first contemptuous of the Wilsonian scheme, discerned the use it might
be put to as a military safeguard, and sought to convert it into that.
"The French," wrote a Francophil English journal published in Paris,
"would like the League to maintain what may be called a permanent
military general staff. The duties of this organization would be to keep
a hawklike eye on the misdemeanors, actual or threatened, of any state
or group of states, and to be empowered with authority to call into
instant action a great international military force for the frustration
or suppression of such aggression. The French have frankly in mind the
possibility that an unrepentant and unregenerate Germany is the most
likely menace not only to the security of France, but to the peace of
the world in general."[342]
And other states cherished analogous hopes. The spirit of right and
justice was to be evoked like the spirit that served Aladdin, and to be
compelled to enter the service of nationalism and militarism, and
accomplish the task of armies.
The paramount Powers prescribed the sacrifices of sovereignty which
membership of the League necessitated, and forthwith dispensed
themselves from making them. The United States government maintained its
Monroe Doctrine for America--nay, it went farther and identified its
interests with the Hay doctrine for the Far East.[343] It decided to
construct a powerful navy for the defense of these political assets, and
to give the youth of the country a semi-military training.[344] Defense
presupposes attack. War, therefore, is not excluded--nay, it is admitted
by the world-reformers, and preparations for it are indispensable.
Equally so are the burdens of taxation. But if liberty of defense be one
of the rights of two or three Powers, by what law is it confined to them
and denied to the others? Why should the other communities be
constrained to remain open to attack? Surely they, too, deserve to live
and thrive, and make the most of their opportunities. Now if in lieu of
a misnamed League of Nations we had an Anglo-Saxon board for the better
government of the world, these unequal weights and measures would be
intelligible on the principle that special obligations and
responsibilities warrant exceptional rights. But no such plea can be
advanced under an arrangement professing to be a society of free
nations. All that can with truth be said is what M. Clemenceau told the
delegates of the lesser states at the opening of the Conference--that
the three great belligerents represent twelve million soldiers and that
their supreme authority derives from that. The rôle of the other peoples
is to listen to the behests of their guardians, and to accept and
execute them without murmur. Might is still a source of right.
It is fair to say that the disclosure of the true base of the new
ordering, as blurted out by M. Clemenceau at that historic meeting,
caused little surprise among the initiated. For there was no reason to
assume that he, or, indeed, the bulk of the continental statesmen, were
converts to a doctrine of which its own apostle accepted only those
fragments which commended themselves to his country or his party. Had
not the French Premier scoffed at the League in public as in private?
Had he not said in the Chamber: "I do not believe that the Society of
Nations constitutes the necessary conclusion of the present war. I will
give you one of my reasons. It is this: if to-morrow you were to propose
to me that Germany should enter into this society I would not
consent."[345]
"I am certain," wrote one of the ablest and most ardent champions of the
League in France, Senator d'Estournelles de Constant--"I am certain that
he [M. Clemenceau] made an effort against himself, against his entire
past, against his whole life, against all his convictions, to serve the
Society of Nations. And his Minister of Foreign Affairs followed
him."[346] Exactly. And as with M. Clemenceau, so it was with the
majority of European statesmen; most of them made strenuous and, one
may add, successful efforts against their convictions. And the result
was inevitable.
"The governments," we read in the organ of syndicalists, who had
supported Mr. Wilson as long as they believed him determined to redeem
his promises--"the governments have acquiesced in the Fourteen
Points.... Hypocrisy. Each one cherished mental reservations. Virtue was
exalted and vice practised. The poltroon eulogized heroism; the
imperialist lauded the spirit of justice. For the past month we have
been picking up ideas about the worth of the adhesions to the Fourteen
Points, and never before has a more sinister or a more odious comedy
been played. Territorial demands have been heaved one upon the other;
contempt of the rights of peoples--the only right that we can
recognize--has been expressed in striking terms; the last restraints
have vanished; the masks have fallen."[347]
From every country in Europe the same judgment came pitched in varying
keys. The Italian press condemned the proceedings of the Conference in
language to the full as strong as that of the German or Austrian
journals. The _Stampa_ affirmed that those who, like Bissolati, were in
the beginning for placing their trust in one of the two coteries at the
Conference were guilty of a fatal mistake. "The mistake lay in their
belief in the ideal strivings of one of the parties, and in the horror
with which the cupidity of the others was contemplated, whereas both of
them were fighting for ... their interests.... In verity France was no
less militarist or absolutist than Germany, nor was England less avid
than either. And the proof is enshrined in the peace treaties which have
masked the results of their respective victories. _Versailles is a
Brest-Litovsk_, aggravated in the same proportion as the victory of the
Entente over Germany, is more complete than was that of Germany over
Russia. Cupidity does not alter its character, even when it seeks to
conceal itself under a Phrugian cap rather than wear a helmet."[348]
M. Clemenceau's opening utterance about the twelve million men, and the
unlimited right which such formidable armies confer on their possessors
to sit in judgment on the tribes and peoples of the planet, was the true
keynote to the Conference. After that the leading statesmen trimmed
their ship, touched the rudder, and sailed toward downright absolutism.
