"WAGING NEUTRALITY"
I
The foregoing letters sufficiently portray Page's attitude toward the
war; they also show the extent to which he suffered from the daily
tragedy. The great burdens placed upon the Embassy in themselves would
have exhausted a physical frame that had never been particularly robust;
but more disintegrating than these was the mental distress--the constant
spectacle of a civilization apparently bent upon its own destruction.
Indeed there were probably few men in Europe upon whom the war had a
more depressing effect. In the first few weeks the Ambassador
perceptibly grew older; his face became more deeply lined, his hair
became grayer, his body thinner, his step lost something of its
quickness, his shoulders began to stoop, and his manner became more and
more abstracted. Page's kindness, geniality, and consideration had long
since endeared him to all the embassy staff, from his chief secretaries
to clerks and doormen; and all his associates now watched with
affectionate solicitude the extent to which the war was wearing upon
him. "In those first weeks," says Mr. Irwin Laughlin, Page's most
important assistant and the man upon whom the routine work of the
Embassy largely fell, "he acted like a man who was carrying on his
shoulders all the sins and burdens of the world. I know no man who
seemed to realize so poignantly the misery and sorrow of it all. The
sight of an England which he loved bleeding to death in defence of the
things in which he most believed was a grief that seemed to be sapping
his very life."
Page's associates, however, noted a change for the better after the
Battle of the Marne. Except to his most intimate companions he said
little, for he represented a nation that was "neutral"; but the defeat
of the Germans added liveliness to his step, gave a keener sparkle to
his eye, and even brought back some of his old familiar gaiety of
spirit. One day the Ambassador was lunching with Mr. Laughlin and one or
two other friends.
"We did pretty well in that Battle of the Marne, didn't we?" he said.
"Isn't that remark slightly unneutral, Mr. Ambassador?" asked Mr.
Laughlin.
At this a roar of laughter went up from the table that could be heard
for a considerable distance.
About this same time Page's personal secretary, Mr. Harold Fowler, came
to ask the Ambassador's advice about enlisting in the British Army. To
advise a young man to take a step that might very likely result in his
death was a heavy responsibility, and the Ambassador refused to accept
it. It was a matter that the Secretary could settle only with his own
conscience. Mr. Fowler decided his problem by joining the British Army;
he had a distinguished career in its artillery and aviation service as
he had subsequently in the American Army. Mr. Fowler at once discovered
that his decision had been highly pleasing to his superior.
"I couldn't advise you to do this, Harold," Page said, placing his hand
on the young man's shoulder, "but now that you've settled it yourself
I'll say this--if I were a young man like you and in your circumstances,
I should enlist myself."
Yet greatly as Page abhorred the Prussians and greatly as his
sympathies from the first day of the war were enlisted on the side of
the Allies, there was no diplomat in the American service who was more
"neutral" in the technical sense. "Neutral!" Page once exclaimed.
"There's nothing in the world so neutral as this embassy. Neutrality
takes up all our time." When he made this remark he was, as he himself
used to say, "the German Ambassador to Great Britain." And he was
performing the duties of this post with the most conscientious fidelity.
These duties were onerous and disagreeable ones and were made still more
so by the unreasonableness of the German Government. Though the American
Embassy was caring for the more than 70,000 Germans who were then living
in England and was performing numerous other duties, the Imperial
Government never realized that Page and the Embassy staff were doing it
a service. With characteristic German tactlessness the German Foreign
Office attempted to be as dictatorial to Page as though he had been one
of its own junior secretaries. The business of the German Embassy in
London was conducted with great ability; the office work was kept in the
most shipshape condition; yet the methods were American methods and the
Germans seemed aggrieved because the routine of the Imperial bureaucracy
was not observed. With unparalleled insolence they objected to the
American system of accounting--not that it was unsound or did not give
an accurate picture of affairs--but simply that it was not German. Page
quietly but energetically informed the German Government that the
American diplomatic service was not a part of the German organization,
that its bookkeeping system was American, not German, that he was doing
this work not as an obligation but as a favour, and that, so long as he
continued to do it, he would perform the duty in his own way. At this
the Imperial Government subsided. Despite such annoyances Page refused
to let his own feelings interfere with the work. The mere fact that he
despised the Germans made him over-scrupulous in taking all precautions
that they obtained exact justice. But this was all that the German cause
in Great Britain did receive. His administration of the German Embassy
was faultless in its technique, but it did not err on the side of
over-enthusiasm.
His behaviour throughout the three succeeding years was entirely
consistent with his conception of "neutrality." That conception, as is
apparent from the letters already printed, was not the Wilsonian
conception. Probably no American diplomat was more aggrieved at the
President's definition of neutrality than his Ambassador to Great
Britain. Page had no quarrel with the original neutrality proclamation;
that was purely a routine governmental affair, and at the time it was
issued it represented the proper American attitude. But the President's
famous emendations filled him with astonishment and dismay. "We must be
impartial in thought as well as in action," said the President on August
19th[90], "we must put a curb upon our sentiments as well as upon every
transaction that might be construed as a prejudice of one party to the
prejudice of another." Page was prepared to observe all the traditional
rules of neutrality, to insist on American rights with the British
Government, and to do full legal justice to the Germans, but he declined
to abrogate his conscience where his personal judgment of the rights and
wrongs of the conflict were concerned. "Neutrality," he said in a letter
to his brother, Mr. Henry A. Page, of Aberdeen, N.C., "is a quality of
government--an artificial unit. When a war comes a government must go in
it or stay out of it. It must make a declaration to the world of its
attitude. That's all that neutrality is. A government can be neutral,
but no _man_ can be."
"The President and the Government," Page afterward wrote, "in their
insistence upon the moral quality of neutrality, missed the larger
meaning of the war. It is at bottom nothing but the effort of the Berlin
absolute monarch and his group to impose their will on as large a part
of the world as they can overrun. The President started out with the
idea that it was a war brought on by many obscure causes--economic and
the like; and he thus missed its whole meaning. We have ever since been
dealing with the chips which fly from the war machine and have missed
the larger meaning of the conflict. Thus we have failed to render help
to the side of Liberalism and Democracy, which are at stake in the
world."
Nor did Page think it his duty, in his private communications to his
Government and his friends, to maintain that attitude of moral
detachment which Mr. Wilson's pronouncement had evidently enjoined upon
him. It was not his business to announce his opinions to the world, for
he was not the man who determined the policy of the United States; that
was the responsibility of the President and his advisers. But an
ambassador did have a certain rôle to perform. It was his duty to
collect information and impressions, to discover what important people
thought of the United States and of its policies, and to send forward
all such data to Washington. According to Page's theory of the
Ambassadorial office, he was a kind of listening post on the front of
diplomacy, and he would have grievously failed had he not done his best
to keep headquarters informed. He did not regard it as "loyalty" merely
to forward only that kind of material which Washington apparently
preferred to obtain; with a frankness which Mr. Wilson's friends
regarded as almost ruthless, Page reported what he believed to be the
truth. That this practice was displeasing to the powers of Washington
there is abundant evidence. In early December, 1914, Colonel House was
compelled to transmit a warning to the American Ambassador at London.
