Salt Lake Tribune | 1914-10-03 | Page 6 | Ally for Peace

ally for peace. The fatal flaw in all tho alliances formed by European countries since the Franco-Prussian war has been that they were formed with the immediate or remote object of waging "war. At the same time those who drafted the treaties professed that they were working work-ing for tho peace of Europe. They declared de-clared that great armies assured peace and that treaties operated to the same result by preserving the balance of power. How fallacious wero these arguments ar-guments has been demonstrated by events. The existence of vast armaments arma-ments and entangling alliances made war inevitable, despite the fact that every ruler in Europe and virtually all the people desired peace. Out of the present war will come a universal demand for better guarantees of peace than armies and treaties looking look-ing forward to war. The people will demand that they alone shall have the right to declare war, but they will further fur-ther insist that whatever treaties are made shall be peace treaties and not war treaties. Undoubtedly there will be proposals for a peace federation : among all the nations now engaged in war. Just what form the agreements I will take can be conjectured but vaguely vague-ly at this time, but undoubtedly arbitration arbi-tration treaties of a most binding char- acter will come into great4 favor and .will be adopted almost universally. This political arrangement will be suple-;mentcd suple-;mentcd by an equally essential arrangement arrange-ment which will provide for partial disarmament dis-armament and perhaps for an international interna-tional police force. 1 Since the invasion of Belgium it has been argued that treaties have in reality real-ity become mere ' scraps of paper," because they are only as strong as the armaments prepared to defend them. This, however, .is an extreme view. After all, the violation of Belgium's1 neutrality is a notable exception iu the modern world and grew out of a military mili-tary madness that inverted the standards stand-ards of morality and honor. If it had been a contract between individuals it . would have been respected, but mili-, mili-, tarism has assumed to place itself above the moral law and to substitute for the j Ten Commandments the theory that a nation may break any canon, human or divine, in order to accomplish its destiny des-tiny in other words, that might makes right. This is but a temporary phase of political evolution and will disappear with militarism.