Up to the end of the Fourth Loan, which coincided with the negotiations

for the Armistice, $16,971,909,050 had been paid in and this helped to

save life to an extent that we can only imagine. It was the confident

expectation when the Americans halted the German onslaught at

Château-Thierry that the end of the war would come in the following

spring. None dared to hope that it would come before Christmas. When the

crash came in November, even the Allied commanders were bewildered by

its suddenness. Had the war been prolonged to the spring of 1919, it is

certain that we would have paid a large toll in lives. Some have

estimated that 100,000 more of our young men would have been sacrificed.

That the war did not drag along for six months more may be ascribed in

part to the effect that the demonstrated loyalty of the Liberty Loan

Army had upon German morale. We know that the Germans fed lies to their

own troops and dropped pamphlets with these same falsehoods into our own

trenches. They tried to convince their own and our men that the Loans

had no support.

MOBILIZING THE LIBERTY LOAN ARMY

When at 11 o'clock on November 11, 1918, peace dawned upon a war-sick

world we had 2,000,000 men in Europe, and as many more on this side

putting themselves in readiness to go across. On the seas we had close

to 300,000 men. This tremendous force was welded into form in the

nineteen months we were in the war. Yet within a few months after our

entrance into the war there were more than this total in the Liberty

Loan Army. The list of subscribers to the First Liberty Loan which

closed two months after our entry had 4,500,000 names.

And this number remained for the duration of the war, giving every penny

they could spare, mortgaging their property, committing themselves to

personal privations. When the Second Loan books were totalled in

November the number had increased to 9,500,000, and it leaped to

17,000,000 in the Third. In the Fourth--the last loan of war-time--it

had grown to 22,777,680 and in the Fifth which closed six months after

the armistice, it finished with 12,000,000 names.

As in the Army, where organization is half the battle, it was through

organization of the enthusiasm and the deep fervor of the American

people that success came in this big venture. We had to create a state

of mind, we had to educate the American public in finance--which in

itself appeared an insuperable task--we had to marshal resources on a

scale such as never before had been attempted, and we had to map out a

sales campaign that would comprehend millions of persons. There were no

precedents to go by; the example set in Europe could not have

application in the United States because of temperamental and financial

differences; the flotation of the loans in the Civil War afforded no

practicable working basis. It was pioneering, and this fact was made

clear in the first conference held in Washington when Secretary of the

Treasury William G. McAdoo called together the financial leaders of the

country.

[Illustration: A Poster Used During the Fourth Liberty Loan Campaign]

Only three weeks were allowed to prepare for the First Loan Drive. As

soon as we had decided to get into the war, this decision carried with

it the determination to go in to the limit of our resources. The

Secretary of the Treasury informed the bankers that the first issue

would be for $2,000,000,000 and this would be merely the forerunner of a

succession of loans in larger amounts. The bonds were to be put on the

market at three and a half percent. and the campaigns were to be

conducted according to the territories of the Federal Reserve districts,

twelve in all.

"It is quite likely," said the Secretary of the Treasury, "that

we could induce a group of men to take up this loan but that

would compromise the country before the world. We must sell to

the public in such numbers that there shall exist no doubt

among our enemies that our people are back of the Government as

a unit in this war."

The men whom he addressed were all recognized as organizers, all had

been identified with big business. However, few of them had had the

general contact with the public so essential to popularizing the loan.

They knew how to sell, but not in small denominations or to millions of

purchasers. In an abstract sense they realized the value of advertising

and newspaper publicity, but not one of them had the remotest idea of

how the ideal of Secretary McAdoo could be realized.

ORGANIZING THE FIRST DRIVE

It was at this point that their resourcefulness came into play. Their

first move was the right one; they engaged specialists to undertake the

tasks of which they knew little. They addressed themselves to the public

through men skilled in establishing such contacts as are given through

advertising, publicity, and canvassing. In the brief time allotted to

them, they barely had time to surround themselves with this trained

talent.

Verily, it was shooting in the dark, a process of hit and miss. Some one

said that the campaign in the First Loan was planned as we went along,

and that is literally true. The patriotism was there--that was an

unquestionable fact; the problem was to make it manifest itself in

sacrifice of savings and earnings. The work of the whole three weeks was

experimental and the country was the laboratory. Let it be said that the

alchemy of patriotism transmuted the hearts and minds of the public into

pure gold. Once the people were informed of their duty toward the United

States they rallied instantly.

Newspapers turned over their columns, advertisers offered their precious

space--and it was precious in those days of paper shortage; stores and

banks opened booths for sales, public speakers cancelled every other

engagement that they might participate, factories strove to enlist every

person in their employment as purchasers, clubs responded in whole

memberships, women's committees were formed for the acceleration of

interest, churches consecrated themselves to the project, trade unions

abandoned all differences with employers and allied themselves

unselfishly, writers pleaded for a chance to exercise their influence,

foreign language groups demanded opportunity to prove their Americanism,

actors, singers, and lecturers begged for a place in the campaign.

Wholeheartedly and with utter disregard of personal sacrifice this vast

aggregation committed itself to the task. The initial momentum gave the

drive the force of an avalanche that swept everything else aside. There

came times during this first drive when the issue seemed in doubt, but

this was due more to an excess of enthusiasm than to a lack of support.

When the totals were in, it was realized that these misgivings were due

to the physical inability of the tabulators to keep abreast of the tide

of subscriptions. The subscriptions went to $3,035,226,850.

It had been said that the first campaign in its directive agencies was

largely hit and miss. When it was over the strikes were recorded and the

misses eliminated for the preliminary work of the Second Loan which was

to follow in October. Out of the mass was evolved a system of methods

that served as the groundwork of the real organization. The results

afforded a working basis that would have carried a dozen loans through,

granting that the people remained faithful to their patriotism.

THE APPEAL

Let it be admitted that in the first loan there was no defined appeal.

We were in the war and in to win, that was sufficient. It was foreseen

that the psychology of the public must have a central theme for the next

loan to which it must respond. The Second campaign began on October 1,

1917, after the embarkation of the nucleus of the vast army that

eventually was to overwhelm the foe. None of them yet had been called

into action. The keynote of this drive was the education of the people

on the meaning of a German victory. We had before us the ghastly stories

of what the Germans had done in Belgium and in France; we had to throw

ourselves into the conflict to keep our own homes safe.

The eyes of all Europe, our Allies and our enemies, were upon us. It was

clear that by the results at home we would be judged, as we had not yet

had the opportunity to show ourselves in the field. For four weeks and a

day the campaign went on, this time for $3,000,000,000. The appeal which

touched the heartstrings of all persons served a double purpose. Not

only did it carry the message of the Loan, but it knit closer the

sentiment of the whole American people to the purposes of the war.

Through its constant reiteration it had the effect of a prayer and like

a prayer gained added meaning with deeper thought.

Thought was compelled through its manifold repetitions. All the

functions of life were linked with it, all the recreations, all the

relaxations embodied it in part. It formed the backbone of conversation,

it became a part of every daily activity. It assailed the eye at every

turn, it smote the ear constantly, it crashed into consciousnesses in

every conceivable form. Through a strange paradox it linked a fear and a

hope. It embraced the whole gamut of emotions.

GROWING RESPONSE

Again there was a resounding response. In the First Loan the

subscriptions were limited to the actual amount of the issue, but in

the Second all subscriptions were accepted. The number of those who

took bonds was increased more than 100 percent.--it reached 9,500,000,

to be exact, and the $3,000,000,000 issue went to $3,808,766,150.

So it was in the Third, which was put before the public on the

anniversary of our entrance into the war. At this time our men had gone

into the trenches which in itself made the war our own in its most

serious meaning. This was intensified throughout the land by the

operation of the Selective Service Act. The draft had entered almost

every home; many of those who had qualified in the first call were at

that time in France. Casualty lists were beginning to appear in the

newspapers.

It needed only this fact--the fact in itself was its own appeal--to

bring out the finest in our people. All previous sentiment faded into

insignificance compared with the solemnity of the actual participation.

The resources that we had been led to believe had been plumbed to their

depths were now revealed to us as inexhaustible. Giving seemed to be the

poorest means of showing how the country was touched; the people gave as

if in despair because this was all they might do.

The campaign had been for $3,000,000,000 and it brought in returns of

$4,170,069,650 from 17,000,000 men, women and children in the United

States; men, who regretted that this was all they might give to their

country's need; women, who offered with each dollar a passionate prayer

that it might help the men now matching themselves against the foe, and

children, who realized with joy that they were becoming part of the

world's greatest war.

FOURTH LIBERTY LOAN

Before the Fourth Loan the Rolls of Honor in the daily newspapers were

carrying a lengthening list of those who had paid the supreme sacrifice.

In the training camps more and more hundreds of thousands of drafted men

were preparing themselves to take their places on the line; the sea

lanes were crowded with troopships, each bearing the best of our country

away. There had been a depressing period when Ludendorff's men seemed to

carry everything before them, when the coast ports of France seemed

menaced, but before the bugle called the non-combatants at home to

attention again our boys had turned the tide at Château-Thierry and now

were in full cry after the fugitive enemy.

[Illustration: A Poster for the Third Liberty Loan Campaign]

On September 27, 1918, the call for the Fourth Loan came and it seemed

at the time as if it had been postponed too long because the foe was

crumbling. President Wilson sounded the tocsin in the Metropolitan Opera

House in New York City. This time the appeal was to drive home the

finishing blows, to demonstrate to the crumbling empire of the

Hohenzollerns that here was a people undivided and unafraid.

The campaign was carried through in a veritable ecstasy of delight.

Where before there had been the spirit to give in order to wage the war

to any length, here was the spirit to bring the end swiftly and

splendidly, to crown the triumphs of our arms abroad with another

triumph at home. In truth, the prospect of impending triumph at first

almost defeated the need of a campaign. The enthusiasm during the period

of the drive transcended everything ever seen in this country before.

The result reflected it: In an issue of $6,000,000,000 there was an

oversubscription of $933,073,250 and the total number was the 22,777,680

which will stand as the high mark of Americanism for many generations to

come.

AROUSING THE HALF-HEARTED

It has been set forth here that all appeals were based on arousing the

emotions of the people. This was necessary because, had the offerings

gone before the public solely on their practical value as investments,

the results would have been considered abroad as another demonstration

of our sordidness. Had the people of the United States been sordid, it

is certain that they might have obtained better investment values. That

they were not touched by selfish instincts is further proved by the fact

that all through the drives the bonds of the previous issues had been

quoted below par, due to the machinations of a group that never could be

lifted above self-interest. The public, in full realization of this

apparent depreciation, fought it out and showed their utter contempt for

the manipulators by subscribing in greater force and for greater amounts

to each subsequent issue.

It has been said before that the feeling of the public toward the war

was made clear in the First Loan. It became the problem of the Second

and the succeeding drives to organize enthusiasm so that through

contagion the more resistant types might be affected. This compelled an

organization of psychology. Back of each demonstration there were stage

managers. These managers of psychology worked upon the public through

the newspapers, through advertising, through "stunts," and generated a

force of example which affected the whole community in which they were

expressed.

For instance, a parade always has the effect of stirring people;

feelings deep-hidden cannot be well concealed when, in war-time,

marching men stride past. Unconsciously there comes to the mind of

people the question: "What will become of these fine boys when they

reach France?" There is the wish to help them, and the means to help

them has been before their eyes for days in the Liberty Loan publicity.

That is what is meant by stage management.

Through all the Loans it was necessary to manipulate the emotions first,

to bring to the consciousness of the people in the news reports the

facts and purposes of the loans; secondly, to carry the "urge" to them

through the advertising; and thirdly to work upon their feelings through

spectacles, meetings, aeroplane flights, sham battles, motion pictures

of actual warfare, and like accelerants. It was necessary to infect them

in the mass so that as individuals they might infect others with the

fever to buy bonds.

All this work had to be carried through and was carried through with

brilliant success in the four war-time loans. The Army, the Navy, the

stage women's committees, police organizations, Boy Scouts, foreign

language groups, all played a part. When the call came for the Fifth

Loan, practically everything that had been done before had to be

scrapped. It was all part of the war equipment and would help little in

getting over another loan when people were striving with every fiber to

get away from the thought and the sacrifices of the war.

"FINISH THE JOB"

We had to deal, then, with a people who were beginning to adjust

themselves to peace, who were consoling themselves with the thought that

they had done their part and should not be called upon again. It looked

like a hopeless prospect from the vista presented at the close of the

Fourth campaign to expect the same response for a peace campaign. The

one optimistic fact that stood out was that the people had proved their

patriotism, and such patriotism never dies. The Fifth Loan based its

appeal solely upon patriotism's one expression in peace, duty.

[Illustration: Victory Way at Night

During the Victory Loan Drive, Park Avenue, just above the Grand Central

Station, was shut off and devoted to propaganda for the drive. The

photograph shows a pyramid of captured German helmets.]

"Finish the Job" was the slogan of the Fifth Loan. The country was told

that the war was not ended until its debts were paid, that we should

feel gratitude in the lives spared by its sudden end. The Liberty Loan

workers had to create a new state of mind, to begin a new education--for

this time the issue was in Victory notes instead of bonds--and to arouse

the people to new emotions through spectacles, parades and other

features. It may be mentioned here that the greatest parade of the

entire war was held in New York in this Fifth Loan, when the different

branches of the army showed in procession the men and weapons they had

employed to win victory.

The call was for $4,500,000,000 and the answer was subscribed in notes

by 12,000,000 persons, who paid in $5,249,908,300.

WAR SAVINGS CAMPAIGN

In between the drives there was a lesser drive constantly carried on

among people who were not able to participate in bond buying. This was

the War Savings campaign which was a part of the Government Loan

enterprise. Newsboys, bootblacks, shop-girls, clerks and others who had

been unable to participate in the Loan drives or who wanted to prove

again their devotion to their country answered this appeal. In these

savings there was collected for the country up to the date of the

armistice $932,339,000 and the number of persons hoarding in small sums

was far beyond a million.

LIBERTY LOAN FIGURES

Entire Country

| | | No. of

Quota |Am't Subscribed| Allotted |Subscribers

First Loan |$ 2,000,000,000|$ 3,035,226,850|$ 2,000,000,000| 4,500,000

Second Loan| 3,000,000,000| 4,617,532,300| 3,808,766,150| 9,500,000

Third Loan | 3,000,000,000| 4,170,069,650| 4,170,069,650|17,000,000

Fourth Loan| 6,000,000,000| 6,993,073,250| 6,993,073,250|22,777,680

Fifth Loan | 4,500,000,000| 5,249,908,300| 4,500,000,000|12,000,000

+---------------+---------------+---------------+----------

Totals | 18,500,000,000|$24,065,810,350|$21,471,909,050|65,777,680

Federal Reserve District of New York

First Loan |$ 600,000,000|$ 1,191,992,100|$ 617,831,650| 978,959

Second Loan| 900,000,000| 1,550,453,500| 1,164,366,950| 2,259,151

Third Loan | 900,000,000| 1,115,243,650| 1,115,243,650| 3,046,929

Fourth Loan| 1,800,000,000| 2,044,901,750| 2,044,901,750| 3,604,101

Fifth Loan | 1,350,000,000| 1,762,684,900| 1,318,098,450| 2,484,532

+---------------+---------------+---------------+----------

Totals |$ 5,550,000,000|$ 7,665,275,900|$ 6,260,442,450|12,373,672

BENEFITS DERIVED FROM LOAN CAMPAIGNS

The benefits derived from the Loan campaigns were many. Prominent among

them was the growth of thrift among the American people. The growth of

this habit will be an important factor in the future greatness of this

country.

