The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1899-08-03
Spirit of the Press.
TREASON FROM THE FATHERS.
Springfield Republican.

i.
Springfield Republican.
Treason" turks in most unexpected
places. small pocket volume has been
got out by Fords, Howard & Hubert of
New York, under the misleading title,
Patriotic Nuggets" to which the atten-
ton of the censorship should be called
There is reason to believe that the au-
thor instead of being the true patriot
he seems, is in reality a traitor of the
most insidious sort, who seeks to cor
fupt his country with disguised sedtion.
This dangerous agitator has compiled n
pithy little volume Of condensed say
ings by Franklin, Washington, Jefferson.
Lincoln and other eminent Americans.
and has cunningly included among them
reasonable utterances which will be all
the worse in their effect because they are
SO artfully mingled with harmless senti-
ments. There is subtle malice in the
man who can impose on msuspecting
readers such a patriotic nugget as
this from Benjamin Franklin:
TO me it seems that neither the OBJ
tanning or retaining of any trade, how
ever valuable soeyer, 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
profit Of no trade can be equal to the
expense of compelling it and of holding
il by fleets and armies
As to meddling with foreign affairs
the texts in this traitors handbook are
many. beginning with Washngton's opin-
ion that Every nation has a right to es-
tablish that form of government under
which it conceives it may be most hap
py." Jefferson says in his pungpnt way
Sometimes it is said that man cannot
be trusted with the government of him
self. Can he. then, be trusted with the
government of others? Or have we
found angels in the forms of kings
(0tises) TO govern him." Lincoln i
homely common sense pricks the thick
skin of Anglo Saxon arrogance in these
words, which might have been written
Tor the present time: Those arguments
that are made. that the inferior race
are to be treated with as much allowance
as they are capable of enjoying; that as
much is to be done for them as their
condition Will allow-what are these ar
guments? They are the arguments that
kings have made for 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 it. but because the people
were better off for being ridden"
As for Daniel Webster, some of the
passages quoted here are positively in
cendiary in tone. This might have come
from the anti-imperialist league, if that
organization contained an orator like
Webster: 1T is certainly true that the
just policy Of this country is, in the first
place, a peaceful policy. No nation ever
had less to expect from forcible aggran-
dizement. The mighty agents which are
working out our greatness are time, in
dustry and the arts. Our augmentation
is by growth, not by acquisition; by in
ternal development, not by external ac-
cession. No schemes can be suggested
to us so magnificent as the prospects
which a sober contemplation Of our own
condition, unaided by projects, unin-
fiuenced by ambition, fairly spreads be-
fore us" This is, Of course, out Of date,
and so is his naive wish that the coun-
try may become a vast, splendid monu-
ment, not Of oppression and terror, but
Of wisdom, of peace and liberty, upon
which the world may gaze with admra
ton forever" We are building our
monuments out of dead Filipinos nova
days.
How short-sighted was Webster when
he said: I'VE eovet no provinces; we de.
sire no conquests; we entertain no ambi-
tious projects Of aggrandizek ent by
war" And the censor should certainly
smear his ink-ball over this quoted pas
sage from the Marshfeld speech of
1913: "All men look at us, all men ex-
anime our course. They see us as that
star of empire which half century ago
was represented as making its way
westward. | wish they might see it as
a mild, placid. though brilliant orb, NOV
ing athwart the whole heavens to the
enlightenment and cheering of mankind,