Chapter 4

Peace Conference and Treaty, 1919

Sothe war had been ended by the military defeat of the Germans. In arranging the preliminaries of peace Mr. Wilson's influence had been dominant. But the personal aspect of his triumph was far more imposing in 1918 than it could possibly have been in 1916. Had his mediation ended the war before America entered it would have been bitterly resented in the allied countries and by American sympathizers of the Allies. But in the interval the President had appeared as the leader of the nation which furnished the decisive addition to allied strength that brought the final victory; he had at last condemned in strong terms the German Government, toward which he had to maintain a neutral attitude earlier in the war, and he had had the satisfaction of seeing that Government overthrown at last when the German people realized that it had cost them more than it was worth. So now the war was ended in victory, but still ended by Wilson's mediation, and moreover on terms which he himself had laid down—another triumph that would have been unthinkable two years earlier. In November, 1918, Woodrow Wilson was exalted in the estimation of the world more highly than any other human being for a century past, and far more highly than any other American had ever been raised in the opinion of the peoples of Europe.

But he had just suffered a surprising defeat at home. It became evident to Democratic leaders in the early Fall of 1918 that they were likely to lose the Congressional elections. Democratic leadership in the House of Representatives had been so notoriously incompetent that most of the war measures had had to be carried through under the leadership of Republicans, and there was grave dissatisfaction with some of the members of the Cabinet. The appeals of Democrats in danger were heard sympathetically at the White House, and on Oct. 25 the President had issued a statement asking the people to vote for Democratic Congressional candidates "if you have approved of my leadership and wish me to continue to be your unembarrassed spokesman in affairs at home and abroad." He admitted that the Republicans in Congress had supported the war, but declared that they had been against the Administration and that the time was too critical for divided leadership. It was the sort of appeal that any European Premier might have made upon "going to the country," and the President ended with the statement that "I am your servant and will accept your judgment without cavil."

If this statement had never been issued, the results of the ensuing election might not have been accepted as a repudiation of the President. But he had made it a "question of confidence," to borrow a term from European politics, and the result was disastrous. The elections gave the Republicans a majority of thirty-nine in the lower house and a majority of two in the Senate, which by a two-thirds vote would have to ratify the peace treaty which the Executive would negotiate. In such a situation a European Premier would, of course, have had to resign, but the President of the United States could hardly resign just as the war was coming to an end. The attempt to fit the parliamentary system into the framework of the American Constitution had failed. The President made no comment on the outcome of the election, but he continued to be the unembarrassed spokesman of America in affairs at home and particularly abroad. It soon became known that he intended to go to the Peace Conference in person—at the request, it was intimated, of Clemenceau and Lloyd George. The criticism of this plan was by no means confined to Republicans, but the President persisted in it. There was a widespread demand for a non-partisan Peace Commission, but the apparent concession which the President finally made to this sentiment—the appointment of Henry White, long out of the diplomatic service and never very active in politics, as the sole Representative on a commission of five—satisfied the bulk of Republican sentiment not at all. It should be observed however, that behind the five official delegates there was a host of experts—military, economic, legal and ethnological—some of whom did very important service at the conference; and in the selection of this body no party lines had been drawn.

On December 4 the President sailed from New York on an army transport, accompanied by Mrs. Wilson and by a whole caravan of savants loaded down with statistics and documents. He left a nation whose sentiment was divided between sharp resentment and a rather apprehensive hope for the best, but he landed on a continent which was prepared to offer to Woodrow Wilson a triumphal reception such as European history had never known. The six weeks between his landing at Brest and the opening of the Peace Conference were devoted to a series of processions through England, France and Italy, in which the Governments and the people strove to outdo each other in expressing their enthusiasm for the leader of the great and victorious crusade for justice and democracy. Sovereigns spiritual and temporal and the heads of Governments heaped him with all the honors in their power, and crowds of workingmen stood for hours in the rain that they might see him for a moment at a railroad station. Even from neutral Holland, divided Ireland and hostile Germany came invitations to the President, and he would probably have been received by those peoples as enthusiastically as by British, French and Italians.

For the war had been ended on the basis of the ideals of President Wilson. Those ideals had been expressed in vague and general terms, and every Government thought that its own war aims coincided with them. Every people, suddenly released from the long and terrible strain of the war, thought that all its troubles were suddenly to be ended by the principles of President Wilson. Jugo-Slavs and Italians claimed Istria and Fiume, and each felt itself supported by the principles of President Wilson. To Frenchmen those principles meant that Germany must pay for the war forced on France, and to Germans they meant that a ruined France and an uninvaded Germany could start again on the same footing.

