of 1776 proclaimed the principles of liberty and drew up a constitution
which has required few changes to the present day. They were
remarkably wise men; and the people of America were almost as wise,
for they appreciated the laws under which they lived and showed no
disposition to thwart or overthrow the statesmen they themselves elected
to guide the nation. The United States grew and grew, crossed the
Mississippi, crossed the Rocky Mountains, reached the Pacific coast, and
fronted on two oceans. As pioneers from the east had pushed out into
the middle of the continent, cleared the wilderness, and filled it with
prosperous cities and villages, so pioneers from the middle-west went
on across the deserts and the mountains and made the far west flourish
like the rose. The great northern territory of Alaska became part of the
republic; to the south Porto Rico; far out in the Pacific Hawaii and the
Philippines joined the United States; the Panama Canal was cut between
the two oceans; and the republic that had begun as thirteen small states
along the Atlantic seaboard became one of the most powerful nations in
the world. Her natural resources were almost limitless and the energy of
her people made the most of what nature had provided.
[Illustration: “AMERICA’S ANSWER”]
The republic fought several wars. That with Mexico settled boundary
disputes. The Civil War between the North and the South resulted in
the abolition of slavery and made the country a united whole, no State
having a right to secede from the rest. The war with Spain freed Cuba
and other Spanish possessions in the western hemisphere. But none of
these wars changed the system of government of the country. The United
States was still the great republic during all the eventful happenings
of the Nineteenth Century.
Meantime what had happened in France? Louis Philippe had shown himself
in his true lights as a Bourbon, had been driven from his throne, and
had been followed by various kinds of government. A new Napoleon, the
nephew of the first one, had come into power, had made himself Emperor
as Napoleon III., and had tried to restore the glories of the First
Empire. For a time France seemed to prosper under his rule, but it came
to a sudden end when the King of Prussia defeated the armies of France
in 1871 and drove Napoleon III. into exile. France lost her provinces of
Alsace and Lorraine and William I. of Prussia was proclaimed Emperor
of Germany in the great hall of Versailles. There followed in Paris
the days of the Commune, which almost equaled the Reign of Terror for
lawlessness. Gradually order was evolved under a new constitution with a
President at the head of the government, and ever since France has been
a real republic. From much turmoil and bloodshed she had won the liberty
that Lafayette had dreamed of.
Other countries in Europe had won independence too. England required
no revolution; by peaceful means she grew more liberal; her sovereign
became largely a figurehead, and the House of Commons, elected by the
people, was the real seat of government. Italy, which in Lafayette’s
time was mainly a collection of small kingdoms and duchies, ruled by
Austrian archdukes or by the Pope, united under the leadership of Victor
Emmanuel, the King of Savoy, drove out the Austrians, deprived the
Papacy of its temporal power, and became a nation under a constitutional
king. The west of Europe was really republican, like the United States;
it was only in the east that the ideas of feudalism still held sway.
Russia had her Czar, an autocrat of the worst type, Turkey her Sultan,
a relic of the Dark Ages, Austria her Hapsburg Emperor, a thorough
Bourbon, who learned nothing and forgot nothing. And Germany had her
Hohenzollern and Prussian Emperor, the descendant of a long line of
autocratic rulers, the sovereign made by Bismarck, “the man of blood and
iron,” the stanch believer in the old doctrine of the divine right of
kings. Germany had become an empire by the power of the sword, and her
Emperor never allowed his people to forget that fact.
Power goes to the head of a nation like strong wine. The true test of
the greatness of a nation is its ability to use its power for the good
of the world rather than for selfish ends. Prussia had always been
selfish. She had fought a number of successful wars, against Denmark,
against Austria, and against France, and each time she had taken
territory from her adversary. Her statesmen regarded her power only as
a means to gain greater material strength, and from the birth of the
empire they trained the people to think only of that end.
It was inevitable that the forces of freedom and those of autocracy
should come into conflict some day. Germany knew this, and her autocrats
carefully prepared themselves for the coming strife with the lovers of
freedom. They paid little or no attention to programs for peace offered
by other nations, they refused to agree to limit their armaments, they
openly showed their contempt for the conferences at the Hague. Like a
fighter who feels his strength they were constantly wanting to force
other people to acknowledge their power; time and again they could
barely restrain themselves from leaping at some opponent; they only
waited for the most auspicious moment to strike.
What they regarded as the right moment came in July, 1914. The
assassination of the heir apparent to the Austrian throne by a Servian
gave the rulers of Germany a pretext to make war on the world. Austria,
always haughty, always greedy, always weak and blind, was simply the
catspaw of the Hohenzollerns. Austria sent an overbearing message to
Servia, and Russia, taking the rôle of protector of the small Balkan
states, made it clear that she sided with Servia. Germany pretended to
take fright and warned Russia not to attempt to oppose Austria. England
and France tried to keep peace in Europe by suggesting a conference to
discuss the matter. But the Kaiser of Germany and his generals did not
want peace; they wanted to show the world how strong they were, they
wanted the world to bow down absolutely before them; they precipitated
the crisis and, pretending that they acted in self-defense, declared war
on Russia, France, and England.
