Some time in April prior to the acceptance of the Treaty of Peace by the Premiers of the Allied Powers, the President and Mr. Lloyd George agreed with M. Clemenceau to negotiate the treaties of protective alliance which the French demanded.  The President advised me of his decision on the day before the Treaty was delivered to the German plenipotentiaries stating in substance that his promise to enter into the alliance formed a part of the settlements as fully as if written into the Treaty.  I told him that personally I considered an agreement to negotiate the treaty of assistance a mistake, as it discredited Article 10 of the Covenant, which he considered all-important, and as it would, I was convinced, be the cause of serious opposition in the United States.  He replied that he considered it necessary to adopt this policy in the circumstances, and that, at any rate, having passed his word with M. Clemenceau, who was accepting the Treaty because of his promise, it was too late to reconsider the matter and useless to discuss it.

Subsequently the President instructed me to have a treaty drafted in accordance with a memorandum which he sent me.  This was done by Dr. James Brown Scott and the draft was approved and prepared for signature.  On the morning of June 28, the same day on which the Treaty of Versailles was signed, the protective treaty with France was signed at the President’s residence in the Place des Etats Unis by M. Clemenceau and M. Pichon for the French Republic and by President Wilson and myself for the United States, Mr. Lloyd George and Mr. Balfour signing at the same time a similar treaty for Great Britain.  Though disagreeing with the policy of the President in regard to this special treaty it would have been futile for me to have refused to accept the full powers issued to me on June 27 or to have declined to follow the directions to act as a plenipotentiary in signing the document.  Such a course would not have prevented Mr. Wilson from entering into the defensive alliance with France and Great Britain and might have actually delayed the peace.  Feeling strongly the supreme necessity of ending the existing state of war as soon as possible I did not consider that I would be justified in refusing to act as the formal agent of the President or in disobeying his instructions as such agent.  In view of the long delay in ratification of the Treaty of the Peace, I have since doubted whether I acted wisely.  But at the time I was convinced that the right course was the one which I followed.

In spite of the fact that my judgment was contrary to the President’s as to the wisdom of negotiating this treaty because I considered the policy of doing so bad from the standpoint of national interests and of doubtful expediency in view of the almost certain rejection of it by the United States Senate and of its probable effect on any plan for general disarmament, I was not entirely satisfied because I could not disregard the fact that an argument could be made in its favor which was not without force.