The Peace conference that began on January 18 was bound to disillusion a great many people, including President Wilson himself. Principles had to be translated into practice, and every effort to do so left one party to the dispute, if not both, convinced that the principles had been betrayed. The treaty which was eventually produced led American liberals to complain that the President had surrendered to European imperialism, and brought from such Republicans as still admired the Allies the complaint that he had betrayed allied interests at the promptings of pacifism. Equally diverse opinions might have been obtained from all types of extremists in Europe. The Fourteen Points were susceptible of varying interpretations, according to individual interests; and at the very outset the American delegates found some of the allied leaders contending that they need not be considered, since the Germans had surrendered, not because they regarded the principles of President Wilson as just, but because they had been beaten. There was undoubtedly a great deal of truth in this contention, but the American delegates succeeded in holding the conference to the position that having accepted the German surrender on certain terms it would have to abide by those terms. The terms had to be interpreted, however, and every agreement on the details led to a protest from somebody that the President had abandoned the Fourteen Points.

All this, together with the growing Republican opposition at home which was making itself heard in Europe, led to a rapid decline in the President's prestige. So long as it was a question of generalities he was the moral leader of the peoples of the world, but after a few weeks of getting down to particulars he was only the head of the peace delegation of a single State—and a State in which there was already serious opposition to his policy. This altered standing was made evident toward the end of April, when a protracted disagreement with the Italian delegation over the Adriatic question led the President to issue a declaration of his position which was virtually an appeal to the Italian people over the heads of their own representatives. Nowhere had the President been received with more enthusiasm than in his trip through Italy four months before; but now Dr. Orlando, the Italian Premier, went home and promptly got a virtually unanimous vote of confidence from his Parliament, which was supported by the overwhelming majority of the people.

The treaty was finally signed on June 28, and the President left at once for home to take up the fight to get it through the Senate—a fight which, it was already apparent, would be about as hard as the struggle to get any treaty evolved at all out of the conflicting national interests in Paris. There was a demonstration for him at Brest as he left French soil, but nothing like the enthusiasm that had greeted his arrival. This was perhaps the measure of his inevitable decline in the estimation of Europe; it remained to be seen how he stood at home. As early as January 1, before the Peace Conference met, Senator Lodge, Republican leader in the Senate, had declared that the conference ought to confine itself to the Peace Treaty and leave the League of Nations for later discussion.

On February 14, after the first reading of the League covenant, the President had made a hurried trip home to talk it over with the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations—a committee that had been loaded up with enemies of the League of Nations. The members of the committee dined with him at the White House on February 26, and the covenant was discussed for several hours. But the President could not convert the doubters; on March 3 Senator Lodge announced that thirty-seven Republican Senators were opposed to the League in its present form, and that they regarded a demand for its alteration as the exercise of the Senate's constitutional right of advice on treaties. The President took up the challenge, and on the following day, just before sailing back to Paris, he declared in a public address that the League and treaty were inextricably interwoven; that he did not intend to bring back "the corpse of a treaty," and that those who opposed the League must be deaf to the demands of common men the world over.

The fight was now begun. Some modifications were made in the covenant in the direction of meeting criticisms by Elihu Root, but it was adopted. On July 10 the treaty was laid before the Senate and referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations, which at once began to hear opinions on it. The President himself appeared before the committee on August 19. Outside the Senate party lines were breaking up; the Irish and German elements who had come into line during the war, but had felt that their interpretation of President Wilson's ideals had been violated by the treaty, were aligned in support of the Republican opposition; and a certain element of the Democratic Party which inclined to admire the theory of traditional isolation found itself in harmony with the Republicans. On the other hand, many moderate Republicans supported the President, chief among them Mr. Taft; and in the churches and colleges support of the League commanded an overwhelming majority.

Convinced that the people were behind him against the Senate, or would be behind him if they understood the issue, the President left Washington on September 3 for another appeal to the country. Declaring that if America rejected the League it would "break the great heart of the world," he went to the Pacific Coast on a long and arduous speaking tour, another request, in effect, for a vote of confidence for his work as Premier. The effort was too much; he broke down at Wichita, Kan., on September 26, and was hurried back to the White House, where for weeks he lay disabled by an illness whose nature and seriousness were carefully concealed at the time, and even yet but imperfectly understood. Meanwhile the treaty had been reported out of committee, and the offering of a multitude of amendments, all of which were defeated, led eventually to the drawing up of the "Lodge reservations," finally adopted on November 16.

Nobody knew how sick the President was, but Senator Hitchcock, who had led the fight for the treaty in the Senate, saw him on November 18 and was told that in the President's opinion the Lodge reservations amounted to nullification of the treaty. So the Democrats voted against the treaty. Lodge's refusal to accept Wilson's treaty was as unshakable as Wilson's refusal to accept Lodge's treaty. When the special session ended and the regular session began the President eventually yielded a little and consented to interpretative reservations proposed by Senator Hitchcock. But this would not satisfy the Republicans; and on March 20 the rejected treaty was finally sent back to the White House.

