X ' I) i 1^7 CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY MM+. -49844H> jm=~ PRINTED IN Date Due 7 ■5 T36GJL ^ Kgr^BgrC car NO. 23233 J82 .D2 1917 Unlver »»y Library Pre iHMiii5lLy!f, i , lson state 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/cu31924030430726 'President Wilson s State Papers and zAddr esses WOODROW WILSON PRESIDENT WILSON'S STATE PAPERS AND ADDRESSES WITH EDITORIAL NOTES A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH AN INTRODUCTION AND AN ANALYTICAL INDEX NEW YORK THE REVIEW OF REVIEWS COMPANY 1917 COPYRIGHT 1917 By THE REVIEW OF REVIEWS CO. 3/ /a3S / ^S INTRODUCTION Under our form of government, the President occupies a place that has no exact parallel in the government of any other important country. In the last analysis we are gov- erned by public opinion, of which the President is chief exponent. He is the country's spokesman, not merely by custom but by express Constitutional provision and man- date. He is directed to inform Congress from time to time concerning the vital interests of the United States. He is also made the spokesman of the country in its dealings with foreign governments. The President's Messages to Congress are not merely a form of communication between the executive and the law- making authority, but they are intended to give information and guidance to the citizenship. Thus 'we have a surprising quantity of important historical and governmental material of an authoritative kind in the unbroken series of Presiden- tial messages and addresses, beginning with the first in- augural of George Washington and coming down to the latest official utterance of Woodrow Wilson. , All of our Presidents have been fully responsive to the duty of giving information to Congress and the country concerning the carrying-on of the government and the public concerns of the nation. Not one of them in the list has come seriously short in this regard, although some of them have been more conspicuous than others in point of literary or oratorical ability. Perhaps no other President has, relatively speaking, accomplished as much of his work through the successful Introduction use of written and spoken appeals to Congress, to American citizens, and to the public opinion of the world, as has Woodrow Wilson. His utterances have shaped events, not only in the current sense but in the larger aspects of his- tory. His Messages to Congress have been unusual in their frequency, vital in their relation to policies, and notable in the fact that he has appeared in person to present them. All of these Messages are published in this little volume. Besides these Messages to Congress, however, he has made many important addresses of a semi-official nature since assuming the Presidency, while he has been the author of a series of diplomatic notes and of proclamations relating to international affairs that constitute state papers of the highest significance. These documents also are included in the present volume, together with much material of Presidential authorship relating to the conduct of the war and to the policies of the Government. The remarkable literary quality of Mr. Wilson's ad- dresses is only eclipsed by their statesmanlike character in relation to public affairs of great moment. His sentences and paragraphs, in their discussion of world affairs, have helped to crystallize the vague longings of right-thinking men in all nations into something like definite policies for permanent peace on the basis of democracy and interna- tional justice. This collection of state papers and Presi- dential utterances is not, therefore, of transitory interest and importance, but of permanent value; and it ought to be in the home and at the hand of every intelligent citizen. Albert Shaw. CONTENTS PAGE Biographical Sketch of Woodrow Wilson ... xi First Inaugural Address (March 4, 1913) ... 1 Special Message to Congress, Urging Tariff Revi- sion (April 8, 1913) 5 Statement Regarding "Lobby" Influences on Tariff Legislation (May 26, 1913) 9 Special Message to Congress, Urging Currency Legis- lation (June 23, 1913) 10 Address at Gettysburg Reunion (July 4, 1913) . . 14 Special Message to Congress, on Mexico (August 27, 1913) 18 Address at Rededication of Congress Hall, Phila- delphia (October 25, 19,13) 27 Address before Southern Commercial Congress, Mobile, Ala. (October 27, 1913) .... 32 First Annual Message to Congress (December 2, 1913) 37 Special Message to Congress, on Trusts and Monopolies (January 20, 1914) .... 47 Proclamations Concerning Shipment of Arms into Mexico (February 3, 1914, and October 19, 1915) 55 Special Message to Congress, Urging Repeal of Free- Tolls Provision for American Ships at Panama (March 6, 1914) 57 Special Message to Congress, on the Tampico Inci- dent (April 20, 1914) 69 Instruction to Attorney-General to Sue for Dissolu- tion of New Haven Railroad Mergers (July 21, 1914) 63 x CONTENTS— (Continued) PAGE Special Message to Congress, Urging Additional Revenue (September 4, 1914) 64 Second Annual Message to Congress (December 8, 1914) 67 Address at Indianapolis, on .Jackson Day (January 8, 1915) 80 Immigration Bill Veto: First (January 28, 1915) . 94 Address before American Electric Railway Associa- tion, Washington (January 29, 1915) ... 97 Address before United States Chamber of Commerce, Washington (February 3, 1915) . . . . . 103 Address at Associated Press Meeting, New York (April 20, 1915) 108 Address at Naturalization Ceremonies, Philadelphia (May 10, 1915) 114 Address at Pan-American Financial Conference, Washington (May 24, 1915) 119 Address to Daughters of the American Revolution, Washington (October 11, 1915) . . . . 122 Address at Manhattan Club, New York, on National Defense Program (November 4, 1915) . . 126 Third Annual Message to Congress (December 7, 1915) 133 Addresses on Preparedness for National Defense, New York and Middle West (January 27 to February 3, 1916) 155 The European War : Diplomatic Notes, etc. Note to Belligerents, Suggesting Observance of Declaration of London (August 6, 1914) . 215 Urging Neutrality on American People (August 19, 1914) 217 Warning Germany Against Submarine "War Zone" Policy (February 10, 1915) 220 x CONTENTS— (Continued) PAGE Protesting Against British Use of American Flag (February 10, 1915) 223 Identic Note to Great Britain and Germany, Pro- posing Solution of Blockade and Submarine Controversy (February 20, 1915) .... 225 Pointing Out Irregularities in British and French Blockade of Germany (March 5, 1915) . . 227 Denouncing British Blockade as Illegal (October 21, 1915) 229 First "Lusitania" Note to Germany (May 13, 1915) 239 Second and Third "Lusitania" Notes (June 9, 1915, and July 21, 1915) 244 Note to Austria, on the "Ancona" Sinking (Decem- ber 6, 1916) 254 Note to Germany, on the "Sussex" Affair (April 18, 1916) 257 Special Message to Congress on the "Sussex" Affair (April 19, 1916) 262 Accepting German Agreement to Modify Sub- marine War Against Merchant Ships (May 8, 1916) 269 Address before League to Enforce Peace, Washing- ton (May 27, 1916) 271 Address before Press Club, New York (June 30, 1916) 276 Address at Salesmanship Congress, Detroit (July 10, 1916) 279 Address at Citizenship Convention, Washington (July 13, 1916) 290 Special Message to Congress, on Threatened Railroad Strike (August 29, 1916) 294 Address Accepting Renomination, Long Branch (Sep- tember 2, 1916) ......... 302 Address on Lincoln, Hodgenville, Ky. (September 4, 1916) 319 x CONTENTS— (Continued) PAGE Address at Woman Suffrage Convention, Atlantic City, N. J. (September 8, 1916) 323 Address before Grain Dealers' Association, Baltimore (September 25, 1916) ....... 327 Fourth Annual Message to Congress (December 5, 1916) 837 Note to Belligerents, Suggesting that Peace Terms Be Stated (December 18, 1916) 343 Address before United States Senate, on Essential Terms of Peace in Europe (January 22, 1917) 348 Immigration Bill Veto: Second (January 29, 1917) 356 Special Message to Congress, Announcing Sever- ance of Diplomatic Relations with Germany (February 3, 1917) 358 Special Message to Congress, Requesting Authority to Arm Merchant Ships (February 26, 1917) . 363 Second Inaugural Address (March 5, 1917) . . 368 Special Message to Congress, Advising that Ger- many's Course Be Declared War Against United States (April 2, 1917) 372 Proclamation of State of War and of Alien Enemy Regulations (April 6, 1917 383 Proclamation on Ways to Serve the Nation During War (April 16, 1917) 387 Address at Dedication of Red Cross Building, Wash- ington (May 12, 1917) 392 Proclamation of Selective Draft Act (May 18, 1917) 395 Outline of Food Administration Program (May 19, 1917) 399 Embargo Proclamations (July-August, 1917) . . 403 Message to the Russian Provisional Government (May 26, 1917) 405 CONTENTS— (Continued) PAGE Address to Confederate Veterans, Washington (June 5, 1917) 408 Flag Day Address, Washington (June 14, 1917) . 411 Message of Greeting to France, on Bastile Day (July 14, 1917) 419 Address of Welcome to the Special Ambassador from Japan, Viscount Ishii (August 23, 1917) . . 419 Message to the Russian National Council, at Moscow (August 27, 1917) 420 Reply to Pope Benedict's Peace Proposals (August 27, 1917) 421 Announcement of the Price to be Paid for Wheat (August 30, 1917) 424 Message to the National Army (September 3, 1917) 426 Appeal to School Children to Cooperate with Red Cross (September 15, 1917) 427 Appointment of Commission to Adjust Labor Dis- putes (September 19, 1917) 428 Index 431 Notable Phrases of Woodrow Wilson .... 437 CAREER OF WOODROW WILSON Twenty-eighth President of the United States [Vice-President, two terms, Thomas R. Marshall] The return of the Democratic party to power was made certain by the feeling of the country that the Payne-Aldrich tariff, enacted by the Republicans early in Mr. Taft's term, did not properly meet the pledge that the tariff should be thoroughly revised and substantially reduced by those re- sponsible for the protective policy. In 1910, the Demo- crats elected a majority of the new Congress. In 1912, they carried the Presidential election as well as the Con- gressional. For the first time, the plan of popular pri- maries was used by the parties in the selection of can- didates. The Democratic primaries showed Champ Clark (Speaker of the House) to be a plurality favorite, while the Republican primaries showed a clear preference for Theodore Roosevelt. But the effort to secure a second term for Taft gave him control of the Republican convention at Chicago, with the result that the larger half of the Repub- lican party supported Roosevelt on a separate ticket. Wood- row Wilson, Governor of New Jersey, had been a prom- inent Democratic candidate, and through the influence of Mr. Bryan, Wilson prevailed over Clark in the Democratic convention at Baltimore. Apart from the fact that it was logically a Democratic year, the split in the Republican party made Democratic victory quite inevitable. Woodrow Wilson had not been in active politics, but he had long been a distinguished citizen a"nd an eminent au- thority in the field oi. American history, government, and public policy. From his youth he had excelled in oratory, and his life study had been in the fields of jurisprudence xi Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers and politics. After graduation from Princeton in 1879, he had studied law at the University of Virginia and had for a short time practiced law at Atlanta, Ga. His birth- place was Staunton, Va., and his boyhood had been spent in the States farther south. In 1883 he had entered upon special studies at Johns Hopkins University, where in 1886 he received the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. He had not only obtained recognition at that time as an accomplished student in history, economics, and the science of government, but he had completed what has al- ways held place as a very notable book, entitled "Con- gressional Government," which deals with the American na- tional system in contrast with the British. After some years of teaching elsewhere, Wilson returned to Princeton as professor, and in due time became president of that in- stitution, having devoted himself constantly to work in the field of American history, comparative politics, and the principles of constitutional law and government. The headship of an American educational institution is analagous, in the character of its executive authority, to the governorship of a State or the presidency of the Union. In 1910 he was made Governor of the State of New Jersey, and at once attracted notice throughout the country as a probable President of the United States. He was still Governor when elected to the Presidency. Wilson's first term was notable for the vigor and success with which he led his party in the revision of the tariff, the important reconstruction of the country's banking and currency system, and in various other policies which were favorably received regardless of party divisions. The prin* cipal foreign situation with which he had to deal in the early part of his term was caused by the chaotic condition of Mexico. Later, however, and before he had been in the presidential chair a full year and a half, the great war in Europe began and his attention was absorbed by the prob- lems due to the neutral position of the United States as xii Career of Woodrow Wilson among the most powerful commercial nations of the world which were now opposing each other in two belligerent groups. President Wilson's renomination, in the summer of 1916, was unanimously accorded by the Democratic party. The Republicans nominated Charles E. Hughes (formerly Gov- ernor of the State of New York), who had for six years been an Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court. The election was very close, and turned finally upon the count of votes in the State of California. Mr. Wilson's reelection was, however, fully conceded by his opponents and accepted with characteristic good will by the entire country. The most serious situation of the latter part of his first term had to do with his diplomatic controversy with Ger- many over the ruthless and illegal use of submarines against the world's merchant shipping in the North Sea and in waters adjacent to the British, French, and Italian coasts. The principal slogan used by the Democrats, par- ticularly in the West and South, in reelecting Mr. Wilson was found in the phrase: "He kept us out of war." But just a month after his second inauguration he led the coun- try into war, with the support of a Democratic Congress and the very general endorsement, regardless of party, of the entire country. This apparent change in his attitude was due to the resumption by Germany, on a far greater scale than