"The President wished me to ask you to please be more careful not to
express any unneutral feeling, either by word of mouth, or by letter and
not even to the State Department. He said that both Mr. Bryan and Mr.
Lansing had remarked upon your leaning in that direction and he thought
that it would materially lessen your influence. He feels very strongly
about this."
Evidently Page did not regard his frank descriptions of England under
war as expressing unneutral feeling; at any rate, as the war went on,
his letters, even those which he wrote to President Wilson, became more
and more outspoken. Page's resignation was always at the President's
disposal; the time came, as will appear, when it was offered; so long as
he occupied his post, however, nothing could turn him from his
determination to make what he regarded as an accurate record of events.
This policy of maintaining an outward impartiality, and, at the same
time, of bringing pressure to bear on Washington in behalf of the
Allies, he called "waging neutrality."
Such was the mood in which Page now prepared to play his part in what
was probably the greatest diplomatic drama in history. The materials
with which this drama concerned itself were such apparently lifeless
subjects as ships and cargoes, learned discourses on such abstract
matters as the doctrine of continuous voyage, effective blockade, and
conditional contraband; yet the struggle, which lasted for three years,
involved the greatest issue of modern times--nothing less than the
survival of those conceptions of liberty, government, and society which
make the basis of English-speaking civilization. To the newspaper reader
of war days, shipping difficulties signified little more than a
newspaper headline which he hastily read, or a long and involved
lawyer's note which he seldom read at all--or, if he did, practically
never understood. Yet these minute and neglected controversies presented
to the American Nation the greatest decision in its history. Once
before, a century ago, a European struggle had laid before the United
States practically the same problem. Great Britain fought Napoleon, just
as it had now been compelled to fight the Hohenzollern, by blockade;
such warfare, in the early nineteenth century, led to retaliations, just
as did the maritime warfare in the recent conflict, and the United
States suffered, in 1812, as in 1914, from what were regarded as the
depredations of both sides. In Napoleon's days France and Great Britain,
according to the international lawyers, attacked American commerce in
illegal ways; on strictly technical grounds this infant nation had an
adequate cause of war against both belligerents; but the ultimate
consequence of a very confused situation was a declaration of war
against Great Britain. Though an England which was ruled by a George III
or a Prince Regent--an England of rotten boroughs, of an ignorant and
oppressed peasantry, and of a social organization in which caste was
almost as definitely drawn as in an Oriental despotism--could hardly
appeal to the enthusiastic democrat as embodying all the ideals of his
system, yet the England of 1800 did represent modern progress when
compared with the mediæval autocracy of Napoleon. If we take this broad
view, therefore, we must admit that, in 1812, we fought on the side of
darkness and injustice against the forces that were making for
enlightenment. The war of 1914 had not gone far when the thinking
American foresaw that it would present to the American people precisely
this same problem. What would the decision be? Would America repeat the
experience of 1812, or had the teachings of a century so dissipated
hatreds that it would be able to exert its influence in a way more
worthy of itself and more helpful to the progress of mankind?
There was one great difference, however, between the position of the
United States in 1812 and its position in 1914. A century ago we were a
small and feeble nation, of undeveloped industries and resources and of
immature character; our entrance into the European conflict, on one side
or the other, could have little influence upon its results, and, in
fact, it influenced it scarcely at all; the side we fought against
emerged triumphant. In 1914, we had the greatest industrial organization
and the greatest wealth of any nation and the largest white population
of any country except Russia; the energy of our people and our national
talent for success had long been the marvel of foreign observers. It
mattered little in 1812 on which side the United States took its stand;
in 1914 such a decision Mould inevitably determine the issue. Of all
European statesmen there was one man who saw this point with a
definiteness which, in itself, gives him a clear title to fame. That was
Sir Edward Grey. The time came when a section of the British public was
prepared almost to stone the Foreign Secretary in the streets of London,
because they believed that his "subservience" to American trade
interests was losing the war for Great Britain; his tenure of office was
a constant struggle with British naval and military chiefs who asserted
that the Foreign Office, in its efforts to maintain harmonious relations
with America, was hamstringing the British fleet, was rendering almost
impotent its control of the sea, and was thus throwing away the greatest
advantage which Great Britain possessed in its life and death struggle.
"Some blight has been at work in our Foreign Office for years," said the
_Quarterly Review_, "steadily undermining our mastery of the sea."
"The fleet is not allowed to act," cried Lord Charles Beresford in
Parliament; the Foreign Office was constantly interfering with its
operations. The word "traitor" was not infrequently heard; there were
hints that pro-Germanism was rampant and that officials in the Foreign
Office were drawing their pay from the Kaiser. It was constantly charged
that the navy was bringing in suspicious cargoes only to have the
Foreign Office order their release. "I fight Sir Edward about stopping
cargoes," Page wrote to Colonel House in December, 1914; "literally
fight. He yields and promises this or that. This or that doesn't happen
or only half happens. I know why. The military ministers balk him. I
inquire through the back door and hear that the Admiralty and the War
Office of course value American good-will, but they'll take their
chances of a quarrel with the United States rather than let copper get
to Germany. The cabinet has violent disagreements. But the military men
yield as little as possible. It was rumoured the other day that the
Prime Minister threatened to resign; and I know that Kitchener's sister
told her friends, with tears in her eyes, that the cabinet shamefully
hindered her brother."
These criticisms unquestionably caused Sir Edward great unhappiness, but
this did not for a moment move him from his course. His vision was
fixed upon a much greater purpose. Parliamentary orators might rage
because the British fleet was not permitted to make indiscriminate
warfare on commerce, but the patient and far-seeing British Foreign
Secretary was the man who was really trying to win the war. He was one
of the few Englishmen who, in August, 1914, perceived the tremendous
extent of the struggle in which Great Britain had engaged. He saw that
the English people were facing the greatest crisis since William of
Normandy, in 1066, subjected their island to foreign rule. Was England
to become the "Reichsland" of a European monarch, and was the British
Empire to pass under the sway of Germany? Proud as Sir Edward Grey was
of his country, he was modest in the presence of facts; and one fact of
which he early became convinced was that Great Britain could not win
unless the United States was ranged upon its side. Here was the
country--so Sir Edward reasoned--that contained the largest effective
white population in the world; that could train armies larger than those
of any other nation; that could make the most munitions, build the
largest number of battleships and merchant vessels, and raise food in
quantities great enough to feed itself and Europe besides. This power,
the Foreign Secretary believed, could determine the issue of the war. If
Great Britain secured American sympathy and support, she would win; if
Great Britain lost this sympathy and support, she would lose. A foreign
policy that would estrange the United States and perhaps even throw its
support to Germany would not only lose the war to Great Britain, but it
would be perhaps the blackest crime in history, for it would mean the
collapse of that British-American coöperation, and the destruction of
those British-American ideals and institutions which are the greatest
facts in the modern world. This conviction was the basis of Sir Edward's
policy from the day that Great Britain declared war. Whatever enemies he
might make in England, the Foreign Secretary was determined to shape his
course so that the support of the United States would be assured to his
country. A single illustration shows the skill and wisdom with which he
pursued this great purpose.
