The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1912-02-29

TILE IN QUESTION
Several Vital Topics Which Uncle
Sam Would Not Wish Decided
Excepting by
Himself.

United Press Leased Wire Service. ! /
WASHINGTON, Feb. 2a.-Not only |
the Monroe doctrine, but Americas
title to the Panama canal might be
jeopardized if the British and French
arbitration treaties were ratified in
their present form, according to SEN
sational speech in the senate today by
Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, of Mass
achusetts.
I'VE are entirely in the dark said
Lodge, "as to the meaning which the
Hague court, or special commission
or high commission OF inquiry might
give to the word 'justiciable' or to the
words equity and law
Lodge contended that the provision
creating the high joint commission
with its supreme authority should be
stricken from the treaties or that 1t
be made clear in the resolution of rat
if1cation that no question should be
submitted to arbitration without the
consent of the senate.
Suppose, for example, some eastern
power should directly or indirectly
take possession of the harbor on the
west coast of Mexico for making it a
place Of arms" he said. Il am using
no imagination in suggesting such a
case. It is not very long since an in
4 direct movement was begun, and it is
apparently still on foot, to obtain pos
q session sog foreign power OF Mag
dalena Bay, SO I may fairly suppose
that such a case might arise
! Lodge referred, of course. to Japan,
He added that II such an attempt
should be made the United States
would protest that 1t was violation
of the Monroe doctrine
: What chance he asked, do yon
think the Monroe doctrine wouI nave
! before commission made up in part
of persons not Americans" The
!, Monroe doctrine is not international
law. 1t is policy of the United
States, declared as essential to its
! safety. Do you think the Amer.csn
people would arbitrate? / do not and
do not think it ought to be arbitrat-
ed"
Other questions that would not be
arbitrated, Lodge declared, would be
the attempted purchase by a foreign
} power of Galapagos Islands, owned by
Ecuador, which lie near the western
3 mouth of the Panama canal; or of the
Island of Curacao, owned by Holland
l near the eastern end of the canal
Take the question of immigration
Chinese, or il you prefer Asia, said
Lodge. "I do not believe the Ameri
, can people would ever permit such
: question to be arbitrated'
I Lodge then cited the Panama cana
D tolls as something that could not be
! arbitrated.
I Our title to our own canal" hs
: said might be called in question
s Three successive secretaries of state
: have refused, and properly refused
| to submit our title to arbitration, ant
now under clause three OF article
three, as interpret 1t, we might b'
forced to submit that title to Th'
4 Hague court or some outside tribunal
The men who rejected the Hay,Horal
!. treaty because they hoped to extor
i more than s10,000,000 from us TO
their own use are even now strug
J. Cling, through assistants in this coun
try who mean to share the spoil. t,
d secure by arbitration what they faile'
h to obtain by blackmail and could no
seize by violence.
Our title to the canal or to on
d territory anywhere is not to be drag
4, ged before any tribunal for examine
" tion and determination and nothin
i. should be subscribed to by us whic
e by any twisting could be construe
% into a promise, that we would submi
/, such question to any Judgment bu
n our own