The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1902-02-23


wide duties. if facts demand autonomy for
our possessions. autonomy II shall De. !
facts demand guardianship at hands
guardianship it shall be. over the Ameri-
can mind and heart and directing American
action. the genius of the practical still
presides. We are no China cursed with
custom. drugged and dead with precedent.
We are Americans-the people OF the APP
propriate and the adaptable.
WILL KEEP THE PHILIPPINES.
The treatment of our dependencies is the
world issue now confronting us Let us
then plant ourselves on the fundamental
certainties And the first of these certain
ties is that not one single foot of soil
which American civil authority is estah-
| lished will ever be abandoned What we
have, we hold!-this is the voice OF our
race. People of our blood never leave land
they have occupied. No master people ever
yield while they remain a master people.
Emerson declares that when the powers or
man decline he draws in his enterprise:
he quits business; ne prepares for the In
evitable end. The same is true of a people.
| But the American people are not on the de-
cline The American people are not ready
| to go out of business. The American peo-
| pie are stronger for the worlds work now
than any people ever were before. And our
portion of the worlds work, which destiny
| has laid upon the younger and the growing
races, Is the duty and labor OF guardian
| ship
| In Porto Rico, in Cuba, in the Philippines
That trust we will execute as thoroughly
as Americans do everything. And so Amer
lean government in the Philippines VIII be
permanent. The American flag in Porto
Rico will float there as long as the Repub-
lies government itself shall stand. Amerl-
can suzerainty over Cuba Will remain until
time laces that island more closely TO US
with more enduring bonds. Events call Tor
| the conservatism of adaptability. Condi-
tions demand the moderation of the fire
hand. The radicalism of ancient methods
has no place among new conditions. Re
member the parable of the new wine in the
old bottles. What would we say If the an
cient mariner should step from his vessel
of wood, and sail. and spars, and ropes
onto the bridge of twentieth century
ocean liner, and declare that the steam
which drove it, the electricity which lighted
it, the steel plates, the copper bottoms and
all the method of modern shipbuidings are
sacrilege, because he had not done in that
way? This hOary representative OF a day
that is dead would not be considered con-
sentative. The board OF directors that
would place him In command of a Deutsch-
land or a Lucania would not be considered
conservative. Moderation means the prog
ress of facts-not the daring of dreams on
the one hand nor yet the cowardlce or
reminiscence the other. And with the
dependencies of the American Republic,
American statesmen must deal as practical
thought directed actual conditions de-
mands that they should deal. They must
not deal systematically. They must not deal
retrogressively. They must deal practically,
steadily. The free hand must be the steady
hand if it is to be the hand of the MASTER
and the free hand can be the steady hand
only when its action is governed by actual
and not imaginary conditions.
PATIENCE ESSENTIAL.
But in this great problem of our depend
encies, more even than in the surprising
developments of our internal economy, pa
thence is the word of power and of success.
A race cannot be transformed over night.
The methods of three centuries cannot be
rennedied hatUaar SllpriSa and The
character of a people is not to be altered
even by the schoolteacherS priceless work
In season or year. Let us not be IN
haste. Let us have the serenity of the stu
alton. We are dealing with an elemental
problem, racial problem, world ques-
ton. We must act, therefore, with deliber-
alton as large and a patience as steady
the problem Is vast and historic. We must
employ no magic but time, no legerdemain
but that of steady and continuous effort
| unvarying and undismayed. There must be
no spasms of retrenchment, no panic Of
retreat, no fury Of advance. Let US not pine
for the fruit before the seed is planted, or
even the ground prepared.
$50, fellow-citizens, we will go on in the
spirit and method of Washington, practi-
cally, steadily, calmly, without prejudice
and without fear Whatever the future may
mold for the American people in internal
development or foreign dominion, that flu
ture will be met with that thoughtful mod
Grafton which adapts means to ends. If ole
methods suffice, those old methods will
use. because they are approved. If present
methods suffice. present methods will we
use, because they are at hand. If new
methods are necessary, new methods we
will invent, because the case demands
them. The fanatcism of the old will not
| influence the American people. The fanati-
cism Of the new will not influence tn,
American people
THE conservatism of adaptabiity the
calmness of the Appropriate. the patience
necessary for the doing of the work i
hand whatever that work may be-these
are the saving influences which will govern
American action now and hereafter The
discipline of the days work the balanced
judgment that accomplishes real things
the steady sanity essential to the settle
ment of actual situations-these are the
councillors which now and hencefOrth the
American people VIII consult. Neither pas
| sion nor fear, neither theory nor precedent
neither imagination nor impulse. shall cor
rupt in the American character that order
ly adaptability which has been the very
soul OF American progress And before
these influences of light every cloud that
fear discerns on our horizon will dissolve:
every impossible ocean which imagination
sees in our pathway will be safely crossed.
| every foe which foresight beholds in the
distance will be vanquished, and the flag
which Washington unfurled will float ovf
| ever-broa dening horizons Frightening every
hour with increasing glories of actual
achievement"