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nerve to outstrip each other in their preparations for combat. Frontiers were never so strongly fortified; armies were never so thoroughly equipped; and the navies of the world have doubled their strength in the last fifteen years. A number of the nations about to assemble at The Hague are in doubt as to what extent it would be wise even to discuss the question of the limitation of armaments. England's Dreadnought challenge thrown down to the world has been accepted, and the powers are duplicating this monster battleship. We, ourselves, were among the first to act. Why? Is there any intention on the part of our Government to attack our sister nations? Have they any disposition to attack us? Years ago we prided ourselves on our freedom from the military burdens from which the old world was suffering. Now we are among the foremost in naval expansion. Has this tended either to lessen other nations' fear of us or to make us less anxious for our own safety? Is not the very existence of these large armaments the greatest source of alarm among the nations? They feel kindly disposed towards each other. Why, then, this enormous expenditure? Is it to meet real emergencies or imaginary difficulties? The results of these preparations are by no means imaginary. They are immediate and distressing and need most imperative consideration. We should get at the very roots of this evil.

Is there not a great selfish force at work in these two thousand million dollars of appropriations that we are not reckoning with? The present system means a great deal of business for somebody; there are large contracts to be secured. Is it natural to suppose that the men securing these valuable contracts can be looked to for their curtailment? Or can we expect men in military life, the officers in the army and navy, to recommend a reduction of armaments, when their whole training and chance of promotion is dependent upon such armaments? I do not in the slightest degree wish to reflect on the honesty and integrity of these men. They compare favorably with any class in the community, but I am urging general considerations. It is perfectly natural that this biased element should be active. You all noticed that when the question of building another Dreadnought was before our own Congress, the daily papers were filled with accounts of the activity of Japan, of her military preparation, and of her desire to wrest the Philippines from us. The things that are

happening with us are happening all over the world. Is it safe for any government to depend upon a board of military experts to tell it whether its army or navy shall be increased or not? Ought we not to have as competent experts in favor of Peace as those who believe in war? Ought there not to be in every capital of the world men of great ability to present to their various parliaments the facts upon these war budgets and to oppose in the interest of the people military extravagance?

As a business man I have to look at this question along the lines of business success in other enterprises; and it does seem to me that we are not sufficiently aroused to the importance of the work before us. Have we presented to men of affairs a sufficiently definite proposition to induce them to come forward liberally and help on the great cause? Have we not rather been talking to the galleries? Can any business, or any great work, be conducted on general lines, with no one in particular to look after it? From my experience, not only must there be able and highlytrained persons at the head, but they must give the work constant supervision every day in the year if success is to be attained.

I do not disparage the Peace Societies, but there must be larger and more generous organization. To my mind there is but one way to compete with the militarism of the age. We must unite all the elements that make for Peace in a supreme effort against this terrible scourge. We must make a business of educating the people, beginning with the children in the home and in the school. Children should be taught that military parades in holiday dress, the manœuvres of armies and navies to the strains of martial music, do not paint war in its true light. Take them rather to the battlefield of Waterloo, as painted by Victor Hugo; to the retreat of the French army from Moscow. Put before them the horrors in the Russian-Japanese war. Training with muskets in hand should be banished from our schools. Everything that tends to excite a military spirit should be removed from our school books. Especially should our histories dwell less upon the glories of war and much more upon the peaceful industries that minister to the development and upbuilding of the nations. (Applause.) We should employ people whose whole duty it should be to work among the teachers along these lines until every teacher in the land should be an Apostle of Peace. The same method should be pursued with the clergy and with the press. A

bureau of information should be established for the purpose of collecting and distributing to every paper in the land matter bearing vitally on this subject. Statesmen should be aroused to the necessity of bringing their influence to bear much more powerfully in dissuading their governments from these extravagant military preparations. Able financiers should warn bankers that in loaning the nations at these high rates of interest, they are taking the risk of losing in the near future their entire principal. Clubs should be established in every city and town in the land, to work actively for the checking of the war spirit, for the prevention of the present tremendous expenditure for military purposes, and for the election of representatives to carry out their wishes.

