^0 ASIA LIBRARY ANNEX €mM\\ Wimvmxi^ pilr«g THE GIFT OF ^ A.7 7 SM.Pr/a <.^ Cornell University Library E 713.R35 Later aspects of our new duties :an addr 3 1924 023 507 100 AN ADDRESS AT PRINCETON UNIVERSITY ON COMMEMORATION DAY ^aS LATER ASPECTS OF OUR NEW DUTIES BY. WHITELAW RE ID Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924023507100 LATER ASPECTS OF OUR NEW DUTIES AN ADDRESS AT PRINCETON UNIVERSITY ON COMMEMORATION DAY OCTOBER 21, 1899 BY WHITELAW REID * NEW YORK HENRY HALL 1899 © iDf ^ St .\'i 1- \ ': I Alexander Hall, Princeton University, October 21, 1899. At the celebration of Commemoration Day, in pursuance of previous action by the governing bodies of the University, Cyrus Fogg Brackett, Henry Professor of Physics, made the following presentation : Mr. President: I have the honor to present for the degree of Doctor of Laws the Hon. Whitelaw Reid, Editor of The Tribune. Mr. Reid is a conspicuous example of our better Aiaerican citi- zenship, as witness the various positions of influence, honor, and trust which he has worthily occupied. To have served as legisla- tive, war and general correspondent for various influential journals during the stirring times of the Civil War, to have passed rapidly to the Editorship-LQ-Chief of The Tribune, were enough to give scope to the powers and to satisfy the ambitions of most men. But it was our good fortune that Mr. Reid accepted the mission to France, in 1889, when difficult matters were pending, and that by his wisdom and tact he secured a satisfactory solution of them. More recently he gracefully represented this country at the Jubilee of Her Majesty the Queen. Still more recent and honorable ser- vice has he rendered his country and the world as a member of the Commission which sat in Paris to adjust the conditions of peace following the conflict of arms between this country and Spain. Besides these Mr. Reid has other claims to grateful recognition arising from his continued interest in Hterature and learning. After conferring the degree, and welcoming Mr. Reid to the fellow- ship of the University, its President, the Rev. Dr. Francis L. Patton, continued : We are here to-day to celebrate the 153d anniversary of the signing of the charter of Princeton University. We give a very large and grateful welcome to our friends who have done us the honor of visiting us on this occasion. At this time it is customary for the President of the University to say something in respect to the progress of the University during the interval since our last meeting. We express anew our obhgations to that most generous alumnus of Princeton University who has given us Stafford Little HaU. If you wiU look at the catalogue which has just come from the press, there is a page devoted to the Stafford Little lectureship, and it is my great gratification to be able to say, as you wiU see, that the incumbent of that lectureship is a person no less distiu- ^shed than our fellow townsman, the Hon. Grover Cleveland, ex- President of the United States. That same catalogue tells the in- teresting story that the enrolment of this year exceeds the enrolment of last year by ninety-flve men. We gave leave of absence yesterday to Professor Baldwin, in order that he might see through the press on the other side his dictionary of philosophy. I take leave to say it will be a monu- mental work, which will bring honor to Princeton, for Professor Baldwin is the chief editor of that work, and he has associated with him the most distinguished men in the sphere of philosophy both in this country and in Europe. Under the auspices of the author of the Volunteer Arctic Expe- dition in command of our own Professor Libbey, the American flag and the Princeton flag were carried farther north than they have ever been carried before in an American vessel since 1872. And the result of that expedition is successful beyond any other expedition in the interest of natural history in the Arctic Sea. We sustain a peculiar relation to both religion and politics : or at least we sustain a relation that we never cease to insist upon, whether pecuUar or not. We are distinctively Christians, but in no sense sectarian, and we are distinctively American and patri- otic, but in no sense partisan in our politics. And so we rejoice equally in seeing the commander-in-chief of the Democratic forces of the country upon this platform, and in seeing, as we see to-day, a conspicuous embodiment of the ideas of the Repubhcan party. We have asked Mr. Reid to come here and speak to us this morn- ing, not because he is a Republican, but because he is a distin- guished man who has had a large and varied experience in the higher realms of practical as well as theoretical politics, and who, whether we agree with him or not, at least has the courage of his convictions and can speak with authority, and not as a scribe, what he has to say. I coimt it one of the pleasures of my life to wel- come Mr. Reid on this occasion, and the trustees of this University consider it a special pleasure to record his name among the laur- eati of the Princeton University. LATER ASPECTS OF OUR NEW DITTIES AN ADDRESS AT PRINCETON UNIVERSITY J- The invitation for to-day witli wliicli Princeton honored me was accompanied with the hint that a discussion of some phase of current public affairs would not be unwelcome. That phase which has for the past year or two most absorbed public atten- tion is now more absorbing than ever. Elsewhere I have al- ready spoken upon it, more perhaps than enough ; but I cannot better obey the summons of this honored and historic Univer- sity, or better deserve the attention of this company of scholars, gentlemen and patriots, than by saying with absolute candor what its present aspects prompt. And first, the chaos of opinion into which the country was Questions that thrown by the outbreak of the Spanish- American War ceases ""^^^ ''^*" to be wholly without form and void. The discussions of a year ^'"'** have clarified ideas ; and on some points we may consider that the American people have substantially reached definite con- clusions. — There is no need, therefore, to debate laboriously before you whether Dewey was right in going to Manila. Everybody now realizes that, once war was begun, absolutely the most efficient means of making it speedily and