OCR Text |
Show KEEN POINTS BY WILSON THE war was started by Germany. Her authorities deny that they started it. But I am willing to let the statement I have just made await the verdict of history. They (the Germans) were not content con-tent with success by superior achievement; achieve-ment; they wanted success by authority- I believe that the spirit of -freedom can get into the hearts of Germans and find as fine a welcome there as it can find in other hearts. But the spirit of freedom does not suit the plans of the pan-Germans. Germany is determined that the political po-litical power of the world shall belong to her. Any body of free mien that compounds com-pounds with the present German government gov-ernment is compounding for its own destruction. de-struction. -1 sent Col. House to take part in a conference as to how the war is to be won, and he knows, as I know, that is the way to get peace, if you want it for more than a few minutes. Lt us show ourselves Americans by showing that we do not want to go off in separate camps or groups by ourselves, our-selves, but that we want, to cooperate with all other classes and all other groups, in a common enterprise which is to release the spirit of the world from bondage. "I am introduced to you as the President Presi-dent of the United States, and yet I would be pleased if you would put the thought of the office into the background back-ground and regard me as one of your fellow-citizens, who has come here to speak, not the words of authority, but the words of counsel, the words which men should speak to one another, who wish to be frank in a moment more critical, crit-ical, perhaps, than the history of the world has ever yet known, a moment when it is every man's duty to forget himself, to forget his own interests, to fill himself with the nobility of a great national and world conception, and act - upon a new platform elevated above the ordinary affairs of life, elevated to where men have views of the long destiny des-tiny of mankind." President Wilson's address to American Federation of Labor La-bor at Buffalo, Nov. 12. ... |