“That the preservation of international peace is the standing policy
   of civilization and to that end a league of nations should be
   organized to prevent international wars;

“That it is a fundamental principle of peace that all nations are equally entitled to the undisturbed possession of their respective territories, to the full exercise of their respective sovereignties, and to the use of the high seas as the common property of all peoples; and

   “That it is the duty of all nations to engage by mutual covenants—­

   “(1) To safeguard from invasion the sovereign rights of one another;

   “(2) To submit to arbitration all justiciable disputes which fail of
   settlement by diplomatic arrangement;

   “(3) To submit to investigation by the league of nations all
   non-justiciable disputes which fail of settlement by diplomatic
   arrangement; and

   “(4) To abide by the award of an arbitral tribunal and to respect a
   report of the league of nations after investigation;

   “That the nations should agree upon—­

   “(1) A plan for general reduction of armaments on land and sea;

   “(2) A plan for the restriction of enforced military service and the
   governmental regulation and control of the manufacture and sale of
   munitions of war;

   “(3) Full publicity of all treaties and international agreements;

   “(4) The equal application to all other nations of commercial and
   trade regulations and restrictions imposed by any nation; and

   “(5) The proper regulation and control of new states pending complete
   independence and sovereignty.”

This draft of a resolution was discussed with the other American Commissioners, and after some changes of a more or less minor character which it seemed advisable to make because of the appointment of a Commission on the League of Nations at a plenary session of the Conference on January 25, of which Commission President Wilson and Colonel House were the American members, I sent the draft to the President on the 31st, four days before the Commission held its first meeting in Colonel House’s office at the Hotel Crillon.

As the Sixty-Fifth Congress would come to an end on March 4, and as the interpretation which had been placed on certain provisions of the Federal Constitution required the presence of the Chief Executive in Washington during the last days of a session in order that he might pass upon legislation enacted in the days immediately preceding adjournment, Mr. Wilson had determined that he could not remain in Paris after February 14.  At the time that I sent him the proposed resolution there remained, therefore, but two weeks for the Commission on the League of Nations to organize, to deliberate, and to submit its report to the Conference, provided its report was made prior to the President’s