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and take me to another place, where I am to address a meeting. (Laughter.) That other meeting is a very important one. I shall not address there business men, I shall not address ladies and gentlemen, but there I shall address thousands and thousands of children. (Applause.) These American children will be the business men and women of to-morrow. They will have to follow your work, which you understand so well, and therefore I am not able to remain and have the pleasure of listening to Mr. Straus, but will go right to the children now. (Great applause.)

MR. STRAUS: I will keep Baron d'Estournelles here for just a minute or two.

BARON D'ESTOURNELLES: Quite right.

MR. STRAUS: And then he can go to the children, but I want to tell an incident

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MR. STRAUS-with which his name is connected. Shortly after the last election, or shortly after the President succeeded to the Presidency, Baron d'Estournelles stated that he feared this country, having advanced to the forefront as a commercial nation, would be led by the President into the way of commercialism. Shortly afterward, when the President directed the Venezuelan affair to the Hague Tribunal, having declined to accept the offer of the German Emperor to arbitrate the matter, referred it, as the Baron has described to you, the Baron made a speech in the French Senate of which he is one of the most distinguished members and stated that he had feared that the United States, which had reached such a high point in its commercial development and had placed in its executive chair a man who was feared by many, would be a powerful instrument for war; but that he felt now he had not only to apologize to the United States but to proclaim to the world that the United States, with President Roosevelt at its head, had taken the moral leadership of the enlightened nations of the world. (Great applause.) The Baron says "quite true." I know it was true, I clipped his statements at the time from a French newspaper, and I showed it to President Roosevelt. (Laughter.) I will now let the Baron de Con

stant go, if he wants to.

(Laughter.) But I wish to say—I am not going to make a long speech, I made a long speech last night

BARON D'ESTOURNELLES: No, not long.

MR. STRAUS: I am going to say only a few words to-day, because there are a number of eminent speakers here, and some from abroad, and I wish to give them the time, because you know I am naturally a peace man, being the head of a department of the government that only can thrive in times of peace. (Applause.)

For many years there has been, and even now there is a kind of shibboleth among the nations, created by a false philosophy, which is embraced in the statement that "trade follows the flag." In other words, the more lands you have conquered, the more wars you have fought, the larger your trade. I know of only one trade that follows the flag of war, and it is the trade of the grave-digger. (Applause.)

Commerce follows along the highways of least resistancecommerce is not extended by the cannon's mouth; on the contrary, times have changed with the expansion of commerce. As the nations have been brought nearer and nearer together by the rapidity of intercommunication, the foreign commerce of the world has within the last forty years taken wonderful leaps and bounds, and the old idea has disappeared that one nation is interested in the weakened condition of other nations. The idea obtained for thousands of years, and obtains yet, in some parts of the world, that as a neighboring nation gets weaker and poorer, the other nations grow greater and more prosperous. The growth of commerce has developed the absolute fallacy of that conclusion. Commerce is reciprocal, based not upon enmity but on fair exchange, on mutuality.

BARON D'ESTOURNELLES: Good.

(Applause.)

MR. STRAUS: Absolute mutuality. The richer the surrounding nations, the better it is for the other nations, because they have commodities to exchange, and have money to pay for those. commodities; consequently the welfare of nations is absolutely bound together, and each nation is interested in the progress, happiness and welfare of the other; that is one of the chief commercial aspects of the subject of International Peace.

More than that, has it ever occurred to you, looking entirely

at the material side, that after every great war has followed a terrible panic? After the Crimean War in '56 came the dreadful panic of 1857 in Europe and in this country. After the FrancoGerman War of 1870 followed the dreadful panic of 1873; and so you will find, going farther back, that from this terrible condition of war and the dislocation of all of the peaceful avocations of the people, comes a dreadful period of commercial depression, which sometimes brings within its train almost as much disaster as the war itself.

The people in civilized countries are pretty well agreed as to what is right and what is wrong; we are pretty well agreed as to moral standards and fundamental principles. We know we have no right to steal our neighbor's goods; we know we have no right to shoot down our debtors; we know we have no right, with sword and pistol, to pursue a man because he happens to owe us something, or from whom we claim an obligation. Now, is there any reason in the world that you can imagine why a different standard or basis of morality should exist between a conglomeration of individuals forming a nation and another conglomeration of people constituting another nation, than should exist between the people or the subjects within the limits of each separate nation?

