I: American Relations with the Weimar Republic

I American Relations with the Weimar Republic

a. America Rejects Trials of War Criminals

IN THE YEARS immediately after the close of the World War the attitude of the American Government towards the Weimar Republic was one of watchful waiting. In the Department of State there was a definite fear that sparks from Soviet Russia might find an easy lodgment in the broken structure of Germany and thus start a fire that would consume all the landmarks of the old German way of life. This fear was increased by the remarks of certain Germans who had held important diplomatic posts under the Kaiser. In October 1919, Count von Bernstorff stressed the importance of establishing close connections between Germany and Russia: “Russia is the country which we can most conveniently exploit. Russia needs capital and intelligence which our industry can provide. Above all, now that Bolshevism is beginning in Germany we are becoming ‘cousin germains’ of the Russians. We must come to terms with the Bolsheviks.”1

The mounting unrest in Germany had many unpleasant expressions. In November 1919 there was a large demonstration in Heidelberg in which anti-Semitism and a spirit of excessive nationalism were clearly in evidence.2 By April 1921 anti-Semitism reached a peak in certain German cities, although it was strongly opposed by Catholic prelates like the Cardinal of Munich.3 After 1933, Hitler merely played upon prejudices that had long existed in Germany.

Fervid expressions of nationalism were in part caused by the loud talk of certain Allied statesmen with reference to holding trials for many prominent German leaders as war criminals. This talk led the ex-Kaiser, Wilhelm II, to write to President Wilson and offer to serve as a victim in place of other Germans: “If the Allied and Associated Governments want a victim let them take me instead of the nine hundred Germans who have committed no offence other than that of serving their country in the war.”4 There was no real need for the ex-Kaiser to make this offer. The American Government was strongly opposed to any war-criminal trials. On February 6, 1920, Secretary Lansing sent a significant instruction to the American Embassy in Paris: “This Government has not yet ratified the Treaty; it is not joining in the demand of the Allies, and it is in no way backing the insistence of the Allies in the immediate carrying out of the demand [for the delivery of German war criminals].”5

b. The Allies Balk at the Payment of American Army of Occupation

The Allies soon abandoned the project of trying Germans as war criminals. Apparently they strongly resented the attitude of Secretary Lansing in this matter because they showed a most non-co-operative spirit with regard to the payment of the costs of the American Army of Occupation. The Wilson Administration had expected the payments to be made promptly out of German reparations, but this action was blocked for several years. In 1923 the British representative on the Reparation Commission expressed a doubt whether the United States, having rejected the Treaty of Versailles, could assert any just claim to be paid for the Rhineland occupation.6 Similar statements deeply angered George B. Lockwood, secretary of the Republican National Committee, who wrote to Secretary Hughes to express his indignation at the situation. He was certain that the “haggling and pettifogging, duplicity and downright dishonesty that has characterized the attitude of Great Britain and the other Allied Powers in their treatment of America’s claims” indicated a strong desire to “bilk” the United States out of any payment for occupation costs.7

On May 25, 1923, the governments of Belgium, Britain, France, and Italy signed an agreement with the United States providing for the reimbursement of the costs of the American Army of Occupation. This reimbursement was to be paid out of German reparations over a period of twelve years.8 Although the Allied governments had finally consented to this long-range schedule of payments, Secretary Hughes noted that in their own case they had insisted that the payments for occupation be “met practically in full as they fell due.” It seemed to him that “they should have distributed the money received for these arms costs equitably; instead, they kept these moneys and left us out.”9

c. France Moves into the Ruhr

In the matter of reparations the French Government proved exceedingly difficult to satisfy. Under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles provision was made for the appointment of a Reparation Commission which should determine the amount owed by Germany and prepare a schedule for “discharging the entire obligation within a period of thirty years from May 1, 1921.” Up to that date the German Government was to pay the equivalent of five billion dollars. Early in 1921, Germany claimed that she had completed this payment in the form of gold, securities, coal, and other commodities, but the Reparation Commission declared that less than half of the required sum had really been paid. The German Government then appealed to the United States to “mediate the reparations question and to fix the sum to be paid . . . to the Allied Powers.”10 Secretary Hughes refused to be drawn into this dispute, but he did admonish the Weimar Republic to make “directly to the Allied Governments clear, definite and adequate proposals which would in all respects meet its just obligations.”11

On April 28, 1921, the Reparation Commission announced that the total German indemnity had been fixed at 132,000,000,000 gold marks or approximately $33,000,000,000. The schedule of payments was forwarded to Germany on May 5 and was promptly accepted.12 Although the first installment of $250,000,000 was paid on August 31, the decline in the value of the mark indicated fundamental financial difficulties in Germany. During 1922 the German Government asked for a moratorium extending two and one-half years. Britain was inclined to favor this request; France was bitterly opposed to it. Under French pressure the Reparation Commission finally declared that Germany was in default and Poincaré insisted upon reprisals.

The American Government was deeply interested in this German problem. Peace between Germany and the United States had been effected under the terms of a joint resolution signed by President Harding on July 2, 1921.13 This action had been followed by a treaty (August 25, 1921) which went into effect on November 11 of that year.14 Under the terms of these instruments all the rights, privileges, indemnities, and reparations to which the United States was entitled under the Armistice and the Treaty of Versailles were “expressly reserved.” Separate peace with Germany would not mean the loss of any of America’s hard-won rights.

These rights would have no value in a Germany whose economic structure was destroyed. Therefore, American representatives abroad looked with strong disapproval upon Poincaré’s determination to press for prompt payment of impossible reparations. In Rome, Ambassador Child talked the situation over with Barthou, the mouthpiece of Poincaré. He reported to Secretary Hughes that this conversation revealed that Barthou had “an anti-German prejudice so strong as to vitiate sound judgment.” He thought it might be necessary for the “world to weigh the necessity of acting independently of the French Government in joint appeals to public opinion.”15

The following month Ambassador Herrick, who was usually quite Francophile, wrote to Secretary Hughes and deprecated the attitude of Poincaré with reference to pressure upon Germany: “There is now definitely no hope of making any impression on Poincaré personally. He has learned nothing and forgotten nothing, not from lack of intelligence but rather from definite purpose. . . . He has staked his political life and reputation on his aggressive policy. If you want to do anything effective to stop this, you must in my judgment make some public utterance with the idea of helping reasonable French opinion.”16 But Hughes replied that an appeal to the French people over the head of their government was a dangerous proceeding: “Previous efforts of this sort have caused more trouble than they cured.”17

In January 1923, French troops moved into the Ruhr as far east as Dortmund. The British Government regarded this action as illegal and refused to support it. Occupation of the Ruhr would paralyze German industry and seriously affect reparations and British trade with Germany. In order to counter this French policy of pressure, German workers in the Ruhr laid down their tools. Mines and factories shut down and telephone, telegraph, and railways services were discontinued. All reparation payments to the Allied governments ceased.