two years previous, of reprisal methods in the form of unrestricted use of floating mines and submarine torpedoes in what the Germans denominated a "blockade" of England, France, and Italy — this policy being in viola- tion of the rights of neutrals. Mr. Wilson's leadership — his country having supported him in the great decision — was fully accepted at home and highly respected abroad. His object, which was to "make the world safe for democracy," was acclaimed by the Euro- pean Allies who were fighting Germany; and his official xiii Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers views were felt as strengthening movement for popular government everywhere in the world. He was visited by important commissions from the governments of France, Great Britain, Italy, Russia, Japan, and several other countries; and his attitude toward these countries, and toward the support of the war against German aggression, secured in every case the confidence and admiration of these official visitors. His leadership in creating a National Army and in obtaining financial support for his war meas- ures upon a scale of unparalleled magnitude, had resulted within six months after war was declared on April 6, 1917, in measures that were at once transforming a considerable part of the human energies and material resources of the country into effective agencies for the carrying-on of war. Born, Staunton, Va. ; Dec. 28, 1856. Graduated, Princeton, 1879. Graduated in law, University of Virginia, 1881. Practised law at Atlanta, Ga., 1883-3. Post-graduate work at Johns Hopkins, 1883-5. Ph. D., 1886. Associate Professor of History and Political Econ- omy, Bryn Mawr College, 1885-8; Professor of History,, and Po- litical Economy, Wesleyan University; 1888-90; Professor of Juris- prudence and Political Economy, Princeton University, 1890-95; Professor of Jurisprudence, Princeton, 1895-7; Professor of Juris- prudence and Politics, Princeton, 1897-1910; President of Princeton University, 1903-10. Governor of New Jersey, January 17, 1911- March 1, 1912. Nominated for President of the United States, Democratic National Convention, Baltimore, 1912. Elected on Nov. 4, 1913, receiving 435 electoral votes, against 88 for Theodore Roosevelt, Progressive, and 8 for William Howard Taft, Repub- lican. (Wilson's popular vote was 2,450,000 less than that of all other candidates combined.) Nominated for second term by the Democratic National Convention at St. Louis, June, 1916, and elected on Nov. 7, 1916 receiving 276 electoral votes against 255 for Charles E. Hughes, Republican, with a popular plurality of about 400,000. Author of; "Congressional Government, A Study in American Politics" (1885) ; "The State— Elements of Historical and Practical Politics" (1889) ; "Division and Reunion, 1829-1889" (1893); "An Old Master, and Other Political Essays" (1893); "Mere Literature, and Other Essays" (1893) ; "George Washing- ton" (1896) ; "A History of the American People" (1902) ; "Con- stitutional Government in the United States" (1908) ; "Free Life" (1913); "The New Freedom" (1913); "When a Man Comes to Himself" (1915). xiv WOODROW WILSON'S INAUGURAL ADDRESS There has been a change of government. It began two years ago, when the House of Representatives became Democratic by a decisive majority. It has now been com- pleted. The Senate about to assemble will also be Demo- cratic. The offices of President and Vice-President have been put into the hands of Democrats. What does the change mean? That is the question that is uppermost in our minds to-day. That is the question I am going to try to answer, in order, if I may, to interpret the occasion. It means much more than the mere success of a party. The success of a party means little except when the Nation is using that party for a large and definite purpose. No one can mistake the purpose for which the Nation now seeks to use the Democratic Party. It seeks to use it to interpret a change in its own plans and point of view. Some old things with which we had grown familiar, and which had begun to creep into the very habit of our thought and of our lives, have altered their aspect as we have lat- terly looked critically upon them, with fresh, awakened eyes; have dropped their disguises and shown themselves alien and sinister. Some new things, as we look frankly upon them, willing to comprehend their real character, have come to assume the aspect of things long believed in and familiar, stuff of our own convictions. We have been re- freshed by a new insight into our own life. We see that in many things that life is very great. It is incomparably great in its material aspects, in its body of wealth, in the diversity and sweep of its energy, in the industries which have been built up by the genius of in- dividual men and the limitless enterprise of groups of men. It is great, also, very great, in its moral force. We have built up, moreover, a great system of government, which has stood through a long age as in many respects a model for Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers those who seek to set liberty upon foundations that will endure against fortuitous change, against storm and acci- dent. But the evil has come with the good, and much fine gold has been corroded. With riches has come inexcusable waste. We have squandered a great part of what we might have used, and have not stopped to conserve the exceed- ing bounty of nature, without which our genius for en- terprise would have been worthless and impotent, scorn- ing to be careful, shamefully prodigal as well as ad- mirably efficient. We have been proud of our industrial achievements, but we have not hitherto stopped thought- fully enough to count the human cost, the cost of lives snuffed out, of energies overtaxed and broken, the fearful physical and spiritual cost to the men and women and children upon whom the dead weight and burden of it all has fallen pitilessly the years through. The groans and agony of it all had not yet reached our ears, the solemn, moving undertone of our life, coming up out of the mines and factories and out of every home where the struggle had its intimate and familiar seat. With the great Govern- ment went many deep secret things which we too long delayed to look into and scrutinize with candid, fearless eyes. The great Government we loved has too often been made use of for private and selfish purposes, and those who used it had forgotten the people. At last a vision has been vouchsafed us of our life as a whole. We see the bad with the good, the debased and decadent with the sound and vital. With this vision we approach new affairs. Our duty is to cleanse, to recon- sider, to restore, to correct the evil without impairing the good, to purify and humanize every process of our com- mon life without weakening or sentimentalizing it. There has been something crude and heartless and unfeeling in our haste to succeed and be great. Our thought has been "Let every man look out for himself, let every generation Woodrow Wilson look out for itself," while we reared giant machinery which made it impossible that any but those who stood at the levers of control should have a chance to look out for them- selves. We had not forgotten our morals. We remem- bered well enough that we had set up a policy which was meant to serve the humblest as well as the most powerful, with an eye single to the standards of justice and fair play, and remembered it with pride. But we were very heedless and in a hurry to be great. We have come now to the sober second thought. The scales of heedlessness have fallen from our eyes. We have made up our minds to square every process of our national life again with the standard we so proudly set up at the beginning and have always carried at our hearts. Our work is a work of restoration. We have itemized with some degree of particularity the things that ought to be altered and here are some of the chief items: A tariff which cuts us off from our proper part in the commerce of the world, violates the just principles of taxation, and makes the Government a facile instrument in the hands of private interests; a banking and currency system based upon the necessity of the Government to sell its bonds fifty years ago and perfectly adapted to concen- trating cash and restricting credits; an industrial system which, take it on all its sides, financial as well as adminis- trative, holds capital in leading strings, restricts the lib- erties and limits the opportunities of labor, and exploits without renewing or conserving the natural resources of the country; a body of agricultural activities never yet given the efficiency of great business undertakings or served as it should be through the instrumentality of science taken di- rectly to the farm, or afforded the facilities of credit best suited to its practical* needs; watercourses undeveloped, waste places unreclaimed, forests untended, fast disappear- ing without plan or prospect of renewal, unregarded waste heaps at every mine. We have studied as perhaps no other Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers nation has the most effective means of production, but we have not studied cost or economy as we should either as organizers of industry, as statesmen, or as individuals. Nor have we studied and perfected the means by which government may be put at the service of humanity, in safe- guarding the health of the Nation, the health of its men and its women and its children, as well as their rights in the struggle for existence. This is no sentimental duty. The firm basis of government is justice, not pity. These are matters of justice. There can be no equality or oppor- tunity, the first essential of justice in the body politic, if men and women and children be not shielded in their lives, their very vitality, from the consequences of great indus- trial and social processes which they can not alter, control, or singly cope with. Society must see to it that it does not itself crush or weaken or damage its own constituent parts. The first duty of law is to keep sound the society it serves. Sanitary laws, pure food laws, and laws determining con- ditions of labor which individuals are powerless to deter- mine for themselves are intimate parts of the very business of justice and legal efficiency. These are some of the things we ought to do, and not leave the others undone, the old-fashioned, never-to-be-ne- glected, fundamental safeguarding of property and of in- dividual right. This is the high enterprise of the new day: To lift everything that concerns our life as a Nation to the light that shines from the hearthfire of every man's con- science and vision of the right. It is inconceivable that we should do this as partisans; it is inconceivable we should do it in ignorance of the facts as they are or in blind haste. We shall restore, not destroy. We shall deal with our economic system as it is and as it may be modified, not as it might be if we had a clean sheet of paper to write upon ; and step by step we shall make it what it should be, in the spirit of those who question their own wisdom and seek counsel and knowledge, not shallow self-satisfaction or the Woodrow Wilson excitement of excursions whither they can not tell. Justice, and only justice, shall always be our motto. . , And yet it will be no cool process of mere science. The Nation has been deeply stirred, stirred by a solemn passion, stirred by the knowledge of wrong, of ideals lost, of govern- ment too often debauched and made an instrument of evil. The feelings with which we face this new age of right and opportunity sweep across our heartstrings like some air out of God's own presence, where justice and mercy are recon- ciled and the judge and the brother are one. We know our task to be no mere task of politics but a task which shall search us through and through, whether we be able to understand our time and the need of our people, whether we be indeed their spokesmen and interpreters, whether we have the pure heart to comprehend and the rectified will to choose our high course of action. This is not a day of triumph; it is a day of dedication. Here muster, not the forces of party, but the forces of hu- manity. Men's hearts wait upon us; men's lives hang in the balance; men's hopes call upon us to say what we will do. Who shall live up to the great trust? Who dares fail to try? I summon all honest men, all patriotic, all forward- looking men, to my side. God helping me, I will not fail them, if they will but counsel and sustain me! Washington, March 4, 1913. Woodrow Wilson's First Special Address to Congress Calling for Immediate Tariff Eevision (Delivered before Congress in Joint Session, April 8, 1913.) [Editorial Note: The two first Presidents, George Washington and John Adams, delivered their annual ad- dresses "On the State of the Union" in person. Thomas Jefferson, the third President, introduced the written form of communication. His successors followed the precedent. Woodrow Wilson returned to the original custom and ap- Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers peared before the Congress to deliver not only the Annual Message, but also many special Messages. Tariff revision downward had been one of the uncompro- mising issues on which he and his party had won the cam- paign. When he delivered this Address, the new tariff bill (the Underwood Bill), already had been definitely formu- lated and approved by him. Its big features were free wool (the famous Schedule K), and the income tax pro- vision, passed under the Sixteenth. Amendment to the Con- stitution. Such an Amendment had been urged repeatedly by Roosevelt in order to make income tax legislation pos- sible, after the United States Supreme Court had declared the first income tax provision unconstitutional. The Under- wood Bill was signed by the President in October, 1913.] Mr. Speaker, Mr. President, gentlemen of the Congress, I am very glad indeed to have this opportunity to address the two Houses directly and to verify for myself the impres- sion that the President of the United States is a person, not a mere department of the Government hailing Congress from some isolated island of jealous power, sending mes- sages, not speaking naturally and with his own voice — that he is a human being trying to co-operate with other hu- man beings in a common service. After this pleasant ex- perience I shall feel quite normal in all our dealings with one another. I have called the Congress together in extraordinary ses- sion because a duty was laid upon the party now in power at the recent elections which it ought to perform promptly, in order that the burden carried by the people under exist- ing law may be lightened as soon as possible, and in order, also, that