Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him

by Joseph P. Tumulty

At a dark moment of the war, the spring of 1917, the British and French, in order to sharpen Japanese support of the allied cause, made private agreements to sustain the claims of Japan at the Peace Conference to German rights in Shantung. It thus happened, in the Council of Three, for Orlando had then gone home, that two of the powers, Great Britain and France, were bound by their pledged word to Japan. Indeed, the British argued that they felt themselves indebted to the Japanese not only as a long-friendly ally but for helping to keep the Pacific free of the enemy while Australian troops were being transported to Europe and thus relieving a great burden for the British fleet. It must not be forgotten that China was also bound by the Treaty and Notes of 1915 and the Notes of 1918 with Japan— although China vigorously asserted that all of these agreements were entered into upon her part under coercion by Japan. In fact, one of the Chinese delegates at Paris had actually signed one of the agreements which he was now asking the Conference to overthrow.

It was not only this wire entanglement of treaties which Mr. Wilson found in his advance, but it must be said, in all frankness, that, in opposing Japan's demands for economic privileges and a "sphere of influence" in China, he was also opposing a principle which every other strong nation at the Conference believed in and acted upon, if not in China, then elsewhere in the world. Japan asserted that she was only asking for the rights already conceded to other nations. Japan was thus in a very strong position in insisting upon her claims, and China in a very weak position.

In this crisis Mr. Wilson was face to face with difficult alternatives. If he stood stiffly for immediate justice to China, he would have to force Great Britain and France to break their pledged word with Japan. Even if he succeeded in doing this, he still would have had to face the probability, practically the certainty, that Japan would withdraw from the Conference and go home. This would not only keep Japan out of the League, but it would go far toward eventually disrupting the Peace Conference, already shaken by the withdrawal of Italy and the dangerous defection of Belgium. Such a weakening of the Peace Conference and of the Alliance of the Great Powers would have the immediate effect of encouraging the Germans not to sign the Treaty and of holding off in the hope that the forces of industrial unrest then spreading all over Europe might overwhelm France or Italy. It would also have a highly irritating effect upon all the bolshevist elements in Europe—increasing uncertainty, and the spread of anarchical conditions. With Japan out of the association of western nations there was also the possibility, voiced just at this time in both French and British newspapers, that she would begin building up alliances of her own in the East—possibly with Germany and Russia. Indeed, if the truth were told, this was probably the most important consideration of all in shaping the final decision. It was the plain issue between the recrudescence, in a new and more dangerous form, of the old system of military alliances and balances of power, and the new system of world organization in a league of nations. It was the militaristic Prussian idea against the American Wilsonian idea.

No statesman probably ever had a more difficult problem presented to him than did Mr. Wilson upon the momentous 29th of April, 1919. At that moment three things seemed of extreme importance if anything was to be saved out of the wreckage of the world. The first was a speedy peace, so that men everywhere might return to the work of production and reconstruction and the avenues of trade everywhere be opened. Peace and work! The second was of supreme importance—keeping the great Allies firmly welded together to steady a world which was threatened with anarchy. It was absolutely necessary to keep a going concern in the world! The third was to perpetuate this world organization in a league of nations: this the most important of all, for it had reference to the avalanche of new problems which were just ahead.

If the Conference were broken up, or even if Italy remained out, and Japan went out, these things would be impossible. On the other hand, if the Allies could be kept firmly together, peace established, and a league of nations brought into being, there was a chance of going forward with world reconstruction on the broadest lines, and of the full realization of the principles of justice laid down in the Armistice terms and accepted by all nations. The Treaty, after all, is no final settlement; it is only one step in the great process of world reconstruction.

It was with all these considerations in view that the Shantung settlement was made by the Council of Three sitting in the President's house in the Place des États-Unis—with the Japanese in full agreement.

This settlement was in two parts, the first set forth in the Treaty itself, and the second a special agreement of the three Great Powers with Japan. I find that this fact is not clear to many people, who look for the entire settlement in the Treaty itself.

Under sections 156, 157, and 158 of the Treaty all the rights at Kiauchow and in Shantung Province formerly belonging to Germany are transferred without reservation to Japan. This conforms broadly with the various treaties, and gives a proud nation what it considered its full rights.

On the other hand, the Japanese delegates at the Conference, on behalf of their government, made a voluntary agreement "to hand back the Shantung peninsula in full sovereignty to China, retaining only the economic privileges granted to Germany and the right to establish a settlement under the usual conditions at Tsingtao."

Under this agreement, by which Japan makes an unqualified recession of the sovereign rights in Shantung to China, she also agrees to remove all Japanese troops remaining on the peninsula "at the earliest possible time."