100 Years Ago February 1919 – Sorting It all Out After The War
Selected from the pages of the Evening Press and lightly annotated by Sally Haase
Pershing Defends His Soldiers. Washington, Feb. 1, 1919: Reports that American soldiers are responsible for a crime wave in Paris are flatly denied by General Pershing in a cable to Secretary Baker. “Paris is offering attractions to men mischievously and criminally inclined. Naturally there are minor disturbances in Paris, but the American military police organization is excellent and these disturbances have been kept to a minimum.
Abolish Submarines? Washington, Feb. 1, 1919: Naval experts believe that a great fleet of under-water craft could successfully defend American shores from any attack. However, brief dispatches from Paris have indicated that England will demand at the peace conference a lasting ban on submarines. A British view by Sir Leo Chiozza explains: The British empire nearly perished by submarine – but not quite. But what of the future? The League of Nations will do its work ill if it does not order the destruction of all submarines and rule that no more be built for any purpose. The submarine, let us remember, is still in its technical infancy. Every year would see the conception and development of improvements in submarine attack and submarine defense. That we, on the British Isle, can attain to self-containment is an idle dream. Our growing population demands an ever increasing flow of imports. A self-contained Britain is a practical impossibility.
Monroe Doctrine In Danger. Washington, Feb. 7, 1919: “Save the Monroe Doctrine” is the slogan in senate circles that is the basis to the proposal that the United States should not be called to act as a sponsor to Armenia and Constantinople or at their financial regeneration. The feeling is that if the United States undertakes such mandatory powers, as suggested, it will be hard to maintain its century old stand upon the Monroe doctrine, and the rest of the world would be in position to imply that this country should stay out of Europe if it expects Europe to stay out of the American hemisphere.
Suffrage Amendment Voted Down Again. Washington, Feb. 10, 1919: The senate for the second time declined to submit the proposed suffrage amendment to the federal constitution to the states for ratification. The amendment was lost today by one vote. The vote was just one year and a month after the resolution passed the house. Three times the senate has voted it down – in 1887, 1914, and 1918.
Fly The Atlantic in 42 Hours. London, Feb. 14, 1919: When peace has been established, a regular trans-Atlantic passenger-carrying traffic between American and England by dirigible is a possibility. Comfortably accommodating 100 passengers, the speed attainable with 2,400 house power would be about 75 mph. At the end of the flight having consumed gasoline along the way, the air bus would be capable of reaching a height of 9,000 feet. The rigid dirigible is immune from danger to engine failure because it has many engines which can be repaired enroute.
Home for Every Worker. Washington, Feb. 12, 1919: Appointment of a federal commission to study ways and means of ‘making every worker a home owner’ was proposed in a bill by Senator Kenyon of Iowa. Kenyon said he believed some plan could be worked out where by federal aid could be extended to workmen wishing to own a home for themselves.
5,000 Anarchists To Be Deported. Washington, Feb. 12, 1919: Some 5,000 bolsheviks and I.W.W.’s[International Workers of the World] are slated for deportation as soon as facilities for transporting them are available. The round-up of undesirables which had its beginning in the northwest and resulted in a batch of prisoners being taken to Ellis Island is waiting deportation under the alien anarchist act. Under its provisions agitators who preach the overthrow of the government may be rounded up and sent from the country even without the formality of a trial.
League Of Nation’s Constitution. Washington, Feb. 14, 1919: A reduction of armaments, establishment of an international court of arbitration, the creation of an international military and naval force to police the world and protect the league’s covenants, and the decision to effect a commercial and financial boycott against any power that disregards its agreements, were among the world-important measures provided in the constitution of the League of Nations and read to the plenary session of the peace conference by President Wilson, in Paris, today.
Germans Accept League O Nations. Weimar, via Berlin and London. Feb. 15, 1919: “The German people are prepared to submit to restrictions of sovereignty, involved in the League of Nations plan, including international arbitration and restriction of armaments, providing our enemies and future neighbors do the same,” declared Count Von Brodkdorft-Rantzau. “We do not recognize that Germany was solely responsible for the war and alone was guilty of barbarous methods of warfare…We hold fast to President Wilson’s 14 principles and take the stand that no war cost be paid and no territory surrendered by the vanquished to the victors.”
Senator Opens Attack On League Of Nations. Washington, Feb. 19, 1919: Instead of bringing universal and enduring peace, the League of Nation’s constitution read in Paris by President Wilson, will multiply the opportunities for war, Senator Poindexter declared today, “There is an internationalism of the elite, and an internationalism of the proletariat rampant in the world. There is internationalism at the top and internationalism at the bottom and both are moving forward through different means and methods to the same destination. Germany is supporting it. The idealists and peace at any price pacifists are approaching by one road. The I.W.W. and their bolshevist allies throughout the world are approaching upon another. Both involve the surrender of nationality and the setting up of a centralized despotism. It must be despotism, because no government in whose discretion is centered in the ultimate control of the affairs of the whole world can be free.”
100 years ago, much has changed and, then again, nothing has changed.
