afting of the Covenant lay in the
clause proclaiming the equality of religions, which Mr. Wilson was bent
on having passed at all costs, if not in one form, then in another. This
is one example of the occasional visibility of the religious thread
which ran through a good deal of his personal work at the Conference.
For it is a fact--not yet realized even by the delegates
themselves--that distinctly religious motives inspired much that was
done by the Conference on what seemed political or social grounds. The
strategy adopted by the eminent American statesman to have his
stipulation accepted proceeded in this case on the lines of a
humanitarian resolve to put an end to sanguinary wars rather than on
those which the average reformer, bent on cultural progress, would have
traced. Actuality was imparted to this simple and yet thorny topic by a
concrete proposal which the President made one day. What he is reported
to have said is briefly this: "As the treatment of religious confessions
has been in the past, and may again in the future be, a cause of
sanguinary wars, it seems desirable that a clause should be introduced
into the Covenant establishing absolute liberty for creeds and
confessions." "On what, Mr. President," asked the first Polish delegate,
"do you found your assertion that wars are still brought about by the
differential treatment meted out to religions? Does contemporary
history bear out this statement? And, if not, what likelihood is there
that religious inequality will precipitate sanguinary conflicts in the
future?" To this pointed question Mr. Wilson is said to have made the
characteristic reply that he considered it expedient to assume this
nexus between religious inequality and war as the safest way of bringing
the matter forward. If he were to proceed on any other lines, he added,
there would be truth and force in the objection which would doubtless be
raised, that the Conference was intruding upon the domestic affairs of
sovereign states. As that charge would damage the cause, it must be
rebutted in advance. And for this purpose he deemed it prudent to
approach the subject from the side he had chosen.

This reply was listened to in silence and unfavorably commented upon
later. The alleged relation between such religious inequality as has
survived into the twentieth century and such wars as are waged nowadays
is so obviously fictitious that one can hardly understand the line of
reasoning that led to its