The effect of such utterances and acts on the minds of the peoples are
distinctly mischievous. For they tend to obliterate the sense of public
right, which is the main foundation of international intercourse among
progressive nations.
And already it had been shaken and weakened by the campaigns of the past
fifty years, and in particular by the last war. In the relations of
nation to nation there were certain principles--derivatives of ethics
diluted with maxims of expediency--which kept the various governments
from too flagrant breaches of faith. These checks were the only
substitute for morality in politics. Their highest power was connoted by
the word Europeanism, which stood for a supposed feeling of solidarity
among all the peoples of the old Continent, and for a certain respect
for the treaties on which the state-system reposed. But it existed
mainly among defeated nations when apprehensive of being isolated or
chastised by their victors. None the less, the idea marked a certain
advance toward an ethical bond of union.
Now this embryonic sense, together with respect for the binding force of
a nation's plighted troth, were numbered by the demoralizing influence
of the wars of the last fifty years. And one of the first and peremptory
needs of the world was their restoration. This could be effected only by
bringing the peoples, not merely of Europe, but of the world, more
closely together, by engrafting on them a feeling of close solidarity,
and impressing them with the necessity of making common cause in the one
struggle worth their while waging--resistance to the forces that
militate against human welfare and progress. The feeling was widespread
that the way to effect this was by some form of internationalism, by the
broadening, deepening, and quickening all that was implied by
Europeanism, by co-ordinating the collective energies of all progressive
peoples, and causing them to converge toward a common and worthy goal.
For the working classes this conception in a restricted form had long
possessed a commanding attraction. What they aimed at, however, was no
more than the catholicity of labor. They fancied that after the passage
of the tidal wave of destructiveness the ground was cleared of most of
the obstacles which had encumbered it, and that the forward advance
might begin forthwith.
What they failed to take sufficiently into account was the _vis
inertiæ_, the survival of the old spirit among the ruling orders whose
members continued to live and move in the atmosphere of use and wont,
and the spirit of hate and bitterness infused into all the political
classes, to dispel which was a herculean task. It was exclusively to the
leaders of those classes that Mr. Wilson confided the realization of the
abstract idea of a society of nations, which he may at first have
pictured to himself as a vast family conscious of common interests, bent
on moral and material self-betterment, and willing to eschew such
partial advantages as might hinder or retard the general progress. But,
judging by his attitude and his action, he had no real acquaintance
with the materials out of which it must be fashioned, no notion of the
difficulties to be met, and no staying power to encounter and surmount
them. And his first move entailed the failure of the scheme.
As a matter of fact, Mr. Wilson came to the Conference with a home-made
charter for the Society of Nations, which, according to the evidence of
Mr. Lansing, "was never pressed." The State Secretary added that "the
present league Covenant is superior to the American plan." And as for
the Fourteen Points, "They were not even discussed at the
Conference."[349] Suspecting as much, I wrote at the time:[350] "The
President has pinned himself down to no concrete scheme whatever. His
method is electric, choosing what is helpful and beneficent in the
projects of others, and endeavoring to obtain from the dissentients a
renunciation of ideas belonging to the old national currents and
adherence to the doctrines he deems salutary. It is, however, already
clear that the highest ideal now attainable is not a league of nations
as the masses understand it, which will abolish wars and likewise put an
end to the costly preparations for them, but only a coalition of
victorious nations, which may hope, by dint of economic inducements and
deterrents, to draw the enemy peoples into its camp in the not too
distant future. This result would fall very short of the expectations
aroused by the far-resonant promises made at the outset; but even it
will be unattainable without an international compact binding all the
members of the coalition to make war simultaneously upon the nation or
group of nations which ventures to break the peace. I am disposed to
believe that nothing less than such an express covenant will be regarded
by the continental Powers of the Entente as an adequate substitute for
certain territorial readjustments which they otherwise consider
essential to secure them from sudden attack.
"Whether such a condition would prevent future wars is a question that
only experience can answer. Personally, I am profoundly convinced, with
Mr. Taft, that a genuine league of nations must have teeth in the guise
of supernational, not international, forces. In these remarks I make
abstraction from the larger question which wholly absorbs this--namely,
whether the masses for whose behoof the lavish expenditure of time,
energy, and ingenuity is undertaken, will accept a coalition of
victorious governments against unregenerate peoples as a substitute for
the Society of Nations as at first conceived."
