The daily journal. (Salem, Or.) 1899-1903, 1901-10-31
TALKING
ABOUT
AMERICA
SkillfuI Dissection of Euro
pean Views About Our
Country.

I sidney Brooks in the November Atlantic.
The Vienna correspondent of one {
the great London dailes was asked wha
was the popular movement Of the da
in central Europe, and replied at once
"What the people Of the 6ual-mOnarch
and Of the German Empire are mos
thinking and talking about just now /
American competition, and the bes
ways of meeting II, an answer whicl
ten years ago would have been amazing
and fifty years ago incredible.
! The decline of European agriculture ha
been the familiar nightmare of the pas
generation, but the intrusion Of tn,
American manufacture has doubly sin
lister significance. 1t blocks up the on,
road Of escape open to Europe, anC
chokes the sources on which she was re-
lying to make good her natural defcien
cies
One has to realize what Europe would
give to have South America ne defense.
less as Africa, before one can gauge the
spirit in which it views the Monroe
Doctrine. To Europe that edict is the
most domineering mandate issued 10
the world since the days of imperial
/ Rome. 1t Is an abridgment Of their
national rights, enforced, as they regard
the matter, simply in the interests Of the
dog in the manger The United States
will neither take South America for
herself nor let any one else take it. She
does not colonize the country with her
own people; she has no trade with it
worth mentioning; she admits no re-
sponsibility for the outrages, disorders,
and financial ireakishness of her
proteges. But she insists that South
America is within her sphere OF in
huence; that such European holdings
as exist there shall neither be extended
nor transferred that immigrants who
settle on its soil must make up their
minds to leave their flag behind them I;
and that in the event of trouble between
a European government and one of the
half.breed republics under her patron,
age, satisfaction must be sought, il at
all in a mere financial indemnity
never in the seizure and retention of
South American territory.
DO Americans seriously believe that
Europe will lie passive forever under
such an edict? Any one who has looked
into the bloody and tangled history OF
South America, and kept an eye on the
steady stream Of European immigration
into Brazil and Argentina, can imagine
at least a score of incidents any one
of which would bring the Monroe Doc.
trine to decisive test. Put on one side
the implacable loyalty OF Americans to
their famous policy, aud on the other
the congested state of Europe, which
would make expansion necessity even
ii it were not all the fashion, the mill
tary spirit OF the Continent which will
never show EnPland's compliance to
American wishes, the extraordinary in
dncements to colonization offered by
South America, and the spirit of revolu.
tionary turbulence that broods over the
country from Patagonia to Panama-and
one has a situation which II will take a
miracle to preserve intact for another
fifty years.
IL is To "proteot European industry
against the threatened danger Of Amer.
lean competition" that the new Cont. |
mental plan was first put forward. 1t I
is practicable, and, within its limits, eff
fective. Americans cannot disregard it !
it lie weapon that will move even the
Senate .... Hitherto Germany and the
dual monarchy have included in their
commercial treaties general and un-
conditional most-iavored-nation clause,
This is now to be abandoned, and the
American example followed instead.
One may take it for certain that the
motive force OF the new central Euro
pean treaties will be the American peril,
and that it will be fought against by a
common agreement to abandon the uni
yersal application of the most-iavored.
nation clause, and for the future only
to conclude treaties on reciprocal basis
with each particular state.
Nothing less than the supreme realiz.
alton OF the commercial side of empire
will be needed TO plunge England and
America into war OF tariffs. English
men laugh at Pan Europeanism. The
weapon has been used against them
selves, and even in the grasp of mas.
ter hand it snapped like a twig. What
Napoleon could not effect against Eng
land, the Concert of Europe is hardly
likely to effect against America. Such,
at any rate, is the English view, both
popular and official England will have
no hand in forging the new weapon still
less will she direct il. One may even
go farther aud with not less assurance.
Were united Europe, in some freak Of
madness. to attempt, as has actually
been suggested she might attempt. TO
prohibit American exports by force,
England would be compelled by sheer
national necessity TO join America in
frustrating it,
The Best Prescription for Malaria
Nhllls and fever is hottla of gnaVatg Taefalass