The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1899-08-16

OUR ISLAND PROBLEMS
KEEP THEM ALL.
The current of a nations history is
marked by curious and uncertain rates
of progress. At times it rolls along
smoothly and without interruption
for a generation. Again, without ap-
parent warning, the stream OF history
breaks into tempestuous flood. Old
wavs are obliterated. old landmarks
are ruthlessly torn from their ancient
moorings and swept away never to be
seen again of men. When the tide
recedes, the citizen gropes IN vain for
the cherished objects which he ana
his ancestors had venerated in the
past. =, ...
In such manner has the swift pro-
gress of history during the past twelve
months swept away absolutely and
beyond recovery many time.honored
ideals of political life and action once
held by the people of the United
States. Overwhelmed and beWildered
by the splendid progress of the span
ish war. the citizen suddenly finds
himself face to face with new aspects
of political life and action that this
contest has pressed Immediately to
the front.
In the solution of new and welghty
questions of the hour, the citizen can
no longer trust to the traditions of the
past. He must take new bearings IN
view of the new political landscape IN
which be finds himself.
In making the decision as to our
Colonial Policy he must consider not
the traditions of the past, but the his
tory of the future.
In what condition does the Nation
and the individual find itself to decide
upon these mementous questions?
Our Physical Supremacy.
The American citizen finds himself
today q member of nation which has
developed naturally, symmetrlcally
and enormously as race inheritance
and a superb physical environment
has dictated from the first. In mere
material progress the advance of the
Nation has far exceeded the widest
dreams that might have been based
upon the most extravagant standards
of the past. In a single century of
national existence the Nation has
covered practically the same ground
that other peoples have painfully ira
yersed in the progress of thousand
years.
Without undue pride, the American
people should today clearly realize
that the United States is far and away
the most powerful nation the history
of the world has seen.
In population, in intelligence, in
the accumulated wealth, which makes
for success in peace or war, this nation
far outranks in effective power any
single nation of the ancient or modern
world. The mere existence of 70,OO0,-
600 intelligent people, living harmon
iously under one accepted govern
ment; seated securely Is the single
largest area of fertile land upon the
globe; of blood either inherited or
assimilated, embodying the best
virtues of race that has made history
for a thousand years safe from all
attack; abundantly prolific; pacific
by disposition, yet of abounding self
other characteristics of
this people present spectacle of ma
tional unity and power that should
make every American citizen proud of
his race and land.
It should fill him with just sense
of the responsibility resting upon him
as a member of the race that has here
tofore, and must hereafter, shape the
history of the world. :.
Nor alone in intellectual and material
does this nation outrank any
of past or present times:
Its moral strength is Of stamp and
vigor that renders doubly effective the
resources of land and intellect.
This combination of physical resour-
ces, vast population and moral vigor,
united in new race whose veins are
filled with clean, fresh blood-unlike
the Latin peoples now tottering to the
phenomenon which
the worn peoples and tyrannical
governments Of the European continent
will do we'll to consider in their law
less and arbitrary division of the East
ern world.
With a full knowledge of our pre-
with q desire to mould
our policy according to what has been
considered right and moral among the
the best Civilizations of the past
above all, with firm faith in the Ger
Civilization as
the best conception of
Government and Morals that history
presents-with these things in view
should the American citizen approach
the duty of the hour.
Our Historic Views OF American
Destiny.
A people that has hitherto attended
strictly to its own affairs, and stud.
iously remained within the limits of
it's own continents, the United States
is today called upon to arrange the
destinies of three different peoples in
three different quarters of the globe.
Happy, for an entire century, in the
universal belief that the nation would
never extend its boundaries beyond it's
own continent, the United States finds
itself to-day the embarrassed owner of
colonies of whose acquisition its people
had never dreamed.
Foreign nations. judging our Civili-
zation by its own, can never be con.
vinced that we had not cleverly plan
ned the acquisition of these islands
beyond the sea. Happily, our own