The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1865-11-11
The Monroe Doctrine.

Aa1 songs tne OyrenS sung, and
what name Achilles bore when he hid
among the GTeoian woInan," a.s
questions of easy solution compared
with that cross between gnarled oak
and a Gordian knot, '.the Monroe
doctrine. The subject has been
written of and talked about SO long,
and so many reams of diplomatic note
paper. and so many days Of dreary,
turgid Congressional rhetoric have
been wasted upon it, that at the very
mention Of the subject by jou1 list
the eye of the sated and dispusted
reader flies for relief to the obituary
notices, or to the column which is
sacred to horrible accidents.
Although the famous doctrine has
been buffeted back and forth for a
quarter of century, without ever
seriously menacing the pacific reIa-
tlons OF the United States and Great
Britain, yet the time is not far distant
when our Government and people
must finally abandon the position of
Mr.. Monroe, or prepare to make it
good at all hazards. This doctrine
has OF late been treated with 80 much
contempt by England and France,
that 1t has ceased to be q scare-crow
even to the smallest German Princi-
paity.
Indeed, the leading and most in
huential organs Of public sentiment
In England treat it as an exploded
doctrine, set up and maintained by
the United States, but from the first
utterly despised and ignored by the
rest OF Christendom, and nov aban-
doned by this country.
The London Saturday Reote,c, of
the 3Oth Of September gravely speaks
of the famous Monroe doctrine as one
OF The ''things" which ga nation sets
up and calls doctrine, and can hold
1t until forced to change it, or is
brought to see the wisdom of torego-
ing it" It then coolly treats the
Monroe doctrine as bnntling which
has been voluntarily abandoned by its
parents, and points to the establish
ment OF Macmillan in Mexico by
Nap oleon as conclusive evidence that
the Monroe doctrine is dead and
buried. It says:
1.-The abandonment of the Monroe
doctrine by the United States is an
instance under the first head When
the Monroe doctrine was first set up.
it was good doctrine. It was pro
test on behalf of liberty against an
audaclous attempt to subjugate the
world and bring both hemispheres
under the sweep of the bighting curse
which the Holy Alliance called orderly
government. The United States pro
claimed to the absolutists of the Old
World that if on attempt was seriously
made to coerce the revolted colonies
OF Spain, on the mere ground that
they chose to form themselves into
republics, there was great republic
in America that would try to prevent
the wrong. The, threat succeeded,
and the Spanish colonies had free
play given them, and were allowed
to form themselves quietly and peace
ably into the most demoralized, abject,
anarchical, heaven-forgotten commu-
mites that ever disgraced the civilized
world. But the remembrance of their
triumph lived on in the breasts of the
Americans; and as the judicious threat
! of President Monroe had unfortunate
ly been styled q doctrine, it was sup
posed that it must contain some
general principles; and it suited the
energetic, ambitious, tall talking hu-
NOR Of Yankees to fancy that this
principle must be that none of the
powers of the Old World have any
right, under any circumstances, to
interfere in the affairs of any part of
the New World. The fact stared
them, and all men, in the face, that
England, France, and Holland are
actHa! owners Of American territory,
and that the mother countries of
almost all the white South Americans
are Spain and Portugal. But it was
glorious to take no notice of this, and
to say that the United States were
! entitled exclusively to nrnsiao o,-or oil