The American commercial attaché in Berlin looked at this French invasion of the Ruhr as an attempt permanently to “emasculate Germany as a Great Power.”18 The American Ambassador reported in a similar vein: “The people have been treated as a subject and alien race; their trade has been harassed and largely destroyed; ineffectual troops have been quartered here and there in their villages. Apparently everything that would arouse hostility, and nothing that would conciliate, has been done. As a result, the Rhineland population today is savagely anti-French.”19

To Herbert Hoover the repressive policy of the French had a world impact. French interference with the coal trade of the Ruhr would upset “the entire coal market of the world and would make life more difficult everywhere.”20 The most graphic description of French terrorism in the Ruhr is given by George E. R. Gedye in The Revolver Republic:

In Essen I saw a boy, one morning, sobbing bitterly after being thrashed by a French officer for failing to yield the pavement to him, and in Recklinghausen the French pursued with their riding-whips into the theatre some men who had taken refuge there, stopped the performance of “King Lear,” and drove out the whole audience. . . . On the night of nth March the bodies of a French chasseur subaltern and a Régie station master were found near Buer. . . . The next morning a seven o’clock curfew was proclaimed in Buer. . . . The order to be indoors by seven had been issued on a Sunday after many people had gone off on excursions for the day. On their return, all-unwitting, they were beaten with riding-whips, struck with rifle butts, chased through the streets by French soldiers, and shot at. A workman named Fabeck was shot dead as he stood with his young wife waiting for a tram.21

These repressive tactics finally bore fruit in the agreement of September 26, 1923, when Germany promised to abandon the policy of passive resistance. But the price of victory had been high. The British Government had not looked with favor upon the occupation of the Ruhr with the consequent collapse of Germany’s economic structure, and opinion in neutral countries was sharply critical. In France the fall in the value of the franc caused milder counsel to prevail. The way was thus prepared for discussions that led to the adoption of the Dawes Plan. The Inter-Allied Agreement providing for this plan was signed in London, August 30, 1924, and the evacuation of French troops from the Ruhr began immediately.22

d. President Hoover Suggests a Moratorium on Reparations

The Dawes Plan was merely a financial sedative and not a cure for the ills of Germany. It was silent with reference to the total reparations bill. Therefore, in a technical sense, the old total bill of $33,000,000,000 fixed by the Reparation Commission was still in force. But it should have been evident to the so-called financial experts that Germany could not continue making huge annual reparations payments for an indefinite period. They should also have realized that no great power would be content to remain in the financial and political chains that were riveted upon Germany under the terms of the plan. In this regard the Commercial and Financial Chronicle made some highly pertinent remarks:

Nothing like the proposed procedure is to be found in history. Germany is to be taken over and administered in the same way as a corporation no longer able to meet its obligations is taken over by the law and transferred to the hands of the bankruptcy commissioners. . . . In reality a foreign control of internal affairs has been imposed such as never before existed either in our times or in the past. . . . Never before has it been proposed to take such complete possession of the wealth of a nation.23

Payments under the Dawes Plan increased each year until they reached (in the fifth year) 2,500,000,000 marks. The German Government was able to make them only because of the large volume of foreign loans. These loans began in 1924 when American financial promoters were scouring Europe in a fervid search for borrowers. According to Dr. Koepker-Aschoff, Prussian Minister of Finance during the years 1925-26, every week some representative of American bankers would call at his office and endeavor to press loans upon him. German officials were “virtually flooded with loan offers by foreigners.”24 It made little difference whether a loan was actually needed. In Bavaria a little hamlet wished to secure $125,000 in order to improve the town’s power station. An American promoter soon convinced the mayor that he should apply for $3,000,000 which would provide not only for the expansion of the power plant but would also finance the construction of various nonproductive projects. The possibility of repayment was given little thoughtful consideration.25

But reparation payments had to be made and this was possible only through foreign loans. From 1924 to June 30, 1931, the following loans were advanced by American bankers:

	Reichsmarks
The Dawes and Young loans	875,000,000
States and Municipalities	860,000,000
Public utilities	1,073,000,000
Municipal Banks	188,000,000
Private borrowers	2,269,000,000
	5,265,000,000

These large American loans represented 55 per cent of the total amount loaned to Germany during these years. It is obvious that American businessmen had a very important stake in continued German solvency, and they scanned with deep interest the manner in which these loans were used in Germany. Her greatest achievement in the sphere of reconstruction was the entire remodeling of her iron and steel industry. Significant technical progress was made in the coal industry, and enormous strides were made in the production of coke and gas and the utilization of by-products. The chemical industry increased its prewar output by at least 25 per cent, and the electrical industries had a similar mushroom growth.26

But the tremendous burden of reparation payments and interest charges on foreign loans was too much for the shaky German financial structure.27 Another financial palliative was now tried. On June 7, 1929, a group of financial experts headed by Owen D. Young handed to the Reparation Commission, and the governments concerned, a financial agreement that was conveniently called the Young Plan. Under its terms the total indemnity bill was reduced to $8,032,500,000 and was capitalized at 5 1/2 per cent. The period for its payment was limited to fifty-eight and one-half years. The Reparation Commission was abolished in favor of a Bank for International Settlements which would enjoy broad powers. As a concession to Germany, the extensive financial and political controls outlined under the Dawes Plan were abandoned.28

The Young Plan went into effect in 1930, but it was a panacea that failed to cure the ills of a world that was on the brink of a breakdown. Some ascribed this desperate situation to an inadequate gold supply; others thought in terms of a surplus of silver. Technology was blamed because it had enabled man to multiply the output of industrial and agricultural products to the point where the world market was flooded with cheap commodities. Aristide Briand pointed to an economic federation of Europe as the best means of surmounting the difficulties that threatened to engulf the Continent, but the Austrian Foreign Minister, Dr. Johann Schober, expressed the opinion that it would not be expedient to push things too fast. Perhaps the best step along the road to eventual European federation would be an Austro-German customs union! In March 1931 this proposed union was formally announced by the governments of Austria and Germany with a cogent explanation of its objectives.

Although Britain was not opposed to this arrangement, France affected to see political motives back of it and expressed vehement disapproval. Her refusal to grant a much-needed loan to the principal bank in Austria (the Kredit Anstalt) helped to undermine confidence in the stability of that institution. This, in turn, had its effect upon the German economic structure that was already tottering under the weight of a large unfavorable trade balance.29

Realizing that Austria and Germany were going through a period of frenzied finance, President Hoover (June 20) proposed a one-year world moratorium, from July 1, with reference to “all payments on inter-governmental debts, reparations and relief debts, both principal and interest. . . not including obligations of governments held by private citizens.” He made it clear, however, that this action would not mean “the cancellation of the debts” due to the United States.30

When France delayed acceptance of this proposal the situation in Europe grew rapidly worse. During the seventeen days “that France held up the Hoover Plan, a run on the German banks and the calling in of short-term credits drained the country of some $300,000,000. All banks in Germany for a time were closed. The Hoover Plan would have saved Germany $406,000,000 this year.”31

e. Chancellor Brüning Is Compelled to Resign

With Germany in financial chaos, Secretary Stimson decided to pay a visit to Berlin in order to get a close-up of the situation. The German press, “without a single discordant note,” gave him a “hearty welcome and the occasion was seized to express in front-page editorials the gratitude felt for America’s . . . friendliness towards Germany.”32 Stimson had a long conversation with Dr. Brüning, the German Chancellor. It was not long before they discovered that they had fought along the Western Front in opposing forces that had repeatedly clashed. The warrior tie drew them at once close together and with President Hindenburg it was much the same thing. To Stimson, the President of the Weimar Republic was an “impressive, fine old man.”33

But it required more than Stimson’s good will to save the Weimar Republic. The failure of the Allied governments to carry out the disarmament pledges of the Treaty of Versailles, the heavy burden of the Young Plan with its consequent crushing taxation, and the difficulties in securing a market for manufactured goods made the situation in Germany seem almost hopeless. In the spring of 1932, Brüning realized that generous concessions on the part of the Allies were badly needed in order to check the tide of National Socialism that was beginning to rise in a menacing manner.

