Metz was annexed to
France in 1552, with the full consent of the then allies of the French
King, Henri II., the German Princes, who recognized by the Treaty of
Cateau-Cambresis, (1559,) that Metz, Toul, and Verdun were French
cities, and could not be considered as a part of the German
Confederation. So there were at one time German Princes who accepted
the dogma of the consent of the governed!
Attacking the record of England in order to defend the record of
Germany, as Dr. Dernburg does, is no justification for the necessary
German aggression of today. Even granting that the English record is
poor, which is a matter open to discussion, two wrongs would not make
things right.
Dr. Dernburg also compares the policy of aggrandizement of Germany in
Schleswig, Alsace, &c., with that of other countries in Morocco,
Tripoli, &c. Even school children know that two things which are
entirely unlike must not be compared. Northern Africa had too long been
a den of pirates and brigands, and Latin Europe has rendered an immense
service to the world in establishing order there. Algeria has been
conquered in the same way as Morocco is now being conquered, and her
natives enjoy more genuine liberty than they ever did before; they are
even willing to fight as volunteers for the country they consider now as
their own.
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