Paris Peace Conference

“ We, the Heads of State or Government of the States participating in the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, have assembled in Paris at a time of profound change and historic expectations. The era of confrontation and division of Europe has ended. We declare that henceforth our relations will be founded on respect and co-operation.
Europe is liberating itself from the legacy of the past. The courage of men and women, the strength of the will of the peoples and the power of the ideas of the Helsinki Final Act have opened a new era of democracy, peace and unity in Europe. ”

“ You were speaking of peace. We need peace and quickly. And after that—what? We were more or less prepared for war, but who thought while we were at war about preparing for peace? Not one of the countries sent delegates with a workable plan. Part of our preparedness should have been a peace program. Nobody thought a year ago to call a conference of specialists. That's why negotiations drag on forever. ”

“ This peace conference doesn't recognize give and take. It is all take. And they refuse to allow themselves and their frontiers to be measured by the same tape-line we propose to use on our enemies. This means simply that we are going to have once more the old-fashioned peace of might making right. I believe in a League of Nations founded on Christian principles. It is the only kind of a league that will give the weak a chance where the strong are concerned. Civilization is on the upgrade. ”

“ A statesman when dealing with urgent, especially revolutionary, emergencies should never take his eyes from the clock. The politicians in Paris hardly ever take account of time or opportunity. The overseas reformers contend that the territorial and political balance of forces has utterly broken down and must be definitely scrapped in favor of a league of nations, and the diplomatists hold that the principle of equilibrium, far from having spent its force, still affords the only groundwork of international stability and requires to be further intensified. ”

“ Events so portentous should have influenced the minds of delegates who were worthy of the name of statesmen, when they met to make the Peace at Paris. Unfortunately, this was not the case. The same frame of mind183 permeated the Conference as that which had existed before and throughout the war. Small States and peoples everywhere were sacrificed to the interests of the greater victorious Powers, whose spokesmen were the representatives and members of a propertied and privileged class. ”

“ On these and other grounds, in drawing up a charter for a society of nations, the political aspect should play but a subsidiary part. In Paris it was the only aspect that counted for anything.
A parliament of peoples, then, is the only organ that can impart viability to a society of nations worthy of the name. By joining the Covenant with the Peace Treaty, and turning the former into an instrument for the execution of the latter, thus subordinating the ideal to the egotistical, Mr. Wilson deprived his plan of its sole justification, and for the time being buried it. ”

“ Five of these states were reckoned at Paris as Allies—Italy, Roumania, Yugo-Slavia, Czecho-Slovakia, and Poland; two of them—Hungary and German Austria—ranked as enemies; while as to the Galician Ukrainians, Paris could never quite make up its mind whether to count them as friends, enemies, or neutrals. The main problem before the Conference, therefore, was, while making peace with the two enemy states mentioned, to effect a definitive division of the Hapsburg inheritance that would be just, practical, and conducive to the peace and security of Europe. ”

“ Created by force, it could be perpetuated only by force; but if symptoms are to be trusted, it is more likely to be broken up by force. As an American press organ remarked in August: "The Council of Five complains that no one now condescends to recognize the League of Nations. Even the small nations are buying war material, quite oblivious of the fact that there are to be no more wars, now that the League is there to prevent them. Sweden is buying large supplies from Germany, and Spain is sending a commission to Paris to negotiate for some of France's war equipment." ”

“ It is our business to show the same loyalty and good faith at the Peace Conference. Let it be clearly understood that the American people absolutely stand behind France, England, Italy, Belgium, and the other Allies at the Peace Conference, just as she has stood with them during the last eighteen months of war. Let every difference of opinion be settled among the Allies themselves and then let them impose their common will on the nations responsible for the hideous disaster which has almost wrecked mankind. ”

“ How are we to save future generations from going down into the arena? We will rearrange the map of Europe: we will secure the independence of small states: we will give the power to the people: there shall be an end of tyrannies. So men speak easily of an international spirit, of a world conference for peace. There is so great a will-power against war, they say, that we will secure the world for the future. Millions of men know the vileness of war ”

“ It is very apparent to one, who without prejudice reviews the state of public sentiment in December, 1918, that the trouble, which later developed as to a League of Nations, did not lie in the necessity of convincing the peoples of the world, their governments, and their delegates to the Paris Conference that it was desirable to organize the world to prevent future wars, but in deciding upon the form and functions of the organization to be created. ”

“ One of the shrewdest delegates in Paris, a man who allowed himself to be breathed upon freely by the old spirit of nationalism, but was capable withal of appreciating the passionate enthusiasm of others for a more altruistic dispensation, addressed me one evening as follows: "Say what you will, the Secret Council is a Council of Two, and the Covenant a charter conferred upon the English-speaking peoples for the government of the world. The design—if it be a design—may be excellent, but it is not relished by the other peoples. ”

“ They all move not whither they will, but whither they are led. For they have no choice. But between the two there is this difference: that whereas the big caravan in the desert has but one leader—a little ass—the Conference in Paris is led by two delegates who are the great Ones of the earth." In effect, the leaders were two, and no one can say which of them had the upper hand. Now it seemed to be the British Premier, now the American President. The former scored the first victory, on the freedom of the seas, before the Conference opened. ”

