Fort Wrangel news., 1898-07-20
THE CHANGING POLICY OF STATES

and our several constitutions nnS prov. ed under the changing yicissitndes to which it has been subjected for hundred years Il pronounced success. Experience has exposed thousand faults, both in the laws and the meth ods of executing them. If all men were honest the laws would be better framed and their administration would be up on lines less partial. There would be less need of them. As We gradually merge into better conditions we will do with less politics. and fewer laws. In setting forth the argument. If We may so call it, which justified their theories of government expressed in our nation al constitution our fathers built as they affirm upon self-e7ident truths. Aside from the methods arrived al by them. incidental questions of policy presented themselves. From the stand
 point of q century and quarter ago. in view of the comparative smallness of onr national beginning, it was we'll To affirm that We would strictly live within the territorial limitations of our own continent, seeking no fields be- yond and resenting outside infringe
 ment. The Monroe doctrine was ad- mirable. and it would have continued
  stances. which even great nations call not always control We have been com. pelled to confront an entirely new sitn
 ation which must be dealt with upon the reason of the particular case. The soundness of the Monroe doctrine is uncontroyertible today in so far as it touches the integrity of our immediate territory but in respect to our remain
 l, hon Il tled4ling we were Tapping experiment tai wings. We must admit its impossi- bility. \ loose suit for a child will not make q comfortable fit for developed man. lt k unnecessary to refer to fig
 ures to express the number of our pop nlaton, the extent of our domestic and foreign commerce. the wealth of our manufactured and agricultural pro duets. to present to view the greatness of our country in it's territorial extent. its wealth of resource. and what k of far more importance. it's power as q moral force Viewing the world as q whole. in general. and OUT own country as an integral. ill particular. it's relative value strikes Us at once. Since We be gan housekeeping the family estates have grown from the Atlantic to the Pacific Discarding waste lands, we find nearly all the cultivable lands oc- cupied and millions of people without any at all. That horrible bete noir of the late Henry George and his econom
 ic predecessors which they term the pressure of population upon the land is fast matcrialiZing. and while if has not as yet developed into d striking hardship. it is only d question of time under our existing rules of property rights when it will. It is perfectly clear therefore to any dispassioned mind that this country of ours must have more air or it will congest. If we are to grow in the future ill the increas
 ing ratio of the past then we need the entire hemisphere, and we opine that in the year 2u)e this republic, if it is to be perpetuated until then. will express that portion of the earth and all the islands contiguous thereto. Take the great Canada region, peopled by the same race The idea that they should hold even in matters of treaty subjec
 tive relations to q government separat
 ed by an ocean is unreasonable. The unnaturalness of arbitrary boundaries, of imposts upon every conceivable thing which crosses them is clear if we look with dispassioned eyes. Great Britain would immeasurably gain if every colony retired from her suzerain
 ty. The common interest of Canada, of the United States and of Great Brit ain would be subseryed by Canadian annexation. lt is therefore certain of accomplishment, but it will be done upon careful reconciliation and by common consent. Not so with the Spanish American people to the south of Us. In these regions we must make way with the sword. Taking Cuba into the consideration, we discover she is one of group known as the West ln
 dia islands, scattered about the Gulf of Mexico and the Carribean Sea. Any one of them commands the approach to the shore lines of North and South America on the Atlantic and crossing the narrow lsthmus strip at Panama, the entire continental coast lines of the Pacific. If we grow as q nation therefore we want neither artificial boundaries nor alien possession of any of the island groups contiguous to our coasts. When we have acquired the whole of the hemisphere, then the no territorial accession feature of the Mon roe doctrine may very properly be joined with the other. Every island occupied off our coasts by foreign power where ships of war can rendez yous to strike our Seaboard cities is a standing threat to our tranquility and a continuing source of anxiety. No body dreams that American statesmen will annex the Phillipines or assume the responsibility of their permanent control. They would make an admira
 ble m prr handlSp to trade with some rp