The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1898-08-18
PRESENT-DAY THOUGHTS.
BY G. Grosvenor Dave.

PRESENI-DAY 1HOUualS.
BY G. GrOSVenor Dave.
Look and learn from the armed
camp of Europe, where, by reason of
false ideas of safety, the sons of the
people are offered to the Moloch of
militarism. 1t is a pitiable condition
of disregard for the highest hopes and
purposes sof the young. If we com
pare the condition there with the one
that prevailed here prior to April, 1898,
we have pride for for the most justi-
fable pride. Though blessed with
population that has increased By
leaps and now exceeds seventy mil
lion, though called on to guard 5000
miles of coast line, and to control 3, 559,-
900 square miles of territory, we have
not found it necessary to maintain an
army larger than $4,000 Even that
number more than included the ven
turesome spirits who were two rest
less to work, for it has been well I'M
derstood that there has been great
difficulty in even keeping the army
up to a peace footing. We have
proved that this handful was sufficient
for our needs and it has been cause
for surprise in Europe where, as pre-
vious letters have stated, the condi-
tiOns are almost reversed.
x
We have done we'll to regard an
army as being of minor Importance.
How unerringly the instinct of our
people has led us may again be learned
by looking abroad.-It would not be
fair to intimate that these vast Euro
pean armies are maintained in order
to control the home population. That
is far from true. Yet as the nation is
made to feel that its very existence
depends upon that of the army-much
as a drowning man will clutch at any
object even though it sink him-the
army by transference. of thought
comes to regard itself in a wrong light.
From a feeling of dissatisfaction
there is the advance to a feeling of
doubt regarding other means of ma
tional maintenance. Then grows up
the tendency to repress the popular
will and so, despotism. This is true of
autocratic Russia, of kaisercratic
~ o,,,o,,,, oY,J of huraa noro + ia Ero poa
Our peaceful, energetic, useful nation
has done well to refuse hitherto the
temptation Of large army. So far,
except during times of public danger,
the army has been kept to police pro
portions and the common people have
held their rightful positions as kings
of our fate. AS a nation of farmers,
traders and mechanics we have been
too busy to show our spirit of combat
except at the time that it was needed.
But now we are at the parting of
the ways, with no sign-pOst to guide
US save good-sense. In less than six
months we have been thrust out from
theoretical isolation into actual in
Movement in the clashing interests of
world-nations. Hawaii is ours already
by peaceful cessiOn. The CarOlines
and Ladrones are ours by seizure.
The Philippines and Porto Rico are
undoubtedly to pass under our con
troll; and possibly the Canaries. Glor-
ious and vain-glorious Spain is to be
stripped of the last of her radiant CO.
lonial vestment and, to save them all
from the destructive anarchy of ra-
cial and religious jealousies the hand
that freed must be the hand that
manages after the freeing is effected.
Suddenly called into military and
naval activity by reason of SPANS
wrong-doing, our army has been in
creased twenty-fold and our navy has
grown to include 285 vessels of all de-
scriptiOns. 1t is not strange therefore
| that the nervous and fearful, who sees
| danger in shadows and mountains il
mole-hills, and who confuse conquest
and administration, should demand a
| great increase of permanent charac-
ter in both army and navy.
To show how mistaken this clamoi
will prove to be we need only to look
at our own internal safety and quie
tude, and to see how it has been
brought. Free speech, free press, free
pulpit, and majority rule have led us
safely along to the present. The
widest theorists have been able tC
expand their energies in talk insteat
of being depressed and forced to sup
posed martyrdom. And each and al
of them has had the Pickering light
of a majority dancing along aheaC
and keeping them out of mischief
| Also those who have had no theories
have been just content to live anC
move under happy conditions, though
repression and injustice might under
| other circumstances have transform
| ed their sweet content into the vitrio
of revolution. Human nature is very
| -, hos Tho hlnnf