League of Nations, Proposed Ten Years Ago Today, is Center of Moral Pressure, Says Sweetser--U.S. Helpful

"The League of Nations is the greatest center of moral pressure in the world today," said Arthur Sweetser '11, a member of the Secretariat of the League, to a representative of the CRIMSON in a recent interview. Proof of this he explained, lies in the fact that even in the settlement of such issues as the Bolivia-Paraguay dispute the League has never had to resort to force.

Sweetser said that the development of the League since it was proposed at the Paris Peace Conference ten years ago today has been phenomenal. The annual Assembly, the quarterly Council, the permanent Secretariat, the World Court, the International Labor Office, and the various committees and commissions dealing with subjects ranging from opium to the movies: these, he said, represent a thoroughly complete organization. He said that news of many League activities never reaches the United States, largely because international relations are too subtle to be treated in detail in the public press.

When asked if the League could operate successfully without the participation of the United States, Sweetser said that the United States is at present lending a great deal of cooperation, both through the government and through individual citizens. He traced the evolution of America's relations to the League, saying that they suffered a severe decline in 1920, but that since then the relationship has been developing rapidly. Sweetser said: "Four main reasons contribute to the probability of continued evolution in America's relationship to the League first, the present partial cooperation, even within its limits, can never be fully effective; second, beyond this cooperation is a large area of international life where American interests are not represented at all: third, America's positive temperament will not long be satisfied with anything but complete and business like methods; and fourth, through such evolution America can best make her contribution to world progress."

Sweetser has been connected with the League since 1919 and is the author of numerous books and pamphlets dealing with that organization.