the business interests of the country may not be kept too long in suspense as to what the fiscal changes are io be to which they will be required to adjust themselves. It is clear to the whole country that the tariff duties must be altered. They must be changed to meet the radical al- Woodroxi) Wilson teration in the conditions of our economic life which the country has witnessed within the last generation. While the whole face and method of our industrial and commercial life were being changed beyond recognition the tariff sched- ules have remained what they were before the change began, or have moved in the direction they were given when no large circumstance of our industrial development was what it is to-day. Our task is to square them with the actual facts. The sooner that is done the sooner we shall escape from, suffering from the facts and the sooner our men of business will be free to thrive by the law of nature — the nature of free business — instead of by the law of legislation and arti- ficial arrangement. We have seen tariff legislation wander very far afield in our day — very far indeed from the field in which our pros- perity might have had a normal growth and stimulation. No one who looks the facts squarely in the face or knows anything that lies beneath the surface of action can fail to perceive the principles upon which recent tariff legislation has been based. We long ago passed beyond the modest notion of "protecting" the industries of the country and moved boldly forward to the idea that they were entitled to the direct patronage of the Government. For a long time — a time so long that the men now active in public policy hardly remember the conditions that preceded it — we have sought in our tariff schedules to give each group of manufacturers or producers what they themselves thought that they needed in order to maintain a practically exclusive market as against the rest of the world. Consciously or un- consciously, we have built up a set of privileges and ex- emptions from competition behind which it was easy by any, even the crudest, forms of combination to organize monop- oly; until at last nothing is normal, nothing is obliged to stand the tests of efficiency and economy, in our world of big business, but everything thrives by concerted arrange- ment. Only new principles of action will save us from a Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers final hard crystallization of monopoly and a complete loss of the influences that quicken enterprise and keep independ- | ent energy alive. It is plain what those principles must be. We must abolish everything that bears even the semblance of priv- ilege or of any kind of artificial advantage, and put our business men and producers under the stimulation of a constant necessity to be efficient, economical, and enterpris- ing, masters of competitive supremacy, better workers and merchants than any in the world. Aside from the duties laid upon articles which we do not, and probably can not, produce, therefore, and the duties laid upon luxuries and merely for the sake of the revenues they yield, the object of the tariff duties henceforth laid must be effective com- petition, the whetting of American wits by contest with the wits of the rest of the world. It would be unwise, to move toward this end headlong, with reckless haste, or with strokes that cut at the very roots of what has grown up amongst us by long process and at our own invitation. It does not alter a thing to upset it and break it and deprive it of a chance to change. It destroys it. We must make changes in our fiscal laws, in our fiscal system, whose object is development, a more free and wholesome development, not revolution or upset or con- fusion. We must build up trade, especially foreign trade. We need the outlet and the enlarged field of energy more than we ever did before. We must build up industry as well, and must adopt freedom in the place of artificial stimu- lation only so far as it will build, not pull down. In deal- ing with the tariff the method by which this may be done will be a matter of judgment exercised item by item. To some not accustomed to the excitements and responsibilities of greater freedom our methods may in some respects and at some points seem heroic but remedies may be heroic and yet be remedies. It is our business to make sure that they are genuine remedies. Our object is clear. If our motive Woodrow Wilson is above just challenge and only an occasional error of judg- ment is chargeable against us, we shall be fortunate. * We are called upon to render the country a great service in more matters than one. Our responsibility should be met and our methods should be thorough, as thorough as moderate and well considered, based upon the faets as they are, and not worked out as if we were beginners. We are to deal with the facts of our own day, with the facts of no other and to make laws which square with those facts. It is best, indeed it is necessary, to begin with the tariff. I will urge nothing upon you now at the opening of your session which can obscure that first object or divert our energies from that clearly defined duty. At a later time I may take the liberty of calling your attention to reforms which should press close upon the heels of the tariff changes, if not accompany them, of which the chief is the reform of our banking and currency laws; but just now I refrain. For the present, I put these matters on one side and think only of this one thing — of the changes in our fiscal system which may best serve to open once more the free channels of prosperity to a great people whom we would serve to the utmost and throughout both rank and file. Wilson Attacks "Lobby" Engaged in Influencing Con- gress on Tariff Schedules [On May 26, 1913, the President gave out for publication the following statement:] I think that the public ought to know the extraordinary exertions being made by the lobby in Washington to gain recognition for certain alterations of the Tariff bill. Wash- ington has seldom seen so numerous, so industrious or so insidious a lobby. The newspapers are being filled with paid advertisements calculated to mislead the judgment of public men not only, but also the public opinion of the country itself. There is every evidence that money with- 9 Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers out limit is being spent to sustain this lobby and to create an appearance of a pressure of opinion antagonistic to some of the chief items of the Tariff bill. I It is of serious interest to the country that the people at large should have no lobby and be voiceless in these mat- ters, while great bodies of astute men seek to create an artificial opinion and to overcome the interests of the pub- lic for their private profit. It is thoroughly worth the while of the people of this country to take knowledge of this matter. Only public opinion can check and destroy it. The Government in all its branches ought to be relieved from this intolerable burden and this constant interruption to the calm progress of debate. I know that in this I am speaking for the members of the two houses, who would rejoice as much as I would to be released from this un- bearable situation. [It was plainly understood that the statement was aimed particu- larly at the "wool lobby" and the "sugar lobby." A Senate investi- gation followed and disclosed the names of many men who had busied themselves in attempting to influence Congress. The effect of the appeal to the public was to clear away very suddenly all secret machinations in regard to the new tariff act.] Wilson Urges Currency Legislation (Address delivered before Congress in Joint Session, June 23, 1913.) [Editorial Note: At the time of this Address, the country's finance was under the operation of the Aldrich- Vreeland Currency Law, passed in 1908, which provided for the issue by the Treasury Department of emergency currency to the banks whenever necessary. The bill passed in response to Wilson's Address was the Glass-Owen Fed- eral Reserve Banking Law, which provided for Federal Reserve centers throughout the United States under mixed government and private control.] 10 Woodrow Wilson Mr. Speaker, Mr. President, gentlemen of the Congress, it is under the compulsion of what seems to me a clear and imperative duty that I have a second time this session sought the privilege of addressing you in person. I know, of course, that the heated season of the year is upon us, that work in these Chambers and in the committee rooms in likely to become a burden as the season lengthens, and that every consideration of personal convenience and per- sonal comfort, perhaps, in the cases of some of us, con- siderations of personal health even, dictate an early con- clusion of the deliberations of the session; but there are occasions of public duty when these things which touch us privately seem very small; when the work to be done is so pressing and so fraught with big consequence that we know that we are not at liberty to weigh against it any point of personal sacrifice. We are now in the presence of such an occasion. It is absolutely imperative that we should give the business men of this country a banking and currency system by means of which they can make use of the free- - dom of enterprise and of individual initiative which we are about to bestow upon them. We are about to set them free; we must not leave them without the tools of action when they are free. We are about to set them free by removing the trammels of the protective tariff. Ever since the Civil War they have waited for this emancipation and for the free opportunities it will bring with it. It has been reserved for us to give it to them. Some fell in love, indeed, with the slothful secu- rity of their dependence upon the Government; some took advantage of the shelter of the nursery to set up a mimic mastery of their own within its walls. Now both the tonic and the discipline of liberty and maturity are to ensue. There will be some readjustments of purpose and point of view. There will follow a period of expansion and new enterprise, freshly conceived. It is for us to determine now whether it shall be rapid and facile and of easy accom- 11 Presidential Message*, Addresses and State Paper* plishment. This it can not be unless the resourceful busi- ness men who are to deal with the new circumstances are to have at hand and ready for use the instrumentalities and conveniences of free enterprise which independent men need when acting on their own initiative. It is not enough to strike the shackles from business. The duty of statesmanship is not negative merely. It is constructive also. We must show that we understand what business needs and that we know how to supply it. No man, however casual and superficial his observation of the conditions now prevailing in the country, can fail to see that one of the chief things business needs now and will need increasingly as it gains in scope and vigor in the years immediatelly ahead of us is the proper means by which readily to vitalize its credit, corporate and individual, and its originative brains. What will it profit us to be free if we are not to have the best and most accessible instru- mentalities of commerce and enterprise ? What will it profit us to be quit of one kind of monopoly if we are to remain in the grip of another and more effective kind? How are we to gain and keep the confidence of the business commu- nity unless we show that we know how both to aid and to protect it ? What shall we say if we make fresh enterprise necessary and also make it very difficult by leaving all else except the tariff just as we found it? The tyrannies of business, big and little, lie within the field of credit. We know that. Shall we not act upon the knowledge ? Do we not know how to act upon it? If a man can not make his assets available at pleasure, his assets of capacity and character and resource, what satisfaction is it to him to see opportunity beckoning to him on every hand when others have the keys of credit in their pockets and treat them as all but their own private possession? It is perfectly clear that it is our duty to supply the new banking and currency system the country needs, and it will need it imme-- diately more than it has ever needed it before. 12 Woodrow Wilton The only question is, When shall we supply it — now or later, after the demands shall have become reproaches that we were so dull and so slow? Shall we hasten to change the tariff laws and then be laggards about making it pos- sible and easy for the country to take advantage of the change? There can be only one answer to that question. We must act now, at whatever sacrifice to ourselves. It is a duty which the circumstances forbid us to postpone. I should be recreant to my deepest convictions of public obli- gation did I not press it upon you with solemn and urgent insistence. The principles upon which we should act are also clear. The country has sought and seen its path in this matter within the last few years — sees it more clearly now than it ever saw it before — much more clearly than when the last legislative proposals on the subject were made. We must have a currency, not rigid as now, but readily, elastically responsive to sound credit, the expanding and contracting credits of everyday transactions, the normal ebb and flow of personal and corporate dealings. Our banking laws must mobilize reserves ; must not permit the concentration anywhere in a few hands of the monetary resources of the country or their use for speculative purposes in such vol- ume as to hinder or impede or stand in the way of other more legitimate, more fruitful uses. And the control of the system of banking and of issue which our new laws are to set up must be public, not private, must be vested in the Government itself, so that the banks may be the instru- ments, not the masters, of business and of individual enter- prise and initiative. The committees of the Congress to which legislation of this character is referred have devoted careful and dispas- sionate study to the means of accomplishing these objects. They have honored me by consulting me. They are ready to suggest action. I have come to you, as the head of the Government and the responsible leader of the party in IS Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers power, to urge action now, while there is time to serve the country deliberately and as we should, in a clear air of common counsel. I appeal to you with a deep conviction of duty. I believe that you share this conviction. I there- fore appeal to you with confidence. I am at your service without reserve to play my part in any way you may call upon me to play it in this great enterprise of exigent