Iron County register., 1900-06-07

1
ly. being wholly matters of policy, not
Involving vital principle any more than
does the question with the farmer oi
whether he shall follow diversified
| farming or devote his energies wholly
to the production of wheat, or corn,
or hay, or potatoes.
But the question now before the
| American people is not one of mere
policy, but of vital, fundamental prin-
ciple. It is this, Shall we, not only as
a nation but as individuals, continue to
respect God-giYen rightsp or shall we
| deny those rights and trample them
under our feetp
We cannot avoid individual respon-
sibility in this matter by remaining
silent spectators. He who fails to pro-
test when his neighbours rights are in
vaded, and who by that failure gives
to that invasion the sanction of silent
consent, forfeits thereby the right to
protest when his own rights are tram
pied under foot.
This nation was established upon the
principle that rights are God-given and
inalienable, and that governments de-
rive their just powers from the con-
sent of the governed.
This principle involves both civil
and religious liberty. And it is impos-
sible to deny the principle as applied
to '.inferior races" in distant lands and
to maintain it as applied to ourselves
in our own land. 1t is either true of
all peoples everywhere, or it is not
true of any people anywhere. There
fore he who by his silence now con-
sents that this principle is not true in
Porto Rico and the Philippines Islands
consents to the same thing for this
country, and for himself and his chill
dren.
When Israel demanded a king, the
Lord sent Samuel to tell them just
what was involved in their demand.
And Samuel said: This will be the
manner of the king that shall rule over
you: He will take your sons, and ap-
point them tor himself, for his chariots,
and to be his horsemen; and they shall
run before his chariots; and he will
appoint him captains over thousands,
and captains over fifties; and will set
them to ear (or plant his ground, and
to reap his harvest, and to make his
instruments of war, and the instru-
ments of his chariots.
And ye shall cry out in
that day because of your king which
you have chosen; and the Lord will
not hear you in that day." I Sam.
Stills.
These words are just as true to-day
of the policy of Imperialism as they
were of Israel's king. It will not only
take fields and vineyards by means of
taxation for the building and equip
ping of navies and the maintenance of
armies. but it will take our sons, as it
has already taken thousands OF young
men, not only to be servants, but TO
learn the art of war-to kill and to be
killed upon the field of battle.
1t is just as true now that this gov
ernment cannot endure partly repub-
lican and partly imperialistic as it was
true in 1860 that it could mot long
endure half slave and half Free" I'm
perialism cannot be confined to those
outlying islands that have come to us
as spoils of war. The policy pursued
toward them is sure to react with dis
astrous results upon our most cher
ished rights.
Indeed the policy pursued thus far
toward Porto Rico and the Philippines,
and which bids fair to be adopted as a
settled policy by the nation, is the true
measure of the decadence of that loyalty |
to principle which characterized the /
early days OF the Republic. The de-
gree Of liberty preserved among US as