Warren sheaf. [volume] (Warren, Marshall County, Minn.) 1880-current, 1900-09-20
The Leading Bryan Organ Was
HOwling for Expansion and
an Imperial Navy Two
Years Ago.
AN EXPANSION EDITORIAL
The journal Of November, 1898,
Loud in Its Demands for
Great Navy and Perma-
nent Possession of the
Philippines. "a

Is manifested in a thousand ways, but
nowhere is it more marked than in the
course of the syndicate Of papers owned
by W. r. Hearst, the millionaire
owner of the New York Journal
San Francisco Examiner and Chicago
American.
These three papers are the bone and
sinew and substance of the Democratic
campaign, furnishing the only avenue
through which the campaign managers
reach the class of readers among
which the Police Gazette and kindred
publications find circulation. If there
is a scandalous campaign lie to be put
in currency about Republican candi-
dates, an immoral story to be told
about the administration or piece of
false testimony to be given concerning
a Republican official it is to be found
in the Journal, the Examiner or the
American. They are sensational papers
of the "yellowest' type, and, though
totally discredited by the intelligent
and we'll informed reading public, have
class. To this class the demogogic ap-
peal is made that the policy Of the
present administration is toward i'm
the reader is frantically appealed to
and pleaded with to vote against a
party that forces government upon an
unwilling people in the Philippines and
which is accomplishing expansion be-
yond the seas.
It so happens that the files of the
Journal, the parent of all this yellow
brood, are still in existence, and those
who have read the Journals latest at
tacks on the administrations expan-
sion policy are invited to peruse and
consider an editorial in the Journal
printed Nov. Is, 1898, and signed by w.
r. Hearst in person. The article in
question was run clear across the edi-
torial page Of the paper, and was ad-
vertised throughout the land as the
Journals policy" The article was as
follows:
We have demanded-frOm the first
the annexation of Hawaii; we de-
manded the war; we demanded the
acquisition of territory in the West
indies and the retention of ALL the
Philippines. We now demand the
government of our new territories
az intergral parts of this country,
according to the American idea,
without any programme of mill
tarism Or imperialism foreign to
the fundam entail principles of our
tiOn of the Nicaragua canal, not only
for reasons of military strategy, but
in order that the most widely sep
:.rated sections of our domain may
have free and direct communica-
ton with each other. We demand
the erection of great national uni
Hersities at West Point and Annnp-
Oils, where all students educated nj
the expense of the government shnl!
receive such military training as
will make them efficient officers in
time of war. to the end that this
nation may be placed upon proper
military footing without the neceS-
sity of that undemocrntic institu-
ton, a large standing army. We
demand the building of the finest
navy in the world and the total sep
aration of the army and navy from
politics.
What the Journal then demanded"
was what it foresaw would be the in
evitabe result of the war with Spain,
and, within certain bounds, what all
Intelligent people then conceded would
be adopted as the administrative policy.
1t was what the nation wanted, and
the Journal cunningly hypothecated the
future and played to the galleries by
''demanding' what it fOresaW would be
accomplished in order that when it
was done the paper might point to the
result and claim the credit for it. The
annexation of Hawaii had already been
accomplished When the demand was
made, and the "acquisition of territory
in the West Indies was then we'll
under way; 1.-The government of our
new territory as integral parts of this
country" was then admitted to be
among the plans of the administration,
and the construction of an Isthmian
canal had already been indorsed; the
building of an imperial navy. which
was the Journals loudest and most
persistent "demand', was met only in
part, and it's demands" as to the army
were in large measure fOrestalled by a
successful volunteer army that carried
all before it in Cuba and the Philip
pines.
It would be supposed that a paper
which had made such "demands'' at
a time, and which had declared for ex-
panSiOh on a scale that would have
fairly dazed the most ultra Republican
of that time, would be somewhat con-
sistent and stand by what it had ad-
vertised, but the Journal, like its mas
tiers, has Topped to anti-expansion, and
has Joined Bryan in opposition to ma
tiona1 growth and the widening of our
commercial field: - 4 Gt.#s
Whoever reads the Journal Of day
and considers its attitude on the great
questions should consider also it's atti-
tude of less than two years ago, when
these questions were really alive and
when they had to be acted upon
especially when they have been de-
.cided in the very way which the Jour-
nal then demanded they should be, it is
a confession of rank Inconsistency and
hypocritical partisanship for the Jour-
nal to condemn the work it had for
merly commended and reverse itself
between two presidential campaigns.
There has been no change in the Re.
publican policy and no change in the
ownership of the Journal. The change
is supplied by the national Democratic
committee, which furnishes the induce
ment to Mr.. Hearst to eat his words
and confess himself the partisan which
he pilloried in 1898, ]. ~ If. ri