As I explained a little more fully last night, because of the sophisms, the pettifogisms, the perversion of ideas of right, drawn from precedents based upon might instead of right, the present state of international law, as it is found in all the leading text-writers, is this: to nations at war, whom we call belligerents, neutral nations have no right to sell armaments or munitions of war, but it is lawful for the subjects of these neutral nations to sell such armaments and munitions. Neutral nations have no right, as such, to lend money to the belligerent nations, and money to-day is the greatest war-making power in the world. Everything can be purchased, the most destructive machinery of war; it is simply a question of money. Whereas neutral nations under the law of nations are not permitted to lend the belligerent nations money, yet the bankers of a neutral nation are permitted to do it under their law. Isn't that a travesty, a perversion and a sophism? (Applause.)

Now, my dear colleague, Baron d'Estournelles, if you do not succeed and I do not think you will succeed-in coming to an

agreement at the next Hague Conference, of which you are one of the most distinguished delegates, if you do not succeed in coming to an agreement on the question of the limitation of armaments, I beg of you have the Hague Treaty amended, so that the lending of money to any nation either about to go to war or in war shall be regarded and by international consent pronounced as an unfriendly and hostile act. (Applause.)

(At this point Baron d'Estournelles shook hands with Mr. Straus and left the meeting.)

Ladies and gentlemen, there are many other phases of this subject that I should like to touch upon, but I must deny myself the privilege, as I do not wish to encroach upon the time of the distinguished gentlemen who are to follow me. I thank you very much. (Great applause.)

MR. MARKS:

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: Before introducing the next speaker, I should like to read a resolution which has been passed to me by one of the delegates (reading):

"Whereas, the merchants, manufacturers and farmers of America appreciate very keenly the importance of substituting a system of law and order in place of war in the settlement of international differences;

"Therefore, be it resolved, That we heartily endorse the sentiments and aims of the Peace Congress;

"Resolved, That we recommend the establishment of a National Peace Society in this country for the purposes of conciliation, mediation and arbitration, and authorize the Chairman of this meeting to give assurance to the executive committee of the Peace Congress of our co-operation in the establishment and maintenance of such an organization."

With your consent I will refer this to the executive committee of the Peace Congress.

We have here with us this afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, the president of the largest and most influential association of manufacturers in the United States. That means a great deal at a meeting of commerce and industry, and I take pleasure in introducing to you Mr. James W. Van Cleave, President of the National Association of Manufacturers. (Applause.)

The Importance of Peace to Industry

JAMES W. VAN CLEAVE.

MR. CHAIRMAN, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: Following, as I am, such men of distinction and representing, as I seem to do, by being the only manufacturer here, such a body of men as the manufacturers of America, it seems that I may be pardoned, at least I hope that I may be pardoned, if I use my manuscript.

As a representative of the manufacturing industries of the United States I am proud of the invitation which has been extended to me to address the eminent men from all over the world who are gathered here to devise means to promote the cause of International Peace. It is hardly necessary for me to say that I am heartily in accord with the object of this assemblage. We manufacturers are interested in World Peace both as humanitarians and as business men. On the latter phase of our interest I will say a few words to you to-day.

Stated in terms of money, this interest can be shown to be large. In the aggregate the manufactures of the United States far exceed those of any other two countries. Our production of pig iron in 1906 equaled that of Great Britain, Germany and France together, and these are our nearest competitors. If there be any virtue, therefore, in the multiplication methods of appraising things, the interest of the American manufacturers in this. vast issue is large.

At this hour a capital of $14,000,000,000 is invested in the mills and factories of the United States, and these employ over 3,500,000 persons, who will receive $4,000,000,000 in wages for this year. The finished products of these factories will, for 1907, amount to over $16,000,000,000. This stupendous sum, which is too large for us to adequately interpret in comprehensible terms, is as great as the value of the entire property, real and personal, of the United States in 1860, at the time of Lincoln's first election. It is as large as the value of all the property of Spain in these prosperous days of Alfonso XIII.

Moreover, much of this vast total depends for its existence on the maintenance of our commerce with the world, for in 1906 we exported over $700,000,000 in manufactures. In our sales of manufactures abroad we rank next to Great Britain and Germany.

Now, I am not saying that the pocket interest in anything is

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