The Tupelo journal., 1904-12-09

It would be a wicked thing for tire most
civilized powers. for those with most sense
of international obligations and with keen.
est and most generous appreciation OF the
difference between right and wrong, to dis
arm. If the great civilized nations of the
present day should completely disarm, the
result would mean an immediate recru-
descence of barbarism in one form or an
other. Under any circumstances a suffi-
cient armament would have to be kept up
to serve the purposes of international po-
lice; and until international cohesion and
the sense of international duties and rights
are far more advanced than at present, a
nation DESTROYS both Of securing respect
for itself and of doing good to others must
have a force adequate for the work which
1t feels is allotted to it as its part of the
general world duty. Therefore it follows
that a self-respecting, just and far-seeing
nation should on the one hand endeavor
by every means to aid in the development
or the various movements which tend to
provide substitutes for war, which tend to
render nations in their actions toward one
another. and indeed toward their own peo-
pies, more responsive to the general senti-
ment of humane and civilized mankind;
and on the other hand, that 1t should keep
prepared, while scrupulously avoiding
wrongdoing itself, to repel any wrong, and
in exceptional cases to take action which
In a more advanced stage of international
relations would come under the head of the
exercise of the international police. A
great free people owes it to itself and to all
mankind not to sink into helplessness be-
fore the ower of evil.
Second Hague Conference.
We are in every way endeavoring to help
on. with cordial good will, every movement
which will tend to bring US into more friend
ly relations with the rest of mankind. In
pursuance of this policy l shall shortly lay
before the senate treaties of arbitration
with all powers which are willing to enter
into these treaties with us. 1t is not pos
sible at this period of the worlds develop
ment to agree to arbitrate all matters, but
there are many matters of possible differ
ence between US and other nations which
can be thus arbitrated. Furthermore, at
the request of the Interpariiamentary
union, an eminent body composed of prac-
teal statesmen from all countries, l have
asked the powers to join with this govern
ment in a second Hague conference, at
which it is hoped that the work already so
happily begun at The Hague may be car
ried some steps further toward completion.
This carries out the desire expressed by
the first Hague conference itself.
The Monroe Doctrine.
Al llIS the NIOHEOe bOCtTlIt, III TAX
ing such steps as we have taken in regard to
Cuba, Venezuela and Panama, and in en-
~GeaVorlng to ircumscribe the theater of
war in the far east. and to secure the open
door in China, We have acted in our own
interest as well as in the interest of human
lty at large. There are, however. cases in
which, while our own interests are not
greatly involved, strong appeal is made to
our sympathies. Ordinarily it is very much
wiser and more useful for us to concern
ourselves with striving for our own moral
and material betterment here at home than
to concern ourselves with trying 10 better
the condition of things in other nations.
We have plenty of sins of our own to war
against, and under ordinary circumstance
We can do more for the general uplifting of
humanity by striving with heart and soul
to put a stop to civic corruption, to brutal
lawlessness and violent race prejudices
here at home than by passing resolutions
about wrongdoing elsewhere. Neverthe-
less there are occasional crimes committed
on so vast a scale and of such peculiar hor-
ror as to make us doubt whether it is not
our manifest duty to endeavor at least to
show our disapproval of the deed and our
sympathy with those who have suffered by
it. The cases must be extreme in which
such a course is justifiable. There must be
no effort made to remove the mote from
our brothers eye if we refuse to remove
NAIC III OuT buI III eNlTGIl0
cases action nay be justifiable and proper.
What form the action shall take must de-
pend upon the circumstance of the case:
that is, upon the degree of the ~atrocity and
upon our power to remedy it. The cases
in which we could interfere by force Of
arms as we interfered to put a stop to in
tolerable conditions in Cuba are neces-
sarily very few. Yet it is not to be expected
that a people like ours, which in spite Of
certain very obvious shortcomings. never
thelesS as a whole shows by its consistent
practice its belief in the principles of civil
and religious liberty and of orderly free
dom, a people among whom even the worst
crime, like the crime of lynching. is never
more than sporadic, so that individuals and
not classes are molested in their funda-
mental rights-it is inevitable that such a
nation should desire eagerly to give express
sion to It's horror on an occasion like that
of the massacre of the Jews in Kishineff, or
when it witnesses such systematic and
~long-eXtended cruelty and oppression as
the cruelty and oppression Of which the
Armenians have been the victims, and
which have won for them the indignant
pity Of the civilized world.
The Philippines.
In the Philippine Islands there has been
during the past year a continuation of
the steady progress which has obtained
ever since our troops definitely got the
upper hand of the insurgents. The Phil
ippine people. or. to speak more accur-
Ately, the many tribes, and ever races,
sundered from one another more or less
sharply, who go to make up the people
of the Philippine islands, contain many
elements of good, and some elements
which WI have a right to hope stand for
progress. At present they are utterly
incapable of existing in independence at
all or of building up a civilization of
their own. 1 firmly believe that we can
help them to rise higher and higher in
the scale of civilization and of capacity
for self-government, and 1 most earnest
ly hope that in the end they will be able
to stand, if not entirely alone, yet in
some such relation to the United States
as Cuba now stands. This end is not yet
in sight, and it may be indefinitely post
poned if our people are foolish enough to
turn the attention of the Filipinos away
from the problems of achieving moral
and material prosperity. of working for
a stable, orderly and just government,
and toward foolish and dangerous in
trigue5 for a complete independence for
which they are as yet totally unfit.
On the other hand our people must
keep steadily before their minds the fact
that the justification for our stay in the
Philippines must ultimately rest chiefly
uI l the good we are able to do in the
islands. 1 do not overlook the fact that
in the development of our interests in
the Pacific ocean and along it's coasts,
the Philippines have played and will play
an important part, and that our interests
have been served in more than one way
by the possession of the stands. But our
chief reason for continuing to hold them
must be that we ought in good faith
to try to do our share of the worlds