re- form which it will dignify and distinguish us to perform and discredit us to neglect. Wilson's Address at Gettysburg, Before G. A. R. and Confederate Veterans, upon Occasion of Fiftieth Anniversary Reunion, July 4, 1913 [In the President's audience on this occasion were several thou- sand survivors of the Gettysburg battle, who had gone back to the scene of the conflict — with other veterans of the armies of the North and the South — to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of "the high-water mark of the Confederacy."] Friends and Fellow-Citizens : I need not tell you what the battle of Gettysburg meant. These gallant men in blue and gray sit all about us here. Many of them met upon this ground in grim and deadly struggle. Upon these famous fields and hillsides their comrades died about them. In their presence it were an impertinence to discourse upon how the battle went, how it ended, what it signified! But fifty years have gone by since then, and I crave the privilege of speaking to you for a few minutes of what those fifty years have meant. What have they meant? They have meant peace and union and vigour, and the maturity and might of a great nation. How wholesome and healing the peace has been! We have found one another again as brothers and com- rades in arms, enemies no longer, generous friends rather, our battles long past, the quarrel forgotten — except that we shall not forget the splendid valour, the manly devotion pf the men then arrayed against one another, now grasping u Woodroto Wilson hands and smiling into each other's eyes. How complete the union has become and how dear to all of us, how un- questioned, how benign and majestic, as State after State has been added to this our great family of free men! How handsome the vigour, the maturity, the might of the great Nation we love with undivided hearts; how full of large and confident promise that a life will be wrought out that will crown its strength with gracious justice and with a happy welfare that will touch all alike with deep contentment ! We are debtors to those fifty crowded years ; they have made us heirs to a mighty heritage. But do we deem the Nation complete and finished ? These venerable men crowding here to this famous field have set us a great example of devotion and utter sacrifice. They were willing to die that the people might live. But their task is done. Their day is turned into evening. They look to us to perfect what they established. Their work is handed on to us, to be done in another way but not in another spirit. Our day is not over; it is upon us in full tide. Have affairs paused? Does the Nation stand still? Is what the fifty years have wrought since those days of battle finished, rounded out, and completed? Here is a great people, great with every force that has ever beaten in the lifeblood of mankind. And it is secure. There is no one within its borders, there is no power among the nations of the earth, to make it afraid. But has it yet squared itself with its own great standards set up at its birth, when it made that first noble, naive appeal to the moral judgment of mankind to take notice that a government had now at last been established which was to serve men, not mas- ters? It is secure in everything except the satisfaction that its life is right, adjusted to the uttermost to the stand- ards of righteousness and humanity. The days of sacrifice and cleansing are not closed. We have harder things to do than were done in the heroic days of war, because harder 15 Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers to see clearly, requiring more vision, more calm balance of judgment, a more candid searching of the very springs of right. Look around you upon the field of Gettysburg! Picture the array, the fierce heats and agony of battle, column hurled against column, battery bellowing to battery ! Val- our? Yes! Greater no man shall see in war; and self- sacrifice, and loss to the uttermost; the high recklessness of exalted devotion which does not count the cost. We are made by these tragic, epic things to know what it costs to make a nation — the blood and sacrifice of multitudes of unknown men lifted to a great stature in the view of all generations by knowing no limit to their manly willingness to serve. In armies thus marshaled from the ranks of free men you will see, as it were, a nation embattled, the leaders and the led, and may know, if you will, how little except in form its action differs in days of peace from its action in days of war. May we break camp now and be at ease ? Are the forces that fight for the Nation dispersed, disbanded, gone to their homes forgetful of the common cause? Are our forces dis- organized, without constituted leaders and the might of men consciously united because we contend, not with armies, but with principalities and powers and wickedness in high places. Are we content to lie still ? Does our union mean sympathy, our peace contentment, our vigour right action, our maturity self-comprehension and a clear confidence in choosing what we shall do? War fitted us for action, and action never ceases. I have been chosen the leader of the Nation. I cannot justify the choice by any qualities of my own, but so it has come about, and here I stand. Whom do I command? The ghostly hosts who fought upon these battle fields long ago and are gone? These gallant gentlemen stricken in years whose fighting days are over, their glory won ? What are the orders for them, and who rallies them? I have in 16 Woodrow Wilson iny mind another host, whom these set free of civil strife in order that they might work out in days of peace and settled order the life of a great Nation. That host is the people themselves, the great and the small, without class or difference of kind or race or origin; and undivided in interest, if we have but the vision to guide and direct them and order their lives aright in what we do. Our constitu- tions are their articles of enlistment. The orders of the day are the laws upon our statute books. What we strive for is their freedom, their right to lift themselves from day to day and behold the things they have hoped for, and so make way for still better days for those whom they love who are to come after them. The recruits are the little children crowding in. The quartermaster's stores are in the mines and forests and fields, in the shops and factories. Every day something must be done to push the campaign forward; and it must be done by plan and with an eye to some great destiny. How shall we hold such thoughts in our hearts and not be moved? I would not have you live even to-day wholly in the past, but would wish to stand with you in the light that streams upon us now out of that great day gone by. Here is the nation God has builded by our hands. What shall we do with it? Who stands ready to act again and always in the spirit of this day of reunion and hope and patriotic fervor? The day of our country's life has but broadened into morning. Do not put uniforms by. Put the harness of the present on. Lift your eyes to the great tracts of life yet to be conquered in the interest of righteous peace, of that prosperity which lies in a people's hearts and outlasts all wars and errors of men. Come, let us be com- rades and soldiers yet to serve our fellow men in quiet counsel, where the blare of trumpets is neither heard nor heeded and where the things are done which make blessed the nations of the world in peace and righteousness and love. 17 Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers Wilson's Special Message on Mexico (Delivered before Congress in Joint Session, August 27, 1913) [Editorial Note: General Huerta had been pro- claimed Provisional President on February 18, 1918, by the rebelling troops under his control. On February 19 a ha- stily assembled Congress elected him Provisional President. On February 22, 1913, Francisco Madero and Pino Suarez, deposed President and Vice-President, were shot dead "while attempting to escape." President Wilson had re- fused to recognise Huerta; and for a year following this message he remained steadfast. Huerta then resigned.} Gentlemen of the Congress: It is clearly my' duty to lay before you, very fully and without reservation, the facts concerning our present rela- tions with the Republic of Mexico. The deplorable posture of affairs in Mexico I need not describe, but I deem it my duty to speak very frankly of what this Government has done and should seek to do in fulfillment of its obligation to Mexico herself, as a friend and neighbor, and to Ameri- can citizens whose lives and vital interests are daily affected by the distressing conditions which now obtain beyond our southern border. Those conditions touch us very nearly. Not merely be- cause they lie at our very doors. That, of course, makes us more vividly and more constantly conscious of them, and every instinct of neighborly interest and sympathy is aroused and quickened by them; but that is only one ele- ment in the determination of our duty. We are glad to call ourselves the friend of Mexico, and we shall, I hope, have many an occasion, in happier times as well as in these days of trouble and confusion, to show that our friendship is genuine and disinterested, capable of sacrifice and every generous manifestation. The peace, prosperity, and con- 18 Woodrote Wilson tentment of Mexico mean more, much more, to us than merely an enlarged field for our commerce and enterprise. They mean an enlargement of the field of self-government and the realization of the hopes and rights of a nation with whose best aspirations, so long suppressed and disap- pointed, we deeply sympathize. We shall yet prove to the Mexican people that we know how to serve them without first thinking how we shall serve ourselves. But we are not the only friends of Mexico. The whole world desires her peace and progress ; and the whole world is interested as never before. Mexico lies at last where all the world looks on. Central America is about to be touched by the great routes of the world's trade and intercourse running free from ocean to ocean at the Isthmus. The future has much in store for Mexico, as for all the States of Central America ; but the best gifts can come to her only if she be ready and free to receive them and to enjoy them honorably. America in particular — America north and south and upon both continents — waits upon the develop- ment of Mexico; and that development can be sound and lasting only if it be the product of a genuine freedom, a just and ordered government founded upon law. Only so can it be peaceful or fruitful of the benefits of peace. Mexico has a great and enviable future before her, if only she choose and attain the paths of honest constitutional government. The present circumstances of the Republic, I deeply re- gret to say, do not seem to promise even the foundations of such a peace. We have waited many months, months full of peril and anxiety, for the conditions there to improve, and they have not improved. They have grown worse, rather. The territory in some sort controlled by the pro- visional authorities at Mexico City has grown smaller, not larger. The prospect of the pacification of the country, even by arms, has seemed to grow more and more remote; and its pacification by the authorities at the capital is evi- 19 Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers dently impossible by any other means than force. Diffi- culties more and more entangle those who claim to consti- tute the legitimate government of the Republic. They have not made good their claim in fact. Their successes in the field have proved only temporary. War and disorder, devastation and confusion, seem to threaten to become the settled fortune of the distracted country. As friends we could wait no longer for a solution which every week seemed further away. It was our duty at least to volunteer our good offices — to offer to assist, if we might, in effect- ing some arrangement which would bring relief and peace and set up a universally acknowledged political authority there. Accordingly, I took the liberty of sending the Hon. John Lind, formerly governor of Minnesota, as my personal spokesman and representative, to the City of Mexico, with the following instructions: Press very earnestly upon the attention of those who are now exercising authority or wielding influence in Mexico the following considerations and advice: The Government of the United States does not feel at liberty any longer to stand inactively by while it becomes daily more and more evident that no real progress is Tieing made towards the establishment of a government at the City of Mexico which the country will obey and respect. The Government of the United States does not stand in the same case with the other great Governments of the world in respect of what is happening or what is likely to happen in Mexico. We offer our good offices, not only because of our genuine desire to play the part of a. friend, but also because we are expected by the powers of the world to act as Mexico's nearest friend. We wish to act in these circumstances in the spirit of the most earnest and disinterested friendship. It is our purpose in what- ever we do or propose in this perplexing and distressing situation not only to pay the most scrupulous regard to the sovereignty and independence of Mexico — that we take as a matter of course to which we are bound by every obligation of right and honor — but also to give every possible evidence that we act in the interest of Mexico alone, and not in the interest of any person or body of persons who may have personal or property claims in Mexico which they may feel that they have the right to press. We are seeking to counsel Mexico for her own good, and in the interest Woodrow Wilson of her own peace, and not for any other purpose whatever. The Government of the United States would deem itself discredited if it had any selfish or ulterior purpose in transactions where the peace, happiness, and prosperity of a whole people are involved. It is acting as its friendship for Mexico, not as any selfish interest, dictates. The present situation in Mexico is incompatible with the fulfill- ment of international obligations on the part of Mexico, with the civilized development of Mexico herself, and with the maintenance of tolerable political and economic conditions in Central America. It is upon no common occasion, therefore, that the United States offers her counsel and assistance. All America cries out for a settlement. A satisfactory settlement seems to us to be conditioned on — (a) An immediate cessation of fighting throughout Mexico, a definite armistice solemnly entered into and scrupulously observed; (6) Security given