overwhelmingly victorious, as well as of defending the most exposed half of our own coast, was to go to Manila. " Find the Spanish fleet and destroy it " was as wise an order as the President overissued, and he was equally wise in choosing the man to carry it out. — So also there is no need to debate whether Dewey was right in staying there. From that come his most enduring laurels. The American people admire him for the battle which sunk the Spanish navy ; but they trust and love him for the months of trial and triumph that followed. The Administration that should have ordered him to abandon the Eastern foothold he had conquered for his country — to sail away like a sated pirate 6 LATER ASPECTS OF OUR NEW DUTIES from the port where his victory broke down all civilized au- thority but our own, and his presence alone prevented domestic anarchy and foreign spoliation — would have deserved to be hooted out of the Capital. So, again, there is no need to debate whether the Peace Com- missioners should have thrown away in Paris what Dewey had won in Manila. The public servant who, without instructions, should in a gush of irresponsible sentimentality abandon great possessions, to which his country is justly entitled, whether by conquest or as indemnity for unjust war, would be not only an unprofitable but a faithless servant. It was their obvious duty to hold what Dewey had won, at least till the American people had time to consider and decide otherwise. ~ Is there any need to debate whether the American people wUl abandon it now ? Those who have a fancy for that species of dialectics may weigh the chances, and evolve from circumstances of their own imagination, and canons of national and interna- tional obligation of their own manufacture, conclusions to their own liking. I need not consume much of your time in that un- profitable pursuit. We may as well, here and now, keep our feet on solid ground and deal with facts as they are. The American people are in lawful possession of the Philippines, with the assent of all Christendom, with a title as indisputable as its title to California; and, though the debate will linger for awhile, and perhaps drift unhappily into partisan contention, the gen- eration is yet unborn that will see them abandoned to the pos- session of any other Power. The Nation that scatters princi- palities as a prodigal does his inheritance is too sentimental and moonshiny for the nineteenth century, or the twentieth ; and too unpractical for Americans of any period. It may flourish in Arcadia or Altruria ; but it does not among the sons of the pilgrims, or on the continent they subdued by stern strug- gle to the uses of civilization. Nevertheless, our people did stop to consider very carefuUy their Constitutional powers. I believe we have reached a point also where the result of that consideration may be safely assumed. The Constitutional arguments have been fully pre- sented and the expositions and decisions marshalled. It is enough now to say that the preponderance of Constitutional authorities, with Gouverneur Morris, Daniel Webster and Thomas H. Benton at their head, and the unbroken tendency of decisions by the Courts of the United States, for at least the last fifty years, from Mr. Chief Justice Waite and Mr. Justice CONTRIBUTIONS TO INTERNATIONAL LAW 7 Miller and Mr. Justice Stanley Matthews, of the Supreme Court, down to the very latest utterance on the subject, that of Mr. Justice Morrow, of the Circuit Court of Appeals, sustains the power to acquire "territory or other property" anywhere, and govern it as we please. Inhabitants of such territory are secure in the civil rights, guaranteed by the Constitution; but they have no political rights under it save as Congress confers them. The evidence in support of this view has been fully set forth, examined and weighed ; and, unless I greatly mistake, a popular decision on the subject has been reached. The Constitutional power is no longer seriously disputed, and even those who raised the doubt do not seem now to rely upon it. In thus summarizing what has been already settled, or dis- Contributions posed of in our dealings with the questions of the war, I may be *" interna- permitted to pause for a moment on the American contributions f^^^^^^^ "" it brought about, to international morality and law. On the day on which the American Peace Commissioners to Paris sailed for home after the ceremonial courtesy with which their labors were concluded, the most authoritative journal in the world pub- lished an interview with the eminent President of the cor- responding Spanish Commission, then and for some time afterward President also of the Spanish Senate, in which he was reported as saying : " We knew in advance that we should have to deal with an implacable conqueror, who would in no way concern himself with any pre-existing International Law, but whose sole object was to reap from victory the largest possible advantage. This conception of International Law is absolutely new ; it is no longer a case of might against right, but of might without right. . . . The Americans have acted as vainquewrs 'parvenus.^ Much may be pardoned to the anguish of an old and trusted public servant over the misfortunes of his native land. We may even in our sympathy endeavor to forget what country it was that proposed to defy the agreements of the Conference of Paris and the general judgment of Nations by resorting to Pri- vateering ; or what country it was that preferred to risk becom- ing an asylum for the criminals of a continent rather than re- vive, even temporarily, that basic and elementary implement of modern international justice, an Extradition Treaty, which had been in force with acceptable results for over twenty years. But when Americans are stigmatized as " vainqueurs parvenus," who by virtue of mere strength violate International Law against a 8 LATER ASPECTS OP OUE NEW DUTIES prostrate foe, and when one of the ablest of their American crit- ics encourages the Spanish contention, by talking of our " bull- dog diplomacy at Paris," it gives us occasion to challenge the approval of the world — as the facts amply warrant — for the scrupulous conformity to existing International Law, and the important contributions to its beneficent advancement that have distinguished the