The Worcester spy. [volume] (Worcester, Mass.) 1898-1904, 1899-01-10

and administered by the agencies of
the republic of the United States, if we
are to succeed in such administration
at all.
Our fathers taught us the priceless
value of national credit, and to keep
free from the burden Of national debt
We have thought until lately that our
strength came in large part from our
unsuliied and unequaled public credit.
II we were compelled in self-defense
TO enter into a contest with the strong
est or richest power on earth, our cred
it would remain unimDaired until our
opponent were bankrupt. If in time of
war or public danger we were compell-
ed to contract debt, we have supposed
that the only policy of dealing with it
In time OF peace was to pay it.
But now the senator from Connecti-
cut seems to contemplate that we shall
| embark on a permanent system of ma
ttonal expenditure, which will put this
nation under an obligation the euuiya-
lent Of which Will be national debt
| greater than that of any other nation
| on the face of the earth. Have you re-
| flected that a permanent increase of our
! expenditures of one hundred and fifty
millions q year-Which we cannot avoid
and from which We cannot withdraw
| is precisely the came thing as adding
to our national debt five thousand mil
1 D
which is more than the government is
now paying, and that permanent in
crease in our expenditures of three
hundred millions a year is the same as
! increasing our national debt ten thou
| sand millions, capitalized at per cent
l think 1t can be easily demonstrated
that the policies on which we are asked
to embark involve permanent nation
| al expenditure much larger than the
1 I ofx lie-t
| already so enormous, must be enor-
mously increased. Instead of taking
| from the people by fair competition, OF
even by fair selection, men to take their
share in self government, we must have
in the future, as they have in England
a trained class whose lives are to be
| spent, not in self government, but in
the government Of other men.
At the close of the nineteenth century
| the American republic, after it's ex-
ample in ab0lishing slavery has spread
through the world, is asked by the
senator from Connecticut to ado0t a
doctrine Of constitutional expansion on
the principle that it Is right to conquer,
buy, and subject a whole nation, if we
happen to deem it for their good-for
their good as we conceive it. and not
as they conceive it.
Mr.. President Abraham Lincoln said:
to own another" No nation was ever
created good enough to own another.
No single American workman, no
humble American home, will ever be
better or happier fer the constitutional
doctrine which the senator from Con-
necticut proclaims. If 1t be adopted
here not only the workman's wages will
be diminished, not only will the burden
OF taxation be increased, not only, like
the peasant Of Europe, will he be born
with a heavy debt about his neck, and
will stasger with an armed soldier upon
his back, but his dignity win be dishon-
cred and his manhood discrowned by
ths act OF his own government.
The senator from Connecticut himself
acted on different doctrine within six
months. He resolved, THAT the people
free and independent" I am sure he
is now incapable of resorting to the
poor subterfuge that the right to be
free and independent belongs to them
by reason of any special conditions,
because they are white men, or because
they are Americans, or because they
are Christians, and does not appertain
to every people the world over The
senator and those who think with him
committed themselves to this doctrine
as the right of other people not only
to freedom, but to independence and
they went to war for 1t. Will they at
tack it now?
Did they not swear at first to fight
For the kings safety and his right?
And after marched to find him out
And charged him home with horse and
And yet still had the confidence
To swear it was his defense?
l do not agree, Mr. President, that
the lesson of our first hundred years
is that the Declaration of Indepen-
dence and the constitution are a fail
ure, and that America is to begin
the twentieth century where Spain be-
gan the sixteenth.
The Monroe doctrine is gone. Every
European nation, every European al
lance, has the right to acquire do
minion In this hemisphere when we &C
quire it in the other. The senator's doc
trine put anywhere in practice win
make of our beloved country cheap
jack country, raking after the cart for
the leavings of European tyranny.
1t may be that in some storm and
tempest of popular delusion, q cloud
may for the moment cover the great
truths of our Declaration. ! have with
in the compass of my own life encoun-
tered such storm and tempest more
than once. In 1850, after the passage
of the compromise measure the great
contest for the freedom of the vast ter
ritory between the Mississippi and the
Pacific seemed hopelessly lost. Senate
and people, courts and state legisla-
lures seemed all bowling in assent to
the overthrow Of the great principles
of the Declaration. But after a few
short years the cloud and storm passed
by, and the eternal constellation shone
out unmoved and mistaken in its glory
in the sky.
L remember when the great political
| party swept over the north, electinE
in my own state every member of the
| legislature but two, every member of
congress, every member of the state
| government, based on the doctrine of
denying the application Of these truths
to citizens Of foreign birth. But again
| the delusion passed by, and the eter-
| nal truths shone out. have seen like
movements of popular error and de-
| fusion in more recent years. So far
God has given me strength to with
stand them in my humble fashion. But
| they were overthrown and brought TO
naught, not by any human strength,
but because the eternal providence Of
| God is on the side of freedom.
Our fathers dreaded a standing ar
| my; but the senator's doctrine, put in
practice anywhere, now or hereafter,
| renders necessary q standing army, to
| De reinforced by powerful navy. our
| fathers denounced the subsection OF
| any people whose judges were appoint
ed or whose salaries We're paid by a
| foreign power; but the senator's doc
| trine requires US to send to u foreign
people Judges, not of their own seec-
ton, appointed and paid by us. The
senator's doctrine, whenever it shall be
put in practice, will entail upon us a
national debt larger than any now OK
listing on the face of the earth, larger
than any ever known in history