“ The neutral conference does not propose to discuss all the issues at stake. Nor does it desire to set forth a plan for the construction of a perfect world. But it emphasizes the universal demand that peace, when it comes, shall be real, insuring mankind against the recurrence of a world war. Humanity demands a lasting peace. ”

“ This odd mixture of exaggerated self-confidence, mismeasurement of forces, and pliability to external influences could not but be baleful in one of the leaders of an assembly composed, as was the Paris Conference, of men each with his own particular ax to grind and impressible only to high moral authority or overwhelming military force. ”

“ Representing the great western giant whose genius, power and marvelous accomplishments of a few short months filled all Europe with amazement and far out-distanced anything they had done in the three years before, standing at the head of the only unexhausted nation and which could dictate the policies of the world—for this man to go to the Peace Conference with a plan to forever abolish war, it simply won for himself and our country the admiration and confidence of the statesmen of the world. ”

“ Economic crises, due in great part to the existing system of excessive armaments, were transforming armed peace into a crushing burden, which peoples had more and more difficulty in bearing. He therefore proposed that there should be an international conference for the purpose of focusing the efforts of all states which were “sincerely seeking to make the great idea of universal peace triumph over the elements of trouble and discord.” ”

“ The duties of this organization would be to keep a hawklike eye on the misdemeanors, actual or threatened, of any state or group of states, and to be empowered with authority to call into instant action a great international military force for the frustration or suppression of such aggression. The French have frankly in mind the possibility that an unrepentant and unregenerate Germany is the most likely menace not only to the security of France, but to the peace of the world in general. ”

“ The President was, therefore, entirely right in giving prominence to the idea of an international union against war and in insisting that the Peace Conference should make provision for the establishment of an organization of the world with the prevention of future wars as its central thought and purpose. ”

“ The labor legislation passed in Paris reduced itself, therefore, to counsels of perfection.
That the Conference was incapable of solving a problem of this magnitude is self-evident. But the delegates could and should have referred it to an international parliament, fully representative of all the interests concerned. For the best way of distributing the necessaries and comforts of life, which have been acquired or created by manual toil, is a problem that can neither be ignored nor reasoned away. ”

“ No man who is fit for the position can to-day hold a place involving the direction of his country's international policy without feeling an almost intolerable pressure of responsibility. To him every remote chance of a lightening of his burden comes as a promise of blessed relief. It is a historical fact that none of the obstacles to success which the Peace Conference had to overcome originated in the mind of any sovereign or of any high minister of State. In every case they were raised by underlings without responsibility and anxious to show superior wisdom by finding fault. ”

“ But let us steadily remember that before dealing with schemes such as the League of Nations, which are necessarily more or less visionary, we must join in good faith with our allies in securing practical right and justice at the Peace Conference. We should treat as an enemy to this country every man who at this time seeks directly or indirectly to stir up dissension between us and England or France, or any other of our allies. ”

“ And the sum total of these reforms will be known to contemporary annals as an inchoate League of Nations. The delegates are already modestly disavowing the intention of realizing the ideal in all its parts. That must be left to coming generations; but what with the exhaustion of the peoples, their aversion from warfare, and the material obstacles to the renewal of hostilities in the near future, it is calculated that the peace will not soon be violated. Whether more salient results will be attained or attempted by the Conference nobody can foretell. ”

“ As for a durable peace, involving general disarmament, it should have been outlined in a comprehensive program, which the delegates had not drawn up, and it would have become feasible only if the will to pursue it proceeded from principle, not from circumstances. In no case could it be accomplished without the knowledge and co-operation of the peoples themselves, nor within the time-limits fixed for the work of the Conference. For the abolition of war and the creation of a new ordering, like human progress, is a long process. ”

“ Sincerely desirous that full light should be thrown on the re- sponsibilities incurred in this matter, and basing itself on what pre- cedes, as well as on its Memorandum, "La Vérité sur les accusations contre la Bulgarie," the Bulgarian Delegation ventures to approach the Peace Conference with the request that an international and truly impartial enquiry be opened at which all the interested parties shall be represented, and which shall examine all the reprehensible acts committed by the belligerents in the Balkans during the war of 1915- 1918, as well as and during the subsequent armistice. ”

“ The sprightly people who form the rind of the politico-social world ... are wont to launch winged words and coin witty epigrams when characterizing what they irreverently term the efforts of the Peace Conference to square the circle; they contrast the noble intentions of the delegates with the grim realities of the workaday world, which appear to mock their praiseworthy exertions. They say that there never were so many wars as during the deliberations of these famous men of peace. ”

“ The first duty of the Peace Conference was to restore a state of equilibrium and re-establish conditions of life. Taking Europe as an economic unity, broken by the War, it was necessary first of all and in the interests of all to re-establish conditions of life which would make it possible for the crisis to be overcome with the least possible damage. ”

“ The League of Nations scheme seemed destined to change fundamentally the relations of peoples toward one another, and the change was expected to begin immediately after the Covenant had been voted, signed, and ratified. But it was not relished by any government except that of the United States, and it was in order to enable the delegates to devise such a wording of the Covenant as would not bind them to an obnoxious principle or commit their electorates to any irksome sacrifice, that the peace treaty with Germany and the liquidation of the war were postponed. ”