action of the United States throughout these whole transactions. Having already set these forth in some de- tail before a foreign audience, I must not now do more than of- fer the briefest summary. , „_The United States ended the toleration of Privateering. It was perfectly free to commission privateers on the day war was declared. Spain was equally free, and it was proclaimed from Madrid that the Atlantic would soon swarm with them, sweep- ing American commerce from the ocean. Under these circum- stances one of the very first and noblest acts of the President was to announce that the United States would not avail itself of the right to send out privateers, reserved under the Declara- tion of Paris. The fast thickening disasters of Spain prevented her from doing it, and thus substantially completed the practice or acquiescence of the civilized world, essential to the accept- ance of a principle in International Law. It is safe to assume that Christendom will henceforth treat Privateering as under International ban. - — The United States promoted the cause of genuine Interna- tional Arbitration by promptly and emphatically rejecting an insidious proposal for a spurious one. It taught those who de- liberately prefer War to Arbitration, and when, beaten at it, seek then to get the benefit of a second remedy, that honest Arbitration must come before War, to avert its horrors ; not after war, to evade its penalties. ■ - The United States promoted peace among nations and so served humanity by sternly enforcing the rule that they who bring on an unjust war must pay for it. For years the over- whelming tendency of its people had been against any territo- rial aggrandizement, even a peaceful one ; but it unflinchingly exacted the easiest if not the only payment Spain could make for a war that cost us at the lowest from four to five hundred million dollars, by taking Porto Rico, Guam and the Philip- pines. It requires some courage to describe this as either a violation of International Law, or a display of unprecedented severity by an implacable conqueror, in the very city and before the very generation that saw the Franco-Prussian war con- CONTRIBUTIONS TO INTERNATIONAL LAW 9 eluded, not merely by a partition of territory but also by a cash payment of a thousand millions indemnity. The United States promoted the peaceful liberalizing of op- ^^^ressive rule over all subject peoples by making it more difl&- cult to negotiate loans in the markets of the world to subdue their outbreaks. For it firmly rejected in the Cuban adjust- ments the immoral doctrine that an ill-treated and revolting colony, after gaining its freedom, must still submit to the extor- tion from it of the cost of the parent country's unsuccessful ef- forts to subdue it. We therefore left the so-called Cuban bonds on the hands of the Power that issued them, or of the reckless lenders who advanced the money. At the same time the United States strained a point elsewhere in the direction of protecting any legitimate debt, and of dealing generously with a fallen foe, by a payment which the most carping critic will some day be ashamed to describe as " buying the inhabitants of the Philip- pines at two dollars a head." * *Wlieii Spain sued for peace in the summer of 1898, she had lost control of the Philippines, and any means for regaining control. Her fleet was sunk ; her army- was cooped up in the Capital, under the guns of the American fleet, and its capture or surrender had only been delayed till the arrival of reinforcements for the American army, because of the fears expressed by foreigners and the principal residents of Manila that the city might be looted by natives unless the American land forces were ample to control them. The Spanish army did so surrender, in fact, before the news of the armistice could reach them. In the protocol granting an armistice, the United States exacted at once the cession of Porto Rico and an island in the Ladrones ; but reserved the decision as to the control, disposition, and government of the Philippines for the treaty of peace, apparently with a view to the possibility of accepting them as further indemnity for the war. When the treaty came to be negotiated, the United States required the cession of the Philippines. Its Peace Commissioners stated that their Government " felt amply supported in its right to demand this cession, with or without concessions " ; added that "this demand might be limited to the single ground of indemnity,'' and pointed out that it "was not now putting forward any claim for pecuniary indemnity, to cover the enormous cost of the war." It accompanied this demand for a transfer of sovereignty with a stipulation for assuming any existing indebtedness of Spain, incurred for public works and improvements of a pacific character in the Philippines. The United States thus asserted its right to the Archipelago for indemnity, and at the same time committed itself to the principle of payment on account of the Philip- pine debt. When it became necessary to put the Philippine case into an ultimatum, the Peace Commissioners did not further refer to the debt or give any specific reason either for a cession or for a payment. They simply said they now presented "a new proposition, embodying the concessions which, for the sake of immediate peace, their Government is, under the circumstances, willing to tender." But it was really nothing but the old proposition, with the mention for the first time of a specific sum for the payment, and without any question of "pacific improve- ments." That sum just balanced the Philippine debt — forty million Mexican, or, say, twenty million American dollars. 