Perhaps nothing in the early days of the war enraged the British
military chiefs more than the fact that cotton was permitted to go from
the United States to Germany. That Germany was using this cotton in the
manufacture of torpedoes to sink British ships and of projectiles to
kill British soldiers in trenches was well known; nor did many people
deny that Great Britain had the right to put cotton on the contraband
list. Yet Grey, in the pursuit of his larger end, refused to take this
step. He knew that the prosperity of the Southern States depended
exclusively upon the cotton crop. He also knew that the South had raised
the 1914 crop with no knowledge that a war was impending and that to
deny the Southern planters their usual access to the German markets
would all but ruin them. He believed that such a ruling would
immediately alienate the sympathy of a large section of the United
States and make our Southern Senators and Congressmen enemies of Great
Britain. Sir Edward was also completely informed of the extent to which
the German-Americans and the Irish-Americans were active and he was
familiar with the aims of American pacifists. He believed that declaring
cotton contraband at this time would bring together in Congress the
Southern Senators and Congressmen, the representatives of the Irish and
the German causes and the pacifists, and that this combination would
exercise an influence that would be disastrous to Great Britain. Two
dangers constantly haunted Sir Edward's mind at this time. One was that
the enemies of Great Britain would assemble enough votes in Congress to
place an embargo upon the shipment of munitions from this country. Such
an embargo might well be fatal to Great Britain, for at this time she
was importing munitions, especially shells, in enormous quantities from
the United States. The other was that such pressure might force the
Government to convoy American cargoes with American warships. Great
Britain then could stop the cargoes only by attacking our cruisers, and
to attack a cruiser is an act of war. Had Congress taken either one of
these steps the Allies would have lost the war in the spring of 1915. At
a cabinet meeting held to consider this question, Sir Edward Grey set
forth this view and strongly advised that cotton should not be made
contraband at that time[91]. The Cabinet supported him and events
justified the decision. Afterward, in Washington, several of the most
influential Senators informed Sir Edward that this action had averted a
great crisis.
This was the motive, which, as will appear as the story of our relations
with Great Britain progresses, inspired the Foreign Secretary in all his
dealings with the United States. His purpose was to use the sea power of
Great Britain to keep war materials and foodstuffs out of Germany, but
never to go to the length of making an unbridgeable gulf between the
United States and Great Britain. The American Ambassador to Great
Britain completely sympathized with this programme. It was Page's
business to protect the rights of the United States, just as it was
Grey's to protect the rights of Great Britain. Both were vigilant in
protecting such rights, and animated differences between the two men on
this point were not infrequent. Great Britain did many absurd and
high-handed things in intercepting American cargoes, and Page was always
active in "protesting" when the basis for the protest actually existed.
But on the great overhanging issue the two men were at one. Like Grey,
Page believed that there were more important things involved than an
occasional cargo of copper or of oil cake. The American Ambassador
thought that the United States should protect its shipping interests,
but that it should realize that maritime law was not an exact science,
that its principles had been modified by every great conflict in which
the blockade had been an effective agency, and that the United States
itself, in the Civil War, had not hesitated to make such changes as the
changed methods of modern transportation had required. In other words he
believed that we could safeguard our rights in a way that would not
prevent Great Britain from keeping war materials and foodstuffs out of
Germany. And like Sir Edward Grey, Page was obliged to contend with
forces at home which maintained a contrary view. In this early period
Mr. Bryan was nominally Secretary of State, but the man who directed the
national policy in shipping matters was Robert Lansing, then counsellor
of the Department. It is somewhat difficult to appraise Mr. Lansing
justly, for in his conduct of his office there was not the slightest
taint of malice. His methods were tactless, the phrasing of his notes
lacked deftness and courtesy, his literary style was crude and
irritating; but Mr. Lansing was not anti-British, he was not pro-German;
he was nothing more nor less than a lawyer. The protection of American
rights at sea was to him simply a "case" in which he had been retained
as counsel for the plaintiff. As a good lawyer it was his business to
score as many points as possible for his client and the more weak joints
he found in the enemy's armour the better did he do his job. It was his
duty to scan the law books, to look up the precedents, to examine facts,
and to prepare briefs that would be unassailable from a technical
standpoint. To Mr. Lansing this European conflict was the opportunity of
a lifetime. He had spent thirty years studying the intricate problems
that now became his daily companions. His mind revelled in such minute
details as ultimate destination, the continuous voyage as applied to
conditional contraband, the searching of cargoes upon the high seas,
belligerent trading through neutral ports, war zones, orders in council,
and all the other jargon of maritime rights in time of war. These topics
engrossed him as completely as the extension of democracy and the
significance of British-American coöperation engrossed all the thoughts
of Page and Grey.
That Page took this larger view is evident from the communications which
he now began sending to the President. One that he wrote on October 15,
1915, is especially to the point. The date is extremely important; so
early had Page formulated the standards that should guide the United
States and so early had he begun his work of attempting to make
President Wilson understand the real nature of the conflict. The
position which Page now assumed was one from which he never departed.
_To the President_
In this great argument about shipping I cannot help being alarmed
because we are getting into deep water uselessly. The Foreign
Office has yielded unquestioningly to all our requests and has
shown the sincerest wish to meet all our suggestions, so long as
it is not called upon to admit war materials into Germany. It will
not give way to us in that. We would not yield it if we were in
their place. Neither would the Germans. England will risk a serious
quarrel or even hostilities with us rather than yield. You may look
upon this as the final word.
Since the last lists of contraband and conditional contraband were
published, such materials as rubber and copper and petroleum have
developed entirely new uses in war. The British simply will not let
Germany import them. Nothing that can be used for war purposes in
Germany now will be used for anything else. Representatives of
Spain, Holland, and all the Scandinavian states agree that they can
do nothing but acquiesce and file protests and claims, and they
admit that Great Britain has the right to revise the list of
contraband. This is not a war in the sense in which we have
hitherto used that word. It is a world-clash of systems of
government, a struggle to the extermination of English civilization
or of Prussian military autocracy. Precedents have gone to the
scrap heap. We have a new measure for military and diplomatic
action. Let us suppose that we press for a few rights to which the
shippers have a theoretical claim. The American people gain nothing
and the result is friction with this country; and that is what a
very small minority of the agitators in the United States would
like. Great Britain can any day close the Channel to all shipping
or can drive Holland to the enemy and blockade her ports.
Let us take a little farther view into the future. If Germany win,
will it make any difference what position Great Britain took on the
Declaration of London? The Monroe Doctrine will be shot through. We
shall have to have a great army and a great navy. But suppose that
England win. We shall then have an ugly academic dispute with her
because of this controversy. Moreover, we shall not hold a good
position for helping to compose the quarrel or for any other
service.
The present controversy seems here, where we are close to the
struggle, academic. It seems to us a petty matter when it is
compared with the grave danger we incur of shutting ourselves off
from a position to be of some service to civilization and to the
peace of mankind.
