tc., of the belligerent governments--confessed this with
pride--lest he should form an opinion and cease to be neutral! Miss X, a
member of the President's household, said to Mrs. Y, the day we lunched
there, that she had made a remark privately to Sharp showing her
admiration of the French.

"Was that a violation of neutrality?" she asked in all seriousness.

I can see it in no other way but this: the President suppressed free
thought and free speech when he insisted upon personal neutrality. He
held back the deliberate and spontaneous thought and speech of the
people except the pro-Germans, who saw their chance and improved it! The
mass of the American people found themselves forbidden to think or talk,
and this forbidding had a sufficient effect to make them take refuge in
indifference. It's the President's job. He's our leader. He'll attend to
this matter. We must not embarrass him. On this easy cushion of
non-responsibility the great masses fell back at their intellectual and
moral ease--softened, isolated, lulled.

That wasn't leadership in a democracy. Right here is the President's
vast failure. From it there is now no escape unless the Germans commit
more submarine crimes. They have kept the United States for their own
exploiting after the war. They have thus had a real triumph of us.

I have talked in Washington with few men who showed any clear conception
of the difference between the Germans and the British. To the minds of
these people and high Government officials, German and English are alike
foreign nations who are now foolishly engaged in war. Two of the men who
look upon the thing differently are Houston[42] and Logan Waller
Page[43]. In fact, there is no realization of the war in Washington.
Secretary Houston has a proper perspective of the situation. He would
have done precisely what I recommended--paved the way for claims and let
the English take their course. "International law" is no strict code and
it's all shot to pieces anyhow.

The Secretary [of State] betrayed not the slightest curiosity about our
relations with Great Britain. I saw him several times--(1) in his
office; (2) at his house; (3) at the French Ambassador's; (4) at
Wallace's; (5) at his office; (6) at Crozier's[44]--this during my first
stay in Washington. The only remark he made was that I'd find a
different atmosphere in Washington from the atmosphere in London. Truly.
All the rest of his talk was about "cases." Would I see Se