[Address delivered at the First Annual Assemblage of the League to
Enforce Peace, May 27, 1916.]
When the invitation to be here to-night came to me, I was glad to accept
it,--not because it offered me an opportunity to discuss the program of
the League,--that you will, I am sure, not expect of me,--but because
the desire of the whole world now turns eagerly, more and more eagerly,
towards the hope of peace, and there is just reason why we should take
our part in counsel upon this great theme. It is right that I, as
spokesman of our Government, should attempt to give expression to what I
believe to be the thought and purpose of the people of the United States
in this vital matter.
This great war that broke so suddenly upon the world two years ago, and
which has swept within its flame so great a part of the civilized world,
has affected us very profoundly, and we are not only at liberty, it is
perhaps our duty, to speak very frankly of it and of the great interests
of civilization which it affects.
With its causes and its objects we are not concerned. The obscure
fountains from which its stupendous flood has burst forth we are not
interested to search for or explore. But so great a flood, spread far
and wide to every quarter of the globe, has of necessity engulfed many a
fair province of right that lies very near to us. Our own rights as a
Nation, the liberties, the privileges, and the property of our people
have been profoundly affected. We are not mere disconnected lookers-on.
The longer the war lasts, the more deeply do we become concerned that
it should be brought to an end and the world be permitted to resume its
normal life and course again. And when it does come to an end we shall
be as much concerned as the nations at war to see peace assume an aspect
of permanence, give promise of days from which the anxiety of
uncertainty shall be lifted, bring some assurance that peace and war
shall always hereafter be reckoned part of the common interest of
mankind. We are participants, whether we would or not, in the life of
the world. The interests of all nations are our own also. We are
partners with the rest. What affects mankind is inevitably our affair as
well as the affair of the nations of Europe and of Asia.
One observation on the causes of the present war we are at liberty to
make, and to make it may throw some light forward upon the future, as
well as backward upon the past. It is plain that this war could have
come only as it did, suddenly and out of secret counsels, without
warning to the world, without discussion, without any of the deliberate
movements of counsel with which it would seem natural to approach so
stupendous a contest. It is probable that if it had been foreseen just
what would happen, just what alliances would be formed, just what forces
arrayed against one another, those who brought the great contest on
would have been glad to substitute conference for force. If we ourselves
had been afforded some opportunity to apprise the belligerents of the
attitude which it would be our duty to take, of the policies and
practices against which we would feel bound to use all our moral and
economic strength, and in certain circumstances even our physical
strength also, our own contribution to the counsel which might have
averted the struggle would have been considered worth weighing and
regarding.
And the lesson which the shock of being taken by surprise in a matter so
deeply vital to all the nations of the world has made poignantly clear
is, that the peace of the world must henceforth depend upon a new and
more wholesome diplomacy. Only when the great nations of the world have
reached some sort of agreement as to what they hold to be fundamental to
their common interest, and as to some feasible method of acting in
concert when any nation or group of nations seeks to disturb those
fundamental things, can we feel that civilization is at last in a way of
justifying its existence and claiming to be finally established. It is
clear that nations must in the future be governed by the same high code
of honor that we demand of individuals.
We must, indeed, in the very same breath with which we avow this
conviction admit that we have ourselves upon occasion in the past been
offenders against the law of diplomacy which we thus forecast; but our
conviction is not the less clear, but rather the more clear, on that
account. If this war has accomplished nothing else for the benefit of
the world, it has at least disclosed a great moral necessity and set
forward the thinking of the statesmen of the world by a whole age.
Repeated utterances of the leading statesmen of most of the great
nations now engaged in war have made it plain that their thought has
come to this, that the principle of public right must henceforth take
precedence over the individual interests of particular nations, and that
the nations of the world must in some way band themselves together to
see that that right prevails as against any sort of selfish aggression;
that henceforth alliance must not be set up against alliance,
understanding against understanding, but that there must be a common
agreement for a common object, and that at the heart of that common
object must lie the inviolable rights of peoples and of mankind. The
nations of the world have become each other's neighbors. It is to their
interest that they should understand each other. In order that they may
understand each other, it is imperative that they should agree to
cooeperate in a common cause, and that they should so act that the
guiding principle of that common cause shall be even-handed and
impartial justice.
This is undoubtedly the thought of America. This is what we ourselves
will say when there comes proper occasion to say it. In the dealings of
nations with one another arbitrary force must be rejected and we must
move forward to the thought of the modern world, the thought of which
peace is the very atmosphere. That thought constitutes a chief part of
the passionate conviction of America.
We believe these fundamental things: First, that every people has a
right to choose the sovereignty under which they shall live. Like other
nations, we have ourselves no doubt once and again offended against that
principle when for a little while controlled by selfish passion, as our
franker historians have been honorable enough to admit; but it has
become more and more our rule of life and action. Second, that the small
states of the world have a right to enjoy the same respect for their
sovereignty and for their territorial integrity that great and powerful
nations expect and insist upon. And, third, that the world has a right
to be free from every disturbance of its peace that has its origin in
aggression and disregard of the rights of peoples and nations.
So sincerely do we believe in these things that I am sure that I speak
the mind and wish of the people of America when I say that the United
States is willing to become a partner in any feasible association of
nations formed in order to realize these objects and make them secure
against violation.
There is nothing that the United States wants for itself that any other
nation has. We are willing, on the contrary, to limit ourselves along
with them to a prescribed course of duty and respect for the rights of
others which will check any selfish passion of our own, as it will check
any aggressive impulse of theirs.
If it should ever be our privilege to suggest or initiate a movement for
peace among the nations now at war, I am sure that the people of the
United States would wish their Government to move along these lines:
First, such a settlement with regard to their own immediate interests as
the belligerents may agree upon. We have nothing material of any kind to
ask for ourselves, and are quite aware that we are in no sense or degree
parties to the present quarrel. Our interest is only in peace and its
future guarantees. Second, an universal association of the nations to
maintain the inviolate security of the highway of the seas for the
common and unhindered use of all the nations of the world, and to
prevent any war begun either contrary to treaty covenants or without
warning and full submission of the causes to the opinion of the
world,--a virtual guarantee of territorial integrity and political
independence.
But I did not come here, let me repeat, to discuss a program. I came
only to avow a creed and give expression to the confidence I feel that
the world is even now upon the eve of a great consummation, when some
common force will be brought into existence which shall safeguard right
as the first and most fundamental interest of all peoples and all
governments, when coercion shall be summoned not to the service of
political ambition or selfish hostility, but to the service of a common
order, a common justice, and a common peace. God grant that the dawn of
that day of frank dealing and of settled peace, concord, and cooeperation
may be near at hand!