But great changes have come to the world since the time of Washington.  The use of steam in navigation, the submarine cable and wireless telegraphy have brought all the world into closer relations than existed between New England and the Southern States in the early days of our national life.  Our government at Washington may send messages to European capitals and receive a reply within ten minutes.  The Atlantic has been crossed by airplane.  The nations of the world have become very close neighbors.  The murder of a prince in a little city of central Europe drew from millions of homes in America their sons to fight on the soil of Europe.  We entered the war because our interests were so closely bound up with those of the world that we could not keep out; because “what affects mankind is inevitably our affair, as well as the affair of the nations of Europe and Asia.”

The war did not create this interdependence; it only emphasized it.  But now that we are aware of it, it will probably influence our lives to a much greater extent than before the war.

WHAT THE WORLD WAS FIGHTING FOR

The nations that were associated against Germany, occupy, with their dependencies, two-thirds of the earth’s surface and include more than four-fifths of its population.  The governments of these nations declared that they were fighting primarily, not for selfish interests such as “ports and provinces and trade,” but “for the common interests of the whole family of civilized nations—­for nothing less than the cause of mankind.” [Footnote:  Stuart P. Sherman, American and Allied Ideals, p. 14.] Even if some of the governments were influenced to a greater or lesser extent by selfish motives, they still recognized a common interest of the peoples of the world, a “cause of mankind,” and based their appeals upon it.  The prime minister of England said, “We must not allow any sense of revenge, any spirit of greed, any grasping desire, to overcome the fundamental principles of righteousness.”  Faraway Siam declared that she entered the war “to uphold the sanctity of international rights against nations showing a contempt for humanity.”  And little Guatemala proclaimed that she had “from the first adhered to and supported the attitude of the United States in defense of the rights of nations, of liberty of the seas, and of international justice.”  Our President said that “what we demand in this war is nothing peculiar to ourselves.  It is that the world be made fit and safe to live in for every peace-loving nation. ...  All the peoples of the world are in effect partners in this interest.”

The avowed purpose for which the United States entered the war, and for which “all the peoples of the world are in effect partners,” is the same as that for which the American Revolutionary War was fought, which was proclaimed in our Declaration of Independence, and for which America has always stood—­the equal right of all men to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” and to self-government.  Nearly the whole world was united against a few autocratic governments that denied these rights.