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128 The Great War situation at this moment. In England and in France party politics had been eliminated, national defence had become the single purpose of governments in which party lines had been obliterated. No American could watch the next few weeks of European history without concern. Questions of right and wrong, of rival cultures and racial ambi- tions were wholly subsidiary to the greater question as to whether democracy, with all its virtues, could, because of its inherent defects, defend itself against autocracy, against the most efficient autocracy this world has known in centuries. If it failed it was not difficult to foresee the reaction that would follow.