The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1898-08-31

sOluJlem. BarDarlem was re-entnfODeQ |
in France. The Inquisition was restor-
ed in Spain. 1t was understood that |
the Holy Alliance intended to extend |
its operations to America and aid Spain
in its warfare against revolted colonies
on this side of the Atlantic. Great
Britain began 10 dread the reaction
which it had helped to promote and
make victorious-Great Britain, which
had not only vanquished Napoleon, but
had helped to put Louis XVIII, on the
throne of France and 10 re-establish
the authority of Jesuitism in Spain.
Then it was that Mr.. Canning, Secre-
tary for Foreign Affairs in England,
suggested to the United States the pro-
priety of making protest against any
intervention by Europe in the affairs
of America. The suggestion was a.
dopted, and the famous Monroe doc
trine was embodied in a declaration by
President Monroe in his annual mes
sage December, 1929 He said that
eve should consider any attempt on
their part 1.-THE allied powers to extend
their system TO any portion of this hem
isfere as dangerous to our peace and
safety"; and that 1--WE could not view
any interposition for the purpose of OPP
pressing or controlling in any manner
their destiny. e. e., that of American
Republics), in any other light than as
manifestation OF an unfriendly dispo-
sition toward the United States"
"This declaration" said DR.. Theodore
d. Woolsey, together with this known
sentiment of the British Cabinet and
Nation, put a end to any designs which
may have been entertained looking
toward armed intervention in American
affairs. The spirit which inspired the
declaration was a prophetic apprecia-
ton of our interests and humane
sympathy with other weaker and OPP
pressed peoples; that which gave it
strength was the knowledge that it rep
resented the sentiments of both Great
Britain and the United States, though
no such formal alliance for liberty was
formed between them as had been
formed for despotism by Austria,
Prussia, France, and Spain"
The new imperalism-th imperialism
of liberty--so far from being inconsis-
tent with the Monroe doctrine, is
simply an extension of it to new and
larger sphere. 1t is the revival in our
times of the same spirit, and the en-
ployment of the same political force.
1t is the recognition on our part that it
is our interest, no less than that of
Great Britain, that nations just emerg-
ing from barbarian shall have freedom
of acknowledgements; it is the declara-
ton on our part that any attempt to i'm
pede that free acknowledgment and
make the nascent State tributary to
some other communicates Russia,
Germany or France-will be regarded
BY us as an unfriendly act; and it is the
establishment not of formal alliance
but of mutual good understanding be-
tween Great Britain and ourselves, so
that as a result we stand together
against absolutism everywhere, and for
liberty, Justice and fair opportunity
for nations just entering into the life
of the world.
That our natural interests demanded
for China the privileges of civilization,
and therefore demanded for her justice,
freedom and education, we showed last
week. No nation can live to itself, any
more than any individual can live to
himself. Any policy, whether impos-
ed by force from without or spontane-
ously evolved from within, which iso-
lates nation from the other nations of
| therefore to it's life. The interests of
America demanded for the people of
, China an opportunity for free develop
ment. Our treaties with China give US
right to insist that all commercial
! privileges accorded TO the most favored
, nation shall be accorded to US. Abso-
lutism in China, shutting off from
.. Chinese markets American goods, and
making China tributary to Russia or 10
Germany, does not threaten our life as
absolutism triumphant in South Ameri-
ca, Central America, or Mexico might
have threatened it in 1928. But just
liz the measure in which it succeeds, it
endangers our growth and is an in
justice to us as well as to China. Our
duty comedies with our interest. HUI
mainly is as much outraged by oppres-
sion on one side of the globe as on the
other. Our duty to interfere for the
protection of struggling and oppressed
peoples in America was imposed not
merely by the accident of their geo.
graphical position, but by the fact that
, this accident gave us power to interfere
effectually. And if larger power and
wider world-interest brings us now
r into as close relations with the east as,
, in 1928, we were with struggling peo-
plies in our southern hemisphere; if our
imperial growth has given us power
to exercise political influence which
, we did not then possess, these changes
. make the duty of sympathy with the
r struggling peoples of the east as sacred
now as was the duty of sympathy with
the struggling peoples of the south
t three-quarters. of century ago.
r Nor is the power wanting. The
, same Great Britain which suggested the
Monroe doctrine to the United States
in 1928 is ready to make similar
t suggestion to the United States in 1898,
3 or to receive it from us; has indeed al.
ready let the world know that she is
more than willing to stand with US for
: justice, liberty and education whenever
and by whomsoever they are assailed.
This did not mean in 1923 formal
alliance between Great Britain and the
' United States, and it does not mean
such an alliance now. 1t did not