It is inconceivable that the people of the United States should play no
part in that great enterprise. To take part in such a service will be
the opportunity for which they have sought to prepare themselves by the
very principles and purposes of their polity and the approved practices
of their Government ever since the days when they set up a new nation in
the high and honorable hope that it might in all that it was and did
show mankind the way to liberty. They cannot in honor withhold the
service to which they are now about to be challenged. They do not wish
to withhold it. But they owe it to themselves and to the other nations
of the world to state the conditions under which they will feel free to
render it.
That service is nothing less than this, to add their authority and their
power to the authority and force of other nations to guarantee peace and
justice throughout the world. Such a settlement cannot now be long
postponed. It is right that before it comes this Government should
frankly formulate the conditions upon which it would feel justified in
asking our people to approve its formal and solemn adherence to a League
for Peace.
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