Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 6.djvu/141

Rh demn as wanton and iniquitous, the more complete our success, the greater will be our disgrace?

What do they fear for the Republic if, before having fully consummated this criminal aggression, we stop to give a people struggling for their freedom what is due them? Will this Republic be less powerful? It will be as strong as ever, nay, stronger, for it will have saved the resources of its power from useless squandering and transformed vindictive enemies into friends. Will it be less respected? Nay, more, for it will have demonstrated its honesty at the sacrifice of false pride. Is this the first time that a powerful nation desisted from the subjugation of a weaker adversary? Have we not the example of England before us, who, after a seven-year war against the American colonists, recognized their independence? Indeed, the example of England teaches us a double lesson. England did not, by recognizing American independence, lose her position in the world and her chances of future greatness; on the contrary, she grew in strength. And secondly, England would have retained, or won anew, the friendship of the Americans, if she had recognized American independence more promptly, before appearing to have been forced to do so by humiliating defeats. Will our friends who are for Philippine independence, but also for continuing to kill those who fight for it, take these two lessons to heart?

Some of them say that we have here to fulfill some of the disagreeable duties of patriotism. Patriotism! Who were the true patriots of England at the time of the American Revolution—King George and Lord North, who insisted upon subjugation; or Lord Chatham and Edmund Burke, who stood up for American rights and American liberty?

Who were the true patriots of France when, recently, that ghastly farce of a military trial was enacted to sacri-