THE KAISER.
NvHAT is to happen to the Kaiser ? It is a question that every one asks. In a situation like the present, hen the greater part of Europe is in dissolution and the r.,ind is unable to grasp all the details, it is not unnatural for the public to bend their attention to a personal point. Yet his personal point after all is a very important one. History is full of instances of the dangers which afflict States in process of reconstruction when some powerful and dangerous person- ality is near by to form a rallying-ground for disaffection and reaction. Cromwell, even at his moments of greatest power, vas troubled and haunted by the sentimental affection which F. great many Englishmen, even those who had suffered badly, still retained for the Monarchy. His attempt to form an Upper House was shattered by ridicule, for no better reason, to state the facts roughly, than that a large part of the nation was accustomed to the idea of a King's summons to the House of Lords, but could not stomach the notion of receiving as noble legislators the newly appointed Peers of Cromwell's creation—the " butchers and grocers " unfairly satirized by Macaulay. So again in the French Revolution, to take only one more example. The emigres formed a headquarters at Coblenz, and the Revolutionary Government in France could never feel safe while this skirmishing army of exiled Royalists was operating on its flank. The Emperor Leopold discounte- nanced the intrigues of the emigres, and even punished some llrabanters for insulting the French national cockade. The King of Prussia took the same line. Nevertheless the Coblenz émigrés wielded a real influence, and it was never quite certain from day to day that they would not turn some occasion to their advantage. The truth is that the greater the disorder and the insecurity of a State in transition, the easier are the opportunities for external intrigue. That is why the presence of the Kaiser in Holland will be a danger not only to Germany but to all Europe. Above all, it will be a great danger to Holland herself. What, then, is to be done with the Kaiser ? For the question must certainly be answered. If we may venture to judge the feelings of our countrymen, we should say that, though there is no trace of a vindictive hostility towards any of the Germans who may • seriously be trying to enter upon a better way of life, there is a very strong feeling that the Kaiser must be brought to trial. This is a perfectly logical conclusion. The British Government have announced that all persons proved guilty of offences against the laws of humanity during the war shall be duly punished. It is unthinkable, therefore, that the Kaiser him- self should be exempt. The whole idea of justice would fall into ridicule and disrepute if justice stopped short at the Jerson of the Kaiser. It should indeed begin there. It is quite possible that the Kaiser may prove to be less guilty than we think. But at all events those who lead the way in establishing a new order of the world must not begin with the fatal mistake of showing themselves respecters of persons. Respectable and admired monarchies would then have to tear an undeserved odium, and would fall into danger, because the democratic nations would inevitably say that the old business of monarchs was being corruptly protected.
We take the law of the matter to be this, that the Kaiser is in the fullest technical sense a prisoner of war. He crossed the Dutch frontier wearing the uniform of a combatant. He is interned in Holland just as much as other men who are indisputably prisoners of war in the eyes of the law are interned in Holland and Switzerland. The law, moreover, although it provides for the protection and humane treatment of all prisoners of war—provisions so grossly violated by the Ger- mans—also stipulates that prisoners of war may be tried for violations during the fighting of the Geneva and other Con- ventions. Thus in every way the Kaiser is a proper subject for justice. But here let us say most emphatically that justice must really mean justice. It would be the greatest of all blunders, and indeed an act out of all keeping with the spirit in which we must now try to rebuild a shattered world, if the Kaiser 'were prosecuted in a hot-blooded and passionate temper. Let us take our time and plan the course of justice in the calmest and most temperate manner. If that precaution be not taken, we shall do not only injustice to the Kaiser, but injustice to ourselves and the whole future. of the world. The meanest and most cruel murderer in the pages of crime gets and deserves a proper trial. It is one of the first elements of the British idea of justice that a man shall be assumed to be innocent till he is proved to be guilty. Precisely the same rule must apply to the Kaiser. What we appeal for is not vengeance but simply a fair trial. Just as Great Britain and Prussia insisted that Napoleon should be handed over after the battle of Waterloo, so the Associated nations of to-day should make it one of the terms of Peace that the Kaiser shall be given over to trial. Regarding it, as we do, as unthinkable that he should be allowed to stay on indefinitely in Holland, we may also say that it is fair, even to the Kaiser himself, that his future treatment should be properly regulated and safeguarded. The most terrible tragedy in the unhappy history of the late Tsar was that he stood no proper trial. He was wickedly shot without ever having been allowed to say a word in public in his own defence, or without anybody being allowed to speak on his behalf. There is no worse stain than this deed upon the record, horrible as it is, of the Bolshevik Government.
But on the assumption that the Kaiser must be sent out of Holland when the Peace settlement comes, by what exact form is he to be tried ? We should contemplate with the deepest misgiving, indeed with terror, the thought that the British people should have to act asjudges in their own cause. The last thing we desire is that the Kaiser should be placed in our own power. Whatever sentence we believed it was right and necessary to pass upon him would surely be cited against us by some other nation as an act of vindictiveness. A clue to the best course to pursue lies, we think, in the tentative Peace terms proposed by Lord Northcliffe in the papers of Monday, November 4th. He proposed (speaking, as we have no doubt, with a considerable degree of sanction from the Government) :- " The appointment of tribunals before which there shall be brought for impartial justice as soon as possible individuals of any of the belligerents accused of offences against the laws of war or of humanity. While I regard this condition as an essential preliminary to peace, as a just concession to the outraged consoienee of humanity, I admit freely that its practical application is full of difficulty. I foresee the extraordinary difficult), of assigning responsibility ; I recognize that during the actual conduct of war there are reasons why belligerents should hesitate to punish adequately those whom in normal times they would unhesitatingly condemn. I offer my own solution of the difficulty. It is that the appointed tribuna's should act as Courts of First Instance. They would hear the evidence brought against the accused, and, if they found a primd-facie case established against them, would refer them to their own countries for ultimate trial, judgment, and sentence. I believe that more stern justice will be done if nations which desire to purge themselves condemn their own criminals than if the punishment were left to other nations which might hesitate to be severe lest they should invest the individuals punished with the halo of martyrdom."
As a matter of fact, the Germans have themselves set a prece- dent for this procedure. In the Peace terms which they imposed upon Rumania they exacted that the punishment of certain Rumanian officials who were said to have been guilty of ill-treating some German prisoners should be carried out by the Rumanians themselves. To sum up, the Kaiser must by no means be allowed to remain in Holland. Holland is far too small a country and too weak to be able to put up with the presence of such a magnet of reaction. The spirit of the new Europe that is rising from the ashes will be preju- diced if the Kaiser is allowed to remain close to Germany in some dignity as a country gentleman or as a prosperous roi en exit. Once again, we do not assume the personal guilt of the Kaiser, but there is an unanswerable case for submis- sion to the Grand Jury. We do not know that the Kaiser was by his own orders responsible for such crimes as the sacking of Louvain, the shooting of hostages, the murder of merchant seamen who survived the torpedoing of their vessels, the torpedoing of the Lusitania,' and the judicial murders of Miss Cavell and Captain Fryatt ; but we do know that a word from him would have stopped every one of these crimes. The primalacie evidence is very strong indeed. If any one is brought to trial, the Kaiser must be.
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