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WEDNESDAY, MARCH 5, 1919.
THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS
The recent utterances of United
States senators in opposition to the
proposed league of nations, taken in
connection with yesterday's disgrace
ful exhibition in the United States
senate, where another “little group of
willful men” again caused to be held
up measures of vast consequence to
the welfare of the American people,
and which may be said to have repre
sented the will of the people at this
time, may well cause every thought
ful citizen to reflect on the dangers to
which this country is still exposed.
Despite the fact that a great war has
been carried to a successful close, that
our armies are being demobilized
rapidly, that war industries are wait
ing to be converted into peace indus
tries; that immense problems face our
government and people, these undig
nified senators, whose patriotism has
been impugned heretofore, and w’ith
good reason, deliberately “fiddle while
Rome is burning." And the American
people, helpless, are obliged to sit
back and witness the humiliating
spectacle. What the motives of these
men may have been in thus blocking
the business of the government at this
time it is difficult to say; we may at
tribute it to either just plain pervers
ity or the deplorable desire to play
politics at critical moments. Of one
thing all will be assured—there was
no desire to serve their country be
hind this spectacle.
Back of it all will be seen the effect;
of the great question of the day—the
proposed league of nations. How
much a desire to discredit President
Wilson in the eyes of the country and
the world may have been responsible
for yesterday’s catastrophe remains to
be seen. But that there is such a de
sire no one can doubt.
Thp sinp.rwViPs KilrtY rtf’
Borah, of Vardanian and lessor lights
in the senate reveal the fact that there
is a well-organized effort to defeat the
plan for a league of nations if pos
sible. The utterances of such men
as the first three mentioned can not
he cast lightly aside. They have
brought to light objections to the plan
which can not be gainsaidi. They
have shown that the entry of the
United States into such a pact means
the surrender of a certain degree of
national sovereignty; that the instru
ment would nullify the Monroe doc
trine. and that we as a nation would
he called upon to assist in the adjudi
cation of disputes with nations with
which we are not concerned. These
statements are all true to a certain ex
tent. But it easily can be seen that
not one of these objections interposes
an insurmountable barrier to the pai
ticipation of the United States in a
world league having for its object the
abolition of warfare as a means of
settling international disputes. The
great objection to the position as
sumed by these eminent statesmen is
not that they are opposed to the plan
being worked out at the Paris peace
conference, but their evident deter
mination that they do not want to be
and will not be convinced of its merits.
The studied snub intended by Senator
Borah in his refusal to discuss the
plan with the President, and the theat
rical delivery of a speech prepared in
advance of Senator Lodge’s confer
ence with the President, after having
listened to the chief executive’s opin
ions, is not the spirit which the peo
ple of the country have the right to
expect from the men who conduct its
foreign affairs. These men evidently
have#taken the stand that a position
once taken by them is impregnable to
assault by any battery of logic that
may be brought against it.
What is national sovereignty? and
what is this Monroe doctrine? of
which fetiches are being made by the
opponents of President Wilson? Each
one of the original states of the Union
>
possessed sovereignty after the Revo
lotion; yet each surrendered a portioi
of such sovereignty when the Con
stitution of the United States wai
adopted. The United States has main
tained its sovereignty for 143 years
and yet it has surrendered a portioi
of that sovereignty every time it ha;
signed a treaty with a foreign gov
eminent; for it signed those docu
merits with the intention of observing
their provisions. If it, be called upoi
to surrender still more of that mythi
cal substance for the nation’s good
and for the welfare of humanity, does
that signify that as a nation we an
relegating ourselves to an inferior po
sition in the affairs of the world'
Nay. it is tile hope and belief o
patriotic men and women throughou
tin1 country that it will place tire na
tion on a higher plane than it. has
occupied heretofore.
As to the Monroe doctrine, that tra
dition is a plan of defense of the na
tion. albeit a source of responsibilit)
and a trust of great moment. \V<
take the position that the welfare ol
the other American republics and gov
ernments is so interlocked with oui
own welfare that danger to then
means danger to us. Therefore wt
have announced that the acquisitioi
of territory on this hemisphere by the
nations of the old world will be looked
upon as a casus belli by this nation
While there is somewhat of idealism
in our position, there is more of the
practical, it is a case where domestic
peace and safety go hand in hand
with benelicient intention. But sup
pose we should be obliged to relin
quish this doctrine. It is more than
likely, from what can be gleaned from
a reading of the constitution of the
proposed league and from the remarks
of the great men who are interested
in framing it, that should the league
of nations become a reality there
would be no need for a. Monroe doc
trine by the United States, any more
than there would be a need for main
taining the “balance of power" in
Europe. If the same doctrine that we
have maintained in the new world can
be extended to the whole habitable
globe, is it not a “consummation de
voutly to be wished"? Each signatory
to the league compact will be obliged
to relinquish something; and if the
United States is called upon to re
linquish a doctrine that is made obso
lete by the new order of things, it
seems like a mere trifle, especially as
it can be reasserted again at any time
when the league is found to be im
practicable, if such an eventuality
takes place.
