The age-herald., 1901-12-19


 cerned with what the American people want"
 MT. Mccall of Massachusetts, mem- ber of the Ways and Means Committee, who opposed the Porto Rican tariff bill in the last congress, opposed the pending measure in vigorous speech. Referring to the Porto Rico decision by the Su- preme Court Mr. Mccall said
 -Four of the five justices who upheld the law were of the opinion that the fifth justice, in deciding with them, assumed a position inconsistent with that taken by the same justice in another declara- ton romulgated by him the same day. One justice said that the two positions were irreconcilable. If his positions were irreconcilable, who shall say which one was right and which one was wrong? It may, therefore, fairly be said that upon these questions which involve our power to make the people of the Philippine Isl- ands more chattels without a rou to con- fer upon them bastard common law cit izenship, and cynically to force upon them cruel commercial isolation, the court stands with four and one half jus tices ranged upon one side and four and half upon the other"
 Could Not Support 1t.
 So far as the pending bill was concern ed Mir Mccall said that he disbelieved so profoundly in the administration Philippine policy. that he could not sup port 1t. What have we seen in the last three years?' He asked. We have witnessed the solemn farce of four or five very estimable American gentlemen sitting as a legislature over ten million of people of whose language, customs, conditions and existence they were prob ably ignorant four years ago. We have witnessed the spectacle of an Ameri- can army numbering over 10000 men engaged in conquering a people strug- gling for independence. We have seen our highest court apparently forgetful that this nation was established as protest against the power of one people to tax permanently another people, de- claring Congress exempt from the con- stitutional limitations upon the great cen tral power of taxation and then open ing the way for autocratic government and for the exploitation of subject peo- ples We have seen our permanent standing army multiplied more than three-fold and the expenses of our milli- tary establishments approaching that of the most army-riden nations of Europe.
 I've have seen ourselves take a posi- ton highly inconsistent in point Of jus tice with the Monroe doctrine when de- manding that the governments Of the over-crowded Eastern continent shall keep their hands off of this hemisphere, we ourselves with hundreds of millions of untitled acres and vast untouched forests, seize at one stroke a thousand islands in the other hemisphere. If four years ago a writer of burlesque opera had put these things in play he would have stood apart and alone fin his pro- fession as the consumate creator of i'm possible situations. I believe now, as I have always believed, that when our commissioners set their hand to the treaty annexing the Philippine Islands they inaugurated as fatal a policy as any upon which a great nation ever embark ed.
 Destruction of Life.
 It was policy which has been followed by the destruction by us of tens of thou sands of innocent brown men who had never done us any harm, and who were lured by our own glorious history to fight for their freedom and their homes It was a policy, too. as result of which thou sands upon thousands of the soldiers of American mothers will sleep their last sleep upon the banks of the Rio Grande and the Pasig. I know 1t is said that 1t will give us commerce. Our trade with those islands appears today to have reached the magnificent proportions of the trade of corner grocery, but if it should promise to bring to this country all the wealth of the Indies, I believe that our national honor. the preservation in their integrity of republican institutions. our future peace and safety, every dic- tate of interest and justice demand that we shall now so shape our steps that We