IX
1908
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AMERICAN SCHOOL
/ .P-E-Al LEAGUE
efiﬁéﬁwﬂ-Ql * ized in 1908

OBJECT
To romote throu h the schools and the educational
P g
public of America the interests of international
justice and fraternity
THE WAR
What Should be Said About it in the Schools?


By
FANNIE FERN ANDREWS
Secretary, American School Peace League
Special collaborator
United States Bureauv of Education
American School Peace League
405 Marlborough St., Boston
November, 1914


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The War: What Should Be Said About
It in the Schools
BY FANNIE FERN ANDREWS

The appeal of President Wilson to the people of the United
States to “act and speak in the true spirit of neutrality” comes
to the teachers of the country with peculiar force. They, as
much perhaps as any other persons, enjoy opportunities to
preserve, as the President expresses it, “the spirit of impartiality
and fairness and friendliness to all concerned.” More than that,
the War aﬁ'ords teachers a unique opportunity to exercise their
most important function,—the training of citizens. For, is
not this, after all, the ultimate aim of education? And should
it not be the purpose of the Twentieth Century Teacher to
develop a civic intelligence regarding present day problems,—
a gradually developing social consciousness, which will termi-
nate, it is hoped, in universal brotherhood?
The war that is now ravaging the continent of Europe has
no parallel in history. It seems unnecessary to say that what
is going on should be presented in the schoolroom in such a
manner as to give pupils a proper interpretation of the whole
dreadful story. The task is difficult, but the American teacher,
reared in a country whose foundation principles are based on
tolerance and respect for the rights of others, is equal to the
emergency. Many of our school children draw their origins
from the nations now at war, and it is natural that their sym-
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pathies should be alert for the home countries. Then, too,
among those who have no ancestral allegiance to the warring
factions, it is inevitable that childish immaturity and the
universal instinct to take sides will lead to partisan ex-
pressions over the daily occurrences of the war. Evidences
of this are seen on every hand. The war is the subject of
supreme moment. The children, like their elders, eagerly Watch
the newspapers, scan the war maps, listen to heated discussions,
and form what may or may not be correct opinions. But
whatever their conclusions are, anirnosities and recriminations
against one nation or the other appear to be the rule. Under
these conditions, race antagonisms are allowed to develop, the
children become partisans, and that very spirit of neutrality
which our President so urgently desires is ﬂagrantly violated.
The child is not able to comprehend the necessity or the duty
of neutrality, nor the reasons why the United States should
remain the one great nation friendly with all “to do what is
honest and disinterested and truly serviceable,” as Mr. Wilson
says, “for the peace of the world.”
This is the situation which confronts teachers. What shall
they do about it? Their opportunity lies in correcting this
partisanship. They should not allow imperfect or prejudiced
ideas to ﬁnd lodgment in the pupils’ minds, especially on a
subject which is so vital to the civilization of the future. They
should point out that every boy and girl who really loves
America will “act and speak in the true spirit of neutrality”;
that the great idea of American patriotism is to wipe out racial
prejudices; that with its historical background and unique
mixture of peoples, our nation is peculiarly ﬁtted, again quoting
the President, to “play a part of impartial mediation and speak
the counsels of peace and accommodation, not as a partisan
but as a friend.” Only by instilling such ideas into the pupils’
minds can they be placed in sympathy with the policy of this
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country. To do this, the teacher must “exhibit the ﬁne poise
of undisturbed judgment, the dignity of self-control,” which
our Executive hopes will be the attitude of this nation. More-
over, painstaking teachers cannot fairly escape discussions on
this subject in the schoolroom. Lessons in history, geography,
civics, and the like cannot go far Without touching at some point
on what is actually taking place across the water. European
history and European geography must be eliminated if we bar
out a discussion of this war.
The request, made at the beginning of the school year by
certain superintendents that there should be no discussion of
this subject in the schoolroom, was apparently in line with
President Wilson's policy. At that time, the world stood aghast
at the tidings of a continent at war, and how to keep out of the
trouble was our supreme concern as a nation. But today,
when the signiﬁcance of this world object-lesson comes more
and more into light, when the causes are becoming better under-
stood and the results to be hoped for more clearly deﬁned, when
the American ideal of universal peace is seen in its direct rela-
tion to the conﬂict, the superintendents of the country should
take the matter under serious consideration. To lose this op-
portunity is to lose the supreme moment for teaching history.
