The Denison review. [volume] (Denison, Iowa) 1867-current, 1899-02-07
the President, subject to the usages
and practices of war alone.

and practices of war alone.
There has been great deal said, Mr..
President, about the Declaration of
Independence and its principles, and
about conscience and morality. l am
sure, Mr. President, that there is no
Senator upon this floor, no matter what
bis views on this question may he, who
would cut off his hand sooner than be
false to he principles of the Declara-
ton of Independence and to the great
traditions and ideals of American his
tory; butt do not believe, Mr.. Presi-
dent, that devotion to the Declaration
of Independence is confined to the
minority in this Chamber any more
than believe that they have mon
OpOly of conscience or of morals. There
is no magic in the word ''minority.v
A minority is not necessarily wiser and
better than the rest of mankind be-
cause 1T is a minority, any more than a
minority is Sy mere virtue Of its name-
believe in the rule OF the majority,
becau Sc believe that in the long run
tle3 iJUllVy 10 LA lllOl lIhCIV W UO
right than the minority. and have no
faith in Matthew Arnnid's self-com-
placent doctrine of 1.-THE remnant
Great policies and great questions must
be decided by higher standards and on
grounds more relative than this. [
have given large part of my life to
the study of the time when this coun-
try freed itself from England, and
when this Government was established,
and of the men who did the great work.
No one has greater reverence for
those men and their deeds than |. No
body loves better than the ideals Sc +
forth in the Declaration CT Indepen-
dence; but my ideals do not stop there.
Nor do they stop even with that great
er period when the life of the nation
was at stake. l have ideals and be-
liefs which pertain to the living pres
ent, and faith in the future of my
country. l believe in the American
people as they are today, and in the
civilization they have created. 1 be-
lieve not merely in what they have
done but in what they are yet to do.
To the American people and their
Government am ready to intrust my
life, my liberty, my honor; and what is
far dearer to me than anything person
al to myself, the lives and the liberty
of my children and my children's
children. If I am ready thus to trust
my children to the Government which
the American people create and sustain
am to shrink from intrusting to that
same people the fate and fortune of
the inhabitants of the Philippine Is
lands? 1 have beheld with Amusement
the specters of wrongdoing which have
been conjured up here and charged as
possible to the American people. I
have been astonished to hear outside
this Chamber men who for three years
J, watched unmoved the torture of Cuba.
pleading with feryid eloquence for the
Fllipinos. just rescued by us from
Spain, against the possible cruelty
which Americans might infiict upon
them. Denunciations which might
have been suitable to Weyler have been
applied to imaginary deeds of cruelty
to be performed at some future time.
date not specified, by humane and
able American President and by Amer
, can soldiers and sailers who have with
III six months shown themselves in the
heat of battle as merciful and tender
as they were brave and daring. Mr..
President, all this is so uncomfortable
tome that / cannot comprehend it. Z
can look at this question in only one
way. A great responsibility has come
to us. If we are unfit for it and un-
equal to it, then we should shirk it and
fly from it. But / believe that we are
both fit and capable, and that therefore
we should meet it and take it up.
| Iwant to get this country out of the
war and back to peace. want to take
} the disposition and control of the Phili-
ppines out of the hands of the war
power and place them where they be.
long, in the hands of Congress and of.
the President. want to enter upon
policy which shall enable us to give
peace and self-government to the
natives of those islands. The rejection
of the treaty makes all these things inn
possible and the delay in the ratification
\ retards them. If did not have faith
in the American people and their Gov
eminent. would do my best to pre-
vent the ratification of the treaty, and
j, l see no other ground of opposition.
j, But as have profound faith in both,
1 want to take those islands from Spain
in the only way which it can lie done,
by the ratification of the treaty, and
then leave it to the President-wise,
humane. patriotic-to the American,
i, Congress, and to the American people
? who hive never failed in any great duty
or feared to face anv great responsible
u ity to deal with them in that spirit9Of