,Uo2- 
 
 Our Island Problems 
 
OUR ISLAND PROBLEMS. 
 
 KEEP THEM ALL. 
 
 The current of a nation's history is marked by curious and uncertain 
 rates of progress. At times it rolls along smoothly and without interrup- 
 tion for a generation. Again, without apparent warning, the stream of 
 history breaks into a tempestuous flood. Old ways are obliterated, old 
 landmarks are ruthlessly torn from their ancient moorings and swept 
 away never to be seen again of men. When the tide recedes, the citizen 
 gropes in vain for the cherished objects which he and his ancestors had 
 venerated in the past. 
 
 In such manner has the swift progress of history during the past twelve 
 months swept away absolutely and beyond recovery many time-honored 
 ideals of political life and action once held by the people of the United 
 States. Overwhelmed and bewildered by the splendid progress of the 
 Spanish war, the citizen suddenly finds himself face to face with new 
 aspects of political life and action that this contest has pressed immedi- 
 ately to the front. 
 
 In the solution of new and weighty questions of the hour, the citizen 
 can no longer trust to the traditions of the past. He must take new bear- 
 ings in view of the new political landscape in which he finds himself. 
 
 In making the decision as to our Colonial Policy he must consider not 
 the traditions of the past, but the history of the future. 
 
 In what condition does the Nation and the individual find itself to 
 decide upon these momentous questions ? 
 
 OUR. PHYSICAL SUPREMACY. 
 
 Tlie American citizen finds himself today a member of a nation which 
 has developed naturally, symmetrically and enormously as race inherit- 
 ance and a superb physical environment has dictated from the first. In 
 mere material progress the advance of the Nation has far exceeded the 
 wildest dreams that might have been based upon the most extravagant 
 standards of the past. In a single century of national existence the Na- 
 tion has covered practically the same ground that other peoples have 
 painfully traversed in the progress of a thousand vcar.; 
 
Without undue pride, the American people should today clearly lealize 
 that the United States is far and away the most powerful nation the his- 
 tory of the world has seen. 
 
 In population, in intelligence, in tlie accumulated wealth, which makes 
 for success in peace or war, this nation far outranks in efftctixe power 
 any single nation of the ancient or modern world. The mere existence 
 of 70,000,000 intelligent people, living harmoniously under one ac- 
 cepted government; seated securely in the single largest area of fertile 
 land upon the globe; of a blood either inherited or assimilated, euTbody- 
 ino" the best virtues of a race that has made histor}' for a thousand years; 
 safe from all attack; al)undantly prolilic; pacific by disposition, yet of 
 abounding self-respect — these and other characteristics of this people 
 present a spectacle of national unit}' and power that should make 
 every American citizen j^roud of his race and land. 
 
 It sliould fill him with a just sense of the responsil)ility resting upon 
 him as a member of the race that has heretofore, and must hereafter, 
 shape the history of the world. 
 
 Nor alone in intellectual and material strength does this nation outrank 
 any Civilization of past or present times. Its moral strength is of a stamp 
 and vigor that renders douI:)ly effective tiit; resources of land and intellect. 
 
 This combination of physical resources, vast population and moral 
 vigor, united in a new race whose veins are filled with clean, fresh blood 
 — unlike the Latin peoples now tottering to the grave — ])reBent a pheno- 
 menon which the worn peoples and tyrannical governments of the Euro- 
 pean continent will do well to consider in tlieir lawless and arbitrary 
 division of the Eastern world. 
 
 With a full knowledge of our preponderance; with a desire to mould 
 our polic)' according to what has been considered right and moral among 
 the best Civilizations of the past; above all, with a firm faith in the Ger- 
 man-Anglo-vSaxon Civilization as representing the liest conception of Gov- 
 ernment and Morals that history presents— with these things in view 
 should the American citizen approach the dul} of the hour. 
 
 OUR HISTORIC VIEWS OF AMERICAN DESTINY. 
 
