Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1900-02-24
Washington and the Idea of Expansion

At the Union League club banquet
at the Auditorium, Chicago, Thurs
day evening, President Jacob Schur-
man, of Cornell university, late head
of the Mckinley Philippine commits
sion, delivered an address on the first
American patriot, the 16Sth anpiver-
sary of whose birth was thus cele-
brated. The tendency of President
Schurman's remarks was that it was
appropriate that he should speak on
the subject of the greatest American.
because Washington was like him
self. an expansionist, in the same
sense that Mckinley is. The attempt
to prove the father of his country
guilty of the charge was of course
failure. The only argument that MIR.
Schurman was able to put forth TO
show that Washington favored any
form of expansion was in the extern
sion of the boundaries of the country
to the Mississippi. This is sugges-
ton that contains no parallel TO the
spirit of conquest and colonial devel-
opment fathered by the present presi-
dent, where people entirely foreign,
having no interests in common with
US, and who. it is proposed. shall be
annexed not as free-born Americans,
constituting a part of the American
repu bile, as are all who inhabit every
foot of ground that has been added to
the sisterhOOd of states on this CONT
nent. but as mere subjects, gov
erned, but having no voice in the
government; taxed, but not represent
ed. Most astonishingly inconsistent
with the statement that the existing
administration in the policy of forci-
BILE expansion that it Is pursuing is
but following the Washington doc
trine, was the statement by Schurman
in supporting it. that he had never
suggested that a state be made of the
Philippines; in fact, he would amend
the constitution If need be, so that none
of the Asiatic country could become a
state, and forthwith he proceeded to
argue upon the strength of the value
| of the new acquisitions to us from a
purely commercial standpoint, assail-
ing the Monroe doctrine as subject
of idolatry that has permitted Euro
pean countries to set up barriers
against Us. President Schurman
would sweep away the Monroe doc
trine, and hold the Asiatic archipelago
key to the Orient.
But in contradiction of the pre-
sumption that the theory of govern
ment for which Washington stood can
in any sense be used as precedent
for the ln-American course that the
present administration has adopted,
it is only necessary to quote Washing
toms own words. The following eX-
tract from his farewell address fits the
case exactly:
Europe has set of primary in
terests. which 10 Us have none, or a
very remote, relation. Hence she
must be engaged in frequent contro-
versies, the causes of which are essen
italy foreign to our concerns. Hence,
therefore. it would be unwise in US to
implicate ourselves. by artificial ties.
in the ordinary vicissitudes of her
politics, or the ordinary com binations
and collisions of her friendships or
enmities.
.'Our detached and distant situation in
vItes and enables Us to pursue n different
course.
why fOregO the advantages OF SO pecu-
liar q situation? why quit our own to
stand upon foreign ground: why, by In
terweavipg our destiny with that of any
part of Europe. entaDgIe our peace and
prosperity In the tolls of European ambI-
ton. riTSlship, Interest, humor or ca
price,"
These are but isolated paragraphs
from the warnings given by Washing
ton against aggression and foreign
complications. To attribute to him
other motives than we're shown by him
in word and practice. to charge him
with other than those lofty sentiments
that all just forms of government de-
rive their power from the consent of
the governed. and that forcible an
neXation is 4 crime, is to desecrate
his memory.