The cause was at once borne up on a mighty wave of public opinion. The peace societies were in a frenzy of activity. Mass meetings of indorsement were held in England and America. Editorials of approval appeared in all parts of the world. The movement was now irresistible. Within eight months the British and the French treaties were drafted. Three of the greatest nations of the world were at last to commit themselves unreservedly to the cause of international peace. Even disputes involving national honor should not halt the beneficent work of high courts of law and of reason. The day when the treaties were signed, August 3, 1911, was hailed as a red-letter day in the annals of the civilized world. It was proclaimed the dawn of a new and auspicious era in the affairs of men and of nations. During all the months preceding the action of the Senate on these treaties the only statesman of any prominence to raise his voice in opposition was ex-President Theodore Roosevelt. The gist of his successive and violent attacks on the treaties is contained in this utterance, which I quote, "It would be not merely foolish but wicked for us as a nation to agree to arbitrate any dispute that affects our vital interests or our independence or our honor." In this spirit, to the surprise and disappointment of the whole nation, the Senate amended the treaties out of their original intent, and placed upon them limitations that defeated their purpose. By the Senate's action the United States is still committed to the pretense that there may be occasion for a just and solemn war, that vital interests and national honor may force us to fight. What, then, are the vital interests that can be conserved only by saber and bullet? Nothing more, nothing less, according to various acknowledged authorities, than a state's independence and its territorial integrity. Did the keen mind of our former president really foresee the seizure of some of our territory by England or France? Yet he protests it that it would be "not merely foolish but wicked for us as a nation to agree to arbitrate any dispute that affects our vital interests." Did Senator Lodge and his threescore colleagues who amended the treaties actually fear an attempt to overthrow our form of government, to destroy our political institutions, or to take away those individual rights and sacred privileges upon which our government was founded? Yet to save us from such fate they refused unlimited arbitration.