controversy revealed this rootlessness. It was in part at least an acrid discussion between careless optimists and unreasonable scare-mongers, between men who held positions no longer tenable and others who were moving to positions which they could not locate. Our ideas were in flux. Whether we should arm, against whom we should arm, how we should arm, was decided by the impact of prejudices and shadowy fears against an obstinate and optimistic credulity.
Nothing was more significant of the externality of these debates than the fact that they seemed to ignore everything that we had cared about before. The case for armament was presented not as a continuation of earlier national policies but as a sort of historical interlude. Past interests were forgotten in the insistence upon the immediate. Until the war broke in upon us we had been groping, both in foreign and domestic policies, towards certain forms of national expression; arbitration, international justice, democracy, social reform. Throughout a century, we had believed that we had blundered towards these goals, and that our history revealed an aspiration approaching fulfilment. We had settled a continent, built an ordered society, and amid a mass of self-created entanglements, were striving to erect a new civilisation upon the basis of a changed economic life. Now it was assumed that all this stubbornly contested progress was forever ended by the conflict engulfing the world.
This whole idealistic phase of American life was disparaged by our sudden ultra-patriots. These men, with a perhaps unconscious bias, opposed their brand new martial idealism to what they falsely believed was a purely materialistic pacifism. Actually both advocates and opponents of increased armaments were contending under the stress of a new and bewildering emotion. For decades we had concerned ourselves with our own affairs, undisturbed by events which convulsed Europe. But the present war, because of its magnitude and nearness, had set our nerves jangling, excited us morbidly, dulled us to horror and made us oversensitive to dread. We read of slaughter, maiming, rape and translated the facts of Belgium and Servia into imaginary atrocities committed against ourselves. We wanted to be "doing something." Not that we wished war, but rather the chance to rank high according to the standards in vogue at the hour. While hating the war, we had insensibly imbibed the mental quality of the men who were fighting. We were tending to think as though all future history were to be one continuing cataclysm.
For the moment, like the rest of the world, we were hypnotised. Upon our minds a crude picture had been stamped. We were more conscious of peril than before the war, though the peril was now less. Our immediate danger from invasion was smaller than it had been in June, 1914; yet while we were perhaps foolishly unafraid in 1914, in 1916 we trembled hypnotically.
It was to this state of the American mind that all sorts of appeals were made. Those who wanted universal conscription and the greatest navy in the world argued not only from dread of invaders but from the necessity of a united nation. They wanted "Americanism," pure, simple, undiluted, straight. There was to be no hyphen, no cleavage between racial stocks, no line between sections or social classes. America was to be racially, linguistically, sectionally one.
It was an ideal, good or bad, according to its interpretation. A more definitely integrated America, with a concrete forward-looking internal and foreign policy, could aid disinterestedly in untying the European tangle. In the main, however, the demand for Americanism took on an aggressive, jingoistic, red-white-and-blue tinge. Out of it arose an exaggerated change of mood toward the "hyphenate," the American of foreign, and especially German, lineage. Newspapers teemed with attacks upon this man of divided allegiance.
In other ways our agitation for a United America took a reactionary shape. Though a pacific nation, we experienced a sudden revulsion against pacifism and Hague tribunals, as though it were the pacifists who had brought on the war. Contempt was expressed for our industrialism, our many-tongued democracy, our policy of diplomatic independence. Those most opposed to Prussianism, as it has been defined, were most stubbornly Prussian in their proposals. We heard praises of the supreme education of the German barracks, and a clamour arose for universal service, not primarily industrial or educational but military in character. A decaying patriotism of Americans was deplored quite in the manner of Bernhardi. More than ever there was talk of national honour, prestige, the rights of America. Our former attitude of abstention from European disputes was called "provincial," and we were urged to fight for all manner of reasons and causes. Even though we cravenly desired peace, we were to have no choice. An impoverished Germany, beaten to her knees, was to pay her indemnity by landing an army in New York and holding that city for ransom. Around such futilities did many American minds play.
All this appeal would have been more convincing had it not been most insistently urged by influential financial groups. The extent of certain financial interests in large armaments, in a spirited foreign policy and in other widely advertised new doctrines, was obvious. The war had built up a vast armament industry, war stocks had been widely distributed, and upon the advent of peace these properties would shrink in value unless America made purchases. More important was the complex of financial interests, likely to be created in Latin America and elsewhere. Speculators were dreaming of great foreign investments for American capital. We were to become a creditor nation, an imperialistic power, exploiting the backward countries of the globe. We were to participate in international loans, more or less forced, and to make money wherever the flag flew. For such a policy there was needed the backing of a patriotic, united, disciplined and armed nation, and to secure such arms, any excuse would suffice.
At the most, of course, these financial adventurers were merely leaders in a movement that arose out of the peculiar conditions of the moment. The roots of our sudden desire for armament and for an aggressive foreign policy ran far deeper than the interests of any particular financial group. A sense that American ideals were in peril of being destroyed by a new barbarism impelled us to new efforts. We dimly perceived that we must solve new problems, accept new responsibilities, and acquit ourselves worthily in new crises.
The most obvious result of this campaign for preparedness was a largely increased expenditure for armies and navies. Its deeper significance, however, lay in the fact that it marked the end of our former theory that war can be ended by precept and example and that no nation need fear war or prepare for war so long as its intentions are good. Hereafter the size and character of our national armament was to be determined in relation to the possibility of war with Europe and of war in Europe. The campaign for military preparation is not ended. It will not end until some relation is established between our new armament and the national policy which that armament is to serve.
So long as these preparedness debates lasted we believed that the fundamental cleavage in American sentiment was between those who wished to arm and those who did not. Yet the proposal to increase the army and navy was defended by men of varying temperaments and opinions, by liberals and conservatives, by workmen and capitalists, by members of peace societies and representatives of the Navy League. As the first stage of mere instinctive arming passes, however, it suddenly appears as though the true cleavage in American thought and feeling runs perpendicular to the division between those who favour and those who oppose armament. The real issue is the purpose to which the arms are to be put. We may use our armed strength to secure concessions in China or Mexico, to "punish" small nations, to enter the balance of power of Europe or to aid in the promotion of international peace. We may use our strength wisely or unwisely, for good or for ill. We began to arm before we knew for what we were arming, before we had a national policy, before we knew what we wanted or how to get it. Our problem to-day is to determine upon that policy, to create out of the constituent elements forming American public opinion a national policy, determined by our situation and needs, limited by our power, and in conformity with our ideals. It is the problem of adjusting American policy to the central fact of international conflict and war.
As we approach this problem we discover that the two great elements in our population tend to pull in contrary directions. In the question of defence the one instinctively follows the lead of European nations, piling up armies and navies and attempting to make us the most formidable power in the world; the second seeks by understandings with other nations to prevent disagreements and to avert wars. The first group emphasises American rights on "land and sea," the property rights