In Washington you seem to be indulging in a more or less
theoretical discussion. As we see the issue here, it is a matter of
life and death for English-speaking civilization. It is not a happy
time to raise controversies that can be avoided or postponed. We
gain nothing, we lose every chance for useful coöperation for
peace. In jeopardy also are our friendly relations with Great
Britain in the sorest need and the greatest crisis in her history.
I know that this is the correct view. I recommend most earnestly
that we shall substantially accept the new Order in Council or
acquiesce in it and reserve whatever rights we may have. I
recommend prompt information be sent to the British Government of
such action. I should like to inform Grey that this is our
decision.
So far as our neutrality obligations are concerned, I do not
believe that they require us to demand that Great Britain should
adopt for our benefit the Declaration of London. Great Britain has
never ratified it, nor have any other nations except the United
States. In its application to the situation presented by this war
it is altogether to the advantage of Germany.
I have delayed to write you this way too long. I have feared that I
might possibly seem to be influenced by sympathy with England and
by the atmosphere here. But I write of course solely with reference
to our own country's interest and its position after the
reorganization of Europe.
Anderson[92] and Laughlin[93] agree with me emphatically.
WALTER H. PAGE.
II
The immediate cause of this protest was, as its context shows, the fact
that the State Department was insisting that Great Britain should adopt
the Declaration of London as a code of law for regulating its warfare on
German shipping. Hostilities had hardly started when Mr. Bryan made this
proposal; his telegram on this subject is dated August 7, 1914. "You
will further state," said Mr. Bryan, "that this Government believes that
the acceptance of these laws by the belligerents would prevent grave
misunderstandings which may arise as to the relations between
belligerents and neutrals. It therefore hopes that this inquiry may
receive favourable consideration." At the same time Germany and the
other belligerents were asked to adopt this Declaration.
The communication was thus more than a suggestion; it was a
recommendation that was strongly urged. According to Page this telegram
was the first great mistake the American Government made in its
relations with Great Britain. In September, 1916, the Ambassador
submitted to President Wilson a memorandum which he called "Rough notes
toward an explanation of the British feeling toward the United States."
"Of recent years," he said, "and particularly during the first year of
the present Administration, the British feeling toward the United States
was most friendly and cordial. About the time of the repeal of the
tolls clause in the Panama Act, the admiration and friendliness of the
whole British public (governmental and private) reached the highest
point in our history. In considering the change that has taken place
since, it is well to bear this cordiality in mind as a starting point.
When the war came on there was at first nothing to change this attitude.
The hysterical hope of many persons that our Government might protest
against the German invasion of Belgium caused some feeling of
disappointment, but thinking men did not share it; and, if this had been
the sole cause of criticism of us, the criticism would have died out.
The unusually high regard in which the President--and hence our
Government--was then held was to a degree new. The British had for many
years held the people of the United States in high esteem: they had not,
as a rule, so favourably regarded the Government at Washington,
especially in its conduct of foreign relations. They had long regarded
our Government as ignorant of European affairs and amateurish in its
cockiness. When I first got to London I found evidence of this feeling,
even in the most friendly atmosphere that surrounded us. Mr. Bryan was
looked on as a joke. They forgot him--rather, they never took serious
notice of him. But, when the Panama tolls incident was closed, they
regarded the President as his own Foreign Secretary; and thus our
Government as well as our Nation came into this high measure of esteem.
"The war began. We, of course, took a neutral attitude, wholly to their
satisfaction. But we at once interfered--or tried to interfere--by
insisting on the Declaration of London, which no Great Power but the
United States (I think) had ratified and which the British House of
Lords had distinctly rejected. That Declaration would probably have
given a victory to Germany if the Allies had adopted it. In spite of
our neutrality we insisted vigorously on its adoption and aroused a
distrust in our judgment. Thus we started in wrong, so far as the
British Government is concerned."
The rules of maritime warfare which the American State Department so
disastrously insisted upon were the direct outcome of the Hague
Conference of 1907. That assembly of the nations recognized, what had
long been a palpable fact, that the utmost confusion existed in the
operations of warring powers upon the high seas. About the fundamental
principle that a belligerent had the right, if it had the power, to keep
certain materials of commerce from reaching its enemy, there was no
dispute. But as to the particular articles which it could legally
exclude there were as many different ideas as there were nations. That
the blockade, a term which means the complete exclusion of cargoes and
ships from an enemy's ports, was a legitimate means of warfare, was also
an accepted fact, but as to the precise means in which the blockade
could be enforced there was the widest difference of opinion. The Hague
Conference provided that an attempt should be made to codify these laws
into a fixed system, and the representatives of the nations met in
London in 1908, under the presidency of the Earl of Desart, for this
purpose. The outcome of their two months' deliberations was that
document of seven chapters and seventy articles which has ever since
been known as the Declaration of London. Here at last was the thing for
which the world had been waiting so long--a complete system of maritime
law for the regulation of belligerents and the protection of neutrals,
which would be definitely binding upon all nations because all nations
were expected to ratify it.
But the work of all these learned gentlemen was thrown away. The United
States was the only party to the negotiations that put the stamp of
approval upon its labours. All other nations declined to commit
themselves. In Great Britain the Declaration had an especially
interesting course. In that country it became a football of party
politics. The Liberal Government was at first inclined to look upon it
favourably; the Liberal House of Commons actually ratified it. It soon
became apparent, however, that this vote did not represent the opinion
of the British public. In fact, few measures have ever aroused such
hostility as this Declaration, once its details became known. For more
than a year the hubbub against it filled the daily press, the magazines,
the two Houses of Parliament and the hustings; Rudyard Kipling even
wrote a poem denouncing it. The adoption of the Declaration, these
critics asserted, would destroy the usefulness of the British fleet. In
many quarters it was denounced as a German plot--as merely a part of the
preparations which Germany was making for world conquest. The fact is
that the Declaration could not successfully stand the analysis to which
it was now mercilessly submitted; the House of Lords rejected it, and
this action met with more approbation than had for years been accorded
the legislative pronouncements of that chamber. The Liberal House of
Commons was not in the least dissatisfied with this conclusion, for it
realized that it had made a mistake and it was only too happy to be
permitted to forget it.
When the war broke out there was therefore no single aspect of maritime
law which was quite so odious as the Declaration of London. Great
Britain realized that she could never win unless her fleet were
permitted to keep contraband out of Germany and, if necessary,
completely to blockade that country. The two greatest conflicts of the
nineteenth century were the European struggle with Napoleon and the
American Civil War. In both the blockade had been the decisive element,
and that this great agency would similarly determine events in this even
greater struggle was apparent. What enraged the British public against
any suggestion of the Declaration was that it practically deprived Great
Britain of this indispensable means of weakening the enemy. In this
Declaration were drawn up lists of contraband, non-contraband, and
conditional contraband, and all of these, in English eyes, worked to the
advantage of Germany and against the advantage of Great Britain. How
absurd this classification was is evident from the fact that airplanes
were not listed as absolute contraband of war. Germany's difficulty in
getting copper was one of the causes of her collapse; yet the
Declaration put copper for ever on the non-contraband list; had this new
code been adopted, Germany could have imported enormous quantities from
this country, instead of being compelled to reinforce her scanty supply
by robbing housewives of their kitchen utensils, buildings of their
hardware, and church steeples of their bells. Germany's constant
scramble for rubber formed a diverting episode in the struggle; there
are indeed few things so indispensable in modern warfare; yet the
Declaration included rubber among the innocent articles and thus opened
up to Germany the world's supply. But the most serious matter was that
the Declaration would have prevented Great Britain from keeping
foodstuffs out of the Fatherland.
