Late German Secretary of State for the Colonies; lived for
several years in the United States as member of the banking
firm of Ladenburg, Thalmann & Co., New York.
_To the Editor of The New York Times:_
Prof. Eliot is conferring a great favor on the exponents of the German
side in the present struggle in explaining to them what he thinks of the
so-called anti-German feeling in the United States. I am sure his views
will be read also in Germany with a great deal of attention, although he
will certainly not remain unchallenged in nearly all essential points.
The compliment that Prof. Eliot pays to the German people as a whole
must be specially appreciated, the more so as it comes from a scientist
whose great authority is equally recognized on both sides of the
Atlantic.
The anti-German feeling, according to Prof. Eliot, takes its source from
the American objection to the committal of a nation to grave mistakes by
a permanent Executive. But then, with the exception of France, all the
warring nations have permanent Executives, professional diplomatists;
all their affairs are conducted in secret, and all their rulers have the
power, including the President of France, to embroil their nations in
war. The German Emperor is in this respect certainly more restricted
than the other heads of State, and I have not read that the declaration
of war has been expressly sanctioned by the English Parliament, and
certainly the mobilization of the English fleet that took place in July,
and the mobilization of the Russian Army that took place at the same
time, have not even been brought to the knowledge of the respective
Parliaments. When, therefore, the same conditions prevail in all the
warring States, how can they be made the reason for such an anti-German
feeling?
The same objection holds good with the American antipathy against the
power of rulers to order mobilization or declare war in advance without
consultation of Parliament, to which I have only to say that the English
fleet was mobilized without consulting the English Parliament, while in
Germany the Bundesrat, the representatives of the Federal States, as
well as of the Federal Diets, has been duly consulted. I may add that
also the party leaders of the Reichstag, which could not be convoked
earlier than two days after the declaration of the war, have been
continuously informed and consulted.
Against the next paragraph, where Prof. Eliot complains of the secrecy
of European diplomacy and of international treaties and understandings,
the same objection must be made. The state described here as particular
to Germany prevails in all European countries, and neither the treaty of
the Russian-French alliance, nor the arrangements of the Triple Entente
have ever been submitted to the French or British Parliaments. As
regards the American attitude toward armaments, I purposely refrain from
adducing the American example into my argument, much as I could show
that with a very large part of the American Nation the idea of defending
the American coast against any invader and the maintenance of a strong
Pan-American policy, if need be by arms, is just as fixed a tenet as the
German idea that the Fatherland should be held safe from invasion or
destruction by the will and the strength of its people. England has
always held the same, if not through her army so through her navy, and
so did the rest of Europe; and there is no argument to be gotten from
that for an anti-German feeling.
No Seizure of Schleswig-Holstein.
Americans object to the extension of territory by force. Germany has
never done that, even if one goes back as far as Prof. Eliot wishes to
go. Mr. Eliot is absolutely mistaken as to the history of the
incorporation of Schleswig-Holstein into Prussia. Schleswig-Holstein was
a Dual-Dukedom that never belonged to Denmark, but having as its Duke
the King of Denmark as long as he belonged to the elder line of the
House of Oldenburg. This elder line was extinct when King Christian
VIII. died without male issue. His successor wanted to incorporate the
two German Dukedoms into Denmark. Then the people stood up and expressed
the desire to remain with the German Federation, to which it had always
belonged, and there it is now, of its own free will. The natural
dividing line between Denmark and Germany, however, is the River Eider.
There are about 30,000 Danes south of the Eider, who have been absorbed
against their will, a thing that can never be avoided, and that has
sometimes given Prussia a little trouble.
Alsace-Lorraine Originally German.
As to Alsace-Lorraine, the facts are known to be that it had belonged to
Germany until it had been taken, against the will of the people, by
France under Louis XIV., and it was returned to Germany as a matter of
right, more than three-quarters of the population being of German
descent and speaking the German language.
But let me ask in return, Mr. Eliot, when did ever in her political
career England consult the will of the people when she took a country?
Can he say that, when England tore the treaty of Majuba Hill, like a
"scrap of paper," and made war on the Boers? Did she consult the people
of Cyprus in 1878? Does he know of any plébiscite in India? Has she
consulted the Persians, or has France consulted the people of Morocco,
or of Indo-China, Italy the people of Tripoli? Since Germany has not
acted here in any other way forty years ago than all the other nations,
why does Dr. Eliot consider the American people justified in taking
anti-German views for reasons of such an old date, while he forgives the
nations of the party he favors for much more recent infringement of his
rule?
"Americans object to the violation of treaties." So do the Germans. We
have always kept our treaties, and mean to do so in the future. The fact
with Belgium is that her neutrality was very one-sided; that, as can be
proved, as early as the 25th of June, Liège was full of French soldiers,
that Belgian fortifications were all directed against Germany, and that
for years past it was the Belgian press that outdid the French press in
attacks against Germany. But I can give Mr. Eliot here some authority
that he has so far not challenged. When Sir Edward Grey presented the
English case in the House of Commons on the 3d of August he declared
that the British attitude was laid down by the British Government in
1870, and he verbally cited Mr. Gladstone's speech, in which he said he
could not subscribe to the assertion that the simple fact of the
existence of a guarantee was binding on every party, irrespective
altogether of the particular position in which it may find itself at the
time when the occasion for acting on the guarantee arises. He called
that assertion a "stringent and impracticable" view of the guarantee and
the whole treaty a "complicated question." So Mr. Gladstone, and with
him Sir Edward Grey, has held the Belgian neutrality treaty not binding
on every party, when it was against the interest which the particular
situation dictated, when the war broke out. It was the interest of Great
Britain to maintain the treaty, and that is why she acted. It was
against German interest to maintain the treaty, and that is why she
broke it. That is the British and not the German theory, and I could
very well rest my case here. My theory is with the German Chancellor,
that I greatly regret the necessity of violating the Belgian neutrality,
after Belgium had chosen to repel the German overtures for a free
passage.