The only way to banish the shadow of Hitlerism was to strengthen the supports of the Brüning Government. But France refused to see this plain fact. Indeed there is evidence to indicate that certain French statesmen conspired to destroy the Brüning Government. According to Brüning himself, “one major factor in Hitler’s rise . . . was the fact that he received large sums of money from foreign countries in 1923 and later [France, Poland, and Czechoslovakia], and was well paid for sabotaging the passive resistance in the Ruhr district. . . . In later years he [Hitler] was paid to excite unrest and encourage revolution in Germany by people who imagined that this might weaken Germany permanently and make the survival of any constitutional, central government impossible.”34

In partial support of this statement by Dr. Brüning there is the following paragraph from Louis P. Lochner’s intriguing book, What About Germany?:

If there was one foreign statesman who thoroughly misjudged Hitler and his movement, it was André François-Poncet, the French Ambassador to Berlin. From what I know of behind-the-scenes activities towards the end of the Bruening era in 1932, I am forced to conclude that no other diplomat is more directly responsible for the elevation to power of Adolf Hitler than this brilliant, forever-wisecracking French politician. According to François-Poncet, the incorruptible Chancellor, Heinrich Bruening, was too brainy and experienced in the wily game of international politics. Hitler, on the other hand, was a fool and a political dilettante. . . . With the Nazi leader in power, he thought it would be much easier to effect deals which would be favorable to France.35

At any rate, the French Government in the spring of 1932 greatly helped to bring about Brüning’s fall. When the Disarmament Conference met in Geneva in February 1932, Brüning presented a program that he thought would find favor in Germany. Ramsay MacDonald and Secretary Stimson expressed their approval of the Brüning proposal, but Tardieu, of France, resorted to the usual French tactics of delay. When Brüning returned to Berlin with empty hands, Hindenburg summoned him to the President’s office and criticized him so sharply that resignation was the only course left open to him.36

When Brüning fell the fate of the Weimar Republic was sealed. And the fault did not lie solely on the shoulders of France. Walter Lippmann summarized the situation in a lucid commentary:

Now that he [Brüning] has fallen, tributes will be paid . . . all over the world, and everywhere there will be great regret that so experienced and upright a statesman is no longer the German spokesman. He is the best liked and most trusted man in Europe. . . . He has lacked only men of equal stature in other countries with whom he could work. . . . Though it appears that he has fallen because of intrigues by the Nationalists [in Germany], what undermined him and made the intrigues possible was the failure of France, Great Britain and the United States to take a single constructive step toward the restoration of international confidence and of the trade and credit which would depend upon it.37

f. The Disarmament Problem Remains a Challenge

The fall of the Brüning Government emphasized the difficulties surrounding the problem of disarmament. It was the same old story of broken pledges by the Allied governments. They had the plausible excuse that the phraseology of Article 8 of the Covenant of the League of Nations was ambiguous: “The Members of the League recognize that the maintenance of peace requires the reduction of national armaments to the lowest point consistent with national safety and the enforcement by common action of international obligations.” In discussing this phraseology, Lord Davies makes the following pertinent comment: “Here is an attempt to compromise, to square the circle, to combine as a basis for reduction two incompatible principles, namely the old doctrine of absolute self-defence . . . and the alternative idea of a police function.”38

It was inevitable that statesmen would differ with reference to the interpretation of this article. André Tardieu asserted that its language did not bind France to any plan for disarmament. Although there was a “legal obligation” to which Germany had subscribed, there was nothing to which France was bound except a “desire” to reduce her armaments.39 Aristide Briand did not agree with Tardieu in this matter. He argued that France was bound by Article 8 to agree to some plan for disarmament. She had partly carried out this pledge by making substantial reductions in her armaments, but was unable to go any further unless other nations took adequate steps to insure French security.40

The American view relative to disarmament was clearly stated by Professor James T. Shotwell: “Germany had been disarmed with the understanding . . . that the other signatories would also voluntarily limit their armaments with due regard to what Germany was forced to do.”41 In 1933 the American position was given cogent expression by Norman H. Davis, who told the Conference for the Reduction and Limitation of Armaments that

it would neither have been just or wise, nor was it intended, that the Central Powers should be subject for all times to a special treatment in armaments. There is and has been a corresponding duty on the part of the other Powers, parties to the peace treaties, that by successive stages they too would bring their armaments down to a level strictly determined by the needs of self-defence.42

In March 1933, Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald presented his plan to the Disarmament Conference. The proposed size of European armies was bound to arouse resentment in Germany: Czechoslovakia, 100,000; France, 200,000 for home country, 200,000 for overseas; Germany, 200,000; Italy, 200,000 for home country, 50,000 for overseas; Poland, 200,000; Russia, 500,000.43

In order to ascertain with precision the viewpoint of Chancellor Hitler on the matter of disarmament, President Roosevelt decided to send Norman H. Davis to Berlin for a conversation that would explore the situation. On the afternoon of April 8, 1933, Davis had a long conference with Hitler who immediately referred to the provisions of the Treaty of Versailles which he regarded as “designed to keep Germany forever in a state of inferiority and to discredit them in the eyes of the world.” He thought it was ridiculous for France to have any fear of Germany. France was the most heavily armed nation in the world; Germany had the pitiful force allowed her under the terms of Versailles. The only reason why “France could have any apprehension of Germany was because she knew she was doing an unjust thing in trying to force Germany forever to live under treaty conditions which no self-respecting nation could tolerate.” In conclusion Hitler remarked that while he did not want “war, the Germans could not forever live under the terms of a Treaty which was iniquitous and based entirely upon false premises as to Germany’s war guilt.”44

With these ominous words ringing in his ears, Davis hurried to the Disarmament Conference at Geneva to discuss the MacDonald Plan with its proposed army limitations that Germany would never accept. On April 25 he received definite instructions from Secretary Hull:

Please be guided by the broad policy of United States in consistently pressing for immediate and practical actual disarmament. Our ultimate goal is twofold: First, reduction of present annual costs of armament maintenance in all national budgets and, Second, arrival at a goal of domestic policing armaments in as few years as possible. . . . We regard the MacDonald Plan as a definite and excellent step towards the ultimate objective, but that it is a step only and must be followed by succeeding steps.45

