The deadlock was complete, and on March 19, 1920, when the vote on
ratification was taken, the necessary two-thirds were lacking by seven
votes. At the last moment a number of Democrats joined with the
Republican reservationists, making fifty-seven in favor of ratification.
On the other hand the bitter-end Republicans voted against it with the
Democrats who stood by the President, thus throwing thirty-seven votes
against ratification. It had taken the Peace Conference five months to
construct the treaty with Germany in all its complexities, and secure the
unanimous approval of the delegates of thirty-one states. The Senate had
consumed more than eight months merely in criticizing the treaty and had
finally refused to ratify it.

We are, perhaps, too close to the event to attempt any apportionment of
responsibility for this failure to cap our military successes by a peace
which--when all has been said--was the nearest possible approach to the
ideal peace. It is clear that the blame is not entirely on one side.
Historians will doubtless level the indictment of ignorance and political
obliquity against the Senators who tried, either directly or indirectly,
to defeat the treaty; they will find much justification for their charge,
although it will be more difficult to determine the dividing line between
mere incapacity to appreciate the necessities of the world, and the
desire to discredit, at any cost, the work of Woodrow Wilson. On the
other hand, the President cannot escape blame, although the charge will
be merely that of tactical incapacity and mistaken judgment. His
inability to combine with the moderate Republican Senators first gave a
chance to those who wanted to defeat the treaty. His obstinate refusal to
accept reservations at the end, when it was clear that the treaty could
not be ratified without them, showed a regard for form, at the expense of
practical benefit. Granted that the reservations altered the character
of the League or the character of American participation in it, some sort
of a League was essential and the sooner the United States entered the
better it would be. Its success would not rest upon phrases, but upon the
spirit of the nations that composed it; the building-up of a new and
better international order would not be determined by this reservation or
that. Wilson's claim to high rank as a statesmen would probably be more
clear if he had accepted what was possible at the moment, in the hope
t