As to the objection that we will be
called upon to meddle in the disputes
of other nations with which we have
no concern, it may be designated as
"provincial”—a relic of the Washing
ton tradition, which we cast to the
winds at the close of the Spanish
American war. The acquisition of
the Philippines and the expansion of
the world commerce of the nation
made us, willy-nilly, a world power.
As such there could be no dispute be
tween nations in which we would not
be vitally interested. For two years
and a half this country assumed that
the European war was none *of our
business, and these blatant senators
who held up the business of the coun
try yesterday were among those who
clung to that theory even after our
ships were sunk and our seamen and
citizens on peaceful missions bent
were foully murdered. It was not our
business and we should keep our ships
at home, they said. Well, they were
not kept at home; and the result was,
as it should be, that we were as much
interested in annihilating an interna
tional outlaw as the rest of the world
was. This war has proved, if it has
proved nothing else, that the United
states is "interested” in the quarrels
of its neighbors. And if it can ac
complish anything in adjusting those
difficulties without drenching the
world once more in blood, it is its
bounden duty to do so.
For some reason certain newspapers
and other periodicals are releasing
upon the public a flood of so-called
argument against the league of na
tions. They are even deliberately
perverting the facts by saying that
the people of other countries do not
want the league, and probably in the
same issues their news columns con
vey the information of the wonderful
acclaim with which President Wilson,
as one of the advocates of the league,
is being received *every where, not only
in this country, but abroad. What
other meaning can these demonstra
tions have than the yearning for
peace, not temporary, but permanent,
on the part of the common people of
the whole world? The only desire
that was uppermost in the minds of
those young men who offered their
lives on the bloody battlefields of
Europe was to inalte an end of war,
The spirit of sacrifice displayed by
American parents in offering up their
sons on the altar of their country
was strengthened by the thought that
future parents would not be called
upon to undergo such agony.
Speaking at Boston a week ago last
Monday, on his return from the peace
conference, his words revolving or
the suggestion of possible failure of
the league of nations plan, President
Wilson said:
"If America at this juncture were to
fail the world all nations will be set
up as hostile camps again; ihe men at
the peace conference will go home
with their heads upon their breasts,
knowing that they have failed.
“Suppose that we sign the treaty of
peace tha^ the confusion of elements
of the modern world will afford we
will have left nothing but a modern
scrap of paper.
“Any man who thinks that America
will take part in giving the world any
such rebuff and disappointment does
not know America.
“I invite him to test the sentiment
o! the nation."
Yes, test the sentiment. Every
where that the common people have
been heard, in all sections of the
globe as well as in America, the cry
goes np for the success of the league
of nations. The plan reported may be
defective; if so, amend it. But to re
vert. to the old savagery after so much
of sacrifice is unthinkable. Woe to
the man or set of men who shall stand
iti the way of its achievement!
-♦
When workmen in an essential in
dustry go out on strike to better
their material condition, and thus dis
commode the public, a:,’d perhaps
bring hardship and unnecessary suf
fering upon the innocent, the coun
try is rightly indignant and calls them
anarchists. But usually these men ;
have the excuse that this is the only
method of peacefully fighting their
battles. But when United States sena
tors, in the precious closing hours of
a session of congress, deliberately ;
block the business of the government
and by taking advantage of the rules
made for the speedy transaction of
public business, refuse to allow the
transaction rtf any business, what
term shall be applied to their con
duct?. Strikes cost thousands of dol
lars. The action of the discredited '■
Illinois and Wisconsin senators may
cost the country hundreds of millions.
Which is the worse anarchist—the ig
norant I. W. W. or the supposedly in
tellectual “statesman”?
-+
VOICE OF THE ALASKA PRESS.
