The evening times. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1906-1914, 1906-11-10
THE PRESIDENTS TRIP.

THE PRESIDENTS TRIP.
President Roosevelt's visit to Pan
ana will be unique and an suspicious |
incident in American history. 1t will
not be the first time a president has |
gone outside of the territorial limits |
Of the United States, but it will be the |
first time one has visited a foreign |
country. In that it will set COM
mendable precedent. In stopping at !
Porto Rico on his way south Mr..
Roosevelt will do away with the fool
ish notion that the outlying posses
sions Of the United States can never
be visited by the president because in
so doing he would have to leave the
United States. One OF these days, We
may hope, he or some succeeding pres
ident will visit our other possessions
Hawaii, Guam, the Philippines, and
above all, Alaska. which we have
owned for nearly forty years and dur
ing the administrations of nine presi-
dents. but which, because of a foolish
superstition, has never yet been Wis
tied by the chief Of its government. In
visiting Panama he will demonstrate
that president Of the United States
is not prisoner, a Dahl Lama or a
Brooding Buddha, but is free to go
about the world as is the French pres
ident or the German emperor.
We must regard it. too, as particu-
larly suspicious that this first foreign
excursion Of an American president is
to be made to one Of the republics of
Latin America. Those countries have,
and not entirely without reason, often
regarded the United States as either
too cold or too patronizing to be an
ideal neighbor. 1t Is cause for re-
proach to this country that it has so
little cultivated intercourse with those
states and has largely left it to them
to take the initiative in commercial
or other appointments. Able men
have held that the best possible way
Of maintaining and vipdicating the
Monroe Doctrine would be not to stand
at one side-and bid Europe keep hands
on, but ourselves to cultivate the clos
est possible relationships, commercial,
social and political, with South Amer
lea, and make American influences so
potent there as to preclude all danger
Of European intrusion. For President
Roosevelt to select one Of those repub-
lies as the object OF the first foreign
visit of an American president cannot
fail tn create a most favorable impress
sion In all the southern continent and
to prove an important step toward a
desirable end.
The Panama canal, which furnishes
the occasion Of the presidents Journey,
is commonly thought Of as an east and
west route Of traffic. Doubtless it will
be thet. a connecting passageway be-
tween our own eastern and western
coasts, and a highway from our east
eru states to that far east which is the
west. Nevertheless, as a matter Of
fact the canal runs not east and west,
but north and south, and we shall do
we'll to bear in mind the great part 1t
is TO I'LL in the promotion Of traffic
between North America and South
America. In the narrowest material
sense it will cut the two continents
asunder. In the highest, broadcast.
most important sense it will draw
them close together and unite them
with indissoluble bonds. 1t is we'll that
the president is in this unprecedented
manner to identify himself with that
epoch making work and with what we
may confidently regard as the opening
Of a new and mutually beneficent era
in the relationship of the great Amer
lean continents.
THE COUNTY PRINTING.