In hurried attempts to expedite a solution of the disarmament problem, Prime Ministers MacDonald and Herriot paid visits to Washington, but they accomplished little. On April 26, President Roosevelt had an extended conference with Herriot during which many important topics were discussed. Herriot expressed the opinion that the most “dangerous spot in Europe” was the Polish Corridor. The President immediately observed that he could “not understand why some mechanical arrangement could not be made by which Germany and East Prussia could be more closely united either by air communication, by elevated train service or, if necessary, by underground tunnels.” But Herriot quickly responded with warm praise of the existing train and highway service between the two frontiers. He then, unwittingly, put his finger upon the real difficulty in arriving at any understanding between Germany and Poland by discussing the “artistic qualities of the Poles, how difficult they were to negotiate with and how even the French . . . found them exceedingly difficult to restrain and quiet whenever they became excited.” At the end of the conference Herriot “did not offer any suggestion for overcoming the Polish Corridor danger spot nor did he seem to feel that there was any solution to the problem.”46

It was this “danger spot” that in 1939 was one of the prime causes of conflict. In 1933, Herriot realized that the “artistic qualities” of the Poles made it impossible to suggest to them a realistic solution of the Corridor question. These same qualities were even more in evidence in the summer of 1939 when the Polish Ambassador in Paris was not on speaking terms with either Bonnet or Daladier. Whom the Gods wish to destroy they first make mad!

In 1933, Hitler regarded the Polish demands for an army of 200,000 as an evident indication of madness. He remembered only too well the bloody forays carried on by Korfanty’s irregulars both before and after the plebiscite in Upper Silesia. A Polish army of 200,000, together with a Russian army of 500,000, constituted a most dangerous threat to Germany’s Eastern Front. The MacDonald Plan was not welcomed in Berlin. It would have to be amended in favor of a larger German army.

But any arguments for an increase in Germany’s military forces met with instant opposition in Washington. On May 6, Dr. Schacht had a conference with President Roosevelt who quickly informed him that the “United States will insist that Germany remain in statu quo in armament.” At the same time he was informed that the American Government would “support every possible effort to have the offensive armaments of every other nation brought down to the German level.” At the conclusion of the conference the President intimated “as strongly as possible” that he regarded “Germany as the only possible obstacle to a Disarmament Treaty and that he hoped Dr. Schacht would give this point of view to Hitler as quickly as possible.”47

Hitler responded by calling a meeting of the Reichstag on May 17 to hear his address on the question of disarmament. In order to influence the remarks of the German Chancellor upon that occasion, President Roosevelt hurriedly issued (May 16) a statement to the “Chiefs of State of all countries participating in the General Disarmament or International Monetary and Economic Conferences.” He stressed the hope that peace might be assured “through practical measures of disarmament and that all of us may carry to victory our common struggle against economic chaos.” These practical measures included the “complete elimination of all offensive weapons.” In addition to this momentous step all nations “should enter into a solemn and definite pact of nonaggression.”48

On May 17, Hitler answered the Roosevelt proposals in a very general manner. He professed to find in the suggestions of the President some items he could support as a means of overcoming “the international crisis.” Although Germany would still insist upon “actual equality of rights as regards disarmament,” she would not resort to force in order to achieve her objectives.”49

These conciliatory remarks of the Führer brought instant relief to many Americans. The Cincinnati Enquirer thought that Hitler had thrown upon other shoulders the responsibility for real disarmament,50 while the Christian Science Monitor expressed the belief that the movement for world peace had been greatly strengthened.51

Encouraged by these signs of agreement, Norman H. Davis announced on May 22 that the American Government was ready to consult with other nations in the event of a threat to world peace and would take no action to hinder the efforts of other nations to restrain the activities of aggressor nations.52 America was moving down the road to collective security.

g. American Press Opinion of Hitler in 1933

While the Department of State was moving down the road of German-American relations with great caution, the American press was divided in its comments upon Hitler. After the Führer had been elevated to the office of Chancellor (January 30, 1933), some papers expressed the opinion that the conservative elements in the German Cabinet would dampen Hitler’s ardor for any radical action. In this regard the following excerpt from the New York Times is typical:

It would be useless to try to disguise the qualms which the news from Berlin must cause to all friends of Germany. At the head of the German Republic has been placed a man who has openly scorned it and vowed that he would destroy it as soon as he could set up the personal dictatorship which was his boasted aim. A majority of the Cabinet, which he, as Chancellor, has been forced to accept would be strongly opposed to him if he sought to translate the wild words . . . of his campaign speeches into political action. . . . Best assurance of all is that President Hindenburg will retain supreme command and be prepared to unmake Hitler as quickly as he made him.53

The Boston Evening Transcript leaned toward the view that responsibility had already sobered the new Chancellor: “The more power passes into Hitler’s hands, the more sobriety enters his mind.”54 The eagerness to see a silver lining to the clouds over Germany was evident in many newspaper editorials after the German election of March 5 had assured Hitler of a majority in the Reichstag. The New York Sun believed this majority was an indication of the yearning of the German people for a ruler with a “strong hand.”55 The Philadelphia Public Ledger56 and the Los Angeles Times57 sought comfort from the fact that Hitler would suppress any internal disorder, while the Milwaukee Journal inclined toward the view that the Hitler majority might be a good thing for “the German people.”58 The Atlanta Constitution was disposed to think that the Hitler victory at the polls might help stabilize conditions on the continent of Europe.59

But there were many papers that expressed deep misgivings. Paul Block’s Pittsburgh Post-Gazette gloomily commented on the passing of democracy in Germany.60 The Nashville Banner rejected the view that the election of March 5 was a true reflection of German sentiment,61 and the Washington News flatly declared that the election was a “fake.”62

The hope that President Hindenburg might prove a restraining force that would curb any radical moves by Hitler was soon dissipated when the Führer pressed for the enactment of an Enabling Bill that would transfer the legislative power to the Chancellor and thus permit him to relieve “the President of unnecessary work.” On the morning of March 23 (1933) this Enabling Bill came before the Reichstag, then sitting in the Kroll Opera House. While the bill was being discussed the incendiary chant of the Storm Troopers who surrounded the building came clearly to the ears of the anxious legislators: “Give us the Bill or else fire and murder.” When the bill was finally passed by an overwhelming majority in the Reichstag, Hindenburg was prevailed upon to sign it and thus he gave clear evidence of his willingness to destroy the Weimar Republic he had sworn to uphold.63

The reaction of certain newspapers to the passage of the Enabling Bill was immediate and bitterly critical. Their viewpoint was trenchantly expressed by the Baltimore Sun: “There is no escape from the conclusion that the Hitler dictatorship is an evil, sadistic and brutal affair, with most of whose declared aspirations it is impossible to sympathize.”64

h. American Diplomats Regard Germany with Misgivings

Some of the dispatches from American representatives in Berlin confirmed the dark suspicions of pessimistic American newspapers. The consul general in Berlin was George S. Messersmith who wrote many long accounts that were critical of the Nazi regime. On the evening of May 10 some twenty thousand books by “Jewish and Marxistic authors” were burned in the great square between the State Opera House and the buildings of the University of Berlin. This pyrotechnic display was followed by pressure that compelled large numbers of persons with Jewish blood to retire from important public and semipublic positions. Authors, artists, educators, physicians, and scientists began to flee from Germany in increasing numbers. Concentration camps for political prisoners made their appearance in certain parts of Germany, but Mr.

