The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1936-01-22


and before we entered it under
which they undertook to divide up
Europe-chiefly the German and
Austrian and Turkish territory
when the war should come to an
end.
1t was a division of the spoils.
President Wilson and Secretary
Lansing both said after the war
that they knew nothing of these
secret treaties until they arrived
in Paris for the Peace Conference
and that these treaties became the
great obstacle to the making of
sound peace.
CENATORS NYE and Clark
~ charged that testimony Just as
sembled and certain papers which
they had inspected in the State
Department proved that the Presi..
dent and Secretary of State did
know of these i. secret treaties
before they went to Versailles and
that therefore when they said they
learned of them for the first time
at the Peace Conference they fall
sified.
Senator Tom Connally of Texas
denounced the two Senators for
their attack on the dead President,
denied the charges, declared the
munitions investigation should be
ended as a punishment. And out
of this the war of words in the
Senate grew.
What relevance has all this to
the munitions hearings? The COM
mittee has presented a neutrality
bill to keep America out of another
European war. 1t has sought to
prove that we started out in the
last war to be neutral but that we
also started out to make money
out of the war by supplying the
belllgerents with war supplies. This
war trade became so rich after a
While that we abandoned our
neutrality in fact in order to Gull
tivate the war trade. This put us
IN fact on the side of the Allies
and brought us into collision with
Germany.
THE committee contends that
Il we were led slowly, almost i'm
perceptibly away from our neu-
trality because the issue was in the
hands of the President and his
Cabinet officers; that the Secretary
of State early became a partisan
of the Allies and that he thereafter
used every effort to put us morally
and commercially on their side and
the President was drawn along be-
cause, having permitted the first
violations of neutrality by sane
tioning war loans, every step after
that was inevitable until we were
actually at war.
The committee seeks to show
that this doom-like trend into war
was SO powerful that even when the
President knew of secret treaties
between the Allies to partition Eu-
rope to their liking, he was power
less to resist the force which led
us into the war and that thereafter
we were fighting, first for Allied
victory. and then unavoidably for
the objective of the Allies, which
was the fulfillment of these secret
treaties.
DEMOCRATS, of course, feel
IL called on to defend their great
President. But the issue is quite
clear. Balfour said he told Will
son all about the treaties at the
White House. The secret files of
the State Department prove this.
Lansing is said to have admitted
it later.
Woodrow Wilson was a great and
good man. He was a strong man.
But he was a human being liable
TO err. What right have we to
suppose that some other les reso-
lutte President would be able TO re-
sist these powerful forces which
even the autocratic Wilson could
not oppose?
This is the lesson of history
no mans discretion should be trust
ed when he might use it, through
mere bad Judgment, to lead a ma
ton into another war. Whether
we should be neutral or not ought
to be a subject for the combined