The independent-reporter. [volume] (Skowhegan, Me.) 1909-1955, 1923-08-09

the highest plane. Every delegate
seemed to desire to promote the COM
mon good by word and action, and
to enhance the prestige of the
League"
Mr.. Holt then told of what the
League is doing for the limitation OF
ornaments and how the permanent
armament commission is working out
the problem. THE question of arma-
ments," said Mr.. Holt, "is inseparably
bound up with all that is good and
all that is bad in our personal and
national psychology. Casual confer
ences, such as Mr.. Hughes has
sponsored, may slough off armament
excrescenes here and there, but the
problem will never be solved casually.
Only by all the great military powers
getting together and tackling the
problem in a permanent way, can we
do more than scratch the surface of
the issue.
This the League is doing. The
United States should join if for no
other reason than that it is the best
plan yet on the horizon looking
towards a genuine solution of the
armament problem"
Mr.. Holt then took up the various
things the League is engaged in to
promote human progress. The list
was long and notable one. He de-
scribed how that grand old Viking"
! DIR. hansen, brought back to their
homes and loved ones nearly 100000
soldiers, who starving and dying of
want and disease, found themselves
stranded in foreign lands at the con-
clusion of the armistice.
"If the League had done nothing
more than save these soldiers" de-
clared Mr.. Holt, at would have more
than justified all the time and money
that have been spent on it to date"
Then the lecturer showed how the
mandate system was working, by
which the conquered German and
Turkish colonies were held as q
sacred trust" Of humanity, and how
the little black republic of Hayti
brought the great British Empire to
the bar of public opinion because of
her mistreatment of band of Hotten-
tots in South Africa, and how Great
Britain bowed to that public opinion.
Mr.. Holt told what the League was
doing for the prosecuted linguistic,
chronological and religious minorities,
and how for the first time in his
tory scheme has been devised by
which cases can be brought before
International public opinion.
The health work of the League and
the Leagues efforts for the suppress
sion of opium and other noxious drugs
Nd ho off MI 70
the $4,000 Christian Armenian women
and girls now held captive in Turk
ish harems and to extirpate the
white-slavery curse were taken up in
detail Mr.. Holt showed in each one
of these instances how the failure OF
the United States to cooperate with
the League and in many instances its
attempts to block progress, had dam
aged these worthy causes.
Mr.. Holt concluded his enumera-
ton of the things accomplished by
the League by reciting the story OF
how the Leagues experts set the little
. kingdom of Albania on her feet, how
the League had probably saved Aus
tria from the fate of Russia by Civ
ing her the necessary financial and
moral support before she collapsed
] and how the League had been working
to mitigate the truly ptiable lot OF
the intellectual workers of the
stricken nations in Europe, and how
the Leagues efforts for financial and
economic rehabilitation had resulted
in much substantial progress along
these lines. 1t was an amazing story
J and Mr. Holt concluded with a plea
for America to forget her partisan
ship and to play her part again in
peace, as nobly as she did in the war
I'VE are the nation that has the
most" said Mr.. Holt, land we arc
literally doing the least.
when our forefathers met at In
dependent Hall more than one hun
dred years ago, they took no coun-
sci of cowardice, but mutually pledged
their lives, their fortunes and their
sacred honor to the document they
framed. And what happened? The
United States of America happened.
$50 if we, in this great world
crisis take no counsel Of cowardice
but mutually pledge our lives, ou1
fortunes and our sacred honor to the
great Declaration of Inter-depcndencC
. embodied in the covenant of the
League of Nations. then the United
Nations of the World will happen
cooperation will be substituted for
competition on earth, peace will fol
low, and our boys, whose blood red
dens the fields of France, will not
have died in vain.