The Owosso times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1897-1926, 1899-12-08
Let the Issue Come!

popular discussion I'LL next year elec
ton. The recent campaign in several
states, notably Ohio, the latest speeches
of Mr.. Bryan, the democratic platforms
of this year, and especially the declara-
tions of small group of distinguished
Independents have brought the subject
seriously to the very front. Whatever
may transpire in the Philippine islands,
or Whatever congress may do, all the
different elements of the opposition to
the administration have so emphasized
the subject that the discussion is likely
to be kept up for a twelvemonth,
AS an independent journal Harper's
Weekly welcomes such discussion, for
it will make far and away the most in
teresting and instructive presidential
campaign that this generation has seen.
For the first time in recent years we
shall have subject really worthy of a
presidential campaigns; and nothing else
can so stir the people to proper
realization of our place in the world
and of the proper meaning of American
, nationality; and no other subject that
can fall within the range of popular
discussion so appeals to the political
Imagination.
In its present stage the discussion
turns on the withdrawal of our troops
from the Philippines, giving up our
authority there, and the granting of in
dependence to the Filipinos at once
none of which things will or can be
done; but if the controversy be carried
to its logical conclusion we shall be
asked by the anti-imperialists to grant
independence also to Puerto Rico ard
to withdraw our control at once from
Cuba. Every man who knows the
people of these islands and can take
historical view of them knows that we
shall have to govern them all for an in
definite time, and that we shall not re.
linquish control of them-that we can
not in honor relinquish control of them
till they are capable of real self
government and ready for it; and those
who know best these Spain-ridden
children of the tropics know that the
time for autonomy for them lies far in
the future. Nothing that can now be
said or done can materially change the
final result-the result TO which the
nation is in honor pledged, and which
the character and mettle of the Ameri-
can people may be trusted under any
administration to work out.
The anti-imperialists are right in say
ing that more is involved in the discus
sion than cur immediate conduct with
regard to these islands. In fact, neither
the Philippine archipelago, nor even
Cuba and Puerto Rico, are necessary
for our salvation. They are indeed
but incidental to the larger subject that
they bring forward-our proper place
among nations in the impending inter-
national readjustments.
During the lifetime of all men now
living our attention has been fixed not
on American nationality in its largest
sense, but on American nationality only
as distinguished from division at home
Slavery, secession, reconstruction, the
proper adjustments of tariffs and the
problem of the currency-these home
duties have engaged us all our lives
long. Important as they were, inn
portant as the currency problem yet is,
they have kept us from proper appre-
citation of what has been going on in the
larger world, and our politics had be-
come provincial and dull Our con-
sciousness of nationality, of a great
mission in the development of civiliza-
ton, had become narrowed to the
thought only of keeping our own ter
ritory intact. To unity it forever, to
solidify our national sentiment, to come
to realization of ourselves, it was
necessary to look outward; and the out
side responsibilities that have now come
to us almost by accident have happily
brought an occasion for us to look out
side ourselves.
The discussion, then, will take in our
relations to other nations it will bring
home to us the necessity of wide.
reaching and modern foreign policy; it
will give us an appreciation of the great
forces that are changing the world
And all this comes just when commerce
is entering its romantic era, and when
adventures of trade are more thrilling
than adventures of knighthood once
were-when the game of honest di-
plomatists and enterprising merchants
must be played on the map of the whole
world, and no longer along the coast
line of single ocean. For many
centuries the Mediterranean limited the
enterprises and bounded the thought of
men; then the Mediterranean broad
ened into the Atlantic, and for four
centuries, almost to our own time, our
enterprises and our thought were