When Mr. Bryan, therefore, blandly asked Great Britain to accept the
Declaration as its code of maritime warfare, he was asking that country
to accept a document which Great Britain, in peace time, had repudiated
and which would, in all probability, have caused that country to lose
the war. The substance of this request was bad enough, but the language
in which it was phrased made matters much worse. It appears that only
the intervention of Colonel House prevented the whole thing from
becoming a tragedy.
_From Edward M. House_
115 East 53rd Street,
New York City.
October 3, 1914.
HIS EXCELLENCY,
The American Ambassador, London, England.
DEAR PAGE:
. . . I have just returned from Washington where I was with the
President for nearly four days. He is looking well and is well.
Sometimes his spirits droop, but then, again, he is his normal
self.
I had the good fortune to be there at a time when the discussion of
the Declaration of London had reached a critical stage. Bryan was
away and Lansing, who had not mentioned the matter to Sir
Cecil[94], prepared a long communication to you which he sent to
the President for approval. The President and I went over it and I
strongly urged not sending it until I could have a conference with
Sir Cecil. I had this conference the next day without the knowledge
of any one excepting the President, and had another the day
following. Sir Cecil told me that if the dispatch had gone to you
as written and you had shown it to Sir Edward Grey, it would almost
have been a declaration of war; and that if, by any chance, the
newspapers had got hold of it as they so often get things from our
State Department, the greatest panic would have prevailed. He said
it would have been the Venezuela incident magnified by present
conditions.
At the President's suggestion, Lansing then prepared a cablegram
to you. This, too, was objectionable and the President and I
together softened it down into the one you received.
Faithfully yours,
E.M. HOUSE.
In justice to Mr. Lansing, a passage in a later letter of Colonel House
must be quoted: "It seems that Lansing did not write the particular
dispatch to you that was objected to. Someone else prepared it and
Lansing rather too hastily submitted it to the President, with the
result you know."
This suppressed communication is probably for ever lost, but its tenor
may perhaps be gathered from instructions which were actually sent to
the Ambassador about this time. After eighteen typewritten pages of not
too urbanely expressed discussion of the Declaration of London and the
general subject of contraband, Page was instructed to call the British
Government's attention to the consequences which followed shipping
troubles in previous times. It is hard to construe this in any other way
than as a threat to Great Britain of a repetition of 1812:
_Confidential_. You will not fail to impress upon His
Excellency[95] the gravity of the issues which the enforcement of
the Order in Council seems to presage, and say to him in substance
as follows:
It is a matter of grave concern to this Government that the
particular conditions of this unfortunate war should be considered
by His Britannic Majesty's Government to be such as to justify them
in advancing doctrines and advocating practices which in the past
aroused strong opposition on the part of the Government of the
United States, and bitter feeling among the American people. This
Government feels bound to express the fear, though it does so
reluctantly, that the publicity, which must be given to the rules
which His Majesty's Government announce that they intend to
enforce, will awaken memories of controversies, which it is the
earnest desire of the United States to forget or to pass over in
silence. . . .
Germany, of course, promptly accepted the Declaration, for the
suggestion fitted in perfectly with her programme; but Great Britain was
not so acquiescent. Four times was Page instructed to ask the British
Government to accede unconditionally, and four times did the Foreign
Office refuse. Page was in despair. In the following letter he notified
Colonel House that if he were instructed again to move in this matter he
would resign his ambassadorship.
_To Edward M. House_
American Embassy, London,
October 22, 1914.
DEAR HOUSE:
This is about the United States and England. Lets get that settled
before we try our hands at making peace in Europe.
One of our greatest assets is the friendship of Great Britain, and
our friendship is a still bigger asset for her, and she knows it
and values it. Now, if either country should be damfool enough to
throw this away because old Stone[96] roars in the Senate about
something that hasn't happened, then this crazy world would be
completely mad all round, and there would be no good-will left on
earth at all.
The case is plain enough to me. England is going to keep
war-materials out of Germany as far as she can. We'd do it in her
place. Germany would do it. Any nation would do it. That's all she
has declared her intention of doing. And, if she be let alone,
she'll do it in a way to give us the very least annoyance possible;
for she'll go any length to keep our friendship and good will. And
_she has not confiscated a single one of our cargoes even of
unconditional contraband_. She has stopped some of them and bought
them herself, but confiscated not one. All right; what do we do? We
set out on a comprehensive plan to regulate the naval warfare of
the world and we up and ask 'em all, "Now, boys, all be good, damn
you, and agree to the Declaration of London."
"Yah," says Germany, "if England will."
Now Germany isn't engaged in naval warfare to count, and she never
even paid the slightest attention to the Declaration all these
years. But she saw that it would hinder England and help her now,
by forbidding England to stop certain very important war materials
from reaching Germany. "Yah," said Germany. But England said that
her Parliament had rejected the Declaration in times of peace and
that she could now hardly be expected to adopt it in the face of
this Parliamentary rejection. But, to please us, she agreed to
adopt it with only two changes.
Then Lansing to the bat:
"No, no," says Lansing, "you've got to adopt it all."
Four times he's made me ask for its adoption, the last time coupled
with a proposition that if England would adopt it, she might issue
a subsequent proclamation saying that, since the Declaration is
contradictory, she will construe it her own way, and the United
States will raise no objection!
Then he sends eighteen pages of fine-spun legal arguments (not all
sound by any means) against the sections of the English
proclamations that have been put forth, giving them a strained and
unfriendly interpretation.
In a word, England has acted in a friendly way to us and will so
act, if we allow her. But Lansing, instead of trusting to her good
faith and reserving all our rights under international law and
usage, imagines that he can force her to agree to a code that the
Germans now agree to because, in Germany's present predicament, it
will be especially advantageous to Germany. Instead of trusting
her, he assumes that she means to do wrong and proceeds to try to
bind her in advance. He hauls her up and tries her in court--that's
his tone.
Now the relations that I have established with Sir Edward Grey have
been built up on frankness, fairness and friendship. I can't have
relations of any other sort nor can England and the United States
have relations of any other sort. This is the place we've got to
now. Lansing seems to assume that the way to an amicable agreement
is through an angry controversy.
Lansing's method is the trouble. He treats Great Britain, to start
with, as if she were a criminal and an opponent. That's the best
way I know to cause trouble to American shipping and to bring back
the good old days of mutual hatred and distrust for a generation or
two. If that isn't playing into the hands of the Germans, what
would be? And where's the "neutrality" of this kind of action?
