with the Coast Defence arm of our army is, under the wise direction of
our present Secretary of War, to be extended to all branches of the
service. For some time in the Coast Artillery Service the enlisted man
under competent instruction has had the privilege of becoming a skilled
machinist or a skilled electrician. Now the system is to be extended
through all branches of the military service, and many additional trades
are to be added to the curricula of the trade schools of the army. The
young man can, therefore, make his own selection and become a trained
artisan at the same time that he serves his time in the army, with all
expenses for such training, as well as maintenance, borne by the
Government. He can thereby leave the service fully equipped for
profitable employment.
This will have the tendency of calling a better class of young men into
the service; it will also do away with the well-founded criticism that
army life and its idleness, or partly-enforced idleness, unfits a man
for useful industrial service after he quits the army. If this same
system is extended through the navy, as it can be, both army and navy
service will meet the American requirement--that neither military nor
naval service take great numbers of men from productive employment, to
be in turn supported by other workers. Instead of so much dead timber,
they are all the time producing while in active service, and are being
trained to be highly efficient as producers, when they leave the
service.
Under this system the Federal Government can build its own ordnance
works and its own munition factories and become its own maker of
whatever may be required in all lines of output. We will then be able to
escape the perverse influence of gain on the part of large munition
industries, and the danger that comes from that portion of a military
party whose motives are actuated by personal gain.
If the occasion arises, or if we permit the occasion to arise, Kruppism
in America will become as dangerous and as sinister in its influences
and its proportions, as it became in Germany.
Another great service that the war has done us, is by way of bringing
home to us the lesson that has been so prominently brought to the front
in connection with the other nations at war, namely, the necessity of
the speedy and thorough mobilisation of all lines of industries and
business; for the thoroughness and the efficiency with which this can be
done may mean success that otherwise would result in failure and
disaster. We are now awake to the tremendous importance of this.
It is at last becoming clearly understood among the peoples and the
nations of the world that, as a nation, we have no desire for conquest,
for territory, for empire--we have no purposes of aggression; we have
quite enough to do to develop our resources and our as yet great
undeveloped areas.
A few months before the war broke, I had conversations with the heads or
with the representatives of leading publishing houses in several
European countries. It was at a time when our Mexican situation was
beginning to be very acute. I remember at that time especially, the
conversation with the head of one of the largest publishing houses in
Italy, in Milan. I could see plainly his scepticism when, in reply to
his questions, I endeavoured to persuade him that as a nation we had no
motives of conquest or of aggression in Mexico, that we were interested
solely in the restoration of a representative and stable government
there. And since that time, I am glad to say that our acts as a nation
have all been along the line of persuading him, and also many other
like-minded ones in many countries abroad, of the truth of this
assertion. By this general course we have been gaining the confidence
and have been cementing the friendship of practically every South
American republic, our immediate neighbours on the southern continent.
This has been a source of increasing economic power with us, and an
element of greatly added strength, and also a tremendous energy working
all the time for the preservation of peace.
One can say most confidently, even though recognising our many grave
faults as a nation, that our course along this line has been such,
especially of late years, as to inspire confidence on the part of all
the fair-minded nations of the world.
Our theory of the state, the theory of democracy, is not that the state
is above all, and that the individual and his welfare are as nothing
when compared to it, but rather that the state is the agency through
which the highest welfare of all its subjects is to be evolved,
expressed, maintained. No other theory to my mind, is at all compatible
with the intelligence of any free-thinking people.
Otherwise, there is always the danger and also the likelihood, while
human nature is as it is, for some ruler, some clique, or factions so to
concentrate power into their own hands, that for their own ambitions,
for aggrandisement, or for false or short-sighted and half-baked ideas
of additions to their country, it is dragged into periodic wars with
other nations.
Nor do we share in the belief that the state is above morality, but
rather that identically the same moral ideals, precepts and obligations
that bind individuals must be held sacred by the state, otherwise it
becomes a pirate among nations, and it will inevitably in time be hunted
down and destroyed as such, however great its apparent power. Nor do we
as a nation share in the belief that war is necessary and indeed good
for a nation, to inspire and to preserve its manly qualities, its
virility, and therefore its power. Were this the only way that this
could be brought about, it might be well and good; but the price to be
paid is a price that is too enormous and too frightful, and the results
are too uncertain. We believe that these same ideals can be inculcated,
that these same energies can be used along useful, conserving,
constructive lines, rather than along lines of destruction.
