Maryland suffrage news., October 16, 1920, Page 227, Image 3

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VI.—THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS
LAST week this column was devoted to the two powers Congress
shares with the President, the making of appointments and of
treaties. As the object of this series is to help the new voter prepare for
the coming election, only those branches of government affected by it
will be discussed before November 2, namely, the Presidency and Con
gress, besides the chief issues upon which she will have to make up her
mind. Today, the greatest of these will be taken up—the League of
Nations.
Said Ex-President Taft on August 2, “I believe that the issue of the
League transcends in its importance any domestic issues, and would
justify and require one who believes so to ignore party lines and secure
this great boon for the world and this country.”
The text of the Covenant was published in last week’s Maryland
Suffrage News, and in an editorial the question was asked, Is this the
best of all possible plans?
The answer to that question is no, ideally speaking. Almost anyone
could frame up a more theoretically perfect document, but when it came
to getting the nations of the world to accept it, they would face the same
difficulties that faced the commission of the most enlightened of the
world’s statesmen who wrote the Covenant at Paris, that of finding
formulas that all would agree upon. So in the sense that it is the most
that could be done under the present state of public opinion, that it is
acceptible to 41 of the nations of the world and that it is the only concrete
plan for world alliance before us, it is the best that can be hoped for now.
Neither Partisan Nor American
The Covenant is neither a Democratic nor an American product.
By reading the first draft submitted the Senate, and comparing it with
the little book on the League written by General Smuts, which can be
gotten for a quarter at Norman Remington’s, anyone can tell whose
plan was followed. The second draft, now incorporated in the Treaty
of Versailles, contains amendments suggested by such leading Republicans
as Ex-President Taft, Elihu Root and Charles E. Hughes and agreed to
by the representatives of Allies at the urgence of President Wilson, who
was assured that they would make the Covenant acceptable to the Senate.
This was known to all who were in touch with the Peace Conference at
the time, and the cables that passed between the President and these
Republicans were published in the Sun of October 11.
It is a composite document, made by the most intelligent and respected
group of men at the Peace Conference, who have accomplished what
was never possible before in the history of the world, the framing of
an alliance among 40 nations. The gravest responsibility the new voter
has is to determine whether her ballot shall further or hinder this already
accomplished fact of world federation. Forty-one nations belong to it;
only Germany, Austria, Turkey, Russia, Mexico and the United States
are outside it.
The League Plan
The organization is a simple one. It consists of a permanent central
office, the Secretariat, made up of the Secretary-General, now Sir Eric
Drummond, and a staff of officials necessary to carry on the work of the
League. At the same place will be the headquarters of the Labor Bureau
established by the Covenant, which also fixed the first meeting of the
International Labor Conference that was held in Washington a year ago,
and the headquarters of the International Red Cross, another great inter
national body provided by it.
It is with the Secretariat that all future treaties must be registered
if they are to be considered binding.
The Assembly is the lower house of the League organization. In
it each State member of the League may have not more than three repre
sentatives and cast only one vote. This body may discuss any subject
and recommend action upon it, but the real governing body is the Council.
The Council is made up of the representatives of Great Britain,
France, Italy, Japan, Belgium, Spain and Greece at present. The latter
four nations will have their places taken later by others of the smaller
MARYLAND SUFFRAGE NEWS
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By Eva O. Wilson.
Mention the Maryland Suffrage News When Patronizing Our Advertisers.
powers, and among the great powers who were always to have seats in
the Council was the United States, but because of the failure of this
country to ratify, our place is vacant.
Each member has one vote, and on all important questions, including
those affecting the sovereign rights of the members of the League,
unanimity is required, which protects a State from having any advice of
the Council forced upon it against its will, and domestic questions are
excluded from the jurisdiction of the League.
To Remove Causes of War
The objects of the League are three:
To bring about peace by removing historic causes of war.
To promote international co-operation.
To carry out the provisions of the Versailles Treaty.
The historic cause of war from the beginning of the world has been
the land-grabbing instincts of nations that have prompted them to attack
their neighbors and to pile up armaments to be ready to do this. The
framers of the Covenant felt that the ax was laid at the root of war in
Article 10, which, instead of being a responsibility assumed by the
United States alone to safeguard the present boundaries of the world, as
many of our friends say who see this country in exaggerated propor
tions in regard to world affairs, it is a self-denying pledge made by the
41 nations making up the League, promising that they will not attack
the territory, nor interfere with the political institutions of their neighbors.
The United States required this freedom from interference by Europe
in the affairs of the South American republics when they were just
getting started, in the famous pronouncement of President Monroe, and
Article 10 has extended this principle of non-interference in other
nations’ political independence and territory to all the world. It thus
destroyed at one blow the motive for armaments, for the reductions of
which it further specifically provides.
Article 10 does not stamp the territorial settlements made in the
Versailles Treaty as sacred and inalterable, as is charged, but provides for
their revision together with that of any obsolete treaties which have
always been a cause of war. It allows the present territorial status quo
to be changed by any means—such as internal revolution—except external
aggression.
Weaker nations that have hitherto fallen prey to their stronger neigh
bors have been further protected by the so-called mandatory system
established by the Covenant. Under it former German colonies and parts
of the former Central empires and Turkey will be administered under
the League by the more advanced nations. This, if given the expected
backing by the public opinion of the world, will prevent the economic
exploitation of undeveloped countries and their final outright annexation
by the stronger nations, which has been the history of colonial expansion
for hundreds of years.
It is futile for Americans to say that a mandate is disguised annexa
tion and at the same time for this country to withhold support from the
League that would make its mandates respected.
Carrying Out the Treaty
The League is the instrument in liquidating the World War. No
final and immediate settlement of the great problem it raised could be
made by any body of men. Those entrusted with that stupendous task
realized this fact, and by setting up the League provided a means of revi
sion for their decisions. Without it many nations who believed them
selves wronged in the settlements, instead of going to war about it, are
appealing to public opinion and know that in due time their case will be
heard and readjusted
The covenant was thus made an integral part of the treaty, and this
was the idea not only of our Peace Commissioners, but of many leading
Republicans before it was done. Dr. Nicholas Murray Butler, for
instance, the day the President sailed for Europe gave out an interview
in which he said: “If you try to construct a league of nations of vague
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