Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1899-08-11
Reasonable Sentiments of the Past.


The best answer to ex-Minister Bar
retts argument for the Philippine job
on the ground of commercial advan-
tage, was made more than 100 years ago
by Benjamin Franklin, who was spposed
In his day to be quite sensible fellow.
He observed:
To me IL seems that neither the obtaining
or retaining of any trade, however valuable
soever, is an object for which men may justly
spill each others blood; that the true and
sure means of extending commerce is the
goodness and cheapness of commodities; and
that the profits of no trade can be. equal TO
by fleets andsarmies.
And Thomas Jefferson spoke in the
same vein of what jingoes now call
''sickly sentimentality," but which was
continuously taken for 100 years to be
American gospel, when he said:
Justice is as strictly due between neighbor
highwayman is as much Of a robber when he
plumbers in gang as when single, and q
nation that makes an unjust war is only a
great gang. know of but one code of
morality for men, whether acting singly or
collectively.
Daniel Webster has not generally been
rated as a sentimentallst among states
men, but he had clearly In view the
danger of lingo projects when he said;
tits certainly true that the just policy of
THIS country Is, IN the nrSt place, peuce1ul
policy No nation ever had less TO expect
from forcible ACKNOWLEDGEMENT. The mighty
agents that are working out our greatness
are time, industry a., and the arts Our aug
by Internal development, not by external
accession. No schemes can be suggested to
US so magnificent as the prospects which a. a
unaided by projects, uninfluenced by ambi
tion, fairly spreads before us.
George Washington was one of the
men whose utterances of the censorship
would now want to Jump upon, for he
also traversed the precise argument that
is now being made for Imperialism when
he said:
Every nation has a right to establish that
| form OF government under which it conceives
it may live most happily.
And Jefferson clinched 1t with this
aphorism:
Sometimes it is said that man cannot be
trusted with the government of himself Can
he, then, be trusted with the government OF
others?
And Abraham Lincoln never in his
long life hesitated to proclaim what Is
outright treason" now according to
the lingo philosophy. One of the times
was when he remarked;
These arguments that are made, that the
inferior races are TO be treated with as much
allowance as they are capable OF enjoying
ments? They are the arguments that kings
have made TOR enslaving the people in all
ages of the world. You will find that all the
arguments for kingcraft were of this class
they always bestrode the necks of the people
not because they wanted to do 1t, but because
the people we're better Off for being ridden.
AS Bryan asks in quoting the Dec
laratiOn of Independence, is all this
true? Oris it false? And the answer
involves the answer to the question
whether McKinley's policy In attempt
lug the "forcible annexation of the
Philippines, is ''crimnal aggression
or not?
The war that began on the PROPOSE
tion that Spain had no right to rule
Cuba ends in a war to enforce the
rights which are bought of Spain II
the Philippines.
And the great men of our past in the
view they took of such proceeding;
were "old fogies.'