It is not my purpose to analyze the provisions of the Covenant which was submitted to the Conference on the Preliminaries of Peace on February 14, 1919.  My objections to it have been sufficiently discussed in the preceding pages.  It would be superfluous to repeat them.  The innumerable published articles and the endless debates on the Covenant have brought out its good features as well as its defects.  Unfortunately for the opponents and defenders of the document alike some of the objections urged have been flagrantly unjustifiable and based on false premises and misstatements of fact and of law, which seem to show political motives and not infrequently personal animosity toward Mr. Wilson.  The exaggerated statements and unfair arguments of some of the Senators, larded, as they often were, with caustic sarcasm and vindictive personalities, did much to prevent an honest and useful discussion of the merits and demerits of the Covenant.

The effect upon President Wilson of this campaign against him personally—­and it seems to me that it would have had the same effect upon any man of spirit—­was to arouse his indignation.  Possibly a less stubborn man would not have assumed so uncompromising an attitude as he did or have permitted his ire to find expression in threats, but it cannot be denied that there was provocation for the resentment which he exhibited.  The President has been blamed for not having sought more constantly to placate the opponents of the Covenant and to meet them on a common ground of compromise, especially during his visit to the United States in February, 1919.  From the point of view of policy there is justice in blaming him, but, when one considers the personal animus shown and the insolent tone assumed by some of his critics, his conduct was very human; not wise, but human.  Mr. Wilson had never shown a spirit of conciliation in dealing with those who opposed him.  Even in the case of a purely political question he appeared to consider opposition to be a personal affront and he was disposed to retaliate in a personal way.  In a measure this explains the personal enmity of many of his political foes.  I think that it is not unjust to say that President Wilson was stronger in his hatreds than in his friendships.  He seemed to lack the ability to forgive one who had in any way offended him or opposed him.

Believing that much of the criticism of the Covenant was in reality criticism of him as its author, a belief that was in a measure justified, the President made it a personal matter.  He threatened, in a public address delivered in the New York Opera House on the eve of his departure for France, to force the Republican majority to accept the Covenant by interweaving the League of Nations into the terms of peace to such an extent that they could not be separated, so that, if they rejected the League, they would be responsible for defeating the Treaty and preventing a restoration of peace.  With the general demand for peace this