New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 5, August, 1915 | Page 2

neutrality according to the accepted laws of nations.
On May 7 the Cunard steamship Lusitania was sunk by a German submarine in the war zone as decreed by Germany, and more than 100 American citizens perished, with 1,000 other persons on board.
Thereupon, on May 13, the United States transmitted to the German Government a note on the subject of this loss. It said:
"American citizens act within their indisputable rights in taking their ships and in traveling wherever their legitimate business calls them upon the high seas, and exercise those rights in what should be the well justified confidence that their lives will not be endangered by acts done in clear violation of universally acknowledged international obligations, and certainly in the confidence that their own Government will sustain them in the exercise of their rights."
This note concluded:
"The Imperial Government will not expect the Government of the United States to omit any word or any act necessary to the performance of its sacred duty of maintaining the rights of the United States and its citizens and of safeguarding their free exercise and enjoyment."
Germany replied to this note on May 29. It stated that it had heard that the Lusitania was an armed naval ship which had attempted to use American passengers as a protection, and that, anyway, such passengers should not have been present. It added:
"The German commanders are consequently no longer in a position to observe the rules of capture otherwise usual and with which they invariably complied before this."
To the foregoing the United States maintained in a note sent to the German Government on June 9 that the Lusitania was not an armed vessel and that she had sailed in accordance with the laws of the United States, and that "only her actual resistance to capture or refusal to stop when ordered to do so ... could have afforded the commander of the submarine any justification for so much as putting the lives of those on board the ship in jeopardy."
In support of this view the note cited international law and added:
"It is upon this principle of humanity, as well as upon the law founded upon this principle, that the United States must stand."
Exactly one month later, on July 9, came Germany's reply. Its preamble praised the United States for its humane attitude and said that Germany was fully in accord therewith. Something, it asserted, should be done, for "the case of the Lusitania shows with horrible clearness to what jeopardizing of human lives the manner of conducting war employed by our adversaries leads," and that under certain conditions which it set forth, American ships might have safe passage through the war zone, or even some enemy ships flying the American flag. It continued:
"The Imperial Government, however, confidently hopes the American Government will assume to guarantee that these vessels have no contraband on board, details of arrangements for the unhampered passage of these vessels to be agreed upon by the naval authorities of both sides."
It is to this reply that the note of the United States Government made public on July 24 is an answer.
Germany's reply of July 8 and President Wilson's final rejoinder of July 21--which was given to the American press of July 24--are presented below, together with accounts of the recent German submarine attacks on the ships Armenian, Anglo-Californian, Normandy, and Orduna, involving American lives, and an appraisal of the German operations in the submarine "war zone" since February 18, 1915, when it was proclaimed. Also Austro-Hungary's note of June 29, protesting against American exports of arms, and an account of American and German press opinion on the Lusitania case are treated hereunder.
THE GERMAN MINISTER FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS TO THE AMERICAN AMBASSADOR AT BERLIN
BERLIN, July 8, 1915.
The undersigned has the honor to make the following reply to his Excellency Ambassador Gerard to the note of the 10th ultimo re the impairment of American interests by the German submarine war:
The Imperial Government learned with satisfaction from the note how earnestly the Government of the United States is concerned in seeing the principles of humanity realized in the present war. Also this appeal finds ready echo in Germany, and the Imperial Government is quite willing to permit its statements and decisions in the present case to be governed by the principles of humanity just as it has done always.
The Imperial Government welcomed with gratitude when the American Government, in the note of May 15, itself recalled that Germany had always permitted itself to be governed by the principles of progress and humanity in dealing with the law of maritime war.
Since the time when Frederick the Great negotiated with John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson the Treaty of Friendship and Commerce of September 9, 1785, between Prussia and the Republic of the West, German and American statesmen have, in fact,