The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-06-28
Deal With Present ISSUES.

w the recent plan has been to
trot out cabinet officers as the
advocates of various measures that are
E. part of the administrations policy.
Not long ago, Secretary Wilson spoke
for the president in the matters that
We're brought to public attention by
General Miles. Postmaster General
Smith dealt with the presidents Cuban
policy; Secretary Gage has been heard
in lame excuse for the administration
bold assault on the civil-service code;
and Attorney General Griggs is just
now the sponsor for the Philippine
programme.
In all candor, what Attorney General
Griggs has recently been giving to
some of the special correspondents at
Washington is not at all ito the point.
These correspondents have been send
| ing extended statements which amplify
and enforce and repeat the pompous
declaration Of the attorney general
| that 1.-The sovereignty of Spain over the
! Philippine islands was never transferred
to the Filipinos," but by the treaty of
| Paris was transferred by solemn con-
vention to the United States" that 1.-The
theory that there can exist in any in
definite body of people the right to sub
stitute their own will or self-constituted
form of government for the regular
constituted sovereignty of any particu-
lar territory is contrary to reason and
to all international PRACTICES" and that
1.-The instruction in the islands is just
as unlawful as if it arose in Porto Rico,
and the United States is justified in
putting it down."
This is threshing old straw. An effort
was made to persuade the administra-
| tion, when the Paris treaty was pend
ing, that to acquire sovereignty over
the Filipinos, against their wish and
consent, was a violation of this repub-
| lies traditions and laws. The admin
| istration would not listen to this plea
| its answer was that, except a few de-
| signing leaders, the islanders We're
| anxious to become subjects of the Unit
ed States. The president, in violation
of what he had previously declared he
| would do, went in for purchasing Unit
| ed States sovereignty over the Philip
pines. There is no getting away from
what has been done. Secretary Griggs
| will find no intelligent citizen disposed
to dispute him when he argues that we
have and hold the sovereignty in ques-
| tion-his words are idle talk. We GER
tainly have it; indisputably we have.
We bought it and paid for it. Each
succeeding week is emphasizing the
fact that the purchase was a piece of
folly; but that doesn't change any fact
Contrary to all the representations of
| the administration, we find ourselves
obliged to enforce this sovereignty at
the point of the bayonet.
The presidents attorney general
makes his observations from the point
where We stood before the Paris treaty
was signed. That is history; that part
of the evil has been done. We warrant
that the administration wouldn't do it
again, If there were a chance to review
the case. The president tangled The
country in good deal bigger war than
| the Spanish war was. But there are
no two ways about it now-the thing
must be fought out and we must whip
the unwilling Filipinos into peaceful
acceptance of our sovereignty. What
the country wants is that, since we are
IN it, the administration, without more
trifiing, shall send the many-times lar
ger force required, as it turns out by
the conditions near Manila.