A lasting monument to the war spirit of those who had to stay at home is

the fact that more than a million persons, men, women and children, were

engaged actively in the promotion of the five loans. In other words, one

person in every hundred in the United States was a part of the

organization, and each induced twenty other persons in that hundred to

buy bonds. This colossal force did not work in haphazard fashion nor

scatter its energy but acted under a definite plan of campaign in which

each had an assigned part and in which each worked according to a method

that would avoid duplication or extra expense.

The five campaigns which united such an aggregation of workers and which

produced such remarkable results were carried forward with a minimum of

expense. Never before in the history of finance had such widespread

exploitation been accomplished at so low a cost. Of the million workers

all but a small nucleus were volunteers; the resources of the country

were thrown open to the organizers with unexampled prodigality, mediums

of flotation in a veritable flood being contributed without cost to the

officers in the Liberty Loan Army.

A single purpose animated the whole nation. Party lines, race prejudice,

creed distinctions, social barriers, all were wiped out in these loan

drives. The whole country formed itself into an All-American team that

rushed onward irresistibly. The closest approximation to a common

brotherhood had been achieved. War, with its terrible losses, with its

impairment of lusty young men, with its heartbreaks and agonies, surely

had not been waged in vain when it brought about such a unity.

The United States in waging the war for democracy had won that democracy

for herself at home.

VIII--FOOD AND THE WAR

How Scientific Control and Voluntary Food-Saving Kept Belgium from

Starving and Enabled the Allies to Avert Famine

By VERNON KELLOGG

Member of the Commission for the Relief of Belgium

America was made familiar with a slogan during 1917 and 1918 which

declared that "Food Will Win the War." The European Allies became

familiar from the very beginning of the war with the fact that without

much more food than they could count on from their own resources they

could not hope to win the war. And it became equally obvious to Germany

and her associates that if their normal food resources were materially

impaired they also could not hope to win the war.

So there arose almost from the beginning of the great military struggle

an equally great struggle to get food and to keep food from being got.

The Allies, devoting their manpower to fighting and munitions-making,

saw their farms doomed to neglect and their food reduction doomed to

lessen. And they began their call on America for food in such quantities

as America had never dreamed of exporting before. In the last years

before the war we had been sending about five million tons of foodstuffs

a year to Europe. In 1918 we sent over fourteen million tons. Also the

Allies began trying, by their blockade, to prevent the Central Empires

from adding to their own inevitably lessened native production by

importations from without.

On the other hand, Germany and her associates began to husband carefully

their internal food supplies by instituting a rigid, or would-be rigid,

control of internal marketing and consumption, and to collect from any

outside sources still accessible to them, such as the contiguous neutral

lands, whatever food was possible. Also they had strong hopes of

preventing, by their submarine warfare, the provisioning of the Allies

from America and other overseas sources.

Thus, from the beginning of the war, and all through its long course,

food supply and food control were of the most vital importance. If our

epigrammatic slogan, "Food Will Win the War," was, like most epigrams,

not literally true, it was, nevertheless, literally true that there was

always possible to either side the loss of the war through lack of food,

and it is literally true that the food victory of the Allies was a great

element in the final war victory. Germany's military defeat was partly

due to food defeat, and if a military decision had not been reached in

the fall of 1918, Germany would have lost the war in the spring of 1919

anyway from lack of food and raw materials.

ECONOMIC SELF-SUFFICIENCY

The great struggle for food supply and food control involved so many and

such complex undertakings that it is hopeless to attempt a detailed

account of it in any space short of a huge volume. Yet the very

limitations of the present discussion may have its advantages in

compelling us to concentrate our attention on the most important aspects

of the struggle and to try to sum up the most important results of it.

Some of these at least should not be forgotten, for they have a bearing

on the peace-time food problem as well as the war-time one. Fortunately

the war-time food situation has developed in us a national and an

individual food consciousness that will certainly not disappear in this

generation at least.

The first important lesson that has been learned is that it is of great

value to a nation to be able to provide in its own land its own

necessary food supply. For although in times of peace and usual harvests

international food exchanges enable a country, such as England or

Belgium, highly industrialized and of large population in proportion to

area, to make up without much difficulty its deficit as between

production and consumption, the moment the great emergency arrives there

is the utmost danger for its people. The history of the "relief of

Belgium" during the war will illustrate this.

$600,000,000 WORTH OF FOOD SUPPLIED

This little country, famous through all past history as a battleground

and now famous for all future time for its heroic and pathetic rôle in

the World War, found itself at the very beginning of the war faced with

a food problem that seemed at first insoluble, and which, if not solved,

meant starvation for its people. It is a country highly industrialized,

and with an agriculture which, though more highly developed as to method

than that of almost any other country, was yet capable of providing but

little more than a third of the food necessary to its people. It

depended for its very life on a steady inflow of food from outside

sources. But with its invasion and occupation by the Germans this inflow

was immediately and completely shut off. Belgium was enclosed in a ring

of steel. What food it possessed inside this ring disappeared rapidly.

The terrible situation was met in a way of which Americans may be proud.

For the Commission for the Relief of Belgium, which was the agency that

solved Belgium's great problem, was an American organization with a

staff composed chiefly of young Americans, most of them from American

colleges and universities, headed by an American, Herbert Hoover, of

great organizing and diplomatic genius, and with the large heart of a

world philanthropist. In the four and a half years from November 1,

1914, to May 1, 1919, which was the period of activity of the

Commission, Belgium depended upon it for the supplying of three-fourths

of the food of its people, over seven million in number. This amounted

to about one million tons a year. In addition, the Commission supplied

the food through practically all this period for the maintenance of the

nearly two million unfortunate people in the German-occupied area of

France. This amounted to a total of about one million tons. The total

value of the food supplied to Belgium and occupied France was about six

hundred million dollars, which was provided by the Governments of

Belgium, France, England, and America, and the private charity of the

world.

THE FOOD PRODUCTION OF GERMANY

For another impressive war-time food problem--which did not have the

same solution as Belgium's--let us take that of Germany. In peace times

the Germans produce about 80 percent. of the total food annually

consumed by them. But their tremendous military effort necessarily

entailed some reduction in their capacity for food production, although

they also made a tremendous effort to stimulate and direct into most

effective channels the native production of food.

Although it is true, as already stated, that Germany normally produces

about 80 percent. of her food needs, making it seem possible for the

nation to meet the blockade emergency by repressing consumption by 10

per cent. and increasing production by 10 per cent. this does not mean

that they normally produce 80 per cent. of each kind of food consumed by

them. As a matter of fact, they produce more than their total needs of

certain kinds of food, as sugar, for example, and less than 80 per cent.

of certain other kinds. And while there is a possibility of

substituting, within certain limits, one kind of food for another, so

that a shortage of wheat might be made up by an abundance of rye, or a

shortage of bread-grains in general be made up, in some degree, by

increasing the ration of potatoes, if they are available, this

substitution cannot go to the extent of substituting pure carbo-hydrate

or starchy foods like potatoes, which simply produce heat or energy for

the body, for the protein foods like meat, fish, eggs and dairy

products which produce not only energy but new tissues. A child must

have protein food in order to grow; an adult must have it in order to

replace the tissues worn out by daily work. Also, there are certain

peculiar and so far little understood elements, called vitamines, found

only in certain kinds of food, notably fats, milk and the green

vegetables, which are essential to the proper metabolism of the body.

[Illustration: Photo by P. Thompson

The Battle Scene at Home

During the war the Allies called on the United States for food in far

greater quantities than we had ever dreamed of exporting. For example,

in the last years before the war we had been sending yearly to Europe

about five million tons of food. In 1918 alone we shipped more than

fourteen million tons of foodstuffs overseas.]

GERMANY'S FOOD PROBLEM

Now in the light of these needs for proper feeding, and in the light of

the special conditions produced by the war, what was Germany's food

problem through the war? It was that of attempting to increase

production when the men and work animals had been sent to the fighting

lines, of repressing consumption when both men in the army and the men

in the war factories had to be well fed in order to fight well and work

well, of attempting to get in food from outside the country when a

blockade was steadily closing the borders ever and ever more tightly,

and finally, of trying to get the people to modify their food habits in

the way of accepting substitutes and using strange new semi-artificial

foods in place of the familiar staples.

In 1916 the potato crop of Germany was a failure--but the turnip crop

was enormous. So turnips were substituted largely for potatoes, and for

many other kinds of food as well. Even marmalade and coffee substitutes

were made from them, and turnip meal was mixed in the already too coarse

and too much mixed flour. The Germans will never forget that terrible

_kohl-rüben zeit_, or turnip time, of late 1916 and early 1917. And it

was just after this time that the effects of Germany's great food

difficulties began to show in a really serious way; they began to

undermine the strength and health of the people. Those diseases like

tuberculosis, which can rest in incipient or suppressed form for years

without becoming serious as long as the body is well nourished, began to

develop rapidly and dangerously. The birth rate decreased and the death

rate increased. The physical and mental and moral tone of the whole

nation dropped.

THE SUGAR SHORTAGE

Belgium and Germany illustrate a special food situation created by the

war, namely, one in which a country, which relied on outside sources for

a greater or lesser part of its food needs, had access to these sources

suddenly and almost completely shut off. But grave food problems also

confronted the countries which were not blockaded in so specific a way.

England and France, with full access to all the great food-producing

lands overseas (except to the extent that the submarines reduced this

freedom of access), nevertheless had food problems hardly less serious

than those of the more strictly blockaded countries. Their difficulties

arose primarily from the fact that there was only so much shipping in

the world and that the war conditions created suddenly a need for much

more shipping than existed. The transference of large numbers of troops

with their necessary equipment and munitions from the distant colonies

to the European seat of fighting, and of other numbers from the mother

countries to extra-European battlegrounds, made great demands on the

shipping available to these nations. At the same time, the reduction of

their native production increased largely their needs of food

importations.

Take, for example, the case of the sugar supply for England and France.

England is accustomed to use about 2,000,000 tons of sugar a year but

she does not produce, at home, a single ton. She had relied before the

war chiefly on importations from Germany and Austria with some little

from Belgium and France. But with the outbreak of the war, she could get

none from the Central Empires, and none from Belgium, while France,

instead of being able to export sugar, suddenly found herself with her

principal sugar-producing region invaded by the Germans and able to

produce hardly a third of her former output. In fact, France herself was

suddenly placed in the position of needing to import nearly two-thirds

of the supply needed for her own consumption. So England and France had

to turn to Cuba, the nearest great sugar-producing country, and ask for

large quantities of her output. But the United States has always

depended on Cuba for a large part of its own needs. Consequently there

was a sugar problem for our own country as well as for England and

France long before we entered the war.

The situation was serious; the demands on Cuba were much larger than she

could meet, although she was able under this stimulation of demand to

increase materially her sugar crop in the years following the first of

the war. One way of meeting this problem, which was promptly resorted

to, was to cut down the consumption of sugar in the countries involved.

In England and France sugar was strictly rationed; and in America the

people were called on to limit their use of sugar by voluntary

agreement. England cut her sugar allowance per capita from about seven

and a half pounds a month to two, and France from nearly four to one. In

America we reduced our per capita consumption by legally restricting the

making of soft drinks and candy and by the voluntary restriction of the

home use of sugar by about one-half. All this lessened the demand on

Cuba, and also the demand on shipping.

NATIONAL TASTES IN FOOD

In this discussion of the war-time sugar problem one may be struck by

the fact, as noted, that the people of France were normally accustomed

to eat much less sugar than the people of England, indeed only about

one-half as much. This introduces a subject of importance in any general

discussion of the world food problem. It is that of the varying food

habits of different peoples, even peoples living under very similar

climatic and general physical conditions. For example, the people of

Germany are accustomed to eat twice as many potatoes as the people of

England, who in turn use more than three times as many as the people of

Italy. On the other hand, England uses twice as much sugar as Germany,

although she produces no sugar and Germany produces much sugar. The

Italians eat only a third as much meat as the English and the French

only half as much. But the English eat only two-thirds as much bread as

the French.

These differences in food use, established by long custom, have to be

taken into account in all considerations of the world's food supply.

They are differences which cannot be easily or quickly changed, even

under circumstances which such great emergencies as war may produce. For

example, we in America are accustomed to eat corn as food in the form of

green corn, corn meal, corn flakes, etc. And in Italy one of the great

national dishes is _polenta_ (corn meal cooked in a certain way). But

when the Commission for the Relief of Belgium tried to introduce corn as

human food in Belgium, because of the large amount that could be

obtained from America when wheat and rye were scarce, it met with great

opposition and but little success. To the Belgians, corn is food for

animals.

SCIENTIFIC CONTROL OF FOOD

An important point brought out by the war-time food problem is that of

the "scientific" make-up of the personal ration. Not only are the

national food habits of a people often difficult to understand from a

point of view of taste, but they are often of such a character as to

lead to a most uneconomical use of food. The exigencies of a world food

shortage and a shortage of shipping for food transport have made it

necessary for food ministries and relief organizations to give careful

consideration to the most economical selection of foods for import and

distribution, both from the point of view of economy of space and weight

and lack of deterioration during shipping and storage, and from that of

concentrated nutritional values and proper balancing of the ration.

Food provides energy for bodily work and maintenance. It is the fuel for

the human machine. Scientific students of nutrition measure the amount

of energy thus provided, or the amount needed by the body, in units

termed calories. Physiologists have determined by experiment the

different amounts of calories produced by different kinds of foods and

the varying amounts needed by men at rest, at light work, at hard work,

by women and by children. By analyzing the make-up of a given population

as to proportions of men, women and children, and of work done by them,

it is possible to express the total food needs of the population in

calories and to arrange for the most economical provision of the total

calories necessary.

But the simple provision of the total sum of calories may by no means

satisfy the real food needs of the population. For example, all the

calories might be provided by potatoes alone, or grains alone, or meat

or fats alone. But the population would starve under such circumstances.

Food provides not merely the energy for the body, but the substances

from which the body adds new tissue to itself during growth and

reproduces its constantly breaking down tissues during all of life. Now

while all kinds of food produce energy in greater or less quantity, only

certain kinds are the source of new tissues. Hence there must be in the

personal or national ration a sufficient proportion of the

tissue-producing foods, the protein carriers, as well as a sufficient

amount of the more strictly energy-producing foods, such as the fats and

carbohydrates. And there is necessary, too, in any ration capable of

maintaining the body in properly healthy condition, the presence in it,

in very small quantities, of certain food substances called vitamines

which have an important regulatory effect on the functioning of the

body. These substances occur only in certain kinds of food.

All these things had to be taken into account in the war-time handling

of food. So important was a proper knowledge of scientific food use and

application of this knowledge, in connection with the efforts of the

various countries to feed themselves most economically and to best

effect in the light of their possibilities in the way of food supply,

that every country concerned called on its scientific men to advise and

help control the obtaining and distribution of its national food supply.

