everyone. Certainly COM
pared with the sharp contrasts Of
the supreme council meetings, with
the flash and clash Of diplomatic ra-
piers and with the fierce excite
! ment of the Genoa conference when
nearly every day brought a crisis
and danger Of rupture and bloodshed,
the league meetings in this placid
town are dull.
They are dull as peace is dull,
compared with war or family life
is dull compared with dissipation.
But to those who believe that vio-
lence only begets violence, they seem
far more likely to bring harmony to
discordant and anarchistic Europe
and prosperity to a disrupted world,
than does any other existing organ
iZatiOn.
1.-TWO years experience" contin-
ued Lord Robert, has shown that
material disarmament at present is
an impossibiIity. The league must
work for moral disarmament. Its
province is any matter dealing with
the peace of the world"
Lord Robert regretted that the
league had not interviewed more de-
cisively in the case of Russia and
that it had hesitated to intervene be-
tween the Turks and the Greeks, but
the chief obstacle to world peace lay
in the reparations question and
hence the question of the German in
demnity is now before the world.
The league mechanism demands that
no question shall be considered I'M
less it is brought before the league
for attention by a member of the
league and hence it will be necessary
for some one to raise the question
of Preparations and inter-allied debts
before the assembly.
This question, according to Lord
Robert, is poisoning the air Of Eu
rope. 1t is reported that if it should
be raised, Prime Minister Lloyd
George, himself, will come to &C.
neva. The writer is informed that
neither Great Britain nor France
would raise objections to its treat
ment by the league-the British be-
! cause they desire an immediate solu-
ton and the French because they be-
! lieve that the league would fix upon
| sum, which would have to be paid
without question by Germany, prob,
ably much larger than France would
! otherwise succeed in collecting.
Japanese