for an early and free election in which all will agree to take part ; (c) The consent of Gen. Huerta to bind himself not to be a candidate for election as President of the Republic at this election; and (d) The agreement of all parties to abide by the results of the election and co-operate in the most loyal way in organizing and supporting the new administration. The Government of the United States will be glad to play any part in this settlement or in its carrying out which it can play honorably and consistently with international right. It pledges itself to recognize and in every way possible and proper to assist the administration chosen and set up in Mexico in the way and on the conditions suggested. Taking all the existing conditions into consideration, the Govern- ment of the United States can conceive of no reasons sufficient to justify those who are now attempting to shape the policy or exer- cise the authority of Mexico in declining the offices of friendship thus offered. Can Mexico give the civilized world a satisfactory reason for rejecting our good offices? If Mexico can suggest any better way in which to show our friendship, serve the people of Mexico, and meet our international obligations, we are more than willing to consider the suggestion. Mr. Lind executed his delicate and difficult mission with singular tact, firmness, and good judgment, and made clear to the authorities at the City of Mexico not only the pur- pose of his visit but also the spirit in which it had been undertaken. But the proposals he submitted were rejected, in a note the full text of which I take the liberty of laying before you. 21 Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers [The Mexican note was addressed to Mr. Lind and signed by Senor F. Gamboa, Secretary for Foreign Affairs. Its salient parts The imputation that no progress has been made toward estab- lishing a Government that may enjoy the obedience of the Mexican people is unfounded. In contradiction with their gross imputation, which is not supported by any proofs, principally because there are none, it affords me pleasure to refer, Mr. Confidential Agent, to the following facts which abound in evidence and which to a certain extent must be known to you by direct observation. The Mexican Republic, Mr. Confidential Agent, is formed by 27 States, 3 Territories, and 1 Federal District, in which the supreme power of the Republic has its seat. Of these 27 States, 18 of them, the 3 Territories, and the Federal District (making a total of 22 political entities) are under the absolute control of the present Government, which, aside from the above, exercises its authority over almost every port in the Republic and, consequently, over the custom houses therein established. Its southern frontier is open and at peace. Moreover, my Government has an army of 80,000 men in the field, with no other purpose than to insure complete peace in the Republic, the only national aspiration and solemn promise of the present provisional President. . . Inasmuch as the Government of the United States is willing to act in the most disinterested friendship, it will be difficult for it to find a more propitious opportunity than the following: If it should only watch that no material and monetary assistance is given to rebels who find refuge, conspire, and provide themselves with arms and food on the other side of the border; if it should demand from its minor and local authorities the strictest observ- ance of the neutrality laws, I assure you, Mr. Confidential Agent,, that the complete pacification of this Republic would be accom- plished within a relatively short time. . . . His Excellency Mr. Wilson is laboring under a serious delusion when he declares that the present situation of Mexico is incom- patible with the compliance of her international obligations and with the required maintenance of conditions tolerable in Central America. No charge has been made by any foreign Government accusing us of the above lack of compliance, we are punctually meeting all of our credits, we are still maintaining diplomatic missions cordially accepted in almost all the countries of the world. With regard to our interior development, a contract has just been signed with Belgian capitalists which means to Mexico the con- struction of something like 5,000 kilometers of railway. In conclusion, we fail to see the evil results, which are prejudicial only to ourselves, felt in Central America by our present domestic war. . . . With reference to the rebels who style themselves "Constitutionalists," one of the representatives of whom has been given an ear by Members of the United States Senate, what could Woodrow Wilson there be more gratifying to us than if, convinced of the precipice to which we are being dragged by the resentment of their defeat, in a moment of reaction they would depose their rancor and add their strength to ours so that all together we would undertake the great and urgent task of national reconstruction? Unfor- tunately they do not avail themselves of the amnesty law enacted by the provisional government. . . . The request that General Victoriano Huerta should agree not to appear as a candidate for the Presidency of the Republic in the coming election cannot be taken into consideration, because, aside from its strange and unwarranted character, there is a risk that the same might be interpreted as a matter of personal dislike. . . . The legality of the government of General Huerta cannot be disputed. Article 85 of our political constitution provides: If at the beginning of a constitutional term neither the Presi- dent nor the Vice-President elected present themselves, the Presi- dent whose term has expired will cease in his functions, and the secretary for foreign affairs shall immediately take charge of the Executive power in the capacity of provisional President; and if there should be no secretary for foreign affairs, the Presidency shall devolve on one of the other secretaries pursuant to the order provided by the law. Now, then, the facts which occurred are the following: The resignation of Francisco I. Madero, constitutional President, and Jose Maria Pino Suarez, constitutional Vice-President of the Republic. These resignations having been accepted, Pedro Lascurain, Minister for Foreign Affairs, took charge by law of the vacant executive power, appointing, as he had the power to do, Gen. Victoriano Huerta to the post of Minister of the Interior. As Mr. Lascurain soon afterwards resigned, and as his resignation was immediately accepted by Congress, Gen. Vic- toriano Huerta took charge of the executive power, also by operation of law, with the provisional character and under the constitutional promise already complied with to issue a call for special elections. As will be seen, the point of issue is exclusively one of constitutional law in which no foreign nation, no matter how powerful and respectable it may be, should mediate in the least. . . . With reference to the final part of the instructions of President Wilson, which I beg to include herewith and say, "If Mexico can suggest any better way in which to show our friendship, serve the people of Mexico, and meet our international obligations, we are more than willing to consider the suggestion," that final part causes me to propose the following equally decorous arrangement: One, that our ambassador be received in Washington; two, that the United States of America send us a new ambassador without previous conditions. And all this threatening and distressing situation will have Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers reached a happy conclusion; mention will not be made of the causes which might carry us, if the tension persists, to no one knows what incalculable extremities for two peoples who have the unavoidable obligation to continue being friends, provided, of course, that this friendship is based upon mutual respect, which is indispensable between two sovereign entities wholly equal before law and justice.] I am led to believe that they were rejected partly because the authorities at Mexico City had been grossly misinformed and misled upon two points. They did not realize the spirit of the American people in this matter, their earnest friend- liness and yet sober determination that some just solution be found for the Mexican difficulties ; and they did not be- lieve that the present administration spoke through Mr. Lind, for the people of the United States. The effect of this unfortunate misunderstanding on their part is to leave them singularly isolated and without friends who can effect- ually aid them. So long as the misunderstanding continues we can only await the time of their awakening to a realiza- tion of the actual facts. We can not thrust our good offices upon them. The situation must be given a little more time to work itself out in the new circumstances ; and I be- lieve that only a little while will be necessary. For the circumstances are new. The rejection of our friendship makes them new and will inevitably bring its own altera- tions in the whole aspect of affairs. The actual situation of the authorities at Mexico City will presently be revealed. Meanwhile, what is it our duty to do? Clearly, every- thing that we do must be rooted in patience and done with calm and disinterested deliberation. Impatience on our part would be childish, and would be fraught with every risk of wrong and folly. We can afford to exercise the self-restraint of a really great nation which realizes its own strength and scorns to misuse it. It was our duty to offer our active assistance. It is now our duty to show what true neutrality will do to enable the people of Mexico to set their affairs in order again and wait for a further op- Woodrow Wilson portunity to offer our friendly counsels. The door is not closed against the resumption, either upon the initiative of Mexico or upon our own, of the effort to bring order out of the confusion by friendly co-operative action, should for- tunate occasion offer. While we wait, the contest of the rival forces will un- doubtedly for a little while be sharper than ever, just be- cause it will be plain that an end must be made of the existing situation, and that very promptly; and with the increased activity of the contending factions will come, it is to be feared, increased danger to the noncombatants in Mexico as well as to those actually in the field of battle. The position of outsiders is always particularly trying and full of hazard where there is civil strife and a whole coun- try is upset. We should earnestly urge all Americans to leave Mexico at once, and should assist them to get away in every way possible — not because we would mean to slacken in the least our efforts to safeguard their lives and their interests, but because it is imperative that they should take no unnecessary risks when it is physically possible for them to leave the country. We should let every one who assumes to exercise authority in any part of Mexico know in the most unequivocal way that we shall vigilantly watch the fortunes of those Americans who can not get away, and shall hold those responsible for their sufferings and losses to a definite reckoning. That can be and will, be made plain beyond the possibility of a misunderstanding. For the rest, I deem it my duty to exercise the authority conferred upon me by the law of March 14, 1912, to see to it that neither side to the struggle now going on in Mex- ico receive any assistance from this side the border. I shall follow the best practice of nations in the matter of neutral- ity by forbidding the exportation of arms or munitions of war of any kind from the United States to any part of the Eepublic of Mexico — a policy suggested by several in- teresting precedents and certainly dictated by many mani- Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers fest considerations of practical expediency. We can not in the circumstances be the partisans of either party to the contest that now distracts Mexico, or constitute ourselves the virtual umpire between them. I am happy to say that several of the great Governments of the world have given this Government their generous moral support in urging upon the provisional authorities at the City of Mexico the acceptance of our proffered good offices in the spirit in which they were made. We have not acted in this matter under the ordinary principles of inter- national obligation. All the world expects us in such cir- cumstances to act as Mexico's nearest friend and intimate adviser. This is our immemorial relation towards her. There is nowhere any serious question that we have the moral right in the case or that we are acting in the interest of a fair settlement and of good government, not for the promotion of some selfish interest of our own. If further motive were necessary than our own good will towards a sister Republic and our own deep concern to see peace and order prevail in Central America, this consent of mankind to what we are attempting, this attitude of the great nations of the world towards what we may attempt in dealing with this distressed people at our doors, should make us feel the more solemnly bound to go to the utmost length of patience and forbearance in this painful and anxious business. The steady pressure of moral force will before many days break the barriers of pride and prejudice down, and we shall tri- umph as Mexico's friends sooner than we could trimph as her enemies — and how much more handsomely, with how much higher and finer satisfactions of conscience and of honor! Woodrow Wilson Wilson's Address on Occasion of the Rededication and Restoration of Congress Hall, Philadelphia, October 25, 1913 Your Honor, Mr. Chairman, Ladies, and Gentlemen : No American could stand in this place to-day and think of the circumstances which we are come together to cele- brate without being most profoundly stirred. There has come over me since I sat down here a sense of deep sol- emnity, because it has seemed to me that I saw ghosts crowding — a great assemblage of spirits no longer visible, but whose influence we still feel as we feel the molding power of history itself. The men who sat in this hall, to whom we now look back with a touch of deep sentiment, were men of flesh and blood, face to face with extremely difficult problems. The population of the United States then was hardly three times the present population of the city of Philadelphia, and yet that was a Nation as this is a Nation, and the men who spoke for it were setting their hands to work which was to last, not only that their people might be happy, but that an example might be lifted up for the instruction of the rest of the world. I like to read the quaint old accounts