2 10 LATER ASPECTS OF OUR NEW DUTIES All these are acts distinctly in accord with International Law so far as it exists and applies; and distinctly tending to promote its humane and Christian extension. Let me add in a word that the peace negotiations in no way compromised or affected the Monroe Doctrine, which stands as firm as ever, though much less important with the disappearance of any probable opposi- tion to it ; and that the prestige they brought smoothed the way for the one welcome and beneficent result of the Czar's Con- ference at The Hague, a response to the American proposal for a permanent International Court of Arbitration. A trifling but characteristic inaccuracy concerning the Peace Commission may as well be corrected before the subject is left. This is the statement, apparently originating from Malay sources, but promptly accepted in this country by unfriendly critics, to the effect that the representative of Aguinaldo was uncivilly refused a hearing in Paris, It was repeated, inadver- tently, no doubt, with many other curious distortions of historic facts, only the other day, by a distinguished statesman in Chicago. As he put it, the doors were slammed in their faces in "Washington as well as in Paris. Now, whatever might have happened, the door was certainly never slammed in their faces in Paris, for they never came to it. On the contrary, every time Mr. Agoncillo approached any member of the Commission on the subject, he was courteously invited to send the Commis- sioners a written request for a hearing, which would at any rate receive immediate consideration. No such request ever came, and any Filipino who wrote for a hearing in Paris was heard. The Present Meanwhile we are now in the midst of hostilities, originating Duty in an unprovoked attack upon our troops in the city they had wrested from the Spaniards, before final action on the treaty. It is easy to say that we ought not to have got into this conflict, and to that I might agree. " I tell you they can't put you in jail on that charge," said the learned and disputatious counsel to the client who had appealed from his cell for help. " But I am in," was the sufldcient answer. The question just then was not what might have been done, but what can be done. I wish to urge that we can only end this conflict by manfully fighting through it. The talk one hears that the present situation calls for " diplomacy " seems to be mistimed. That species of diplo- macy which consists in the tact of prompt action in the right line at the right time might very probably have prevented the present hostilities. '-Any diplomacy now would seem to our ELIMINATE TEMPORARY DISCOURAGEMENTS 11 Tagalog antagonists the raising of the white flag — the final proof that the American people do not sustain their army, in the face of unprovoked attack. Every witness who came before the American Peace Commission in Paris or sent it a written - statement, English, Glerman, Belgian, Malay or American, said the same thing. Absolutely the one essential for dealing with the Filipinos was to convince them at the very outset that what you began you stood to ; that you did not begin without con- sideration of right and duty, or quail then before opposition ; that your purpose was inexorable and your power irresistible, while submission to it would always insure justice. On the contrary, once let them suspect that protests would dissuade and turbulence deter you, and all the Oriental instinct for delay and bargaining for better terms is aroused, along with the special Malay instinct and genius for intrigue and double-dealing, their profound belief that every man has his price, and their childish ignorance as to the extent to which stump speeches here against any Administration can cause American armies beyond the seas to retreat. No ; the toast which Henry Clay once gave in honor of an earlier naval hero fits the present situation like a glove. He proposed " The policy which looks to peace as the end of war, and war as the means of peace." In that light I maintain that the conflict we are prosecuting is in the line of National necessity and duty ; that we cannot turn back ; that the truest humanity condemns only needless delay or half-hearted action, and de- mands overwhelming forces and irresistible onset. But in considering this duty, just as in estimating the Treaty Eliminate of Paris, we have the right to eliminate all account of the tri- Temporary fling success, so far, in the Philippines, or of the great trouble and cost. What it was right to do there, and what we are bound to do now, must not be obscured by faults of hesitation or insuf- ficient preparation, for which neither the Peace Commissioners nor the people are responsible. I had occasion to say before a college audience last June what I now repeat with the addi- tional emphasis subsequent events have warranted, that the dif- ficulties which at present discourage us are largely of our own making, and I repeat that it is still not for us, here and now, to apportion the blame. We have not the knowledge to say just who or whether any man or body is wholly at fault ; what we do know is that the course of hesitation and inaction which the Nation pursued in face of an openly matuiing attack was pre- Discourage- meats 12 LATER ASPECTS OF OUR NEW DUTIES cisely the policy sure to give us the greatest trouble, and that we are now paying the penalty. If the opposite course had been taken at the outset — unless all the testimony from foreign ob- servers and from our own officers is at fault — there would have been either no outbreak at all, or only one easily controlled and settled to the general satisfaction of most of the civilized and semi-civilized inhabitants of the Island. On the personal and partisan disputes already lamentably begun, as to Senatorial responsibility. Congressional respon- sibility, or the responsibility of this or that executive officer, we have no occasion here to enter. What we have a right to insist on is that our general policy in the Philippines shall not be shaped now merely by the just discontent with the bad start. The reports of continual victories that roll back on us every week, like the stone of Sisyphus, and need to be won over again next week ; the mistakes of a censorship that was absolutely right as a military measure, but may have been uninteUigently, not to say childishly conducted — all these are beside the real question. They must not obscure the duty of restoring order in the regions where our troops have been assailed ; or prejudice our subsequent course. Pacification I Venture to say of that course that neither our duty nor our and Natural interest will permit us to stop short of a pacification which can Course of ^j^jy. ^^^ jj^ ^^ye establishment of such local self-government as the people are found capable of conducting, and its extension just as far and as fast as the people prove fit for it. The natural development thus to be expected