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PROMISE-KEEPING IS MIGHTIERTHAN GUNS
196
●
TAFT, WILLIAM HOWARD. Typed Letter Signed, “WmHTaft,” to
New York
Evening Post
editor Oswald GarrisonVillard, sending a copy of the lecture he was to deliver
the following day [in which he argued that anxiety concerning insufficient military
strength is misplaced; not present], and warning that the reckless disregard of the rights of
aliens in California could endanger relations with Japan. 1 page, 4to, personal stationery;
faint soiling at lower right, horizontal folds. (TFC)
New Haven, 8 December 1914
[400/600]
“
I send you a copy of some remarks that I am going to deliver . . . on . . . December 9. It concerns the
present agitation for the improvement of the military defenses, . . . . [Y]ou with your knowledge of the
Army know that Congress has neglected in times past a reasonable provision for ammunition, small
arms equipment and field artillery. . . . [T]hey have neglected it for river and harbor bills, public build-
ing bills and things that affected matters in their own districts. It is curious that the present war, which
makes foreign attack less probable than ever before, should develop this anxiety, but the paradox is eas-
ily understood.
“
. . . [T]he clause of the article upon aliens’ rights, . . . is more important in preventing war than even
adequate military defenses.The recklessness of Johnson and the trades-unions in California is a real
danger in our relations with Japan, but I fancy the gentlemen who are agitating in favor of military
defenses will not be found very loud in demanding such a law as we need to give the National
Government control where it ought to have control.”
In a lecture delivered to the Heptorean Club in Somerville, MA, on 9 December, four months after
the outbreak of World War I,Taft declared that ensuring the adherence to international agreements is
more effective at deterring war than the enhancement of the military (see
Cornell Daily Sun
, 10
December 1914).