such as Mr. Day has read to us this afternoon. Strangers came then to America to see what the young people that had sprung up here were like, and they found men in counsel who knew how to construct governments. They found men delibera- ting here who had none of the appearance of novices, none of the hesitation of men who did not know whether the work they were doing was going to last or not; men who addressed themselves to a problem of construction as fami- liarly as we attempt to carry out the traditions of a Gov- ernment established these 137 years. I feel to-day the compulsion of these men, the compulsion of examples which were set up in this place. And of what do their examples remind us ? They remind us not merely 07 Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers of public service but of public service shot through with principle and honor. . . . Politics, ladies and gentlemen, is made up in just about equal parts of comprehension and sympathy. No man ought to go into politics who does not comprehend the task that he is going to attack. He may comprehend it so com- pletely that it daunts him, that he doubts whether his own spirit is stout enough and his own mind able enough to attempt its great undertakings, but unless he comprehend it he ought not to enter it. After he has comprehended it, there should come into his mind those profound im- pulses of sympathy which connect him with the rest of mankind, for politics is a business of interpretation, and no men are fit for it who do not see and seek more than their own advantage and interest. We have stumbled upon many unhappy circumstances in the hundred years that have gone by since the event that we are celebrating. Almost all of them have come from self-centered men, men who saw in their own interest the interest of the country, and who did not have vision enough to read it in wider terms, in the universal terms of equity and justice and the rights of mankind. I hear a great many people at Fourth of July celebrations laud the Declaration of Independence who in between Julys shiver at the plain language of our bills of rights. The Declara- tion of Independence was, indeed, the first audible breath of liberty, but the substance of liberty is written in such documents as the declaration of rights attached, for ex- ample, to the first constitution of Virginia which was a model for the similar documents read elsewhere into our great fundamental charters. That document speaks in very plain terms. The men of that generation did not hesitate to say that every people has a right to choose its own forms of government — not once, but as often as it pleases — and to accommodate those forms of government to its existing in- Woodrow Wilson terests and circumstances. Not only to establish but to alter is the fundamental principle of self-government. We are just as much under compulsion to study the par- ticular circumstances of our own day as the gentlemen were who sat in this hall and set us precedents, not of what to do but of how to do it. Liberty inheres in the circumstances of the day. Human happiness consists in the life which human beings are leading at the time that they live. I can feed my memory as happily upon the cir- cumstances of the revolutionary and constitutional period as you can, but I can not feed all my purposes with them in Washington now. Every day problems arise which wear some new phase and aspect, and I must fall back, if I would serve my conscience, upon those things which are fundamental rather than upon those things which are super- ficial, and ask myself this question, How are you going to assist in some small part to give the American people and, by example, the peoples of the world more liberty, more happiness, more substantial prosperity; and how are you going to make that prosperity a common heritage instead of a selfish possession ? . . . The men of the day which we now celebrate had a very great advantage over us, ladies and gentlemen, in this one particular: Life was simple in America then. All men shared the same circumstances in almost equal degree. We think of Washington, for example, as an aristocrat, as a man separated by training, separated by family and neigh- borhood tradition, from the ordinary people of the rank and file of the country. Have you forgotten the personal history of George Washington? Do you not know that he struggled as poor boys now struggle for a meager and im- perfect education; that he worked at his surveyor's tasks in the lonely forests; that he knew all the roughness, all the hardships, all the adventure, all the variety of the common life of that day ; and that if he stood a little stiffly in this place, if he looked a little aloof, it was because life Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers had dealt hardly with him ? All his sinews had been stif- fened by the rough work of making America. He was a man of the people, whose touch had been with them since the day he saw the light first in the old Dominion of Vir- ginia. And the men who came after him, men, some of whom had drunk deep at the sources of philosophy and of study, were, nevertheless, also men who on this side of the water knew no complicated life but the simple life of primi- tive neighborhoods. Our task is very much more difficult. That sympathy which alone interprets public duty is more difficult for a public man to acquire now than it was then, because we live in the midst of circumstances and conditions infinitely complex. No man can boast that he understands America. No man can boast that he has lived the life of America, as almost every man who sat in this hall in those days could boast. No man can pretend that except by common counsel he can gather into his consciousness what the varied life of this people is. The duty that we have to keep open eyes and open hearts and accessible understandings is a very much more difficult duty to perform than it was in their day. Yet how much more important that it should be performed, for fear we make infinite and irreparable blunders. The city of Washington is in some respects self-contained, and it is easy there to forget what the rest of the United States is think- ing about. I count it a fortunate circumstance that almost all the windows of the White House and its offices open upon unoccupied spaces that stretch to the banks of the Potomac and then out into Virginia and on to the heavens themselves, and that as I sit there I can constantly forget Washington and remember the United States. Not that I would intimate that all of the United States lies south of Washington, but there is a serious thing back of my thought. If you think too much about being re-elected, it is very difficult to be worth re-electing. You are so apt to forget that the comparatively small number of persons, SO Woodrow Wilson numerous as they seem to be when they swarm, who come to Washington to ask for things, do not constitute an im-* portant proportion of the population of the country, that it is constantly necessary to come away from Washington and renew one's contact with the people who do not swarm there, who do not ask for anything, but who do trust you without their personal counsel to do your duty. Unless a man gets these contacts he grows weaker and weaker. He needs them as Hercules needed the touch of mother earth. If you lift him up too high or he lifts himself too high, he loses the contact and therefore loses the inspiration. I love to think of those plain men, however far from plain their dress sometimes was, who assembled in this hall. One is startled to think of the variety of costume and color which would now occur if we were let loose upon the fashions of that age. Men's lack of taste is largely con- cealed now by the- limitations of fashion. Yet these men, who sometimes dressed like the peacock, were, nevertheless, of the ordinary flight of their time. They were birds of a feather; they were birds come from a very simple breeding; they were much in the open heaven. They were beginning, when there was so little to distract their attention, to show that they could live upon fundamental principles of govern- ment. We talk those principles, but we have not time to absorb them. We have not time to let them into our blood, and thence have them translated into the plain mandates of action. The very smallness of this room, the very simplicity of it all, all the suggestions which come from its restoration, are reassuring things — things which it becomes a man to realize. Therefore my theme here to-day, my only thought, is a very simple one. Do not let us go back to the annals of those sessions of Congress to find out what to do, be- cause we live in another age and the circumstances are abso- lutely different; but let us be men of that kind; let us feel at every turn the compulsions of principle and of honor SI Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers which they felt; let us free our vision from temporary cir- cumstances and look abroad at the horizon and take into our lungs -the great air of freedom which has blown through this country and stolen across the seas and blessed people everywhere ; and, looking east and west and north and south, let us remind ourselves that we are the custodians, in some degree, of the principles which have made men free and governments just. Wilson's Address Before the Southern Commercial Congress at Mobile, Ala., October 27, 1913 [The Panama Canal was approaching completion — the Presi- dent himself, two weeks earlier, having touched a button in the White House and set off an explosive which blasted away the last barrier separating the waters of the Atlantic and the Pacific] Your Excellency, Mr. Chairman: It is with unaffected pleasure that I find myself here to-day. I once before had the pleasure, in another southern city, of addressing the Southern Commercial Congress. I then spoke of what the future seemed to hold in store for this region, which so many of us love and toward the future of which we all look forward with so much confidence and hope. But another theme directed me here this time. I do not need to speak of the South. She has, perhaps, ac- quired the gift of speaking for herself. I come because I want to speak of our present and prospective relations with our neighbors to the south. I deemed it a public duty, as well as a personal pleasure, to be here to express for myself and for the Government I represent the welcome we all feel to those who represent the Latin American States. The future, ladies and gentlemen, is going to be very dif- ferent for this hemisphere from the past. These States lying to the south of us, which have always been our neigh- bors, will now be drawn closer to us by innumerable ties, and, I hope, chief of all, by the tie of a common under- Woodrow Wilson standing of each other. Interest does not tie nations to- gether; it sometimes separates them. But sympathy and understanding does unite them, and I believe that by the new route that is just about to be opened, while we physi- cally cut two continents asunder, we spiritually unite them. It is a spiritual union which we seek. I wonder if you realize, I wonder if your imaginations have been filled with the significance of the tides of com- merce. Your governor alluded in very fit and striking terms to the voyage of Columbus, but Columbus took his voyage under compulsion of circumstances. Constantinople had been captured by the Turks and all the routes of trade with the East had been suddenly closed. If there was not a way across the Atlantic to open those routes again, they were closed forever, and Columbus set out not to discover America, for he did not know that it existed, but to discover the eastern shores of Asia. He set sail for Cathay and stumbled upon America. With that change in the outlook of the world, what happened? England, that had been at the back of Europe with an unknown sea behind her, found that all things had turned as if upon a pivot and she was at the front of Europe; and since then all the tides of energy and enterprise that have issued out of Europe have seemed to be turned westward across the Atlantic. But you will notice that they have turned westward chiefly north of the Equator and that it is the northern half of the globe that has seemed to be filled with the media of intercourse and of sympathy and of common understanding. Do you not see now what is about to happen? These great tides which have been running along parallels of lati- tude will now swing southward athwart parallels of lati- tude, and that opening gate at the Isthmus of Panama will open the world to a commerce that she has not known be- fore, a commerce of intelligence, of thought and sympathy between North and South. The Latin American States, which, to their disadvantage, have been off the main lines, S3 Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers will now be on the main lines. I feel that these gentlemen honoring us with their presence to-day will presently find that some part, at any rate, of the center of gravity of the world has shifted. Do you realize that New York, for ex- ample, will be nearer the western coast of South America than she is now to the eastern coast of South America ? Do you realize that a line drawn northward parallel with the greater part of the western coast of South America will run only about 150 miles west of New York? The great bulk of South America, if you will look at your globes (not at your Mercator's projection), lies eastward of the continent of North America. You will realize that when you realize that the canal will run southeast, not southwest, and that when you get into the Pacific you will be farther east than you were when you left the Gulf of Mexico. These things are significant, therefore, of this, that we are closing one chapter in the history of the world and are opening another, of great, unimaginable significance. There is one peculiarity about the history of the Latin American States which I am sure they are keenly aware of. You hear of "concessions" to foreign capitalists in Latin America. You do not hear of concessions to foreign capitalists in the United States. They are not granted con- cessions. They are invited to make investments. The work is ours, though they are welcome to invest in it. We do not ask them to supply the capital and do the work. It is an invitation, not a privilege; and States that are obliged, because their territory does not lie within the main field of modern enterprise and action, to grant concessions are in this condition, that foreign interests are apt to dominate their domestic affairs, a condition of affairs always dan- gerous and apt to become intolerable. What these States are going to see, therefore, is an