Cameron County press. [volume] (Emporium, Cameron County, Pa.) 1866-1922, 1899-02-23
AMERICAN POLICY.
Peace Commissioner Whitelaw Reid
on National Expansion.
Great Gain to he Achieved by ENten-
sion of Territorial Limits
BuSbears of Partisan
Critics.


| Lincoln day celebration, at the Audi
| torium, was regaled with some splen-
| did speeches by men of national prom
| inence, among them being Whitelaw
| Reid, peace commissioner and publish
er of the New York Tribune, who spoke
upon american Diplomacy" as fol-
| lows:
Your toast is to the Achievements OF
American Diplomacy. Not such were it's
achievements under your earlier ;esmen.
| Not such has been it's work under the in
structions of your state department from
| John quincy Adams on down the hon
| ored line and not such the work your rep
| resentatives brought back to you from
| Paris.
They were dealing with a nation with
which it has never been easy to make
| peace, even when war was no longer pos
sible, but they secured peace treaty with
out word that compromises the honor or
| endangers the interests of the country
They scrupuously reserved for their
own decision, through your congress or at
| the polls. the question of political status
and civil rights for the inhabitants of your
new possessions
'"They pledged the United States to alb
| solute freedom in the exercise of their re-
| liSion for all these recent Spanish sub
| jects-pagan, Mohammedan, Confucian or
| Christian.
They maintained, in the face of the
most vehement opposition, not only of
| Spain, but of well-nigh all Europe, a prin-
| ciple vital TO the oppressed people strug-
| Cling for freedom-a principle without
| which our own freedom could not have
| been established, and without which any
| successful revolt against any unjust rule
could be made practically impossible. That
| principle is that, contrary to the prevail
| ing rule and practice in large transfers of
sovereignty, debts do not necessarily fol-
| low the territory if incurred by the mother
country distinctly in efforts to enSlaVe it.
They were enabled to pledge the most
protectionist country in the world to the
| liberal and wise policy of the open door in
the east.
AT the same time they neither neglect
| ed nor feared the duty of caring for the
material interests of their own country
| the duty of grasping the enormous possi-
| bilities upon which we had stumbled, for
sharing in the awakening and development
| of the farther east. That way lies now the
| best hope of American commerce. There
| you may command a natural rather than
an artificial trade.
The Atlantic ocean carries mainly diff
| ferent trade, with people advanced as
ourselves, who could produce or procure
elsewhere much of what they buy of US,
| while we could produce If driven to ii, most
of what we need to buy from them. The
ocean carriage for the Atlantic is in the
hands of our rivals.
},
| in our hands now. Practically we own more
| than half the coast on this side, dominate
| the rest and have midway stations in the
| Sandwich and Aeutian islands. To extend
now the authority of the United States over
the great Philippine archipelago is to fence
| in the China sea and secure an almost
| equally commanding position on the other
| side of the PacitiC-doubling our control of
| it and of the fabulous trade the TWEEN
| tieth century will see ii bear. Rightly used
| r, fI,. t,1 tot tIg to lrf
| he Pacific ocean almost into an American
| lake.
Are we to lose all this through a mushy
| sentimentality, characteristic neither of
| practical nor of responsible people-alike
un-American and un-Christian, since 1t
| would humliate us all by showing lack
| of nerve to hold what are entitled TO,
| and incriminate us by entailing endless
| bloodshed and anarchy on a people whom
| we have already stripped of the only gov
| ernment they have known for $50 years,
| and whom we should thus abandon to civil
| war and foreign spoliation?
Let us free our minds of some bugbears.
| One of them is this notion that with the
| retention of the Philippines our manufac-
| turers viii be crushed by the products of
| cheap eastern labor. But ii does not abol-
| ish our custom houses, and we can still
| enforce whatever protection we desire.
Another is that our American workmen
| will be swamped under the immigration of
| cheap eastern labor. But tropical labor
| does not emgrate to colder climates. None
| nave ever come. If we need law to
! keep them out we can make It.
"It is a bugbear that the Filipinos would
! be citizens of the United States, and would
! therefore have the same rights of free
| travel and free entry of their own manu-
| factures with other citizens. The treaty
| did not make them citizens of the United
| States at all; and they never will be, un-
| less you neglect your congress
1T is a bugbear that anybody living on
| territory or other property belonging to the
| United States must be citizen. The con-
| stitution says that persons born or nat
uraized in the United States are citizens
| of the United States while it adds in the
| same sentence, and of the state wherein
they reside showing plainly that the
| provision does not necessarily relate to
| territories.
1T is equally a bugbear that the tariff
must necessarily be the same over any of
| the territory other property of the
| United States as it is in the nation itself.
The constitution requires that all duties,
| imposts and eXcises shall be the same
| throughout the United States and while
| there was an incidental expression from
| the supreme bench in 1920 to the effect that
| this should include the District of Column
| bia and other territory, il was no part even
| then of the decision actually rendered, and
| it would be absurd to stretch this mere
! dictum of three-quarters of century ago,
| relating then at any rate to this continent
| alone, to carry the Dingley tarlH now
| across to the antipodes.'
The speaker referred to "the sincere
and conscientious opposition to all
| these conclusions manifest chiefly in
| the east and in the senate" deprecated
any fear that the American people
would prove unequal to their new du-
| ties. and concluded:
Now. if ever. is the time to rally the
| brain and conscience of the American peo-
| pie to a real elevation and publication of
| their civil service, to the most exalted
| standards of public duty, to the most siren
| uous and united efforts of all men of good
| will, to make our government worthy of
| the new and great responsibilities which
| the providence of God, rather than any pur-
| pose of man has imposed upon it."
! POINTED PARAGRAPHS.