ET
The Commoner
To the American People.
The Anti-Imperialist leagues of the United
States have been silent since the presidential elec
tion, but cot because they have less faith in their
cause or believe the battle lost. They had hoped
that those who voted for MY. McKiiey, while dis
approving his policy in the West Indies and the
Philippines, would see that their votes were mis
interpreted, and would make their disapproval
known and felt. They had hoped that congress
would claim, its place in our government, and
would insist that the principles of freedom must
be recognized and applied wherever our country
holds sway. They had hoped that the supreme
court would with no uncertain voice declare that
no human being under our control could be with
out the rights secured by our constitution, and that
neither president nor congress, nor both together,
could exercise absolute power over men entitled to
the protection of our flag.
These hopes have not been realized. Where
Benjamin Harrison nobly led, too few have fol
lowed. The war in the Philippines has been prose
cuted with unrelenting cruelty until the resistance
of unhappy islands seems to have been crushed;
Many thousands of their bravest men have been
killed, or have died of disease, during the con
test, and today the president exercises a power as
despotic as the czar's over the whole Filipino
nation. Congress has abdicated its function, has
given these people Into the president's hands, and
has adjourned without attempting to deal with
the questions presented by the islands. Already
It has learned that free government is hard and
absolutism easy a dangerous lesson in a republic.
Liberty and absolutism cannot exist together.
Three years ago congress by joint resolution
declared "that the people of the island of Cuba are
and of right ought to be free and independent"
that they were then independent, and were justly
entitled to be independent. This country inter
vened to establish their independence, and by the
same resolution promised not to exercise 'sover
eignty, jurisdiction or control over said island, ex
cept for the pacification thereof." Today the
president ic the absolute ruler of Cuba. He spends
the revenues of the island as he pleases. No" con
stitution, no law, fetters his power. At his In
stance congress has violated the nation's pledge.
The "independent" Cuban people have been told
thatthew will not be allowed to establish any gov
ernment in their own land, unless they surrender
lb part the control of their finances and foreign
affairs; unless they give to this country the pos
session of strategic points on their 'territory; and
unless in addition they give to it the right to in
tervene in their domestic affairs whenever in the
judgment of our authorities the occasion shall de
mand such intervention. They are offered no op
t on to refuse these dc ands, which are backed by
the presence of American troops on their soil.
Thus to the whole world our course has become
an example of national perfidy. The enforced sub
mission of the Cubans to these unjust requirements
has made the stain on our national record indelible.
The supreme court has spoken, but has left the
law in doubt. Some of its members have given
their countenance to views urged by the admin
istration, of which their associate, Mr. Justice
Harlan, says: "If the principles thus announced
should ever receive the sanction of a majority of
this court, a radical and mischievous change in our
system of government will be the result. We will
In that event pass from the era of constitutional
liberty, guarded and protected by a written consti
tution, into an era of legislative absolutism."
Where such a revolution is threatened, and
when congress and the supreme court both fail,
there Is no help save in the people. If they would
avert the impending calamity they must help
themselves. Let us not be misled by names. Im
perialism is not a question of crowns and sceptres,
of names and titles. It is a system of government.
Wharo a man or body of men, an emperor, a presi
dent, a congress, or a nation, claims the absolute
right to rule a people, to compel the submission of
that people by brute force, to docide what rights
they shall have, what taxes they shall pay, what
judges shall administer their laws, what men shall
govern them all without responsibility to the peo
ple thus governed this is imperialism, the anti
thesis of free government. As Mr. Justice Harlan
says: "The Idea that this country may acquire ter
ritories anywhere upon the earth, by conquest or
treaty, and hold them as mere colonies or pro
vinces, and the peoplo Inhabiting them to enjoy
only such rights as congress chooses to accord
tbem, 13 wholly Inconsistent with the spirit and
genius as well as with the words of the constitu
tion." In organized society there is no liberty that is
not constitutional liberty. Even in America, where
wc have only to fear the abuse of power by our
own fellow-citizens, wo all rely on constitutions,
national and state, to protect our rights. We can
not conceive an American community without
these safeguards. Do not the Inhabitants of Luzon
need against us the protection that we need against
ourselves? It has ever been the American method
to Incorporate acquired territory with representa
tion; it is now proposed to revert to the Roman
method and hold conquered territory by force with
out representation. This policy which we oppose
gives to the Filipinos and Porto Ricans no con
stitutional rights, Ho American citizenship, no
hope of statehood, no voice In the congress which
rules them;, it leaves them without a country, the
subjects of a republic. To believers in free gov
ernment this policy is monstrous.
"Let it be remembered," said the Continental
congress, "that it has ever been the pride and
boast of America that the rights for which she con
tended were the rights of human nature.' When
this country denies to millions of men the rights
which we have ever claimed, not only for our
selves, but for all men, its policy Is suicidal. As
Lincoln said: "Those who deny liberty to others
deserve it not themselves, and under a just God
cannot long retain It." Indifference to liberty any
where breeds indifference to liberty everywhere.
No man can defend despotic methods abroad and
long retain his loyalty to democracy at home. The
common speech of those who support our new pol
icy gives us daily examples of this truth. We can
not have citizens and subjects under the same flag.
"A . house divided against itself cannot stand."
For
"Laws of changeless justice bind oppressor with
oppressed,
And close as sin and suffering joined we march
to fate abreast."
