The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1906-12-21

basis of their mutual sentiment of re-
spect, love and admiration.
THAT fact naturally was never more
eloquently brought home to us than in
that hour of gigantic struggle from which
1t has pleased Providence to see us en-
erSe as power of some consequence.
1t was a struggle in which our very ex-
istenee was at stake. The support ac-
tually received by the Japanese people
at the hanas of the American people
was wider in its scope than mere moral
support and embraced every kind of as
sistance which could consistently be civ
en- to belligerent by nation that has
declared its neutrality in time of war.
The people of Japan are fully alive to
the magnitude of the everlasting service
which was thus rendered by the people
of this country in the cause of Japan
and the memory of that support so
literally given will continue to be
living monument of the cordial friend
ship which cements the two nations.
Turning to the commercial aspect of
the question, the plain facts should not
be lost sight of that the Pacific ocean is
a vast eXpanse of water; that the terri
tories of Japan and the United States
nowhere touch each other, and that East
ern Asia, with more than five hundred
millions of souls, is large enough to give
room for the commerce of all nations,
including that of Japan and of the Unit
ed States. The dream of the pessimist
who sees the phantom of the struggle
for supremacy between Japan and the
United States for the control of the
Pacific is too ridiculous to be made the
subject of serious comment.
"Mr. President, you have fittingly al
luded to the fact that the government
of Japan is as fully and firmly pledged
as the government of the United States
is to the maintenance of the principle
of the open door in the natural markets
fact that in certain circles during the
course of last summer some doubts were:
entertained as to the intentions of Japa-
nese regarding the maintenance of that
principle in Manchuria. [ trust, how
ever, that the sequence of events since
has dispelled all suspicion regarding the
intention of the japanese government to
maintain the principle of equal OppOrtu-
nifty in Manchuria. You may therefore
rest assured that there is the best of
commercial reasons for the resoulte de-
Tense and maintenance by Japan of that
principle with which the name of John
Hay is honorably connected.
Turning to the moral reasons which
should draw the two nations closer and
closer together, it should be observed
that while the political institutions of
the two. countries widely differ in form,
yet that high sense of liberty, equality
and justice which forms the ideal of the
American national life is also the guild
ing principle of Japan's political life.
The love of fair play which is often rel
ferred to as a popularity Anglo Saxon
characteristic. | am proud to say, is
also found in the blood of the japanese.
1t is: therefore safe to say that so long
as the moral character of the two peoples
does not change the, commercial, activi-
ties of the two people will be character
lied by that sense of fairness which is,
after all, the best guarantee of peace in
the intercourse of nations no less than
in the intercourse of individuals"