In the first days of August, 1914, the enemy of liberty began its march.
With a ruthlessness that has no counterpart except in the acts of those
barbarian hordes that swept across Europe in the Dark Ages Germany
marched into Belgium, a small and peaceful country, giving as the only
excuse for her wanton invasion the fact that the easiest road to France
lay across that land. She expected Belgium to submit. The giant, swollen
with power, would do as it pleased with the pigmy. And when the British
Ambassador remonstrated with the German Chancellor over this illegal
treatment of a nation that all the powers of Europe had promised to
protect the Chancellor answered that the treaty of Germany with Belgium
was simply “a scrap of paper.” Germany knew no treaties that opposed her
desires; Germany has cared for nothing but her own selfish goal. And the
great German people consented to this infamous course, because they had
been taught that their first duty was blind obedience to the will of the
Fatherland, which meant the will of the House of Hohenzollern. Never in
history has a people,--and in this case a people that was supposed to be
civilized and thoughtful,--bowed its neck so meekly to the yoke of its
overlords.
But as the hordes of power-drunk Germans,--whom civilization has rightly
named the Huns, in memory of those earlier barbarian invaders of western
Europe,--advanced through the peaceful fields of little Belgium they
found, to their great surprise, that the Belgian people did not intend
to submit to such an outrage without protest. Led by their heroic king,
Albert, the Belgians threw themselves in the path of the Huns and
checked them for a few days. They could not save their country, but they
saved precious days for the French and English, and the Huns found
that their march to Paris was not the easy, triumphal progress they had
planned.
Yet the German army was a mighty and effective machine in that autumn of
1914, built by men who had devoted their lives to perfecting instruments
of destruction. It rolled on and on, across Belgium, southward and
westward into France, crushing the small Belgian army, forcing the
outnumbered British into retreat, driving back the French by sheer
weight of cannon and men. The Kaiser thought to repeat the act of his
grandfather and make the French sign a treaty with him at Versailles,
taking more territory and wealth from them as the next step toward
making the House of Hohenzollern the greatest power in the world. As the
Huns drove on their over-mastering pride and self-conceit grew and grew,
inflating them like over-swollen frogs, until a chorus of what the rest
of the world had formerly considered intelligent professors, scientists,
and writers, actually dared to announce that the German will to victory
was the supreme achievement of the ages. Cæsar, Charlemagne, Napoleon,
at the height of their power, never lost some sense of proportion, some
human notion of justice; it was left to this Germany of 1914 to show how
blind, how mad, how intolerant the mind of man can be.
Rapidly the Huns marched toward Paris; and then something happened. The
French turned at bay, held, drove the invaders back. Over the ground
they had crossed in triumph the Huns retreated, back and back until they
had reached the line of the River Marne. And when the French General
Joffre drove them back to the Marne he won one of the greatest victories
for civilization in the annals of history.
Meantime Russia was attacking in the east and the Germans had to look
to the protection of their own territory. Europe was now ablaze,
England was training men, France was digging trenches, the flames of
war, lighted by Germany’s reckless torch, were spreading across the
world. Italy, true to the principles of her great leaders of the last
century, Mazzini, Cavour, Garibaldi, Victor Emmanuel, hating that
power of Austria whose history had been one long record of deceit and
enslavement, joined hands with the countries that stood for liberty
and justice. The Turk, true to his nature, united with the Hun. The war
raged back and forth, its battle-fields the greater part of Europe.
The issue was clearly drawn between liberty and tyranny. The Germans
were now the Bourbons, the Allied Powers were the true descendants of
Lafayette and Washington. The land of Lafayette lay next to the Menace
and her fair breast had been the first to bear the scars of war. The
land of Washington, however, lay far across the Atlantic, and one of
her guiding principles had been to avoid taking part in the affairs of
Europe. Some of her sons, loving Lafayette’s country for what she meant
to the world, volunteered in the French army, joined the French flying
corps, worked in the hospital service; but the great republic across the
sea proclaimed herself a neutral, although the hopes of her people lay
on the side of France and England.