would probably proceed safely, along the lines of least resistance, about in this order : First, and till entirely clear that it is no longer needed, Military Grovernment. Next, the rule of either Military or Civil Q-overnors (for a considerable time, probably the former), relying gradually more and more on native agencies. Thirdly, the de- velopment of Dependencies, with an American Civil Grovemor, with their foreign relations and their highest courts controlled by us, and their financial system largely managed by members of a rigidly organized and jealously protected American Civil Service; but in most other respects steadily becoming more self-governing. And finally, autonomous Colonies, looking to us for little save control of their foreign relations ; profiting by the stability and order the backing of a powerful nation guar- antees ; cultivating more and more intimate trade and personal relations with that nation, and coming to feel themselves par- ticipants of its fortunes and renown. EVASIONS OF DUTY 13 Sucli a course, Congress, after full investigation and delibera- tion, might perhaps wisely formulate. Such a course, with slight modifications, to meet existing limitations as to his powers, has already been entered upon by the President, and can doubtless be carried on indefinitely by him until Congress acts. This action should certainly not be precipitate. The system demands most careful study, not only in the light of what the English and Dutch, the most successful holders of tropical countries, have done, but also in the light of the peculiar and varied circumstances that confront us on these different and distant islands, and among these widely differing races — circumstances to which no previous experience exactly applies, and for which no uniform system could be applicable. If Congress should take as long a time before action to study the problem as it has taken in the Sandwich Islands, or even in Alaska, the President's power would still be equal to the emer- gency, and the policy, while flexible, could still be made as con- tinuous, coherent and practical as his best information and ability would permit. Against such a conscientious and painstaking course in deal- Evasions of ing with the grave responsibilities that are upon us in the East, Duty two lines of evasion are sure to threaten. The one is the policy of the upright but short-sighted and strictly Continental Patriot — the same which an illustrious statesman of another country followed in the Soudan : " Scuttle as quick as you can." The other is the policy of the Exuberant Patriot, who believes in the universal adaptability and immediate extension of American institutions. He thinks aU men everywhere as fit to vote as himself, and wants them for partners. He is eager to have them prepare at once, in our new possessions, first in the West Indies, then in the East, to send Senators and Representatives to Con- gress — and his policy is: "Make territories of them now and States in the American Union as soon as possible." I wish to speak with the utmost respect of the sincere advocates of both theories, but must say that the one seems to me to fall short of a proper regard for either our duty or our interest, and the other to be National suicide. Grentlemen in whose ability and patriotism we aU have con- fidence have lately put the first of these policies for evading our duty in the form of a protest " against the expansion and estab- lishment of the dominion of the United States, by conquest or otherwise, over unwilling peoples in any part of the globe." Of this it may be said, first, that any application of it to the Phihp- 14 LATER ASPECTS OF OUR NEW DUTIES pines probably assumes a factional and temporary outbreak to represent a settled unwillingness. Aaron Burr came near making New Orleans as "unwilling" as Aguinaldo bas made Manila. Mr. Lincoln, you remember, always believed the people of North Carolina not unwilling to remain in the Union, yet we know what they did. But next, this protest contemplates evading the present responsibility by a reversal of our settled policy any way. Mr. Lincoln probably never doubted the un- willingness of South Carolina to remain in the Union, but that did not change his course. Mr. Seward never inquired whether the Alaskans were unwilling or not. The historic position of the United States, from the day when Jefferson braved the envenomed anti-expansion sentiment of his time and bought the territory west of the Mississippi, on down, has been to con- sider, not the willingness or unwillingness of any inhabitants, whether aboriginal or colonists, but solely our National oppor- tunity, our own duty and our own interests. -^ Is it said that this is imperialism 1 That implies usurpation of power, and there is absolutely no ground for such a charge against this Administration at any one stage in these whole transac- tions. If any complaint on this score is to lie, it must relate to the critical period when we were accepting responsibility for order at Manila, and must be for the exercise of too little power, not too much. It is not imperialism to take up honestly the responsibility for order we incurred before the world, and continue under it, even if that should lead us to extend the civil rights of the American Constitution over new regions and strange peoples./ It is not imperialism, when duty keeps us among these chaotic, warring, distracted tribes, civilized, semi- civilized and barbarous, to help them, as far as their several capacities will permit, toward self-government on the basis of those civil rights^ A terser and more taking statement of opposition has been recently attributed to a gentleman highly honored by this Uni- versity, and by his townsmen here. I gladly seize this oppor- tunity, as a consistent opponent during his whole political life, to add that his words carry great weight throughout the country by reason of the unquestioned ability, courage and patriotic devotion he has brought to the public service. He is reported as protesting simply against " the use of power in the extension of American institutions." But does not this, if applied to the present situation, seem also to miss an important distinction ? What planted us in the Philippines was the use of our power in OBJECTIONS TO DUTY 15 the most