 A people that has hitherto attended strictly to its own affairs, and 
 studiously remained within the limits of its own continents, the United 
 States is today called upon to an-ange the destinies of three dif- 
 ferent peoples in three different (juarters of the globe. Happy, for an 
 entire centur\', in the universal Ijelief that that the nation would never 
 extend its boundaries l)e3'ond its own continent, the United States finds 
 
itself to-da}' the embarrassed owner of colonies of whose acquisition its 
 people had never dreamed. 
 
 Foreign nations, judging our Civilization by its own, can never be con- 
 vinced that we had not cleverly planned the acquisition of these islands 
 bevond the sea. Happily, our own prepon derance and the knowledge 
 of our own integrity may render us totally indifferent to what these for- 
 eign nations think or do not think. 
 
 In solving the problem of our colonial doniains, we are accountable to 
 ourselves alone. 
 
 HAWAII. 
 
 Proceeding in due order, it may be said that our first foundling was 
 clearly a case of Manifest Destiny, long thwarted in her efforts. The 
 Hawaiian civilization of today is a product of American hand and brain 
 that has been at work in this outlying island for fifty years. The trade 
 of Hawaii is largely American. Her industries, material resources and 
 accumulated wealth are almost wholly the result of American enterprise. 
 But for American civilization Hawaii would be to-day a howling canni- 
 balistic isle, or a European non-productive colony, under the iron heel of 
 military law. 
 
 Hawaii is the key which, in the hands of any other nation, may at any 
 time unlock the door to our Pacific coast. By every law of trade; by 
 every demand of national safety; by every behest of Civilization and good 
 government, this island should have been ours not five, but fifty years 
 ago. That this splendid possession has now dropped into our lap— not in 
 its crude immaturity — but as a fully perfected fruit, is not alone a tribute 
 to the manifest destiny of our race. It happily removes the Hawaiian 
 question from the realm of controversy. It is a fact accomplished and so 
 accomplished that the most bitter foreign critics cannot gainsay our 
 rights. 
 
 CUBA AND PORTO RICO. 
 
 By the same considerations that have finally'made Hawaii a part of the 
 I'nited States, Cuba and Porto Rico should likewise have been ours half 
 a century ago. That the inevitable destiny of our race has likewise cast 
 these foundlings into our lap, almost without a struggle, is another proof 
 that Mediaeval bigotry and misrule shall not dominate the Western world. 
 The future of these isles should be burdened with no great problems. 
 Porto Rico is now a component portion of the United States. It is an 
 island comparatively small, accessible and well supplied with military 
 roads. There should l^e nothing serious to encounter beyond the inevit- 
 
able friction that must follow the displacement of a semi-barbarous rule 
 bv civilized forms of government. Keep out the politicians and the 
 carpet-baggers; give the island an economic industrial government and 
 '■Lwill speedilv merge into the ))ody of the great repuljlic. 
 
 The future of Cuba must differ somewhat from that of Porto Rico. In a 
 moment of what now seems ill-gotten generosity, the nation pledged the 
 world Cuba should be given self government of her own. The history of 
 the past six months indicates too clearly that this isle is not yet ripe for 
 absolute self-control and that her future cannot be safely placed at once 
 in the keeping of her own inexperienced people. She must be slowly 
 schooled to self-control, and must then b^ given a fair opportunity to 
 show her capacity for self-rule under .Vmericau supervision. 
 
 We may give Cuba the opportunity to govern herself hut can we 
 make the men fit to govern out of vSpanish stock ? 
 
 The ultimate future of this isle is foreordained. She will be given her 
 chance to redeem herself. She will probably fail, as has almost every 
 other Spanish-.lmerican people of the western hemisphere. 
 
 Cuba will then be merged into the United States, and her people will 
 gradually melt into the Anglo-Saxon civilization, as did their kindred 
 people in the Floridas, Texas and I^ouisiana. 
 
 THE PHILIPPINES. 
 
 The final parting of the roads comes upon the (juestiou of the Philip- 
 pines. The other islands were component portions of North America, 
 but temporarily detached. The Philippines bring us into another hemis- 
 phere; throw us into contact with questions and races, of whose ex- 
 istence we hardl}- knew a year ago. 
 
