The Yakima herald. [volume] (North Yakima, W.T. [Wash.]) 1889-1914, 1900-04-12


friends, nothing has been more remark.
able than the complete turn over of the
republican party on this question OF i'm
perialism. Who would have supposed
that the republicans, who for over thirty
years have boosted that they applied the
declaration of independence to black
who would have supposed that these same
republicans would cross an ocean to denv
the declaration of independence to a
brown man who is only half black :?
Who would suppose it? Who would
have thought that the republican party,
which in 1860 put into it's platform
plank setting forth the four great princi.
Piles of the declaration OF independence
would, in the year 1900, just forty years
afterward, assert the imperial policy that
contradicts every principle of the declar-
alton Of independence? Isn't it strange ?
Republicans tell you that we had to pay
the penalty measured by hundreds of
thousands of the best lives of this nation,
and by hundreds of millions OF money,
because we allowed for nearly century
an exception clause to remain in the dec.
laration of independence; because we
had so constructed that declaration that
it did not cover black man, we had to
pay this terrible penalty in blood and
money. Republicans. can you calculate
the penalty that this nation may have to
pay ii for greed, for gain, we write into
the declaration another exception clause
and say it does not mean the Filipino.
because his skin is dark and his trade is
valuable? Who can tell what the pen
atty for this will be? My friends, be-
lieved from the beginning that the con-
science of the American people would
revolt against imperialism. When this
question first came up was so impressed
with the danger that 1 took occasion a
year ago last June to warn my people in
my own state of the danger of the policy.
There were some who said it seemed to
be popular. My reply was that that
doctrine could never be popular unless
the American people had lost interest in
the principles that underlie our govern
ment; and yet people have been blind TO
the doctrine OF imperialism until the
Puerto Rican bill came up, and then how
they did squeal. 1t has amazed me to
hear republicans denounce that Puerto
Rican bill. 1t has amazed me to read
republican papers, to hear republican
editors denounce the Puerto Rican bill.
Why, my friends, that Puerto Rican bill
is necessary if we have imperialism
that Puerto Rlcan bill is in line with i'm
perialism. There is difference between
expansion and imperialism. We have
had expansion; we have never had i'm
perialism. We had expansion when we
took in that land that could be settled by
American states. We had expansion
when We took in Louisiana territory.
We expanded when We took in Texas and
New Mexico and California; but it is not
expansion today, it ls Imperialism. We
We are not urging that it is land upon
which American citizens can settle; we
are not urging that it is land which can
be built into American states. We are
urging it for subsection. We are going
out to fight people; to subdue them and
then to govern them for own gain. Lin
coin never said truer thing than when
he declared this nation could not long
endure half slave and half free. He
took it from the Bible: "a house divided
against itself cannot stand" and for
more than thirty years Abraham Lincoln.
who owes his early fame more to that ex-
preston than to any other thing he ever