World War, 1914-1918 -- Atrocities; World War, 1914-1918 -- Hospitals; World War, 1914-1918 -- Personal narratives
I have made out the best case I can for our people. These chapters have
listed every excuse that can reasonably be given for our failure to
declare ourselves on the moral issue of this war. They have said that
a careless, busy folk, like those of the Middle West, need many facts
to enable them to see where the truth lies. They have pointed out how
short-sighted is the foreign policy of the Allies which gives few facts
to the American public. They have shown how the best of our radicals
have failed to think clearly because they have been befuddled by a
vague pseudo-internationalism. I have stated what I believe to be the
falsity in our present-day conception of Europe, the self-complacency
in our monopoly of freedom and justice; and I have tried to reveal how
that assumption of merit blinded our eyes to the struggles of other
peoples for the same causes. I have blamed our failure on Germany and
on England. But after every explanation has been made, it is still
true that our people ought to have been sensitive. At a great moment
of history we failed of greatness. There remains a shame to us that we
held aloof. There was no organized campaign of facts needed to convince
France that we were fighting for human rights in our Revolution. Three
thousand miles of water did not drown the appeal of our extremity. But
to-day our leaders are so bewildered by dreams of universal brotherhood
that they overlook our blood-brother on the Marne. Our common people
have their eyes to their work, and do not look up, as the workers of
Lancashire looked up with cheer and sympathy when we rocked in the
balance of 1863.
This war has shown to us that we are not at the level of earlier days.
We have lost our national unity, our sense of direction. The war has
revealed in us an unpreparedness in foreign and domestic policy. It is
a curse to know one's weakness unless one cures it. So this war will
not leave us blessed until we take a program of action. It is a waste
of time to write a book on the war except to convince and move to
action.
The steps are clear.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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