Evening star., 1899-06-15
REID ON NEW DUTIES
The Editor Discusses Our Lately Ae-
quired Possessions.
ADDRESS At MIAMI UNIVERSITY
First Thing to Restore Law and
Order in Islands.
OLD FALLACIES EXPLODED


OXFORD, Ohio, June 15-The culmina-
ton of the diamond anniversary jubilee of
Miami University occurred today, when a
| class of sixteen men was graduated and
Mr.. Whitelaw Reid of the class of 1856 de-
| hvered the commencement address upon
| "Our New Duty This event marked a
| new era in this famous institution. Its
| growth recently has been phenomenal. The
| grounds and buildings and equipment have
| been improved. over 100000 being spent
| within three years. The sons of Miami
| congregated to do honor to the new Miami
of today, and never in its history had there
been such a large percentage of it's grad
uates present as upon this occasion.
Mr.. Reid's Address.
| Mr. Reid spoke of the good work accom-
| plished by small colleges, centers of right
| thinking and right living. He then launcht
| ed into his theme, New Duties and New
| World. He dwet upon public matters
! which it was the duty of educated men to
| consider and of matters which may here
| after divide parties, but which. he said
We must refuse now to recognize party
distinctions
He said:
'Partisanshp stops at the guard line
| In the face of an enemy we are all French-
men,, said an eloquent imperialist once
| in my hearing, in rallyirg his followers to
support a foreign measure of the French
republic. AT this moment our soldiers are
facing barbarous or seni-civiized foe,
which treacherously attacked them in q
distant land, where our flag had been sent,
in friendship with them, for the defense of
our own shores. Was it creditable or SEEM
ly that it was lately left to a Bonaparte
on our own soil to teach some American
leaders that at such a time loyal men at
home do not discourage those soldiers or
weaken the government that directs than?
Responsible for Law and Order.
I've are actually now responsible, not
| merely to the inhabitants and to our own
people, but in International law, to the
commerce. the travel, the civilization of the
world, for the preservation of order and
the protection of life and property in Cuba,
in Porto Rico, in Guam and in the Philip
pine archipelago, including that recent
haunt of piracy, the SuluS. Nothing in
human power can ever restore the United
States to the position 1t occupied the day
before Congress plunged US into the war
with Spain, enable US to escape what
that war entailed. No matter what We
wish, the old continental isolation Is gone
forever. WftherSOever we turn now w9
must do it with the burden of our late acts
to carry; the responsibility of our new po-
sition to assume"
Continuing. he said that when order sue
distant regions called for the soberest
thought and the colleges and the educated
classes generally should make it matter
of conscience to find. first, our national
duty, and then our national interest, which
it is also duty for our statesmen to pro-
tect.
1T would be an i'll day for the colleges if
crude and hOt-tempered incursions into cur
rent public affairs, like a. few unhappily
witnessed of late, should lead even their
friends to fear that they have been so long
accustomed to dogmatiZe to boys that they
have lost the faculty of reasoning with
men.
When first duty is done, when order
Is restored in those commercial centers and
on that commercial highway, somebody
must then be responsible for maintaining
it-either ourselves or some power whom
We persuade to take them off our hands.
Does anybody doubt what the American
People in their present temper would say to
the latter alternative?-the same people who
a fortnight ago were ready to break off their
joint commission with Great Britain and
take the chances rather than give up a
few square miles of worthless land and
harbor of which a year ago they scarcely
knew the name the remote coast of
Alaska. Plainly, 1t is idle now, in a gov
ernment so purely dependent on the popu-
lar will. TO scheme or hope for giving the
Philippine task over to other hands as
soon as order is restored We must then
be prepared with a policy for maintaining
1t ourselves.
Some Old FalIacies.
"Of late years men have unthinkingly as
sumed that new territory was. in the very
| nature of our government, merely and nee
essarily the raw material for future states
| in the Union. Colonies and dependencies
it IS now said. are essentially inconsistent
with our system. But if any ever enter
tanned the wild dream that the instrument
whose preamble says it is ordained for the
United States of America could be stretch
| ed TO the China Aa the first Tagai guns
| fired at friendly soldiers of the Union and
the first mutilation of American dead that
enSued ended the nightmare of states from
Asia admitted to the American Union. For
that relief, at least, We must thank the up
| rising of the Tagals. 1t was a continental |
union of Independent sovereign states our
| fathers planned. Whoever proposes to de-
base II with admiXtures of states made up
| from the islands of the in any archipel-
ago. east or west, is bad friend to the re-
| public. We may guide, protect, elevate
| them and even teach them some day to
stand alone. but If we ever invite them
| into our Senate and House to help rule u.s.
| We the most imbecile of ali the Off
spring OF time"
Mr.. Reid then summarized the constftu-
| tfonal objections to the United States hold
| ing territory that was not to be erected
into states in the Union or to govern peo-
| pie that were not to be made citizens.
This objection rests mainly the as
sumption that the name United States
as used in the Constitution, necessarily in
cludeS all territories the nation owns, and
on the historic fact that a large part of
| its territory, on acquiring sufficient popula-
| ton. has already been admitted as states,
| and has generally considered such admis-
sion to be right"
| He thought that no candid and competent
| man could thoroughly investigate the sub
| ject in the light of the actual provisions
| of the Constitution, the avowed purpose
| of its trainers. their own practice and the
| practice of their successors. without being
| absolutely convinced that the whole fabric
| of opposition on constitutional grounds was
! fiimsy as a cobweb
| JURY FAILS TO AGREE.
| Trial of Charles Washington for Al