148 EMPLOYMENT OF THE PLEBISCITE [446 



by the racial kinship of the population." In this connection 

 the German reply states : 



For the most part, Alsace-Lorraine is old German territory, hav- 

 ing become more than a thousand years ago a part of the old 

 German Empire. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the 

 German parts passed, mainly by conquest, under French sover- 

 eignty, without any reference to the wishes of the people, and fre- 

 quently in the face of their opposition. The French regime has 

 indeed succeeded in bringing about a political annexation to France, 

 but the racial and political characteristics of the inhabitants have 

 been so little influenced that even to-day four-fifths of the country's 

 population is still German in its language and customs. 



Germany has declared her willingness to right the wrong 

 of 1871, but the proposed outright cession of Alsace-Lor- 

 raine, without the consultation of the inhabitants, would 

 be "a new and greater injustice." Such a settlement would 

 not tend " to make a peace in the interest of all " and " the 

 danger would rather arise that, in the future, this question 

 would be the cause of new hatred among the nations." 



Germany proposes a vote for the entire population of 

 Alsace-Lorraine, to " provide for the three following possi- 

 bilities: (a) Union with France, (b) Union with the Ger- 

 man Empire as a Free State, or (c) Complete independ- 

 ence, especially liberty of economic relations with any of its 

 neighbors." 



In 1871 France protested the cession of Alsace-Lorraine 

 to Germany not on the grounds of the objection of the in- 

 habitants, but on the principle of the inviolability of French 

 soil. However, in their reply to the present German argu- 

 ment the Allied rejoinder stresses the point of popular pro- 

 test against the cession of 1871. Hence, since "to right a 

 wrong is to replace things, so far as possible, in the state 

 in which they were before being disturbed by the wrong," 

 Alsace-Lorraine must be returned on the basis of the senti- 

 ment of the people as it existed in 1871. 



The German insistence on the consultation of the inhabi- 

 tants as to their sentiments at the present time is rejected 

 on the ground that "the population of Alsace and Lorraine- 

 has never asked for it." that Alsace and Lorraine have 



