for its acceptance by the other Great Powers, but only on condition that it becomes a member and bears its share of the risk and receives its share of the benefit of membership.

Our wealth in the last three years has been added to by billions in the profits that have been reaped from the sale of war material and war equipment to the nations of Europe and thus from the blood and the suffering of the people of these stricken countries. We had the right to take advantage of the situation for which we were not responsible; but the fact should make us sensitive to our duty when occasion and opportunity arise for us to help our brethern of Europe to avoid a recurrence of such woe. We have been blessed beyond any other nation. Our good fortune seems to have no limit. We shall not be worthy of it unless we recognize our responsibility and run our share of risk in securing the world from a return of the scourge visiting it now. Of course, the first duty of a nation is to its own people and to itself; and it should not, out of a mere ideal of self-sacrifice, endanger the integrity of its government or its civilization. But it has a duty as a member of the family of nations; and that duty is commensurate with its power for good to the world.

Moreover the risk which the United States would run in joining such a League should not be exaggerated. If the United States makes adequate preparation, as it intends to do, to defend itself against the unlawful aggression of any nation, the army and navy which it has projected will furnish ample constabulary force to fill any quota which may be allotted to it in the formation of the world police to suppress the beginnings of war in violation of the regulations of the League.

In the preliminary conference as to the proposals of the League, one member present put this question to another: Would you be willing that your boy, the apple of your eye and the pride of your heart, should lay down his life in a struggle over a question between Servia and Austria in which America has no concern? The answer was: "If the suppression of that struggle by the police force of the world would prevent a spread of the local fire into a general world conflagration, my boy's life could not be sacrificed in a higher cause." It is the duty of the United States, in its own interest and in the interest of mankind, to lead the nations into a League to Enforce Peace.

VIII

Washington's advice has no application to the League. The alliances which he condemned were like that with France during the Revolution because of which we were called on twenty years later to serve the selfish motive of our ally. Jefferson advocated a permanent alliance with Great Britain to maintain the Monroe Doctrine. Our League is a league of all nations to support the selfish purposes of none. has only one object: to prevent unnecessary wars.

It

The Monroe Doctrine rests ultimately on force. The traditions of ninety-three years strengthen it; but the Zimmermann note advises us that they may not be sufficient. Indeed our interests the world over require us to protect and maintain them. Our enormous trade with all the countries of Europe makes it most difficult, in a European war, to preserve our rights and interests as neutrals, and is most likely to involve us in the war. We are now on the

brink of hostilities with Germany. Why, then, should Washington's advice be controlling, advice given us in a day of small things, based on an isolation and a remoteness from the rest of the world which has ceased? Our coming war with Germany demonstrates, from the selfish point of view alone, the wisdom of our joining in a world movement to prevent the recurrence of another European war, even though it imposes on us the burden of contributing our quota to an international police force.

But Mr. Bryan says that in joining the League we would abandon the Monroe Doctrine. The Monroe Doctrine, shortly described, is our national policy of preventing, by protest and by force if necessary, any non-American Power from subverting any independent American government and from colonizing, by such means or by purchase, American territory under a government of its own. Our reason for maintaining the Doctrine is that we think such a course by a non-American Power would endanger our interests. The Doctrine does not rest on International Law. Should a question arise as to its enforcement between us and a nonAmerican Power, therefore, it would be non-justiciable and must go to the Commission under the second article for a recommendation of compromise in which we would not be bound in honor to acquiesce. We would then have the same opportunity to maintain the Doctrine by force as if there were no league. Under the thirty-one treaties of Mr. Bryan, we would now have to abide a year of investigation before using force. The disadvantage to us, if any, of delay, therefore, will certainly be no greater under the terms of the League.

Instead of hampering our maintenance of the Doctrine, the League would help us in any case where its violation

might be attempted, for by the terms of the League, the nonAmerican Power must submit its cause for hearing to one of the Tribunals of the League before hostilities; and, if it failed to do so, we could summon the international police force to drive it off American shores.

But it is said that, if we mix in European politics to the extent required by this League, we cannot exclude European Powers from taking part in those of this hemisphere. There is nothing in the League requiring us or authorizing us to participate in the internal politics of any European country or to do other than to use our good offices to prevent a war between any two of such countries. We are to furnish our quota to suppress a premature war between them. They are to exercise the same functions in this hemisphere. In what respect does that violate the Monroe Doctrine? The League does not enable us nor authorize us to acquire and colonize territory in Europe by purchase or conquest any more than it authorizes a European nation to do so on this side; and that is all the Monroe Doctrine forbids.

Mr. Bryan suggests that we should not join a World League because our citizens of foreign nativity would divide in their sympathies as between European nations. If our foreign policies, needed for our protection and for that of the world, are to be abandoned because of race prejudice in a comparatively small group of our foreign-born citizens, we have failed in our experiment of naturalization. I cannot acquiesce in such a view. This would indeed be a humiliating surrender to the so-called "hyphen."

IX

Mr. Bryan's eighth article commends the attitude of the President in his message read to the United States Senate on

January 22nd. I have altogether misinterpreted the notes of the President to the belligerent powers, his speech at the dinner of the League to Enforce Peace in May, 1916, as well as the message of January 22nd last, if he has not, in all of these, intended to approve the general principles of our League. His reference to "the major force of the world' was certainly an approval of the political organization of the world to the extent of creating an international police force to secure compliance with a peaceable procedure for the settlement of international questions likely otherwise to lead to Mr. Bryan's citation of the President as authority does not sustain his contention.

war.

The question who shall command the joint military force in a campaign is not material, provided it be understood in advance, as it must be, what the purpose of the campaign is. The United States has had no difficulty in the past in acting with other nations to carry out a common purpose of a military character, as the taking of Pekin by the Allied force during the Boxer trouble proves. Nations have acted together often in history; and the question who shall have the military command or how the joint armies should be directed is a practical military question to be agreed upon by the joint powers in war council. The purpose of League campaigns would be settled by the terms of the League before the mobilization begins. It would be to restrain the warlike activities of a nation unlawfully breaking a peace to which it is pledged. To characterize this as placing the destiny of the toiling millions of the United States in the hands of aliens for their selfish purposes is to reveal a complete misunderstanding of the normal operation of the League. The United States retains complete control of its