In making this acknowledgment, which is due for the courtesy of “The Times” in permitting an article prepared for its columns to be utilized as the basis for the book, it is in order for the publishers to explain to the readers that the material in the article has itself been rewritten and amplified, while the book contains, in addition to this original paper, a number of further chapters comprising together more than six times the material of the first article.
The present book is an independent work, and is deserving of consideration on the part of all citizens who are interested in securing authoritative information on the issues of the great European contest.
New York, December 12, 1914
INTRODUCTION
BY THE HON. JOSEPH H. CHOATE, FORMER AMERICAN
AMBASSADOR TO GREAT BRITAIN[1]
For five months now all people who read at all have been reading about the horrible war that is devastating Europe and shedding the best blood of the people of five great nations. In fact, they have had no time to read anything else, and everything that is published about it is seized upon with great avidity. No wonder, then, that Mr. James M. Beck’s book, The Evidence in the Case, published by G. P. Putnam’s Sons, which has grown out of the article by him contributed to the New York Times Sunday Magazine, has been warmly welcomed both here and in England as a valuable addition to the literature of the day.
An able and clear-headed lawyer and advocate, he presents the matter in the unique form of a legal argument, based upon an analysis of the diplomatic records submitted by England, Germany, Russia, France, and Belgium, as “A Case in the Supreme Court of Civilization,” and the conclusions to be deduced as to the moral responsibility for the war.
The whole argument is founded upon the idea that there is such a thing as a public conscience of the world, which must and will necessarily pass final judgment upon the conduct of the parties concerned in this infernal struggle. Many times in the course of the book he refers emphatically to that “decent respect to the opinions of mankind” to which Jefferson appealed in our Declaration of Independence as the final arbiter upon our conduct in throwing off the British yoke and declaring our right to be an independent nation. That this “public opinion of the world” is the final tribunal upon all great international contests is illustrated by the fact that all mankind, including Great Britain herself, has long ago adjudged that our great Declaration was not only just, but necessary for the progress of mankind.