le enterprise. The conduct
of our soldiers, their submission to a discipline to which most of them
were completely unused was, I think, in a very large measure due to the
recognition of this aim. We recognized it as a nation and we recognized
it in one another. The standard of contact set by our soldiers during
the days of conflict is unique in military history. Whole divisions went
for months without a single court-martial. The reason was, more than
anything else, the national assumption that they would give a good
account of themselves and the fact that they felt themselves in
training for the championship, and no man wanted to miss his chance on
the battlefield for the sake of a selfish indulgence.

Some of the experiments in conduct tried in the American Expeditionary
Forces were extraordinary in their success. The leave areas, an immense
enterprise, were run on the basis of absolute freedom to the enlisted
man. He lived in the best hotels in Europe and amused himself in casinos
where crowned heads had been in the habit of gambling away the money of
their subjects. He had no roll calls, no taps, no officers in sight, no
military machinery whatever. He arose when he pleased, either before or
after his breakfast; he ate and drank when he pleased, and he stayed out
as late as he pleased. The physical and moral effect of this absolute
change from the military regime was a very interesting and instructive
phenomenon, but that is not the point I wish to make. Out of the
thousands and thousands of men who were sent to these leave areas, there
was hardly a single case in which a man abused the trust which was put
upon him or failed to turn up on time to go back to the grind of
military duty. This could never have been done with soldiers of another
type, with soldiers lacking an ideal.

Someone has recently written that fine minds have been finely touched by
the war, and base minds basely. He might have added that wise minds have
been wisely touched, and foolish minds foolishly. In general, I think it
may fairly be said that when the appeal was to the finest in a man's
character, the result was correspondingly fine.

* * * * *

These, it seems to me, are the four main things we have learned, or at
any rate we have had a chance to learn. First, that we are a real
nation, potentially strong with the strength of youth. Second, that to
fulfill our mission, every man and woman and all of every su