The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1900-09-20
What imperialism Really Means to the
United States.

Within the past thirty years the
wealth Of the United States, which
was once fairly distributed, has been
accumulated in the hands of few,
so that, according to the last census,
$50, 900 men own S44, ZOO, 900, 900,
or over three-fourths of the wealth
Of this country, while So per cent.
of the population practically have
no property at all and do not own
their homes.
1t would naturally be supposed
that the 4S per cent. of the
people who still have an interest in
the property of the nation would be
the governing classes. Recent
events, however, point unmistak-
ably to the fact that the $50, 900
people who own nearly all the
wealth have combined with the So
per cent. of Our population who
have no property, and by gaining
control of great and aforetime
patriotic political organization have
usurped the functions Of govern
ment and established a plutocracy.
Among all monarchies ofthe past,
whenever all power and all property
have been gathered into the hands
of the few and discomfort appears
among the masses it has been the
policy to acquire foreign possessions
to enlarge the army and the navy,
to employ the discontented and dis
tract their attention.
The attempt on the part of the
United States to acquire foreign ter
ritory, coming as it does along with
an ever-increasing clamor for the
enlargement of the army and for
the creation OF great navy, is suffi-
cient to alarm patriotic citizens and
lead to All anxious inquiry as to
whittier we are drifting.
To-day we have no territory that
a navy is needed to defend. The
United States is so situated that she
can say whether she will have peace
or war. We possess no territory
that can be acquired or held by
foreign foe, even if we owned not
one single ship, and no nation, how
ever great and strong, can gain any
advantage by war with us.
But the moment we acquire dis
tant possessions we must build
navy to defend them, for in case of
war these possessions would be first
attacked and taken from us. France,
England and Germany have pos.
sessions scattered all over the world,
and those nations are consequently
compelled to maintain immense
navies to defend them. These pos
sessions, in case of war, furnish so
many points of attack, so many en-
barrassments, so many opportuni-
ties for national humiliation, that
the strife is to see who can maintain
the greatest fleet upon the sea.
Shall we enter the arena of this
contest?
From our earlist history We have
insisted that we would engage In no
entangling alliances. We have said
that we would attend to our own
affairs and that our interests de-
manded that no European country
should gain further foothold upon
the Western Hemisphere; and so
strong has been our moral position
that without navy we have always
been able to enforce this doctrine.
Throughout our past we have en-
countered many propositions for the
annexation of tropical countries and
we resolutely put them behind us
until judgment was circumvented
by the Vaccinations of capitalistic
combinations and we took forcible
possession of the Hawaiian Islands.
The same influences are now at
work to attach permanently to the
United States the Philippine Is,
lands, still deeper in the realms Of
the blazing sea.
Tropical countries produce and
maintain populations much more
dense than countries in the temper.
ate zone because it takes less tc
clothe and feed and care for thei,
people, because their demands anC
wants are less and because of thc
wonderful iJod-producing power O
the soil Of the tropics.
The island Of Java has an are;
no larger than the State of Iowa
and it contains 24,ooo,ooo people
1t is reasonable to suppose that tn
Hawaiian and Philippine Island
will maintain population in pre-
portion to their area equal to thos
of other tropical countries.
But what kind of a population
,, The more of them the worse. Their
, is not a colony of European c
Anglo-SaXon laborers within twent
two degrees oil the equator any
, where on the globe.
/, No Euglish, no French, no &c,
mans, no Scandinavians. no Ru,