efficient naval and military defence then available for our own institutions where they already exist, against the attack of Spain. If the responsibility entailed by the result of these acts in our own defence does involve some extension of our — institutions, shall we therefore run away from it? If a guar- antee to chaotic tribes of the civil rights secured by the Amer- ican Constitution does prove to be an incident springing from the discharge of the duty that has rested upon us from the moment we drove Spain out, is that a result so objectionable as to warrant us in abandoning our duty ? There is, it is true, one other alternative — the one which Aguinaldo himself is said to have suggested, and which has certainly been put forth in his behalf with the utmost simplicity and sincerity by a conspicuous statesman at Chicago. We might at once solicit peace from Aguinaldo. We might then encourage him to extend his rule over the whole country. Catholic, Pagan and Mahometan, willing and unwilling alike, ~- - __ and promise him whatever aid might be necessary for that task. Meantime, we should undertake to protect him against outside interference from any European or Asiatic nation whose in- terests on that oceanic highway and in those commercial capitals might be imperilled ! I do not desire to discuss that proposi- tion. And I submit to candid men that there are just those three courses and no more now open to us — to run away, to protect Aguinaldo, or to back up our own Army and firmly hold on ! If this fact be clearly perceived, if the choice between these Objections three courses be once recognized as the only choice the present *" '•"♦y situation permits, our minds will be less disturbed by the con- fused cries of perplexity and discontent that still fill the air. Thus men often say, "If you believe in liberty for yourself, why refuse it to the Tagals?" That is right; — they should have, in the degree of their capacity, the only kind of liberty worth having in the world, the only kind that is not a curse to its possessors and to aU in contact with them ; — ordered liberty, under law, for which the wisdom of man has not yet found a better safeguard than the guarantees of civil rights in the Con- stitution of the United States, Who supposes that to be the liberty for which Aguinaldo is fighting? What his people want, and what the statesman at Chicago wishes us to use the Army and Navy of the United States to help him get, is the liberty to rule others ; — the liberty first to turn our own troops 16 LATER ASPECTS OF OUR NEW DUTIES out of the city and harbor we had in our own self-defense cap- tured from their enemies; the liberty next to rule that great commercial city, and the tribes of the interior, instead of leav- ing us to exercise the rule over them that events have forced upon us, till it is fairly shown that they can rule themselves. Again, it is said : " Tou are depriving them of freedom." But they never had freedom, and could not have it now. Even if they could subdue the other tribes in Luzon, they could not establish such order on the other islands and in the waters of the archipelago as to deprive foreign Powers of an immediate excuse for interference. What we are doing is in the double line of preventing otherwise inevitable foreign seizure and put- ting a stop to domestic war. " But you cannot fit people for freedom — they must fit them- selves, just as we must do our own crawling and stumbling in order to learn to walk." The illustration is unfortunate. Must the crawling baby, then, be abandoned by its natural or acci- dental guardian, and left to itself to grow strong by struggling, or to perish, as may happen ? Must we turn the Tagals loose on the foreigners in Manila, and on their enemies in the other tribes, that by following their instincts they may fit themselves for freedom ? Again, " It will injure us to exert power over an unwilling —people — just as slavery injured the slaveholders themselves." Then a community is injured by maintaining a police. Then a court is injured by rendering a just decree, and an ofiicer by executing it. Then it is a greater injury, for instance, to stop piracy than to suffer from it. Then the manly exercise of a just responsibility enfeebles instead of developing and strengthening a nation. " Grovernments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed." " No man is good enough to govern another against his wUl." Great truths, from men whose greatness and moral elevation the world admires. But there is a higher authority than Jefferson or Lincoln, who said : " If a man smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also." Yet he who acted literally on even that divine injunction toward the Malays that attacked our army in Manila would be a congenital idiot to begin with, and his corpse, while it lasted, would remain an object lesson of how not to deal with the present stage of Malay civilization and Christianity. Why mourn over our present course as a departure from the policy of the Fathers ? For a hundred years the uniform policy EVASION BY EMBRACE 17 which they began and their sons continued has been acquisition, expansion, annexation, reaching out to remote wildernesses far ! more distant and inaccessible then than the Philippines are now, ! — to disconnected regions like Alaska, — to island regions like Midway, the G-uano Islands, the Aleutians, the Sandwich Islands, — and even to quasi-protectorates like Liberia and Samoa. Why mourn because of the precedent we are estab- lishing ? The precedent was established before we were born. Why distress ourselves with the thought that this is only the beginning, that it opens the door to unlimited expansion ? The door is wide open now, and has been ever since Livingston in Paris jumped at Talleyrand's offer to sell him the wilderness west of the Mississippi instead of the settlements eastward to Florida, which we had been trying to get; and Jefferson eagerly sustained him. For the rest, the task that is laid upon us now is not proving so easy as to warrant this fear that we shall soon be seeking unlimited repetitions of it. That danger, in fact, can come only if we evade our present Evasioa by duty by the second of the two alternative methods of evasion I Embrace have mentioned — the one favored by the Exuberant Patriot, who