Alexandria gazette. [volume] (Alexandria, D.C.) 1834-1974, 1899-02-21

is 81 second-cAss matter
President McKinley's Boston Speech.
The Philippine observation-disclosures
patton by shot and Shell---"Thoir
Good is Our .Sim.!"
The address OF President McKin-
ley at the dinner of the Home Market
Club in Boston Thursday evening is
the most important deliverance FROM
that august source for many months.
Whatever opinion may be entertained
of the sincerity of our chief magis-
trate, few will dispute his ability and
skill es speaker, and this latest utter
auce is dangerously plauslble-just
such as is most likely to delude the un-
thinking and further contribute largely
to that betrayal of the interests ana
liberties OF the country for which he
has already been conspicuous.
The President says, in brief, that he
appropriated the Philippines because,
al the clcse of the war, no other course
was possible, end thai he did it solely
on the ground Of moral obligation TO
! them: that we are their 'emancipators,
aot their masters, and that no i'm.
perial designs lurk III the American
mind." La short, we are numbering
sbese poor people, burning their towns
aud devastating their country and in this
way making them feel and know that
we are their friends not their enemies;
that their good is our aim, that their
welfare is our welfare" etc, etc. Il is
difficult TO read with patience sentences
10 uosurd, or to qualify the indignant
contempt which such Donsense ewake ems
IL every unprt JUDGED mind; bat let us
examine more closely the presidential
reasoning
He declares that "no true American
consents" /. o. would have consented,
20 returning the Philippines to Spain.
The writer may not be "rue Ameri-
can" though he never lived anywhere
but il Virginia, but he sees no reason
why, due protection and indemnity
having been guaranteed the few hun
dreds or thousands OF the people who
sided with us against Spain, these
island should not have been turned
oack TO that power Most of our pso-
pie, certainly, agree that we DO not
want them; that responsibility for them
is bindrance and burden; in word.
that we are much better of without
them. What possible concession then
would have been involved in letting
Spain keep them? There would have
been no difficulty in protecting and
providing for the support OF every man,
woman snd child in the islands who
had, directly or indirectly, sided with
us, and it would have bsen a great pc
cuniary saving, as compared with the
coutse 1hat has been adopted, 10 do this.
The mere fact that Admiral Dewey
happened to overhaul and destroy a
| Spanish fleet at Manila Involve d Us in
no sort of obligation toward the people
of vast archipelago, not one in fifty
of whom were in the 6 ightest deg c =
involved by our presence on their boz
der, and the majority OF whom proba-
| bly did not know of our existence.
When the war with Spain began
there was fighting in the Philippines 5.
Had we, when the war ended, left the
| Islands, with the qualification above
indicated) fighting might have con.
tiuued, only it would not have been we
who we're doing it. In any event,
whether under the auspices of Spain or
the United States, or left to themselves,
an indefinite period of disorder would
probably ensue there. The great ques-
| lion is whether the accidental locality
of Dewey's victory, properly deyolved
upon the people of this country the
tremendous responsibility, risk and ex
pense of the control and pscifcation Of
these eight million savages. In the
Judgment of most of our sober minded,
plain people, the answer to this ques-
ton is an emphatic negative, and,
if the mutterings already heard
do not deceive the day is not
distant when the crime of Presi-
dent Mckinley and the republican
party will be recognized by this people
| and they be held to strict account.
Is anything more intolerable than
| this cant about the obligations we owe
to distant Asiatics of whom year ago
hardly anybody had ever heard, end to
whom our sole responsibility springs
| from the aCcldenE or DaVai VlctOTS
near their capital? And, even allowing
for the sake of argument that some re-
spousibility TO them does exist, should
none be felt for ourselves? Should our
system of government be revolution
izsd, our army quadrupled, our navy
vastly augmented, our expenditures
annually increased by hundreds Of mil
lions, aud the precious lives OF our sol.
diers risked for On indefinite period in
dangerous zone, al for the purpose Of
doing what is no business of ours and
can possibly work Us nothing but harm?
COMMON SENSE.
FAIRFAX COUNTY, Va, Feb. 20.
THE SNOW BIRDS ARE HERE AGAIN
Snow birds have made their appear