fo~r i.tights - swarthmore college€¦ · poverty, disease and despair, which must result in the...

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I.tights ''Then he showed four lights when he wished them to set full sail and follow in his wake/' From "First Voyage 'Roualll the World by llagellau." - JUNE 12, 1919 AN ADVENTURE IN INTERN. ATIONALISM VoL. II No. l . "To-day we are separated, drift before the storm, toys of the whirlwind- To-morrow we shall come together and rule the world/'- J. o., seven Arts. RESOLUTIONS PASSED BY THE INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF - WOMEN, AT ZURICH, MAY 12- 21, 1919 Condemning the Terms of Peace. (Presented by Mrs. Philip Snowden of England and seconded by Miss Jeannette Rankin, of the U. S. A.) This- International Congress o·f women expresses its deep regret that the terms of peace proposed at Ver- sailles should so seriously violate the principles upon which alone a just and lasting peace can be secured, and which the Democracies of the world had come to accept. By guaranteeing the fruits of the secret treaties to the conquerors the terms tacitly sanction secret diplomacy. They deny the principle of self- determination, recognize the right of the victox:s to the spoils of war, and create all over Europe discords and aniqlosities, which can lead only to future wars. By the demand for the disarmament of one set of beli- gerents only, the principle of justice is vio· lated and the rule of force is continued. By the financial and economic proposals a hundred million people of this generation in the heart of Europe are condemned to poverty, disease and despair, which must result in the spread of hatred and anarchy within each nation. With a deep sense of responsibility !his Congress strongly urges the Allied Governments to accept such amend- ments of the terms as may be proposed to bring the peace i!J..to harmony With those principles first enumer·· ated. by President Wilson upon the faithful carrying out of which the honour of the Allied peoples depends. (The delegates of the Central Powers refrained from voting upon this resolution.) Concerning the . Relation of Pacifists to the Coming Social Revolution. The world is facing widespread revolutionarY' changes coming at a time when the habit of violence has been fostered by a' world war. We recognize that there is a fundamentally just demand· most of these revolutionary movements. We declare . our sympathy with the purpose of the workers who are rising up everywhere to make .an end of exploitation and to claim their world. Nevertheless we reassert our belief in the m. ethods of peace and we feel that it is our special part in this revolutionary age to . counsel against violence on both sides. Demanding the ·Lifting of the Blockade. This International Congress of Women regards the tragic situation of wide-spread unemployment, famine and pestilence, extending throughout great tracts of Central and Eastern Europe and through parts of Asia as a profound disgrace to civilization. · It urges that the blockade shall be immediately lifted and that all the resources of the world, foo.d, raw materials, finance, transport, shall be organized immediately for the relief of peoples and that, if there is an insufficiency either of food or of transport facilities to supply all de. mands, luxuries shall not allowed transport from one coun- try to another until the necessaries of life are supplied to all and that people of every country shall be ration- ed, in order that all the starving shall be fed. We believe that immediate international action at this time can serve humanity and bring about the reconciliation and union of the peoples. (A delegation from the Congress was instructed to present the protest against the blockade and the peace terms to the delegates of the Great Powers in Paris. This delegation included Miss Jane Addams and Miss Crystal MacMillan as President and Secretary and Mme. Ragaz of Switzerland, Mrs. Despard of England, Signora Genoni of Italy and Mme. Duchene of France.) (Continued on next page) ..

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Page 1: fo~r I.tights - Swarthmore College€¦ · poverty, disease and despair, which must result in the ... is our special part in this revolutionary age to .counsel against violence on

fo~r I.tights ''Then he showed four lights when he wished them to set full sail and follow in his wake/'

From "First Voyage 'Roualll the World by llagellau."

- JUNE 12, 1919 AN ADVENTURE IN INTERN.ATIONALISM VoL. II No. l

.

"To-day we are separated, drift before the storm, toys of the whirlwind­To-morrow we shall come together and rule the world/'- J. o., seven Arts.

RESOLUTIONS PASSED BY THE INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF- WOMEN, AT ZURICH, MAY 12- 21, 1919

Condemning the Terms of Peace. (Presented by Mrs. Philip Snowden of England and seconded

by Miss Jeannette Rankin, of the U. S. A.) This- International Congress o·f women expresses its

deep regret that the terms of peace proposed at Ver­sailles should so seriously violate the principles upon which alone a just and lasting peace can be secured, and which the Democracies of the world had come to accept. By guaranteeing the fruits of the secret treaties to the conquerors the terms tacitly sanction secret diplomacy. They deny the principle of self­determination, recognize the right of the victox:s to the spoils of war, and create all over Europe discords and aniqlosities, which can lead only to future wars. By the demand for the disarmament of one set of beli­gerents only, the principle of justice is vio·lated and the rule of force is continued. By the financial and economic proposals a hundred million people of this generation in the heart of Europe are condemned to poverty, disease and despair, which must result in the spread of hatred and anarchy within each nation. With a deep sense of responsibility !his Congress strongly urges the Allied Governments to accept such amend­ments of the terms as may be proposed to bring the peace i!J..to harmony With those principles first enumer·· ated. by President Wilson upon the faithful carrying out of which the honour of the Allied peoples depends.

