Ashland tidings. [volume] (Ashland, Or.) 1876-1919, 1912-09-26
ROOSEVELT'S CONFESSION OF
FAITH"
National Defense Views Given.
eleventh Installment.) }

In international affairs this coun-
try should behave toward other ma
tions exactly as an honorable private
citizen behaves toward other private
citizens. We should do no wrong to
any nation, weak or strong, and we
should submit to no wrong. Above
ALL we should never in any treaty
make any promise which we do not
intend in good faith to fulfill | be-
lieve it essential that our small army
should be kept to a high pitch of
| perfection, and in no way can it be
so damaged as by permitting it to
become the plaything of men in con-
gress who wish to crafty either spite
or favoirtism, or to secure to locali-
ties advantages to which those locali-
ties are not entitled. The navy
should be steadily built up, and the
| process of upbuilding must not be
| stopped until-and not before-it
proves possible to secure by interna-
toinal agreement general reduction
of ornaments The Panama canal
must be fortified 1t would have
been criminal to build it if we were
not prepared to fortify it and to keep
our navy at such pitch of strength
as to render it unsafe for any foreign
power to attack us and get control of
1t. We have perfect right to per-
nit our coastwise traffic with which
there can be no competition by the
merchant marine of any foreign ma
tion-so that there is no discrimina-
tion against any foreign marine) to
pass through that canal on any terms
we choose, and l personally think
that no toll should be charged on
such traffic. Moreover, in time of
war, where all treaties between war
ring nations, save those connected
with the management of the war, at
once lapse, the canal would of course
be open to the use of our warships
and closed to warships of the nation
with which we were engaged in hos
tilities. But at all times the canal
should be opened on equal terms to
the ships of all nations, including our
own, engaged in international COM
merce. That was the understanding
of the treaty when it was adopted,
and the United States must always,
as matter of honorable obligation
and with scrupulous nicely, live up
to every understanding which she
has entered into with any foreign
power.
The question that has arisen over
the right of this nation to charge
tolls on the canal vividly illustrates
the folly and iniquity of making
treaties which cannot and ought not
to be kept AS a people there is no
| LAGOON Ua mora mood n 1aorn than
the lesson not in an outburst of emo
tionalism to make treaty that
ought not to be, and could not be,
kept; and the further lesson that,
when we do make a treaty, we must
soberly live up to it as long as
changed conditions do not warrant
! the serious step of denouncing it. If
we had been so unwise as to adopt the
general arbitration treaties a few
months ago. we would now be bound
to arbitrate the question of our right
to free our own coastwise traffic
from canal tolls; and at any future
time we might have found ourselves
obliged to arbitrate the question
whether, in the event of war, we could
keep the canal open to our own war
vessels and closed to those of our
foes, There could be no better illus
tration of the extreme unwisdom of
entering into international agree
ments without paying heed to the
question of keeping them. On the
other hand, we deliberately, and with
our eyes open, and after ample con-
sideration and discussion, agreed to
treat all merchant ships on the same
basis; it was partly because of this
agreement that there was no ques-
tion raised by foreign nations as to
our digging and fortifying the canal;
and, having given our word, we must
keep it. When the American people
make promise, that promist must
and will be kept.
Views Gained From knowledge.
Now, friends, this is my confession
of faith. | have made it rather long