no's contentions in brief, pithy speeches. President Wilson's
lengthy rejoinder, delivered with more than ordinary sweetness,
deprecated M. Bratiano's comparison of the Allies' proposed intervention
with Russia's protection of the Christians of Turkey, and represented
the measure as emanating from the purest kindness. He said that the
Great Powers were now bestowing national existence or extensive
territories upon the interested states, actually guaranteeing their
frontiers, and therefore making themselves responsible for permanent
tranquillity there. But the treatment of the minorities, he added,
unless fair and considerate, might produce the gravest troubles and even
precipitate wars. Therefore it behooved the Powers in the interests of
all Europe, as of each of its individual members, to secure harmonious
relations, and, at any rate, to remove all manifest obstacles to their
establishment. "We guarantee your frontiers and your territories. That
means that we will send over arms, ships, and men, in case of necessity.
Therefore we possess the right and recognize the duty to hinder the
survival of a set of deplorable conditions which would render this
intervention unavoidable."

To this line of reasoning M. Bratiano made answer that all the helpful
maxims of good government are of universal application, and, therefore,
if this protection of minorities were, indeed, indispensable or
desirable, it should not be restricted to the countries of eastern
Europe, but should be extended to all without exception. For it is
inadmissible that two categories of states should be artificially
created, one endowed with full sovereignty and the other with
half-sovereignty. Such an arrangement would destroy the equality which
should lie at the base of a genuine League of Nations.

But the Powers had made up their minds, and the special treaties were
imposed on the unwilling governments. Thereupon the Rumanian Premier
withdrew from the Conference, and neither his Cabinet nor that of the
Jugoslavs signed the treaty with Austria at St.-Germain.

What happened after that is a matter of history.

Few politicians are conscious of the magnitude of the issue concealed by
the involved diplomatic phraseology of the obnoxious treaties, or of the
dangers to which their enactment will expose the minorities which they
were framed to protect, the countries whose hospitality those minorities
enjoy, and possibly other lands, which for the time being a