Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 6.djvu/132

108 indeed, all over the world, who are now grieving to see us go astray, will rejoice, and their hearts will be uplifted with new confidence in our honesty, in our wisdom and in the virtue of democratic institutions when they behold the American people throwing aside all the puerilities of false pride, and returning to the path of their true duty. The world knows how strong we are. It knows full well that if the American people chose to put forth their strength, they could quickly overcome a foe infinitely more powerful than the Filipinos, and that, if we, possessing the strength of the giant, do not use the giant's strength against this feeble foe, it is from the noblest of motives—our love of liberty, our sense of justice and our respect for the rights of others—the respect of the strong for the rights of the weak. The moral prestige which, in fact, we have lost, will be restored, while our prestige of physical prowess and power will certainly not be lessened by showing that we have not only soldiers, guns, ships and money, but also a conscience.

Therefore, the cry is childish, that, unless we take and keep the Philippines, some other Power will promptly grab them. Many a time this cry has been raised to stampede the American people into a policy of annexation—in the San Domingo case, twenty-eight years ago, and more recently in the case of Hawaii—and in neither case was there the slightest danger—not that there were no foreign Powers that would have liked to have those islands, but because they could not have taken them without the risk of grave consequences. Now the old bugbear must do service again. Why should not American diplomacy set about to secure the consent of the Powers most nearly concerned to an agreement to make the Philippine Islands neutral territory, as Belgium and Switzerland are in Europe? Because some of those Powers would like to have the Philippines themselves? Well, are there not