My Three Years in America. Johann Heinrich Andreas Hermann Albrecht Graf von Bernstorff
these people, almost without exception, still cling to their old home with heartfelt affection; but they are Americans, like the rest of the nation. "Germania is our mother, and Columbia is our bride," said Carl Schurz, and with these words he described the situation in a nutshell. Just as a man shall "leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife," so the man who is generally styled the German-American decides in favor of his new home-land, when a conflict arises between America and Germany. He will, however, do anything in his power to avoid such a conflict. Even before the war, we in Germany entirely failed to understand the difficult and delicate position of the American of German origin. And during the war this was more than ever the case. The question of the "German-Americans" has never been dealt with tactfully in Germany. Our greatest mistake was to expect too much from them. The Americans of German origin have retained in their new home all the failings and virtues of the German people. We could not, therefore, blame them if they showed less interest and less understanding in regard to political questions than the rest of America; for did they not, on the other hand, distinguish themselves by their respect for the established order of things, and by the fidelity and industry with which they pursued their various callings? The inevitable consequence of these national qualities was that they did not exercise the political influence which would have been only in keeping with their numerical superiority. For instance, I might mention that, on the occasion when I first visited Milwaukee, I was welcomed by an Irish mayor, a circumstance which somewhat surprised me, seeing that at the time the town contained from 300,000 to 400,000 Germans.
In consequence of the state of affairs described above, the principal object of German policy in the United States before the war was to try to bring about a more satisfactory understanding between the two peoples. Prince Henry's journey to America, the exchange of University professors and school teachers, which took place on this occasion, the visits of the two fleets, the American Institute in Berlin, and similar more or less successful undertakings served the same purpose. German diplomatic representatives were instructed to promote this policy with all their power. When I was appointed Ambassador in Washington, the Kaiser's and the Chancellor's principal injunction, in taking leave of me, was that I should enlighten public opinion in the United States regarding the peaceful and friendly intentions of German policy. Prince Bülow also said to me that I must without fail bring the negotiations about an Arbitration Treaty with the United States, which had been left unfinished owing to the death of my predecessor, to a satisfactory conclusion. Despite these definite instructions, the German Government, as I have already pointed out, ultimately blundered and stumbled over legal quibbles. In any case, however, Prince Bülow had meanwhile vacated his office. The effect upon the American mind of our obstruction of this matter should not be under-estimated. It helped not a little to convince public opinion in the United States of the alleged warlike intentions of the German people.
In accordance with American custom, the semi-official and semi-private activities concerned with fostering a better understanding between the two States had to be published to the whole world, and this had the inevitable disadvantage of provoking opposition, both in Germany and in the United States, among all those who had reasons for being hostile. Unfortunately, the official representatives of Germany in Washington were always a thorn in the side of a certain section of the German Press, whenever they tried, in consideration of the American attitude of mind and social customs, to introduce a warmer feeling into the relations between the two sides. Even in the time of my predecessor, Speck von Sternburg, the German Embassy was on such occasions charged with softness and an excessive desire to become adapted to American ways; and this remained the case during my tenure of office.
Our Press in general, moreover, never revealed a sufficient amount of interest or understanding in regard to American affairs. There were only a very few German newspaper correspondents in the United States, and those that did happen to be there were too poorly paid to be able to keep properly in touch with American social life. About twelve months before the war, the well-known wealthy German-American, Hermann Sielcken, offered to help me out of this difficulty by undertaking to pay the salary of a first-rate American journalist, of German origin, who was to reside in Washington, and act as the representative there of Wolff's telegraphic bureau. I immediately took steps to organize this telegraphic service. Very shortly afterwards, however, I was informed by Berlin, that the telegrams would be too expensive, as the subject was not of enough interest, and in this case the Wolff Bureau would only have had to defray the cost of the actual telegrams. This was the way the supply of news was organized in a country that imagined it was practising world-politics.
Mr. Wilson took up his quarters in the White House, Washington, about a year before the war, and opened his period of office with several internal reforms. Then came the American-Mexican crisis, and relations with Europe in general, and Germany in particular, therefore, fell somewhat into the background.
Woodrow Wilson was a University don and an historian. His works are distinguished by their brilliant style and the masterly manner in which he wields the English language – a power which was also manifested in his political speeches and proclamations. Mr. Wilson sprang into political and general fame when he was President of the University of Princeton, and was elected as Governor of the State of New Jersey. Even in those days he displayed, side by side, on the one hand, his democratic bias which led him violently to oppose the aristocratic student-clubs, and on the other, his egocentric and autocratic leanings which made him inaccessible to any advice from outside, and constantly embroiled him with the governing council of the University. As Governor of New Jersey, The Holy Land of "Trusts," Mr. Wilson opened an extraordinarily sharp campaign against their dominion. Mr. Roosevelt, it is true, had spoken a good deal against the trusts, but he had done little. He could not, however, have achieved much real success, because the Republican Party was too much bound up with the trusts, and dependent on them. At the time when Mr. Roosevelt wanted to take action, he also succeeded in splitting up his party, so that real reform could only be expected from the Democratic side. The conviction that this was so was the cause of Mr. Wilson's success in the Presidential election of 1912.
In regard to external politics, Mr. Wilson was pacifistic, as was also his party; whereas the Imperialists belonged almost without exception to the Republican Party. In spite of "Wall Street," and the influence of English ideas and opinions upon American society, Pacifist tendencies largely prevailed in the United States before the outbreak of the Five-Years War; how much more was this the case, therefore, when Mr. Wilson, in accordance with American custom, gave the post of Secretary of State to the politician to whose influence he owed his nomination as candidate for the Presidency by the Democratic Party. Thus did Mr. William Jennings Bryan attain to the dignity of Secretary of State after he had thrice stood as a candidate for the Presidency without success.
In all political questions, Mr. Bryan followed a much more radical tendency than Mr. Wilson. His opponents call him a dishonest demagogue. I, on the contrary, would prefer to call Mr. Bryan an honest visionary and fanatic, whose passionate enthusiasm may go to make an exemplary speechmaker at large meetings, but not a statesman whose concern is the world of realities. He who in his enthusiasm believes he will be able to see his ideal realized in this world next Thursday week is not necessarily dishonest on that account, even if he overlooks the fact that things are going very badly indeed.
It was believed in a large number of circles that Mr. Bryan would not accept the post of Secretary of State, for even at that time everybody who was in the know was already aware that Mr. Wilson could only tolerate subordinates and not men with opinions of their own. Mr. Bryan, however, felt the moral obligation, at least to attempt to give his radical views a chance of succeeding, and declared, as he took over the post, that so long as he was Secretary of State the United States would never go to war. He even wanted this principle to be generally accepted by the rest of the world, and with this end in view, submitted to all foreign Governments the draft of an Arbitration and Peace-Treaty, which was to make war utterly impossible in the future. As is well known, the German Government, unlike all the others, refused to fall in with Mr. Bryan's wishes. The Secretary of State was a little mortified by this, even though he still hoped that we should ultimately follow the example of the other Powers. Every time we met, he used to remind me of his draft Arbitration Treaty, which I had forwarded to Berlin. Later on I often regretted that we did not fall in with Mr. Bryan's wishes; who, by the by, during the war, again returned to the question, but in vain. If the treaty had been signed by us, it