But Germany knew no law, either that of Christ or man. The Sermon on the
Mount, the merciful provisions of the Hague Conventions, might never
have been given to the world as far as she was concerned. See what
some of her writers, men supposedly human, dared to say. “Might is
right and ... is decided by war. Every youth who enters a beer-drinking
and dueling club will receive the true direction of his life. War in
itself is a good thing. God will see to it that war always recurs. The
efforts directed toward the abolition of war must not only be termed
foolish, but absolutely immoral. The peace of Europe is only a secondary
matter for us. The sight of suffering does one good; the infliction of
suffering does one more good. This war must be conducted as ruthlessly
as possible.” And another German said, “They call us barbarians. What of
it? The German claim must be: ... Education to hate.... Organization of
hatred.... Education to the desire for hatred. Let us abolish unripe and
false shame.... To us is given faith, hope, and hatred; but hatred is
the greatest among them.”
This was indeed a strange religion for a nation that was supposed to
have heard of the Sermon on the Mount; a religion that might have been
made by Satan himself, with hate for its foundation instead of love. Yet
this was the German religion; if any one dare to deny that the words of
these writers truly represent Germany let him look at Germany’s acts,
let him think of the treatment of Belgium, the bombing of unprotected
cities and towns, the enslavement of women and children, the destruction
of hospital ships and of Red Cross camps, the murder of Edith Cavell,
the sinking of the _Lusitania_!
The submarine captain who fired the torpedo that sank the _Lusitania_
was a true son of Germany. He sent non-combatants to their death in the
sea as ruthlessly as might a demon of darkness. There was no humanity in
him, nor in those who commanded the deed. But there is no act of evil
that does not bear its own just consequences. The innocent men, women
and children who went down with the _Lusitania_ called forth the hate
of the world on the Huns, and set America on fire with indignation. For
every victim there Germany was to pay a thousandfold in time.
The United States had a great President, a man who knew the temper
of his people far better than those who criticized him. He knew the
history of the country, he knew that its people loved peace and hated
war, that Europe was far from the vision of most of them, and that they
still cherished Washington’s advice against the making of “entangling
alliances.” He tried to be patient, even with Germany, though he
knew her for what she was; he waited, urging her to obey the laws of
civilization, hoping that he might act as a peacemaker between the
warring nations, feeling that peace might lie in the power of America,
provided she kept neutral. But his efforts meant nothing to Germany; she
believed in insincerity and the piling of lies on lies.
In many ways the United States had been very successful. It had grown
tremendously, it had carried out many of the ideals of its founders.
But in some ways it had fallen from its true course. Special privileges
had allowed some men to grow enormously rich at the expense of their
neighbors, city governments were too often the playthings of grafting
politicians, men were often apt to prefer the liberty of the individual
to the welfare of the state. The real question of the country was not
as to whether we had won success, but as to whether liberty was still
worth striving for. A nation is very much like an individual, and an
individual often loses his ideals as he wins material success. Had
America grown to be like a rich and torpid man who cares more for his
ease and comfort than for the dreams of his youth? Had America forgotten
Lafayette’s vision of her, forgotten that liberty is the one priceless
gift? Were the youths, few in number but great in spirit, who were
offering their lives for freedom in the airplanes and trenches of Europe
the only part of the nation that still saw the vision clear?
Woodrow Wilson never doubted his people in that time of stress and
strain. He knew what their answer must be when the call came to them.
They had forgotten their heritage no more than he. The Declaration of
Independence was still their testament; the hundred millions were the
true sons of the few millions of the days of Washington. And when the
German Menace dared to forbid Americans to travel in safety on the seas
the answer of America came instantly. Yes, there was something better
than comfort and peace and wealth; there was freedom, there was the
goal of helping humanity to throw off the beasts of prey! The world
must be made safe for all men! The mailed fist must be shown that might
_does not_ make right!
Germany notified the United States that she intended to carry on
unrestricted submarine warfare, to become the lawless pirate of the
seas. President Wilson handed the German Ambassador his passports and
waited to see if Germany intended to carry out her threat. As usual, the
House of Hohenzollern would not listen to reason. Germany turned pirate,
throwing away the last vestige of any respect for law. And when this was
plain the President went to Congress on April 2, 1917, and advised the
representatives of the nation to accept the challenge of war thrust upon
us by the German Empire.
“Let us be very clear,” said the President, “and make very clear to
all the world what our motives and our objects are.... Our object ...
is to vindicate the principles of peace and justice in the life of the
world as against selfish and autocratic power and to set up amongst
the really free and self-governed peoples of the world such a concert
of purpose and of action as will henceforth ensure the observance of
those principles. Neutrality is no longer feasible or desirable where
the peace of the world is involved and the freedom of its peoples, and
the menace to that peace and freedom lies in the existence of autocratic
governments backed by organized force which is controlled wholly by
their will, not by the will of their people....
“We are now about to accept gauge of battle with this natural foe to
liberty and shall, if necessary, spend the whole force of the nation
to check and nullify its pretentions and its power.... The world must
be made safe for democracy. Its peace must be planted upon the tested
foundations of political liberty. We have no selfish ends to serve. We
desire no conquest, no dominion. We seek no indemnities for ourselves,
no material compensation for the sacrifices we shall freely make. We are
but one of the champions of the rights of mankind. We shall be satisfied
when those rights have been made as secure as the faith and the freedom
of nations can make them.”
