Jasper County Democrat, Volume 23, Number 50, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 September 1920 — WAR OR PEACE [ARTICLE]

WAR OR PEACE

Choice between the league of nations and no league is a choice between certain war within the lifetime of this generation and the chance of permanent peace. Since iB6O we have had the American civil war, -the Danish war, the war between Prussia and Austria, the Franco-Prussian war, the RussoTurkish war, the war between China and Japan, the Russo-Japanese war, our war with Spain, the South African war and the great world war —to mention only the wars of importance. France and Italy have fought in Africa, and there have been fierce struggles in Greece and

the Balkans. In 60 years there have been 10 wars —not counting the minor struggles —or one every six years. There is no reason whatever to hope for anything better in the next 60 years—unless something positive, and wholly new, is done to stop this crime of war. Without a league of nations there will inevitably be a revival of the old balance of power system, with its shifting and uncertain alliances, its secret treaties, and its international suspicions and jealousies —the system out of which the world war was born. Itj is this system which those who framed the league and those who favor it wish to destroy. Many « the prophets say that we phall almost certainly be Involved in the next European war. President Wilson was quite right when he said that under such conditions neutrality wouls be for uq an impossible role. The Hague arrangement has been tried, and has failed. It has failed so completely that even Senator Harding proposes to “put teeth” in it, which means, if it means anything, that he would be willing to “send our boys abroad to fight,” for, as has been said, the only teeth that are good for anything are those that bite. Yet the league is objected to because it comtemplates that possible use of force —or “teeth.” The judgment of no court is worth anything unless it can be enforced. What, then, are fathers and mothers going to do in the face of this great emergency? To do nothing is to insure the continuance of those very conditions under which 16 wars occurred in 60 years, and to make probable another great war in which hundreds of thousands of Americans, many of them now in their cradles, may have to be fed into the great war machine —and the next war, about which people are even now talking, and against which our own government is preparing at enormous cos:, will be frightful beyond all imagination. Here, then, is an Instrument which the wisest men of all nations believe will be effective in preventing war?' It is the best thing offered for adoption. Will the American people reject it? Dare they take the chance? Rather they should demand that the whole power of the western hemisphere, including the enormous strength of the great republic, be put into the league. It may be that we have reached a turning point in civilization. Even now men are demanding that the Versailles treaty be modified in the interest of Germany, though the effect of such modifications would be greatly to increase her war power. The treaty was designed to destroy that power. A vote against the league is a vote for war, and for heavily increased armaments as an insurance—which does not insure—against it. Tennyson asked: “Have we risen from out the beast, then back into the beast again?” The question is not simply political—it is moral and religious.—lndianapolis News (Rep.).