The Closing Year, 1920-1921

ThePresident's recovery was slow, and the first incidents of his return to the management of public affairs were rather startling, in view of the abrupt manner with which he resumed the direction of executive policy. During his illness the Cabinet had met from time to time and in a fashion had carried on the routine work of the executive department. Had it not done so, had the gravity of the President's illness been generally known, the demand which was heard for an explanation of the constitutional reference to the "disability of the President" and an understanding of the circumstances under which the Vice-President might assume the office would have been much stronger. There was a good deal of apprehension, therefore, when Secretary of State Lansing resigned, and the published correspondence showed that the President had regarded his action in calling Cabinet meetings as a usurpation of Presidential authority. It was evident from the correspondence that another and perhaps stronger reason for the President's disapproval had been the action of the Secretary in conducting a Mexican Policy on his own initiative, during the President's illness, which showed considerable divergence from the President's own. Nevertheless, the manner of the action caused some uneasiness and there was much surprise when Mr. Lansing was replaced by Bainbridge Colby, a comparatively recent proselyte from the Progressive Party.

There was still further uncertainty as to the condition of the President when he re-entered with a series of rather sharp notes into the Adriatic controversy, which England, France and Italy had been trying to settle, without consulting the Jugoslavs, during his illness; and a letter to Senator Hitchcock on March 8, asserting that the militarist party was at that time in control of France, aroused grave misgivings on both sides of the Atlantic. These, however, were unjustified; the President's improvement, though gradual, continued. But the work of the Executive during 1920 was far less important than in previous years, for the interest of the country was concentrated on the Presidential election.

On January 8 a letter from the President had been read at the Jackson Day dinner in Washington, in which he refused to accept the Senate's decision on the treaty as the decision of the nation. "If there is any doubt as to what the people of the country think about the matter," he added, "the clear and single way out is ... to give the next election the form of a great and solemn referendum." Once more, as in 1918, the President had asked for a verdict on his leadership. There was some perturbation among the Democratic leaders, for into a Presidential election so many issues enter that it would be difficult to regard it as a referendum on any particular issue. It might have been so accepted if the President himself had come forward as a candidate for a third term, but there was no sign from the White House as to his attitude on this issue, and there was no spontaneous demand for him outside. The leading candidate during the pre-convention campaign was William G. McAdoo, the President's son-in-law, who had resigned as Secretary of the Treasury and Director General of Railroads after making a successful record during the war, and before the criticism of the Wilson Administration as a whole had become acute. McAdoo had the powerful support of organized labor and most of the Federal office-holders, but whether or not he had the support of the White House no man knew. The Republicans assumed it for their own purposes, and Senator Lodge's keynote speech at the Chicago Convention was full of denunciations of the "Wilson dynasty"; but if McAdoo were Wilson's candidate the President showed no sign of knowing it.

That McAdoo was not nominated, however, can be ascribed very largely to his relationship to the President and the suspicion that he was the President's candidate. The Democratic Convention at San Francisco adopted a platform praising and indorsing the President's record in all details. The convention had to do that; the President's record was the party's record. Homer Cummings as Temporary Chairman kept the convention cheered up by a keynote speech of eulogy of that record, which moved the assembled Democrats to such enthusiasm that Secretary of State Colby, who had not been a Democrat long enough to know much about the behavior of the species, declared that at any movement that day the rules could have been suspended and the President renominated by acclamation. But when the convention came down to the work of nomination the President was not considered, and the delegates devoted themselves to finding the most available man who had not had any connection with the Administration. James M. Cox was finally nominated on Woodrow Wilson's record and sent out to the great and solemn referendum.

Aside from a formal proclamation of unity of ideals and intentions with the candidate, the White House took practically no part in the campaign. Not until October, when a delegation of pro-League Republicans called at the White House, was it known that the President's health had temporarily taken a turn for the worse and that active participation would have been impossible. It could hardly have affected the result very much in either direction.

Whether or not the President had intended to turn over the Government to Hughes in November, 1916, he did nothing so unkind to Harding in November, 1920. The President-elect was allowed plenty of time to try to choose his Cabinet and his policies, but the Administration had gradually withdrawn from all connection with European affairs, and it was made known soon after Congress met in December that nothing would be done which might embarrass the new Administration in its handling of foreign relations and interrelated problems.

The history of Woodrow Wilson's Administration virtually ends with the rejection of the treaty; but the business of government had to be carried on through the final year. During 1920 old issues that had long been hidden behind the war clouds came out into the open again. Obregon overthrew Carranza and entered into power in Mexico, but the Wilson Administration maintained neutrality during the brief struggle. Ambassador Fletcher had resigned, but Henry Morgenthau, appointed to succeed him, did not obtain the confirmation of the Senate, and the new Administration had not been formally recognized at the end of President Wilson's term. A controversy over the status of American oil rights was one of the chief impediments to recognition, though Obregon's general attitude was far more friendly to America than that of Carranza.