Let us be thankful that our President could voice the same spirit in
1917 that Jefferson wrote into the Declaration of Independence and that
Lincoln proclaimed on the field at Gettysburg. Our country bore malice
toward none, we wanted to be friends to all, we had no selfish desires
for power or dominion. But as Lafayette heard the call to battle for the
freedom of men in America in 1776, so America now heard the same call
from the fields of Europe. On April 6, 1917, the United States formally
declared war against the autocracy of Germany.
What were we fighting against? Against the old idea of feudalism that
the ruler need respect no rights of the ruled, against the old Bourbon
theory that the sovereign need obey none of the laws that govern the
rest of humankind, against the principles of Hapsburgs and Hohenzollerns
that the people exist solely for the benefit of the ruling dynasties.
All this Prussia had converted into the principle that the Fatherland
is supreme, and that the people must obey the Fatherland in everything;
and the autocrats of Prussia had made the Fatherland a savage monster,
ruthless, unjust and cruel, devouring all it could to satisfy its greed.
If you look back through history you will see that the crimes of all
the despots are the crimes of Germany to-day and that whenever men were
fighting tyranny, rapacity and cruelty they were fighting the same
battle that America and her allies fight to-day.
More than that. In fighting for freedom we are fighting for our
preservation. The world cannot exist one half slave, the other half
free. Let tyranny succeed in Europe and it can only be a short time
before it will look hungrily at America. The Menace must be destroyed
before it grows so powerful that none can withstand it. “The time has
come,” wrote President Wilson shortly after the declaration of war, “to
conquer or submit.” Submission would have been to surrender all the
principles of the republic, the country to which lovers of liberty had
looked for more than a century to prove the actual realization of their
dreams.
It is the German machine-made government, the autocratic ruling military
caste, the idea that might makes right, and that small nations have no
rights that big nations need respect, it is all these old and hideous
beliefs of the Dark Ages and the era of despots that the liberty-loving
nations are fighting to-day. The individual German is, after all, a
human being like ourselves, though warped and twisted in his ideas of
what is right and wrong by his selfish and barbarous government. The
individual German may become a civilized man again, provided he can come
to see the monstrous tyranny of his government. And for this reason
President Wilson said to Congress in his speech of April 2, 1917, “We
have no quarrel with the German people. We have no feeling toward them
but one of sympathy and friendship. It was not upon their impulse that
their government acted in entering this war. It was not with their
previous knowledge or approval. It was a war determined upon as wars
used to be determined upon in the old, unhappy days when peoples were
nowhere consulted by their rulers and wars were provoked and waged in
the interest of dynasties or of little groups of ambitious men who were
accustomed to use their fellow-men as pawns and tools.”
It was a war in fact deliberately determined upon and brought about
by that same dark enemy of liberty that thrust Lafayette into an
Austrian dungeon a century ago, that oppressed the people of Italy and
wantonly imprisoned some of the noblest patriots that ever lived, that
tore Alsace-Lorraine from France, and that has rattled its sabre and
clanked its spurs and declared that war and destruction are the noblest
objects of man. But the people have let themselves be treated like
galley-slaves, have allowed that dark enemy of liberty to chain them to
the benches and make them row that ship of state which is nothing less
than a pirate bark upon the seas of the world. The people have been
blind. Our President has tried to help them to see the light of freedom.
Treachery, deceit, lies, these have been the watchwords of the rulers
of the Huns. When our government was still at peace with Germany her
statesmen tried to make a secret agreement with Mexico that in case we
should declare war the latter country should attack us and take our
southwestern states. Again and again they lied to our Ambassador at
Berlin and tried to intimidate him. Nothing has been sacred to them.
They talk of religion and God and in the same breath outrage every
teaching of Christianity. They have no respect for the great works
of art of the world; cathedrals, libraries are destroyed without a
thought other than to impress the enemy peoples with the frightfulness
of their warfare. The world must be taught to fear them is their creed.
And they have no more sense of humor than a stone. Over the slaughter
of thousands of poor slave-driven soldiers the Kaiser can still send
decorations to his sons, complimenting them and extolling their valor
and generalship while all the world knows them to be mere pawns and
puppets tricked out in the gaudy dress of the Hohenzollerns. Neither
Kaiser nor generals nor statesmen have the least sense of humor, and a
sense of humor is more than a saving grace, it is the mark of a sanity
of judgment. But how can any sane judgment be found in a nation that
thinks to frighten the rest of the world into submission by bombing
hospital camps and Red Cross workers? There is no health in the monster.
All the poisons of the past ages have collected in his blood.