A nation may have the most colossal and perfect military system in the
world, and still may suffer defeat in any given while, because of those
unseen things that pertain to the soul of another people, whereby powers
and forces are engendered and materialised that make defeat for them
impossible; and in the matter of big guns, it is well always to remember
that no nation can build them so great that another nation may not build
them still greater. National safety does not necessarily lie in that
direction. Nor, on the other hand, along the lines of extreme
pacificism--surely not as long as things are as they are. The argument
of the lamb has small deterrent effect upon the wolf--as long as the
wolf is a wolf. And sometimes wolves hunt in packs. The most preeminent
lesson of the great war for us as a nation should be this--there should
be constantly a degree of preparedness sufficient to hold until all the
others, the various portions of the nation, thoroughly coordinated and
ready, can be summoned into action. Thus are we prepared, thus are we
safe, and there is no danger or fear of militarism.
In a democracy it should, without question, be a fundamental fact that
hand in hand with equal rights there should go a sense of equal duty. A
call for defence should have a universal response. So it is merely good
common-sense, good judgment, if you please, for all the young men of the
nation to have a training sufficient to enable them to respond
effectively if the nation's safety calls them to its defence. It is no
crime, however we may deprecate war, to be thus prepared.
For young men--and we must always remember that it is the young men who
are called for this purpose--for young men to be called to the colours
by the tens or the hundreds of thousands, unskilled and untrained, to be
shot down, decimated by the thoroughly trained and skilled troops of
another nation, or a combination of other nations, is indeed the crime.
Never, moreover, was folly so great as that shown by him or by her who
will not see. And to look at the matter without prejudice, we will
realise that this is merely policing what we have. It is meeting force
with adequate force, _if it becomes necessary_, so to meet it.
This is necessary until such time as we have in operation among nations
a thoroughly established machinery whereby force will give place to
reason, whereby common sense will be used in adjusting all differences
between nations, as it is now used in adjusting differences between
individuals.
Our period of isolation is over. We have become a world-nation. Equality
of rights presupposes equality of duty. In our very souls we loathe
militarism. Conquest and aggression are foreign to our spirit, and
foreign to our thoughts and ambitions. But weakness will by no means
assure us immunity from aggression from without. Universal military
training up to a reasonable point, and the joint sense of responsibility
of every man and every woman in the nation, and the right of the
national government to expect and to demand that every man and woman
stand ready to respond to the call to service, whatever form it may
take--this is our armour.
All intelligent people know that the national government has always had
the power to draft every male citizen fit for service into military
service. It is not therefore a question of universal military service.
The real and only question is whether these or great numbers of these go
out illy prepared and equipped as sheep to the shambles perchance, or
whether they go out trained and equipped to do a man's work--more
adequately prepared to protect themselves as well as the integrity of
the nation. It is not to be done for the love or the purpose of
militarism; but recognising the fact that militarism still persists,
that with us it may not be triumphant should we at any time be forced to
face it. There are certain facts that only to our peril as well as our
moral degradation, we can be blind to. Said a noted historian but a few
days ago:
"I loathe war and militarism. I have fought them for twenty years. But I
am a historian, and I know that bullies thrive best in an atmosphere of
meekness. As long as this military system lasts you must discourage the
mailed fist by showing that you will meet it with something harder than
a boxing glove. We do not think it good to admit into the code of the
twentieth century that a great national bully may still with impunity
squeeze the blood out of its small neighbours and seize their goods."
We need not fear militarism arising in America as long as the
fundamental principles of democracy are preserved and continually
extended, which can be done only through the feeling of the individual
responsibility of every man and every woman to take a keen and constant
interest in the matters of their own government--community, state,
national, and now international. We must realise and ever more fully
realise that in a government such as ours, the people are the
government, and that when in it anything goes wrong, or wrongs and
injustices are allowed to grow and hold sway, we are to blame.
Universal military training has not militarised Switzerland nor has it
Australia. It is rather the very essence of democracy and the very
antithesis of militarism.
"Let each son of Freedom bear
His portion of the burden. Should not each one do his share?
To sacrifice the splendid few--
The strong of heart, the brave, the true,
Who live--or die--as heroes do,
While cowards profit--is not fair!"
Many still recall that not a few well-meaning people at the close of the
Civil War proclaimed that, with upwards of two million trained men
behind him, General Grant would become a military dictator, and that
this would be followed by the disappearance of democracy in the nation.
But the mind, the temper, the traditions of our people are all a
guarantee against militarism. The gospel, the hallucination of the
shining armour, the will to power, has no attraction for us. We loathe
it; nor do we fear its undermining and crushing our own liberties
internally. Nevertheless, it is true that vigilance is always and always
will be the price of liberty. There must be a constant education towards
citizenship. There must be an alert democracy, so that any land and sea
force is always the servant of the spirit; for only otherwise it can
become its master--but otherwise it will become its master.
