The evening times. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1895-1902, 1901-01-12
IMPERIALISM.
General HarrisoR's Review Of the
Administrator, Policy.
From the North American Review

(Fron the North American Review
But We are now having It dinned into
our ears that expansion IS the Law Of
life and that expansion IS not pTactica-
bic If the Constitution is 10 20 with the
flag Lord Salisbury some years ago,
stated this supposed law OF national life.
In a recent address, aIr- James Bryce
says. By way OF comment:
He thinks II like a bicycle, which
must fail when it comes to a standstill-
Il IS an awk ward result of this doctrine
that when there is no more room for ex-
pansion. and a time must come, perhaps
soon. when there viii b. 70 more room,
the Empire win begin to decline
II Great Britain. win her accepted
methods OF territorial growth, finds the
problem of growth by expansion increas-
ingly hard, it viii be harder COR Us. for
We are fettered by our traditions as TO
popular rights, at least-3f not by our
Constitution.
But expansion is not necessa rily Of a
healthy sort; Il may be 5-opsieal- If
judgment is passed now the attempted
conquest of the Boer Repub les has net
strengthened Great Britain She has OF
gained esteem. She has not increased
her loyal population. She has created a
need for more outlying garrisons-already
too numerous She has strained her mill
tary and financial resources. and has had
and stronger coast defences at home. The
recent appeal Of Lore Salisbury a the
Lord Mayors banquet FOR more complete
island defeuCes IS most significant Did
the South African war furnish truer
measure Of the Empires land strength
than the familiar campaigning against
haIf-savage peoples had done? The old
coach, with its power to stand as well -
to move. may after all be a safer car
riage for the hopes and interests of a
great people than the bicycle
Some one viii say increasing years and
retirement and intrOspeCIiOn haEc broken
your touch with practical affairs and left
you out OF sympathy with the glowing
prospects of territorial expansion that
now opens before US; that il has always
been 50, the Louisiana and the Alaskan
purchases were opposed by some fearful
souls But I have been making no aFgu-
ment against expansion The recent ac-
QUESTIONS from Spain must present widely
different conditions from all previous ac-
QUESTIONS Of territory. s.Ice il seems to
be admitted that they cannot be allowed
to become a part of the United States
without q loss that overbalances the gain
that we can only safely acquire them
upon the condition that we can govern
them without any constitutional restraint.
One who has retired from the service.
but not from the love of his country.
must be paEdOned if he finds himself IN
able 10 rejoice in the acquisition OK lands
and forests and mines and commerce at
the cost of the abandonment of the old
American idea that government Of alb
soIute powers is an intOierabie thing. and,
under the Constitution OF the United
States an impossible thing. The view Of
the Constitution I have suggested viii
not limit the power. of territorial eXpan-
sion. but it will lead US to limit the use
of that power to regions that may safely
become a part of he United States. and Ia
peopr es to whom American citizenship may
be allowed. II has been Sc = that the
fash OF DeWey's guns in Mania Bay re-
vealed to the American people rev mis-
sion. I like rather to think OF them as
revealing the same old mission that we
read in the fash Of Washin6tca's guns at
Yorktown.
God forbid that the day should ever
come when. in the American mind. the
thought of man as a consumer shall
submerge the old American thought of
man as a creature of God, endowed with
"inalienabIe rights