On the eve of love and forgiveness, we find it appropriate to remember a man whom many blame, justly or unjustly, for the misfortunes of Hungary as well as for the turmoil of the entire world. If we are to give an unbiased verdict, we must consider the factors that brought about these conditions.

There are three factors which govern human activities--heredity, environment, and contact. The first factor made itself felt in Wilson's stubborn nature. The second left deep imprints on his life. Wilson was born and reared in the downtrodden South after the Civil War. The politics of the North then seemed unfair, since the white people were neglected and the colored people were continually favored by the political leaders of the North. This fact irritated the feelings of the young Wilson, and he never forgot the poverty which the people of the South had been forced to suffer. When he became President of the United States, he favored the 2people of the South at every opportunity. Most of his aides were from the South. Most of the appointments to army posts during the World War were given to Southerners, while most of the Northern boys were sent South to work with the colored boys in road construction gangs.

The third factor, his contacts, was responsible for his autocratic ideas. Born into the family of a Southern leader, raised in a highly developed intellecutal environment, he became president of Princeton University, then Governor of New Jersey, and finally President of the United States. This autocratic feeling became evident when he selected his cabinet. He chose men who would act blindly at his command, men who, as time went on, became merely his rubber stamps.

If we ask what the talisman was with which he gained the support of the American people, we can only answer in one way. He was an eloquent speaker, one with whom very few other speakers could be compared. Dumba, the Austro-Hungarian ambassador, was in Chicago in 1914, and talked to the 3writer of these lines. He stated that he did not believe there was another man living who had mastered the art of public speaking as well as President Wilson had.

Perhaps some people were awed and others were mentally sluggish and without forethought, but the fact remains that most of them received Wilson's miraculous utterances, heard all over the world, as an oracle, and his ideas and doctrines were accepted as gospel by even half-barbaric peoples. In effect, the world recognized a new Moses, whose will and ideas were divinely inspired.

Wilson was a master of ideas, but he could not handle people. He was aware of the fact that through his theories he could reach the mind, but that to grasp the soul of the individual his theories must attain idealistic heights. As is the case with all great individuals, Wilson also had a weakness--he was susceptible to flattery.

If Wilson had not gone to Europe, he probably would be living today.

Clemenceau, Lloyd George, and Orlando managed to evade responsibilities, by referring back to their respective governments the decision on important issues. Wilson did not have any one to turn to. He was the chief executive of a nation. History should take note of the schemes used by the European crafty foxes in their efforts to shift to Wilson the responsibility of making a decision in delicate issues. We will mention only the mandate over Armenia and the Fiume verdict, both of which were so written that regardless of how Wilson interpreted them he could gain only enemies.

True, it was a grave mistake on his part to have submitted his Fourteen Point program. If he could have risen to the height of the situation, he would have pointed out the fact that the United States had fought in the World War for ideals, and that if the Allies wanted, as conquerors, a selfish peace, he would leave the conference, return home, and make a separate peace treaty with the Central Powers. Had he only gone a little further and announced that the United States would refuse to lend the Allies any more money, but 5instead would expect them to pay their debts in a very short time, his ideals would have triumphed, because the Allies were in no condition to risk losing the friendship of the United States. But if, from one angle, the mutilation of Hungary can be attributed in part to Wilson's passivity, Wilson cannot, from any other standpoint, be called an enemy of the Hungarian people.

On September 18, 1918, the Hungarian people of Chicago and vicinity raised the flag of the Hungarian Republic. They unfurled this flag with the cooperation of the Chicago Hungarian Social and Sick Benefit Society. We thought at that time that our homeland might be saved in its hour of distress. The American press aided us in our movement, while our own daily papers stood by and watched.

Certain understanding American men, such as Augustus Lukeman and ex-Senator Hamilton Lewis, informed President Wilson of our activities. President Wilson then announced that if a few other Hungarian communities would make similar 6demonstrations, he would be willing to receive Hungarian delegates from industrial sections--and that following this reception he would officially recognize the Hungarian Republican movement.

That these things never happened must be blamed partly on our daily newspapers, which paid little or no attention to the matter, and partly on the flu epidemic, which made meetings at this time impossible. It is a certainty, though, that if Wilson had recognized the activities of the Hungarian-Americans, Hungary would never have been dismembered to the extent that it actually was.

Every man has his faults, and so had Wilson. But no man deserves the bitterness which our position has made us feel toward Wilson. There is only one question we must ask ourselves. Did this man try to do the most good possible for the greatest number of people? Wilson voiced ideals that in years to come will have great effects on international affairs. His faults will be forgotten, and all that will be remembered will be 7his theories and their effect upon mankind.

Doctor Alderman spoke justly of him when, in an address delivered in Washington in memory of Wilson, he made the following remarks:

"As death hovered over him, men stopped amid their work and unconsciously felt that an individual blessed with great faith had lived among them. An apparition of a great man with a beautiful soul arose before them. They understood that our leader was a prophet, and for a moment their hearts were filled with warm sentiments. They felt that a fearless and generous man, with a warm heart and an unflinching will, had this slow-moving humanity in his grasp in his effort to be one with those who are called deathless and to enter the eternal Pantheon in glory."