Semi-weekly Windham County reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1897-1901, 1901-07-05
The Philosophy of Democracy.

tim at the idea of such an extenslo
to the other peoples of color that nav
co"e under our rule TIE experience
with Hawaii, it declares, has concln
sively proved "the folly of establish
ing a territorial government VIII
nractically universal suffrage anon!
peopls unframed to the exercise o
nolitjcal power'' with all the chance
II gives to incompetent legislator
and mischief making demagogues,
anu it sounds the warning as to TIT
Philippines and and West Indies
thusly;
1t is the first step that counts,
Either we are going to have all OF
these peoples in thir ignorance and
unfitress of for American citizenshlr
introduced into our electorate ana
made instruments of INSCRIPTIONS
men to rule US, or We are going once
and fer all to establish the principle
that the union of states in an Ameri-
can union and continental UNION,
and that its character is not to be
changed by the Incorporation not our
ctizensbip OF every semi civilized or
barbarous tribe which may CHARGE at
any tims to clme under our sover.
eighty The inhahitah's OF
Hawaii are justly entitled to sucn
measure of self govern msnt as they
show they can wisely use, but con-
gress cannot afford to ahdicate its
complete authority, particularly, IN
view of their demonstrated need OF
guard ianship.
If this is true of Hawaii and the
Philippines. it was even more true OF
our regroes who at the close of the
war we're far inferior in polGt of ed
ucation and every other requirement
for self rule to the people of these is
lands that will rank very we'll as re-
CARDS education With the average
white peoples of the world. The
Tribune thirty odd years ago was
laundering the contrary doctrine from
the standpoint Of the philosophy OF
democracy. The negro, it declared
must have the ballot to protect him
self-there was no other way to save
him from being forced back to vir-
tual slavery and from being subject
to all sorts of abuses and robberies at
the hands of men having unlimited
and unchecked power over him. This
was true, and it was also tree, as the
Tribune we'll argued then, that the
only way to train and and tit any reo'
pie for self rule was to set them at it,
that the great virtue OF Democracy
was that it contained within itsel (
the chance for remedy for its own
evils and short comings, not that any
people ever could bs entirely fit for
it, not that it would produce ideal
or ever had done so even
among ourselves, but that taking into
account its pote ucies OF development
and uplifting, it vas on the whole the
best government any people could
have, wherever situated or however
circum stanced. To deny all this row
is simply to declare that the country |
was all wrong on the negro question |
after the waf--to camp on southern |
ground as Secretary Herbert we'll
declares in the article quoted else
where.
The Tribune's pressLt argument is
lnans werable IS an indictment of the
policy of annexation of distant terri,
,ories aud peoples that We are rot will
ng and cannot afford to receive upon
IN equality with ourselves. The mean
ng OF it all is simply that we ought
% let them alone and leave them to
work. out their own destiny, on the
or any other basis they
hose, which they can do without in
ury to US and without any response
'ility on our Part for either their
uccesses or failures. Aud the prac-
ical fact, attested by all human his
Dry, is that they can do it better in
dependence on themselves than Under
ny foreign and alien guardianship.
An article by Henry r Marshall in
he July International journal of
.thics we'll presents the reason on :
loral and physical grounds why this
5 so, and as a matter of strict scisnce
ombats the idea that mankind lives ,
lnder an iron law of nature which s
the individual to crowd
nd crush and eytingui5h his weaker ,
elbows. The law of struggle and sur :
ival Of fittest, as even Darwin init {
lated, ends where reason begins. Mr.
larshall likens individuals and differ ,
ut peoples in the interracaal organic 1
ton to the elementary parts of the a
ldividual animal, each expressing
IS own instructive tendency and yet r
II together producing the activities of i
le whole organism, where it fails t
, do so death or paralysis results
o:
The study of evolutionary doctrine
aus leads US to see that it should be
nr aim to foster the development Of l.
ldividusl life with as little restric- !;
on to its free unfolding as is COM
4tible with our ideals Of social sta
llity: and, in fact, most intelligent n
len will agree that the ideal state C
ould be one 10 which the greatest >,
herty Of the individual would lie
alntaired without restriction Of
lOsa n6vantpOaS ubipb cap op1v ar If