Messersmith hastened to add that there was “no reason to believe that the persons in these camps were . . . mistreated.”65

These critical comments of Mr. Messersmith were supplemented by the less acidulous remarks of George A. Gordon, the American chargé d’affaires in Berlin. Mr. Gordon feared that the German Foreign Office was due for a “shakeup” which might have some unpleasant aspects. He then commented upon the rapprochement between Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy. Both Goebbels and Göring were working hard to make this accord firm and lasting. With reference to Russia the situation was quite different. There was a fundamental antagonism between

Hitlerism and Bolshevism. Bolshevism is essentially an international movement, based on a single class—the Proletariat—and on the international solidarity of the Proletariat. Its final goal is world revolution and the establishment of a communistic world-state. Hitlerism is an essentially national movement. . . . It believes that friendly international relations and universal peace cannot be secured by co-ordinating all nations on a proletarian basis and by wiping out their national differences.66

By the middle of June the dispatches from Mr. Gordon took on a distinctly somber tinge. There were indications that the Nazi leaders believed that the time had arrived “for the complete absorption of all political parties in accordance with their philosophy of a ‘total state’ in which there can be no room for any party other than the Nazi Party. . . . Arrests of Catholic leaders and the suppression of Catholic journals have been reported from various parts of the country.”67

On the evening of June 22, Dr. Brüning paid a visit to the American Embassy and expressed his profound concern at the “recent events and especially by the apathetic attitude evinced by President Hindenburg and his immediate entourage.” The President had “done nothing whatever” about numerous outrages and it was Brüning’s fear that the lawless elements in the Nazi Party would always “prevail over Hitler in the long run.”68

But the Führer soon showed surprising strength in his resistance to the clamor of the Nazi clique that was trying to speed the movement of the revolutionary tide that was sweeping over Germany. He rebuked Goebbels “who had recently been indulging in more than the usual inflammatory talk concerning the imminence of a Second Revolution.” Hitler was strongly opposed to such a movement which he believed would lead to nothing but “chaotic results.” It seemed apparent that he had “decided to take the bolder and more statesmanlike line of trying to curb the illegalities and excesses of his followers.”69

Mr. Messersmith shared Gordon’s opinion that Hitler was determined to check the excesses of his restless followers. His assurances to German businessmen had been definite and forceful. The dissolution of political parties might have some good results. One could only say “that for the present time the outlook is decidedly more optimistic and encouraging than it has been at any time since March 5.”70

i. President Roosevelt “Torpedoes” the World Economic Conference

After the fall of the Brüning Government the Allies realized that the system of reparations was at an end. At the Lausanne Conference (June 16-July 8, 1932) this fact was frankly recognized. The new German Chancellor, Franz von Papen, offered to pay a reasonable sum in order to liquidate all reparation claims. This suggestion was adopted with certain reservations, and the amount was fixed at $714,000,000.71

After this important item had been settled, the German Government next turned to the task of finding some means of meeting the payments on the large public and private debts contracted before the banking crisis of July 1931. The “reflationary policy” of Hitler had resulted in an impressive increase in the production of coal and iron, and an equally impressive decline in unemployment, but despite these favorable factors the German export surplus was constantly dwindling, thus destroying any possibility of making payments on foreign loans. As the economic situation in Germany grew worse, Dr. Schacht, president of the Reichsbank, on May 29, 1933, had a conference with the representatives of Germany’s creditors in six countries.72 After five days of discussion these representatives issued a statement which agreed that a continued decline in the Reichsbank’s reserves might impair its functions and that an increase in reserves was required to strengthen the bank “in its successful endeavors to maintain the stability of the German currency.”

The statement concluded with a strong expression of hope that the permanent solution of the German transfer problem would be made “one of the most important and most urgent objectives of the World Economic Conference” soon to be held in London.73

It was apparent to banking circles that Dr. Schacht was about to take some temporary step to protect the reserves of the Reichsbank. He could then wait and see what solution would be offered by the World Economic Conference. On June 9 he finally issued a regulation which decreed a transfer moratorium on the interest and sinking fund payments on foreign debts estimated at approximately 17,000,000,000 reichsmarks.74 John Foster Dulles, as the representative of American bankers, sent Dr. Schacht a telegram of sharp protest.75 Schacht, in turn, waited to see what the World Economic Conference would do with reference to the economic ills that were plaguing Europe. He did not have to spend much time in contemplation. When the conference convened on June 12, the representatives of Britain, France, and Italy were anxious as an initial step for President Roosevelt to agree upon a mild declaration of financial policy. Raymond Moley regarded the declaration as “wholly innocuous.” It was merely a statement that “gold would ultimately be reestablished as a measure of international exchange value, but that each nation reserved the right to decide when it would return to a gold standard and undertake stabilization.”76

When this declaration was placed before President Roosevelt he abruptly declined to accept it and thereby “torpedoed” the conference. All Europe “exploded with resentment and wrath” at the President’s action,77 and the delegations of experts dejectedly left London. On July 27 the conference formally adjourned without having reached any agreement on the important questions of credit policy, price levels, limitation of currency fluctuations, exchange control, tariffs, quotas, subsidies, and the resumption of foreign lending.78 If one may borrow a familiar phrase of Woodrow Wilson used in a different connection, President Roosevelt “broke the heart of the world” and spent the rest of his life trying to put it together again.

After the failure of the World Economic Conference to find some answer to the questions that clamored for settlement, Dr. Schacht carried on negotiations with the representatives of American bankers and finally reached a compromise whereby the Dawes loan (1924) and the Young loan (1930) would be exempted from the scope of the moratorium he had announced on June 9. Other concessions were made to American banking interests, but the situation remained distinctly unsatisfactory. The collapse at London was a serious blow to the plans of European statesmen for a satisfactory adjustment of political and economic difficulties.

j. The Four Power Pact Proves a Failure

The collapse of the London Economic Conference had an immediate effect upon the political situation on the Continent, because it helped to sabotage the political accord arrived at in the Four Power Pact signed at Rome on July 15, 1933. The concept of this Four Power Pact appears to have originated with Prime Minister MacDonald who talked the matter over at Geneva in March 1933. Mussolini then took up the matter and on March 18 transmitted to the British, French, and German ambassadors at Rome a tentative outline of a Four Power agreement. The draft not only provided for the collaboration of the powers in the preservation of European peace but recognized the need for a revision of the peace treaties concluded at the close of the World War. Particular reference was made to the need of some settlement of the colonial aspirations of Germany and Italy. With reference to the Polish Corridor the draft provided for the return to Germany of a strip of territory which would connect East Prussia “with the rest of the Reich.” The British Government frowned upon these provisions and they were finally deleted.79