See here: If we let England go on, we can throw the whole
responsibility on her and reserve all our rights under
international law and usage and claim damages (and get 'em) for
every act of injury, if acts of injury occur; and we can keep her
friendship and good-will. Every other neutral nation is doing that.
Or we can insist on regulating all naval warfare and have a quarrel
and refer it to a Bryan-Peace-Treaty Commission and claim at most
the selfsame damages with a less chance to get 'em. We can get
damages without a quarrel; or we can have a quarrel and probably
get damages. Now, why, in God's name, should we provoke a quarrel?
The curse of the world is little men who for an imagined small
temporary advantage throw away the long growth of good-will
nurtured by wise and patient men and who cannot see the lasting and
far greater future evil they do. Of all the years since 1776 this
great war-year is the worst to break the 100 years of our peace, or
even to ruffle it. I pray you, good friend, get us out of these
incompetent lawyer-hands.
Now about the peace of Europe. Nothing can yet be done, perhaps
nothing now can ever be done by us. The Foreign Office doubts our
wisdom and prudence since Lansing came into action. The whole
atmosphere is changing. One more such move and they will conclude
that Dernburg and Bernstorff have seduced us--without our knowing
it, to be sure; but their confidence in our judgment will be gone.
God knows I have tried to keep this confidence intact and our good
friendship secure. But I have begun to get despondent over the
outlook since the President telegraphed me that Lansing's proposal
would settle the matter. I still believe he did not understand
it--he couldn't have done so. Else he could not have approved it.
But that tied my hands. If Lansing again brings up the Declaration
of London--after four flat and reasonable rejections--I shall
resign. I will not be the instrument of a perfectly gratuitous and
ineffective insult to this patient and fair and friendly
government and people who in my time have done us many kindnesses
and never an injury but Carden[97], and who sincerely try now to
meet our wishes. It would be too asinine an act ever to merit
forgiveness or ever to be forgotten. I should blame myself the rest
of my life. It would grieve Sir Edward more than anything except
this war. It would knock the management of foreign affairs by this
Administration into the region of sheer idiocy. I'm afraid any
peace talk from us, as it is, would merely be whistling down the
wind. If we break with England--not on any case or act of violence
to our shipping--but on a useless discussion, in advance, of
general principles of conduct during the war--just for a
discussion--we've needlessly thrown away our great chance to be of
some service to this world gone mad. If Lansing isn't stopped,
that's what he will do. Why doesn't the President see Spring Rice?
Why don't you take him to see him?
Good night, my good friend. I still have hope that the President
himself will take this in hand.
Yours always,
W.H.P.
The letters and the cablegrams which Page was sending to Colonel House
and the State Department at this time evidently ended the matter. By the
middle of October the two nations were fairly deadlocked. Sir Edward
Grey's reply to the American proposal had been an acceptance of the
Declaration of London with certain modifications. For the list of
contraband in the Declaration he had submitted the list already adopted
by Great Britain in its Order in Council, and he had also rejected that
article which made it impossible for Great Britain to apply the
doctrine of "continuous voyage" to conditional contraband. The modified
acceptance, declared Mr. Lansing, was a practical rejection--as of
course it was, and as it was intended to be. So the situation remained
for several exciting weeks, the State Department insisting on the
Declaration in full, precisely as the legal luminaries had published it
five years before, the Foreign Office courteously but inflexibly
refusing to accede. Only the cordial personal relations which prevailed
between Grey and Page prevented the crisis from producing the most
disastrous results. Finally, on October 17th, Page proposed by cable an
arrangement which he hoped would settle the matter. This was that the
King should issue a proclamation accepting the Declaration with
practically the modifications suggested above, and that a new Order in
Council should be issued containing a new list of contraband. Sir Edward
Grey was not to ask the American Government to accept this proclamation;
all that he asked was that Washington should offer no objections to it.
It was proposed that the United States at the same time should publish a
note withdrawing its suggestion for the adoption of the Declaration, and
explaining that it proposed to rest the rights of its citizens upon the
existing rules of international law and the treaties of the United
States. This solution was accepted. It was a defeat for Mr. Lansing, of
course, but he had no alternative. The relief that Page felt is shown in
the following memorandum, written soon after the tension had ceased:
* * * * *
"That insistence on the Declaration entire came near to upsetting the
whole kettle of fish. It put on me the task of insisting on a general
code--at a time when the fiercest war in history was every day becoming
fiercer and more desperate--which would have prevented the British from
putting on their contraband list several of the most important war
materials--accompanied by a proposal that would have angered every
neutral nation through which supplies can possibly reach Germany and
prevented this Government from making friendly working arrangements with
them; and, after Sir Edward Grey had flatly declined for these reasons,
I had to continue to insist. I confess it did look as if we were
determined to dictate to him how he should conduct the war--and in a way
that distinctly favoured the Germans.
"I presented every insistence; for I should, of course, not have been
excusable if I had failed in any case vigorously to carry out my
instructions. But every time I plainly saw matters getting worse and
worse; and I should have failed of my duty also if I had not so informed
the President and the Department. I can conceive of no more awkward
situation for an Ambassador or for any other man under Heaven. I turned
the whole thing over in my mind backward and forward a hundred times
every day. For the first time in this stress and strain, I lost my
appetite and digestion and did not know the day of the week nor what
month it was--seeing the two governments rushing toward a very serious
clash, which would have made my mission a failure and done the
Administration much hurt, and have sowed the seeds of bitterness for
generations to come.
"One day I said to Anderson (whose assistance is in many ways
invaluable): 'Of course nobody is infallible--least of all we. Is it
possible that we are mistaken? You and Laughlin and I, who are close to
it all, are absolutely agreed. But may there not be some important
element in the problem that we do not see? Summon and nurse every doubt
that you can possibly muster up of the correctness of our view, put
yourself on the defensive, recall every mood you may have had of the
slightest hesitation, and tell me to-morrow of every possible weak place
there may be in our judgment and conclusions.' The next day Anderson
handed me seventeen reasons why it was unwise to persist in this demand
for the adoption of the Declaration of London. Laughlin gave a similar
opinion. I swear I spent the night in searching every nook and corner of
my mind and I was of the same opinion the next morning. There was
nothing to do then but the most unwelcome double duty: (1) Of continuing
to carry out instructions, at every step making a bad situation worse
and running the risk of a rupture (which would be the only great crime
that now remains uncommitted in the world); and (2) of trying to
persuade our own Government that this method was the wrong method to
pursue. I know it is not my business to make policies, but I conceive it
to be my business to report when they fail or succeed. Now if I were
commanded to look throughout the whole universe for the most unwelcome
task a man may have, I think I should select this. But, after all, a man
has nothing but his own best judgment to guide him; and, if he follow
that and fail--that's all he _can_ do. I do reverently thank God that we
gave up that contention. We may have trouble yet, doubtless we shall,
but it will not be trouble of our own making, as that was.
