Unity of purpose and counsel are as imperatively necessary in this war as was unity of command in the battlefield: and with perfect unity of purpose and counsel will come assurance of complete victory. It can be had in no 5 other way. "Peace drives" can be effectively neutralized and silenced only by showing that every victory of the nations associated against Germany brings the nations nearer the sort of peace which will bring security and reassurance to all peoples and make the recurrence of 10 another such struggle of pitiless force and bloodshed forever impossible, and that nothing else can. Germany is constantly intimating the "terms" she will accept; and always finds that the world does not want terms. It wishes the final triumph of justice and fair dealing.

WOODROW WILSON

36. THE NECESSITY FOR A LEAGUE OF

NATIONS

SPEECH BEFORE THE PEACE CONFERENCE AT PARIS,
JANUARY 25, 1919

I CONSIDER it a distinguished privilege to be permitted to open the discussion in this conference on the League of Nations. We have assembled for two purposes, to make the present settlements which have been rendered necessary by this war and also to secure the peace of 5 the world, not only by the present settlements but by the arrangements we shall make at this conference for its maintenance.

The League of Nations seems to me to be necessary for both of these purposes. There are many complicated 10 questions connected with the present settlements, which perhaps cannot be successfully worked out to an ultimate issue by the decisions we shall arrive at here. I can easily conceive that many of these settlements will need subsequent consideration; that many of the decisions we 15 make shall need subsequent alteration in some degree, for if I may judge by my own study of some of these questions they are not susceptible for confident judgments at present.

It is therefore necessary that we should set up some machinery by which the work of this conference should be 20 rendered complete.

We have assembled here for the purpose of doing very much more than making the present settlements that are necessary. We are assembled under very peculiar conditions of world opinion. I may say, without strain5 ing the point, that we are not the representatives of Governments, but representatives of the peoples.

IO

It will not suffice to satisfy governmental circles anywhere. It is necessary that we should satisfy the opinion of mankind.

The burdens of this war have fallen in an unusual degree upon the whole population of the countries involved. I do not need to draw for you the picture of how the burden has been thrown back from the front upon the older men, upon the women, upon the children, upon 15 the homes of the civilized world, and how the real strain of the war has come where the eyes of the Government could not reach, but where the heart of humanity beats.

We are bidden by these people to make a peace which will make them secure. We are bidden by these people 20 to see to it that this strain does not come upon them again. And I venture to say that it has been possible for them to bear this strain because they hoped that those who represented them could get together after this war and make such another sacrifice unnecessary.

25 It is a solemn obligation on our part, therefore, to make permanent arrangements that justice shall be rendered and peace maintained.

This is the central object of our meeting. Settlements may be temporary, but the action of the nations in the 30 interest of peace and justice must be permanent. We can set up permanent processes. We may not be able to set up a permanent decision.

Therefore, it seems to me that we must take as far as we can a picture of the world into our minds. Is it not a startling circumstance, for one thing, that the great discoveries of science, that the quiet studies of men in laboratories, that the thoughtful developments which have taken place 5 in quiet lecture rooms have now been turned to the destruction of civilization? The powers of destruction have not so much multiplied as they have gained facilities.

The enemy, whom we have just overcome, had at his seats of learning some of the principal centres of scientific 10 study and discovery, and he used them in order to make destruction sudden and complete. And only the watchful and continuous coöperation of men can see to it that science, as well as armed men, is kept within the harness of civilization.

15

In a sense the United States is less interested in this subject than the other nations here assembled. With her great territory and her extensive sea borders, it is less likely that the United States should suffer from the attack of enemies than that other nations should suffer. 20 And the ardor of the United States - for it is a very deep and genuine ardor - for the society of nations is not an ardor springing out of fear or apprehension, but an ardor springing out of the ideals which have come in the consciousness of this war.

25

In coming into this war the United States never for a moment thought that she was intervening in the politics of Europe, or the politics of Asia, or the politics of any part of the world. Her thought was that all the world had now become conscious that there was a single cause 30 of justice and of liberty for men of every kind and place.

Therefore, the United States should feel that its part

in this war should be played in vain if there ensued upon it abortive European settlements. It would feel that it could not take part in guaranteeing those European settlements unless that guarantee involved the continuous 5 superintendence of the peace of the world by the associated nations of the world.

Therefore, it seems to me that we must concern our best judgment in order to make this League of Nations a vital thing a thing sometimes called into life to meet 10 an exigency - but always functioning in watchful attendance upon the interests of the nations, and that its continuity should be a vital continuity; that its functions are continuing functions that do not permit an intermission of its watchfulness and of its labor; that it should be 15 the eye of the nations, to keep watch upon the common interest an eye that did not slumber, an eye that was everywhere watchful and attentive.

And if we do not make it vital, what shall we do? We shall disappoint the expectations of the peoples. 20 This is what their thought centres upon.

I have had the very delightful experience of visiting several nations since I came to this side of the water, and every time the voice of the body of the people reached me, through any representative, at the front of the plea 25 stood the hope of the League of Nations.

Gentlemen, the select classes of mankind are no longer the governors of mankind. The fortunes of mankind are now in the hands of the plain people of the whole world. Satisfy them, and you have justified their con30 fidence not only, but have established peace. Fail to satisfy them, and no arrangement that you can make will either set up or steady the peace of the world.