wants to clasp Cuban, Kanaka, and Tagalog alike to his bosom as equal partners with ourselves in our inheritance from the Fathers, and take them all into the Union as States. We will be wise to open our eyes at once to the gravity and the insidious character of this danger — the very worst that could threaten the American Union. Once begun, the rivalry > of parties and the fears of politicians would insure its continu- ance. With Idaho and Wyoming admitted, they did not dare prolong the exclusion even of Utah, and so we have the shame of seeing an avowed polygamist, with a prima facie right to sit in our Congress, as a legislator not merely for Utah but for the whole Union. At this moment scarcely a politician dares frankly avow unalterable opposition to the admission of Cuba, if she should seek it. Yet, bad as that would be, it would neces- sarily lead to worse. Others in the West Indies might not linger long behind. In any event, with Cuba a State, Porto Eico could not be kept a Territory. No more could the Sandwich Islands. And then, looming direct in our path, like a volcano rising out of the mist on the affrighted vision of mariners tempest tossed in tropic seas, is the spectre of such States as Luzon, and the Visayas, and Hayti. They would have precedents, too, to quote, and dangerous 3 18 LATER ASPECTS OF OUR NEW DUTIES ones. When we bought Louisiana we stipulated in the treaty that " the inhabitants of the ceded territory shall be incorporated in the Union of the United States and admitted as soon as pos- sible, according to the principles of the Federal Constitution, to the enjoyment of all the rights, advantages and immunities of citizens of the United States." We made almost identically the same stipulation when we bought Florida. When one of the most respected in the long line of our able Secretaries of State, Mr. William L. Marcy, negotiated a treaty in 1854, for the an- nexation of the Sandwich Islands, he provided that they should be incorporated as a State, with the same degree of sovereignty as other States, and on perfect equality with them. The schemes prior to 1861, for the purchase or annexation of Cuba, practically all looked to the same result. Not till the annexation of San Domingo was proposed did this feature disappear from our treaties. It is only candid to add that the habit of regarding this as the natural and necessary destiny of any United States territory, as soon as it has sufficient population, has been uni- versal. It is no modern vagary, but the practice, if not the theory, of our whole National life that would open the doors of our Senate and House, and give a share in the Grovernment to these wild-eyed newcomers from the islands of the sea. The calamity of admitting them cannot be overrated. Even ^inr the case of the best of these islands, it would demoralize and degrade the National suffrage, almost incalculably below the point already reached. To the Senate, unwieldy now, and greatly changed in character from the body contemplated by the Constitution, it would be disastrous. For the present States of the Union it would be an act of folly like that of a business firm which blindly steered for bankruptcy, by freely admitting to full partnership, new members, strangers and non-residents, not only otherwise ill-qualified, but with absolutely conflicting interests. And it would be a distinct violation of the clause in the preamble that " we, the people ... do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America^ There is the only safe ground — on the letter and the spirit of the Constitution. It contemplated a Continental Union of sov- ereign States. It limited that Union to the American continent. The man that takes it farther sounds its death knell. The General I have designedly left to the last any estimate of the material Welfare interests we serve by holding on in our present course. What- ever these may be, they are only a subordinate consideration. HAVE THEY ANY VALUE? 19 We are in the Philippines, as we are in the West Indies, because duty sent us ; and we shall remain because we have no right to run away from our duty, even if it does involve far more trouble than we foresaw when we plunged into the war that entailed it. The call to duty, when once plainly understood, is a call Ameri- cans never fail to answer ; while to calls of interest they have often shown themselves incredulous or contemptuous. But the Constitution we revere was also ordained " to pro- mote the general welfare," and he is untrue to its purpose who squanders opportunities. Never before have they been showered upon us in such bewildering profusion. Are the American people to rise to the occasion ; are they to be as great as their country ? Or shall the historian record that at this unexampled crisis, they were controlled by timid ideas and short-sighted views, and so proved unequal to the duty and the opportunity which unforeseen circumstances brought to their doors ? " The two richest archipelagoes in the world are practically at our dis- posal. The greatest ocean on the globe has been put in our hands, the ocean that is to bear the commerce of the Twentieth Century. In the face of this prospect shall we prefer, with the teeming population that century is to bring us, to remain a " hibernating nation, living off its own fat — a hermit nation," as Mr. Senator Davis has asked ? For our first Assistant Sec- retary of State, Mr. Hill, was right when he said that not to enter the open door in Asia means the perpetual isolation of this continent. Are we to be discouraged by the cry that the new possessions Have they any are worthless ? Not while we remember how often and under ^"1"* ? what circumstances we have heard that cry before. Half the public men of the period denounced Louisiana as worthless. Eminent statesmen made merry in Congress over the idea that Oregon or Washington could be of any use. Daniel Webster, in the most solemn and authoritative tones Massachusetts has ever employed, assured his fellow Senators that in his judg- ment California was not worth a dollar. Is it said that the commercial opportunities in the Orient, or at least in the Philippines, are overrated ? So it used to be said of the Sandwich Islands. But what does our experience show ? Before their annexation even, but after we had