"There shall be no annexations, no contributions, no punitive damage. Peoples are not to be handed about from one sovereignty to another by an international conference or an understanding between rivals and antagonists. National aspirations must be respected; peoples may now be dominated and governed only by their own consent. "Self-determination" is not a mere phrase. It is an imperative principle of actions which statesmen will henceforth ignore at their peril. We cannot have general peace for the asking, or by the mere arrangements of a peace conference. It cannot be pieced together out of individual understandings between powerful states. All the parties to this war must join in the settlement of every issue anywhere involved in it; because what we are seeking is a peace that we can all unite to guarantee and maintain and every item of it must be submitted to the common judgment whether it be right and fair, an act of justice, rather than a bargain between sovereigns."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Presidents of the United StatesAcademics from the United StatesNobel Peace Prize laureatesGovernors of New JerseyPoliticians from Virginia
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Imported from EN Wikiquote
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Woodrow_Wilson
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Woodrow Wilson
1856 – 1924
Präsident der USA (1913-1921)
210 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Woodrow Wilson →
Related Quotes
"Now, Therefore, I, Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States, under and by virtue of the powers vested in me by …"
"Il pesch grand ho adüna maglio il pitschen."
"An independent Polish state should be erected which should include the territories inhabited by indisputably Polish p…"
"Love work, loath mastery over others, and avoid intimacy with the government. -Shmaayah"
"14. A general association of nations must be formed under specific covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guar…"
"What is at at stake now is the peace of the world. What we are striving for is a new international order based upon b…"
"The peace of the world depends upon the just settlement of each of the several problems to which I adverted in my rec…"
"1. Open covenants of peace must be arrived at."
"2. Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas, outside territorial waters, alike in peace and in war."
"It is a fearful thing to lead this great peaceful people into war, into the most terrible and disastrous of all wars,…"