You appear to think that it is in order for Germany to visit upon unoffending Belgians reprisal for the misdeeds (as far as such misdeeds may be in evidence) committed by Russians in East Prussia.  I cannot see that this contention is in accord with justice or with common sense.

GEORGE HAVEN PUTNAM.

New York, Oct. 28, 1914.

“The United States of Europe”

INTERVIEW WITH NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER.

     Dr. Butler is President of Columbia University; received
     Republican electoral vote for Vice President of the United
     States, 1913; President of American Branch of Conciliation
     Internationale; President American Historical Association;
     Trustee Carnegie Endowment for International Peace; Commander
     Order of the Red Eagle (with Star) of Prussia; Commandeur de
     Legion d’Honneur of France.

By Edward Marshall.

The United States of Europe.

Dr. Nicholas Murray Butler, President of Columbia University, firmly believes that the organization of such a federation will be the outcome, soon or late, of a situation built up through years of European failure to adjust government to the growth of civilization.

He thinks it possible that the ending of the present war may see the rising of the new sun of democracy to light a day of freedom for our transatlantic neighbors.

He tells me that thinking men in all the contending nations are beginning vividly to consider such a contingency, to argue for it or against it; in other words, to regard it as an undoubted possibility.

Dr. Butler’s acquaintance among those thinking men of all shades of political belief is probably wider than that of any other American, and it is significant of the startling importance of what he says that by far the greater number of his European friends, the men upon whose views he has largely, directly or indirectly, based his conclusions, are not of the socialistic or of any other revolutionary or semi-revolutionary groups, but are among the most conservative and most important figures in European political, literary, and educational fields.

This being unquestionably true, it is by no means improbable that in the interview which follows, fruit of two evenings in Dr. Butler’s library, may be found the most important speculative utterance yet to appear in relation to the general European war.

Dr. Butler’s estimate of the place which the United States now holds upon the stage of the theatre of world progress and his forecast of the tremendously momentous role which she is destined to play there must make every American’s heart first swell with pride and then thrill with a realization of responsibility.

The United States of Europe, modeled after and instructed by the United States of America!  The thought is stimulating.

Said Dr. Butler: 

“The European cataclysm puts the people of the United States in a unique and tremendously important position.  As neutrals we are able to observe events and to learn the lesson that they teach.  If we learn rightly we shall gain for ourselves and be able to confer upon others benefits far more important than any of the material advantages which may come to us through a shrewd handling of the new possibilities in international trade.