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Now, with free moral self-determination a new subject comes into existence and activity in the individual, which makes that subject, reacting upon mere sensations and ideas, its object, and, as a new immaterial subjective unity, acts determiningly upon that subject which has just become object.
They recognized that so long as it lasted there was no hope of establishing a community of nations, but they discarded military intervention on grounds of their own internal policy, and because it ran counter to the principle of self-determination.
Equality of nations, sacrifice in Wilson's draft of League; in Lansing's form for League; ignored in Cecil plan; primacy of Great Powers retained in reported Covenant; violation by Treaty; and secret diplomacy at Conference. Esthonia, Wilson and; autonomy. Ethnic influence on boundary lines. See also Racial minorities; Self-determination. Finland, question of independence.
The Italians of Fiume, as I have already shown, outnumber the Slavs almost three to one, and it is they who are demanding so violently that the city should be annexed to Italy on the ground of self-determination. But I do not believe that, because there is an undoubted Italian majority in Fiume, the city should be awarded to Italy.
The Spanish War, as has been said, marked a transition, a development of the American Idea. In obedience to a growing perception that dominion and exploitation are incompatible with and detrimental to our system of government, we fought in good faith to gain self-determination for an alien people. The only real peril confronting democracy is the arrest of growth.
"Guided by these principles, we solemnly protest against the rejection of the right of self-determination at the peace negotiations, and demand that, in the sense of this right, all nations, including, therefore, also the Czecho-Slovaks, be guaranteed participation and full freedom of defending their rights at the Peace Conference."
If the Germans of Bohemia secede from the Czechoslovaks or the Croats from the Serbs, will British armies cross the sea to uphold the union which those peoples repudiate? And in the name of which of the Fourteen Points would they undertake the task? That of self-determination? France's interests, and hers alone, would be affected by such changes. And France would be left to fight single-handed.
From the middle of the eighteenth century until the end of the French Revolution the masses everywhere were influenced by the emotional, and at times hysterical, abstractions of the French encyclopedists; and that these had influenced thought in the American colonies is readily shown in the preamble of the Declaration of Independence, with its unqualified assertion of the equality of men and the absolute right of self-determination.
She had not entered the conflict with any motives of aggrandizement or of territorial extension. She felt her self-sufficiency and could well afford proudly to refuse to join the League of Nations on the ground that she did not wish to be involved in European wrangles or sacrifice a tittle of her rights of self-determination.
In such a case it is only a matter of time and occasion when the dependency will demand the right of self-determination and be prepared to fight for independence of "foreign tyrants, oppressors and exploiters." Minor inexpensive military operations for the suppression of colonial revolt which are quickly and successfully ended may add to the stature of empire-building leaders.