Gloucester County Democrat. (Woodbury, N.J.) 1878-1932, 1899-07-20
AND YETI

acts right or wrong.
And yet, says the Clinton Democrat, in
this land of free men, wherein Free Speech
and Free Press were placed in perpetual
command of exalted powers before even
the first of our great Presidents had been
seated for his limited term, even the high
chief of the nation is kept to constant and
strict accountability for his administrative
acts; and the very fact that the country is
bound by its acts, for good or for i'll, makes
the greater reason why the people and
their press should hold the President to
accountability that shall be incessant and
most searching.
1t is not merely the right of every Amer
lean, but the vital right-the very life of
the republic-to criticize and discuss the
course of either President or Congress, and
to protest at any point, or petition for a
change of any course which seems to haYe
been mistakenly begun.
In this view we have such protest and
appeal now from one of the living patri-
archs of our politics and of the Presidents
own ar George S. Boutwell,, of Massa-
chusetts-which is SO strong and earnest,
and from man whom all Americans have
so long listened to with respect, that even
Mr.. Mckinley ought to hear and heed,
though the influence which surround him
ruora q bnndra3 tiraau ,,oora ,,o..za-f,,I 4ba,.
they seem to be.
George S. Boutwell, has been Governor
of Massachusetts, has been member of
Congress and United States Senator, and
was the Secretary of the Treasury Hnder
President Grant and when in his old age,
but with his great intellect unclOuded and
love of country confirmed by the life be
has lived in its service or enjoyment of its
security, he comes out to speak to his
csuntrymen in words like these, his words
ought to be as potential as they are clear
and true. He thus addressed great State
gathering (the Clau-na GaeD in Boston, last
week. in response to their invitation =
There has been no other such depart
ure from American ideas and principles in
all our history, not even by Jefferson Davis,
as is now in progress under the lead of the
President.
Jefferson Davis did not contemplate
the destruction of the American republic;
be only contemplated its division. Presi-
dent Mckinley is transforming this re-
public into an empire, and the permanent
establishment of our authority in the
Philippine Islands is the consumation of
the undertaking.
" We are engaged in var which no one
defends as just and righteous war. Its
supporters are apoIogists, laying the re-
sponsibility for the war sometimes on des-
tiny. SON etimes upon divinity. Is it an
answer, or only guilty pretext, when we
say that for twenty million dollars we have
purchased from Spain the title to the Phil
ippine Islands and Herewith the right,
through war and slaughter, to subjugate
ten million human beings who never in
jured us, and who ask only for the right to
manage their own affairs-s right as sacred
as the right to exist?
For the execution of this unhOly puT-
pose call is now pending for the enlistment
of thirty thousand, soon to be sixty thou
sand and then one hundred thousand of the
youth of this country, whose destiny it
will be to either tall in battle, or 10 perish
by disease, or to return broken in health to
become the recipients of pensions to be
paid IRON the labor of those who may have
10 remain at home.
This sacrifice of men and this waste OF
money and the consequent burden of taxa
too through generations are not more to
be regretted than the humiliation to which
the country is now subjected in the aban-
dOnmeDt of the republic and the acceptance
of Engiand as guide and model in affairs
of government The Administration has
been inveigled into policy which involves
an alliance with England for the defence
of her Eastern empire against the frowning
supremacy of Russia, that has already its
iron hand upon China, and which is yet to
dominate oyer Japan.
We are now to choose whether America
shall remain republic and lead the world
on to higher ideas and to purer practices in
public affairs, or whether we are to accept
the ideas and principles of despOtie govern
ments.
Justice and peace are possibilities in a
republic. Justice and peace are impossible
titles in an empire. Imperialism and re-
publicanism are impossible in the same
government
" The greatest crime which the world
can ever know, the greatest crime which
mankind can commit, is the Inauguration
Of a war and the prosecution of war for
the conquest of territory and the suhjuga-
tiOn of peoples, with the incident and
inevitable sacrifice of human life.
The founders of this Government pre-
feried republicanism and peace to imperial
ism and war. President Mckinley and his
supporters are engaged in an effort to re-
wise those founders work and to reverse
their opinion.
This is the ISSUE Let Us unite, one
and all, whatever may be our differences
on other matters,and demand the abandon
ment of the unjust and thus far uusuceess-
ful war in the Philippine Islands,"