 Reducing the Philippine question to its lowest terms, its solution 
 becomes more plain. 
 
 Prior to the war these islands belonge<l tu .Spain. 
 
 Where did she get them? 
 
 She discovered them some four hundred years ago, and has since mis- 
 governed them by the sole right of superior power. 
 
 We destroyed the Spanish fleet at Manilla, not to secure these islands, 
 but to protect our own Pacific coast. The surrender of Manilla carried 
 the surrender of the islands., and the close of the war found them in our 
 hands. 
 
 Not De.sire, but Destiny, lias thrust this burden on us. 
 
 The Philip)nnes are now our own, first, by the universal law of war 
 which permits the victor to absorb the spoils of the van(|uished in such 
 reasonable amount as shall compensati; liini for injury done and outlay 
 
made. This is the lower law, accepted b_v the higher Civilized Nations 
 of the contirent. and which none of them have denied assent. 
 
 The Philipines are also ours, by that higher law, which justices an 
 advanced Civilization in crushing a despotic and vicious government and 
 bestowing upon a suffering people the right to live a free and decent life. 
 
 They are ours b_v that inexorable law of nature that replaces the rack, 
 the tax collector and the hangman with the schoolhouse, the township 
 meetinij and the Law. 
 
 IS EXPANSION UNCONSTITUTIONAL? 
 
 Next in order comes the claim put forth by many cloistered and learned 
 folk that the acquisition of new territor}- is unconstitutional and against 
 the traditions of the United States. 
 
 Is this so, and if so, what is the basis for this claim!' 
 
 In the whole body of the Constitiition there is no reference to the 
 acquisition of new territory. There is nothing that can be construed to 
 cover this contingency. 
 
 The argument that we cannot, therefore, annex new territor}-, has been 
 largely based upon this lack of specific consent to such expansion. This 
 objection is sophistical and totally contrary to common sense. 
 The mere state of Sovereignty itself implies many acts and obli- 
 gations not specified in the Constitution. They are the natural attributes 
 of National Supremacy and are so manifestly bound up in the very fabric 
 of the Constitution that they need no direct mandate in black and white. 
 
 The Constitution does not specifically provide that we defend oursehes 
 if attacked. Nor does the Constitution, in terms, deny the right of Seces- 
 sion to a state which no longer desires to retain its place in the national 
 union. Yet we have waged both defensive and offensive warfare when 
 common sense demanded. We fought the greatest war in history to retain 
 states which desired to secede yet no man can point to the constitutional 
 mandate in black and white which authorized the coercion of the South- 
 ern vStates. 
 
 Yet neither of these acts of Sovereignty was more logical than is the 
 retention of conquered territory thrust upon us against our will and in 
 such a manner that it cannot be abandoned without a distinct moral 
 wrong against Progress and Civilization. 
 
 Neither is there any precedent against expansion in our written or 
 recorded law. 
 
 If so, where is it, who wrote it and where is it now concealed;* 
 
6 
 
 TRADITIONS FAVOR A WISE EXPANSION. 
 
 Still less ilo our alleged traditions offer any barrier to such wise and 
 necessary expansions as are vitally necessary to our national safety and 
 well being. On the contrary, the history of the United States is but the 
 story of successive expansions, by which the necessities of increasing 
 population has led us to absorb inferior races and to open new lands to 
 Industry and Civilization. Our own I\nglish ancestry lirst drove out the 
 Indian, and tlien tlie Dutch, and then the French. The very ancestors 
 of these particular patriots who now raise the cry of Imperialism, were 
 the first to drive the untutored savage out of New England, with a 
 melancholy, but no less persistent zeal. 
 