taken this little archipelago under our protection and into our commercial sys- ' tern, our ocean tonnage in that trade became nearly double as heavy as with Great Britain, Why ? Because while we have 20 LATEE ASPECTS OF OUR NEW DUTIES lost the trade of the Atlantic, superior advantages make the Pacific ours. Is it said that elsewhere on the Pacific we can do as well without a controlling political influence as with it? Look again ! Mexico buys our products at the rate of $1.95 for each inhabitant; South America at the rate of 90 cents; Great Britain at the rate of $13.42 ; Canada at the rate of $14, and the Hawaiian Islands at the rate of $53.35 for each inhabi- tant. Look at the trade of the chief city on the Pacific Coast. All Mexico and Central America, all the western parts of South America and of Canada, are as near to it as is Honolulu ; and comparison of the little Sandwich Islands in population, mth any of them, would be ridiculous. Yet none of them bought as much salmon in San Francisco as Hawaii, and no countries bought more save England and Australia. No countries bought as much barley, excepting Central America; and even in the staff of life, the California flour which all the world buys, only five countries outranked Hawaii in purchases in San Francisco. No doubt a part of this result is due to the nearness of Hawaii to our markets, and her distance from any others capable of competing with us ; and another part to a favorable system of reciprocity. Nevertheless, nobody doubts the advantage our dealers have derived in the promotion of trade, from controlling political relations and frequent intercourse. There are those who deny that "trade follows the flag," but even they admit that it leaves, if the flag does. And, independent of these ad- vantages, and reckoning by mere distance, we still have the better of any European rivals in the Philippines. Now, assume that the FUipino would have far fewer wants than the Kanaka or his coolie laborer, and would do far less work for the means to gratify them. Admit, too, that, with "the open door," our political relations and frequent intercourse could have barely a flfth or a sixth of the effect there they have had in the Sandwich Islands. Roughly cast up even that result, and say whether it is a value which the United States should throw away as not worth considering ! And the greatest remains behind. For the trade in the Philip- pines will be but a drop in the bucket compared to that of China, for which they give us an unapproachable foothold. But let it never be forgotten that the confidence of Orientals goes only to those whom they recognize as strong enough and de- termined enough always to hold their own and protect their rights ! The worst possible introduction for the Asiatic trade would be an irresolute abandonment of our foothold because THE FUTURE 21 it was too mucli trouble to keep, or because some Malay aud half-breed insurgents said they wanted us away. Have you considered for whom we hold these advantages in The Future trust ? They belong not merely to the seventy-five millions now within our borders, but to all who are to extend the fortunes and preserve the virtues of the Republic in the coming century. Their number cannot increase in the startling ratio this century has shown — if they did the population of the United States a hundred years hence would be over twelve hundred millions- That ratio is impossible, but nobody gives reasons why we should not increase half as fast. Suppose we do actually in- crease only one-fourth as fast in the Twentieth Century as in the Nineteenth. To what height would not the three hundred millions of Americans whom even that ratio foretells bear up the seething industrial activities of the Continent ! To what corner of the world would they not need to carry their com- merce ? What demands on tropical productions would they not make ? What outlets for their adventurous youth would they not require ? With such a prospect before us, who thinks that we should shrink from an enlargement of our National sphere because of the limitations that bound, or the dangers that threatened, before railroads, before ocean steamers, before tele- graphs and ocean cables, before the enormous development of our manufactures, and the training of executive and organizing faculties in our people, on a constantly increasing scale for generations ? Does the prospect alarm? Is it said that our Nation is already too great ; that all its magnificent growth only adds to the con- flicting interests that must eventually tear it asunder ? What cement then like that of a great common interest, beyond our borders, that touches not merely the conscience, but the pocket and the pride of all alike, and marshals us in the face of the world, standing for our own? What then is the conclusion of the whole matter ? Hold fast ! Stand firm in the place where Providence has put you, and do the duty a just responsibility for your own past acts imposes. Support the army you sent there. Stop wasting valuable strength by showing how things might be different if something different had been done a year and a half ago. Use the edu- cated thought of the country for shaping best its course now, instead of chiefly finding fault with its history. Bring the best hope of the future, the colleges and the generation they are 22 LATER ASPECTS OF OUR NEW DUTIES training, to exert the greatest influence and accomplish the most good by working intelligently in line with the patriotic aspirations and the inevitable tendencies of the American people, rather than against them. Unite the efforts of all men of good will to make the appointment of any person to these new and strange duties beyond seas impossible save for proved fitness, and his removal impossible save for cause. Rally the colleges and the churches, and all they influence, the brain and the conscience of the country, in a combined and irresistible demand for a genuine, trained and pure Civil Service in our new possessions, that shall put to shame our detractors, and show to the world the Americans of this generation, equal still to the work of civilization and colonization, and leading the development of the coming century as bravely as their Fathers led it in the last. m m ^m 1'^ f,^''-. ^'R m !:■ W] /V. .4?i ^<^'> tM m * m-m 1