When the Romanoffs were overthrown the Russian people lacked self-control and they permitted the dominion of a Bolshevist gang, which has brought wholesale robbery, murder, and starvation in its trail. The overthrow of the Hohenzollerns in Germany has been accompanied by Bolshevist uprising in that country also. There is some excuse for excesses in a revolution against a despotism, but in this country there is no more excuse for Bolshevism in any form than there is for despotism itself. Any foreign-born man who parades with or backs up a red flag or black flag organization ought to be instantly deported to the country from which he came. Appropriate punishment should be devised for the even more guilty native-born.
Our National Government should take the most vigorous action and have it understood that America is a bulwark of order no less than of liberty. We must make it evident that we will stamp out Bolshevism within our borders just as quickly as Kaiserism.
Moreover, let us realize the nonsense of the pretense that the German people have not been behind the German Government. They were behind their Government with hearty enthusiasm until the Government was smashed by the military powers of General Foch. The effort now being made by the German Government to bring dissensions between the Allies by appealing to the United States against the Allies proper should be spurned by our Government. The French, English, Italians, and Belgians have been fighting side by side with our men under Foch. They have acted as comrades under Foch, and we could not have done anything if we had not acted as comrades like the rest. Now let’s play the game when the effort is made to divide us by the German peace drive.
Senator Poindexter was entirely right in his proposed bill. The United States must make absolutely common cause with the Allies. We regret that the German and Russian people should suffer; the fault lies solely with the past or present governments. To the very minute of the closing of the war the hideous German brutalities continued unabated, and apparently the Turks are still slaughtering Armenians. We will do our best to help even our enemies now that they have been stricken down, but we will not do so at the cost of doing injustice to our friends. We will not permit Hun hypocrisy to succeed where Hun violence has failed. And we are equally uncompromising foes of Bolshevism and Kaiserism at home and abroad.
THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS
November 17, 1918
There are so many prior things to do and so much uncertainty as to the form of agreement for permanently increasing the chances of peace that it is difficult to do more than make a general statement as to what is desirable and possibly feasible in the league of nations plan. It would certainly be folly to discuss it overmuch until some of the existing obstacles to peace are overcome. That such discussion may be not futile, but mischievous, has been vividly shown in the last six weeks. During the first week of October President Wilson and Germany agreed on the famous fourteen points of Mr. Wilson’s as a basis for peace. But this agreement amounted to nothing whatever except for a moment it gave Germany the hope that she could escape disaster by a negotiated peace. The emphatic protest of our own people caused this hope to vanish, and just five weeks later peace came, not on Mr. Wilson’s fourteen points, but on General Foch’s twenty-odd points, which had all the directness, the straightforwardness, and the unequivocal clearness which the fourteen points strikingly lacked.
Nevertheless, it is well to begin considering now the things which we think can be done and the things that we think cannot be done in making a league of nations. In the first place, we ought to realize that the population of the world clearly understands that in this war they have been involved to a degree never hitherto known. In consequence the horror of the war is very real, and people are at least thinking of the need of coöperation with much greater fixity of purpose and of understanding than ever before. Of course, fundamentally war and peace are matters of the heart rather than of organization, and any declaration or peace league which represents the high-flown sentimentality of pacifists and doctrinaires will be worse than useless; but if, without in the smallest degree sacrificing our belief in a sound and intense national aim, we all join with the people of England, France, and Italy and with the people in smaller states who in practice show themselves able to steer equally clear of Bolshevism and of Kaiserism, we may be able to make a real and much-needed advance in the international organization. The United States cannot again completely withdraw into its shell. We need not mix in all European quarrels nor assume all spheres of interest everywhere to be ours, but we ought to join with the other civilized nations of the world in some scheme that in a time of great stress would offer a likelihood of obtaining just settlements that will avert war.
Therefore, in my judgment, the United States at the peace conference ought to be able to coöperate effectively with the British and French and Italian Governments to support a practical and effective plan which won’t attempt the impossible, but which will represent a real step forward.
Probably the first essential would be to limit the league at the outset to the Allies, to the peoples with whom we have been operating and with whom we are certain we can coöperate in the future. Neither Turkey nor Austria need now be considered as regards such a league, and we should clearly understand that Bolshevist Russia is, and that Bolshevist Germany would be, as undesirable in such a league as the Germany and Russia of the Hohenzollerns and Romanoffs. Bolshevism is just as much an international menace as Kaiserism. Until Germany and Russia have proved by a course of conduct extending over years that they are capable of entering such a league in good faith, so that we can count upon their fulfilling their duties in it, it would be merely foolish to take them in.