As the negotiations for the Four Power Pact slowly proceeded at the different European capitals, the Italian Ambassador in London (Grandi) had a conversation with Norman Davis, with reference to the problem of disarmament. He expressed the opinion that the best way to speed an accord on the matter of disarmament and other questions was to have a meeting between Daladier, Hitler, MacDonald, and Mussolini. This could be brought about only on the initiative of the United States.80 The President failed to respond to this overture, but the negotiations proceeded so rapidly that the Four Power Agreement was initialed in Rome on June 7. Its provisions were a confirmation of the Kellogg-Briand Pact. The four powers would “consult together as regards all questions which appertain to them,” and would “make every effort to pursue, within the framework of the League of Nations, a policy of effective co-operation between all Powers with a view to the maintenance of peace.” The high contracting parties would also “make every effort to ensure the success of the Disarmament Conference and, should questions which particularly concern them remain in suspense on the conclusion of the Conference, they reserve the right to reexamine these questions between themselves in pursuance of the present agreement.” This consultative arrangement also included “all economic questions which have a common interest for Europe and particularly for its economic restoration.”81

A week after the agreement had been initialed in Rome, Lord Tyrrell, the British Ambassador in Paris, had a conversation with Ambassador Jesse Straus. After an extended eulogy of Daladier, Tyrrell then expressed “great fear of the future.” Hitler was faced with a tremendous task in Germany and would “lose out, unless he found means of carrying out his many promises which were to result from an Organized Germany. . . . Then the great danger of a communistic uprising might threaten the peace of Europe.” He was distressed over the fact that a dictatorship existed in Germany because the only stable form of government was “the democratic form, and that the sort of medieval rule that Germany was now suffering from could not last. . . . He expressed the opinion that. . . both England and the United States are responsible for the rise of Hitlerism.”82

The fears of Lord Tyrrell were felt by many other statesmen who did not have much faith in the Four Power Pact that was formally signed at Rome on July 15, 1933. In confirming the Kellogg-Briand Pact, it merely guaranteed the provisions of the Treaty of Versailles which few recognized as a perfect treaty. Mussolini had been realistic in including in his first draft provisions to deal with the Polish Corridor and the colonial aspirations of the German and Italian governments. The refusal of Britain and France to agree to this draft made the Four Power Pact a scrap of worthless paper.

k. William E. Dodd Goes to Germany as U.S. Ambassador

There is ample evidence in the Colonel House Papers in the Yale University library that the selection of William E. Dodd as the American Ambassador to Germany was made upon the strong recommendations of Colonel House and Daniel C. Roper, one-time commissioner of internal revenue.83 Also, there is no doubt that this selection was an unfortunate one. The Colonel did not realize that Dodd knew little about American foreign policy and even less about the problems of Europe. His knowledge of the German language was so limited that his conversations in that tongue were as full of pauses as a hesitation waltz. In Berlin he was always uncomfortable. As an American liberal he had a deep-seated dislike for every aspect of the Nazi movement. If he had been as fluent as George Bancroft he would have had to watch his words so that some sharp edge of criticism did not thrust its way through the wide-spaced texture of his discourse.

It is evident that a bigger man would have done a better job. Diplomacy is a profession that requires keen eyes that read between the lines of international relations, and sensitive ears that quickly detect the undertones of intrigue. With his second-rate mind that had mastered merely the dubious fundamentals of how to get ahead in the historical profession, Dodd was really a babe-in-the-woods in the dark forests of Berlin. Colonel House had moved with safety through those same deep shadows, but the Nazi wolf was far more dangerous than the Hohenzollern eagle. In the pages of Dodd’s diary one gets occasional glimpses of the torments that flitted through his mind as he endeavored to size up a situation that defied definition. He was constantly hoping to discover some common denominator of culture that would solve all difficulties without seeming to realize that he and the Nazi leaders looked at culture through very different eyes. He was a tragic misfit in Berlin in the prewar years, and his selection as ambassador was one of the first mistakes of the Roosevelt Administration.

l. The President Tells a Spurious Story

Inasmuch as Ambassador Dodd would have to have frequent conferences in Berlin with reference to the payment of American loans, President Roosevelt thought it expedient to invite him to the White House and regale him with an anecdote that Dodd did not suspect was spurious. He was informed that in the spring of 1933, Schacht had paid a visit to the United States to confer with American officials concerning the matter of the repayment of loans that had been extended to the German Government, German municipalities, German corporations, and German nationals. When Schacht called at the White House to talk with the President, he was treated with Hyde Park courtesy. After detailing with relish that example of boorishness, the President told the following story which was patently untrue:

He described the arrogant bearing of Dr. Hjalmar Schacht in May when he was threatening, as head of the German Reichsbank, to cease paying interest and principal on debts of more than one billion dollars due to American creditors next August. The President said he had told Secretary Hull to receive Schacht, but to pretend to be deeply engaged in looking for certain papers, leaving Schacht standing and unobserved for three minutes, with Hull’s secretary watching the German’s nervous reactions. Then Hull was to discover a note from the President which indicated serious opposition to any such defaults of German debtors. He was to turn to Schacht and hand him the document and watch the changing color of the German’s face as he, Hull, greeted him. This, the President said, was to take a little of the arrogance out of the German’s bearing, and he added that the effect was even more marked, as reported from Hull, than had been expected.84

In the Memoirs of Cordell Hull this story is repeated with some additions. It is easy to demonstrate its falsity.

On May 8, Dr. Schacht, head of the German Reichsbank, who was in Washington on an official visit . . . announced that his Government would cease payments abroad on Germany’s external debts, totaling $5,000,000,000, of which nearly $2,000,000,000 were held by Americans. The following day I called Dr. Schacht into my office, determined to speak some bare-fisted words. I found Schacht simple and unaffected, thoroughly approachable. . . . The moment Schacht sat down alongside my desk, I went right to the point and said, with some anger: “I was never so deeply surprised as I was yesterday afternoon by your announcement. My Government is exercising every ounce of its power to bring the nation out of the depths of awful panic conditions. . . . Just as real progress is being made, you come over here and, after sitting in confidential conferences with our officials . . . suddenly let it be given out from our doorstep that Germany has suspended these payments. . . .” I felt outraged at such a bald attempt to involve this Government in so odious an act by Germany. I said: “Any person ought to realize the serious possibilities of such steps.” Dr. Schacht kept protesting that he had not foreseen or grasped these reactions, “I am extremely sorry,” he said. I gave Dr. Schacht a written memorandum which stated: “The President has directed me to say to you in regard to your communication as to the decision of the German Government to stop transfers on obligations externally sold or externally payable, that he is profoundly shocked.”85

As one reads the Memoirs of Secretary Hull, it is noticeable that he makes no reference to the “arrogant bearing” of Dr. Schacht as described by the President to Dr. Dodd. Instead, he speaks of Dr. Schacht as “simple and unaffected.” There is no confirmation of the President’s story of the discourteous manner in which Schacht was supposed to be treated in the office of Secretary Hull. But the Memoirs of the Secretary are just as fictional, in places, as the story of President Roosevelt. As a matter of fact, Secretary Hull, or his genial “ghost,” Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Berding, became badly confused when writing about this “Schacht incident.” First of all, Dr. Schacht did not announce on May 8 that “his Government would cease payments abroad on Germany’s external debts.” That announcement came a month later (June 9). As early as January 19, 1933, Herr Wambold, Minister of Economics in the Reich, announced that repayments “of the principal of foreign private debts will be impossible in 1933.”86 Dr. Schacht countered this statement by an assurance that all “foreign commercial debts will be fully paid.”87 On May 8 an announcement appeared in the American press to the effect that the German “debt service is imperiled by drop in exports.”88 A similar announcement had been previously made on January 19 and April 10. Schacht was not ready to take any definite action until he returned to Berlin and had a conference with the representatives of the principal creditor countries (May 29-June 2).