For example, America and the Allies (England, France, Belgium and Italy)

established an Inter-Allied Scientific Food Commission composed of

experts who met at various times at London, Paris, and Rome, and on

whose advice the determination, both as to kind and quantity, of the

necessary importations of food from overseas to England, France, Belgium

and Italy was largely made. Thus the war has done more to popularize the

scientific knowledge of food, and to put into practice a scientific

control of food-use than all the efforts of colleges and scientific

societies and food reform apostles for years and years before. Calories,

proteins, carbohydrates, fats and vitamines have been taken out of the

dictionary and put into the kitchen.

[Illustration: Photo by P. Thompson

A Community Conference on Food-Saving

The importance of work of this kind increased after the signing of the

armistice, because the Poles, the Belgians, and other peoples whom we

could not reach during the war needed every pound of food we could

spare.]

GOVERNMENT REGULATIONS

America's special relation to the world's war food problem was primarily

that of a provider of the Allies, but in order to insure that this

provision should be sufficient to keep the Allied soldiers and war

workers up to full fighting and working strength and their families in

full health, it was necessary for America to stimulate its own

production, repress considerably its consumption and cut out all

possible waste in food handling. To do this there was needed some form

of governmental food control and a nation-wide voluntary effort of the

people. Each of the Allied countries had established governmental food

control early in the war under the direction of a "food controller"

either attached to an already existing government department of

agriculture or commerce, or acting as an independent food minister.

On the actual entrance of America into the war in 1917, governmental

food control was vested in a "United States Food Administration" with

powers given it by Congress to control all exports of food and all

food-handling by millers, manufacturers, jobbers, wholesalers, and

large retail dealers. But no retail dealer doing a business of less than

$100,000 a year, nor any farmer or farmers' coöperative association came

under the Food Administration's control. Thus the American food

administration differed from that of most European countries in that it

had no authority to fix the prices at which the actual producers should

sell their products or the small retailers should charge the consumers.

But, indirectly, it was able to do, and did, a good deal in this

direction. By its direct control of exports, and of the millers,

manufacturers and large dealers, it was able to cut out a great part of

the middleman profits, and reduce wholesale prices for most staple

foodstuffs, especially that most important one, flour. By publicity of

prices and by indirect pressure through the wholesaler it was also able

to restrain the further sky-rocketing of retail prices.

NATION-WIDE FOOD SAVING

But if the Food Administration was limited in what it could effect by

legal authority, there was no limit to what it could do by calling on

the voluntary action of the people of the country, except by the

possible refusal of the people to help. So there was set in movement a

nation-wide propaganda for food-production and food-saving which

resulted in the voluntary acceptance of wheatless and meatless days,

voluntarily modified hotel and restaurant and dining-car meals, and the

adoption of household pledges, taken by more than 12,000,000 American

homes, to follow the Food Administration's suggestions for food-saving.

All this, and the many other things which the Food Administration asked

the people to do, and which the people did, resulted in accomplishing a

very necessary thing. It enabled America not only to meet all those

ever-increasing absolutely imperative calls of the Allies for food for

their armies and people through 1917 and 1918, but to supply its own

army and people sufficiently well to carry on the war effectively. The

more food sunk by submarines, or prevented from coming to Europe from

distant food sources, as Australia and Argentine and India, the more we

provided by saving and increasing our production.

A few figures will illustrate the actual results of the call for food

conservation. We entered the crop year of 1917 (July 1, 1917, to July 1,

1918), with a wheat supply which gave us only about 20,000,000 bushels

available for export. By December 1, 1917, our surplus had gone overseas

and an additional 36,000,000 bushels had been shipped to the Allies. In

January we learned of the further imperative need of the Allies of

75,000,000 bushels. We responded by sending 85,000,000 bushels between

the first of the year and the advent of the new crop. When the crop year

ended we had sent in all about 136,000,000 bushels of wheat to Europe.

We were assisted in these operations by the importation of 28,000,000

bushels of wheat from Australia and the Argentine to supplement our

domestic supply, but the outstanding fact was the saving in our domestic

consumption, most of which was accomplished in the six-months' period

from January 1 to July 1, 1918.

AMERICAN RELIEF ADMINISTRATION

But the cessation of the war did not produce food for the war-ravaged

countries of Europe. The newly liberated peoples of Central and Eastern

Europe found themselves, at the time of the Armistice, facing a period

of starvation until their 1918 harvest could come in. Something to save

these peoples had to be done quickly and on a large scale. The situation

was met by the establishment of a new American governmental organization

called the American Relief Administration which, with Mr. Hoover as

director-general, worked in connection with the Inter-Allied Supreme

Economic Council. Representatives of the A. R. A. were sent at once into

all the countries crying for help to find out the exact food situation,

and to arrange with the respective governments for the immediate

beginning of the importation and distribution of staple foodstuffs.

Programs for a food supply sufficient to last until the 1919 harvest

were determined on a basis of minimum necessity, and provision for

sufficient shipping and rail transportation was arranged by

international agreement.

Modern war has thrown the spotlight on food. It has partly realized that

famous prophecy of the Polish economist, Jean Bloch, who wrote, twenty

years ago: "That is the future of war, not fighting, but famine." In

the World War of 1914--18 there was fighting on a scale never before

reached, but there was also famine, as never before dreamed of.

IX THE HIGH COST OF LIVING

A Study of the Extraordinary Conditions Subsequent to the Armistice

By THE DIRECTOR OF THE COUNCIL OF NATIONAL DEFENSE

On August 9, 1919, Grosvenor B. Clarkson, Director of the Council of

National defense, submitted to the Secretary of War, a report entitled

"An Analysis of the High Cost of Living Problem." This report was the

result of much careful study and investigation. It is non-academic in

form and by omitting details presents a "panoramic view of the problem."

It laid chief stress upon conditions since the armistice.

In the report the problem of the high cost of living is viewed as a

permanent one. It was, in other words, not peculiar to past war

conditions. Careful investigation by the Council has resulted in the

following analysis of the problem.

THE ESSENCE OF THE HIGH COST OF LIVING SITUATION

"1. The only complaints of the high cost of living which have

justification are those which are based upon inability of the

present income to maintain previous or reasonable standards of

living at present prices--such well-founded complaints mean

that increase of income has not kept pace with increased cost

of living, and therefore imply enforced reduction in standards

of living.

AMERICA'S PRODUCTIVE CAPACITY

"2. America's industrial and economic achievements during the

war, notwithstanding depleted man power and diversion of

productive effort to war purposes, demonstrate the ample

ability of the Nation to sustain its population according to a

standard of living equal to or above standards of living which

obtained previous to or during the war.

"3. The fundamental basis for the maintenance of national

standards of living is adequate production, economical

distribution, and fair apportionment among the various economic

groups which constitute our society. With the exception of

agricultural activity, production since the armistice has shown

evidence of curtailment, and has in general been abnormally

low. Normal consumption can not continue unless an adequate

rate of production is maintained.

FOOD SITUATION AND READJUSTMENT

"4. Food production and the facilities for food production were

improved rather than injured during the war. Moreover, the

program with respect to food production since the signing of

the armistice has been one of vigorous expansion of the means

of providing raw food products. The actual consumption of

wheat, as shown by the Grain Corporation's report of May 25,

1919, had for the previous ten months averaged 37,700,000

bushels per month, as against 39,000,000 bushels for the

previous twelve months. This does not necessarily imply reduced

consumption of cereals.

"The number of cattle slaughtered in the period January to May,

1919, was 3,803,000, as against 4,204,000 for the corresponding

period of 1918, though the national reserve of cattle on farms

had increased during the war. The swine slaughtered January to

May increased from 18,260,000 in 1918 to 20,500,000 in 1919.

CLOTHING SITUATION

"5. The production of civilian cloths and clothing suffered

some reduction during the war, and has suffered heavy

curtailment for many months since the signing of the armistice.

"Boot and shoe production for civilian use was unfavorably

affected by the war and has likewise undergone extreme

curtailment since the signing of the armistice.

HOUSING PROBLEM

"6. Housing facilities developed acute shortage through

curtailment of building during the war and, due to curtailment,

for many months following the armistice, of the production of

building material and of building construction, housing is

still far below normal. Rents continue to rise.

PROVISION OF NEW CAPITAL

"7. The first half of 1919 shows diminished production of raw

materials and subnormal construction of new capital, and thus

indicates failure to utilize an adequate proportion of our

productive forces in the preliminary processes of provision to

meet future requirements. In fact, due to business uncertainty

and hesitation and tendencies to disagreement between

productive groups, retailers, wholesalers, manufacturers,

labor, etc., there ensued after the armistice a disuse of a

large proportion of America's productive capacity. Unless this

slump in production is atoned for by consistent future

activity, and unless production is constantly maintained on an

adequate scale, reduced standards of living will become

inescapable, regardless of prices, whether they rise or fall.

"8. The very fact that prices of finished commodities,

consumption goods, so called, have risen to an extent out of

proportion to the rise in prices of raw materials and perhaps

out of proportion to the rise in general wages, indicates that

production and distribution carried on under these conditions

is, in general, yielding profits abnormally high."

In corroboration of the preceding analysis, the report cites statistical

data gathered from various sources. The relation of currency and credit

to prices is admirably epitomized in the following extract:

CURRENCY AND CREDIT

"The manner in which the volume of circulating credit and

currency is related to the war-time rise in prices is about as

follows:

"The outbreak of the war brought to America urgent government

orders for munitions and supplies. Inasmuch as the belligerent

governments could not brook delay they were obliged to pay the

increased prices which American producers found it possible to

demand, and thus the wave of war prices was started in America.

When America entered the war it required, in order to perform

its part, almost boundless quantities of equipment and man

power. Producers naturally took advantage of the extremely

urgent character of these demands in order to increase their

prices, and, as a natural sequence, wages began to advance.

These increased prices and wages of course necessitated larger

expenditures by the government.

"Increased prices also necessitate the employment of larger

funds in the conduct of a business. A larger volume of credit

is required at higher prices to take care of bills for raw

materials, and more money is necessary to meet increased

payrolls. As a consequence, therefore, of increased prices,

business men required increased credit if they were to avoid

curtailment of operations and reduced production. Due to higher

prices, therefore, the banks were under the necessity of

meeting the business demand for expansion of credit."

INFLATION

The inflation process is described as follows:

"In pre-war times every dollar finding its way to the market

was supposedly the counterpart of some commodity or part of a

commodity also appearing in the market. Funds expended for the

purchase of food, clothing, and for the payment of rentals

were assumed to have been earned by some productive

contribution to the general supply of commodities. With the

outbreak of war there began to appear in the market, funds

derived from wages, profits, etc., which had been paid out in

connection with nonproductive activities of war, and which

therefore implied no corresponding contribution to the market

supply of commodities. The producers of, and the dealers in,

the decreased quantity of commodities brought to market

increased the prices of these commodities to the point where

they might absorb all the purchase money that became available.

These increased prices and wages have required increased

circulating medium. This requirement has been met primarily by

increased credit and the increased use of bank checks as an

instrument of payment. As to the currency situation, the total

money in the United States in 1900 amounted to $2,340,000,000.

According to a statement issued by Governor W. P. G. Harding,

of the Federal Reserve Board, the amount of money in

circulation has varied during the last five years as follows:

July 1, 1914, $3,419,108,368, or $34.53 per capita.

April 1, 1917, $4,100,976,000, or $37.88 per capita.

December 1, 1918, $5,129,985,000, or $48.13 per capita.

August 1, 1919, $4,796,890,000, or $45.16 per capita.

"This shows an increase during our war period of $7.28 per

capita. The amount of money in the Treasury and in Federal

Reserve Banks is not in circulation, and is, therefore not

included in the figures quoted from Governor Harding's

statement.

"In regard to the part played by national credit in meeting the

situation growing out of the extraordinary requirements of the

government and the rise in prices which the urgency of demands

made possible, it is to be noted that government bonds had to

be sold to pay for a large proportion of the goods which war

activities were consuming. In consequence the national debt up

to August 1, 1919, had been increased by $24,518,000,000, or

approximately $230 per capita. Of course, government bonds are

always good security for bank credit."

FOOD SUPPLY--WHEAT, CORN AND SUGAR

Despite the fact that we sent large shipments of food to our Allies, our

supply at the close of the war was not seriously diminished. The 1919

crop, while not expected to be large, was amply sufficient to prevent a

real shortage. This is supported by the following extract from Mr.

Clarkson's report:

"The wheat crop for 1918 amounted to 917,000,000 bushels, as

compared to an average for 1910--14 of 728,000,000 bushels; and

the probable harvest in 1919 is 1,236,000,000 bushels. Our

supply of wheat in elevators, mills, etc., on May 9, 1919, was

96,000,000 bushels, as against 34,000,000 bushels the year

before. Our flour mills, whose capacity is estimated at

something like double their usual output, were milling week by

week during 1919 considerably more flour than the year before.

They produced for the week ending May 9, 1919, for example,

2,553,000 barrels as against 1,569,000 barrels for the

corresponding week of 1918. Notwithstanding large exports, our

wheat supply is obviously adequate. In 1918, a record year, we

exported 21,000,000 barrels of flour. In 1915 our wheat exports

reached their maximum--206,000,000 bushels.

[Illustration: McCutcheon in the Chicago Tribune

Will There Be Enough to Go Around?]

"The corn crop of 1918 was likewise sufficient. The supply of

corn on hand on May 1, 1919, was 23,000,000 bushels, as

compared with 16,000,000 bushels May 1, 1918, and 7,000,000

bushels on May 1 of both 1917 and 1913. Though the 1919 corn

crop is not expected to be unusually large, there is no

prospect of real shortage. And the situation with respect to

the other cereals is generally very good.

"The sugar industry of the United States passed through the

period of the war with a tendency to increased production,

notwithstanding shipping difficulties. Though present stocks

are somewhat low in the United States, our exports during 1919

have been unusually large. The future is normally provided

for."

THE MEAT SUPPLY

The meat situation is described as follows:

"America emerged from the war producing meat at a rate far

above pre-war figures, and yet possessing in reserve a larger

number of animals on the farms than we had before the heavy war

drafts upon our supplies began. The number of cattle

slaughtered in 1918 was 11,000,000, as compared with 6,978,000

in 1913. Swine slaughtered were 41,214,000 in 1918 and

34,163,000 in 1913. The cattle slaughtered in 1919,

January--May, were 3,803,000, as against 4,204,000, January--May,

1918. The swine slaughtered January--May, 1919, made an increase

over the 1918 record, the figures being 20,500,000 for the

present year, as against 18,260,000 for the corresponding

interval last year. Although exports of hams and shoulders for

1918 approximately doubled previous records, amounting to

518,000,000 pounds, as against 172,000,000 pounds for 1913, and

exports have continued large during 1919, there is no doubt

that our productive capacity is vastly more than ample to meet

our requirements."

