The Salt Lake tribune. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1890-current, 1913-12-23
ON THE FIRING LINE AGAIN.

At last the long looked for tussle
has come. Roosevelt did everything to
avert it. He submitted his speeches
TO the foreign Offices at Rio dc ia
neiro. Bucnos Aires and Santiago de
Chile. He let il be known that he
wanted all his speeches TO be diplo-
natically correct, safe, sane and sound
He bore a message Of peace and good
viii 10 South America from Mr.. Roose-
welt and the United States. And yet,
in spite Of all his efforts TO maintain
the peace, he got into fight al San
tiago But decidedly it was not his
fault; ii was forced upon him by Dr..
Msrcial Martinez. who, if VIC are to
believe his biographers, is one of our
best friends in South America.
At public banquet in honor Of our
former president. DIR. Martinez made
speech in which he pronounced tho
Monroe doctrine dead, preached its
funeral sermon, and sat down. Up rose
Colonel Roosevelt. in high and lofty
dudgeon, TO proclaim, as Mark Twain
would say, that the report OF the Mon
roe doctrine s death was greatly eXag-
gerated. He maintained that it was
,,o1 L.. of ,Lnrr r,~11
relations in the western hemisphere aud
lie Was right.
Could anyone wish Nj. Roosevelt
greater JOY than this9 He did not seek
the fight, but it came to him. All of
as who believe that we are familiar
with the bellicose characteristics of the
colonel will also believe that he would
have come home from South America
sorely disappointed if he had failed to
engage in at least one fight. More
over, the American people would have
been almost equally chagrined, We
fo-esaw that when Mr.. Roosevelt went
20 Africa he would be able to find a
fight somewhere. The colonel probab bly,
feared that the fight would occur some
where IN darkest Africa where tele-
graph lines are few and far between
Bat how splendid it was for the col
onel and for all true Americans when
he succeeded IN s'pulling of the fight
IN The Rome Of Caius Marius Mark An.
tony, Caesar and Plus Y. He made
Rome howl and the world echoed back
The howl. And now as great tri-
umpb has como TO him. He has had
his fight without seeking il. He CON
dueted himself as patriotic American
by refusing to sit silent while the Chill
can diplomat sneered at our most cher
ished international doctrine Very
properly he resented the wholly un-
callcdfor slight put upon him and the
United States by Dr. Martinez, and he
win return hone rejoicing with an.
other scalp at his belt.
Dr.. Martinez voiced the sentiment Of
the chief South american nations. Al
though people OF these lands must real
izc that the Monroe doctriue has been
protection to them and serious bur-
den TO the United States in times of
trouble. yet they regard it as placing
them in humiliatlrg position. An IN
dependent nation is one possessing com
plete sovereignty. The South Ameri-
cans feel, and rightly, that the Monroe
doctrine abrogates portion of the
sovereignty which they claim as indie
pendent nations, Every exercise Of the
doctrine by the United States limits
the right of the other nations on this
hemisphere to conduct their interna-
tlonal negotiations as completely free
and independent powers. It matters not
that the Monroe doctrine has been used
benevolently by the United States and
that IL has been a protection and a
benefit TO the other republics on this
side of the globe The very fact that
it docs limit sovereignty is sufficient
reason for the South Americans to re.
pudiate it aud to demand that the
United States consider it dead Issue
but the people Of this country DO not
share the South American point OF
view. Thcy believe ia the Monroe doc
trine and have always been willing to
maintain it, even by the arbitrament OF
arms.