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Full Title	The Fatherland v. 3 no. 4
Author	Viereck, George Sylvester, 1884-1962. Ed.
Date Added	11 January 2014
Format	Newspaper
Language	English
Publish Date	1915-09-01
Publisher	New York : International Monthly Inc.
Topic	World War, 1914-1918 > Periodicals. Europe > Politics and government > 1871-1918 > Periodicals.
About	More Details Permanent Link
Disclaimers	Disclaimer of Liability Disclaimer of Endorsement

OCR THE Thou shalt not bear - false witness against thy neighbor! Thou shalt not steal! Thou shalt not kill! Perhaps the New York W arid regards the ten command- ments as scraps of paper. THE “CHANIPION” OF LITTLE NATIONS ENGLAND, that champion of little nations, has notified Greece that she had to occupy the Greek Island of Mytilene for military purposes. VVhat is the dilterence be- tween the German occupation of Belgium and the British occupation of Mytilenc, except that Germany, considerate to the point of folly, gave Belgium the choice of friendly neutrality before encroaching upon her soil. whereas Eng- land, the “champion” of little nations, brutally seized Greek territory whenever it suited her convenience? VVe vainly looked in the pro-Ally press for a single outburst of indig- nation. If Germany should be guilty of a similar misdecd the New York Timer would writhe with virtuous indigna- tion, and T.R.would burst once more into hysterical protests. AN OFFICIAL DENIAL ALTHOUGH much indignation is expressed in the German press on account of the lynching of Frank, we are in the position to deny officially that Germany is contemplating a note of protest in this connection to the United States on the high ground of humanity. MR. LANSING MISSED ONE POINT R. LANSING’S exhaustive reply to Austria-Hun- gary’s note on the export of munitions of war to the Allies has delighted the large Tory element of our popu- lation as nothing else. That the aid of the British Ambas- sador, Sir Cecil Spring-Rice, was requisitioned in preparing the reply is obvious from the table of figures purporting to show what quantity of arms Germany and Austria-P‘lung:1ry each supplied to England during the Boer war. This W115 Mr. Lansing’s trump card-to justify Mr. VVilson’s unholy traffic in murder tools to England and her motley Allies. The administration may iiilm’-T itself “P0” h“"i“g ‘"5’ Posed of the problem to the entire satisfaction of the Amer- ican people, but mere figures are a poor substitute for the great moral and political question underl)’i"z's’ the 155.11?‘ If the high moral pretenses by which the VVilson admiiiistra- ‘ion claims to be actuated mean anything. Wh)’ does ‘t Seek its precedents in acts universally condemned b)’ the American people and the entire world? we have been told again and again that Geffnanyy fwd incidentally Austria-Hungary, are militarist nations, with- Out scruple, lackingin moral fortitude and ind1ii61‘CIit to "the instincts of “humanit)”’"‘Hl1i1S, We believe’ is the 1-av’ Wile expression. , Mr. lVilson never misses an oPP0”““i‘)’ of ‘vaxmg eloquent over American “humanity” and the higher. laws Oi civilization. He has fairly raised our national virtues int‘) 21 fetish, in the face of the threatening .l9“’l5l‘ Pogmms In the South, the barbarous lynching of L90 M‘ Frank’ and ‘he burning of a negro at Temple, Texas: in th9.‘P"35‘“‘.Ce of Cheering school children who chased the angulshed we‘ tim repeatedly back into the flames--all within two weeks. FATHERLAND 69 Is it not reasonable to infer, in View of Mr. VVilson’s ardent protestations of virtue, that Mr. Lansing would have stretched out a restraining hand to save these sacred heir- looms of humanity and higher civilization from the deliling contact of commercial greed, legal sophistries, and bar- barous precedents? “7hat a nation of Huns may do in its benighted disre- gard of the laws of civilization can never be justified in practice by a people claiming to uphold the torch of en- lightenment, and continually boasting of its virtues as qualities superior to those of other peoples. . Mr. Lansing has not read the hearts of the American people aright, nor benevolently construed the laws of civil- ization, if he justifies our participation in the wholesale murder of one set of belligerents by the unrestricted traflic in arms and acids as a policy justitied by the laws of humanity. Admitting that it is true that according to Article VII of the Hague Convention No. V, “a neutral powergis not called upon to prevent the export, or transport, on behalf of one or other of the belligerents, of arms and munitions of war,” Mr. Lansing quite ignored Article IX of the Hague Convention, which says: - “Every measure of restriction or prohibition taken by a neutral power in regard to the matter referred to in Articles VII and VIII, must be impartially applied by it to both belligerents.” If he was looking for law, here was law to justify an act of humanity without a complete surrender to the alleged precedents of two militaristic nations. But there is another side to this question that Mr. Lan- sing conveniently ignores in his searching argument. It is supplied by the printed testimony of an American states- man and scholar, Mr. Andrew D. lVhite, American Ain- bassador to Germany during our war with Spain. Then, as now, one belligerent appealed to a friendly power to stop the export of munitions of war from its teeming war factories. That appeal came from the United States and was addressed to Germany! Did Germany justify its traffic in murder tools when the United States appealed to her to observe a benevolent neu- trality? Let Mr. Andrew D. VVhite answer the question, as he answers it in his autobiography: He states that at one time the American Consul at Hamburg telegraphed that a Spanish vessel laden with arms for use againstgtlie United States in Cuba,was leaving port. Continuing,he says: “I hastened to the Foreign Oflice and urged vigorous steps, with the result that the vessel was overhauled and searched at the mouth of the Elbe. Germany might easily have pleaded that America had shown itself opposed to any interference with shipments of small arms to belligerents. She might also have contended that she was not ob- liged to search vessels to find contraband, but that this duty was incumbent ‘upon the belligerent nation concerned.” This is a point in the controversy which Mr. Lansing has somehow overlooked. VVe should like to see the present ad- ministration show one--just one-iota of courtesy to Ger- many on plane with Germany’s friendship to us when we, infinitely more formidable than our adversary, were at war with Spain. FREDERIC FRANKLIN SCHRADER.

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