Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1898-06-15
Generosity to SDain.

Hannis Taylor, late United States
minister to Madrid, and various
mugwump or pro-Spanish publica-
tions in the United States are urging
that our government shall "deal gen
erouslY" with Spain after we shall
have forced her to sue for peace.
Their apparent meaning is that hav-
ing driven her out of Cuba we shall
exact no indemnity for our expendi-
lures in the war she forced upon US;
that we shall leave Puerto Rico and
the Philippines under her rule, and
content ourselves with the glory we
shall have won and the refreshing
contemplation Of the big addition
made to our national debt. They
also remind us of the unmanliness of
dealing hardly with ga woman and
child" as they tenderly refer to the
queen regent and boy-monarch Of
Spain.
But Americans do not need admoni-
tions to generosity toward friends or
foes. The only question with them
is where can it be best bestowed?.
AS that question is asked they turn
thier eyes towards Cuba, where they
behold the graves, or the whitening
bones, of several hundred thousand
women and children who were sub
stantially murdered by the govern
ment of which the queen regent and
her "child" are the fgureheads. They
behold also several hundred thou
sand more women and children, in
the same island, whose homes have
been wrecked and who are yet lead
ing lives bordering on starvation as
the result of an administration car
ried on under the authority of the
queen regent. These throngs of sui
ferers appeal to the generosity of the
United States for means to begin
civilized life again.
Looking toward thePhilippines, we
behold one of the fairest domains on
the globe, including two islands larger
than Ireland, and countless others
each one of which under a civilized gov
eminent might have been made an
earthly paradise--held by Spanish
greed and ferocity and incapacity in
a condition hardly a whit advance
over what it was when an evil fate
first sent the 1Spaniards to their
shores some three hundred years ago.
These people twice as many as in
habit Ireland-have had glimpses Of
better things, and have unavailingly
risen, time and again, against their
Spanish oppressOrs, only to fall
again under yet worse misrule. With
the coming of Dewey's fleet a new
dawn has broken over those islands,
and our government is invited by
Providence to undertake the plotting
of their people toward the full light
ofcivilization. Will it be generous"
for us to remand them to the custody
of Spain? Have the "woman and
child on a Bourbon throne greater
claims on American generosity than
all those millions on the Philippines?
Then as to Puerto Rico. It's people
have not the same eagerness for the
coming of Los Americanos" as have
the Cubans or the paople'of theislands
where Dewey has planted our flag
But the island has been the scene of
frequent revolutionary movements,
and it needs but short experience
of American rule to make it's people
resolve that they will "take no
other" Have they, too, no just
claim to an opportunity for tasting
the best things in government, and
for putting their feet on the ladder Of
progress? Does not every generous
feeling revolt at the idea of leaving
them, or any people on this side of
the world, under the heel of Spain?
We may be generous to Spain in al
lowing her to retain few ships, per-
haps, for patrolling her European
coasts. We may refuse to demand
an indemnity in cash. We may Of
fer to support some schoolmasters in
her benighted territory for term of
years. But our generosity in her be-
half will not be exercised at the ex-
pense Of any people over whose heads
the American flag shall wave during
the present war.-St. Paul Pioneer
Press.
THE Milwaukee wheat market yes
terday was steadier and the tendency
upward, closing at 94c for No. 1 and