(The delegates of the Central Powers refrained from voting upon this resolution.)

Concerning the .Relation of Pacifists to the Coming Social Revolution.

The world is facing widespread revolutionarY' changes coming at a time when the habit of violence has been fostered by a' world war. We recognize that

there is a fundamentally just demand· ~nderlying most of these revolutionary movements. We declare. our sympathy with the purpose of the workers who are rising up everywhere to make .an end of exploitation and to claim their world. Nevertheless we reassert our belief in the m.ethods of peace and we feel that it is our special part in this revolutionary age to .counsel against violence on both sides.

Demanding the ·Lifting of the Blockade. This International Congress of Women regards the

tragic situation of wide-spread unemployment, famine and pestilence, extending throughout great tracts of Central and Eastern Europe and through parts of Asia as a profound disgrace to civilization. ·It urges that the blockade shall be immediately lifted and that all the resources of the world, foo.d, raw materials, finance, transport, shall be organized immediately for the relief of th~ peoples and that, if there is an insufficiency either of food or of transport facilities to supply all de.mands, luxuries shall not b~ allowed transport from one coun­try to another until the necessaries of life are supplied to all and that people of every country shall be ration­ed, in order that all the starving shall be fed. We believe that immediate international action at this time can serve humanity and bring about the reconciliation and union of the peoples.

(A delegation from the Congress was instructed to present the protest against the blockade and the peace terms to the delegates of the Great Powers in Paris. This delegation included Miss Jane Addams and Miss Crystal MacMillan as President and Secretary and Mme. Ragaz of Switzerland, Mrs. Despard of England, Signora Genoni of Italy and Mme. Duchene of France.)

(Continued on next page)

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• (ContJo uation from first page)

Concerning Conscientious Objectors.

We women assembled at this International Congress wish to record our deep sense of the heroism of those who have counted no sacrifice too great to serve the cause of Peace. We recognize the devotion alike of those who believed that in offering their lives in war, they are helping to end war, cand of those who, with equal courage and, as we believe, with deeper insight, fought war by refusing to take part in it. It fortified our courage, and our faith in the achievement of per-manent peace, to know that thousands in so many countries have counted it worth the cost to face death and imprisonment and obloquy, and the loss of health and fortune and friends, for that end.

Imagine Imagine the entire population of Lynn, Quincy and

Salem, Massachussetts, wiped out by starvation since November nth.

Imagine the population of the State capitals of New -York and Pennsylvania starved to death since November I xth.

Then you will be able to imagine something of what has happened in Central Europe since the signing of the armistice.

But you will not be able to imagine the mothers so undernourished that they must carry their babies ten months before they can be born, nor the babies that are born dead, (70 out of gx is one week's record in a Vienna hospital), nor the diseases which are attacking all classes weak from hunger.

Natural and Unavoidable "We ought to make, we must make, peace without

delay, and ships laden with food must enter the har­bors of Germany. We have reached a crisis in the affairs of the w:orld. We must meet it without passion and without permitting our judgment to be warped by a natural and unavoidable desire for vengeance on a nation which has committed such atr.ocities as those the Germans committed."

SECRETARY OF STATE LANSING, Paris, March uth.

Peace Without Honor? "T6-day ·it is here, an Allied peace, a victorious peace,

but also a peace at any price, costly for Germany, still costlier for ourselves, forced upon a world no longer too proud, but too exhausted to fight. Just it cannot be, when Japan"is rewarded with Chinese territory and Belgium is excluded by the five powers from her share in world control; permanent it cannot be, with Russia's 167 millions shut out from the settlement and with three new Alsace-Lorraines to take the place of the old.

" As to the price, it is high indeed for Germany,­starvation during the armistice, economic servitude for thirty years,- yet the curse of conscription is lifted from our enemy, and the reduction of her army, navy and fortifications is a boon for which we all might pray. It is for us victors that the price is too bitter to be borne, for we are offered a peace with dishonor. The .knightly honor that scorns to trample upon a sur­rendered foe is perhaps foo lofty for our aspiration, but

I I

...

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If Thine Enemy Hunger .

AUTHENTIC reports of conditions in Germany indicate .that in certain sections the food shortage is causing terrible misery, disease and death. After the Armistice, the allied

blockade was maintained with undiminished rigor for months. Even the nominal relaxing of the blockade does not prevent thou­sands from starving.

The Inter-Allied Food Cortimission is not authorized to give away food in enemy countries, but Mr. Hoover writes to our repre-sentative in Paris: · I

"Disregarding every poJ \ical question (which I know is the whole basis of Que: \ work) I should say that the area today where there is the most acute suffering, that is receiving no assistance from any foreign quarter, is probably industrial ' Germany, more particularly in Saxony." ·

The English and American Quakers who have been doing relief and reconstruction work in France since 1914 and in Russia since 1916 are sending a small group of men and women into Germany with a message of good will, carrying as much food as our resources permit. Mr. Hoover has promised to sell them supplies, to provide transportation, and to give passports into Germany. This plan has the hearty endorsement of Miss J ane Addams, of General Smuts and of others in Paris who know the European situation.