emancipation from the subordination, which has been inevitable, to foreign enter- prise and an assertion of the splendid character which, in spite of these difficulties, they have again and again been Si Woodrow Wilson able to demonstrate. The dignity, the courage, the self- possession, the self-respect of the Latin American States^ their achievements in the face of all these adverse circum- stances, deserve nothing but the admiration and applause of the world. They have had harder bargains driven with them in the matter of loans than any other peoples in the world. Interest has been exacted of them that was not exacted of anybody else, because the risk was said to be greater; and then securities were taken that destroyed the risk — an admirable arrangement for those who were forcing the terms! I rejoice in nothing so much as in the prospect that they will now be emancipated from these conditions, and we ought to be the first to take part in assisting in that emancipation. I think some of these gentlemen have already had occasion to bear witness that the Department of State in recent months has tried to serve them in that wise. In the future they will draw closer and closer to us because of circumstances of which I wish to speak with moderation and, I hope, without indiscretion. We must prove ourselves their friends, and champions upon terms of equality and honor. You can not be friends upon any other terms than upon the terms of equality. You can not be friends at all except upon the terms of honor. We must show ourselves friends by comprehending their interest whether it squares with our own interest or not. It is a very perilous thing to determine the foreign policy of a nation in the terms of material interest. It not only is unfair to those with whom you are dealing, but it is de- grading as regards your own actions. Comprehension must be the soil in which shall grow all the fruits of friendship, and there is a reason and a com- pulsion lying behind all this which is dearer than anything else to the thoughtful men of America. I mean the develop- ment of constitutional liberty in the world. Human rights, national integrity, and opportunity as against material in- terests — that, ladies and gentlemen, is the issue which we 85 Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers now have to face. I want to take this occasion to say that the United States will never again seek one additional foot of territory by conquest. She will devote herself to show- ing that she knows how to make honorable and fruitful use of the territory she has, and she must regard it as one of the duties of friendship to see that from no quarter are material interests made superior to human liberty and na- tional opportunity. I say this, not with a single thought that anyone will gainsay it, but merely, to fix in our con- sciousness what our real relationship with the rest of America is. It is the relationship of a family of mankind devoted to the development of true constitutional liberty. We know that that is the soil out of which the best enter- prise springs. We know that this is a cause which we are making in common with our neighbors, because we have had to make it for ourselves. . . . I know what the response of the thought and heart of America will be to the program I have outlined, because America was created to realize a program like that. This is not America because it is rich. This is America because it has set up for a great population great opportunities of material prosperity. America is a name which sounds in the ears of men everywhere as a synonym with individual opportunity because a synonym of individual liberty. I would rather belong to a poor nation that was free than to a rich nation that had ceased to be in love with liberty. But we shall not be poor if we love liberty, because the nation that loves liberty truly sets every man free to do his best and be his best, and that means the release of all the splendid energies of a great people who think for them- selves. . . . In emphasizing the points which must unite us in sym- pathy and in spiritual interest with the Latin American peoples we are only emphasizing the points of our own life, and we should prove ourselves untrue to our own tradi- tions if we proved ourselves untrue friends to them. . . . 86 Woodrow Wilson Wilson's First Annual Message (Delivered before Congress in Joint Session, December 2, 1913) [The custom of including departmental reports in the President's annual message is here abandoned^ by Mr. Wilson ; and this message is therefore noticeably shorter than those of his predecessors.] Mr. Speaker, Mr. President, Gentlemen of the Congress: In pursuance of my constitutional duty to "give to the Congress information of the state of the Union," I take the liberty of addressing you on several matters which ought, as it seems to me, particularly to engage the attention of your honorable bodies, as of all who study the welfare and progress of the Nation. I shall ask your indulgence if I venture to depart in some degree from the usual custom of setting before you in formal review the many matters which have engaged the attention and called for the action of the several depart- ments of the Government or which look to them for early treatment in the future, because the list is long, very long, and would suffer in the abbreviation to which I should have to subject it. I shall submit to you the reports of the heads of the several departments, in which these subjects are set forth in careful detail, and beg that they may receive the thoughtful attention of your committees and of all Mem- bers of the Congress who may have the leisure to study them. Their obvious importance, as constituting the very substance of the business of the Government, makes com- ment and emphasis on my part unnecessary. The country, I am thankful to say, is at peace with all the world, and many happy manifestations multiply about us of a growing cordiality and sense of community of inter- est among the nations, foreshadowing an age of settled peace and good will. More and more readily each decade do the nations manifest their willingness to bind them- 87 Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers selves by solemn treaty to the processes of peace, the proc- esses of frankness and fair concession. So far the United States has stood at the front of such negotiations. She will, I earnestly hope and confidently believe, give fresh proof of her sincere adherence to the cause of international friendship by ratifying the several treaties of arbitration awaiting renewal by the Senate. In addition to these, it has been the privilege of the Department of State to gain the assent, in principle, of no less than 31 nations, repre- senting four-fifths of the population of the world, to the negotiation of treaties by which it' shall be agreed that whenever differences of interest or of policy arise which can not be resolved by the ordinary processes of diplomacy they shall be publicly analyzed, discussed, and reported upon by a tribunal chosen by the parties before either nation determines its course of action. There is only one possible standard by which to deter- mine controversies between the United States and other nations, and that is compounded of these two elements: Our own honor and our obligations to the peace of the world. A test so compounded ought easily to be made to govern both the establishment of new treaty obligations and the interpretation of those already assumed. There is but one cloud upon our horizon. That has ' shown itself to the south of us, and hangs over Mexico. There can be no certain prospect of peace in America until General Huerta has surrendered his usurped authority in Mexico; until it is understood on all hands, indeed, that such pretended governments will not be countenanced or dealt with by the Government of the United States. We are the friends of constitutional government in America; we are more than its friends, we are its champions ; because in no other way can our neighbors, to whom we would wish in every way to make proof of our friendship, work out their own development in peace and liberty. Mexico has no Government. The attempt to maintain one at the City of 38 Woodrow Wilson Mexico has broken down, and a mere miltary despotism has been set up which has hardly more than the semblance of national authority. It originated in the usurpation of Victoriano Huerta, who, after a brief attempt to play the part of constitutional President, has at last cast aside even the pretense of legal right and declared himself dictator. As a consequence, a condition of affairs now exists in Mex- ico which has made it doubtful whether even the most ele- mentary and fundamental rights either of her own people or of the citizens of other countries resident within her ter- ritory can long be successfully safeguarded, and which threatens, if long continued, to imperil the interests of peace, order, and tolerable life in the lands immediately to the south of us. Even if the usurper had succeeded in his purposes, in despite of the constitution of the Republic and the rights of its people, he would have set up nothing but a precarious and hateful power, which could have lasted but a little while, and whose eventual downfall would have left the country in a more deplorable condition than ever. But he has not succeeded. He has forfeited the respect and the moral support even -of those who' were at one time willing to see him succeed. Little by little he has been completely isolated. By a little every day his power and prestige are crumbling and the collapse is not far away. We shall not, I believe, be obliged to alter our policy of watchful waiting. And then, when the end comes, we shall hope to see constitutional order restored in distressed Mexico by the concert and energy of such of her leaders as prefer the liberty of their people to their own ambitions. I turn to matters of domestic concern. You already have under consideration a bill for the reform of our sys- tem of banking and currency, for which the country waits with impatience, as for something fundamental to its whole business life and necessary to set credit free from arbitrary and artificial restraints. I need not say how earnestly I hope for its early enactment into law. I take leave to Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers beg that the whole energy and attention of the Senate be concentrated upon it till the matter is successfully disposed of. And yet I feel that the request is not needed — that the Members of that great House need no urging in this service to the country. I present to you, in addition, the urgent necessity that special provision be made also for facilitating the credits needed by the farmers of the country. The pending cur- rency bill does the farmers a great service. It puts them upon an equal footing with other business men and masters of enterprise, as it should; and upon its passage they will find themselves quit of many of the difficulties which now hamper them in the field of credit. The farmers, of course, ask and should be given no special privilege, such as extending to them the credit of the Government itself. What they need and should obtain is legislation which will make their own abundant and substantial credit resources available as a foundation for joint, concerted local action in their own behalf in getting the capital they must use. It is to this we should now address ourselves. It has, singularly enough, come to pass that we have al- lowed the industry of our farms to lag behind the other activities of the country in its development. I need not stop to tell you how fundamental to the life of the Nation is the production of its food. Our thoughts may ordinarily be concentrated upon the cities and the hives of industry, upon the cries of the crowded market place and the clangor of the factory, but it is from the quiet interspaces of the open valleys and the free hillsides that we draw the sources of life and of prosperity, from the farm and the ranch, from the forest and the mine. Without these every street would be silent, every office deserted, every factory fallen into disrepair. And yet the farmer does not stand upon the same footing with the forester and the miner in the market of credit. He is the servant of the seasons. Nature determines how long he must wait for his crops, 40 Woodrow Wilson and will not be hurried in her processes. He may give his note, but the season of its maturity depends upon the season when his crop matures, lies at the gates of the mar- ket where his products are sold. And the security he gives is of a character not known in the broker's office or as familiarly as it might be on the counter of the banker. The Agricultural Department of the Government is seek- ing to assist as never before to make farming an efficient business, of wide cooperative effort, in quick touch with the markets for foodstuffs. The farmers and the Government will henceforth work together as real partners in this field, where we now begin to see our way very clearly and where many intelligent plans are already being put into execution. The Treasury of the United States has, by a timely and well-considered distribution of its deposits, facilitated the moving of the crops in the present season and prevented the scarcity of available funds too often experienced at such times. But we must not allow ourselves to depend upon extraordinary expedients. We must add the means by which the farmer may make his credit constantly and easily available and command when he will the capital by which to support and expand his business. We lag behind many >ther great countries of the modern world in attempting to do this. Systems of rural credit have been studied and developed on the other side of the water while we left our farmers to shift for themselves in the ordinary money mar- ket. You have but to look about you in any rural district to see the result, the handicap and embarrassment which have been put upon those who produce our food. Conscious of this backwardness and neglect on our part,, the Congress recently authorized the creation of a special commission to study the various systems of rural credit which have been put into operation in Europe, and this commission is already prepared to report. Its report ought to make it easier for us to determine what methods wilL 41 Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers be best suited to our own farmers. I hope and believe that the committees of the Senate and House will address them- selves to this matter with the most fruitful results, and I believe that the studies and recently formed plans of the Department of Agriculture may be made to serve them