The President in November announced the boundaries of Armenia, which he had drawn at the request of the European Allies. But these boundaries were of no particular interest by that time, since the Turks and the Bolsheviki were already partitioning Armenia; and the mediation between the Turks and Armenians which the Allies requested the President to undertake was forestalled by the Bolshevist conquest of the remnant of the country. The Adriatic dispute, in which the President had taken such a prominent part in 1919, was finally settled without him by direct negotiation between Italy and Jugoslavia. In one other international problem, however, that of Russia, the United States Government still exerted some influence. The President during 1918 had showed more willingness to believe in the possibility of some good coming out of Bolshevist Russia than most of the European Governments, and the American Expeditionary Forces in Siberia took no active part in the fighting there. At the Peace Conference the President had been willing to call the various Russian parties to the Prinkipo conference, but nothing came of this; and America eventually took up a middle ground toward Russia. While the British seemed ready to make friends with the Bolsheviki and the French remained irreconcilably hostile, the American Government—whose policy was fully set forth in a note of August 10, 1920—refused to attack them, but also to have any dealings with them. This policy was much criticised as being purely negative, but toward the end of Mr. Wilson's Administration both England and France were tending to follow it through the force of circumstances, England's effort to find a basis of trade relations with Bolshevist Russian being as futile as France's support of anti-Bolshevist revolutionary movements.

The Republicans and their Irish supporters in the 1920 campaign revived the old demand for the exemption of American shipping from the Panama Canal tolls, but this and various other differences with England which arose toward the end of Mr. Wilson's Administration were left over for settlement by the new President. More urgent, however, was another ancient issue now revived—the California land question. In 1917, when America was just entering the war and could not afford any dangerous entanglements on the Pacific, the Lansing-Ishii agreement was negotiated with Japan. By this the United States recognized Japan's "special interests" in China, particularly in "the parts to which her territory is contiguous," while both powers professed agreement on the principles of Chinese independence and territorial integrity, and the open door. However necessary this concession in order to protect an exposed flank in time of war, it was regarded with much alarm by friends of China, whose wrath was later aroused by the action of the President at the Peace Conference in agreeing to the cession of Shantung to Japan. There was a renewed antagonism between American and Japanese interests in certain quarters, and the American Army in Siberia, if it did nothing else, at least kept the Japanese from seizing Vladivostok until the Americans had left.

With this background, the situation created by the revival of anti-Japanese agitation in California seemed more or less disquieting, but when a more stringent land law was enacted by the Californians in November negotiations between the two Governments began at once and are still going on at the close of the Administration with good prospect of agreement.

The President's unpopularity had been so violently expressed by the election of November 2 that it was bound to be mitigated soon after, and this natural reaction was aided by the failure of the Republican Congress to accomplish anything in the short session and by President-elect Harding's slowness in deciding among candidates offered for the Cabinet and policies put forward for his attention. As President Wilson prepared to turn over the executive duties to his successor there was already evidence that the American public was returning to a greater appreciation of his services. As a token of the estimation in which he was still held by the more intelligent circles abroad, the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to him in December, 1920; and European statesmen who had opposed him at the Peace Conference were already expressing surprise at learning that Mr. Harding believed that the League of Nations was dead.

CopyrightNew YorkTimes.

Published through the courtesy of the New York Times.

In Flanders FieldsBy Lieut. Col. John McCreaIn Flanders fields the poppies growBetween the crosses, row on row,That mark our place, and in the skyThe larks still bravely singing, fly,Scarce heard amid the guns below.We are the dead. Short days agoWe lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,Loved and were loved, and now we lieIn Flanders fields.Take up our quarrel with the foe!To you from failing hands we throwThe torch. Be yours to lift it high!If ye break faith with us who dieWe shall not sleep, tho poppies blowIn Flanders fields.

In Flanders Fields

By Lieut. Col. John McCrea

In Flanders fields the poppies growBetween the crosses, row on row,That mark our place, and in the skyThe larks still bravely singing, fly,Scarce heard amid the guns below.

In Flanders fields the poppies grow

Between the crosses, row on row,

That mark our place, and in the sky

The larks still bravely singing, fly,

Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the dead. Short days agoWe lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,Loved and were loved, and now we lieIn Flanders fields.

We are the dead. Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,

Loved and were loved, and now we lie

In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe!To you from failing hands we throwThe torch. Be yours to lift it high!If ye break faith with us who dieWe shall not sleep, tho poppies blowIn Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe!

To you from failing hands we throw

The torch. Be yours to lift it high!

If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, tho poppies blow

In Flanders fields.

America's AnswerBy R. W. LillardRest ye in peace, ye Flanders dead!The fight that ye so bravely ledWe've taken up! And we will keepTrue faith with you who lie asleep,With each a cross to mark his bed,And poppies blowing overheadWhere once his own life blood ran red!So let your rest be sweet and deepIn Flanders fields!Fear not that ye have died for naught,The torch ye threw to us we caught!Ten million hands will hold it high,And Freedom's light shall never die!We've learned the lesson that ye taughtIn Flanders fields!

