Copies were, therefore, furnished to them with the request that they give the document consideration in order that they might make criticisms and suggest changes.

I had not sent a copy to the President, intending to await the views of my colleagues before doing so, but during the conference of January 10, to which I have been compelled reluctantly to refer in discussing the Covenant of the League of Nations, I mentioned the fact that our legal advisers had been for some time at work on a "skeleton treaty" and had made a tentative draft.

The President at once showed his displeasure and resented the action taken, evidently considering the request that a draft be prepared to be a usurpation of his authority to direct the activities of the Commission.

It was this incident which called forth his remark, to which reference was made in Chapter VIII, that he did not propose to have lawyers drafting the Treaty.
In view of Mr.Wilson's attitude it was useless for Dr.Scott and Mr.
Miller to proceed with their outline of a treaty or for the Commissioners to give consideration to the tentative draft already made.
It was a disagreeable situation.

If the President had had anything, however crude and imperfect it might have been, to submit in place of the Scott-Miller draft, it would have been a different matter and removed to an extent the grounds for complaint at his attitude.