HIGH PRICE OF FOOD

In view of the apparent abundance of food it is interesting to know the

reason for the high price of foodstuffs. The Council of National Defense

is of the opinion that the probability that the production of garden

products in war gardens had fallen far below that of 1918, when, it is

estimated, to have reached the value of $525,000,000, would not account

for the high prices. Exportation and storage had not depleted our stock

sufficiently to affect prices abnormally. In regard to the question of

exports the report gives the following illuminating figures:

"Present food prices are not to be accounted for largely on the

basis of heavy exports. Exports of beef, canned, fresh, and

pickled, for example, have been less for 1919 than in the

previous year, the quantity amounting to 23,499,000 pounds in

May, 1919, as compared with 82,787,000 pounds in May, 1918. The

May figures for exports of hog products show 125,937,000 pounds

in 1919, as against 201,279,000 pounds in May, 1918. The

monthly exports of beef and pork show a declining tendency

during the first five months of 1919, contrary to the tendency

in 1918, the total amounting to 1,090,000,000 pounds in 1919,

as against 1,122,000,000 pounds for the corresponding period of

1918--less than the amount of all meats in cold storage on July

1, 1919, which was 1,336,000,000 pounds."

Concerning storage the same report states that:

"Even the fact that the report of goods in cold storage shows

an increase of over 9 per cent. in the quantity of all meats

held on July 1, 1919 (1,336,000,000 pounds), as compared with

the figures for July 1, 1918, is, though very important, not a

matter of significance for any considerable period of time.

Storage poultry July 1, 1919, was 48,895,704 pounds, or 181 per

cent. above last year; cheese, about 25 per cent.; butter,

about 75 per cent.; and eggs, about 25 per cent. above July 1

last year. There was a decrease of frozen fish of about 13 per

cent. from last year. Taken in connection with the evidence of

relatively abundant reserves of live animals and large crops

for the current year, it would seem that some relief from high

prices of food should be possible."

WHY FOOD PRICES WERE HIGH

The explanation of the post-war high prices of food is given as follows:

"It is true that food is, by comparison, plentiful. But it is

also true that money or other circulating medium is

unprecedently plentiful. The fact that food prices are

relatively high and that the prices of chemicals, metals,

lumber, etc., are relatively low, though their supply is

relatively small, may be due to a concentration of purchasing

power upon food, and the general direction of the flow of

currency toward the purchase of immediate consumables. Some

relatively minor luxuries such as jewelry (and perhaps

automobiles should also be included here as the semi-luxury of

greater magnitude) find favor with purchasers, but the main

trend of purchase seems to bear toward demand for the

necessities of life now in a finished state or nearly so, with

a relatively weaker tendency toward demand of capital goods. If

the supply, and also the production, of raw materials has been

relatively small, and if the prices at which they have

exchanged have also been relatively low, it seems obvious that

the proportionate amount of currency and credit engaged in

their purchase must be abnormally small, thus accounting for

the ability of the producers and purveyors of food to demand

abnormally high prices regardless of the relative plentifulness

of their goods."

CONDITIONS FAVORABLE TO PROFITEERING

"The conditions just described are highly favorable to both

speculative profiteering and wasteful distribution, through the

intervention of supernumerary middlemen and caterers. In fact,

the statistics published by the New York Industrial Relations

Commission seem to indicate an unusually large increase of

persons engaging in certain kinds of salesmanship after the

armistice. It should, however, be remembered that even though

it may smack of profiteering to produce a very large crop and

sell it at abnormally high prices, this is a kind of

profiteering which deserves unstinted praise as compared with

that other species of profiteering which deliberately reduces

output in the expectation that the extortionate prices which

the reduced product will command may more than make up to the

producer or speculator for the portion of production withheld

or the percentage of hoarded goods condemned to spoil and be

lost to the nation."

OTHER COMMODITIES

The price of commodities other than foodstuffs was influenced in 1919 by

the inadequacy of supply and the curtailment of production. This was

especially true of woolens, as stated by the Council:

"The most obvious explanation of the high prices of woolens is

the glaring fact of the extreme reduction in output which

ensued after the signing of the armistice and the completion of

Army orders, which practically ended in January, 1919.

"The war came to an end with the supply of civilian woolens

unprecedentedly low. The total quantity of wool available for

civilian fabrics between April and November, 1918, was probably

somewhere in the neighborhood of 75,000,000 pounds, an amount

perhaps a little more than sufficient to meet the demands of

normal manufacture for civilian consumption for one and

one-half months.

* * * * *

"In consequence of the general situation the total consumption

of wool in manufacture during first five months of the year

1919 amounted to but little more than one-half the amount

consumed during the corresponding months of the previous year.

The proportion of looms, 50-inch reed space and over, idle

increased from 21 per cent. in November, 1918, to 52 per cent.

idle in February, 1919, and these looms were still 39 per cent.

idle in May, 1919. Of worsted spindles, 27 per cent. were

reported idle in December, 1918, and 52 per cent. idle in

March, 1919, and 26 per cent. were still idle in May. In the

meantime an extraordinary number of textile workers were

condemned to idleness, their productive capacity perishing day

by day and week by week, while the deficiency in the supply of

clothing was developing to such a point that it became possible

for the wholesale index number of the prices of cloths and

clothing to rise to 250 in June."

The production of cotton and cotton goods also was far below normal. To

quote again from the report:

"When the war ended the world's cotton supply was understood to

be below normal. The supplies of cotton goods were also

reported low. The acreage planted to cotton was in 1919

approximately 9 per cent. less than for 1918. The present

prospects are that the cotton crop will be small, and published

articles are appearing expressing gratification over the

prospectively large commercial returns which the cotton

producers may be able to command because of the high prices

which may be had for the reduced cotton output. The forecast of

the cotton crop for 1919 is 10,900,000 bales--about 10 per

cent. below that of recent years and but little over two-thirds

as large as the record crop of 1914."

"OUTPUT AND MORE OUTPUT" ABANDONED

"In regard to cotton manufacture, it may be recorded that the

situation is less unsatisfactory than as regards wool

manufacture. In this industry, as in most of our industries,

the economic watchword of war-time, which was 'Output, and more

output' (the necessary condition of full prosperity in peace,

as well as of success during war), was not heard after the

armistice. There soon developed, on the contrary, groundless

doubts about future demand, and hints of unhealthy fears of

'overproduction.'

"Notwithstanding the release of labor, if it were needed, by

demobilization, and notwithstanding adequate supplies of raw

cotton to meet the season's requirements and the lack of any

important difficulties in the way of reconversion to peace-time

products, and with low supplies of finished goods in stock, the

cotton industry kept more spindles idle during the first five

months of 1919 than were idle during the corresponding period

for 1918. The amount of cotton consumed in the United States

during the nine months ending with April, 1919, was

approximately 12 per cent. less than for the corresponding nine

months of 1918. The prices of cloths and clothing, as above

mentioned, show in June, 1919, an increase of 150 per cent.

over 1913 prices."

The boot and show industry showed a marked decline after the signing of

the armistice. This, too, was borne out by the investigations of the

Council.

"The production of boots and shoes for the first quarter of

1919 was reported as about 60 per cent. below the production

for the last quarter of 1918. Plants were partially closed and

in some cases it is reported that machinery was returned to the

Shoe Machinery Co. All in all, there were 75,000,000 less pairs

of shoes produced in the first quarter of 1919 than in the last

quarter of 1918.

"The census report shows a reduction of more than 25 per cent.

in the output of civilian men's shoes in the quarter ending

with March, 1919, as compared with production in the quarter

ending with December, 1918, and nearly 25 per cent. reduction

as compared with the quarter ending with September, 1918. The

reduction in output of women's shoes amounted to approximately

30 and 25 per cent., respectively, in comprising corresponding

periods. The reduction in the output of shoes for youths, boys

and misses was even more marked."

COAL AND IRON

What has been said of the production of cotton and woolen goods applied

equally to the mining of coal and to the output of iron and steel.

During the war we increased our coal production. In 1918 it amounted to

"685,000,000 short tons, almost 50 per cent. of the world's estimated

output for that year. Production for 1913 was 571,000,000 short tons."

The coal situation since the armistice is stated as follows:

"Coal, the source of a vast proportion of our industrial power

as well as our chief source of heat and light, is a commodity

the production of which is itself an index of our economic

life. Coal output since the armistice has been greatly reduced,

the weekly production of anthracite for the first half of 1919

being from 1,200,000 to 1,800,000 net tons, as against

1,800,000 net tons to 3,000,000 net tons for the corresponding

period of 1918. Bituminous production was 9,147,000 net tons

for a typical week in 1919, as against 12,491,000 net tons for

the corresponding week in 1918. Coke production for the week

ending June 28, 1919, amounted to only 287,000 net tons, as

compared with 627,000 net tons for the week ending June 29,

1918. The total amount of coal produced up to July 5, 1919, was

261,000,000 long tons, as compared with 364,000,000 long tons

for the corresponding period of 1918."

The production of iron and steel which was greatly stimulated by the war

was allowed to decline as soon as the concentrated effort of the nation

to win the war was abandoned. The resulting condition is succinctly

described by the Council:

"The record of our after-war steel and iron output furnishes us

with another warning that we have been neglecting to keep pace

with the established American rate of industrial improvement

and expansion and foresighted preparation for future

requirements and progress.

"The iron and steel business was considerably stimulated by

war-time requirements. There was a governmental agency whose

business it was to for see the war needs and to place orders so

that those productive forces which are wrapped up in the steel

industry might be utilized to capacity. The steel industry's

activity has, however, since the armistice greatly declined.

Pig-iron production for April, 1919, was 82,607 tons per day,

as against 109,607 tons in April, 1918. Birmingham properties

are reported to have been working in April, 1919, at about 50

per cent. of the 1918 production. For the period January to

May, 1919, pig-iron production was only 2,114,000 tons, as

against 3,446,000 tons during the same period in 1918.

Steel-ingot production fell in the spring of 1919 to lower

figures than had been reached in more than two years. In fact,

a regular decline in production was in evidence after December,

1918.

"The figures representing the unfilled orders of the United

States Steel Corporation at the end of May, 1919, were smaller

than they had been since 1915."

[Illustration: Copyright Underwood & Underwood

Women Doing Night Farming

Girls running a tractor plow and harrow at Farmingdale, Long Island.]

RECOMMENDATIONS

The Council summarized its findings and recommends remedial measures as

follows:

"The findings of the Reconstruction Research Division Council

of National Defense, indicate that the high cost of living is

primarily due to curtailment in the production of nearly all

commodities except raw food products, to hoarding of storage

food products, to profiteering, conscious and unconscious, and

to inflation of circulating credit. The findings indicate that

the situation may be most advantageously met by:

"1. Stimulated production.

"2. Some readjustment of incomes to the basis of higher price

levels.

"3. The repression of hoarding and profiteering.

"4. Improvement and standardization of methods and facilities

for distributing and marketing goods.

"5. The perfecting of means of keeping the nation frequently,

promptly, and adequately informed regarding probable national

requirements and of current production and stocks of the more

important commodities.

"The findings emphasize the fact that high standards of living

can not be maintained upon a basis of reduced production,

regardless of whether price levels be high or low."

[Illustration: The Ore Market--Cleveland]

_PART II_

I--THE PEACE CONFERENCE AT WORK

A Vivid Account from the Inside of the Machinery Which Produced the

Peace Treaty. How the Crises with Japan, Italy and Belgium Were Averted

By THOMAS W. LAMONT

Financial and Economic Adviser at Paris to the American Commission to

Negotiate Peace

When we finally gain an historic perspective of the work of the Peace

Conference we shall realize that, instead of being unduly delayed, it

was accomplished in an astonishingly brief period. The Treaty of Vienna,

back in 1815, took eleven months, and the factors to be dealt with were

nothing like so numerous nor so complex. The Paris Conference occupied

only about six months, and the earlier weeks were largely given over to

questions relating to the renewal of the Armistice, rather than to the

actual framing of the Peace Treaty. The Treaty text itself--aside from

the League of Nations Covenant--was whipped through in a little over

three months; for the active work of the Commissions which were to draft

the various chapters did not get under way until February 1st; and the

Treaty was presented to the German delegates at Versailles on May 7th.

COVENANTS "OPENLY ARRIVED AT"

No adequate history of the Peace Conference can be written until years

have elapsed--until it is possible, as it is not now possible, to make

public a multitude of intimate details. Hundreds of important documents

were woven into the completed text of the Treaty. Such documents must

eventually be made available to the chroniclers of history, who must

finally have access to the official records, so that in course of time

they can acquaint the world with the details of those momentous

conferences which were held among the Chiefs of State, where the

ultimate decisions settling every important question were made. There

have been complaints that the covenants of the Treaty were not as

President Wilson had promised, "openly arrived at." In point of fact, as

far as lay within the bounds of possibility, the covenants of the Treaty

_were_ "openly arrived at," inasmuch as their essence was made public

just as soon as an understanding upon them had been reached, and in many

cases, long before the final agreement. Nothing was held back which the

public had any legitimate interest in knowing. It would, of course, have

been quite out of the question for the Chiefs of State to discuss in

public all the highly delicate and complex situations which were bound

to, and which did, arise at Paris. Every man of strong character and

powerful conviction has a view of his own upon any given subject, and

naturally maintains that view with vigor and tenacity--even at times, if

he be bitterly opposed--with acrimony.

To take a familiar instance, it is an open secret that M. Clemenceau's

first solution of the question of the Saar Basin did not at all suit

President Wilson. Not unnaturally, M. Clemenceau simply wanted in effect

to annex the Saar Basin, on the grounds that the Germans had destroyed

the coal mines of Northern France. Mr. Wilson was in entire accord--to

this extent, that France should, until her coal mines had been repaired,

enjoy the entire output of the Saar coal fields; but to have France

permanently annex the Basin was contrary to his profoundest convictions,

as expressed in the well-known Fourteen Points.

In the course of the discussion between M. Clemenceau and Mr. Wilson,

their ideas at the start being so divergent, vigorous views were

undoubtedly expressed; quite possibly tart language was used, at any

rate by the French Premier, who was feeling all the distress of German

frightfulness and war weariness. But to what possible good end could the

detail of such intimate conversations have been made public? I allude to

the possible conversations on the Saar Basin not as an historical fact,

but as an example of what might have taken place, and very likely did

take place; and if such temporary disagreements existed on that

question, undoubtedly, among so many Chiefs of State as were gathered

together at Paris, they existed on others. But in all cases amicable and

cordial agreements were finally reached.

Whenever agreements were even in sight, the press was informed; so that,

when the Treaty of Peace and the summary of it finally came out, there

were no surprises for the public. Every covenant, every clause, had been

already foreshadowed and accurately pictured.

THE "BIG THREE"

Naturally, the question is often asked: Who were the peacemakers at

Paris? Were they two or three powerful Chiefs of State? The answer is

both "Yes" and "No." The final decision on every important matter lay in

the hands of the so-called Big Four, and after Premier Orlando's

defection and return to Italy, it narrowed down to the Big Triumvirate,

Messrs. Wilson, Lloyd George, and Clemenceau. Yet while they made the

final decisions, these were almost invariably based upon reports and

opinions expressed to this trio, or to the quartet, by their advisers

and experts. The actual text of the Treaty was, of course, written by

the technicians, and there is hardly a phrase in the whole of it that

can claim as its original author any one of the Chiefs of State. In

every true sense, then, the Treaty of Peace has been the product, not of

three men, not even of three-score, nor of three hundred, but of

thousands; for quite aside from the official delegations at Paris, which

comprised several hundred persons, we must remember that the data and

the various suggested solutions on most of the questions had been

canvassed at home for each delegation by large groups of office and

technical experts.