America's Answer

By R. W. Lillard

Rest ye in peace, ye Flanders dead!The fight that ye so bravely ledWe've taken up! And we will keepTrue faith with you who lie asleep,With each a cross to mark his bed,And poppies blowing overheadWhere once his own life blood ran red!So let your rest be sweet and deepIn Flanders fields!

Rest ye in peace, ye Flanders dead!

The fight that ye so bravely led

We've taken up! And we will keep

True faith with you who lie asleep,

With each a cross to mark his bed,

And poppies blowing overhead

Where once his own life blood ran red!

So let your rest be sweet and deep

In Flanders fields!

Fear not that ye have died for naught,The torch ye threw to us we caught!Ten million hands will hold it high,And Freedom's light shall never die!We've learned the lesson that ye taughtIn Flanders fields!

Fear not that ye have died for naught,

The torch ye threw to us we caught!

Ten million hands will hold it high,

And Freedom's light shall never die!

We've learned the lesson that ye taught

In Flanders fields!

RecessionalBy Richard LinthicumIThe tide is at the ebb, as if to markOur turning backward from the guiding light;Grotesque, uncertain shapes infest the darkAnd wings of bats are heard in aimless flight;Discordant voices cry and serpents hiss,No friendly star, no beacon's beckoning ray;We follow, all forsworn, with steps amiss,Envy and Malice on an unknown way.But he who bore the light in night of war,Swiftly and surely and without surcease,Where other light was not, save one red star,Treads now, as then, the certain path to peace;Wounded, denied, but radiant of soul,Steadfast in honor, marches toward the goal.IIThe spirit that was Peace seems but a wraith,The glory that was ours seems but a name,And like a rotten reed our broken faith,Our boasted virtue turned to scarlet shameBy the low, envious lust of party power;While he upon the heights whence he had led,Deserted and betrayed in victory's hour,Still wears a victor's wreath on unbowed head.The Nation gropes—his rule is at an end,Immortal man of the transcendent mind,Light-bearer of the world, the loving friendOf little peoples, servant of mankind!O land of mine! how long till you atone?How long to stand dishonored and alone?To Woodrow Wilson, March 4, 1921.

Recessional

By Richard Linthicum

The tide is at the ebb, as if to markOur turning backward from the guiding light;Grotesque, uncertain shapes infest the darkAnd wings of bats are heard in aimless flight;Discordant voices cry and serpents hiss,No friendly star, no beacon's beckoning ray;We follow, all forsworn, with steps amiss,Envy and Malice on an unknown way.But he who bore the light in night of war,Swiftly and surely and without surcease,Where other light was not, save one red star,Treads now, as then, the certain path to peace;Wounded, denied, but radiant of soul,Steadfast in honor, marches toward the goal.

The tide is at the ebb, as if to mark

Our turning backward from the guiding light;

Grotesque, uncertain shapes infest the dark

And wings of bats are heard in aimless flight;

Discordant voices cry and serpents hiss,

No friendly star, no beacon's beckoning ray;

We follow, all forsworn, with steps amiss,

Envy and Malice on an unknown way.

But he who bore the light in night of war,

Swiftly and surely and without surcease,

Where other light was not, save one red star,

Treads now, as then, the certain path to peace;

Wounded, denied, but radiant of soul,

Steadfast in honor, marches toward the goal.

The spirit that was Peace seems but a wraith,The glory that was ours seems but a name,And like a rotten reed our broken faith,Our boasted virtue turned to scarlet shameBy the low, envious lust of party power;While he upon the heights whence he had led,Deserted and betrayed in victory's hour,Still wears a victor's wreath on unbowed head.The Nation gropes—his rule is at an end,Immortal man of the transcendent mind,Light-bearer of the world, the loving friendOf little peoples, servant of mankind!O land of mine! how long till you atone?How long to stand dishonored and alone?

The spirit that was Peace seems but a wraith,

The glory that was ours seems but a name,

And like a rotten reed our broken faith,

Our boasted virtue turned to scarlet shame

By the low, envious lust of party power;

While he upon the heights whence he had led,

Deserted and betrayed in victory's hour,

Still wears a victor's wreath on unbowed head.

The Nation gropes—his rule is at an end,

Immortal man of the transcendent mind,

Light-bearer of the world, the loving friend

Of little peoples, servant of mankind!

O land of mine! how long till you atone?

How long to stand dishonored and alone?

To Woodrow Wilson, March 4, 1921.

THE FOUNDERS OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

Baldridge inStars and Stripes

Make firm, O God, the peace our dead have won,For folly shakes the tinsel on her headAnd points us back to darkness and to hell,Cackling, "Beware of Visions," while our deadStill cry, "It was for visions that we fell."—Alfred Noyes

Make firm, O God, the peace our dead have won,

For folly shakes the tinsel on her head

And points us back to darkness and to hell,

Cackling, "Beware of Visions," while our dead

Still cry, "It was for visions that we fell."