 From the Ijeginning of our national government we have lost no oppor- 
 tunity to extend our national domain. Thomas Jefferson, who had nmch 
 to saj- about peace and various mixed theories of human rights, wasted 
 scant time when the most favorable chance in history offered the territory 
 of I.ouisiana to the United States. Thomas Jefferson abandoned theory 
 on the spot, and for once consorted with common sense. In spite of 
 frenzied opposition he bought Louisiana without the consent of Congress 
 and upon his own responsibility. To-day, the civilization of 30,000,000, 
 now resident in the Mississippi valley, justify and approve the wisdom of 
 this act. 
 
 Without this enlightened purchase we should still be a second class 
 nation, hemmed in by the Mississippi river and the Atlantic coast. 
 Mexico or France or Spain would have occupied all that vast parallelo- 
 gram between New Orleans, Lake Superior, Oregon and California. 
 
 In 1821 we absorbed the Floridas because they had become a common 
 nuisance. They were misgoverned by Spain in the same shocking man- 
 ner as she has misgoverned the West Indies and the Philippines. The 
 Floridas were a menace to the prosperity and happiness of the civilized 
 people who were endeavoring to live peacefully and decently by their 
 side. Andrew Jackson wanted no rhetoric on this occasion. He seized 
 the Floridas, and while we afterwards made payment for the same, this 
 was done not as a matter of right, but as a sop to the outraged dignity of 
 Spain. 
 
 In 1848 we absorbed the best portion of Mexico because our slave- 
 holding rulers demanded more room to raise slaves and cotton and other 
 things. This seizure of Mexican territory was a crudely brutal act. 
 However base the means, the final result has been wholly desirable. It 
 has opened up to Civilization a region which would otherwise have 
 remained as bare and j)rofitless as most ol' Mexico is to-day. 
 
In 1850 we absorbed Oregon, parti}- because we had discovered it, but 
 particularly because we needed it in our onward progress to the West. 
 Xay, we were even at the point of war with England because we did not 
 at the same time secure British Columbia, then a portion of the Oregon 
 territory. 
 
 In 1865 we took the Gads<len Purchase to protect our own frontier. 
 
 In IS 67 we took Alaska because it was cheap and a bargain and its 
 purchase forever excluded the Russian empire from the American conti- 
 nent. 
 
 So far from our acquisitions weakening the Republic, they have really 
 made it what it is to-day. Nearly half of our population is to-dav resi- 
 dent in the acquired portion of the United States. More than half of our 
 natural resources and future wealth will be found in such portions as we 
 have annexed since we became a commonwealth. As a matter of fact, 
 history shows our sainted faithers even more crudel}' acquisitive than 
 ourselves, for they lived in a day when the strong invariably preved 
 upon the weak and nations seized whatever was unprotected and near 
 at hand. 
 
 COMMERCIAL, STRATEGIC AND MORAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 The Philipine question then resolves itself into a discussion upon the 
 (1 ) Commercial, (2) Strategic and (3) Moral aspects of the case. 
 
 Will the accession of these islands increase the general prosperity of 
 the United States? 
 
 Will the}' be of strategic value in the protection of our interests at 
 home and in the eastern world? 
 
 Lastly, can we abandon them with safety to ourselves and with justice 
 to the inhabitants of the islands? 
 
 A year ago the American people would have considered mad any- 
 one who had suggested the possibility of acquiring territory in Asiatic 
 waters. So fast has history moved, however, that to-day hardly a citizen 
 can be found who feels assured that we should abandon the Philippines. 
 
 Commercially speaking, there can be no question that the Philippines 
 would be of vast importance to the United States. Including 1,400 sep- 
 arate isles, lying almost wholly in tropic waters ; stretching 800 miles 
 from north to south ; occupying more territory than all New England, 
 these islands are a vast empire in themselves. They constitute a store of 
 tropical and mineral wealth, such as how remains unexploited in no por- 
 tion of the world. These islands produce spontaneously and almost with- 
 out cultivation, nearly every single object of necessity and luxury which 
 
we do not produce ourselves. They produce coffee, sugar, rice, hemp 
 gutta percha, cotton, indigo and nearly every product of the tropical and 
 semitropical zones. Notwithstanding an occupancy of 400 years Spain 
 has explored only a small portion of the i^roup. Tliese islands are said 
 to contain iron, i^old and copper. It is also said tliit some of the outly- 
 ing islands contriin lart^e de]50sits of coal. vSucli deposits, if existing', are 
 of the verv highest value. Aside from New South A\'ales and some half- 
 worked lodes in China and Tonquin, there is little or no coal in the Far 
 East. Such deposits alone would be justification enough, from a com- 
 mercial point of view, to retain these islands. 
 