"Tyrrell[98] came into the reception room at the Foreign Office the day
after our withdrawal, while I was waiting to see Sir Edward Grey, and he
said: 'I wish to tell you personally--just privately between you and
me--how infinite a relief it is to us all that your Government has
withdrawn that demand. We couldn't accept it; our refusal was not
stubborn nor pig-headed: it was a physical necessity in order to carry
on the war with any hope of success.' Then, as I was going out, he
volunteered this remark: 'I make this guess--that that programme was not
the work of the President but of some international prize court
enthusiast (I don't know who) who had failed to secure the adoption of
the Declaration when parliaments and governments could discuss it at
leisure and who hoped to jam it through under the pressure of war and
thus get his prize court international.' I made no answer for several
reasons, one of which is, I do not know whose programme it was. All that
I know is that I have here, on my desk at my house, a locked dispatch
book half full of telegrams and letters insisting on it, which I do not
wish (now at least) to put in the Embassy files, and the sight of which
brings the shuddering memory of the worst nightmare I have ever
suffered.
"Now we can go on, without being a party to any general programme, but
in an independent position vigorously stand up for every right and
privilege under law and usage and treaties; and we have here a
government that we can deal with frankly and not (I hope) in a mood to
suspect us of wishing to put it at a disadvantage for the sake of a
general code or doctrine. A land and naval and air and submarine battle
(the greatest battle in the history of the belligerent race of man)
within 75 miles of the coast of England, which hasn't been invaded since
1066 and is now in its greatest danger since that time; and this is no
time I fear, to force a great body of doctrine on Great Britain. God
knows I'm afraid some American boat will run on a mine somewhere in the
Channel or the North Sea. There's war there as there is on land in
Germany. Nobody tries to get goods through on land on the continent, and
they make no complaints that commerce is stopped. Everybody tries to ply
the Channel and the North Sea as usual, both of which have German and
English mines and torpedo craft and submarines almost as thick as
batteries along the hostile camps on land. The British Government (which
now issues marine insurance) will not insure a British boat to carry
food to Holland en route to the starving Belgians; and I hear that no
government and no insurance company will write insurance for anything
going across the North Sea. I wonder if the extent and ferocity and
danger of this war are fully realized in the United States?
"There is no chance yet effectively to talk of peace[99]. The British
believe that their civilization and their Empire are in grave danger.
They are drilling an army of a million men here for next spring; more
and more troops come from all the Colonies, where additional enlistments
are going on. They feel that to stop before a decisive result is reached
would simply be provoking another war, after a period of dread such as
they have lived through the last ten years; a large and increasing
proportion of the letters you see are on black-bordered paper and this
whole island is becoming a vast hospital and prisoners' camp--all which,
so far from bringing them to think of peace, urges them to renewed
effort; and all the while the bitterness grows.
"The Straus incident' produced the impression here that it was a German
trick to try to shift the responsibility of continuing the war, to the
British shoulders. Mr. Sharp's bare mention of peace in Paris caused the
French censor to forbid the transmission of a harmless interview; and
our insistence on the Declaration left, for the time being at least, a
distinct distrust of our judgment and perhaps even of our good-will. It
was suspected--I am sure--that the German influence in Washington had
unwittingly got influence over the Department. The atmosphere (toward
me) is as different now from what it was a week ago as Arizona sunshine
is from a London fog, as much as to say, 'After all, perhaps, you don't
_mean_ to try to force us to play into the hands of our enemies!'"
III
And so this crisis was passed; it was the first great service that Page
had rendered the cause of the Allies and his own country. Yet shipping
difficulties had their more agreeable aspects. Had it not been for the
fact that both Page and Grey had an understanding sense of humour,
neutrality would have proved a more difficult path than it actually was.
Even amid the tragic problems with which these two men were dealing
there was not lacking an occasional moment's relaxation into the lighter
aspect of things. One of the curious memorials preserved in the British
Foreign Office is the cancelled $15,000,000 check with which Great
Britain paid the _Alabama_ claims. That the British should frame this
memento of their great diplomatic defeat and hang it in the Foreign
Office is an evidence of the fact that in statesmanship, as in less
exalted matters, the English are excellent sports. The real
justification of the honour paid to this piece of paper, of course, is
that the settlement of the _Alabama_ claims by arbitration signalized a
great forward step in international relations and did much to heal a
century's troubles between the United States and Great Britain. Sir
Edward Grey used frequently to call Page's attention to this document.
It represented the amount of money, then considered large, which Great
Britain had paid the United States for the depredations on American
shipping for which she was responsible during the Civil War.
One day the two men were discussing certain detentions of American
cargoes--high-handed acts which, in Page's opinion, were unwarranted.
Not infrequently, in the heat of discussion, Page would get up and pace
the floor. And on this occasion his body, as well as his mind, was in a
state of activity. Suddenly his eye was attracted by the framed Alabama
check. He leaned over, peered at it intensely, and then quickly turned
to the Foreign Secretary:
"If you don't stop these seizures, Sir Edward, some day you'll have your
entire room papered with things like that!"
Not long afterward Sir Edward in his turn scored on Page. The Ambassador
called to present one of the many State Department notes. The occasion
was an embarrassing one, for the communication was written in the
Department's worst literary style. It not infrequently happened that
these notes, in the form in which Page received them, could not be
presented to the British Government; they were so rasping and
undiplomatic that Page feared that he would suffer the humiliation of
having them returned, for there are certain things which no
self-respecting Foreign Office will accept. On such occasions it was the
practice of the London Embassy to smooth down the language before
handing the paper to the Foreign Secretary. The present note was one of
this kind; but Page, because of his friendly relations with Grey,
decided to transmit the communication in its original shape.
Sir Edward glanced over the document, looked up, and remarked, with a
twinkle in his eye,--
"This reads as though they thought that they are still talking to George
the Third."
The roar of laughter that followed was something quite unprecedented
amid the thick and dignified walls of the Foreign Office.
One of Page's most delicious moments came, however, after the Ministry
of Blockade had been formed, with Lord Robert Cecil in charge. Lord
Robert was high minded and conciliatory, but his knowledge of American
history was evidently not without its lapses. One day, in discussing the
ill-feeling aroused in the United States by the seizure of American
cargoes, Page remarked banteringly:
"You must not forget the Boston Tea Party, Lord Robert."
The Englishman looked up, rather puzzled.
"But you must remember, Mr. Page, that I have never been in Boston. I
have never attended a tea party there."
It has been said that the tact and good sense of Page and Grey, working
sympathetically for the same end, avoided many an impending crisis. The
trouble caused early in 1915 by the ship _Dacia_ and the way in which
the difficulty was solved, perhaps illustrate the value of this
coöperation at its best. In the early days of the War Congress passed a
bill admitting foreign ships to American registry. The wisdom and even
the "neutrality" of such an act were much questioned at the time.
Colonel House, in one of his early telegrams to the President, declared
that this bill "is full of lurking dangers." Colonel House was right.