Of course it sounds well to say that the Treaty was written by three

men: the picture of those few Chiefs of State sitting in conference day

after day is dramatic in the extreme. That is, I must confess, the

picture which comes back oftenest to my mind. I see them today, as I saw

them for months at Paris, sitting in that large but cosy salon in the

house allotted to President Wilson on the Place des États Unis; for, by

common consent, it was there that the Supreme Council finally held all

its meetings. It is in that theatre, with the three or four Chiefs of

State taking the leading rôles, that we saw the other characters in the

great drama moving slowly on the stage, playing their parts, and then

disappearing into the wings. Today it might be Paderewski, pleading with

all his earnestness and sincerity, to have Danzig allotted to the

sovereignty of Poland. To-morrow it might be Hymans, the Belgian

Secretary for Foreign Affairs, begging that there should be a prompt

realization of those pledges to Belgium, which Belgium felt had been

made by all the Allies; or it might even be word brought by special

aeroplane from the King of the Belgians at Brussels, with fresh and

important instructions to his delegation in the matter of Reparation. Or

it might be a group of the representatives of those newer nationalities,

Czechoslovakia, Rumania, Jugoslavia, arguing some burning question of

boundary rights. Or it might be the British shipping experts,

maintaining that the captured German ships should be restored to the

various Allies upon a basis dividing the ships _pro rata_ to the losses

sustained by submarines, and contending against the American claim that

the United States should have all the German ships finding lodgment in

American harbors. Or it might be Herbert Hoover, that brilliant

American, come to describe to the Big Four starvation conditions in

Vienna, and to emphasize his belief that, enemy or no enemy, those

conditions must be relieved or Bolshevism would march into Austria and

directly on west until it reached France--and beyond.

THE PLACE OF MEETING

The stage for this world drama was originally set at the Ministry of

War, behind the Chamber of Deputies and across the Seine; and here

Premier Clemenceau--who, it will be remembered, was Minister of War as

well as President of the Council of French Ministers--was the presiding

genius. But eventually, as the result of an interesting trend of

circumstances, the all important conferences took place at President

Wilson's house.

[Illustration: Copyright Walter Adams & Sons

=David Lloyd George=

Ray Standard Baker, who attended the Peace Conference, wrote in his

book, "What Wilson Did at Paris": "Lloyd George personally was one of

the most charming and amiable figures at Paris, full of Celtic

quicksilver, a torrential talker in the conference, but no one was ever

quite sure, having heard him express an unalterable determination on one

day, that he would not be unalterably determined some other way the day

following."]

The original theatre of operations at the War Ministry had been so

large, and there was such an enormous chorus brought into play, that

progress was interminably slow. There were usually present all five of

the plenipotentiaries of each of the five great powers, including Japan,

and very frequently Marshal Foch as well. His presence automatically

commanded the attendance of the chief military experts of the other

delegates. With the innumerable secretaries who had to attend the

plenipotentiaries, with the interpreters and whatnot, the Supreme

Council came to look like a legislative chamber, in the midst of which

sat Clemenceau, presiding with his usual incisiveness. At such meetings

progress could be made only upon rather formal matters which had been

threshed out beforehand. When it came to a point of great delicacy,

where the discussions could be only on a most intimate basis, it became

quite impossible to "carry on." Nobody would feel like speaking out in

meeting and calling the other fellow names--as was necessary at times in

order to clear the atmosphere--if there were half a hundred other people

around, to hear those names, and promptly to babble them to an expectant

throng outside.

So finally the Supreme Council was boiled down to the four Chiefs of

State, including Japan's representative on any questions not strictly

confined to Western Europe; and the small Council began to meet

alternately at Clemenceau's office in the War Ministry, at Mr. Lloyd

George's house, and at Mr. Wilson's, which was just around the corner

from the British Premier's. Then in March, shortly after President

Wilson's second coming from the United States, he fell ill with the

grippe. After a rather severe attack he was able to get on his feet

again and to do business, but was warned by his vigilant friend and

physician, Admiral Grayson, to keep within doors for a time. Mr. Lloyd

George, M. Clemenceau, and Signor Orlando were glad to accommodate

themselves to Mr. Wilson's necessities, and formed the habit of meeting

regularly at his house. His large salon was much better adapted for

these conferences than the room at Mr. Lloyd George's. So there it was

they met during all the final weeks of the Conference, leading up to the

very end.

A DESCRIPTION OF THE COUNCIL CHAMBER

In the middle of the salon, facing the row of windows looking out upon

the Place, was a large yet most inviting fireplace. On the left of this,

a little removed from it, President Wilson usually ensconced himself on

a small sofa, where he made room for some one member of his delegation,

whom, for the particular subject under discussion, he desired to have

most available. On the other side of the fireplace sat Mr. Lloyd George

in a rather high, old-fashioned chair of carved Italian maple, and at

his left sat his experts. Opposite the fireplace, to the right of it,

and about half-way across the room, sat M. Clemenceau, with such of his

Ministers as he needed, and then between him and President Wilson was

Signor Orlando with the Italians. This made a semi-circle around the

fireplace, and whenever Viscount Chinda of the Japanese delegation was

present, the circle was usually enlarged so as to give him a seat in the

middle of it. Behind this first semi-circle was a second one, made up of

secretaries and various technical experts, but the conference was always

a limited one, and was not allowed to grow so large as to become

unwieldy.

Directly in front of the fireplace, almost scorching his coat-tails, sat

Professor Mantou, the official interpreter for the Big Four. Mantou is a

Frenchman, Professor of French in the University of London, so he had a

perfect mastery of both French and English, with a good working

knowledge of Italian. Mantou was quite an extraordinary character, and

the most vivid interpreter I have ever heard, or rather seen; for at

times he entered into the spirit of the discussions more vigorously than

the original actors. M. Clemenceau, for instance, might make a quiet,

moderate statement, in French, of course; and when it became Mantou's

time to interpret it into English, he would enliven and embellish it

with his own unique gestures.

The Secretary of the Council was Sir Maurice Hankey, a British Army

officer of great skill and tact, who had a marvelous aptitude for

keeping everything straight, for taking perfectly adequate, and yet not

too voluminous minutes, for seeing that no topic was left in the air

without further reference, and in the last analysis, for holding the

Chiefs of State with their noses to the grindstone. He knew French and

Italian well, and was a distinct asset to the Council. I note that, in

the honors and money-grants disbursed by Parliament to Marshal Haig,

Admiral Beatty and others, Hankey received £25,000. Everybody who worked

with him at Paris will be glad of this just recognition. I have

described this Council Chamber in the President's house rather minutely

because, as I have said, it formed the stage for all of the momentous

decisions which went to make up the final peace settlement. At these

conferences there was no formal presiding officer, but to President

Wilson was usually accorded the courtesy of acting as moderator.

HOW THE TREATY WAS COMPOUNDED

What, then, is the Treaty? The answer is that it is a human document, a

compound of all the qualities possessed by human beings at their

best--and at their worst. People might expect a Treaty of Peace to be a

formal, legal, mechanical sort of document; and undoubtedly an effort

was made by some of the drafting lawyers, who bound all the different

clauses together, to throw the Treaty into the mold of formality. But

all the same, it is a compound quivering with human passion--virtue,

entreaty, fear, sometimes rage, and above all, I believe, justice.

The reason fear enters into the Treaty must be manifest. Take, for

instance, the case of France. France had lived under the German menace

for half a century. Finally the sword of Damocles had fallen, and almost

one-sixth of beautiful France had been laid waste. Her farms, her

factories, her villages, had been destroyed; her women ravished and led

captive; her children made homeless; her men folk killed. Do we realize

that almost 60 per cent. of all the French soldiers under thirty-one

years of age were killed in the war? Is it any wonder France could not

believe that the German menace was gone forever, and that the world

would never again allow German autocracy to overwhelm her? She could not

believe it, and for that reason she felt it essential that the terms of

the Treaty should be so severe as to leave Germany stripped for

generations of any power to wage aggression against beautiful France. If

her Allies pointed out that to cripple Germany economically was to make

it impossible for Germany to repair the frightful damage she had wrought

in France, France would in effect reply that this might be so, but never

again could she endure such a menace as had threatened her eastern

border for the previous half century. If certain of the Treaty clauses

appear to some minds as unduly severe, it must be remembered that the

Allies, little more than France, could bear the thought of letting

Germany off so easily that within a few years she might again prepare

for war.

There was fear, too, on the part of those new nations, which had been

largely split off from the effete and outworn Austro-Hungarian Empire,

that in some way their ancient oppressors would once more gain sway over

them. And, every nation, great and small, was overshadowed with the

constant terror of Bolshevism,--that dread specter which seemed to be

stalking, with long strides, from eastern Europe west towards the

Atlantic. Unless peace were hastened that evil might overtake all the

Allies. Such apprehensions as these, far more than imperial ambition or

greed, were factors in the Treaty decisions. Judgments that might take

many months in the ripening could not with safety be awaited.

THE PROTECTION DEMANDED BY FRANCE

France, I say, was thoroughly shocked at the frightful fate which had

come upon so great a portion of her land and population. She seemed to

have real fear that out of the ground, or from the sky, or from the

waters of the earth, at the waving of the devil's wand, there would

spring into being a fresh German army, ready to overwhelm her. It was

this fear that led France to ask for a special Treaty by which England

and America would pledge themselves to come to her aid in case of

Germany's unprovoked attack against her. Those Americans who object to

this have no conception of the real terror in France which led her to

entreat her two most powerful Allies to make such a special treaty with

her. France maintained, and with some reason, that during the formative

period of the League of Nations, before it might become an effective

instrument, if she did not have the psychological and practical

protection of England and America, she must look to her own defense, and

the only real defense she could conceive was to make the Rhine her

eastern boundary. This suggestion of Marshal Foch, based upon sound

military concept, was rejected by President Wilson and Mr. Lloyd George

on the theory that it would mean the annexation of German territory,

would change Germany's ancient boundary line of the Rhine, and

inevitably lead to future trouble.

[Illustration: Copyright Underwood & Underwood

President Poincaré With the Swiss President, M. Gustave Ador, Driving to

the Peace Conference in Paris.]

"Very well," in effect answered M. Clemenceau, "we see your point, but

if you will not allow us to fix this natural boundary for defense, then

we must beg you to guarantee us by treaty your coöperation against

German aggression. That coöperation you will never be called upon to

render with military force, because if Germany knows you are pledged to

come to our defense, that very fact will act as a complete deterrent to

any aggression."

This was the sound reasoning which led President Wilson and Mr. Lloyd

George to agree to submit respectively to Congress and Parliament this

special French Treaty; this is the reasoning which ought to lead

Congress, as it has led Parliament, to ratify the French Treaty

promptly. My belief is that after five years, this special Treaty will

be abrogated by mutual consent, because by that time the League of

Nations will be built up into such an effective instrument for the

prevention of future wars, any special treaties will be deemed

unnecessary.

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS COVENANT

If, in the foregoing paragraphs, I have given some idea as to how the

Treaty of Peace was compounded, how it was made up of a mixture of

virtue, selfishness, fear and justice, then perhaps I can proceed to

describe briefly how the document was actually evolved. First, then, we

deal with the drafting of the League of Nations Covenant:

The world has come to regard President Wilson as the special promoter

and sponsor for the League of Nations. It is perfectly true that Mr.

Wilson went to Paris with a fixed determination, above all else, to

bring about some definite arrangement which would tend to prevent future

wars. It is also true, however, that English statesmen had, for an even

longer time than President Wilson, been giving this same subject earnest

thought and study. Some of the more enlightened French statesmen, like

Leon Bourgeois, had also been sketching out plans for a League of Free

Nations. In England Viscount Grey of Falloden, England's really great

Minister of Foreign Affairs for almost a decade prior to the war, the

man who did everything that human intelligence and wisdom could devise

to prevent the war, and now happily named as British Ambassador to the

United States, had long worked for a League of Nations. Lord Robert

Cecil, a worthy son of a noble father, was another British statesman who

had given his mind to the same subject. General Smuts of South Africa,

recently made Premier in succession to the late General Botha, was

another. So that President Wilson, Colonel House, and the other

delegates, upon their arrival in Paris, found themselves in a not

uncongenial atmosphere. To be sure, on the part of Clemenceau and of

course of the militarists, there was great scepticism. Nevertheless the

French joined in, and early in January the Covenant for the League of

Nations began to evolve. It was built up step by step, President Wilson

taking a most active part in the work.

Finally the Covenant was adopted in a preliminary way and made public

late in February. It was subject to amendment, and those who drafted the

document welcomed amendments and urged that they be offered. An especial

effort was made to secure suggestions from various Republican

statesmen. No amendments, so far as I have been able to learn, were

offered by any of the Republican Senators, but ex-President Taft

suggested certain changes, some of which were adopted. President Lowell

of Harvard contributed one or two which were taken over almost verbatim.

Ex-Senator Elihu Root also made valuable suggestions, some of which were

utilized in the final drafting of the Covenant, made public early in

April.

ESSENCE AND SPIRIT OF THE LEAGUE

Roughly, as the situation developed, the purpose of the League of

Nations became two-fold. The initial purpose, of course, was to set up

the machinery for a body, representative of the nations, keeping in such

close contact and guided by such general principles as would tend to

make it impossible for one nation to begin war upon another. Elsewhere

in this volume ex-Attorney General Wickersham has described in detail

the clauses of the Covenant; but even in this brief allusion it is

proper to set down the essence and spirit of the League. It is this: No

two peoples, if they come to know each other and each other's motives

sufficiently well, and if by certain machinery they are maintained in

close personal and ideal contact, can conceivably fly at each other's

throats. Now no machinery can be devised that will absolutely prevent

war, but a carrying out of the spirit and principles set forth in the

present Covenant ought to make war well-nigh impossible. The machinery

that was thus set up at Paris was deemed at the time to be of course

imperfect and subject to constant improvement.

The second purpose of the League was to act as the binder, and in a way,

the administrative force of the present existing Treaty. That is to say,

we found as time went on there were many situations so complex that

human wisdom could not devise an immediate formula for their solution.

Hence, it became necessary for the Peace Conference to establish certain

machinery which, if necessary, should function over a series of years,

and thus work out permanently the problems involved. Therefore, as it

fell out, there were established under the Treaty, almost a score of

Commissions, most of them to act under the general supervision of a

League of Nations. Here, then, is another great function that the League

of Nations is immediately called upon to fulfil.

WORK OF THE COMMISSIONS

With the Covenant of the League of Nations more or less complete, the

next business of the Conference was the setting up of the Treaty proper.

The method for this work was roughly as follows: About the first of

February there was appointed a large number of special Commissions, made

up of members of the various delegations. These Commissions, which were

each to treat of separate topics, having arrived at a solution of the

special subject, were then to draft their reports in such language that

they could readily be embodied in the final Treaty of Peace itself.