 Notwithstanding the semibarbarous government of the Philippine 
 islands, which has hitherto crushed industry with all manner of taxes 
 and extortions, the total value of tlie Philippine exports was nearly ^;>0,- 
 000,000 in 1897. As showing its latent possibilities, il may l»e said 
 that the exports of the one small island of Java, near at hand, amounted 
 in 1897, under tlu; wis2 rule of Holland, to 225,000,000 guilders, or 
 !f;90,000,000. 
 
 Yet Java is no richer in natural resources, and is only one-half as large. 
 
 THE EASTERN QUESTION. 
 
 Turning to the ])olitical and strategic factors connecled with the Pliil- 
 ippines, we are confronted with Lhe fact that the ])o.ssessor of tlie Philip- 
 pine islands to-day holds tlie key to the Eastern (Juestiiui. 
 
 Reared in almost complete ignorance of tlie portentt)us ])roblems now 
 jjressing for solution in the I'Vir Ka.st, the people of tlie United vStates are 
 not only plunged into this vexed and perplexing question, but its final 
 solution is thrust unexpectedly and unceremoniously into our hands. 
 
 The Eastern Question in the P'ar East as well as in the West, is simply 
 the question as to Avhich of the European powers shall ab.sorb the dying 
 nat ionalities of the Orient. The past three hundred years in Asia 
 is the history of the division of the national domain of the Malay, 
 Hindoo and Mongolian races. 
 
 The Malays andlli'.idoos have already been absorl)ed. The Mongo- 
 lia n alone remain. 
 
 Hitherto the superior energies and colonizing powers of P^ngland have 
 en abled her to acquire the lion's share. During this period P'rance has 
 a Iways demanded compensation for England's gains, while Russia has 
 qu ieth', but assiduously, chipped off fragments all along her vast frontiers, 
 until to-<lay she threatens the very existence of the INIongolian empire- 
 Spai u, in her shame and weakness, has i^laj-ed no jiart in this cannibal- 
 
9 
 
 istic feast for some two hundred years. Xominall}- possessing the richest 
 colony in the East, she has only remained its owner because the other 
 nations could decide upon no amicable division of her colonial domain. 
 
 THE ASIATIC EQUILIBRIUM UPSET. 
 
 Thus has the so-called equilibrium in the East been maintained by di- 
 plomatic "Accessions" and "Compensations" and "Realms of Influence" 
 till the fateful day when Dewey destroyed the Spanish fleet in Manilla 
 bay. When the diplomats of Europe woke on May 4, they confronted 
 the fact that their eastern mosaic had been broken into a thousand frag- 
 ments. 
 
 Not alone did they find the cherished equilibrium shattered, upon 
 which they had expended patient generations of diplomacy. They 
 were further confronted with a new power in the East, whose approach 
 had not even been remotely anticipated. The key to the situation had 
 not only been taken from their grasp, but it had been unconsciously 
 taken by a nation whose latent strength of resistance rendered useless 
 any return to the conditions before existing. 
 
 Germany, bitterly disappointed in her share of the eastern 
 spoils, had for some time looked upon the Philippines for "Com- 
 pensation." During the preliminary controversies between Spain 
 and the I"nited States, Germany had ostentatiously and offensively 
 sided with her European neighbor. She did this with her eye 
 upon the Philippines. Her fleet was even then collected in eastern 
 seas ready to back up Spanish claims if her safety and self-interest 
 might so dictate. As prudence dictated otherwise, Germany has 
 abstained thus far from anything more than a display of ill will and evil 
 humor. 
 
