Page:War and Other Essays.djvu/316

280 be raised and that, if they are, a great advantage will be produced for the wages class. We have also a project before us to inclose all America in a barrier within which an arbitrary circulation of silver money may be secured, all relations with the money of the rest of the world being cut off. That these doctrines and projects all hang together, and are all coherent with the political notion of the dual division of the world, is obvious. The common element is in the narrow and distorted view of what is true and possible and desirable in social and economic affairs.

We have had before us, since the revolt of the English North American colonies, another conception of the organization of human society which is to come out of the extension of civilization to the outlying continents. It is, in fact, now embedded in international law and in the diplomacy of civilized states. That is why the advocates of the Monroe doctrine have been forced to meet the argument that their doctrine was not in international law by new spinnings of political metaphysics. They have to try to cover the fact that the Monroe doctrine is an attempt by the United States to define the rights of other nations. The modern conception, however, is that the states of the world are all united in a family of nations whose rights and duties toward each other are embodied in a code of international law. All states may be admitted into this family of nations whenever they accept this code, whether they have previously been considered "civilized" or not. The code itself is a product of the reasoning and moral convictions of civilized states, and it grows by precedents and usages, as cases arise for the application of the general principles which have been accepted as sound, because they conduce to peace, harmony, and smooth progress of affairs. The code has undergone its