Delegate Wickersham leaves Wash
ington on March S for Juneau in con
nection with the canvass of the 1918
election. He will come direct to Ju
neau. Delegate Wickersham is being
represented by two attorneys at the
official canvass.—Juneau Dispatch.
All indications point to the fact that
tlte coining spring will see an influx
of ex-soldiers to the Northland, as a
great many of the Alaskans' are bring
ing their friends along. Nenana
would appear to be their objective,
and the majority of them expect to get
work on the government rjulroad.—
Nenana News.
The man who said that rumor was a
lying jade put a great truth modestly.
A rumor is more dangerous than a
pure lie. It spreads faster, because
most of those who spread it believe
that it is true—because someone told
[hem so, that “someone” having ex
actly the same right for the belief.
Some rumors are harmless, some
ire merely foolish. Some are deadly
poison; some have as much explosive
power as dynamite. There is only one
good thing to be said of rumors; and
hat is that in ninety-nine cases out of
i hundred they aren’t true. -Ketchi
kan Miner.
The success of the war and the
union and co-operation of the Ameri
can people in connection with it, are
the greatest illustrations the people
of the country ever had of the bene
ficial effects of consistent and har
monious boosting. If the people of
Alaska would work just half as hard
tnd with half of the same earnest
unanimity to boost Alaska, as they
worked to help win the war the
imount of the war debt that was float
ed in this territory would he regained
oy the people in less than a year, and
die foundation would be laid for more
riches and for the payment of a large
slice of the country’s war debt.—Ju
neau Empire.
Congress has the old strangle hold
an Alaska all the time and every once
n a while gives the country a wallop
in the face in the shape of freak
legislation that no one in Alaska
wants but that some senator or rep
esentative from Jimtown on the Pike
fancies is necessary for the w ell-being
if a territory that he has never seen
md never will see if Alyskans see him
iirst.
A little less freak legislation, a
ittle more speed in getting through
neasures that will benefit the country,
i little favorite son treatment instead
if step-child chastisement, and Alaska
will one day be a great empire.—Doug
as News.
-♦
Fresh shipment of Brookfield saus
age arrived on this boat. Blum,
O’Neill Co.
-*
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—' '" — — - I
“Help make the world safe for men who
are trying to make reverence for law the polit
ical religion of the nations.”
Ponder on this utterance and let it he a guide to your
action in the reforms that should resolve from the pres
ent social unrest.
The variety of our industries Insures a wonderful
future for us, but without a bank account you will be
handicapped.
Don’t be afraid to come in and talk your affairs
over, so that you can open an account now with the
BANK OF ALASKA
Capital $170,000.00
ALASKA’S BRANCH BANKING SV STEM
Cordova Skagway Wrangell Anchorage
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WEEKLY TRIPS BETWEEN
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Carrying Passengers and Freight from
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Perfect The Best Guaranteed
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PHONE 66
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■■111 MU. ■■■■.— -I— .. 1^
ARE YOU GOING OUT THIS FALL?
Visit San Francisco and Stop with
Mark C. Thompson
at his new hotel in the heart of the city between
Powell and Mason Streets.
The Dale-Tallac Hotel
140 ELLIS STREET
Special Rates and Headquarters for Alaskans.
i ' i :
Manhattan Hotel
R. W. FERRELL, Prop.
Electric Lighted. Hot Water. Turkish and Tub
Baths.
OPPOSITE CORDOVA GRILL, CORDOVA, ALASKA.
PHONE 99
JUST ARRIVED
DETMER’S new Spring Samples of the
latest patterns in light and heavy!
weights for ladies’ and men’s Suits,
Tailored in Up-to-Date Styles.
TOM HUBBERT
Tailor and Cleaner
•«« ... ..1
largain Stor
JUST RECEIVED
A LINE OF SHIRTS, PANTS, WOOL BLANKETS
QUILTS, ETC. FROM F. A. PATRICK AND CO.
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We also handle the Hirsch-Weis and Co. “Rose City”
brand of Mackinaws, Loggers’ Shirts, Rainset and Au
apelle Clothing.
Black Bear brand of union made Overalls and Jackets.
A complete line of Wool and Cotton Blankets, Quilts of all kinds,
Bed Spreads, Sheets and Pillow Slips, Wool Sox and Insoles.
Parkees, Gloves and Mittens, Shoe Pacs and Rubber Overshoes.
Tents, Bed Sheets, Pack Sacks and Clothes Bags.
Towers' Fish Brand Oil Coats.