On May 9 there was no reason for Secretary Hull to call Dr. Schacht to his office and assault him with some “bare-fisted words” with reference to Germany’s default on her obligations to American creditors. There had been no announcement of such a proposed default, and the highly colored stories told by President Roosevelt and Secretary Hull are mere flights of imagination.

Ambassador Dodd was not sufficiently acquainted with the President to be able to draw the line between truth and mendacity, so he duly recorded the story for posterity and thereby afforded another illustration of the moral make-up of the Chief Executive. After listening to the President’s dubious discourse on Dr. Schacht, Dodd went to New York City (July 3) for a conference with a group of prominent bankers who had no glib prescription with reference to a settlement of financial difficulties with Germany. They merely expressed the hope that the American Ambassador might be able to keep the German Government from “defaulting openly.” As an inducement to this end they were willing to reduce the rate of interest on their loans from seven to four per cent.89

After receiving these official and unofficial instructions with regard to proposed German defaults on American loans, Dodd then had to listen to advice on many other problems that vexed the course of German-American relations. One of the most important irritants that pointed to future trouble was the anti-Semitic campaign that had been launched by the Nazi Government. During his conversation with Dodd at the White House the President had remarked: “The German authorities are treating the Jews shamefully and the Jews in this country are greatly excited. But this is . . . not a governmental affair. We can do nothing except for American citizens who happen to be made victims. We must protect them, and whatever we can do to moderate the general persecution by unofficial and personal influence ought to be done.”90

On the following day Dodd met Raymond Moley who apparently held “entirely different views from the President about the American attitude toward the Jews in Germany.” After listening to Moley’s remarks for some moments, Dodd countered with an unrelated question about the operation of the Walker tariff of 1846. Moley was thrown off mental balance by this sudden shift in subject, and when he fumbled around for an answer that was not on the tip of his tongue, Dodd decided that he was an intellectual lightweight who “could not long hold his confidential relations with Roosevelt.”91

In the first week in July, Dodd was in New York City preparing to take the boat for Germany. He had a long conference with some outstanding Jews, including Rabbi Stephen S. Wise and Felix Warburg. They strongly urged him to press for an immediate change in the repressive policy that had been adopted by the Nazi Government towards the Jews, and Dodd assured them that he would “exert all possible personal influence against unjust treatment” of that unfortunate minority.92

Dodd then hurried to keep an engagement with Colonel House at Beverly Farms near Boston. With reference to the Jewish question, the Colonel remarked: “You should try to ameliorate Jewish sufferings. They are clearly wrong and terrible; but the Jews should not be allowed to dominate the economic or intellectual life in Berlin as they have done for a long time.” In New York City, at the home of Charles R. Crane, Dodd listened to a new viewpoint concerning anti-Semitism in Germany. Crane, though old and feeble, showed surprising animation against all Jews. His concluding words to Dodd were sharply sanguinary: “Let Hitler have his way.”93

One of Dodd’s last visitors before his departure for Berlin was George Sylvester Viereck. Viereck was known to Dodd as a German propagandist during the years from 1914 to 1917, and he was held at arm’s length as a “curious sort of journalist with whom one would best not be too free.” After leaving Viereck he was driven to the steamboat pier where insistent reporters kept clamoring for photographs. Reluctantly, Dodd posed for a picture. Perhaps the “curious” personality of Viereck pursued him, for unfortunately, “unaware of the similarity of the Hitler salute . . . we raised our hands.”94 In months to come, in Berlin, he would frequently raise his hands, not as a salute to Hitler, but by way of imprecation against a regime he quickly grew to loathe.

(Rm. Millions)
Monthly average	Imports	Exports	Balance
1931	560.7	799.8	239.1
1933	350.3	405.9	55.6
1934	371.0	347-2	-23.8