XIII
OUR SOLE AGENCY OF INTERNATIONAL PEACE, AND INTERNATIONAL CONCORD
The consensus of intelligent thought throughout the world is to the
effect that just as we have established an orderly method for the
settlement of disputes between individuals or groups of individuals in
any particular nation, we must now move forward and establish such
methods for the settlement of disputes among nations. There is no
civilised country in the world that any longer permits the individual to
take the law into his own hands.
The intelligent thought of the world now demands the definite
establishment of a World Federation for the enforcement of peace among
nations. It demands likewise the definite establishment of a permanent
World Court, backed by adequate force for the arbitrament of all
disputes among nations--unable to be adjusted by the nations themselves
in friendly conference. We have now reached the stage in world
development and in world intercourse where peace must be
internationalised. Our present chaotic condition, which exists simply
because we haven't taken time as yet to establish a method, must be
made to give place to an intelligently devised system of law and order.
Anything short of this means a periodic destruction of the finest fruits
of civilisation. It means also the periodic destruction of the finest
young manhood of the world. This means, in turn, the speedy degeneration
of the human race. The deification of force, augmented by all the
products and engines of modern science, is simply the way of sublimated
savagery.
The world is in need of a new dispensation. Recent events show
indisputably that we have reached the parting of the ways, the family of
nations must now push on into the new day or the world will plunge on
into a darker night. There is no other course in sight. I know of no
finer words penned in any language--this time it was in French--to
express an unvarying truth than these words by Victor Hugo: "There is
one thing that is stronger than armies, and that is an idea whose time
has come."
Never before, after viewing the great havoc wrought, the enormous debts
that will have to be paid for between fifty and a hundred years to come,
the tremendous disruptions and losses in trade, the misery and
degradation stalking broadcast over every land engaged in the
war--scarcely a family untouched--never before have nations been in the
state of mind to consider and to long to act upon some sensible and
comprehensive method of international concord and adjustments. If this
succeeds, the world, including ourselves, is the gainer. If this does
not succeed, though the chances are overwhelmingly in its favour, then
we can proclaim to the assembled nations that as long as a state of
outlawry exists among nations, that then no longer by chance but by
design, we as a nation will be in a state of preparedness broad and
comprehensive enough to defend ourselves against the violation of any of
the rights of a sovereign nation. It is only in this way that we can
show a due appreciation of the struggles and the sacrifices of those who
gave us our national existence; it is only in this way that we can,
retain our self-respect, that we can command the respect of other
nations _while things are as they are_; that we can hope to retain any
degree of influence and authority for the diplomatic arm of our
Government in the Council of Nations.
Every neutral nation has suffered tremendously by the war. Every neutral
nation will suffer until a new world-order among nations is projected
and perfected.
We owe a tremendous duty to the world in connection with this great
world crisis and upheaval. Diligently should our best men and women,
those of insight and greatest influence, and with the expenditure of
both time and means, seek to further the practical working out of a
World Federation and a permanent World Court. Public opinion should be
thus aroused and solidified so that the world knows that we stand as a
united nation back of the idea and the plan.
The divine right of kings has gone. It holds no more. We hear now and
then, it is true, some silly statement in regard to it, but little
attention is paid to it. The divine right of priests has gone except in
the minds of the few remaining ignorant and herdable ones. The divine
right of dynasties--or rather of dynasties to persist--seems to die a
little harder, but it is well on the way. We are now realising that the
only divine right is the right of the people--and all the people.
Never again should it be possible for one man, or for one little group
of men so to lead, or so to mislead a nation as to plunge it into war.
The growth of democracy compelling the greater participation of all the
people in government must prohibit this. So likewise the close
relationship of the entire world now must make it forever impossible for
a single nation or a group of nations for any cause to plunge a whole
world or any part of it into war. These are sound and clear-visioned
words recently given utterance to by James Bryce: "However much we
condemn reckless leaders and the ruthless caste that live for war, the
real source of the mischief is the popular sentiment behind them. The
lesson to be learned is that doctrines and deep-rooted passions, whence
these evils spring, can only be removed by the slow and steady working
of spiritual forces. What most is needed is the elimination of those
feelings the teachings of which breed jealousy and hatred and prompt men
to defiance and aggression."
Humanity and civilisation is not headed towards Ab the cave-man,
whatever appearances, in the minds of many, may indicate at the present
time. Humanity will arise and will reconstruct itself. Great lessons
will be learned. Good will result. But what a terrific price to pay!
What a terrific price to pay to learn the lesson that "moral forces are
the only invincible forces in the universe"! It has been slow, but
steadily the world is advancing to that stage when the individual or the
nation that does not know that the law of mutuality, of cooperation, and
still more the law of sympathy and good will, is the supreme law in real
civilisation, real advancement, and real gain--that does not know that
its own welfare is always bound up with the welfare of the greater
whole--is still in the brute stage of life and the bestial propensities
are still its guiding forces.
