The Irish standard., 1902-12-27
Causes Which Led to the Present State of
Affairs in Venezuela are
Strongly Stated.
Trouble in South America Brought About
Under the Evil Influence
Of Secretary Hay.

The present conditions III Venezuela
show better than anything that has
happened in the last few years of i'm
perialism the road along which the Re-
public has been travelling, and they
make the average American cry fol
one hour of Richard Olney. We have
now the humiliating spectacle of the
United States acting as Il silent and
complacent partner of an international
debt-collecting agency by which the
private debts of foreign capitalistic or
ganiZations are collected at the muzzle
of the rifle. There is no use in trying
to evade responsibility, for the full
responsibility for this danger to Amer
lean honor and the Monroe Doctrine
rests upon the administration in
Washington, writes Joseph Smith in
the Boston Pilot.
The present revolution in Venezuela.
which has brought so much debt, dis
order and disaster to that government,
is the outcome of the efforts Of what is
known as the Asphalt Trust to coll
troll the asphalt fields in that republic,
and to the aid rendered that body Of
capitalists by the Mckinley admins
tratiOn and the United States minister
at Caracas. Spoiled by the action of
the supreme court of Venezuela from
grabbing everything i'll sight and be-
ing compelled to surrender part of it's
plunder to Il rival asphalt company,
the trust made ready to hold it's loot
ed lands against both the courts and
government of Venezuela by force Of
arms, depending upon the friends it
had i'll Washington to bring it the
backing of the United States govern
lnent to pull it out. \ little army Of
tilibusters were armed and equipped
by the trust and placed under COM
mand of Captain Rafferty,, of the New
York militia, and some West Point
cadets who had been discharged from
the academy for breaches Of discipline.
The then minister at Caracas sympa-
thized with the Asphalt Trust, for GER
tain occult reasons, and began Il cam
paign designed to lead to forcible in
reference by the Mckinley admin
istratiOn, with the connivance of the
State Department. Everything pro-
gressed finely up to the point where
some of our vessels were under orders
to sail for La Guayra to coerce Cas-
trO's government into compliance with
the impudent claims of the trust. The
rival concern, which did not propose
to be robbed of it's rights in the as
phalt fields, let the cat out of the bag
by making row, when the conspira-
tors in Washington ran to cover and
the administration 'squawled" in the
teeth of the rising storm. The Ameri-
can minister had to be recalled and rel
egated to some other job where his tai
cnts might find a fair field, and the
asphalt plot, for the time being, was
thwarted. The transaction was only
one of the number of dirty semi-finan-
cial jobs in which the underlings of
the Mckinley administration were
mixed up. and the American minister
was another of that precious pack of
patriots which managed to bring dis
honor to the American name abroad.
The next move in this pretty scheme
was the financing of some of the pro-
fessional revolutionists or "pronuncia-
menteros" who lived under the British
flag adjacent to Venezuela. With the
active connivance of the British au-
thbrities, the steamship Ban Righ was
lo;ld with arms and equipments and
allowed to sail with her revolutionary
element from Barbados, in spite of
the protest of the Venezuelan govern
mfnt The Ban Righ made no secret
of her purposes and she was treated
handsomely by the Barbadian authori-
ties in every way that was likely to
facilitate her revolutionary aims. She
was a latter-day Alabama, operating
against weak government, which
had no navy to defend her interests on
the sea- Venezuela has little chance
of Inserting her rights now; we were