The Saint Paul globe., 1904-01-24
A NATIONAL CRIME.

| A NATIONAL CRIME.
A crime against humanity is involved
in the new Spanish naval programme
that is to be submitted at the opening
of parliament. 1t includes provision
for the immediate construction of four
cruisers and forty auxiliary vessels,
with the reorganization of the entire
naval service. The expenditure con-
templated is some $6O0OO,0OO.
This would be a generous outlay and
debatabIe policy for a nation of am
pie resources and in great need of pro-
lection for its coasts or it's distant pos
sessions. Spain has no more need Of
navy today than man frostbitten
because of insufficient clothing AMI
without morsel to stay his hunger
has of an expensive nickel-plated re-
volver AT the same time the people
of Spain have great need of this money
that is, to be spent and the future of
Spain depends upon some remission of
taxation and some added possibility of
endurable conditions of life for her
peasantry and her artisans.
greater good fortune to Spain than it
did to us. She was cursed by old tra-
ditions and by the remnants of an
ancient colonial empire that compelled
her to keep up a state which she was
no longer able to maintain. She was
like a man who has inherited splen-
did house, which he cannot give UP
without disgracing the name of his an
cestors and which il will run him in
debt thousands of dollars every year to
keep open. The war that cut off her
colonies closed a drain that was sap
ping her life. The war that destroyed
her navy relieved her from the neces-'
sity OF keeping up a war equipage that
impoverished her people without max
ing her in the least to be feared by any
other-of the powers or helping to es-
of expenditure and sources of debt were
thus swept away by the war which
might have been made for her a cleans
ing and purifying instead of a devour-
ing flame.
Spain proposes deliberately to place
her CALLED and withered neck again
beneath the yoke. She is going to
build a navy for the sake OF the name,
just as man might buy a diamond
stud at the expense of his stomach for
years to come. 1t will not be of any
more practical advantage to her. 1t
will not lift her to the level of the other
European powers. She will not be one
whit more feared as an aggressor or
one iota safer against attack should
anybody contemplate it. The war
ships and the arsenaIs will be a mere
ornamental appendage,. costing not only
the $60,0O0,00O original expenditure. but
more millions annually to maintain
them.
The proportions of this crime are
more apparent when we consider the
deplorable domestic conditions which
prevail in Spain today: In no country
of Europe are the common people so
heavily taxed, so near the margin of
starvation, so utterly deprived of all
that makes life worth living or that
aids in the formation of an admira BILE
individual or national character. In no
country In Europe, for this very reason.
has anarchy made greater progress. In
all the large towns of Spain TODAY
there is a populaee but little above the
level of the wild beast; uninstructed
Goddess, eontenptuous of the rights OF
man or the claims of humanity, anxious
only to fill it's belly with one comfort
able meal and holding grudge against
all the world because that happiness
remains forever beyond its reach.
This mob is forever turbulent. al
| ways ready to raise it's hand against
the powers that be, and must be re-
pressed and kept in subsection by the
military arm. 1t has created a system
of oppressive taxation that closes every
avenue in life to comfort and to hope
This burden is to be increased, this
condition to be aggravated by the i'm
| position of new taxes for the creation
| of useless and expensive navy. The
| marvel of it all is that those who suf
fer most will rush with most effusive
gladness to lick the rod; and that the
new naval programme, plastered over
with the sorry name of national honor.
will have no more enthusiastic sup
porters than the very populace to whom