All protest meetings were cancelled on August 1st, and the Press restricted itself to chronicling rumours and events.  The sitting of the Reichstag was awaited with impatience as that was expected to bring more light on the crisis.  The effect which Bethmann-Hollweg produced upon his hearers was to convince them that Russia alone was to blame.  “The question of supporting the war by voting a loan was all the easier for us to decide, because the provocation had come, not from France or England, but from Russia.  I admit openly that while I was travelling to Berlin to the Reichstag I had very little time to hunt for precedents in the party’s history to determine my vote.  For me the force of circumstances alone was decisive; the material interests of the working classes and the entire nation; common sense and the realization of a practical policy."[75]

[Footnote 75:  “Die Kriegssitzung des deutschen Reichstags” ("The War Sitting of the Reichstag"), by Karl Hildenbrand, Member for Stuttgart.  Published 1915; p. 13.]

“At the time of voting on August 4th, we were not in a position to take England into consideration, because at the moment she had not yet declared war.  But by England’s intervention our attitude on August 4th has been still more emphatically justified."[76]

[Footnote 76:  Ibid., p. 16.]

This statement is a gross distortion of the truth.  It is true that England had not yet declared war, but Sir Edward Grey had made England’s attitude quite clear on the previous day.  His speech had been published in the Berlin papers.  Furthermore, the Chancellor informed the Reichstag that England’s position was perfectly clear, although he suppressed the fact that Germany had begun preparations for war with this country five days before, by ordering civilians to leave Heligoland, and despatching the Koenigin Luise to lay mines on our coasts.

In any case, the action of the Social Democrats on that occasion is an example of unfaithfulness to principles.  Accepting the invasion fear as a ground for voting a loan for a war of defence, there is still no evident reason why they should vote funds for a war of aggression against Belgium.  On the surface, there is no explanation for their cheers when Bethmann-Hollweg announced the invasion of two neutral States by Germany’s armies.

Had they been tricked into supporting an alleged defensive war, there was still time to protest against German hordes overrunning two weak neighbouring countries.  In spite of their terror that they personally might suffer through the horrors of war, their vaunted humanitarianism led to no outcry against those same horrors being wilfully and ruthlessly forced upon their Belgian Genossen.

The only anxiety which the speech of their chosen spokesman, Herr Haase, betrays, is the anxiety to avoid responsibility.  “In the name of my party I am empowered to make the following declaration:  We are standing in an hour of solemn destiny.  The consequences of the imperialistic policy—­which brought about an era of armaments and made international difficulties more acute—­have now fallen upon Europe like a storm-flood.