National Affairs: Treaty Maltreated

On the floor of the U. S. Senate last week stood Senator William Edgar Borah, fighting-man from Idaho. The business before the Senate was the ratification of the Kellogg peace treaty, already signed by some 60 of the world's nations. As Chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Senator Borah had steered it through legislative tangles, had secured for it the right of way over the Cruiser Bill (see col. 2). Crowds gathered in the galleries; political correspondents prepared to hear and to record history. The Kellogg treaty was ready to go over in bursts of Borahtorical splendor.

Yet as the debate progressed, as its first day wore into its second and its second into its third, Senator Borah's position appeared to grow hourly more on the defensive. The bill was being "pounded," the Senator was being "heckled," the "treaty foes" were "hurling" questions, suggestions, criticisms. The Senator passed from the oratorical into the conversational; galleries and stenographers strained ears to catch low-toned thrusts and parries. Relatively in the background remained Senator Reed of Missouri, big anti-treaty gun still to be shot off. Meanwhile Bruce of Maryland, Johnson of California, Robinson of Indiana, Bingham of Connecticut, many another smaller gun popped, snapped, sputtered. The Senator from Idaho began somewhat to resemble an Horatius at the bridge, a Leonidas at Thermopylae. It was a sham battle, inasmuch as there existed an almost universal opinion that the treaty would easily collect its necessary two-thirds vote. Nevertheless, Senator Borah's partners remained silent partners; Senator Borah was sharply badgered, the treaty severely peppered.

The Treaty. Frequent discussion has made the main terms of the treaty familiar enough—by it the signatory powers "condemn recourse to war" and "renounce it as an instrument of national policy." They agree also to settle disputes "by pacific means." Furthermore, as Senator Borah stated last week, as Secretary Kellogg has previously said before the Foreign Relations Committee, the treaty should not be regarded as affecting in any manner the right of any signatory to go to war in what it considers self-defense.

No Compulsion. Inasmuch as virtually all modern wars are theoretically wars of self-defense, the question immediately arose as to what would prevent a war between two nations, each going to battle under a self-defense plea. Senator Borah admitted that the treaty in no way prevented such a possibility. "A nation must answer to the tribunal of public opinion as to her right to go to war," said he. "The only censor of her action is the power of public opinion."

Senator Hiram Johnson of California referred to the Spanish War, asked whether the U. S. could have gone to war over the Maine had the Kellogg Pact been in effect in 1898. Senator Borah replied that the U. S. could then have gone to war, since its ship had been blown up, its sailors killed.

"Rather sentimental reasons dictated the Spanish-American war, did they not?" asked Connecticut's Bingham.

"Well, I suspect that those reasons did enter into it," said Senator Borah. "I should hope that if we sign this treaty we would be more vigilant in confining ourselves to actual attack and not sentimental attacks."