 As for Russia, she liad ardently desired to be left alone. She had en- 
 gulfed China in a treaty by which she was gradually absorbing all Man- 
 churia. Russia only desired undisturbed repose during the process of 
 digestion. By a clever diplomacy she had gradually alienated the contin- 
 ental nations from England and all the Continent played cat's paw at the 
 behest of St. Petersburgh. 
 
 Japan still chewed the cud of bitter melancholy, because Russia had 
 seized all the fruits of the Japane.se victory in 1892. Yet Japan was 
 powerless without allies to prevent the gradual absorption of China by 
 her Russian guest. In the meantime, England, looking vainly for sup- 
 port, was not yet prepared to beard her Russian rival in the Ea.st. France, 
 in her fond hope of protection against Germany, was still a tool of Rus- 
 sia and a mere pawn in the game of Russian diplomacy. 
 
10 
 
 It was at this point that English prestige reached its nadir, and that 
 Russian progress seemed destined to make all China a Russian province. 
 
 The battle of ^Manilla cluinged history in a night. An Anglo-Saxon 
 nation, with strong but undeveloped ideas as to the duties of its race, has 
 seized the ke}'. The projected absorption and partition of the Chinese 
 empire became an impossibility at once. 
 
 STRATEGIC STRENGTH OF THE PHILIPPINES. 
 
 While it is difficult for our people to realize that the seizure of these 
 islands involve such vast interests in the East, a brief glance at the map 
 will show the point at once. 
 
 The archipelago of the Philij^piues confr(jnls the coast of Asia for 
 nearly 800 miles. 
 
 It commands the coast of China, Tonijuin, Cochin China and .\nnam, 
 the Mala}' peninsula and the Polynesian isles. 
 
 Manilla is only 700 miles, or thirty-six hours from the English i)ort of 
 Hongkong. This is the port of the great city of Canton, and the outlet 
 of the richest portion of the Chinese empire. 
 
 All the vast commerce of the Far East with Europe passes between 
 Manilla and the port of our Anglo-Saxon kindred at Hongkong. 
 
 The Pliilippines are but a thousand miles from Japan, and this is no 
 distance in the vast waste of the Asiatic seas. 
 
 The largest portion of the connneice of America with India, .Singapore, 
 Runnah, passes through these seas, and is commanded by our new acqui- 
 sition. 
 
 In fact, Manilla is tlie one mid-point in the east where all the 
 great lines of ocean traffic are held in sure command. The geometrical 
 center of a vast circle, it is almost equi-distant from Peking, Tokio and 
 Singapore. 
 
 It is the only available point in the east where France, Rus- 
 sia or Germany could have obtained desirable coaling and commercial 
 stations without a struggle. It will l)e seen, therefore, that our position 
 in the Philippines is fraught with possibilities that we have liardly com- 
 menced to grasp. 
 
 THE DESPOILING OF CHINA. 
 
 Yet another question of the greatest moment interjects itself. This 
 touches upon the future of the Chinese empire. 
 
 Absorbed in our own affairs we have hitherto remained oblivious to the 
 fact that we have neglected the greatest and most profitable markets of 
 the world. One by one, great fragments of the East have been torn off 
 
11 
 
 by foreign powers and shut to our legitimate commerce. Without a pro- 
 test we have seen our commercial treaties violated, and have been ousted 
 from our legitimate traffic in the East. Contented with our own and 
 European markets, we have apparently overlooked the fact that the mar- 
 kets of 300,000,000 people are all but finally closed to the enterprise 
 and energy of our people. 
 
 Now that Chance or Destiu}' has placed us in command of the situation, 
 what do we propose to do about it? 
 
 Shall we abandon this vantage placed unconscioush- in our grasp, or 
 shall we make intelligent use of the great Godsend which has been 
 thrust upon us? 
 
 Shall we, by the abandonment of the Philippines permit the gradual 
 dismemberment of China among European powers, and the consequent 
 loss of our Chinese trade; or shall we demand that this rich field be left 
 open to the legitimate trade of all alike? 
 
