The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1901-01-01
GENERAL HARRISON ON OUR INsULAR
POLICY.

ON OUR 1NSULAh
POLICY.
Ex-P President Benjamin Harrison
spoke to three thousand students of
the University of Michigan, Deem
Der IA, on "The Status of Annexed
Territory and the Rights of it's Free
and Civilized Citizens" His address
has attracted widespread attention,
coming, as it does, from the only
living Republican ex-President. In
part he said:
We have now taken lands lying
in the tropics untitled for American
settlement, even if they we're not
already densely populated. We have
taken over peoples, not lands, and
not of our stock. Their labor is
cheap and threatens competition,
There is a total lack of American
ideas. We have said the Chinese
will not homologize. Nor will the
Philippines do so rapidly, and the
tropics are productive of wholly new
views, and their peoples are differ
ent. r.
It has been held by Chief Justice
Marshall that because the ConstitU-
ton cOnfers on the Government the
right to make war and treaties it
also gives it power to acquire terri
tory, either by conquest or treaty.
So there is no doubt that the govern
ment has the power of conquest and
of treaty in acquiring territory. The
people have delegated to the Presi-
dent and Congress the power of &C
quiring territories by the power
given them concerning Hawaii and
the Philippines. But this power is
[limited?]. It applies only to get
land capable of being erected into
the union.
Our flag waves, but only as a sign
of benevolence. For the flag to stand
SO is a mockery. We bid the people
hail it as the sign of freedom, and
then civil governor reads that
Congress is their master. If the act
of annexation does not carry the
Constitution, and the Constitution is
only in a territory by an act of Con-
gress which can at any time be re-
pealed, 1 think of no way to carry it
but by annexation of new lands as
States.
Some n must determine how far
our territories can be intrusted with
powers. We have, however, no
right to make the lack of this de-
termination of powers an excuse for
injustice. The Constitution as it is
written holds no rule about holding
conquered territory, and as tor
whether we can hold it otherwise
than in a state of freedom. But it is
not practicable for the flag to go
without the Constitution. The
conquest of the annexed Dutch re-
publics has not strengthened Great
Britain. She has not gained respect,
but has multiplied her garrisOns
greatly the number Of her disaf-.
fected people has increased and she
must have more defenses at home. l.
And the recent acquisitions from
Spain, of these you must be judges.
They present very difficult questions,
since we cannot safely let them in
under the Constitution, nor can we
safely govern them in any way other
than by the Constitution. A man
true to the old ideas of freedom can
not ignore that the acquisition of
lands at the cost of the abandonment
of old American ideas and that a
form Of absolute government is in
tolerable and, under the Constitu-
ton of the United States, impossible.
Fellow-citizens God forbid that
the day shall ever come when in the
American mind the thought of d
business man and a consumer should
overcome ancient faith in unalien
able rights. 81