The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1895-05-14

In view Of the new Importance
which the Monroe Doctrine and
the attitude of the United States
I5toward foreign powers have been
given by recent events, the follow
ing article read by Sanford B. Dole
before the Social Science Club
June Is, 1887, has a renewed in
terest:
The promulgation of the Monroe
Doctrine effectively prevented the ex-
tension of the principle of interna-
tional interference for the sake of
maintaining political equilibrium to
America. Since that time the COM
bination of European States instituted
by the treaty of Vienna in 1915 has
been somewhat modified. Germany,
through its successive wars with Den
mark, Austria and France, and it's
resulting consolidation, has outstrip-
ped all of it's rivals, and by its pre-
ponderating military strength, threat
ems the peace of Europe, and compels
war preparations on the part of its
neighbors, which are ruinously expen-
s1ve, but which may be said to be
necessary under the circumstances,
and which have had the effect Of put
ting off or preventing still more
ruinously expensive war.
The development of commercial and
manufacturing interests among the
Continental States of Europe, and the
resulting tendency to establish colo
nies and trading stations all over the
world, whereby their vulnerability
has been increased, has definitely les
sened the old time readiness with
which these nations have been accus-
toned to attack each other.
In 1876, President Woolsey, of Yale
College, wrote, In referring to the
right of Intervention to prevent dis
turbance of the balance of power,
Commercial growth, colonial growth
in remote parts, furnish little ground
for apprehension" Since that time
events bearing upon matters of COM
CURED with great rapidity, and have
materially modified the aspect of the
question of the application of the
balance of power principle. England
had just annexed Fiji at the time
WOolsey stated the abOve-quoted con-
clusiOn, but had made no material
progress in occupying the country or
administering the government, and in
1884 she annexed the southern part of
NEW OuISiu0 OI the
possessions, a territory of about SO, 900
square miles in extent, and one-haIf
of the Solomon Islands, adjacent to
the eastern point of New Guinea, and
in 1856 she annexed the Kermadec
Islands, northeast of New Zealand.
The extension of her sway over Egypt,
and later over Burmah, are fresh in
the minds of all. In 1880 France an
nexed Tahiti and three adjacent ISL
ands, and three islands of the Austral
group, over which she had held a
protectorate since 1912, and hoisted
the French flag over the till then in
dependent Island of Raiatea, and has
held it ever since; and in 1885 or 1886
she seized the New Hebrides Islands,
and has continued her possession of
them to the present time, in the face
of much opposition from England and
her colonies, and her encroachments
in Tonquin and Madagascar have been
affairs of a late period.
In the year 1884, following The in
itiative of its merchants, who were
conducting the larger part of the trade
of the South Sea islands, Germany
made a new departure in her national
policy, and annexed the northern part
of New Guinea, outside of the Dutch
possessions, a region of $4,000 square
miles in extent, and this in the face of
q quasi claim of the British Govern
ment to. the whole of New Guinea
outside of the Dutch portion, and it's
proposition to Germany to open nego.
tiations relative to the desire of the
latter to obtain a foothold on that
island. This action of the German
Government caused Irritation in the
English Foreign Office, and great ex-
citement in the Australian Colonies.
By subsequent agreement between
England and Germany, the Solomon
Islands, lying east of New Guinea,
were divided between those powers,
England taking the southern part
and Germany the northern, and as
part of this arrangement both Eng
land and Germany conceded
to Spain the control OF the Car
Oline and Pelew Islands, and
agreed upon certain limitations and
concessions whereby Germany acquir-
ed the Marshall Islands and the archi-
pelagO north of New Guinea, includ-
ing New Ireland, New Britain and
the Admiralty Islands, and England
was relieved of Germauic political
influence over that large part of the
south. western Pacific which includes
the Fijian, TOngan, Samoan, New
Hebrides and Gilbert Island groups.
The United States have acquired