Prejudice, suspicion, hatred, national big-headedness, must give way to
respect, sympathy, the desire for mutual understanding and cooperation.
The higher attributes must and will assert themselves. The former are
the ways of periodic if not continuous destruction--the latter are the
ways of the higher spiritual forces that must prevail. Significant are
these words of one of our younger but clear-visioned American poets,
Winter Bynner:
Whether the time be slow or fast,
Enemies, hand in hand,
Must come together at the last
And understand.
No matter how the die is cast,
Or who may seem to win--
We know that we must love at last--
Why not begin?
The teaching of hatred to children, the fostering of hatred in adults,
can result only in harm to the people and the nation where it is
fostered. The dragon's tooth will leave its marks upon the entire nation
and the fair life of all the people will suffer by it. The holding in
contempt of other people makes it sometimes necessary that one's own
head be battered against the wall that he may be sufficiently aroused to
recognise and to appreciate their sterling and enduring qualities.
The use of a club is more spectacular for some at least than the use of
intellectual and moral forces. The rattling of the machine-gun produces
more commotion than the more quiet ways of peace. All of the powerful
forces in nature, those of growth, germination, and conservation, the
same as in human life are quiet forces. So in the preservation of peace.
It consists rather in a high constructive policy. It requires always
clear vision, a constantly progressive and cooperative method of life
and action; frank and open dealing and a resolute purpose. It is won and
maintained by nothing so much in the long run as when it makes the
Golden Rule its law of conduct. Slowly we are realising that great
armaments--militarism--do not insure peace. They may lead away from
it--they are very apt to lead away from it.
Peace is related rather to the great moral laws of conduct. It has to do
with straight, clean, open dealing. It is fostered by sympathy,
forbearance. This does not mean that it pertains to weakness. On the
contrary it is determined by resolute but high purpose, the actual and
active desire of a nation to live on terms of peace with all other
nations; and the world's; recognition of this fact is a most powerful
factor in inducing and in actualising such living.
Our own achievement of upwards of a hundred years in living in
peaceable, sympathetic and mutually beneficial relations with Canada;
Canada's achievement in so living with us, should be a distinct and
clear-cut answer to the argument that nations need to fortify their
boundaries one against another. This is true only where suspicion,
mistrust, fear, secret diplomacy, and secret alliances hold instead of
the great and eternally constructive forces--sympathy, good will, mutual
understanding, induced and conserved by an International Joint
Commission of able men whose business it is to investigate, to
determine, and to adjust any differences that through the years may
arise. Here we have a boundary line of upwards of three thousand miles
and not a fort; vast areas of inland seas and not a war vessel; and for
upwards of a hundred years not a difference that the High Joint
Commission has not been able to settle amicably and to the mutual
advantage of both countries.
I know that in connection with this we have an advantage over the
old-world nations because we are free from age-long prejudices,
hatreds, and past scores. But if this great conflict does not lead along
the lines of the constructive forces and the working out of a new world
method, then the future of Europe and of the world is dark indeed.
Surely it will lead to a new order--it is almost inconceivable that it
will not.
The Golden Rule is a wonderful developer in human life, a wonderful
harmoniser in community life--with great profit it could be extended as
the law of conduct in international relations. It must be so extended.
Its very foundation is sympathy, good will, mutuality, love.
The very essence of Jesus' entire revelation and teaching was love. It
was not the teaching of weakness or supineness in the face of wrong,
however. There was no failure on his part to smite wrong when he saw
it--wrong taking the form of injustice or oppression. He had, as we have
seen, infinite sympathy for and forbearance with the weak, the sinful;
but he had always a righteous indignation and a scathing denunciation
for oppression--for that spirit of hell that prompts men or
organisations to seek, to study, to dominate the minds and thereby the
lives of others. It was, moreover, that he would not keep silent
regarding the deadly ecclesiasticism that bore so heavily upon his
people and that had well-nigh crushed all their religious life whence
are the very springs of life, that he aroused the deadly antagonism of
the ruling hierarchy. And as he, witnessing for truth and freedom,
steadfastly and defiantly opposed oppression, so those who catch his
spirit today will do as he did and will realise as duty--"While wrong is
wrong let no man prate of peace!"
Peace? Peace? Peace?
While wrong is wrong let no man prate of peace!
He did not prate, the Master. Nay, he smote!
* * * * *
Hate wrong! Slay wrong! Else mercy, justice, truth,
Freedom and faith, shall die for humankind.[F]