\

A special fund of $50,000 is asked from America at once. All persons who wish to express thdr Christian internationalism by a gift to the destitute in Germany are invited to join in raising this fund. ·

Contributions should be sent to

AMERICAN FRIENDS SERVICE COMMITTEE

20 South 12th Street .. Philadelphia, Pa.

1.· ! '•·

::

I !

-the everyday business honor that keeps its word America is not yet willing to forego. As Russia went to Brest-Litov_jk ~pon the promise of 'no annexations, no indemnities,' so Germany has signed the armistice upon the assurance of Wilson's fourteen points. A peace that-abates e-ne of these points of just settlement is a peace that dishonors America."

JESSIE WALLACE HUGHAN. From the W orld Tomorrow.

Germans Deported from Alsace­Lorraine Starviug

(E.xtract from a letler from one of our members, who is in Europe)

" 'We do not know how we are going to feed these starving refugees from Alsace-Lorraine,' said Frau Tondeau, President of the National Organization for the Relief of Housewives. 'We cannot feed our own people for we have not got the food, but such ali we have will be shared with them.'

"Frau Daul of Diedenhoffen, one of the fifty or seventy-five thousand German natives of Alsace-Lor­raine expelled by the French prior to the coming elec­tion for 'self-determination' in these two provinces, described to me the destitute condition of the Alsatian refugees.

" 'I am one of the fortunate ones, as .I have wealthy and powerful friends in neighboring cities, but the rich and poor are treated alike . . If you are suspected of having German sympathies or are born of German parents you receive twenty-four hours' notice to report at French headquarters. · You are allowed to take only as much as you can carry and husbands and wives report to different places often requiring an all-night walk through the country as train service is practically suspended.

" 'Yesterday I reached the French examination sta­tion. Here I was searched to the skin, and all money except fifty marks (now worth five dollars) was taken from me. I was examined by a woman in the presence of at least fifty other women. If there are any women who ask for medical assistance as expectant mothers they are first examined by a midwife and compelled to walk many miles before receiving aid.

" 'We cannot choose where we wish to go but must make our way outside of Alsace-Lorraine within a specified time. We have had no food for five days ex­cept what we could catty walking thirty kilos. Women with babies had no milk, and if suspected of any activ­ity in favor of Germany the refugees are imprisoned by the French. I do not know where my husband and son have gone but I am already trying to relieve through the kindness of friends the sufferings of my fellow refugees.' "

I, as an American "I got so that I could not look into a baby carriage

any more while I was in Germany, for I found my• self saying to the child~ 'You'll probably be dead in four or five months, and I, as an Amencan, will have to bear my share of the responsibility for your death.' "

OSWALD GARRISON VILLARD in the London Nation, April 12th.

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Address of French· Women to the Ger~an Women

Read at a Public Meeting in Zurich University, May 12, 1919.

Today for the first time our hand'S which have sought each other in the night can be joined. We are a single humanity, we women. Our work, our joys, our children, are the same. French and Germans ! The soldiers which have been killed between us are for both of us alike victims. It is our brothers and our sisters who have suffered. We do not want vengeance. We hate all war. We push from us both the pride of victory and the rancor of defeat. United by the same faith, by the same sense of service, we agree to con­secrate ourselves to the fight against war and to the struggle for everlasting peace.

All women against all wars ! Come, to work! Publicly, in the face of those who

have vowed eternal hate, let us unite, let us love each other.

/

Reply of the German Women

We German women have heard the greetings of our French sisters with the deepest joy, and we respond to them from the depths of our souls. We too protest against the perpetuation of a hate which was always foreign" to women's hearts. Our French sisters I It is with joy that we grasp your extended hand. We will stand and march together, in common effort for the good of mankind. On the ruins of a materialist world, founded by force and violence, on misunderstanding and hate, we women will, through death and sorrow, clear the road to the new humanity. As mothers of the coming generations, we, women of all nations, want lOve and understanding and peace. Despite the dark and gloom of the present we stumble, comforted, toward the sunshine of the future.

Resolution on Russia and Hungary passed unanimously by the Zurich Conference

This International Congress of Women, recognizing the right of each nation to determine its own form of government, in accordance with President Wilson's Fourteen Points, urges the immediate cessation of attack, whether by armed force, by supply of munitions or money, or by blockade, upon Russia and Hungary.

We ask an explanation of the warfare now being waged without open declaration of war upon peoples who are experimenting in a new social and economic order which has not yet had a fair trial; but which may prove to have a great contribution to make to the future of the world.

"America, deceived into establishing an enormous military machine which must not only destroy her own liberties, but endanger the liberties of other peoples, America, busily forging weapons to menace the spirit of freedom struggling to life .in exhausted Europe at the close of the war,-that is the picture which above all has made us fighters for peace. That America, the hope of liberty, should become its destroyer! Rather do we burn to pledge our country for World Union as the only hope of both peace and democracy."

From the first issue of Four Lights, January 27, 1917. PAULINE K. ANGELL, GRATIA GOLLER,

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