MR. ROOSEVELT'S TEEMS

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 46, 19 November 1918, Page 5

MR. ROOSEVELT'S TEEMS

FULL REPARATION

The celebrations throughout America of "Lafayette and Mnrno Day" on September 6 wove marked by many significant manifestations of the American determination to do all to achieve a complete and decisive military victory. At New York demonstrations wero made before the Lafayette stntiie. The principal speaker was Mr. Roosevelt, who, after dwelling on the services rendered to America by France, said:-"The peace wo win must guarantee full reparation for the awful cost of life and treasure which the Prussianised Germany of the Hohenzollerns has inflicted on.the entire world, and this reparation mist not take the form of action that will render possible for Germany to repav her colossal wrongdoing. Serbia and Rumania must have restored to them what Bulgaria has taken from them, the' Austrian and Turkish Empires must both be, broken up, and all their subject peoples liberated, and the Turk driven from Europe. We do not intend that Germans or Magyars should be oppressed by. others, but neither do we intend that they shall oppress or domineer over others. . France must receive back Alsace-Lorraine, Belgium must be restored and indemnified, Italian-Austria must be restored to Itnlv,' and Rumanian-Hungary to Rumania. The heroic Czecho-Slovaks mustbe made into'an independent Commonwealth. • The Southern Slavs must bo united in a great Jugo-Slav Comonwealth. Poland, as a genuinely independent Commonwealth, must receive back Austrian and Prussian Poland as well as Russian Poland, and have her coast lino on the Baltic. Lithuania, Livonia, and Finland must be guaranteed tfieir freedom, and no part of the ancient Empire of Russia left under , the German yoke.' Northern Schleswig should go back to the Danes. Grea 1 . Britain and Japan should keep the .colonies they have conquered. Armenia must bo freed; Palestine made into a Jewish State, and the Syrian Christians liberated.

League of Nations. "It is sometimes announced that part of the peace agreement must be. a League of Nations which will prevent all-war for for the future and put a stop.to the netd of this nation preparing its own strength 'for its own defence. Many ot the adherents of this idea grandiloquently assert that they intend to supplant nationalism by internationalism. In deciding upon proposals of this nature it behoves our. people to _ remember that competitive rhetoric is a poor substitute for . the habit Oi •. looking facts resolutely m the face. Patriotism stands in national matters as tho love of family does in private life. Nationalism corresponds to the love that a man bears for the lifo of his childen. ! Internationalism corresponds to the reeling he has for his neighbours generally. To substitute internationalism' for nationalism means to do away with pat riotisni, and is as vioious and as profoundly demoralising as to put promiscuous devotion to all other persons in. the place of steadfast devotion to a mans own family.' Either effort means the atrophy of a robust morality. The man who loves other' countries as much as his own stands level with the man who loves other women as much as he loves his own wife. One is as worthless, a. umilr-i'i' as tho other. The professional pacifist and the professional internationalist are equally undesirable, citizens ■The American pacifist lias in actual fact shown himself to be the tool and ally of (he Gorman militarist. _ ■ Test the proposed future League of i\alions, so far as it concerns the proposals to disarm and to trust to anything except our own strength for our own defence, by what nations are actually doing at the present time. And such a league would have to depend for its success upon the adhesion of the nine nations which are actually or- potentially the most powerful military nations; and these nine nations include Germany, Austria, Turkey, and ttussia. The' first three liavo recently repeatedly violated, and are now actively and continuously violating, not only every • treaty, but every rule of civilised warfare and international good faith. During the last year Russia, under tho dominion of t?.e Bolshevists, has'betrayed her Allies and becomo the tool Of her brutal conqueror, Germany. Any treaty of any kind or sort which we make with them should be made with the full understanding that they will cynically repudiate it whenever they think It to their interests to do so. Therefore, unless our folly is such that it will not depart from us until we are brayed in n mortar, lot us remember that any such,treaty will be worthless unless our own prepared strength renders it unsafe to brenk it. ' The surest way to make wrongdoers keep tho peace in the future is to punish them heavily' now. leti us support any reasonable plnn. whether in the form of a League of Nations or in any other .shape, which bids fair To lessen the probable number of future wars and limit their Bcope;. but let us laugh out of court, any assertion that any such plan will guarantee peace /and safety to those foolish, weak, n> timid creatures who have not the willnOwer to prepare for their own defence. Support anv Such nlan which is hone-t or reasonable, but support it as an addition, to, and never as a substitute for, tho policy of preparing our own strength for our own defence.