Thus, for instance, there was appointed a Commission on Reparations, a

Commission on Economic Phases of the Treaty, a Commission on Finance, a

Commission on Boundaries, a Commission on Military and Naval Armament, a

Commission on German Colonies, a Commission on the Saar Basin Coal

Fields, a Commission on Inland Waterways, and so on to the number of

perhaps twenty. These Commissions immediately organized, and if the

subject were particularly complex and many-sided, resolved themselves

into sub-commissions. These sub-commissions in turn organized, each with

its chairman and vice-chairman, its secretariat, and its interpreters,

together with experts called into attendance.

DELAYS TO THE TREATY

The sittings of all these Commissions began, as I say, about February

1st, and at that time the plan was that the work of the Commissions

should be concluded in the form of a report to the Supreme Council six

weeks later, or about March 15th. The plan, further, was for the Supreme

Council to pass upon these various reports, amend them if need be, and

then have them drafted in such form as together would go to make up the

Treaty, which, under this scheme, would be presented to the Germans on

or about April 1st. The Germans would presumably sign within a

fortnight, and we should all be going home about April 15th. As a matter

of fact, the Germans signed the Treaty at Versailles at three o'clock on

the afternoon of June 28th, two and one-half months later than the time

originally planned.

This delay was, however, not at all unreasonable, if one stops to

consider the number of questions involved, their magnitude, and the

difficulty of dealing with them promptly. In the first place, each

Commission was supposed to present the Supreme Council a unanimous

report. The Council had ruled that the Commissions should not report by

majority vote, for if in any given instance the majority overruled the

minority, the minority might have such bitter complaint that there would

be left in the situation the seed for future trouble. Therefore the

Council determined that in the case of divergence of opinion in the same

Commission, the two or more groups in the Commission should make

separate reports to the Council, each having its own day in court. The

Council would act as judges of the last resort, and no delegation would

go away feeling that it had not had ample opportunity to present its

case. Inevitable and sharp differences of opinion did arise, so that at

least half the reports, I should say, as presented to the Big Four had

to be thrashed out there in considerable detail.

The second handicap to rapid progress, of course, lay in the composition

of the various Commissions. Each of the large five powers had to be

represented on each Commission, and in most instances smaller powers

also demanded representation. On some of the important Commissions the

larger powers had two or more delegates sitting. Owing to the fact that

Paris was full of influenza, each delegate had to have his alternate so

as to keep the ball rolling. When they first met these delegates were

not well acquainted with each other. They did not know how to get along

together. It took weeks for them to shake down, so as to understand

each other's methods and points of view; so as to be prepared to make

the necessary give and take, certain meetings of views which are always

essential where people are gathered from the four corners of the earth

with a single aim, but with vastly different ideas for attaining it.

[Illustration: Copyright by Underwood & Underwood

Where the Peace Treaty Was Signed

This was the table and chair at which the delegates sat and signed the

peace document.]

POLITICS AT THE CONFERENCE

Still another difficulty was the question of politics which could not be

eliminated. It is easy enough to say, "cut out politics," but in any

international gathering it is never possible to do it. I must say right

here, however, that--as it seemed to me--the American delegation

well-nigh attained that ideal, and be it to President Wilson's credit, I

never once saw him throughout the length of the conference, "play"

politics. But some of the other delegations naturally felt that at home

there was a "list'ning senate" to applaud or to condemn, and many of

these delegates, being members of their respective parliaments or

ministries, naturally had their ear to the ground for the effect that

their course at Paris was producing. Then if, at the sittings of a

Commission, one delegate made a particularly eloquent speech, his fellow

delegate might feel it incumbent upon him to make another equally long.

Some of the delegates deemed it their duty to make an extended speech

every day and seemed to feel that they were lacking in patriotism if

they failed each morning to cover several pages of the record with their

views.

THE DIFFICULTY OF LANGUAGE

Then the final difficulty, uniting with the other troubles to prevent

rapid progress, was that of language. The Paris Conference was, of

course, a regular Tower of Babel. There were two official

languages--French and English. Each delegation used the language with

which its delegates were most familiar, and every word uttered by those

delegates had to be translated into the vernacular of the others. Not

only did this interpretation consume a vast amount of time, but of

course it frequently proved most unsatisfactory. Both the English and

French languages are so idiomatic that the finer shades of meaning can

never be well transmuted from one to the other. Hence, frequent and

sometimes serious mistakes arose. For instance, a Serbian delegate who

knew not a word of English would misunderstand something said by the

British delegate, poorly translated into French. As the Serbian

delegate's knowledge of French was also very limited he could not

readily understand. So he would fly into a towering rage, and for an

hour a heated argument would volley back and forth. Perhaps, at the end

of that time, some cool-headed delegate (frequently an American), would

point out that neither of the honorable delegates had any conception of

what the other had said, and at bottom their views were precisely

similar. Each of the competitors would then listen to reason, the

situation would clear up, and things move on more happily.

I use here as an example a Serbian delegate, not that the Serbian

delegates were more prone to passion than anybody else. We were all

fighting like mad to make peace. We realized that though fundamentally

we all had the same aim, yet as to methods our views were so divergent,

that when we entered into conference at ten o'clock in the morning we

should probably have one continuous struggle, with interludes for

luncheon and dinner, until perhaps late in the evening. These struggles

never ceased altogether, but as we got to know one another better, they

of course let up materially, and we got on amicably and effectively.

THE COMMISSION ON REPARATIONS

No sketch of the Peace Conference, even one as cursory and superficial

as this, could give any idea of the picture without a more detailed

reference to the workings of some particular Commission that played an

important part in the building up of the Peace Treaty. Hence I may be

permitted to mention the Commission on Reparations. All things

considered, this was perhaps the most important Commission at work.

The original Commission on Reparations was divided into three

sub-commissions. Commission Number One was to determine upon what

principles reparation should be demanded from Germany, that is to say,

what items of damage should be included. In addition to physical damage

inflicted by Germany upon the Allies, by reason of her aggression on

land or sea, and from the air, should the cost of pensions for dead

French soldiers be claimed? Was the entire cost of the war as waged by

England, for instance, to be included as a charge against Germany? In

other words, just what categories should be adopted in order to define

Germany's liability?

This Commission Number One sat for weeks, and it was only towards the

very end that it succeeded in establishing the categories. At the start

there was a sharp divergence of opinion among the various delegations.

The American delegation pointed out that under President Wilson's

Fourteen Points costs of war would have to be excluded. The British

delegation maintained otherwise. The French thought the costs of war

ought to be included, but deemed the matter academic, inasmuch as

Germany could never pay the total war costs. And so the argument ran.

Sub-commission Number Two on reparations had for its object to determine

what Germany's capacity to pay was, and what the proper method of

payment should be. Sub-commission Number Three was to devise sanctions

or guarantees by which the Allies should be assured of receiving the

payments finally determined upon.

For weeks I was active upon Sub-commission Number Two, and in fact was

charged with the duty of drawing up the initial report covering the

question of Germany's capacity to pay. Early in the deliberations of

this Sub-commission it became apparent that its work was of momentous

import, for whatever the Sub-commission determined as Germany's capacity

to pay, undoubtedly that sum would be fixed as what Germany should be

obligated to pay. Theoretically, as the French had pointed out, it did

not make a great difference what categories of damage were included,

because Germany would probably be unable to pay even the extent of

material damage she had wrought. It was equally evident that she would

be compelled by the Allies to pay to the utmost extent of her capacity.

Therefore Sub-commission Number Two was in effect, naming the amount of

the German "indemnity."

AN ESTIMATE OF GERMANY'S CAPACITY TO PAY

This knowledge rendered the work of the delegates on Sub-commission

Number Two considerably more difficult. To estimate Germany's capacity

to pay over a series of years was by no means a purely scientific

matter. No banker, or economist, or financier, whatever his experience,

could look far enough into the future to be able to say what Germany

could or could not pay, in ten, twenty, or thirty years. The initial

estimate made by one of the delegations, as representing Germany's

capacity to pay, was one thousand million of francs. Another estimate

was twenty-four billion sterling, about one hundred twenty billion of

dollars. Now Germany's entire wealth was estimated at not over eighty

billion dollars, so it was inconceivable how it could be possible, even

over a series of years, for Germany to pick up her entire commonwealth

and transfer it to the Allies. Most of Germany's property consists of

the soil, railroads, factories, dwellings, and none of those things can

be transported, none can be made available for the payment of

reparation. Hence the question arose as to how much liquid wealth

Germany could export year after year and still maintain her own economic

life. This was the estimate upon which the British, French and American

delegations wrangled pleasantly for weeks. Whenever we reached too tense

a point, tea and toast was served, with jam to sweeten the atmosphere a

bit, and then we would start afresh.

As a matter of fact, as we encouraged newspaper reporters to surmise, we

had nearly arrived upon a basis of agreement for demanding a fixed sum

from Germany. That sum would not have exceeded forty or forty-five

billion dollars, with interest added. The American delegation believed

it to be far sounder economically to name a fixed sum and thus limit

Germany's liability, so that all nations could address themselves to a

definite end and arrange their fiscal and taxation policies accordingly.

But both Mr. Lloyd George and M. Clemenceau urged that public opinion in

both their countries would not acquiesce in any sum that fell far below

previous expectations; that, therefore, inasmuch as it was difficult

anyway to arrive at once upon the exact amount of damage caused, it

would be wiser to leave the amount of reparation open, to be determined

by a commission which should examine into the damage sustained, and fix

the total amount within two years. America's material interest in the

question was so limited that President Wilson finally did not oppose Mr.

Lloyd George's and M. Clemenceau's judgment. This, in brief, is the

history of the Reparation clauses in the Treaty. As I have already said,

if we realize that in almost every one of the other chapters similar

complex courses of procedure had to be followed, we shall not be

surprised at the time which the Treaty took for drafting.

THE ITALIAN CRISIS

The world is already familiar with the several crises which arose during

the course of the Peace Conference. The so-called Fiume crisis, when the

Italian delegation walked out and returned to Rome, was regarded as the

most serious. I am not sure it was, although it was generally so

considered. I believe most of Italy's warmest friends maintain that her

action in going home was a mistake. The question of putting Fiume under

Italian sovereignty was not covered nor even touched upon in the Treaty

of London. In face, the question of Fiume arose long after the Peace

Conference was under way. Signor Orlando, the Italian Premier, was

accused of fostering Italian feeling on Fiume and of fanning it into

flame. I believe there is no truth in this. At any rate, if the Italians

had been wise, they would have prevented the matter of Fiume from

becoming such a _cause celèbre_. I think that by judicious work they

could have prevented it. Then, too, probably the difficulty would have

been lessened if President Wilson's statement to the Italian people had

previously met Signor Orlando's approval. Mr. Wilson made his statement

with the best will in the world, with the intent to allay and not

inflame Italian public opinion. It should have been possible to

coördinate his idealism with Signor Orlando's position.

Later on the Italian delegation returned to Paris, realizing that the

question of Fiume, which was formerly an Austrian port, did not bear one

way or another upon the Treaty with Germany. But the Italians had lost a

certain tactical position which was important to them, and in my

judgment the move cost Italy much more than the whole question of Fiume

amounted to.

[Illustration: Copyright Underwood & Underwood

Awaiting the Decision of the German Peace Delegates.

President Clemenceau is shown standing. Next to him from right to left

are: President Wilson, Secretary of State Robert Lansing, Commissioner

Henry White, Colonel House, Gen. Tasker H. Bliss, Stephen Pichon, French

Minister of Foreign Affairs; Louis Klotz, French Minister of Finance,

and André Tardieu, French High Commissioner. From Clemenceau, left to

right: Premier Lloyd George, Bonar Law and A. J. Balfour.]

THE QUESTION OF SHANTUNG

The Shantung crisis was another serious one. It was so realized at the

time by the conferees at Paris. The Japanese delegation considered that

it had already suffered one or two rebuffs. Their clause to embody race

equality in the League of Nations Covenant had not been accepted. They,

as the leading Far Eastern Power, were being urged to take an active

part in the organization and development of the League of Nations, yet

they could see nothing for Japan in the idea except a chance to help the

other fellow. It was at this time that the Treaty clause was being

drafted covering the disposition of German rights in the Far East,

including those on the Shantung Peninsula. It will be remembered that at

the outbreak of the war Germany, by reason of treaty rights with China,

had possession of Kiauchau, upon the neck of the Shantung Peninsula.

Back in 1916, at a time when the war was going badly, after Japan had

driven the Germans out of the Far East and had prevented German

submarines from getting a base there to prey upon British troop ships

from Australia, Japan had demanded from England and France that she

become the inheritor of whatever rights Germany had in Shantung. England

and France readily granted this request, as America probably would have

done if she had been in the war at the time. Later on, according to the

record, China confirmed Japan in these rights.

President Wilson's idea, however, was "China for Chinamen"; therefore

Shantung should be turned over to China. This was a proper point of

view. It was a great pity that it could not be made to prevail. The

difficulty, however, was two-fold: first, the agreement which I have

just cited between England and France on one hand, and Japan on the

other; second, Japan's statement to President Wilson that if he began

his League of Nations by forcing England and France to break a solemn

agreement with Japan, then Japan would have no use for such a faithless

confederation and would promptly withdraw. At the same time, however,

Japan reiterated that her inheritance of Shantung was largely a formal

matter, and that if the Allies gave her that recognition, she would feel

in honor bound to withdraw from Shantung in the near future. This

statement, made repeatedly by the Japanese delegates to President

Wilson, finally led him to refrain from forcing Great Britain and France

to break their agreement, as he might perhaps otherwise have done. The

climax, of course, came when Japan gave her ultimatum and said that

unless she had her rights she would retire from the Conference.

DEMANDS OF BELGIUM

Then came the third and last crisis--the Belgians threatened to withdraw

and go home. They had, as they claimed, been promised by their Allies,

as well as by their enemies, including specifically Germany, that their

country, trampled over and devastated in order to defend France and

England from attack, was to be fully restored and reimbursed for its

expenditures. Early in the Conference Colonel House projected a plan to

Mr. Balfour of the British delegation and Mr. Klotz of the French

delegation, granting Belgium a priority of $500,000,000 on the German

reparation, this sum being sufficient to set Belgium well on her way to

recovery. There was, however, great delay in getting the final assent to

this priority. The American delegation worked hard to bring it about and

to push the plan on every occasion, but it still hung fire.

The Belgian delegation, finally becoming alarmed, insisted on formally

taking up the question with the Council of Four. The Belgian delegation,

under the leadership of Mr. Hymans, Minister of Foreign Affairs, made

two chief demands, one for the priority already mentioned, and one for

reimbursement for what the war had cost her. To this latter item there

was vigorous objection on the ground that it was inadmissible to provide

for Belgium's "costs of war" and not for those of England, France, Italy

and the other Allies. As a compromise to meet the situation, a formula

was finally proposed in a phrase to the effect that Germany was to be

obligated especially "to reimburse Belgium for all the sums borrowed by

Belgium from the Allies as a necessary consequence of the violation of

the Treaty of 1839." Inasmuch as all such sums borrowed by Belgium were

used for the prosecution of the war, this phrase was simply a euphemism

for granting to Belgium the war costs which she had demanded. But it was

finally agreed to on all hands, and the crisis was averted.

[Illustration: Copyright by Press Illustrating Service

The George Washington

It was on this ship that President and Mrs. Wilson made their two trips

across the Atlantic and back during the Peace Conference.]