The supposed object of the League was the substitution of right for
force, by debarring each individual state from employing violence
against any of the others, and by the use of arbitration as a means of
settling disputes. This entails the suppression of the right to declare
war and to prepare for it, and, as a corollary, a system of deterrents
to hinder, and of penalties to punish rebellion on the part of a
community. That in those cases where the law is set at naught
efficacious means should be available to enforce it will hardly be
denied; but whether economic pressure would suffice in all cases is
doubtful. To me it seems that without a supernational army, under the
direct orders of the League, it might under conceivable circumstances
become impossible to uphold the decisions of the tribunal, and that, on
the other hand, the coexistence of such a military force with national
armaments would condemn the undertaking to failure.
An analysis of the Covenant lies beyond the limits of my task, but it
may not be amiss to point out a few of its inherent defects. One of the
principal organs of the League will be the Assembly and the Council. The
former, a very numerous and mainly political body, will necessarily be
out of touch with the peoples, their needs and their aspirations. It
will meet at most three or four times a year. And its members alone will
be invested with all the power, which they will be chary of delegating.
On the other hand, the Council, consisting at first of nine members,
will meet at least once a year. The members of both bodies will
presumably be appointed by the governments,[351] who will certainly not
renounce their sovereignty in a matter that concerns them so closely.
Such a system may be wise and conducive to the highest aims, but it can
hardly be termed democratic. The military Powers who command twelve
million soldiers will possess a majority in the Council.[352] The
Secretariat alone will be permanent, and will naturally be appointed by
the Great Powers.
Instead of abolishing war, the Conference described its abolition as
beyond the power of man to compass. Disarmament, which was to have been
one of its main achievements, is eliminated from the Covenant. As the
war that was to have been the last will admittedly be followed by
others, the delegates of the Great Powers worked conscientiously, as
behooved patriotic statesmen, to obtain in advance all possible
advantages for their respective countries by way of preparing for it.
The new order, which in theory reposes upon right, justice, and moral
fellowship, in reality depends upon powerful armies and navies. France
must remain under arms, seeing that she has to keep watch on the Rhine.
Britain and the United States are to go on building warships and
aircraft, besides training their youth for the coming Armageddon. The
article of the Covenant which lays it down that "the members of the
League recognize that the maintenance of peace requires the reduction
of national armaments to the lowest point consistent with national
safety,"[353] is, to use a Russian simile, written on water with a fork.
Britain, France, and the United States are already agreed that they will
combine to repel unprovoked aggression on the part of Germany. That
evidently signifies that they will hold themselves in readiness to
fight, and will therefore make due preparation. This arrangement is a
substitute for a supernational army, as though prevention were not
better than cure; that it will prove efficacious in the long run very
few believe. One clear-visioned Frenchman writes: "The inefficacy of the
organization aimed at by the Conference constrains France to live in
continual and increasing insecurity, owing to the falling off of her
population."[354] He adds: "It follows from this abortive expedient--if
it is to remain definitive--that each member-state must protect itself,
or come to terms with the more powerful ones, as in the past.
Consequently we are in presence of the maintenance of militarism and the
régime of armaments."[355] This writer goes farther and accuses Mr.
Wilson of having played into the hands of Britain. "President Wilson,"
he affirms, "has more or less sacrificed to the English government the
society of nations and the question of armaments, that of the colonies
and that of the freedom of the seas...."[356] This, however, is an
over-statement. It was not for the sake of Britain that the American
statesman gave up so much; it was for the sake of saving something of
the Covenant. It was in the spirit of Sir Boyle Roche, whose attachment
to the British Constitution was such that, to save a part of it, he was
willing to sacrifice the whole.
The arbitration of disputes is provided for by one of the articles of
the Covenant;[357] but the parties may go to war three months later with
a clear conscience and an appeal to right, justice, self-determination,
and the usual abstract nouns.
In a word, the directors of the Conference disciplined their political
intelligence on lines of self-hypnotization, along which common sense
finds it impossible to follow them. There were also among the delegates
men who thought and spoke in terms of reason and logic, but their voices
evoked no echo. One of them summed up his criticism somewhat as follows:
"During the war our professions of democratic principles were far
resonant and emphatic. We were fighting for the nations of the world,
especially for those who could not successfully fight for themselves.
All the peoples, great and small, were exhorted to make the most painful
sacrifices to enable their respective governments to conquer the enemy.
Victory unexpectedly smiled on us, and the peoples asked that those
promises should be made good. Naturally, expectations ran high. What has
happened? The governments now answer in effect: 'We will promote your
interests, but without your co-operation or assent. We will make the
necessary arrangements in secret behind closed doors. The machinery we
are devising will be a state machinery, not a popular one. All that we
ask of you is implicit trust. You complain of our action in the past.