1John H. Ferguson, American Diplomacy and the Boer War (Philadelphia, 1939), pp. 208-9.
2February 10, 1904.
3February 10, 1904.
4February 11, 1904.
5Tatsuji Takeuchi, War and Diplomacy in the Japanese Empire (New York, 1936), pp. 155-57.
6Edward H. Zabriskie, American-Russian Rivalry in the Far East 1895-1914 (Philadelphia, 1946), pp. 101-60.
7Ernest B. Price, The Russo-Japanese Treaties of 1907-1916 Concerning Manchuria and Mongolia (Baltimore, 1933), pp. 34-38.
8A. Whitney Griswold, The Far Eastern Policy of the United States (New York, 1938), pp. 129-34.
9Theodore Roosevelt to President William H. Taft, December 22, 1910. Knox MS, Library of Congress.
10John G. Reid, The Manchu Abdication and the Powers, 1908-1912 (Berkeley, 1935), chaps. 4-10.
11Charles Callan Tansill, Canadian-American Relations, 1875-1911 (New York, 1944), chaps. 1-4, 10-12.
12Merle E. Curti, “Bryan and World Peace,” Smith College Studies in History, XVI (Northampton, 1931).
13Charles Callan Tansill, America Goes to War (Boston, 1938), chaps. 2-6.
14Edwin Borchard and William P. Lage, Neutrality for the United States (New Haven, 1937), p. 183.
15Tansill, op. cit., pp. 459-60.
16Borchard and Lage, op. cit., p. 88. It is interesting to note that in the eventful days that just preceded America’s entry into the World War, President Wilson had so little regard for Secretary Lansing that he complained bitterly to Colonel House about his shortcomings: “I [House] was surprised to hear him [the President] say that Lansing was the most unsatisfactory Secretary in his Cabinet; . . . that he had no imagination, no constructive ability, and but little real ability of any kind. He was constantly afraid of him because he often undertook to launch policies himself which he, the President, had on several occasions rather brusquely reversed.” House Diary, March 28, 1917. House MS, Yale University Library.
17President Wilson did not have a clear idea of the actual meaning of the Fourteen Points. In his Diary, December 20, 1918, Secretary Lansing makes the following significant comments: “There are certain phrases in the President’s ‘Fourteen Points’ [Freedom of the Seas and Self-Determination] which I am sure will cause trouble in the future because their meaning and application have not been thought out. . . . These phrases will certainly come home to roost and cause much vexation. . . . He [the President] apparently never thought out in advance where they would lead or how they would be interpreted by others. In fact he does not seem to care just so his words sound well.” Lansing Papers, Library of Congress.
18Oscar Cargill, Intellectual America: Ideas on the March (New York, 1941), p. 504.
19The correspondence dealing with the pre-Armistice agreement is printed in full in Foreign Relations, 1918, Supplement, I, The World War, I (Washington, 1933), 337-38, 343, 357-58, 379-81, 382-83, 425, 468-69.
20Paul Birdsall, Versailles Twenty Years After (New York, 1941), pp. 35-36.
21David Lloyd George, Memoirs of the Peace Conference (New Haven, 1939), I, 306-9.
22Harold Nicolson, Peacemaking, 1919 (New York, 1939), p. 18.
23The Intimate Papers of Colonel House, ed. Charles Seymour (Cambridge, 1928), IV, 343.
24Philip M. Burnett, Reparation at the Paris Peace Conference (New York, 1940), I, 63-64.
25Ibid., p. 69.
26Ibid., pp. 832-33.
27Birdsall, op. cit., p. 258.
28Thomas A. Bailey, Woodrow Wilson and the Lost Peace (New York, 1944), p. 240.
29Thorstein Veblen, The Nature of Peace (New York, 1917), p. 261. Secretary Lansing did not share the viewpoint that the Germans had forfeited their colonies through maladministration. In his Diary, January 10, 1918, he remarked: “This purpose of the retention of conquered territory is prima facie based upon conquest and is not in accord with the spirit of a peace based upon justice. . . . it is necessary for peace that the adjustment should be equitable.” Lansing Papers. Library of Congress.
30Edwyn Bevan, The Method in the Madness (London, 1917), pp. 305-6.
31Arthur P. Scott, “George Louis Beer,” in the Marcus W. Jernegan Essays in American Historiography, ed. W. T. Hutchinson (Chicago, 1937), p. 315.
32Ibid., p. 319.
33George L. Beer, African Questions at the Paris Peace Conference, ed. L. H. Gray (New York, 1923), pp. 58-60.
34Bailey, op. cit., p. 163.
35Harry R. Rudin, Germany in the Cameroons, 1884-1914 (New Haven, 1938), pp. 11, 414, 419.
36Bailey, op. cit., p. 167.
37It is significant that most of Professor Lord’s colleagues on the Inquiry thought that his zeal for Poland was “excessive.” Birdsall, op. cit., p. 178. See also, Hunter Miller, My Diary at the Conference of Paris (privately printed, 1928), I, 289.
38Ray S. Baker, Woodrow Wilson and World Settlement (Garden City, 1922), III, 37-38.
39Miller, op. cit., IV, 224-26.
40Seymour, op. cit., IV, 334-35.
41Lloyd George, op. cit., II, 637-42.
42René Martel, The Eastern Frontiers of Germany (London, 1930), pp. 49-50.
43William H. Dawson, Germany Under the Treaty (London, 1933), pp. 149-52.
44Diaries, Letters and Papers (London, 1935-37), II, 503.
45Documents on International Affairs, 1934, ed. John W. Wheeler-Bennett and Stephen Heald (New York), p. 424.
46Miller, op. cit., IV, 224-28; VI, 49-52.
47E. Alexander Powell, Thunder Over Europe (New York, 1931), p. 62.
48Dawson, op. cit., pp. 102-9. See also, I. F. D. Morrow and L. M. Sieveking, The Peace Settlement in the German Polish Borderlands (London, 1936).
49Powell, op. cit., p. 66.
50Baker, op. cit., pp. 482-84. Apparently, Henry White did much to give President Wilson the correct view of the situation in Upper Silesia. See Allan Nevins, Henry White (New York, 1930), p. 423.
51In the learned account written by Georges Kaeckenbeeck, The International Experiment of Upper Silesia (London, 1942), p. 6, the vote is given as 707,605 for Germany; 479,359 for Poland.
52(London, 1930), pp. 79-88.
53Dawson, op. cit., pp. 206-9.
54Sir Robert Donald, The Polish Corridor and the Consequences (London, 1929), pp. 197-98. See also, Sarah Wambaugh, Plebiscites Since the World War (Washington, 1933); W. J. Rose, The Drama of Upper Silesia (Brattleboro, 1936); Colonel E. S. Hutchinson, Silesia Revisited—1929 (London, 1930).
55Seymour, op. cit., IV, 347, 349, 383.
56Articles 428-432 of the Treaty of Versailles, The Treaties of Peace, 1919-1923 (New York, 1924), I, 254-55.
57General Henry T. Allen to Secretary Hughes, December 22, 1921. 862T.01/346, MS, National Archives.
58Ambassador Wallace to Secretary Hughes, Paris, April 27, 1920. 862.00/921, MS, National Archives.
59Emil Sauer to Secretary Hughes, Cologne, February 16, 1923. 862.00/1215, MS, National Archives.
60Dawson, op. cit., p. 84.
61Nevins, op. cit., p. 372.
62G. E. R. Gedye, The Revolver Republic (London, 1930), pp. 29-31.
63Herbert Hoover, “Communism Erupts in Europe,” Collier’s, CXXVIII (September 8, 1951), pp. 26-27, 68-71.
64Alma Luckau, The German Delegation at the Paris Peace Conference (New York, 1941), p. 124.
65Ibid., pp. 98-100.
66George A. Gordon to Secretary Hull, Berlin, May 22, 1933. 862.00/2985-86, MS, Department of State.
67George A. Gordon to Secretary Hull, Berlin, June 17, 1933. 862.00/3010, MS, Department of State.
68George A. Gordon to Secretary Hull, Berlin, June 23, 1933. 862.00/3017, MS, Department of State.
69George A. Gordon to Secretary Hull, Berlin, July 10, 1933. 862.00/3028-29, MS, Department of State.
70George S. Messersmith to Secretary Hull, July 10, 1933. 862.00/3033, MS, Department of State.
71The Final Act of the Lausanne Conference, July 9, 1932 (London, 1932), Cmd. 4126.
72The countries represented at this conference in Berlin were France, Great Britain, the Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United States.
73New York Times, June 3, 1933.
74The United States was deeply concerned about this transfer moratorium because about 40 per cent of the German external debt, approximately $1,800,000,000, was owed to American creditors. For a different estimate see Cleona Lewis, America’s Stake in International Investments (Washington, 1938), p. 414.
75New York Times, June 21, 1933.
76Raymond Moley, After Seven Years (New York, 1939), p. 247.
77Ibid., pp. 261-62.
78The documents dealing with the London Economic Conference are given in great detail in Foreign Relations, 1933, I, 452-762.
79Memorandum by the chief of the Division of Western European Affairs (Moffat), March 24, 1933. Ibid., pp. 396-98.
80Ibid., pp. 409-11. Atherton to Secretary Hull, London, May 12, 1933.
81Ibid., pp. 417-19. Agreement of understanding and co-operation.
82Memorandum by the ambassador in France (Straus) of a conversation with the British Ambassador in France (Tyrrell), June 15, 1933. Ibid., pp. 420-21.
83Ambassador Dodd’s Diary, 1933-1938, pp. 9-10. For July 4, 1933, Dodd records a conversation with Colonel House in which the aging colonel remarked: “I sent two nominations to the President, your’s and Nicholas Butler’s, but I felt that you ought to be given precedence.”
84Ibid., p. 5.
85Cordell Hull, Memoirs (New York, 1948), I, 237-38.
86New York Times, January 19, 1933.
87New York Times, March 19, 1933.
88New York Times, May 8, 1933.
89Dodd, op. cit., p. 9.
90Ibid., p. 5.
91Ibid., pp. 6-7.
92Ibid., p. 9.
93Ibid., pp. 10-11.
94Ibid., p. ix.

Back Door to War: The Roosevelt Foreign Policy 1933-1941