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'Senate in the customary way. Manifestly, I cannot now 'speak for the Senate or consult its members, nor can they 'consult with each other, nor can the President consult 'them while they are at their homes in forty-eight States.' "You will perceive that this assumes that White wishes the information for the President's benefit, which is the proper attitude for him to occupy so long as he is a member of the Commission. It avoids either entering into a discussion of the subject, or refusing to discuss it.

"I wish you great success in your discussion with Lowell. I assume that he occupies substantially the same attitude that Taft does. I think it a great mistake for Taft while he knows perfectly well that the so-called constitution [of the League of Nations] is in serious need of amendment to take a course tending to help Wilson to put it through without amendment.

"I have been studying the paper and trying to dispossess my mind of the prejudice against it created by the way in which it has been presented,—a way exceedingly offensive to me. The more I study it, the more satisfied I am that it has some very useful provisions, some very bad ones, some glaring deficiencies, and that if it is not very materially amended not merely in form but in substance, the world will before very long wake up to realize that a great opportunity has been wasted in the doing of a futile thing.

"Honorable H. Cabot Lodge,
"56 Beacon Street,
"Boston, Mass."

"Faithfully yours,
"ELIHU ROOT.

To the debate between President Lowell of Harvard College and myself to which Senator Root refers in his letter I shall allude later (pp. 129 et seq.). It is not necessary for me now to say anything further in regard to

the debate except that when it was over it seemed that President Lowell apparently agreed with most of my criticisms and favored changes on the points to which I especially called attention. The sole value of the debate from my standpoint was that being widely published it helped to bring the questions raised by the covenant of the League of Nations sharply to the attention of the country, which was what I desired to do beyond anything else.

After hearing from Senator Knox and Senator Brandegee and after receiving this letter from Mr. Root, I sent the following cablegram, which, as I have said, embodies what was my own opinion and that of Senators Knox and Brandegee and of Mr. Root in whose language I think no improvement could be made:

"Have considered your cable March 9th. The President expressed no willingness to receive any communication from the Senate while that body was in session. If he now wishes to have amendments drafted which the Senate will consent to, the natural and necessary course is to convene the Senate in the customary way. Manifestly I cannot now speak for the Senate or consult its members nor can they consult with each other nor can the President consult them while they are at their homes in forty-eight States."

This cable message closed this incident and we received no more requests for statements as to what amendments or reservations the Senate desired or would accept. The effort to obtain this information officially failed, but the attempt to secure it is none the less instructive.

CHAPTER VIII

THE QUESTION OF CONSISTENCY

BEFORE tracing the story of the contest in the Senate over the Treaty of Versailles and more particularly the Covenant of the League of Nations, I think it is well, in order to avoid later digressions or interruptions, that I should make a brief statement in regard to the charge of inconsistency which was constantly brought forward against me during the debate. I wish to dispose of that matter, as I have already disposed of the entirely false charge that I was in any degree influenced by a personal hostility to Mr. Wilson which, as a matter of fact, never existed. To this end it is necessary for me briefly to state the course and development of my own opinions in regard to the vital question of a League of Nations.

At the opening of a public debate with President Lowell of Harvard on the 19th of March, 1919, in Boston, I said:

"I have also been charged with inconsistency. In the autumn of 1914, Theodore Roosevelt made a speech in which he brought forward the idea of a League of Nations for the prevention of future wars. In the following June, of 1915, speaking at Union College in New York on Commencement, I took up the same idea and discussed the establishment of a League of Nations backed by force."

I spoke of it only in general terms. The following are the essential parts of that address taken from my volume of War Addresses published in 1917:

"In differences between nations which go beyond the limited range of arbitrable questions peace can only be

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maintained by putting behind it the force of united nations determined to uphold it and to prevent war. No one is more conscious than I of the enormous difficulties which beset such a solution or such a scheme, but I am certain that it is in this direction alone that we can find hope for the maintenance of the world's peace and the avoidance of needless wars. Even if we could establish such a union of nations there might be some wars which could not be avoided, but there are certainly many which might be prevented.

"It might be easily said that this idea, which is not a new one, is impracticable; but it is better than the idea that war can be stopped by language, by speechmaking, by vain agreements, which no one would carry out when the stress came, by denunciations of war and laudations of peace, in which all men agree, for these methods are not only impracticable but impossible and barren of all hope of real result. It may seem Utopian at this moment to suggest a union of civilized nations in order to put a controlling force behind the maintenance of peace and international order; but it is through the aspiration for perfection, through the search for Utopias, that the real advances have been made. At all events, it is along this path that we must travel if we are to attain in any measure to the end we all desire of peace upon earth. It is at least a great, a humane purpose to which, in these days of death and suffering, of misery, and sorrow among so large a portion of mankind, we might well dedicate ourselves. We must begin the work with the clear understanding that our efforts will fail if they are tainted with the thought of personal or political profit or with any idea of self-interest or self-glorification. We may not now succeed, but I believe that in the slow process of the years others who come after us will reach the goal. The effort and the sacrifice which we make will not be in vain when the end in sight is noble, when we are striving to help mankind and lift the heaviest of burdens from suffering humanity."

I spoke again in favor of the plan for a League in the following winter at a meeting in Washington of the League to Enforce Peace. I then said:

"The limit of voluntary arbitration has, I think, been reached. It has done much. It has taken out of the range of arms a large mass of questions which once were causes, frequently of war, constantly of reprisals, and by the general consent of civilized mankind has put them before a tribunal and had them there decided.

"If we have reached the limit of voluntary arbitration, what is the next step? I think the next step is that which this League proposes and that is to put force behind international peace, an international league or agreement, or tribunal, for peace. We may not solve it in that way, but if we cannot solve it in that way it can be solved in no other.

"You cannot keep order in your cities unless you put force behind the will of the community and behind the peace of the citizens. The peace of your states is maintained by force. It rests upon the militia and the constabulary of the states. The peace of the United States can only be secured and maintained by an ample, thorough, national defense.

"We have not that defense now.

"I trust that we are entered on the path which will lead us to the upbuilding of our national defense, both in the army and in the navy. I hope this not only to make our own peace secure, but because we as a nation will find it very difficult to induce others to put force behind peace if we have not force to put behind our own peace.

"I know, and no one, I think, can know better than one who has served long in the Senate, which is charged with an important share of the ratification and confirmation of all treaties-no one can, I think, feel more deeply than I do the difficulties which confront us in the work which this League has undertaken.

"But the difficulties cannot be overcome unless we try to overcome them. I believe much can be done.

"Probably it will be impossible to stop all wars, but it certainly will be possible to stop some wars and to diminish their number.

"The way in which this problem must be worked out must be left to this League and to those who are giving this great question the study which it deserves. I know

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