Evening star., 1936-01-12
BY FRANK Fl. SIMONDS.

opened the discussion OF
" American neutrality in his
a annual address to Congress,
the country is face to face with the
third phase in the battle over Amer
ica's relation to the League of Ma
tions. The first phase was fought to
a finish in the Senate il 1919 and,
in the following year. the country in
dorsed the course of the Senate in the
presidential election. Last year the
second phase was fouoht cut over the
adherence to the World Court and
once more the isolationists triumphed.
With this second defeat the cham
pions of the League of Nations re-
vised their strategy. Convinced
finally that for the time being at
least they could not persuade Con-
gress to permit American entrance
into the League or court, they set out
to effect a transfer of power from
Congress to the President and then
to employ the executive branch of
the Government to make the United
States an ally of Geneva This end
was to be attained by procuring for
the President discretionary powers in
dealing with American neutrality. In
effect, the President was to be granted
authority which would enable him to
make his country the ally of the
League. if and when the latter under
took punitive action against an al
legged aggressor state.
What lay back of this plan was
were furnished with discretionary
powers, then, when the League en-
barked upon campaign of coercion
the champions of Geneva in the
United States would be able to bring
such pressure upon the President as
to force him to support League sane
tionS and to assist in League pres
sure. To achieve this end they re-
lied upon their own resources in
propaganda, upon the aid of the va
rious peace societies and finally upon
the backing of the press favorable
to the League.
Congress Saw Through Plan.
Congress quickly saw through this
strategy and denied the President all
discretionary powers in the neutrality
act which it passed in August and
which the President, with patent re-
1uctance, ultimately signed. Mr..
Roosevelt was, however, able to limit
the life OF the act to February 90
Of the current year, thus leaving the
way open for a renewal of the strug-
gle. And that struggle is now in full
nrnCTnCC
events of the past few months have
shed significant light upon the pur-
poses of the pro-Leaguers
Thus, although the neutrality act
itself restricted the embargo field to
that of actual implements of war, no
sooner had the League launched its
war OF sanctions against Italy than
the pro-League press and public in
this country began to demand that the
President extend the restriction to the
materials of war such as cotton. oil
and scrap iron. The argument ad-
vanced was that by doing this the
United States would escape the re-
sponsibility for defeating League sane
tions and for thus prolonging the
&UulO-GIAlIUpldll COlllllCl-
To this demand the administration
was compelled to reply that it was
helpless because it had no legal au-
thority to extend its embargo to apply
to anything but actual implements of
war. Nevertheless the pro-League
camp did make a certain measure of
progress with the State Department
and Judge Hull presently began to
apply moral pressure to American ex-
porters to limit their sales of war ma
terials-notably of oil-to normal
volume. This attempt failed because
1t had no legal warrant 1t was, how
ever, promptly identified by Italy as
an unfriendly act, since it undertook
to change the conditions of policy
after war had been begun and to the
injury OF one of two belligerents.
Seek to Make U. S. League Ally.
1t is essential for the American peo-
pie to perceive that those who advo-
cate discretionary powers for the Presi-
dent are not primarily interested in
neutrality at all. Quite sincerely they
believe that neutrality has become i'm
possible and that peace for their
country is conditioned upon the sue
cess CT the collective system. which is
the League. in furnishing aggression
by its technique of sanctions. In one
word, they seek to make their country
the ally of the League in all Of its wars
because they believe that eventually
such wars will establish precedent
which will prevent countries from re-
sorting to aggression.
Whatever may be the fact as to the
future, however, 1t is plain that an
alliance with the League in its present
practices holds out the prospect of
partnership in not less than three
major wars. At the moment the