You have good cause. You say that the same men are about to determine
your future. Again you are right. But when you affirm that we are sure
to make the like mistakes, you are wrong, and we ask you to take our
word for it. You complain that we are politicians who feel the weight of
certain commitments and the fetters of obsolete traditions from which we
cannot free ourselves; that we are mainly concerned to protect and
further the interests of our respective countries, and that it is
inconceivable we should devise an organization which looks above and
beyond those interests. We ask you, are you willing, then, to abandon
the heritage of our fathers to the foreigner?'
"That the downtrodden peoples in Austria and Germany have been
emancipated is a moral triumph. But why has the beneficent principle
that is said to have inspired the deed been restricted in its
application? Why has the experiment been tried only in the enemies'
countries? Or are things quite in order everywhere else? Is there no
injustice in other quarters of the globe? Are there no complaints? If
there be, why are they ignored? Is it because all acts of oppression are
to be perpetuated which do not take place in the enemy's land? What
about Ireland and about a dozen other countries and peoples? Are they
skeletons not to be touched?
"By debarring the masses from participation in a grandiose scheme, the
success of which depends upon their assent, the governments are
indirectly but surely encouraging secret combined opposition, and in
some cases Bolshevism. The masses resent being treated as children after
having been appealed to as arbiters and rescuers. For four and a half
years it was they who bore the brunt of the war, they who sacrificed
their sons and their substance. In the future it is they to whom the
states will look for the further sacrifices in blood and treasure which
will be necessary in the struggles which they evidently anticipate.
Well, some of them refuse these sacrifices in advance. They challenge
the right of the governments to retain the power of making war and
peace. That power they are working to get into their own hands and to
wield in their own way, or at any rate to have a say in its exercise.
And in order to secure it, some sections of the peoples are making
common cause with the socialist revolutionaries, while others have gone
the length of Bolshevism. And that is a serious danger. The agitation
now going on among the people, therefore, starts with a grievance. The
masses have many other grievances besides the one just sketched--the
survivals of the feudal age, the privileges of class, the inequality of
opportunity. And the kernel formed by these is the element of truth and
equity which imparts force to all those underground movements, and
enables them to subsist and extend. Error is never dangerous by itself;
it is only when it has an admixture of truth that it becomes powerful
for evil. And it seems a thousand pities that the governments, whose own
interests are at stake, as well as those of the communities they govern,
should go out of their way to provide an explosive element for
Bolshevism and its less sinister variants."
The League was treated as a living organism before it existed. All the
problems which the Supreme Councilors found insoluble were reserved for
its judgment. Arduous functions were allotted to it before it had organs
to discharge them. Formidable tasks were imposed upon it before the
means of achieving them were devised. It is an institution so elusive
and elastic that the French regard it as capable of being used as a
handy instrument for coercing the Teutons, who, in turn, look upon it as
a means of recovering their place in the world; the Japanese hope it may
become a bridge leading to racial equality, and the governments which
devised it are bent on employing it as a lever for their own
politico-economic aims, which they identify with the progress of the
human race. How the peoples look upon it the future will show.
On the Monroe Doctrine in connection with the League of Nations the less
said the soonest mended. But one cannot well say less than this: that
any real society of peoples such as Mr. Wilson first conceived and
advocated is as incompatible with "regional understandings like the
Monroe Doctrine" as are the maintenance of national armaments and the
bartering of populations. It is immaterial whether one concludes that a
Society of Nations is therefore impossible in the present conjuncture or
that all those survivals of the old state system are obsolescent and
should be abolished. The two are unquestionably irreconcilable.
It would be a mistake to infer from the unanimity with which Mr.
Wilson's Covenant was finally accepted that it expressed the delegates'
genuine conceptions or sentiments. Mr. Bullitt, one of the expert
advisers to the American Peace Delegation, testified before the Senate
committee in Washington that State-Secretary Lansing remarked to him: "I
consider the League of Nations at present as entirely useless. The Great
Powers have simply gone ahead and arranged the world to suit themselves.
England and France, in particular, have gotten out of the Treaty
everything they wanted. The League of Nations can do nothing to alter
any unjust clauses of the Treaty except by the unanimous consent of the
League members. The Great Powers will never consent to changes in the
interests of weaker peoples."[358]
This opinion which Mr. Bullitt ascribed to Mr. Lansing was, to my
knowledge, that of a large number of the representatives of the nations
at the Conference. Among them all I have met very few who had a good
word to say of the scheme, and of the few one had helped to formulate
it, another had assisted him. And the unfavorable judgments of the
remainder were delivered after the Covenant was signed.