 WE MUST HOLD THIS KEY. 
 
 Regardless of the perplexing details of this problem, can the patriotic 
 American citizen hesitate for one moment in his decision? 
 
 The Philippines are ours by the right of war, to which civilized Europe 
 gives consent. The}' are ours by the higher law that has thus given a 
 helpless and wickedh* governed people into our hands Our flag now 
 waves above the Philippines. In the interest of humanity and of enlight- 
 ened self-interest, there should it remain until someone prove strong 
 enough to pull it down. 
 
 While the retention of these islands is filled with vexed problems, 
 these are nothing as compared with the momentous evils that would fol- 
 low the abandonment of the islands. 
 
 What of the alternative ? 
 
 If we do not take them, who will ? 
 
 We could not abandon them to England or sell them to any other na- 
 tion without universal war. 
 
 If the United States does not retain the Philipines they must go back 
 to the insurgents. Were we now to leave them, their condition would be 
 even more lamentable than under the corrupting rule of Spain. 
 
 New England senators may compare the mercenary Aguinaldo to Wash- 
 ington and Bolivar. They may continue to offer moral support against 
 our arms and fleets. The people of the United States however will not 
 believe that the man who has counseled wholesale slaughter of all for- 
 eigners on the island is a patriot nor a statesman, nor qualified to erect 
 an independent government. 
 
12 
 
 Neither will they surrender into the hands of Mala}- bowmen the lives of 
 thousands of innocent Spanish people nor the millions of property whose 
 security is dependent upon civilized and enlightened government. 
 
 If we are afraid to take the Responsibility, will History ever justify us 
 in destroying the only system of Government these islands possessed and 
 then abandoning them to the anarchy that must follow native attempts 
 to govern? 
 
 Whether it be called Annexation, Autonomy or a Protectorate, the fu- 
 ture of all these islands must be Anglo-Saxon —not Latin nor IMalay nor 
 Japanese. 
 
 While the natives of these islands will be given Liberty it must be Lib- 
 erty on Anglo-Saxon lines. It will never be the License under which the 
 Spanish-American Republics have mocked Republican Government for 
 three-quarters of a century past. 
 
 HOLD ALL THE ISLANDS. 
 
 Do not all the arguments in favor of holding Manilla as a coaling sta- 
 tion apply equally well to the island of Luzon and the balance of the 
 group ? 
 
 Furthermoie, will there not be much less friction with foreign powers 
 if we at once take over the whole group as a legitimate spoil of war? Nor 
 is there any danger that the alleged "powers" will actively interfere if 
 we boldly and courageously stand by our lights. All of them have too 
 many troubles of their own to actively antagonize the rising giant of the 
 west, right on the threshold of his recent victory. 
 
 There may be diplomatic threats and murmurs, but no nation is in 
 shape to actively resist the United States. Even if they do, the fleets of 
 Japan and England are both at our command, and with this combination 
 we control the world. 
 
 THE RUSSIAN PERIL. 
 
 Nor from a larger historical view, should our people overlook the fact 
 that any action regarding the Philipines will alTect for good or evil the 
 whole future history of Democratic Government and the Anglo-vSaxon 
 race. 
 
 One hundred years ago Napoleon shrewdly remarked that the next 
 century would see the world Cossack or Republican. 
 
 Since that day the colossal development of the Russian empire has 
 threatened to engulf the entire Eastern world in its onward jjrogress. 
 The Latin race, now in decay, has ceased to play any material part in the 
 
13 
 
 history of the world. The next century must develop the supremacy of 
 the Germanic or Slavonic race. 
 
 There is no room for compromise. 
 
 The Civilization of America and Europe and the Germanic race, or the 
 Civilization of Asia and the Slav must finall}- survive. 
 
 While we please ourselves with nursery traditions regarding the an- 
 cient friendship of Russia for the United States, it were little less than 
 idiocy to believe that there can be an}' common unity Ijetween the ex- 
 treme Despotism and the extreme Democracy of the age. 
 