Silence on this subject in the schoolroom at this time is incon-
sistent with the purpose and the spirit of education. Conse-
quently the Great War should form a part of school instruction,
and its treatment should be indicated with careful precision.
The schools, if true to their aims, must react to the meaning
of great events, to the ideas which govern men and nations.
So delicate and intricate are the elements involved, that we
are impressed at the outset with the necessity for eliminating
the perilous phases of the subject. The motives of any nation
engaged in the war should not be impugned in the schoolroom.
To do so would give offense to some of our own citizens. It
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would, of course, violate the President's injunction as to neu-
trality, and what is more, it would tend to keep alive racial
prejudices. Nor should daily reports of the military move-
ments be followed in the schoolroom. Such details as reach
us are vague at best, but in any case, they should be eliminated,
because they tend to excite the interest of the pupils unneces-
sarily in the game of war, and enmity toward one or the other
of the contestants would naturally result. The study of
military minutiae has no proper place in the common school
curriculum. What we really need at this time is to grasp the
philosophy of militarism, reach the elemental causes that
brought on the trouble and ﬁnd a chart that will lead the world
out. Therein lies the only course for safe and sane action.
Certain American colleges, in giving courses of lectures on the
vital relations of the war to history and to civilization, are pro-
viding a wise method of acquiring scientiﬁc background for the
real setting of this war in the historical sequence of world events.
While the History Teachers’ Magazine suggests that “the history
teacher has now the opportunity to stand as an expert guide
for his school community and for the larger community about
the school.”
Teachers should lead pupils to understand the historical
causes of the war, to look upon this spectacle of human suffer-
ing and devastation with horror, to contrast a world at war
with a world at peace, to comprehend the principles which
should govern the terms of peace—in fact that would make
another great war impossible, to be conscious of the part which
the United States, a nation founded on democracy, universal
brotherhood, and good-will, should play after the cessation of
hostilities, to realize that every boy and girl has an interest in
the movement which shall bring about the reign of law in place
of the reign of the sword.
I. WHAT SHOULD BE SAID AS TO THE CAUSES OF THE STRUGGLE?
No single event brought on the war. Its causes reach
far back in history. In the development of nations, based on
racial lines, there have grown up between some of them mis-
understandings and enmities. These differences and the clash-
ing of interests, which usually result when people of one type
undertake to dominate those of another, are in large part
responsible for this sudden plunging of the world into unprec-
edented disaster.
Another cause is the failure of governments to keep pace with
the processes of civilization that in all the great countries of
the world have been moving forward ahnost abreast, and this
failure is due to the fact that they have blindly assumed national
greatness to be dependent on ﬁghting strength. Powerful
nations, long after they should have known better, clung to
the ancient doctrine that might makes right. Their false
philosophy has led to secret alliances which have, of course,
rendered impossible frank and fair dealings among the peoples
of the world. Suspicion is the inevitable result of such a system
and the nations have believed that they must protect themselves
against one another by building up larger and larger armaments
on the land and on the sea. With these forces they have deﬁed
their enemies and have likewise deﬁed civilization. For, in
every instance, the real enemy was within. His name is Mili-
tarism. He is the common enemy of all the warring nations.
The teachings of militarism affirm that without war the virile
virtues gradually decay, that war is indispensable for the devel-
opment of nations, that since war lies in the great world plan the
supreme duty of each nation is to prepare for it, and that the
well-being of a nation demands obedience to the mandate of
military leaders. These ideas, held to a greater or lesser de-
gree in all the countries now at war, developed an armed peace,
which threatened at any moment to become active hostilities.-
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With the materials of mischief ready at hand, it required but
a slight provocation to plunge a continent into chaos. When
the oombustibles are piled high, one spark suffices to set them
ablaze, and militarism, the common enemy, has full sway.
II. WHAT SHOULD BE SAID AS TO THE RESULTS OF THE WAR?
The state of mind which war produces is probably the worst
result of war. The legacy of ill-will, the play of the savage
instincts for killing and robbing let loose in the frenzied madness
of the battleﬁeld and persisting long after war ceases, are un-
doubtedly the chief obstacles to be overcome in the ﬁnal process
of reconstruction. Moreover, there will be lower standards of
living and a heavy loss in human eﬂiciency; for millions of the
best men of each nation, victims of guns and disease, will be sacri-
ﬁced. The next generation, to whom must be entrusted the
interests of civilization, will, to a degree at least, be of inferior
stuff, because it has descended from the weaklings rejected by
the recruiting sergeant. Of course, there are the other obvious
results,——the world-wide interference with commercial and in-
dustrial progress aﬁecting alike belligerents and neutrals,
the depletion of national treasuries, the set-back to scientiﬁc
and cultural progress, the destruction of the world's art treas-
ures, to say nothing of human suffering, distress and want and
private griefs which always follow in the wake of war.