It is quite certain that the breach of the Belgian neutrality by Germany
was used in Great Britain as a powerful instrument to influence the
public sentiment. Every war must be borne by national unity, and it is
the duty of the nation's leaders to secure such unity by all practicable
means. But has it been forgotten that the attitude of Sir Edward Grey
caused such excellent men as Lord Morley, John Burns, and Sir John
Trevelyan to leave the Cabinet, where they were looked upon as the best
and most liberal members of the ruling combination? Bernard Shaw says of
Great Britain that she has never been at a loss for an effective moral
attitude. Such an attitude is a powerful weapon in diplomatical and
actual warfare, and it must be resorted to, if the necessity arises. But
that cannot blind us to the fact that the British Government allowed the
political interest to be the paramount consideration in this Belgian
neutrality matter. The German interest for not acting on the guarantee
was just as strong as the English to act for it.
The proof is found in the English "White Paper." I cite the famous
reprint of THE TIMES, (Dispatch No. 148 of Aug. 2 to Paris.) Here Sir
Edward Grey says: "We were considering ... whether we should declare
violation of Belgian neutrality to be a casus belli."
"Treaties Must Not Be Overrated."
I am an ardent believer in all international arrangements to prevent
difficulties and wars between nations, and I rejoice with the American
people in the signal success this policy is now having in this country.
But international treaties must not be overrated. There are questions
which cannot be settled by them. It is too difficult to explain just the
nature of such situations as arose in Europe, so I may be permitted for
once to ask this question: Does Prof. Eliot believe that the majority of
the American people think that the unwritten Monroe Doctrine could be
made the subject of arbitration, whether it had a right to exist or to
be enforced? I must emphatically say, No, it could not. It can be as
little arbitrated upon as a matter of religion or of personal morals.
Mr. Eliot thinks a happy result of the war would be that American
institutions should prevail in Germany thereafter. Why should Germany
only become a representative republic? Does he not demand the same
regarding Russia, England, Italy, Austria, and Japan? And if not, why
not?
From all this I fail to see the point in the reasons given by Prof.
Eliot why fair-minded Americans should side with the Allies because the
objections made against German procedure, down to the breach of the
Belgian neutrality, must be made against all other European States.
British history is just teeming with examples of broken treaties and
torn "scraps of paper." The chasing of German diplomatic representatives
out of neutral Egypt is a case in point.
I must insist that whatever anti-German feeling there is is not fully
explained by Prof. Eliot, and his article cannot be made a code by which
German behavior could be regulated in the future. Prof. Eliot is a
scholar; business interests do not come very near him. So he is
especially concerned with the ethical aspect of the matter. He believes
the Germans think that "might is right." This is very unjust. Our
history proves that we have never acted on this principle. We have never
got or attempted to get a world empire such as England has won, all of
which, with a very few exceptions, by might, by war, and by conquest.
The German writers who have expounded this doctrine have only shown how
the large world empires of England and France were welded together, what
means have been adopted for that purpose, and against what sort of
political doctrines we must beware.
Our Sympathy for the Under Dog.
As Dr. Eliot makes his remarks for the benefit of his German confrères,
may I be permitted to say to them what I consider the reason for the
American attitude? There is, in the first place, the ethical side.
Americans have a very strong sense of generosity, and are, as a rule,
very good sports. They think Belgium a small nation, brutally attacked
by a much bigger fellow; they feel that the little man stands up bravely
and gamely, and fights for all he is worth. Such a situation will always
command American sympathy and antagonism against the stronger. Then
there is the business side. Americans feel that this war is endangering
their political and commercial interests, so they are naturally angry
against the people who, they believe, have brought the war about.
As Germany has not had an opportunity to make herself heard as amply as
her adversaries, they think that it was Germany which set the world
afire, and that is what they resent, and in which they were justified,
if it were true. But the question of the hour is not the question of the
past, but of the present and of the future, and the people on this side
who will give Germany fair play because it is just in them will examine
the situation in the light of their interests. Then they will find that
Belgium had been in league with the Allies long before the conflagration
broke out, only to be left to its own resources when the critical hour
arose. They will further find that it is not Germany but England and her
allies that are throttling commerce, maiming cables, stopping mails,
and breaking neutrality and other treaties to further their aims; that,
finally, today England has established a world rule on the sea to which
even America must submit. They will then soon come to the conclusion
that, no matter what happened in the past, the peace of the world can
only be assured by a good understanding between Germany and the United
States as a sort of counterbalance against the unmeasured aggrandizement
of English sea power. Then the feeling toward Germany will be
considerably better, and I may add that even now it is not so very bad
after all.
I make these remarks with due respect to Prof. Eliot and his views, and
with great reluctance for being compelled to enter the field against a
personality whose undoubted superiority I wish to be the first to
acknowledge.