sent M. Albert Thomas; Great Britain, Mr. Henderson; Belgium, M. Vandervelde, to dispel the distrust of the Russian Socialists and to uphold joint action between Russia and her Allies.1 These three gentlemen wrote to the Council of Workers' and Soldiers' Delegates, expressing surprise that they had called an international conference to consider peace before the conclusion of the negotiations between the Russian and the British, French and Belgian delegations.

To this came the reply that the Revolution was not only against Czardom but against the war, the blame for which falls upon international imperial

ism.

The Revolution showed the way out a union of the working classes everywhere to defeat attempts, on the part of Imperialism, to prolong the war in the interests of the wealthy and to prevent peace on the Russian terms.

The [Stockholm] conference can be the turning point . . . only if the members of the conference are imbued with these ideas. The idea of the necessity of a previous agreement among socialists of the Allied countries is futile, for the conference can succeed only if the Socialists consider themselves representatives not of the two belligerent parties but of a single movement of the working classes toward the common aim of a general peace."

Meaning of no annexations, no indemnities." The Russian reply also contained a very important explanation of what was meant by the no annexations, no indemnities " formula.

her lackeys, Austria and Turkey." He disclaimed "all punitive and improper indemnities" and urged that only by compelling the abdication of the Hohenzollerns and Hapsburgs can the German people bring the war to an early end.

See also, Villehardouin, "Stockholm, a French View" in New Europe, Sept. 15, 1917. For the opposite view see Arnold Bennett's article, p. 213.

Having recognized the right of the nations to dispose of their destiny, the members of the conference will come to an understanding without difficulty regarding the future of Alsace-Lorraine and other regions. Moreover, the working classes, relieved of the mutual distrust with which the Imperialists have envenomed them, will agree regarding the means of granting compensation and the amount of such compensation to the country devastated by war, like Belgium, Poland, Galicia, and Serbia. But it goes without saying that such compensation must have nothing in common with the contribution which is imposed on the conquered country."

James Duncan, labor member of the American Mission to Russia, was quoted in a dispatch of July 2 as saying that the Minister of Labor, Skobeleff, had made it clear to him " that Russian democracy means nothing by this phrase which we cannot heartily subscribe to. . . . Before this phrase was defined, it seemed to me that Germany was to emerge from the war with impunity and without making reparation for the damage she had done. But the Russian deputies do not mean this at all. They believe that Germany should be compelled to restore and make full reparation for Belgium, and they are not opposed to the principle of indemnities. The word contribution' refers exclusively to a kind of war-levy forced by Germany upon Brussels. There is no important difference between the aims of the Russian democracy and our own. We both agree upon the conditions upon which peace can be determined."

Vandervelde, writing in Le Temps (May 28), said: "Socialists of every country accept this [Russian] formula so far as it shuts out annexations against the will of their populations, and penalties

imposed by the victor on the vanquished. But we loudly claimed for Belgium complete reparation for damage caused, and we proclaim that the liberation of territories like the Trentino and Alsace-Lorraine are no annexations but disannexations:" 1

When Vandervelde addressed the General Congress of Workers' and Soldiers' Delegates of All Russia, Tcheidse replied: "You know our platform, which must be the basis of Peace. The sooner the war will be concluded, the sooner will the sufferings of Belgium end. Comrade Vandervelde, I ask you to remember and to tell your Belgian Comrades, that the liberation is not in a continuation of the war; not in the crushing of the Central Powers do the Russian Socialists see the freeing of Belgium, the freeing of the world from militarism and from the possibility of future wars, but in an immediate conclusion of the war on the only just and practical basis the Socialists' terms of peace." 2

CHAPTER VI

DEVELOPMENT OF THE STRUGGLE IN GERMANY: THE REICHSTAG RESOLUTION

I.

HERR SCHEIDEMANN, the leader of the Socialist Majority in the Reichstag, apparently carried home with him from Stockholm a new sense of how Germany was regarded abroad, and of the degree to which the character of the German government stood in the way of peace.

Lloyd-George's Glasgow Speech. The lesson was emphasized by Mr. Lloyd-George in his Glasgow speech of June 29, in which he dwelt significantly on this point.

No one wishes to dictate to the German people the form of government under which they choose to live. That is a matter entirely for themselves, but it is right we should say we could enter into negotiations with a free government in Germany with a different attitude of mind . . . with more confidence than we could with a government whom we knew to be dominated by the aggressive and arrogant spirit of Prussian militarism. And the Allied governments would, in my judgment, be acting wisely if they drew the distinction in their general attitude in a discussion of the terms of peace. The fatal error committed by Prussia in 1870 — the error which undoubtedly proves her bad faith at that time was that when she entered the war she was fighting against a restless military empire, dominated largely by mili

tary ideals, with military traditions behind them. When that empire fell it would have been wisdom of Germany to recognize the change immediately. Democratic France was a more sure guarantee for the case of Germany than the fortress of Metz, or the walled ramparts of Strasburg. If Prussia had taken that view, history would have taken a different course. It would have acted on the generous spirit of the great people who dwell in France, it would have reacted on the spirit and policy of Germany herself. Europe would have reaped a harvest of peace and good-will among men instead of garnering, as she does now, a whirlwind of hate, rage and human savagery. I trust the Allied Governments will take that as an element in their whole discussion of the terms and prospects of peace."

All this the contagious spirit of Russian liberty, the enlightenment gained at Stockholm, the encouraging implications of the Glasgow speech served to strengthen those in Germany who were striving for democratization. The Russian offensive of July, putting an end to the hopes of a separate Russian peace, and the knowledge of the vigor with which the United States was entering the war, also had the same effect.1

New German Demand for Reform and Peace. The internal struggle in Germany centered around the effort to secure a Chancellor and Ministry representative of the Reichstag. On the last day of June, the same day as Lloyd-George's Glasgow speech, a call, signed by well-known and conservative leaders, by Rohrbach, Delbrück, von Harnack,

1 The internal political considerations behind von BethmannHollweg's attitude at the time of his non-committal speech of May 15, and when he resigned, a month later, the office of Chancellor, which he had held since July, 1909, are interestingly analyzed in an article, Germany at the Cross-Roads," in New Europe of July 26, and in the New York Times' Current History for August, 1917.

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