Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 6.djvu/48

24 It would seem, therefore, that the new territorial acquisitions in view are after all very different from those we have made before. But something more is to be said. When the Cuban affair approached a crisis, President McKinley declared in his message that “forcible annexation cannot be thought of”; for “it would, by our code of morals, be criminal aggression.” And in resolving upon the war against Spain, Congress, to commend that war to the public opinion of the world, declared with equal emphasis and solemnity that the war was, from a sense of duty and humanity, made specifically for the liberation of Cuba, and that Cuba “is, and of right ought to be free and independent.” If these declarations were not sincere, they were base and disgraceful acts of hypocrisy. If they were sincere at the time, would they not be turned into such disgraceful acts of hypocrisy by subsequently turning the war, professedly made from motives of duty and humanity, into a war of conquest and self-aggrandizement? It is pretended that those virtuous promises referred to Cuba only. But if President McKinley had said that the forcible annexation of Cuba would be criminal aggression, but that the forcible annexation of anything else would be perfectly right, and if Congress had declared that as to Cuba the war would be one of mere duty, humanity and liberation, but that we would take by conquest whatever else we could lay our hands on, would not all mankind have broken out in a shout of scornful derision?

I ask in all candor, taking President McKinley at his word, will the forcible annexation of the Philippines by our code of morals not be criminal aggression—a self-confessed crime? I ask further, if the Cubans, as Congress declared, are and of right ought to be free and independent, can anybody tell me why the Porto Ricans and the Filipinos ought not of right to be free and independent? Can you sincerely recognize the right to freedom and