River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1904-12-08

It would be a wicked thing for the most
civilized powers, for those with most ser Sc
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 am
other. Under any circumstances a sufi-
cient armament would have to be kept uI
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 force adequate for the work which
1t feels is allotted to it as it's part of the
general world duty. Therefore it follows
that self-respecting, just and far-seeing
nation should on the one hand endeavor
Dy 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 enc
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 it should keep
prepared, While ScrupuouSly avoiding
Wrongdolng itself, to repel any wrong, and
IN exceptional cases to take action which
In more advanced stage of International
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 powers of evil
Second Hague Conference.
We are in every way endeavoring to helm
on, with cordial good will, every movement
which will tend to bring US into more friend
Iy 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
sloIe 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 Interparliamentary
union, an eminent body composed of prac-
teal statesmen from all countries, l have
asked the powers to join with this govern
ment in second Hague conference, at
which 1t 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.
In asserting the Monroe Doctrine, in taxi
Ing such steps as we have taken in regard to
Cuba, Venezuela and Panama and in en-
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-
tty 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 IL 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 to better
the condition of things in other nations
We have plenty of sins of our own to war
against, and under ordinary circumstances
we can do more for the general uplifting Of
humanity by striving with heart and soul
to put 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 scale and of such peculiar hor-
TOR 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
1t. The cases must be extreme in which
such course is justifable. There must be
no effort made to remove the mote from
our brothers eye If we refuse to remove
the beam from our own. But in extreme
cases action may be justifable and proper.
What form the action shall take must de-
pend upon the circumstances 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 people like ours which in spite of
certain very obvious shortcomings, never
theless as a whole shows by it's consistent
practice Its belief in the principles Of civil
and religious liberty and of orderly free
HIM ytnV,n ~,
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 its 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 anu 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 even 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 we have right to hope stand for
progress. At present they utterly
incapable of existing in independence at
all or OF building up a civilization Il
their own. I firmly believe that we can
help them to rise higher and higher in
the scale of civilization and of capacity
for Self-government, and I 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
from the problems of achieving moral
| and material prosperity, of working for
stable, orderly and just government,
and toward foolish and dangerous in
trigues for 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
upon the good we are able to do in the
| islands. l do not overlook the fact that
| IN the development Of our interests in
| the Pacific ocean and along its 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 islands. 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 world 8
| work, and this particular piece of work
has been imposed upon US by the results
| of the war with Spain.
For Elective Government.