The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1899-09-02
wEsSTERN SOLDIERS.

The list of returned and returning
volunteers brings out in very clear light
the important part which the Western
states play in the affairs of this nation.
Every regiment that has seen service in
the Philippines, excepting alone the
has come from a dstinctively Western
state, and from a state, moreover, west
of the Mississippi river. Oregon, Cali
fcrnia, Washington, North and South
Dakota. Montana, Minnesota, Iowa, Ne
braska, Kansas and Utah Here is a
roll of states, in the Eastern parlance, all
have borne themselves in posts of death
and danger as becomes citizens of the
call of the nation to meet the trained
regulars of Spain without thought Of
cause or consequence.
As these men are being mustered out
it may be we'll for the Eastern prophet
and philosopher, who is unaware that
the West produces anything save
agrarian politics and other cyclonic dis
turbances of great variety. to pause for
a moment and reflect, if reflection is
within the possibilities of his case. If,
then, he will refectively cast his eyes
toward a map of his country and OBJ
serve the space which these several states
occupy thereon, it may dawn upon him
that the entire world is not encompassed
by his own immediate bailiwick; and
that, while Kansas raises, among other
things, Pefferian statesmen, and while,
in the propagation of the species, ali is
not as it might be in Utah, yet when
there is soldering to be done it is not
usually done by men of these common
wealths on the plan established by the
gallant Seventh" of New York, whose
military operations were never designed
to extend beyond Broadway or Fifth ave-
nue., and whose business engagements
are so engrossing as to keep very many
miles between them and the tropics.
There are probably not hundred men
among these several regiments that were
ever east of the Ohio river, in their own
land. Their views of the government and
policy of the United States they have
not received through the self-complacent
source of the Eastern press; but, when
there is a duty which their patriotism
entails on them to do, they do not stop
to. inquire, but go forth and do it. So.
among these same men there is in all
probability but the merest fraction that
would give their concurrence ID the
course now being pursued by their gov
eminent in the Philippines. Yet, were
the same exigency presented to them
and their fellow citizens of the same
states, they would respond as blithely as
they did year or so ago.
The republic has reason to be proud of
such men. They are indeed the product
of true civil liberty They have shown
that they can not only fight for their own
liberties, but for the freedom of other
races less happily situate than their own.
They will lay down their rifles and go
back to their respective callings as quiet
ly and as cheerfully as did the men of
the great army that marched down Penn,
sylvania avenue on the eventful day in
65 when it was proclaimed that the
American union of states should and
would survive. The West may not bear
whole country as does the East, but the
part that it represents in the wealth,
prosperity, happiness and patriotism of
America is one that it is quite content