The Lancaster news. [volume] (Lancaster, S.C.) 1905-current, 1914-06-26
SCORES
WILSON'S POLICIES
Calls $25,OOO,OOO to Colombia
Belated Blackmail.
THE MEXICAN SITUATION.
Says Handling of Foreign Affairs
Has Made Uncle Sam
Ridiculous.

Roosevelt declared the payment of |
$25, 100000 to Colombia for having
secured the right to build the Pana-
ma canal, as provided for in the
pending treaty, merely would be the
payment of belated blackmail
If the proposed treaty is right, he
said, the presence of the United !
States in Panama is wrong and Pana-
ma, therefore, should be restored to
Colombia and the United States
should abandon the zone.
In his statement Col. Roosevelt
said in part:
''The payment of twenty-five mil
lion to Colombia together with the
expression of wnIt is in effect an apol
ogy for our having secured the right
to build the Panama Canal merely is
the belated payment of blackmail
with an apology to the blackmailers.
If this proposed treaty submitted by
President Wilson through Mr.. BRYAN
| is right, then our presence on the 18th
mus is wrong. In such case Panama
/ Immediately should be restored to Co
lombia and we should stop work on
the canal and abandon the place bag
/ and baggage There should be no
halfway measures. If we as a nation
have been guilty Of theft. we should
restore the stolen goods. If we have
not been guilty of theft we should not
pay blackmail.
The handling of our foreign affairs
by President Wilson and Secretary
, Bryan has been such as to make the
United States a figure of fun in the
international world. This proposed
Colombia treaty caps the climax and
! If ratified will rightly render us an
object of contemptuous derision to
every great nation.
Incidentally Col. Roosevelt con
tinued, Il would call the attention of
President Wilson and Secretary Krv
an to the fact that this $4O,OOO.OOO
represents the exact sum which Co.
lombia lost when the United States
Government of that day refused to
submit TO blackmail. They now only
propose to pay $4,000, 900 blackmail
They had better make the Job
thorough while they are about il
and give the whole forty millions.
Colombia has exactly as much right
to one sum as to the other.
AS President 1 declined to allow
Uncle Sam to be blackmailed. Iresi-
dent Wilson now desires the olack.
mail to be paid. His attitude can he
illustrated by hypothetical case.
The present Administration has with
regard to Mexico purchased a course
wavering between peace and war, ex-
quisitely designed to combine the
disadvantages of both, and feebly ten
ding first towards one and then to-
ward the other. Usually it has per
mitted the free ingress of arms into
Mexico both from this country and
from others. Occasionally, however, it
has undergone spasms of unGerst ana
ing that these arms might ultimately
be vscG against our own troops.
+ 1T tAen has prohibited the LANDING
vi arms, sometimes WaDbilng back
again to its original position rs when
1t took Vera Cruz to prevent the and
ing of weapons and munitions of war.
and shortly afterward permitted the
very same arms and munitions tn be
landed. Well, If some future admins
Itration of similar views on interna-
tiona' relations should of,.' Mexico
81, 600, 900 as atonement 70 intermit
tently refusing to allow the landing
"f aims that miSbt be used against
"nr wn people, 1t would be beha,ing
precisely and exactly as President
Wilson'S administration Is b5having
about Colombia.
The conduct of the United States
Government throughout the entire
course of proceeding which resulted
in acquisition of the canal was open
and straightforward, absolutely i'm ac
cordance with the principles of the
highest international morality. Only
by acting precisely as we did act
would we have secured the right to
build the Panama Canal. II is hy-
'pocristy to claim credit for the canal
and at the same time to attempt to
discredit the course which alone rem