—Alfred Noyes

Workmen's Compensation

Workmen's CompensationWemust hearten and quicken the spirit and efficiency of labor throughout our whole industrial system by everywhere and in all occupations doing justice to the laborer, not only by paying a living wage but also by making all the conditions that surround labor what they ought to be. And we must do more than justice. We must safeguard life and promote health and safety in every occupation in which they are threatened or imperiled. That is more than justice, and better, because it is humanity and economy.—From President Wilson's Speech of Acceptance at Shadow Lawn, September 2, 1916.

Workmen's Compensation

Wemust hearten and quicken the spirit and efficiency of labor throughout our whole industrial system by everywhere and in all occupations doing justice to the laborer, not only by paying a living wage but also by making all the conditions that surround labor what they ought to be. And we must do more than justice. We must safeguard life and promote health and safety in every occupation in which they are threatened or imperiled. That is more than justice, and better, because it is humanity and economy.—From President Wilson's Speech of Acceptance at Shadow Lawn, September 2, 1916.

President Wilson as he looked during the Peace Conference in Paris

Woodrow Wilson's Place in History

By General the Right Honorable Jan Christian Smuts, Premier of the Union of South Africa

General the Right Honorable Jan Christian Smuts, premier of the Union of South Africa, served with President Wilson on the League of Nations commission of the peace conference.Gen. Smuts was an active leader of the Boer Army in the field in the Boer war. He is a graduate of Cambridge University in England, served as state attorney for the South African Republic, and was known as a member of the bar at Cape Town.Accepting the outcome of the Boer war, he entered the service of the British Government, becoming colonial secretary for the Transvaal in 1907 and exercising a leading influence as a delegate in the national convention in 1910, which drew up the constitution for the present Union of South Africa. He was minister of the defense of the South African Government and commanded the troops in the campaign against the Germans in East Africa in 1916-17. Promoted to be an honorary lieutenant-general, he was the South African representative in the imperial war cabinet in 1917-18. This led to his prominence in the peace conference and to his close contact with President Wilson. On February 8, of this year, Premier Smuts and the South African party won a decisive victory at the polls over Gen. Hertzog and those who advocated the secession of South Africa from the British Empire.

General the Right Honorable Jan Christian Smuts, premier of the Union of South Africa, served with President Wilson on the League of Nations commission of the peace conference.

Gen. Smuts was an active leader of the Boer Army in the field in the Boer war. He is a graduate of Cambridge University in England, served as state attorney for the South African Republic, and was known as a member of the bar at Cape Town.

Accepting the outcome of the Boer war, he entered the service of the British Government, becoming colonial secretary for the Transvaal in 1907 and exercising a leading influence as a delegate in the national convention in 1910, which drew up the constitution for the present Union of South Africa. He was minister of the defense of the South African Government and commanded the troops in the campaign against the Germans in East Africa in 1916-17. Promoted to be an honorary lieutenant-general, he was the South African representative in the imperial war cabinet in 1917-18. This led to his prominence in the peace conference and to his close contact with President Wilson. On February 8, of this year, Premier Smuts and the South African party won a decisive victory at the polls over Gen. Hertzog and those who advocated the secession of South Africa from the British Empire.

Written for the New York Evening Post and The Washington Herald

Pretoria, South Africa, January 8, 1921.

It has been suggested that I should write a short estimate and appraisal of the work of President Wilson on the termination of his Presidency of the United States of America. I feel I must comply with the suggestion. I feel I may not remain silent when there is an opportunity to say a word of appreciation for the work of one with whom I came into close contact at a great period and who rendered the most signal service to the great human cause.

There is a great saying of Mommsen (I believe) in reference to the close of Hannibal's career in failure and eclipse: "On those whom the gods love they lavish infinite joys and infinite sorrows." It has come back to my mind in reference to the close of Wilson's career. For a few brief moments he was not only the leader of the greatest State in the world; he was raised to far giddier heights and became the center of the world's hopes. And then he fell, misunderstood and rejected by his own people, and his great career closes apparently in signal and tragic defeat.

Position of Terrible Greatness

What is the explanation for this tremendous tragedy, which is not solely American, which closely concerns the whole world? Of course, there are purely American elements in the explanation which I am not competent to speak on. But besides the American quarrel with President Wilson there is something to be said on the great matters in issue. On these I may be permitted to say a few words.