For the last five years work along these lines through the press, the schools, and the clergy has been going on in a small way, laying the foundations, as it were, for an International School of Peace, although this organization has not been publicly mentioned. Some of the best peace literature extant has been published. Its representatives have attended for several years the great Peace Congresses of the world, and three years ago aided materially in bringing the International Peace Congress to Boston, in making out the program of work, and in raising the funds necessary to its success. The protest against the coming military exposition at Jamestown has attracted wide. notice.

If so much has been accomplished with our limited organization and resources, what might we not hope to do if we could secure the counsel of the wisest in planning out a broader educational campaign, and the funds for carrying it on commensurate with the importance of the work in hand? Many an institution has its endowment of ten million dollars, but what institution of the world has so great a work to do as this International School of Peace, established for the purpose of creating among the nations of the earth the friendship and brotherhood of man? (Applause.) We need men and women who first of all are embued with enthusiasm for the work, believing it to be the greatest on the face of the earth; those who possess the true spirit of the reformer, the spirit which actuated a Luther, a Garrison and Phillips of our own day. It is the personality of the reformer which creates enthusiasm. He brings home to his

hearers the importance of his subject because of his intense earnestness. He knows how to communicate his zeal to others and turn their kindly feelings into action. We need men of that kind and we must make it possible to secure the co-operation of such if we would rid mankind of the greatest misfortune of all the ages.

Finally, this International School of Peace should be built on a foundation strong enough and broad enough to take in all the different organizations for carrying on the world's work, and merge them into one coherent, effective force for the upbuilding of society in every corner of the globe, for the elimination of all the influences that are retarding the productive work of man in his social, intellectual and moral progress, and for the strengthening of the influences that tend to promote good-fellowship and the welfare of all mankind.

Should we not appoint a committee to plan the work of such an organization and secure a proper endowment? This committee should be composed of broad-minded men, the leaders in education and industry, who know how to organize a great work and carry it to a successful issue. Some of these leaders of industry are already keenly alive to the necessary work and are prepared to do their share of it.

Are we expecting a few individuals to do this great work? It is a world's task, and if we wish to see it move on as it should, it must be undertaken by all, each one of us taking his full share of responsibility, however great or small. (Applause.)

MR. MARKS:

This meeting will be brought to a glorious close by Mr. William McCarroll, President of the New York Board of Trade and Transportation. I now introduce to you Mr. William McCarroll. (Applause.)

Commercial Organization as a Peace Promoter

WILLIAM MCCARROLL.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: There are two considerations that will prevent a glorious close. The first one is the speaker and the second one is the statement that this meeting would be closed in fifteen minutes by an eloquent speech, for which there is, I believe, just about a minute and a half. (Laughter.)

Ladies and gentlemen, I intend to do it, because veracity is the quality that in this day, by the highest authority, is most to be esteemed. (Laughter and applause.) There is an old proverb which says, as I recall it, that "His words were smoother than butter, but in his heart there was war"; and when the hour for the commissary department is in sight and a speaker gets up to close a meeting with a long speech, I believe that, however smooth might be his words, in the heart of his hearers there would be war (laughter) and in a Peace Meeting that would be very unbecoming. (Laughter.)

The New York Board of Trade and Transportation has for many years taken a deep interest in the movement for International Arbitration and Peace. It has watched and in a measure shared in its development. To-day it joins in the felicitations that are due and appropriate, as this great Congress gathers with representatives from many nations of the earth. Its meeting marks the progress of the movement which itself is a measure of the onward march of Christian civilization.

As we consider this, we find abundant cause for congratulation. It is not without significance to us that this month of April is the sixth anniversary of the first Hague Court, which followed the International Conference of nearly two years earlier, which was attended by one hundred delegates from twenty-six nations. We are now approaching the time of the next meeting in June, at which representatives of all the forty-five nations of the world will be present. In the interim of these gatherings, indeed within the last five years, more than sixty-five national disputes have been settled by arbitration, and within the last three years twenty nations have signed as many general arbitration treaties.

It is eminently fitting, and it seems something in the nature of compensating justice, that commercial organizations, as such, should unite in and actively support this Peace Movement. This is not only because peace is a necessary condition for commerce. Peace may exist without commerce, though that would be the peace of stagnation. But general commerce cannot flourish where peace does not prevail. I say "general" commerce, for it is true, of course, that war produces an unusual commercial demand for munitions and supplies. The claim has sometimes been made that such is an advantageous result of war, but it is at most limited and temporary, and the suggestion is heartless

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