Our own country, separated from Europe by about three
thousand miles of ocean and on friendly terms with each of the
warring nations, ﬁnds itself among the victims of the conﬂict.
We were startled last August at the closing of the stock ex-
changes. We are now alarmed at the serious plight of the cotton
planter and of the miner who ﬁnd their markets curtailed.
Many of our industries are gravely hampered. We look with
concern at the thousands of men and women who are swelling
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the ranks of the unemployed. And we are disturbed in our
plans for cultural enjoyment by the interruption of foreign
study and travel, as well as by the cessation of international ex-
changes among our schools and universities.
Perhaps the most important result of the war will be to teach
the peoples of the world that great armaments are not guarantees
of peace,—that the tenets of militarism are detrimental to
the well-being of nations and to the progress of civilization. It
has centered reﬂection on the fact that forty years of the most
elaborate military organization in the world’s history have been
followed by possibly the most stupendous war of the ages.
The ﬁnal result of the war will, it is hoped, be the stimulation of
international organization,—-the only guarantee of permanent
peace. This aspiration should become common among the
peoples of the world, who now look with helpless grief on the
devastation wrought by a terrible conﬂict and see too late that
the nations have been following false ideals. Public conscience
should be unanimous in demanding that this be the last war,
—that the world must enter upon a new order of things.
III. WHAT SHOULD BE SAID AS TO THE TERMS OF PEACE?
The ﬁnal settlement should compel loyalty to the world's
order. It should be based on a world conscience that inter-
national harmony is not only a pressing need but a pressing
duty. Out of the struggle should come a complete revul-
sion of feeling against the use of force as a means of settling
international disputes. The substitution of law for war should
be the ﬁnal order. There is an approaching unanimity of opinion
not only in this country but among the leaders of thought in
Europe, as to the policy which should inspire the conditions
of peace. They may be summed up as follows:
1. A Concert of Europe. The surest method of establish-
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ing permanent peace is to bring about a Concert of Europe,
based upon the knowledge that, with nations as with individ-
uals, co-operation and not conﬂict is the law of progress. In
order to insure mutual conference and concerted action, there
should be organized a representative Council whose delibera-
tions and decisions would be public. This would mark the
end of offensive alliances and ententes which have proved their
inability to safeguard the real and permanent interests of
the people.
2. Nationality Must be Respected. No territory should be
transferred from one nation to another against the will of the
inhabitants, nor should any readjustments be made which
might breed fresh wars. National boundaries should coincide
as far as possible with national sentiment. N 0 terms of settle-
ment should be regarded as satisfactory if they impose upon
any nation such harsh and humiliating terms of peace as would
be inconsistent with its independence, self-respect, or well-being.
All idea of revenge should, of course, be rooted out.
3. Limitation of Armaments. Since the policy of huge
national armaments has lamentably failed to preserve peace,
competition in armaments should end. The nations should
agree to have no military forces other than those maintained
for international police duty. Militarism should be abandoned
by all nations, because they recognize the absolute futility of
force as a means of advancing the moral or material well-being of
any country. To facilitate the elimination of militarism, the
conditions of peace should stipulate that all manufactories of
arms, armaments, and munitions for use in war shall hereafter
be national property. N 0 private citizen or corporation should
be permitted to engage in such manufacture.
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IV. WHAT SHOULD BE SAID AS TO THE PART WHICH THE
UNITED STATES SHOULD PLAY IN FINAL MEDmTIoN?
There is a growing conviction that the world has reached a
turning point in its history,—that it is about to enter upon a
new social and political era. However true this may be, it is a
fact that at the close of the war the world will have to face a
stupendous task of reconstruction; and in solving the problems
that must arise, the United States may be destined to assume a
unique responsibility. This country may assist in shaping
events which will lay the foundations of a higher civilization.