THE TREATY PRESENTED TO THE GERMANS AT VERSAILLES

The Treaty in its final form was presented to the Germans at Versailles

May 7th. The Germans were hoping they would be permitted to discuss

certain phases of the Treaty in person with the Allied delegates, and in

fact repeatedly requested the opportunity. Some of us believed such

conversations might be advantageous if they were held; not between the

chiefs of the Allied states and the heads of the German delegation, but

between technical experts on both sides. Mr. Wilson favored this view,

as tending to enlighten the Germans on certain phases of the Treaty,

which from their written communications it was evident they did not

understand. We thought that some weeks of delay might possibly be

averted by sitting around the table with the Germans, distasteful as

that task might be, and holding a kind of miniature peace conference.

This suggestion, however, was strongly opposed by M. Clemenceau,

although it was favored by some of his ministers. In fact, some of the

latter, as well as many of the British, were for a time convinced that

the terms of the Treaty were such that Germany would never sign them.

Again and again Clemenceau was urged to give way on this point, but he

sturdily opposed the view and declared positively that he knew the

German character; that the only way to secure a German signature to the

Treaty was to insist upon purely formal and written communications.

Clemenceau had his way, and then began the laying of a good many wagers

as to whether the Germans would sign. This was after the original German

delegation, or at least the chiefs of it, had returned to Berlin and

declared that they would not come back again to Versailles. My own

opinion was, that after making as great a kick as possible the Germans

would undoubtedly sign. The logic of the situation was all for their

signing, the reasoning being this: If the Treaty were a just Treaty,

then they ought to sign any way; if it were an unjust Treaty, then, even

if signed, it would eventually fall of its own weight, and the Germans

would run no risk in signing it. I felt that the German psychology of

the situation would be acute enough to see these points and to lead to a

signature.

GERMANY SIGNS THE TREATY

This proved to be the case, and on Saturday, the 21st of June, after

questionings and misgivings, we finally got the word that the Germans

were to sign. I shall never forget the moment that the news came. Some

of us were in session with the Council of Four at the President's house.

Mr. Wilson sat on the right of the fireplace, Mr. Lloyd George on the

left, and M. Clemenceau in the middle. Mr. Orlando was in Italy but his

foreign minister, Baron Sonnino, was there in his place. The afternoon

was a tense one, for the time was growing short and the Germans had, as

I say, not yet signified their intention of signing the treaty. In the

mind of every one of us there lurked the question as to the terrible

steps that would have to be taken in the event the Germans refused to

sign. Late in the afternoon an orderly slipped into the room and

whispered into M. Clemenceau's ear. He struggled to his feet, marched up

to President Wilson and Mr. Lloyd George, and, drawing himself up, said

in solemn tones, "I have the honor to announce to you that the Germans

will sign the treaty."

And then a moment later the cannon boomed forth to the expectant

populace the news that the Germans would sign, and M. Clemenceau,

turning to me, breathed: "Ah, that is the sound that I have been waiting

to hear for forty-eight years."

II--WILSON'S FOURTEEN POINTS

An Attempt to Raise International Morality to the Level of

Private Morality

On January 8, 1918, President Wilson outlined the fourteen points on the

basis of which the Allies should make peace. This program was the

startling climax of a whole series of peace proposals which had kept

coming from both camps of belligerents, from neutrals, Socialists, and

the Pope. It is without doubt one of the greatest and most inspiring

State documents in the history of the world. It struck a vital and

telling blow at the basic causes of modern wars. For that reason it

electrified into complete unity the masses of the Allied countries.

Liberal, radical and pacifist opponents of the war rallied around it as

the last great hope of civilization. Its most important effect was to

give a democratic basis to the weary and disillusioned masses of the

Central Powers who were longing for peace. It was on the basis of the

fourteen points that the enemy surrendered.

THE WILSON PROGRAM

We entered this war because violations of right had occurred

which touched us to the quick and made the life of our own

people impossible unless they were corrected and the world

secured once for all against their recurrence. What we demand

in this war, therefore, is nothing peculiar to ourselves. It is

that the world be made fit and safe to live in; and

particularly that it be made safe for every peace-loving nation

which, like our own, wishes to live its own life, determine its

own institutions, be assured of justice and fair dealings by

the other peoples of the world, as against force and selfish

aggression. All the peoples of the world are in effect partners

in this interest and for our own part we see very clearly that

unless justice be done to others it will not be done to us. The

programme of the world's peace, therefore, is our programme,

and that programme, the only possible programme, as we see it,

is this:

I. Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which

there shall be no private international understandings of any

kind, but diplomacy shall proceed always frankly and in the

public view.

II. Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas, outside

territorial waters, alike in peace and in war, except as the

seas may be closed in whole or in part by international action

for the enforcement of international covenants.

III. The removal, as far as possible, of all economic barriers

and the establishment of an equality of trade conditions among

all the nations consenting to the peace and associating

themselves for its maintenance.

IV. Adequate guarantees given and taken that national armaments

will be reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic

safety.

V. A free, open minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment of

all colonial claims, based upon a strict observance of the

principle that in determining all such questions of sovereignty

the interests of the populations concerned must have equal

weight with the equitable claims of the government whose title

is to be determined.

[Illustration: Copyright by Underwood & Underwood

Paris Crowds Greeting President Wilson

A general holiday was declared to welcome the President of the United

States. This photograph was taken in the Place dé la Concorde.]

VI. The evacuation of Russian territory and such a settlement

of all questions affecting Russia as will secure the best and

freest coöperation of the other nations of the world in

obtaining for her an unhampered and unembarrassed opportunity

for the independent determination of her own political

development and national policy and assure her of a sincere

welcome into the society of free nations under institutions of

her own choosing; and, more than a welcome, assistance also of

every kind that she may need and may herself desire. The

treatment accorded Russia by her sister nations in the months

to come will be the acid test of their good will, of their

comprehension of her needs as distinguished from their own

interests, and of their intelligent and unselfish sympathy.

VII. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evacuated and

restored, without any attempt to limit the sovereignty which

she enjoys in common with all other free nations. No other

single act will serve as this will serve to restore confidence

among the nations in the laws which they have themselves set

and demanded for the government of their relations with one

another. Without this healing act the whole structure and

validity of international law is forever impaired.

VIII. All French territory should be freed and the invaded

portions restored, and the wrong done France by Prussia in 1871

in the matter of Alsace-Lorraine, which has unsettled the peace

of the world for nearly fifty years, should be righted, in

order that peace may once more be made secure in the interest

of all.

IX. A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy should be effected

along clearly recognizable lines of nationality.

X. The peoples of Austria-Hungary, whose place among the

nations we wish to see safeguarded and assured, should be

accorded the freest opportunity of autonomous development.

XI. Rumania, Serbia and Montenegro should be evacuated;

occupied territories restored; Serbia accorded free and secure

access to the sea, and the relations of the several Balkan

States to one another determined by friendly counsel along

historically established lines of allegiance and nationality,

and international guarantees of the political and economic

independence and territorial integrity of the several Balkan

States should be entered into.

XII. The Turkish portions of the present Ottoman Empire should

be assured a secure sovereignty, but the other nationalities

which are now under Turkish rule should be assured an undoubted

security of life and an absolutely unmolested opportunity of

autonomous development, and the Dardanelles should be

permanently opened as a free passage to the ships and commerce

of all nations under international guarantees.

XIII. An independent Polish State should be erected which

should include the territories inhabited by indisputably Polish

population, which should be assured a free and secure access to

the sea and whose political and economic independence and

territorial integrity should be guaranteed by international

covenant.

XIV. A general association of nations must be formed under

specific covenants for the purpose of affording mutual

guarantees of political independence and territorial integrity

to great and small States alike.

III--HOW THE PEACE TREATY WAS SIGNED

A Description of the Historic Ceremony in the Hall of Mirrors at the

Palace of Versailles, June 8, 1919

(Reprinted from the New York _Times_.)

No nobler and more eloquent setting could have been found for this

greatest of all modern events, the signing of the Peace of Versailles,

after five years of terrific struggle on whose outcome the fate of the

whole world had hung, than the palace of the greatest of French Kings on

the hillcrest of the Paris suburb that gave its name to the treaty. To

reach it, says the correspondent of _The New York Times_, the

plenipotentiaries and distinguished guests from all parts of the world

motored to Versailles that day, and drove down the magnificent

tree-lined Avenue du Château, then across the huge square--the famous

Place d'Armes of Versailles--and up through the gates and over the

cobblestones of the Court of Honor to the entrance, where officers of

the Republican Guard, whose creation dates back to the French

Revolution, in picturesque uniform, were drawn up to receive them.

All day the crowd had been gathering. It was a cloudy day; not till noon

did the sky clear. By noon eleven regiments of French cavalry and

infantry had taken position along the approaches to the palace, while

within the court on either side solid lines of infantry in horizon blue

were drawn up at attention.

Hours before the time set for the ceremony an endless stream of

automobiles began moving out of Paris up the cannon-lined hill of the

Champs Elysées, past the massive Arc de Triomphe, bulking somberly

against the leaden sky, and out through the Bois de Boulogne. This whole

thoroughfare was kept clear by pickets, dragoons, and mounted gendarmes.

In the meantime thousands of Parisians were packing regular and special

trains on all the lines leading to Versailles, and contending with

residents of the town for places in the vast park where the famous

fountains would rise in white fleur-de-lis to mark the end of the

ceremony.

A MEMORABLE SCENE

Past the line of gendarmes thrown across the approaches to the square

reserved for ticket holders, the crowd surged in a compact and

irresistible wave, while hundreds of the more fortunate ones took up

positions in the high windows of every wing of the palace. Up the broad

boulevard of the Avenue de Paris the endless chain of motor cars rolled

between rows of French soldiers; and a guard of honor at the end of the

big court presented arms to the plenipotentiaries and delegates as they

drove through to the entrance, which for the Allied delegates only was

by the marble stairway to the "Queen's Apartments" and the Hall of

Peace, giving access to the Hall of Mirrors. A separate route of entry

was prescribed for the Germans, an arrangement which angered and

disconcerted them when they discovered it, through the park and up the

marble stairway through the ground floor.

The delegates and plenipotentiaries began to arrive shortly after 2 p.

m., their automobiles rolling between double lines of infantry with

bayonets fixed--it was estimated that there were 20,000 soldiers

altogether guarding the route--that held back the cheering throngs. The

scene from the Court of Honor was impressive. The Place d'Armes was a

lake of white faces, dappled everywhere by the bright colors of flags

and fringed with the horizon blue of troops whose bayonets flamed

silverly as the sun emerged for a moment from behind heavy clouds. At

least a dozen airplanes wheeled and curvetted above.

Up that triumphal passage, leading for a full quarter of a mile from the

wings of the palace to the entrance to the Hall of Mirrors,

representatives of the victorious nations passed in flag-decked

limousines--hundreds, one after another, without intermission, for fifty

minutes. Just inside the golden gates, which were flung wide, they

passed the big bronze statue of Louis XIV., the "Sun-King," on

horseback, flanked by statues of the Princes and Governors, Admirals and

Generals who had made Louis the Grand Monarque of France. And on the

façade of the twin, temple-like structures on either side of the great

statue they could read as they passed an inscription symbolic of the

historic ceremony just about to occur: "To All the Glories of France."

NOTABILITIES ARRIVE

One of the earliest to arrive was Marshal Foch, amid a torrent of

cheering, which burst out even louder a few moments later when the

massive head of Premier Clemenceau was seen through the windows of a

French military car. To these and other leaders, including President

Wilson, General Pershing, and Premier Lloyd George, the troops drawn up

all around the courtyard presented arms. After Clemenceau the unique

procession continued, diplomats, soldiers, Princes of India in gorgeous

turbans and swarthy faces, dapper Japanese in immaculate Western dress,

Admirals, aviators, Arabs; one caught a glimpse of the bright colors of

French, British, and Colonial uniforms. British Tommies and American

doughboys also dashed up on crowded camions, representing the blood and

sweat of the hard-fought victory; they got an enthusiastic reception. It

was 2:45 when Mr. Balfour, bowing and smiling, heralded the arrival of

the British delegates. Mr. Lloyd George was just behind him, for once

wearing the conventional high hat instead of his usual felt. At 2:50

came President Wilson in a black limousine with his flag, a white eagle

on a dark blue ground; he received a hearty welcome.

By 3 o'clock the last contingent had arrived, and the broad ribbon road

stretched empty between the lines of troops from the gates of the palace

courtyard. The Germans had already entered; to avoid any unpleasant

incident they had been quietly conveyed from their lodgings at the Hotel

des Reservoirs Annex through the park.

THE SCENE INSIDE

The final scene in the great drama was enacted in the magnificent Hall

of Mirrors. Versailles contains no more splendid chamber than this royal

hall, whose three hundred mirrors gleam from every wall, whose vaulted

and frescoed ceiling looms dark and high, in whose vastness the

footfalls of the passer re-echo over marble floors and die away

reverberatingly. It was no mere matter of convenience or accident that

the Germans were brought to sign the Peace Treaty in this hall. For this

same hall, which saw the German peace delegates of 1919, representing a

beaten and prostrate Germany, affix their signatures to the Allied terms

of peace, had witnessed in the year 1871 a very different ceremony. It

was in the Hall of Mirrors that the German Empire was born. Forty-nine

years ago, on a January morning, while the forts of beleaguered Paris

were firing their last defiant shots, in that mirror-gleaming hall was

inaugurated the reign of that German Empire the virtual end of which, so

far as the concept held by its originators is concerned, was signalized

in Versailles in the same spot on Saturday, June 28. And in 1871

President Thiers had signed there the crushing terms of defeat imposed

by a victorious and ruthless Germany.

In anticipation of the present ceremony carpets had been laid and the

ornamental table, with its eighteenth century gilt and bronze

decorations, had been placed in position on the daïs where the

plenipotentiaries were seated. Fronting the chair of M. Clemenceau was

placed a small table, on which the diplomatic instruments were laid. It

was to this table that each representative was called, in alphabetical

order by countries, to sign his name to the treaty and affix to it his

Governmental seal. The four hundred or more invited guests were given

places in the left wing of the Hall of Mirrors, while the right wing was

occupied by about the same number of press representatives. Sixty seats

were allotted to the French press alone. Besides the military guards

outside the palace, the grand stairway up which the delegates came to

enter the hall was controlled by the Republican Guards in their most

brilliant gala uniform.

THE PEACE TABLE

The peace table--a huge hollow rectangle with its open side facing the

windows in the hall--was spread with tawny yellow coverings blending

with the rich browns, blues, and yellows of the antique hangings and

rugs; these, and the mellow tints of the historical paintings, depicting

scenes from France's ancient wars, in the arched roof of the long hall,

lent bright dashes of color to an otherwise austere scene. Against the

sombre background also stood out the brilliant uniforms of a few French

guards, in red plumed silver helmets and red, white, and blue uniforms,

and a group of Allied Generals, including General Pershing, who wore the

scarlet sash of the Legion of Honor.

But all the diplomats and members of the parties who attended the

ceremony of signing wore conventional civilian clothes. All gold lace

and pageantry was eschewed, the fanciful garb of the Middle Ages was

completely absent as representative of traditions and practices sternly

condemned in the great bound treaty-volume of Japanese paper, covered

with seals and printed in French and English, which was signed by

twenty-seven nations that afternoon.