We insist that constitutional liberty shall bo
the inalienable right of every man who owes al
legiance 10 our flag; -that freedom shall belong to
man and cot to place; that our constitution shall
be no. respector of persons, colors, or races; that it
shall recognize the equal rights of all. Ours is the
policy of liberty. Ours is the cause for which the
Am lean revolution was fought and .which tri
umphed again In the civil war. It is the cause of
human freedom now threatened In the house of
its friends. It makes little difference under what
name we rally to its support. Daniel Webster said:
"Arbitrary governments may have territories
and distant possessions because arbitrary govern
ments may rule them by different laws and differ
ent systems. . . . Wa can do no such thing;
They must be- of us, part of us, or else strangers."
With Benjamin Harrison, we are "unable to re
joice in the acquisition of lands and mines and
fc. :ts and commerce, at tho cost of the abandon
ment of the old American idea that a government
of absolute powers Is an Intolerable thing, and,
under tne constitution of the United States, an im
possible tiling." We agree with him that this view
"will not limit the power of territorial expansion;
but it will lead us to limit the use of that power
to regions that may safely be'eomo part of tht
United States, and to peoples whoso American citi
zenship may bo allowed."
Wo urge all Jovors of frcodora to organizo in
defense of human rights now threatened by th
greatest free government in history. Even if our
government may exerciso arbitrary power over mil
lions of men in disregard of tho constitution
which wo deny It can never bo right for it to exer
ciso such power. Right is higher than might
Let every citizen study tho facts and make his
conclusion known, combining with his neighbor to
influence congress to stand truo to tho principles
ot the Declaration by which this government was
founded and undor which it has grown so great.
Tho gravest danger our country has known till
now has come from a denial of those principles.
Tho incomnig congress is not yet committed to the
policy of incorporating the island peoples into our
system without rights. Let it resume its place In
the government in defense of the inalienable right
of man.
We appeal from those who for tho moment ex
erciso the power of the nation to the people who
are tho nation that nation which, on July 4, 1770,
was "conceived in liberty and dedicated to th
proposition that all men are created equal."
AMERICAN ANTI-IMPERIALIST LEAGUE,
By Georgo S. Boutwell, President, and W. J. MJzs
Secretary.
NEW ENGLAND ANTI-IMPERIALIST LEAGUE,
By Albert S. Parsons, Chairman Executive Com
mittee, and Erving Winslow, Secretary. .
ANTI-IMPERIALIST LEAGUE OF NEW YORK,
By Ernest H. Crosby, President, and E. W. Ord
way, Secretary.
AMERICAN LEAGUE OF PHILADELPHIA,
By George G. Mercer, President, and Samuel Mll-
Hken, Secretary.
WASHINGTON ANTI-IMPERIALIST LEAGUE,.
By W. A. Croffut, President.
CINCINNATI ANTI-IMPERIALIST LEAGUE,
By Charles B. Wilby, Chairman Executive Com
mittee. MINNEAPOLIS ANTI-IMPERIALIST LEAGUE,
By Henry J. Fletcher, President.
We concur in tho above address: Carl Schura,
New York; Charles H. Aldrich, Chicago, ex-sollc-Itor-general,
U. S.;- Leonard Woolsey Bacon, Conn.;
John Beatty, Columbus, p.; James L. Blair, St.
Louis; Horace Boles, Iowa; Donelson Caffery, Lou
isiana; D. H. Chamberlain, Massachusetts; Samuel
L. Clemens, New York; C. R. Codman, Massachus
etts; Louis R. Ehrich, Colorado; William H. Flem
ing, Georgia; Frederick W. Gookin, Chicago; Ar
thur C. A. Hall, P. E bishop of Vermont; Moses
Hallett, Denver; Edward Holton James, Seattle,
Wash.; William D. Howells, New York; Henry U.
Johnson, Indiana; Henry W. Lamb, Boston; Daniel
S. Lord, Chicago; J. Laurence Laughlln, Chicago;
Kenry B. Metcalf, Rhode Island; J. Sterling Mor
ton, Nebraska; Charles Eliot Norton, Cambridge,
Mass.; Warren Olney, San Francisco; George L.
Paddock, Chicago; Robert Treat Paine, jr., Bos
ton; Wheeler H. Peckham, New York; Henry
Wade Rogers, New Haven; James Rran, bishop of
Alton; Edwin Burrltt Smith, Chicago; Rufus B.
Smith, Cincinnati; Charles B. Spahr, New York;
J. L. Spalding, bishop of Peoria; Moorfield Storey,
Boston; Charles M. Sturges, Chicago; William G.
Sumner, Now Haven; John J. Valentine, San Fran
cisco; Herbert Welsh, Philadelphia; Horace White,
New York; C. E. S. Wood, Portland, Ore.; Sigmund
Zeisler, Chicago.
Washington Times: The total number of ves
sels passing through the Suez canal In 1900 was 3,
441, of which 1,935 were British, 402 German, 285
French, 232 Dutch, 162 Austrian, 100 Russian, 82
Italian, G3 Japanese, 34 Spanish, 28 Turkish, 3d
Norwegian, 27 Danish, 22 American, 7 Belgian, 3
Portuguese, 2 Swedish, 2 Greece and 1 Argentine.
Thi passengers numbered 282,000, this being tht
highest number on record except that of 1896.
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