The trouble was that many German merchant ships were interned in
American harbours, fearing to put to sea, where the watchful British
warships lay waiting for them. Any attempt to place these vessels under
the American flag, and to use them for trade between American and German
ports, would at once cause a crisis with the Allies, for such a paper
change in ownership would be altogether too transparent. Great Britain
viewed this legislation with disfavour, but did not think it politic to
protest such transfers generally; Spring Rice contented himself with
informing the State Department that his government would not object so
long as this changed status did not benefit Germany. If such German
ships, after being transferred to the American flag, engaged in commerce
between American ports and South American ports, or other places
remotely removed from the Fatherland, Great Britain would make no
difficulty. The _Dacia_, a merchantman of the Hamburg-America line, had
been lying at her wharf in Port Arthur, Texas, since the outbreak of the
war. In early January, 1915, she was purchased by Mr. E.N. Breitung, of
Marquette, Michigan. Mr. Breitung caused great excitement in the
newspapers when he announced that he had placed the _Dacia_ under
American registry, according to the terms of this new law, had put upon
her an American crew, and that he proposed to load her with cotton and
sail for Germany. The crisis had now arisen which the well-wishers of
Great Britain and the United States had so dreaded. Great Britain's
position was a difficult one. If it acquiesced, the way would be opened
for placing under American registry all the German and Austrian ships
that were then lying unoccupied in American ports and using them in
trade between the United States and the Central Powers. If Great Britain
seized the _Dacia_, then there was the likelihood that this would
embroil her with the American Government--and this would serve German
purposes quite as well.
Sir Cecil Spring Rice, the British Ambassador at Washington, at once
notified Washington that the _Dacia_ would be seized if she sailed for a
German port. The cotton which she intended to carry was at that time not
contraband, but the vessel itself Was German and was thus subject to
apprehension as enemy property. The seriousness of this position was
that technically the _Dacia_ was now an American ship, for an American
citizen owned her, she carried an American crew, she bore on her
flagstaff the American flag, and she had been admitted to American
registry under a law recently passed by Congress. How could the United
States sit by quietly and permit this seizure to take place? When the
_Dacia_ sailed on January 23rd the excitement was keen; the voyage had
obtained a vast amount of newspaper advertising, and the eyes of the
world were fixed upon her. German sympathizers attributed the attitude
of the American Government in permitting the vessel to sail as a "dare"
to Great Britain, and the fact that Great Britain had announced her
intention of taking up this "dare" made the situation still more tense.
When matters had reached this pass Page one day dropped into the Foreign
Office.
"Have you ever heard of the British fleet, Sir Edward?" he asked.
Grey admitted that he had, though the question obviously puzzled him.
"Yes," Page went on musingly. "We've all heard of the British fleet.
Perhaps we have heard too much about it. Don't you think it's had too
much advertising?"
The Foreign Secretary looked at Page with an expression that implied a
lack of confidence in his sanity.
"But have you ever heard of the French fleet?" the American went on.
"France has a fleet too, I believe."
Sir Edward granted that.
"Don't you think that the French fleet ought to have a little
advertising?"
"What on earth are you talking about?"
"Well," said Page, "there's the _Dacia_. Why not let the French fleet
seize it and get some advertising?"
A gleam of understanding immediately shot across Grey's face. The old
familiar twinkle came into his eye.
"Yes," he said, "why not let the Belgian royal yacht seize it?"
This suggestion from Page was one of the great inspirations of the war.
It amounted to little less than genius. By this time Washington was
pretty wearied of the _Dacia_, for mature consideration had convinced
the Department that Great Britain had the right on its side. Washington
would have been only too glad to find a way out of the difficult
position into which it had been forced, and this Page well understood.
But this government always finds itself in an awkward plight in any
controversy with Great Britain, because the hyphenates raise such a
noise that it has difficulty in deciding such disputes upon their
merits. To ignore the capture of this ship by the British would have
brought all this hullabaloo again about the ears of the Administration.
But the position of France is entirely different; the memories of
Lafayette and Rochambeau still exercise a profound spell on the American
mind; France does not suffer from the persecution of hyphenate
populations, and Americans will stand even outrages from France without
getting excited. Page knew that if the British seized the _Dacia_, the
cry would go up in certain quarters for immediate war, but that, if
France committed the same crime, the guns of the adversary would be
spiked. It was purely a case of sentiment and "psychology." And so the
event proved. His suggestion was at once acted on; a French cruiser went
out into the Channel, seized the offending ship, took it into port,
where a French prize court promptly condemned it. The proceeding did not
cause even a ripple of hostility. The _Dacia_ was sold to Frenchmen,
rechristened the _Yser_ and put to work in the Mediterranean trade. The
episode was closed in the latter part of 1915 when a German submarine
torpedoed the vessel and sent it to the bottom.
Such was the spirit which Page and Sir Edward Grey brought to the
solution of the great shipping problems of 1914-1917. There is much more
to tell of this great task of "waging neutrality," and it will be told
in its proper place. But already it is apparent to what extent these two
men served the great cause of English-speaking civilization. Neither
would quibble or uphold an argument which he thought unjust, even though
his nation might gain in a material sense, and neither would pitch the
discussion in any other key than forbearance and mutual accommodation
and courtliness. For both men had the same end in view. They were both
thinking, not of the present, but of the coming centuries. The
coöperation of the two nations in meeting the dangers of autocracy and
Prussian barbarism, in laying the foundations of a future in which
peace, democracy, and international justice should be the directing
ideas of human society--such was the ultimate purpose at which these two
statesmen aimed. And no men have ever been more splendidly justified by
events. The Anglo-American situation of 1914 contained dangers before
which all believers in real progress now shudder. Had Anglo-American
diplomacy been managed with less skill and consideration, the United
States and Great Britain would have become involved in a quarrel beside
which all their previous differences would have appeared insignificant.
Mutual hatreds and hostilities would have risen that would have
prevented the entrance of the United States into the war on the side of
the Allies. It is not inconceivable that the history of 1812 would have
been repeated, and that the men and resources of this country might have
been used to support purposes which have always been hateful to the
American conscience. That the world was saved from this calamity is
owing largely to the fact that Great Britain had in its Foreign Office a
man who was always solving temporary irritations with his eyes
constantly fixed upon a great goal, and that the United States had as
ambassador in London a man who had the most exalted view of the mission
of his country, who had dedicated his life to the world-wide spread of
the American ideal, and who believed that an indispensable part of this
work was the maintenance of a sympathetic and helpful coöperation with
the English-speaking peoples.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 90: In a letter addressed to "My fellow Countrymen" and
presented to the Senate by Mr. Chilton.]
[Footnote 91: This was in October, 1914. In August, 1915, when
conditions had changed, cotton was declared contraband.]
[Footnote 92: Mr. Chandler P. Anderson, of New York, at this time
advising the American Embassy on questions of international law.]
[Footnote 93: Mr. Irwin Laughlin, first secretary of the Embassy.]
[Footnote 94: Sir Cecil Spring Rice, British Ambassador at Washington.]
[Footnote 95: Sir Edward Grey.]
[Footnote 96: Senator William J. Stone, perhaps the leading spokesman of
the pro-German cause in the United States Senate. Senator Stone
represented Missouri, a state with a large German-American element.]
[Footnote 97: See Chapter VII.]
[Footnote 98: Private secretary to Sir Edward Grey.]
[Footnote 99: The reference is to an attempt by Germany to start peace
negotiations in September, 1914, after the Battle of the Marne. This is
described in the next chapter.]