The position occupied by President Wilson in the world's imagination at the close of the great war and at the beginning of the peace conference was terrible in its greatness. It was a terrible position for any mere man to occupy. Probably to no human being in all history did the hopes, the prayers, the aspirations of many millions of his fellows turn with such poignant intensity as to him at the close of the war. At a time of the deepest darkness and despair, he had raised aloft a light to which all eyes had turned. He had spoken divine words of healing and consolation to a broken humanity. His lofty moral idealism seemed for a moment to dominate the brutal passions which had torn the Old World asunder. And he was supposed to possess the secret which would remake the world on fairer lines. The peace which Wilson was bringing to the world was expected to be God's peace. Prussianism lay crushed; brute force had failed utterly. The moral character of the universe had been signally vindicated. There was a universal vague hope in a great moral peace, of a new world order arising visibly and immediately on the ruins of the old. This hope was not a mere superficial sentiment. It was the intense expression at the end of the war of the inner moral and spiritual force which had upborne the peoples during the dark night of the war and had nerved them in an effort almost beyond human strength. Surely, God had been with them in that long night of agony. His was the victory; His should be the peace. And President Wilson was looked upon as the man to make this great peace. He had voiced the great ideals of the new order; his great utterances had become the contractual basis for the armistice and the peace. The idealism of Wilson would surely become the reality of the new order of things in the peace treaty.

Saved the "Little Child"

In this atmosphere of extravagant, almost frenzied expectation he arrived at the Paris Peace Conference. Without hesitation he plunged into that inferno of human passions. He went down into the Pit like a second Heracles to bring back the fair Alcestis of the world's desire. There were six months of agonized waiting, during which the world situation rapidly deteriorated. And then he emerged with the peace treaty. It was not a Wilson peace, and he made a fatal mistake in somehow giving the impression that the peace was in accord with his Fourteen Points and his various declarations. Not so the world had understood him. This was a punic peace, the same sort of peace as the victor had dictated to the vanquished for thousands of years. It was not Alcestis; it was a haggard, unlovely woman with features distorted with hatred, greed and selfishness, and the little child that the woman carried was scarcely noticed. Yet it was for the saving of the child that Wilson had labored until he was a physical wreck. Let our other great statesmen and leaders enjoy their well-earned honors for their unquestioned success at Paris. To Woodrow Wilson, the apparent failure, belongs the undying honor, which will grow with the growing centuries, of having saved the "little child that shall lead them yet." No other statesman but Wilson could have done it. And he did it.

People Did Not Understand

The people, the common people of all lands, did not understand the significance of what had happened. They saw only that hard, unlovely Prussian peace, and the great hope died in their hearts. The great disillusionment took its place. The most receptive mood for a new start the world had been in for centuries passed away. Faith in their governors and leaders was largely destroyed and the foundations of the human government were shaken in a way which will be felt for generations. The Paris peace lost an opportunity as unique as the great war itself. In destroying the moral idealism born of the sacrifices of the war it did almost as much as the war itself in shattering the structure of Western civilization.

And the odium for all this fell especially on President Wilson. Round him the hopes had centered; round him the disillusion and despair now gathered. Popular opinion largely held him responsible for the bitter disappointment and grievous failure. The cynics scoffed; his friends were silenced in the universal disappointment. Little or nothing had been expected from the other leaders; the whole failure was put to the account of Woodrow Wilson. And finally America for reasons of her own joined the pack and at the end it was his own people who tore him to pieces.

Must Wait for Judgment

Will this judgment, born of momentary disillusion and disappointment, stand in future, or will it be reversed? The time has not come to pass final judgment on either Wilson or any of the other great actors in the drama at Paris. The personal estimates will depend largely on the interpretation of that drama in the course of time. As one who saw and watched things from the inside, I feel convinced that the present popular estimates are largely superficial and will not stand the searching test of time. And I have no doubt whatever that Wilson has been harshly, unfairly, unjustly dealt with, and that he has been made a scapegoat for the sins of others. Wilson made mistakes, and there were occasions when I ventured to sound a warning note. But it was not his mistakes that caused the failure for which he has been held mainly responsible.

Let us admit the truth, however bitter it is to do so, for those who believe in human nature. It was not Wilson who failed. The position is far more serious. It was the human spirit itself that failed at Paris. It is no use passing judgments and making scapegoats of this or that individual statesman or group of statesmen. Idealists make a great mistake in not facing the real facts sincerely and resolutely. They believe in the power of the spirit, in the goodness which is at the heart of things, in the triumph which is in store for the great moral ideals of the race. But this faith only too often leads to an optimism which is sadly and fatally at variance with actual results.

Says Humanity Failed

It is the realist and not the idealist who is generally justified by events. We forget that the human spirit, the spirit of goodness and truth in the world, is still only an infant crying in the night, and that the struggle with darkness is as yet mostly an unequal struggle.