very greatly in their work of framing appropriate and ade- quate legislation. It would be indiscreet and presumptuous in anyone to dogmatize upon so great and many-sided a question, but I feel confident that common counsel will pro- duce the results we must all desire. Turn from the farm to the world of business which cen- ters in the city and in the factory, and I think that all thoughtful observers will agree that the immediate service we owe the business communities of the country is to pre- vent private monopoly more effectually than it has yet been prevented. I think it will be easily agreed that we should let the Sherman antitrust law stand, unaltered, as it is, with its debatable ground about it, but that we should as much as possible reduce the area of that debatable ground by further and more explicit legislation; and should also supplement that great act by legislation which will not only clarify it but also facilitate its administration and make it fairer to all concerned. No doubt we shall all wish, and the country will expect, this to be the central subject of our deliberations during the present session; but it is a subject so many-sided and so deserving of careful and discrimi- nating discussion that I shall take the liberty of addressing you upon it in a special message at a later date than this. It is of capital importance that the business men of this country should be relieved of all uncertainties of law with regard to their enterprises and investments and a clear path indicated which they can travel without anxiety. It is as important that they should be relieved of embarrass- ment and set free to prosper as that private monopoly should be destroyed. The ways of action should be thrown wide open. 4* Woodrow Wilson I turn to a subject which I hope can be handled promptly and without serious controversy of any kind. I mean the method of selecting nominees for the Presidency of the United States. I feel confident that I do not misinterpret the wishes or the expectations of the country when I urge the prompt enactment of legislation which will provide for primary elections throughout the country at which the voters of the several parties may choose their nominees for the Presidency without the intervention of nominating conventions. I venture the suggestion that this legislation should provide for the retention of party conventions, but only for the purpose of declaring and accepting the verdict of the primaries and formulating the platforms of the par- ties; and I suggest that these conventions should consist not of delegates chosen for this single purpose, but of the nominees for Congress, the nominees for vacant seats in the Senate of the United States, the Senators whose terms have not yet closed, the national committees, and the candi- dates for the Presidency themselves, in order that platforms may be framed by those responsible to the people for carry- ing them into effect. These are all matters of vital domestic concern, and be- sides them, outside the charmed circle of our own national life in which our affections command us, as well as our consciences, there stand out our obligations toward our territories oversea. Here we are trustees. Porto Rico, Hawaii, the Philippines, are ours, indeed, but not ours to do what we please with. Such territories, once regarded as mere possessions, are no longer to be Selfishly exploited; they are part of the domain of public conscience and of serviceable and enlightened statesmanship. We must ad- minister them for the people who live in them and with the same sense of responsibility to them as toward our own people in our domestic affairs. No doubt we shall success- fully enough bind Porto Rico and the Hawaiian Islands to ourselves by ties of justice and interest and affection,' 48 Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers but the performance of our duty toward the Philippines is a more difficult and debatable matter. We can satisfy the obligations of generous justice toward the people of Porto Hico by giving them the ample and familiar rights and privileges accorded our own citizens in our own territories and our obligations toward the people of Hawaii by per- fecting the provisions for self-government already granted them, but in the Philippines we must go further. We must hold steadily in view their ultimate independence, and we must move toward the time of that independence as steadily as the way can be cleared and the foundations thoughtfully and permanently laid. Acting under the authority conferred upon the President by Congress, I have already accorded the people of the islands a majority in both houses of their legislative body by appointing five instead of i&ar native citizens to the membership of the commission. I believe that in this way we shall make proof of their capacity in counsel and their sense of responsibility in the exercise of political power, and that the success of this step will be sure to clear our view for the steps which are to follow. Step by step we should extend and perfect the system of self-government in the islands, making test of them and modifying them as experience discloses their successes and their failures; that we should more and more put under the control of the na- tive citizens of the archipelago the essential instruments of their life, their local instrumentalities of government, their schools, all the common interest of their communities, and so by counsel and experience set up a government which all the world will see to be suitable to a people whose affairs are under their own control. At last, I hope and believe, we are beginning to gain the confidence of the Filipino peoples. By their counsel and experience, rather than by our own, we shall learn how best to serve them and how soon it will be possible and wise to withdraw our super- vision. Let us once find the path and set out with firm and u Woodrow Wilson confident tread upon it and we shall not wander from it or linger upon it. A duty faces us with regard to Alaska which seems to me very pressing and very imperative; perhaps I should say a double duty, for it concerns both the political and the material development of the Territory. The people of Alaska should be given the full Territorial form of govern- ment, and Alaska, as a storehouse, should be unlocked. One key to it is a system of railways. These the Govern- ment should itself build and administer, and the ports and terminals it should itself control in the interest of all who wish to use them for the service and development of the country and its people. But the construction of railways is only the first step ; is only thrusting in the key to the storehouse and throwing back the lock and opening the door. How the tempting re- sources of the country are to be exploited is another matter, to which I shall take the liberty of from time to time call- ing your attention, for it is a policy which must be worked out by well-considered stages, not upon theory, but upon lines of practical expediency. It is part of our general problem of conservation. We have a freer hand in work- ing out the problem in Alaska than in the States of the Union; and yet the principle and object are the same, wherever we touch it. We must use the resources of the country, not lock them up. There need be no conflict or jealousy as between State and Federal authorities, for there can be no essential difference of purpose between them. The resources in question must be used, but not destroyed or wasted; used, but not monopolized upon any narrow idea of individual rights as against the abiding interests of communities. That a policy can be worked out by conference and concession which will release these resources and yet not jeopard or dissipate them, I for one have no doubt; and it can be done on lines of regulation which need be no less acceptable to the people and gov- 45 Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers ernments of the States concerned than to the people and Government of the Nation at large, whose heritage these resources are. We must bend our counsels to this end. A common purpose ought to make agreement easy. Three or four matters of special importance and sig- nificance I beg that you will permit me to mention in closing. Our Bureau of Mines ought to be equipped and empow- ered to render even more effectual service than it renders now in improving the conditions of mine labor and making the mines more economically productive as well as more safe. This is an all-important part of the work of con- servation; and the conservation of human life and energy lies even nearer to our interest than the preservation from waste of our material resources. We owe it, in mere justice to the railway employees of the country, to provide for them a fair and effective em- ployers' liability act ; and a law that we can stand by in this matter will be no less to the advantage' of those who ad- minister the railroads of the country than to the advantage of those whom they employ. The experience of a large number of the States abundantly proves that. We ought to devote ourselves to meeting pressing de- mands of plain justice like this as earnestly as to the ac- complishment of political and economic reforms. Social justice comes first. Law is the machinery for its realiza- tion and is vital only as it expresses and embodies it. An international congress for the discussion of all ques- tions that affect safety at sea is now sitting in London at the suggestion of our own Government. So soon as the conclusions of that congress can be learned and considered we ought to address ourselves, among other things, to the prompt alleviation of the very unsafe, unjust, and burden- some conditions which now surround the employment of sailors and render it extremely difficult to obtain the services of spirited and competent men such as every ship J,6 Woodrow Wilson needs if it is to be safely handled and brought to port. May I not express the very real pleasure I have experK enced in cooperating with this Congress and sharing with it the labors of common service to which it has devoted it- self so unreservedly during the past seven months of un- complaining concentration upon the business of legislation? Surely it is a proper and pertinent part of my report on "the state of the Union" to express my admiration for the diligence, the good temper, and the full comprehension of public duty which has already been manifested by both the Houses; and I hope that it may not be deemed an im- pertinent intrusion of myself into the picture if I say with how much and how constant satisfaction I have availed my- self of the privilege of putting my time and energy at their disposal alike in counsel and in action. Wilson's Special Message on Trusts and Monopolies (Delivered before Congress in Joint Session January 20, 1914) [Editorial Note : Wilson's views on trust legislation were fairly well known, having been embodied in the fa- mous New Jersey laws which became noted as "The Seven Sisters" while he still was Governor of that State. This Message formulated the following definite laws: (i) Pro- hibition of interlocking directorates, '(#) government su- pervision of railway financing, (3) exact definition of the meaning of the Sherman anti-trust law, (4) an interstate trade commission to direct and shape corrective processes and inform the public, (5) legislation to reach individuals responsible for corporate wrong-doing. Bills had already been prepared, under the direction of Henry D. Clayton of Alabama, Chairman of the Judiciary Committee of the House, who had declined nomination to the Senate on Wilson's public request that he remain in the House to formulate this legislation. 47 Presidential Messages, Addresses and State Papers The bills, known first as the "Five Brothers," finally were merged into one bill, the Clayton anti-trust bill, and passed in October, 1914. The Federal Trade Commission law was passed September, 1914-] Mr. Speaker, Mr. President, gentlemen of the Congress, in my report "on the state of the Union," which I had the privilege of reading to you on the 2d of December last, I ventured to reserve for discussion at a later date the subject of additional legislation regarding the very difficult and in- tricate matter of trusts and monopolies. The time now seems opportune to turn to that great question, not only because the currency legislation, which absorbed your at- tention and the attention of the country in December, is now disposed of, but also because opinion seems to be clear- ing about us with singular rapidity in this other great field of action. In the matter of the currency it cleared sud- denly and very happily after the much-debated act was passed; in respect of the monopolies which have multiplied about us and in regard to the various means by which they have been organized and maintained, it seems to be coming to a clear and all but universal agreement in anticipation of our action, as if by way of preparation, making the way easier to see and easier to set out upon with confidence and without confusion of counsel. Legislation has its atmosphere like everything else, and the atmosphere of accommodation and mutual understand- ing which we now breathe with so much refreshment is mat- ter of sincere congratulation. It ought to make our task very much less difficult and embarrassing than it would have been had we been obliged to continue to act amidst the atmosphere of suspicion and antagonism which has so long made it impossible to approach such questions with dispassionate fairness. Constructive legislation, when suc- cessful, is always the embodiment of convincing experience and of the mature public opinion which finally springs out 48 Woodrow Wilson of that experience. Legislation is a business of interprets tion, not of origination ; and it is now plain what the opinion is to which we must give effect in this matter. It is not recent or hasty opinion. It springs out of the experience of a whole generation. It has clarified itself by long contest, and those who for a long time battled with it and sought to change it are now frankly and honorably yielding to it and seeking to conform their actions to it. The great business men who organized and financed ; monopoly and those who administered it in actual everyday transactions have, year after year until now, either denied its existence or justified it as necessary for the effective maintenance and development of the vast business processes of the country in the modern circumstances of trade and manufacture and finance ; but all the while opinion has made head against them. ,__Xh£-aKej;agfi_bu&in.e;s§..man is convinced feat the ways of*-liberty ar&valso»the-ways of peace and- the ways of success