Certain it is, that the appeal of the embattled nations for our
favorable judgment has conferred on us a sort of moral leader-
ship, with all the obligations which this implies. And our
traditions seem to ﬁt us for the task. Founded on the prin-
ciples of democracy, which make every person responsible for
the common good, and wipe out race prejudices in giving freedom
to every type of human being, the United States is distinctly the
nation which can extend the idea of human well-being through-
out the world. World brotherhood is but the expansion of
American faith. The union of our forty-eight States, containing
representatives from all the races of the world, working to-
gether and abiding by the laws of the Central Government,
demonstrates that the principle of federation is practically
applicable to political harmony regardless of racial, religious, or
economic differences. Each State retains its identity, has its
local laws and local governments, pursues its own ideals, and
yet remains loyal to the whole, presenting in little, as it were,
the plan for a world federation, where civilization can progress
unhampered.
Immanuel Kant, in his famous essay, “Perpetual Peace,”
published in 1795, declared that the world will never attain
universal peace until it is politically organized and that it can
never be so organized until the people rule. Thus, the greatest
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thinker of the eighteenth century, perhaps the greatest of all
time, hinged the world’s progress on the realization of an inter-
national federation and the universal extension of democracy.
The twentieth century has seen a revival of Kant’s ideas.
Men distinguished in diplomacy and in statesmanship have
accepted them as the true philosophy of peace; and at this
time, when peace is shaken to its very foundations, may not
world federation and the extension of democracy be the props
by which we can hope to sustain the fair structure?
After the cessation of hostilities, there should be opportunity
to impress this view. We can point out that the variety of
elements and the combination of types that comprise our own
people have given our country its distinctive character and that
every type of manliness has contributed to our prosperity.
There is no reason why the forty-six civilized nations of the
world should not be bound together in the pursuit of a common
ideal, and for the common good, as effectively as our forty-eight
Commonwealths. Our experience and our vision prompt us
to characterize this as the next great step in world development.
Nor would this involve a sudden change in world politics. For
the past forty years, although more obviously since 1899, the
date of the opening of the First Hague Conference, the world
has been moving rapidly on toward international federation.
In 1862, when Montgomery Blair, the Postmaster General
during Lincoln's Administration, proposed to the nations that
they make a joint agreement for a more eﬁicient postal service,
he started What has grown to be an international organization
of ﬁrst signiﬁcance to the world’s progress. On October 8, 187 4,
delegates from twenty-ﬁve nations signed the constitution of
what is now the Universal Postal Union, which has a permanent
bureau at Berne, supported jointly by the whole world. Many
other instances could be given to show how the nations have
adopted uniform practices in the conduct of important affairs.
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The most important result of the First Hague Conference
was the establishment of the International Court of Arbitration,
which will doubtless develop eventually into a real judicial
tribunal. As the world is gradually creating a code of inter-
national law, so the recurring Hague Conferences are the fore-
runners of an international parliament, with power to legislate
on all affairs of common concern. Logic and the world’s politi-
cal history force us to look to a future in which the world shall
establish an international executive to carry out the decrees of
both the court and the legislature, and an international police
to enforce these decisions. The program appeals peculiarly
to the American spirit. The prominent part which the United
States took in the First and Second Peace Conferences at The
Hague in 1899 and 1907 was in keeping with that spirit. Amer-
ica had the honor of opening the Hague Court in 1902, since
which time this international institution has shown on eleven
different occasions its efﬁcacy in settling disputes between
nations.
Our country has taken the lead among the nations in negotia-
ting treaties of arbitration, and this activity has not abated even
in the midst of the European War. Twenty-nine nations have
signed peace commission treaties with the United States, while
eight others have signiﬁed their willingness to sign similar
treaties. As these provide that all matters in dispute shall
be investigated during the period of a year before any dec-
laration of war or commencement of hostilities can take place, it
is believed that they will make armed conﬂict between the con-
tracting nations improbable, if not entirely impossible. More
than two-thirds of the civilized globe are now living under
the protection of these treaties. Our Government has cheerfully
taken this long step in the direction of peace, and it is not
only willing but indeed anxious to execute similar instruments
with all remaining nations, large and small.
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V. WHAT SHOULD BE SAID As TO THE PART WHICH EVERY
BOY AND GIRL HAS TO PLAY IN FURTHERING HUMAN FREEDOM?
The youth of our country should be conscious of their direct
relationship to this World-wide movement for the extension
of human freedom. The child will readily see that being a
member of a family, a school, a town, a state, a nation, and
the world at large, he has functions to perform in all these re-
lations. In discharging his duties well in any one of these ways,
he becomes a better citizen in all other respects. But it should
be impressed upon him that all artiﬁcial and political relation-
ships are secondary to what he owes the whole human race.
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