Paris proved this terrible truth once more. It was not Wilson who failed there, but humanity itself. It was not the statesmen that failed so much as the spirit of the peoples behind them. The hope, the aspiration for a new world order of peace and right and justice—however deeply and universally felt—was still only feeble and ineffective in comparison with the dominant national passions which found their expression in the peace treaty. Even if Wilson had been one of the great demi-gods of the human race, he could not have saved the peace. Knowing the Peace Conference as I knew it from within, I feel convinced in my own mind that not the greatest man born of woman in the history of the race would have saved that situation. The great hope was not the heralding of the coming dawn, as the peoples thought, but only a dim intimation of some far-off event toward which we shall yet have to make many a long, weary march. Sincerely as we believed in the moral ideals for which he had fought, the temptation at Paris of a large booty to be divided proved too great. And in the end not only the leaders but the peoples preferred a bit of booty here, a strategic frontier there, a coal field or an oil well, an addition to their population or their resources—to all the faint allurements of the ideal. As I said at the time, the real peace was still to come, and it could only come from a new spirit in the peoples themselves.

Wilson Had to Be Conciliated

What was really saved at Paris was the child—the covenant of the League of Nations. The political realists who had their eye on the loot were prepared—however reluctantly—to throw up that innocent little sop to President Wilson and his fellow idealists. After all, there was not much harm in it, it threatened no present national interest, and it gave great pleasure to a number of good unpractical people in most countries. Above all, President Wilson had to be conciliated, and this was the last and the greatest of the fourteen points on which he had set his heart and by which he was determined to stand or fall. And so he got his way. But it is a fact that only a man of his great power and influence and dogged determination could have carried the covenant through that Peace Conference. Others had seen with him the great vision; others had perhaps given more thought to the elaboration of the great plan. But his was the power and the will that carried it through. The covenant is Wilson's souvenir to the future of the world. No one will ever deny that honor.

Great Creative Document

The honor is very great, indeed, for the covenant is one of the great creative documents of human history. The peace treaty will fade into merciful oblivion and its provisions will be gradually obliterated by the great human tides sweeping over the world. But the covenant will stand as sure as fate. Forty-two nations gathered round it at the first meeting of the League at Geneva. And the day is not far off when all the free peoples of the world will gather around it. It must succeed, because there is no other way for the future of civilization. It does not realize the great hopes born of the war, but it provides the only method and instrument by which in the course of time those hopes can be realized. Speaking as one who has some right to speak on the fundamental conceptions, objects and methods of the covenant, I feel sure that most of the present criticism is based on misunderstandings. These misunderstandings will clear away, one by one the peoples still outside the covenant will fall in behind this banner, under which the human race is going to march forward to triumphs of peaceful organization and achievements undreamt of by us children of an unhappier era. And the leader who, in spite of apparent failure, succeeded in inscribing his name on that banner has achieved the most enviable and enduring immortality. Americans of the future will yet proudly and gratefully rank him with Washington and Lincoln, and his name will have a more universal significance than theirs.

THE NOBLE PEACE PRIZE 1920

WITHOUT THE ADVICE AND CONSENT OF THE SENATE.Kirby in the New YorkWorld

"We die without distinction if we are not willing to die the death of sacrifice. Do you covet honor? You will never get it by serving yourself. Do you covet distinction? You will get it only as a servant of mankind."—Woodrow Wilson's Addressat Swarthmore CollegeOct. 5, 1913.

—Woodrow Wilson's Address

at Swarthmore College

Oct. 5, 1913.

Woodrow Wilson

AN INTERPRETATION

Published Through the Courtesy of the New YorkWorld

No other American has made so much world history as Woodrow Wilson, who retires at noon today from the office of President of the United States. No other American has ever bulked so large in the affairs of civilization or wielded so commanding an influence in shaping their ends.

The great outstanding figure of the war, Mr. Wilson remains the great outstanding figure of the peace. Broken in health and shattered in body, Mr. Wilson is leaving the White House, but his spirit still dominates the scene. It pervades every chancellery in Europe. It hovers over every capital. Because Woodrow Wilson was President of the United States during the most critical period of modern history international relations have undergone their first far-reaching moral revolution.

Mr. Harding is assuming the duties of the Presidency, but the main interest in Mr. Harding is still a reflected interest, which is concerned chiefly with the efforts that his Administration may make to adjust itself to the forces that Mr. Wilson has set in motion. Stripped of all the paraphernalia of his office, Mr. Wilson, by virtue of his achievements, remains the most potent single influence in the modern world; yet after this eight years in the White House it may be doubted if even the American people themselves know him better or understand him better than they did the day he was first inaugurated.

Neither Mr. Wilson's friends nor his enemies have ever succeeded in interpreting him or in explaining him, nor can any interpretation or explanation be satisfactory which fails at the outset to recognize in him the simplest and at the same time the most complex character in the greatest drama ever played on the stage of human history. Even his closest associates have never found it easy to reconcile a fervent political democracy with an unbending intellectual aristocracy, or to determine which of those characteristics was dominant in his day-to-day decisions.

No man ever sat in the President's chair who was more genuinely a democrat or held more tenaciously to his faith in democracy than Woodrow Wilson, but no other man ever sat in the President's chair who was so contemptuous of all intellect that was inferior to his own or so impatient with its laggard processes.

Back to Index Next