 Russia represents ignorance, l)igotr3' and slavery of mankind. She has 
 placed her foot upon every germ that makes towards progress and individ- 
 ual freedom. She is diametrically opposed to ev-er}- cherished theory tliat 
 the Germanic peoples hold regarding Politics, Religion or the Law. She 
 is the one great, inexorable, portentous enemy of modern progress and 
 the Germanic race. 
 
 Having absorbed China, with 300,000,000 people at her command, 
 what will then become of Europe ? 
 
 It will be Asiatic and not Germanic. 
 
 And after Europe, what of America and the future of Eree Government 
 in the world?' 
 
 A REAL PERIL. 
 
 It is difficult to impress upon Americans living in the security of their 
 virgin land that they owe exact and certain duties to the future of Democ- 
 rac}' and Civilization. History is but a story of the survival of the races 
 and race ideas. Why should future history differ from the past? 
 
 If for no other reason, we should hold the Philippines intact to estab- 
 lish a permanent and impregnable barrier to the progress of Asiatic civ- 
 ilization in the world. England will shortly have to fight a decisive bat- 
 tle for the existence of European civilization in the East. While we need 
 not become involved in actual war, we .should give her all the moral as- 
 sistance in our power. 
 
 This can be done in no better way than by holding the key to the East, 
 which in other hands might be betraj'ed into the enemy of our race and 
 culture. 
 
 VOICE OF THE WEST. 
 
 We, as a nation, ha\-e never yet failed to rise to the full compass and 
 greatness demanded by the destiny of our race. 
 
 Why should we fail in this? 
 
 We will not fail. We are not a race that fails. Our forefathers en- 
 countered much vaster problems in the past, and shall we say that we are 
 
14 
 
 unworthy to follow in their footsteps? Shall we shrink ignoble from the 
 path plainly blazed out before us by our Destin\-, and by our duties to- 
 wards the human race ? 
 
 While some closet thinkers of the Eastern coast may shrink with fear 
 from these new problems, there is no apprehension for our future among 
 the 50,000,000 people who fill the vast realm between the AUeghenies 
 and the Pacific coast. The people who have wickedly "expanded" into 
 the ^Mississippi valley, and have turned the Louisiana purchase, the Mex- 
 ican Cession and the Oregons into the granary of the world are not per- 
 plexed with the intellectual fantasies which paralize the overcultured in- 
 tellect of the East. 
 
 Their thoughts and aspirations are American and not European. 
 
 From the first the)' believed fervently and ardently in the full right- 
 eousness of the war which has destroyed the last lingering tyranny 
 of Spain in two (|uarters of the globe. Breathing the pure air of 
 mountain ranges, vast plains and prairie lands, their convictions are a 
 product of honest toil in forests and in field. They are not impregnated 
 with those purely conmiercial considerations which have so often be- 
 numbed the natural humanit}' of the East. The people of the West, 
 whose soldiery have born the brunt of the recent contest, both in Cuba 
 and the Philippines do not propose that the Ijlood of their sons shall 
 have been shed in vain. 
 
 They do not propose that these two wars shall have been fought with- 
 out a distinct and permanent gain to the cause of real Liberty and Good 
 Government in this world. 
 
 The people of the western empire do not not propose to surrender back 
 to barbarism a single foot of territory once reclaimed from bigotry and 
 misgovernment. 
 
 Where American blood has once been shed and the American flag has 
 once been raised, there they believe it should stay in spite of all the 
 world. 
 
 Today the seat of empire resides not upon the .Atlantic coast, but far 
 inland, where the Mississippi and its tributaries wander towards the 
 sea. 
 
 The West has not lived down the great migratory and civilizing in 
 stincts inherent in its blood. It voices these instincts in no uncertain 
 terms. It does not fear the Future. Where the clear Destiny of the 
 Race and Nation points, it does not fear to follow. 
 
 Minneapolis, Minn., March 1, 1899. W. D. W.A.SHm-RN, Jr. 
 
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