ours if in our eyes the light of high resolve is dimmed, if we trail in the dust the golden hopes of men. If on this new continent we merely build another country of great and unjustly divided material prosperity, we shall have done nothing; and we shall do as little if we merely set the greed of envy against the greed of arrogance, and thereby destroy the material well-being of all of us. To turn this Government either into government by a plutocracy or government by a mob would be to repeat on a larger scale the lamentable failures of the world that is dead.

We stand against all tyranny, by the few or by the many. We stand for the rule of the many in the interest of all of us, for the rule of the many in a spirit of courage, of common sense, of high purpose, above all in a spirit of kindly justice towards every man and every woman. We not merely admit, but insist, that there must be self-control on the part of the people, that they must keenly perceive their own duties as well as the rights of others; but we also insist that the people can do nothing unless they not merely have, but exercise to the full, their own rights. The worth of our great experiment depends upon its being in good faith an experiment - the first that has ever been tried- in true democracy on the scale of a continent, on a scale as vast as that of the mightiest empires of the Old World. Surely this is a noble ideal, an ideal for which at need it is worth while to sacrifice much; for our ideal is the rule of all the people in a spirit of friendliest brotherhood towards each and every one of the people.

RIGHTS OF NEUTRALS ON THE HIGH SEAS

WOODROW WILSON

[From a letter to Senator William J. Stone, chairman of the committee on foreign relations in the Senate of the United States. It is dated February 24, 1916. It was written while an interchange of notes was going on between the United States and Germany in regard to undersea warfare. One of Germany's suggestions was, that neu

war.

trals should refrain from traveling in the ships of nations that were at There was a strong sentiment in Congress in favor of accepting such a compromise rather than run the risk of a violent break with Germany. President Wilson's letter to Senator Stone, however, held firmly to our rights as neutrals. Congress accepted the President's point of view.]

No nation, no group of nations, has the right while war is in progress to alter or disregard the principles which all nations have agreed upon in mitigation of the horrors and sufferings of war; and if the clear rights of American citizens should ever unhappily be abridged or denied by any such action we should, it seems to me, have in honor no choice as to what our own course should be.

For my own part, I cannot consent to any abridgment of the rights of American citizens in any respect. The honor and self-respect of the nation is involved. We covet peace and shall preserve it at any cost but the loss of honor. Το forbid our people to exercise their rights for fear we might be called upon to vindicate them would be a deep humiliation indeed. It would be an implicit, all but an explicit, acquiescence in the violation of the rights of mankind everywhere, and of whatever nation or allegiance. It would be a deliberate abdication of our hitherto proud position as spokesman, even amidst the turmoil of war, for the law and the right. It would make everything this Government has attempted, and everything that it has achieved during this terrible struggle of nations, meaningless and futile.

It is important to reflect that if in this instance we allowed expediency to take the place of principle, the door would inevitably be opened to still further concessions. Once accept a single abatement of right, and many other humiliations would certainly follow, and the whole fine fabric of international law might crumble under our hands piece by piece. What we are contending for in this matter is of the very essence of the things that have made America a sovereign nation. She

cannot yield them without conceiving her own impotency as a nation, and making virtual surrender of her independent position among the nations of the world.

NEUTRALITY AND AMERICAN RIGHTS

GEORGE SUTHERLAND

[From an address in the Senate of the United States, March 7, 1916. The loss of American lives when the Lusitania and other vessels were sunk by submarines gave rise to much diplomatic correspondence and to much discussion in Congress and elsewhere. Mr. Sutherland advocated the rights of neutrals.]

THE question next arises — and, indeed, it is really the crucial question - shall our citizens be officially advised to forbear from traveling upon belligerent merchant vessels armed for defense only? Or, indeed, shall we go further, as some people insist, and forbid their doing so under penalty for disobedience? If I am correct in what I have already said, namely, that these merchant ships have the right to carry defensive armament, it follows that such a ship has the same status as though unarmed and that the right of a neutral citizen to transport his goods or travel upon either is the same, and not a different right. . .

If, therefore, a citizen take passage upon a ship so armed and lose his life by the sinking of the ship without warning, what must be the contention and claim of this government? To my mind, clearly this: That the citizen in the exercise of a clear right has been deprived of his life by the deliberately illegal act of the belligerent government which sent the submarine on its mission of death. Others are welcome to their own opinions, but I can conceive of no other position for this government to assume; and unless it is willing to forfeit the respect of mankind by becoming a craven thing, it must be prepared to sustain that position at whatever cost or consequence.

However desirable it may be that our citizens for their own

sakes should refrain from traveling upon defensively armed ships, it is quite another matter for the government to advise or order them to do so. So long as he violates no law, an American citizen may pursue his business in his own way, even though it may be a dangerous business or a dangerous way. It is not to be presumed that he will recklessly or needlessly put his life in danger—indeed, all presumptions are to the contrary—and no resolution of Congress can possibly advise him of any danger of sea travel which he does not already fully understand.

But what of the American citizens scattered about the world, engaged in lawful pursuits, who are from time to time obliged to travel upon the sea from and to ports between which neutral ships do not ply? What is the citizen so placed to do? Is he to indefinitely maroon himself, however imperatively his presence may be required elsewhere? If not, and he be entitled to the protection of his Government in the exercise, and perhaps in the vitally necessary exercise, of his lawful right of travel upon a belligerent merchant vessel armed for defense, upon what theory consistent with national courage and selfrespect can Congress or the Executive interfere with or forbid the use of his own discretion in the matter?

I am one of those who desire peace. I detest the bully and the brawler among nations as I do among individuals. I would sacrifice much to avoid war-pride of opinion, money, property, comfort, — I would fight over no wrongs which money could compensate, but a nation, when all other means fail, that will not resent a flagrant and illegal attack upon the lives of its own citizens is only less detestable than a man who will not fight for his wife and children.

I repeat, sir, that I do not want war at any time, and I pray God that it may not come now; but I would rather have war, with all its sacrifices and sufferings, than that this nation, with its long history of heroism and glory, should play the poltroon when confronted by a supreme national duty because it places a greater value upon its ease than upon its honor.

Nothing in the long run can be more certain to bring trouble upon us than a policy of timidity and vacillation. Such a policy is not in keeping with American traditions or spirit. It is the duty of a self-respecting nation to stand, and to stand firmly, for the rights of every citizen against foreign aggression from any source, however powerful.

SOBER SECOND THOUGHT OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE

GEORGE SUTHERLAND

[From a speech in the Senate of the United States, July 11, 1911. Thoughtful men are ever seeking remedies for the harmful practices that creep into political life from time to time. It is a sign of political health. Some have advocated, among other expedients, the extension of the primary system, and the adoption of the "recall," a plan by which an unfit or unsatisfactory public official may, by a popular vote, be deprived of office. The more radical have advocated the recall of judges, even the justices of the Supreme Court of the United States. Mr. Sutherland's speech was in opposition to hasty and ill-considered changes.]

I AM not one of those who have become impatient at the restraints and checks and safeguards of the representative form of government and the written Constitution. I am not one of those who would launch the ship of state, with every sail set, upon the wide sea of tossing waters with all its unsounded depths and unknown shallows, with here a whirlpool and there a half-submerged rock without a chart or a compass or a rudder or an anchor, trusting alone to the merciful chance of wind and wave and the tumultuous efforts of an uncaptained crew to preserve it from disaster. I disagree utterly with the distinguished Senator from Oklahoma [Mr. Owen], who told us a few days ago in that calm, judicial way of his, that the Constitution of the United States for which some of us had conceived a rather high opinion — was all wrong; that it was not sufficiently democratic; that it was so