ned, I hope, so far as they can equitably be sustained
by the present generation, by well-conceived taxation.

I say sustained so far as may be equitable by taxation, because it seems
to me that it would be most unwise to base the credits, which will now
be necessary, entirely on money borrowed. It is our duty, I most
respectfully urge, to protect our people, so far as we may, against the
very serious hardships and evils which would be likely to arise out of
the inflation which would be produced by vast loans.

[Sidenote: Nations must obtain supplies from us.]

In carrying out the measures by which these things are to be
accomplished we should keep constantly in mind the wisdom of interfering
as little as possible in our own preparation and in the equipment of our
own military forces with the duty--for it will be a very practical
duty--of supplying the nations already at war with Germany with the
materials which they can obtain only from us or by our assistance. They
are in the field, and we should help them in every way to be effective
there.

[Sidenote: Measure suggested to accomplish nation's ends.]

I shall take the liberty of suggesting, through the several executive
departments of the Government, for the consideration of your committees,
measures for the accomplishment of the several objects I have mentioned.
I hope that it will be your pleasure to deal with them as having been
framed after very careful thought by the branch of the Government upon
whom the responsibility of conducting the war and safeguarding the
nation will most directly fall.

[Sidenote: Concert of purpose and action among free peoples.]

While we do these things, these deeply momentous things, let us be very
clear, and make very clear to all the world, what our motives and our
objects are. My own thought has not been driven from its habitual and
normal course by the unhappy events of the last two months, and I do not
believe that the thought of the nation has been altered or clouded by
them. I have exactly the same things in mind now that I had in mind when
I addressed the Senate on the 22d of January last; the same that I had
in mind when I addressed the Congress on the 3d of February and on the
26th of February. Our object now, as then, is to vindicate the
principles of peace and justice in the life of the world as against
selfish and autocratic power, and to set up among the really free and
self-governed peoples of the world such a co