As a contrast with the Franco-German peace session of 1871, held in the

same hall, there were present some grizzled French veterans of the

Franco-Prussian war. They took the place of the Prussian guardsmen of

the previous ceremony, and gazed with a species of grim satisfaction at

the disciples of Bismarck, who sat this time in the seats of the lowly,

while the white marble statue of Minerva looked stonily on.

ENTRANCE OF CHIEF ACTORS

The ceremony of signing was marked only by three minor incidents: a

protest by the German delegation at the eleventh hour over the

provision of separate entrance, the filing of a document of protest by

General Jan Smuts of the South African delegation, and the deliberate

absence of the Chinese delegates from the ceremony, due to

dissatisfaction over the concessions granted to Japan in Shantung.

[Illustration: Copyright Underwood & Underwood

Henry White

Former Ambassador to France and Italy and one of the United States

delegates to the Peace Conference.]

The treaty was deposited on the table at 2:10 p.m. by William Martin of

the French Foreign Office; it was inclosed in a stamped leather case,

and bulked large. Because of the size of the volume and the fragile

seals it bore, the plan to present it for signing to Premier Clemenceau,

President Wilson, and Premier Lloyd George had been given up. A box of

old-fashioned goose quills, sharpened by the expert pen pointer of the

French Foreign Office, was placed on each of the three tables for the

use of plenipotentiaries who desired to observe the conventional

formalities.

Secretary Lansing, meanwhile, had been the first of the American

delegation to arrive in the palace--at 1:45 p.m. Premier Clemenceau

entered at 2:20. Three detachments each consisting of fifteen private

soldiers--from the American, British, and French forces--just before 3

o'clock and took their places in the embrasures of the windows

overlooking the château park, a few feet from Marshal Foch, who was

seated with the French delegation at the peace table. Marshal Foch was

present only as a spectator, and did not participate in the signing.

These forty-five soldiers of the three main belligerent nations were

present as the real "artisans of peace" and stood within the inclosure

reserved for plenipotentiaries and high officials of the conference as a

visible sign of their rôle in bringing into being a new Europe. These

men had been selected from those who bore honorable wounds. Premier

Clemenceau stepped up to the poilus of the French detachment and shook

the hand of each, expressing his pleasure at seeing them, and his

regrets for the suffering they had endured for France.

PRESIDENT WILSON ENTERS

Delegates of the minor powers made their way with difficulty through the

crowd to their places at the table. Officers and civilians lined the

walls and filled the aisles. President Wilson entered the Hall of

Mirrors at 2:50. All the Allied delegates were then seated, except the

Chinese representatives, who were conspicuous by their absence. The

difficulty of seeing well militated against demonstrations on the

arrival of prominent statesmen. The crowd refused to be seated and

thronged toward the center of the hall, which is so long that a good

view was impossible from any distance, even with the aid of opera

glasses. German correspondents were ushered into the hall just before 3

o'clock and took standing room in a window at the rear of the

correspondents' section.

At 3 o'clock a hush fell over the hall. There were a few moments of

disorder while the officials and the crowd took their places. At 3:07

the German delegates, Dr. Hermann Müller, German Secretary for Foreign

Affairs, and Dr. Johannes Bell, Colonial Secretary, were shown into the

hall; with heads held high they took their seats. The other delegates

remained seated, according to a prearranged plan reminiscent of the

discourtesy displayed by von Brockdorff-Rantzau, who at the ceremony of

delivery of the peace treaty on May 7th, had refused to rise to read his

address to the Allied delegates. The seats of the German delegates

touched elbows with the Japanese on the right and the Brazilians on the

left. They were thus on the side nearest the entrance, and the program

required them to depart by a separate exit before the other delegates at

the close of the ceremony. Delegates from Ecuador, Peru, and Liberia

faced them across the narrow table.

THE GERMANS SIGN

M. Clemenceau, as President of the Peace Conference, opened the

ceremony. Rising, he made the following brief address, amid dead

silence:

"The session is open. The allied and associated powers on one

side and the German Reich on the other side have come to an

agreement on the conditions of peace. The text has been

completed, drafted, and the President of the Conference has

stated in writing that the text that is about to be signed now

is identical with the 200 copies that have been delivered to

the German delegation. The signatures will be given now, and

they amount to a solemn undertaking faithfully and loyally to

execute the conditions embodied by this treaty of peace. I now

invite the delegates of the German Reich to sign the treaty.'

There was a tense pause for a moment. Then in response to M.

Clemenceau's bidding the German delegates rose without a word, and,

escorted by William Martin, master of ceremonies, moved to the signatory

table, where they placed upon the treaty the sign-manuals which German

Government leaders had declared over and over again, with emphasis and

anger, would never be appended to this treaty. They also signed a

protocol covering changes in the documents, and the Polish undertaking.

All three documents were similarly signed by the Allied delegates who

followed.

WILSON SIGNS NEXT

When the German delegates regained their seats after signing, President

Wilson immediately rose and, followed by the other American

plenipotentiaries, moved around the sides of the horseshoe to the

signature tables. It was thus President Wilson, and not M. Clemenceau,

who was first of the Allied delegates to sign. This, however, was purely

what may be called an alphabetical honor, in accordance with which the

nations were named in the prologue to the treaty. Premier Lloyd George,

with the British delegation, came next. The British dominions followed.

M. Clemenceau with the French delegates, was next in line; then came

Baron Saionji and the other Japanese delegates, and they in turn were

followed by the representatives of the smaller powers.

[Illustration: Copyright Underwood & Underwood

Count von Brockdorff-Rantzau

Foreign Minister of Germany and President of the German Peace

delegates.]

During the attaching of the signatures of the great powers and the

Germans a battery of moving picture cameras clicked away so audibly that

they could be heard above the general noise and disorder of the throng.

The close of the ceremony came so quickly and quietly that it was

scarcely noticed until it was all over. M. Clemenceau arose almost

unremarked, and in a voice half lost amid the confusion and the hum of

conversation which had sprung up while the minor powers were signing

declared the conference closed, and asked the Allied and associated

delegates to remain in their seats for a few moments--this to permit the

German plenipotentiaries to leave the building before the general

exodus.

THE GERMANS DEPART

None arose as the Germans filed out, accompanied by their suite of

secretaries and interpreters, just as all the plenipotentiaries had kept

their seats when Dr. Müller and Dr. Bell entered. The Germans went forth

evidently suffering strong emotion. Outside an unsympathetic crowd

jammed close to the cars which took them away. There was no aggression,

but the sentiment of the throng was unmistakable.

Meanwhile the great guns that announced the closing of the ceremony were

booming, and their concussion shook the old palace of Versailles to its

foundations. Amid confusion the assembly dispersed, and the most

momentous ceremony of the epoch was at an end.

The great war which for five long years had shaken Europe and the world

was formally ended at last. It was a war which had cost the belligerents

over $200,000,000,000; which had caused the deaths of 8,000,000 human

beings, and which had left the world a post-war burden of debt amounting

to $135,000,000,000. It was a war which had changed the whole face of

Europe, which had brought many new nations into existence, which had

revolutionized the organization of all national and international life.

It was a war which had brought the world the consciousness of its common

obligation to unite against all war. The booming of the great guns of

Versailles seemed to proclaim a new epoch.

IV--THE PEACE TREATY--ITS MEANING

TO AMERICA

America's "Place in the Sun" Due to Her Efforts to Secure a Just Peace

By GEORGE W. WICKERSHAM

Formerly Attorney-General of the United States.

"The cause of our entrance into the great war," declares Dr. David Jayne

Hill in a recent essay, "being the violation by the German Imperial

Government of our legal rights as a nation, our object in the war was to

make our rights respected. The one clear duty of the treaty-making power

in concluding peace with Germany, therefore, is to secure this

result."[25]

[25] "Americanizing the Treaty."--_North American Review_, August, 1919.

In these words, one of the most distinguished and accomplished of the

opponents of the treaty of Paris reveals the profound abyss which

separates those who oppose from those who are urging the approval of the

Treaty of Versailles. Dr. Hill, perhaps unconsciously, gives expression

to a sordid, narrow, selfish view of the issues of the war, which would

transmute into the most elemental act of self-defense one of the

greatest crusades of high idealism ever conducted by any people in the

history of nations. If, in fact, the cause of our participation in the

war was merely to repel attacks upon our legal rights as a nation, then

indeed, that end being attained, and the aggressor reduced to impotence

for the future, we may return within our own borders, withdraw unto

ourselves, disclaim all responsibility for the condition of the world

elsewhere and plunge into the selfish exploitation of our national

resources, "the world forgetting, by the world forgot." It is a strange

perversion of the facts of recent history that leads to such a

conception of America's responsibility for the future of civilization.

There were undoubtedly, as Mr. Wilson said, "violations of right which

touched us to the quick." Was it merely violations of our own national

rights that roused this peace-loving nation to array itself for battle;

that sent two million of our young men across three thousand miles of

ocean to take their places beside the heroes of Verdun and the Marne,

the veterans of Cambrai and Arras, Ypres and the Somme; infused the

weary defenders of civilization with new courage; converted their

defense into an irresistible offensive which shattered the greatest

military machine of history, overthrew the Kaiser and his government,

and brought the German nation to its knees? No! It was not the German

attacks upon our rights as a nation; it was the German challenge of the

whole basis of modern Christian civilization. It was her cynical

disclaimer of the binding character of treaties; her inhuman method of

warfare; her brutal cruelties of non-combatant men, women and children;

her ruthless destruction of monuments of art--the possessions of not

merely one nation, but of the entire world of men and women in every

land who love beauty and revere art. It was the growing conviction that

a government which ordered the sinking of the _Lusitania_ and the

_Sussex_; that destroyed the priceless literary treasures of Louvain;

that separated families in Belgium and France, and deported great

companies of men to work in German munition factories; that ruthlessly

cut up by the roots the fruit trees and shrubs of the occupied regions

of France; that sought to destroy not merely the men, but the souls of

nations, so that its own horrid philosophy of Force might reign over

them--that such a government must no longer exist; that its pestilential

influence was more noxious than tuberculosis or the bubonic plague.

THE BASIS OF PEACE

Therefore, the Youth of America joyously leaped to arms and crowded

overseas in the greatest of all crusades, insuring victory and promising

the opening of a new and better epoch of human history. It was the

recognition of human kinship; the perception of human brotherhood, that

inspired them to the great endeavor. Our proud sense of American

nationality took on a deeper and holier significance as we joined

forces with the older peoples in defense of the great principles of

human right which had been formulated by our fathers and upon which was

reared the American State. We were no less Americans that we had

accepted a common responsibility with Great Britain, France and Italy

for the preservation of the ideals of human freedom for which Washington

fought and Lincoln died. Nay! better Americans, as we realized that the

war was being fought in defense of those principles upon which our own

institutions were founded and by which we had become the great, strong,

free nation we are.

And as the hideous carnage went on, and we saw a whole generation of the

youth of the free nations of Europe butchered because the German people

had become so obsessed with their own sense of superiority that they

were determined to rule the world and impose upon all other peoples

subservience to their Moloch-like gospel of efficiency, another feeling

began to struggle for expression in Europe and America alike--a

determination that all wars of aggression must cease; that disputes

between nations must be settled like those between individuals, by

peaceful arbitration or conciliation; that the causes of war must be

examined and, so far as possible, removed, and that no such war as this

ever again should desolate the earth. This was the meaning of the phrase

one came to hear on many lips, that it was "a war against war." How

could such a result be attained? Obviously, only by the continued

association in peace of those powers whose close coöperation in war was

compelling the overthrow of German militarism, and the widening of that

association to include all the other nations who should accept its

program and give an earnest of adherence to its ideals. There was also

the hope that some time--when they should have offered up that ancient

sacrifice, "an humble and a contrite heart"--even the German people,

enfranchised and regenerated, might be admitted into the society of Free

Peoples and with new significance become entitled to be called a

civilized nation.

These were the principles that underlay Mr. Wilson's program of

peace--the fourteen points of January 8, 1918, and subsequent addresses;

the only definite formulation of the basis of peace which was laid

before the world, a program concerning which the American Congress

expressed no definite criticism and for which it offered no substitute;

a program which was accepted by Allies and opponents alike, and which

constituted the Chart by which the Conference of Paris was required to

endeavor to formulate the terms of the Treaty of Peace.

The work of that Conference now has been submitted to the judgment of

mankind. It was accepted by the new government of Germany with a wry

face, as the judgment of the victors naturally would be taken by the

vanquished. It has been ratified by the Parliament of Great Britain, by

Italy, by France and by Japan. It has been for weeks under debate in the

Senate of the United States. Daily efforts have been made to create a

partisan political issue over it, and to visit upon it party resentment

against the past actions of the President.[26]

[26] This article by Mr. Wickersham was prepared prior to the Senate

deadlock and the rejection of the Treaty with the Lodge reservations.

Dr. Hill again sums up the case against the treaty--the final basis

which the confused gropings after some means of making it unpopular with

the people finally have evolved--in these words:

"The League of Nations, as proposed, includes not only

obligations not related to the reasons for engaging in the war,

but also obligations opposed to the traditions, the

time-honored policies, and even the constitutional provisions

of the United States. It commits the whole future policy of

this country to the decisions of an international body in which

it would have only a single voice; it permits that body to

intrude its judgments, and thereby its policies into a sphere

hitherto regarded as exclusively American, and, in addition, it

demands that the territories held by each of the members of the

League under this treaty shall receive the permanent protection

of the United States as integral parts of the Nations that now

claim them."

Is it true? What is the real meaning of the Peace Treaty and its effect

upon the people of the United States? The answer to these questions, and

indeed to most of the criticism of the Covenant, is conclusively met by

a reading of the treaty. But first let us turn for a moment to the

fourteen points of Mr. Wilson's address of January 8, 1918. The basis of

the territorial readjustment of Europe which he then proposed, was the

giving of national expression to racial aspiration. Alien imperial rule

such as that of Austria over Hungary and Bohemia, and that of Germany,

Austria or Russia over Poland, was to end, and the Poles, the Croats,

Serbs, Hungarians, Bohemians, and the Czechoslavs and Jugoslavs each

were to be allowed national existence, with the right of

self-determination. Whatever may now be thought of the wisdom of this

theory, it was accepted by all of the Allies, who thereby were committed

to a responsibility for the protection, certainly in the early years of

their existence, of the new nations they united to call into being.

Recognizing this fact, the fourteenth of the Wilson points provided for

the creation of an Association of the Allied Nations to protect the work

of their arms. Aside from that practical purpose, the League of Nations

was recognized by many in every land as furnishing the only practicable

machinery for the removal of causes of war and the prevention of new

assaults upon civilization, such as that which Germany had launched in

August, 1914.

[Illustration: Copyright Underwood & Underwood

=Victoria Hall at Geneva=

Selected by the Council of the Powers as the meeting place of the League

of Nations.]

The first Chapter of the Peace Treaty, therefore, is a Covenant or

Compact forming a League of Nations, whose purpose, as expressed in the

Preamble, is "to promote international coöperation and to achieve

international peace and security." Worthy objects, these: how are they

to be attained? The Preamble answers,