Page:Carl Schurz- 1898-07-14 Imperialism The Independent.pdf/4

1898 authorized but morally obliged to annex them. Is this reasonable? When, before the war, the right and duty of intervention in Cuba was being discussed, the following illustration was used by way of argument:

“My neighbor is an old brute, who cruelly maltreats his children. I witness across the fence in my back yard how he mercilessly cudgels one of his daughters, and kicks her nigh to death. Is it not my moral duty to jump over the fence, and to rescue the girl from the brutality of her unnatural parent?”

I accept the simile, but I say: “If it is my moral duty to rescue the girl, it does not follow that, after I have knocked down the old tyrant and rescued the girl, it will also, if she cannot take care of herself, be my moral duty to marry her, or to adopt her as a daughter and take her into my own household as a permanent member of my family; for she may be very undesirable company for my own children.” And this is the real point to be considered as to whether the having of those colonies would be good for us.

Is there aconscientious and sober-minded man among the Imperialists who will deny that in deciding this question of expansion the welfare of our own people should be our first consideration? Is there one who will deny that it would be an exceedingly risky experiment to annex Cuba and Porto Rico and the Philippines and to incorporate them in our political system as States on an equal footing with the other States, not only to govern themselves, but to take part in governing the whole Republic, with such populations as they have, and considering that, owing to the influences of the tropical climate, those populations will never be like ours? And is there one who will deny, that it will be an equally risky experiment, to annex those countries and to govern them in the pro-consular way—a system of government which, aside from overthrowing all the fundamental principles of our institutions, would be likely—I might say certain—to bring into our politics a flood of corruption?

I know it is pretended by some of the Imperialists that of late our statesmanship has been at a low ebb, because it had to deal only with parochial questions; that our country was too small for great statesmen, that we needed expansion to make our views larger; that if we only obeyed our new “consciousness” and

recognized our “destiny,” such small topics as silver and the tariff would be crowded out by vast international interests, and that greater responsibilities would not only make us broader in our conceptions, and wiser, but also more virtuous. We heard similar predictions when “Greater New York” was in issue. We were told that the larger responsibility for so great a city as that would be, would arouse the citizens from their apathy to a firm determination that only the best and wisest men should be in the high places thereof. The first result was the restoration of old Tammany Hall to power. Does any one believe that if we annex the Spanish colonies Bosses Croker and Platt will lose their power, and New York City will send Joseph Choate and Seth Low to Congress instead of Sulzer and Quigg? We have heard much of the Sugar Trust exercising great influence in Congress. The first effect of the annexation of the Spanish colonies would be likely to add to the Sugar Trust a Manila combine and a Cuba and Porto Rico ring working to get favorable legislation from Congress for their own enrichment. I certainly do not despair of the purification of our politics. But I look for it in the concentration of the people’s attention upon our home affairs, not in its distraction from them and in the multiplication of the elements of corruption. Here lies what I deem the first duty the American people owe to themselves—not the care for the people of Cuba, Porto Rico and the Philippines. After liberating them we should do for them the best we can, but in any event keep them out of our own household.

There are many other phases of this great subject—the matter of expense, for instance—which I cannot discuss here for lack of space. I will only add that I expect this craze to pass over as other crazes have passed before when the search-lights of public discussion were turned upon them. It is said that the Republicans are likely to make the expansion policy a party issue and that they rely for their triumph upon the war-cry and upon the unpopularity of the Democratic silver policy with the conservative citizens of the country. This may prove a miscalculation. I have seen several very earnest Sound Money men who reason thus: “A victory of the silver party would be a great calamity, but a calamity which in the course of time may be repaired. The annexation of the Spanish colonies would be in its