The daily morning journal and courier., 1902-08-23
GREATER AMERICA.
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 low Americans of ours to whom so great a debt is due-the officers and enlisted men of the United States army, regulars and volunteers alike. Tn a succession Of campaigns, carried on in unknown trop1c Jungles against an elusive and treacherous foe vastly outnumbering them, under the most adverse condi- tions of climate, weather and country, our troops completely broke the power of the insurgents, smashed their armies and harried the broken robber bands into submission. In it's latter stages the war against our rule sank into mere brigandage; and what our troops had to do was to hunt down the bands, re- quiring infinite firmness, tact. broad mincedness. All these qualities and the countless others necessary have been found in the civil and military officials who have been sent over to administer the islands. It was of course inevitable that there should be occasional failures, but it is astonishing how few these have been. Here and there the civil govern ment which has been established in a
 
 withdrawn because of some outbreak; but at last on the July 4th that has just passed-on the 125th anniversary of our ndependence-it was possible at the same time to declare amnesty through out the islands and definitely to estab- fish civil rule over all of them excepting the country of the Mohammaden Moros, where the conditions were wholly differ ent Such inhabitant of the Philippines is now guaranteed his civil and religious rights, his rights to life, personal lib- erty and the pursuit of happiness, sub ject only to not infringing on the rights of others. It is worth noting that al- ready the Philippine people have receiv- ed greater share of self-government, that they have more to say as to how they shall be governed than is the case with any people in the Orient which is under European rule. Nor is this all. Congress has, with far-seeing wisdom, heartily supported all that has been done by the executive. Wise laws for the government of the Philippines have been placed on the statute books, and under those laws provision is made for the introduction into the Philippines of representative government, without only the delay absolutely necessary to allow for the establishment of definite peacefi for the taking of a census and the settling down of the country. In short, we are governing the Filipinos primarily in their interest and for their very great benefit And we have acted in practical fashion-not trying to lay down rules as to what should be done in the remote and uncertain future, but turning our attention to the instant need of things and meeting that need in the fullest and amplest way. It would be hard to say whether we owe most to our military or our civil representatives in the Philippines. The soldiers have shown splendid gallantry in the field and they have done no less admira ble the work in preparing the provinces for civil government. The civil authorities have shown the utmost wisdom in doing a very difficult and very important work of vast etent It would be hard to find in modern times better ex- ample of successful constructive states manship. Finally in the Philippines, as in Cuba, the instances of wrong do- ing among either our civil or military representative have been astonishing ly few; and punishment has been meted with even handed justice to all offend ers
 Nor should it be forgotten that while we have thus acted in the interest of the islanders themselves we have also helped our own people, Our interests are as great in the Pacific as in the At lantic.@- The welfare of California, Oregon and Washington is as vital to the nation as the welfare of New Eng land, New York and the south Atlantic states. The awakening of the Orient means very much to all the nations of Christiandon, commercially no less than politically; and it would be short sighted statesmanship on our part to refuse to take the necessary steps for securing a proper share to our people of this commercial future. The possession of the Philippines has helped us, as the securing of the open door in China has helped us. Already the government has taken the necessary steps to pro- vide for the laying of a Pacific cable under conditions which safeguard abso- lutely the interests of the American public. Our commerce with the East is growing rapidly. Events have abun- dantly justified alike from the moral and material standpoint all that we have done in the far East as a sequel to~our war with Spain.