getting definite and detailed information as to the character of
land and timber within their boundaries. This method of action often
resulted in badly chosen boundaries and consequent injustice to
settlers and others. Therefore this Administration adopted the present
method of first withdrawing the land from disposal, followed by careful
examination on the ground and the preparation of detailed maps and
descriptions, before any forest-reserve is created.
I have repeatedly called attention to the confusion which exists
in Government forest matters because the work is scattered among
three independent organizations. The United States is the only one
of the great nations in which the forest work of the Government
is not concentrated under one department, in consonance with the
plainest dictates of good administration and common-sense. The
present arrangement is bad from every point of view. Merely to
mention it is to prove that it should be terminated at once. As I
have repeatedly recommended, all the forest work of the Government
should be concentrated in the Department of Agriculture, where the
larger part of that work is already done, where practically all of
the trained foresters of the Government are employed, where chiefly
in Washington there is comprehensive firsthand knowledge of the
problems of the reserves acquired on the ground, where all problems
relating to growth from the soil are already gathered, and where
all the sciences auxiliary to forestry are at hand for prompt and
effective co-operation. These reasons are decisive in themselves, but
it should be added that the great organizations of citizens whose
interests are affected by the forest reserves, such as the National
Live Stock Association, the National Wool Growers’ Association, the
American Mining Congress, the National Irrigation Congress, and the
National Board of Trade, have uniformly, emphatically, and most of them
repeatedly, expressed themselves in favor of placing all Government
forest work in the Department of Agriculture because of the peculiar
adaptation of that Department for it. It is true, also, that the
forest services of nearly all the great nations of the world are under
the respective departments of agriculture, while in but two of the
smaller nations and in one colony are they under the department of the
interior. This is the result of long and varied experience, and it
agrees fully with the requirements of good administration in our own
case.
The creation of a forest service in the Department of Agriculture will
have for its important results:
First. A better handling of all forest work, because it will be under
a single head, and because the vast and indispensable experience of
the Department in all matters pertaining to the forest reserves, to
forestry in general, and to other forms of production from the soil,
will be easily and rapidly accessible.
Second. The reserves themselves, being handled from the point of view
of the man in the field, instead of the man in the office, will be more
easily and more widely useful to the people of the West than has been
the case hitherto.
Third. Within a comparatively short time the reserves will become
self-supporting. This is important, because continually and rapidly
increasing appropriations will be necessary for the proper care of
this exceedingly important interest of the Nation, and they can and
should be offset by returns from the National forests. Under similar
circumstances the forest possessions of other great nations form an
important source of revenue to their Governments.
Every administrative officer concerned is convinced of the necessity
for the proposed consolidation of forest work in the Department of
Agriculture, and I myself have urged it more than once in former
messages. Again I commend it to the early and favorable consideration
of the Congress. The interests of the Nation at large and of the West
in particular have suffered greatly because of the delay.
* * * * *
I call the attention of the Congress again to the report and
recommendation of the Commission on the Public Lands forwarded by me
to the second session of the present Congress. The Commission has
prosecuted its investigations actively during the past season, and a
second report is now in an advanced stage of preparation.
* * * * *
In connection with the work of the forest reserves I desire again to
urge upon the Congress the importance of authorizing the President to
set aside certain portions of these reserves or other public lands as
game refuges for the preservation of the bison, the wapiti, and other
large beasts once so abundant in our woods and mountains and on our
great plains, and now tending toward extinction. Every support should
be given to the authorities of the Yellowstone Park in their successful
efforts at preserving the large creatures therein; and at very little
expense portions of the public domain in other regions which are wholly
unsuited to agricultural settlement could be similarly utilized. We
owe it to future generations to keep alive the noble and beautiful
creatures which by their presence add such distinctive character to
the American wilderness. The limits of the Yellowstone Park should
be extended southward. The Canyon of the Colorado should be made a
national park; and the national park system should include the Yosemite
and as many as possible of the groves of giant trees in California.
* * * * *
The veterans of the Civil War have a claim upon the Nation such as no
other body of our citizens possess. The Pension Bureau has never in
its history been managed in a more satisfactory manner than is now the
case.
* * * * *
The progress of the Indians toward civilization, though not rapid,
is perhaps all that could be hoped for in view of the circumstances.
Within the past year many tribes have shown, in a degree greater than
ever before, an appreciation of the necessity of work. This changed
attitude is in part due to the policy recently pursued of reducing the
amount of subsistence to the Indians, and thus forcing them, through
sheer necessity, to work for a livelihood. The policy, though severe,
is a useful one, but it is to be exercised only with judgment and with
a full understanding of the conditions which exist in each community
for which it is intended. On or near the Indian reservations there is
usually very little demand for labor, and if the Indians are to earn
their living and when work can not be furnished from outside (which
is always preferable), then it must be furnished by the Government.
Practical instruction of this kind would in a few years result in the
forming of habits of regular industry, which would render the Indian
a producer, and would effect a great reduction in the cost of his
maintenance.
It is commonly declared that the slow advance of the Indians is due to
the unsatisfactory character of the men appointed to take immediate
charge of them, and to some extent this is true. While the standard of
the employees in the Indian Service shows great improvement over that
of bygone years, and while actual corruption or flagrant dishonesty
is now the rare exception, it is, nevertheless, the fact that the
salaries paid Indian agents are not large enough to attract the best
men to that field of work. To achieve satisfactory results the official
in charge of an Indian tribe should possess the high qualifications
which are required in the manager of a large business, but only in
exceptional cases is it possible to secure men of such a type for
these positions. Much better service, however, might be obtained from
those now holding the places were it practicable to get out of them
the best that is in them, and this should be done by bringing them
constantly into closer touch with their superior officers. An agent
who has been content to draw his salary, giving in return the least
possible equivalent in effort and service, may, by proper treatment, by
suggestion and encouragement, or persistent urging, be stimulated to
greater effort and induced to take a more active personal interest in
his work.
Under existing conditions an Indian agent in the distant West may be
wholly out of touch with the office of the Indian Bureau. He may very
well feel that no one takes a personal interest in him or his efforts.
Certain routine duties in the way of reports and accounts are required
of him, but there is no one with whom he may intelligently consult on
matters vital to his work, except after long delay. Such a man would be
greatly encouraged and aided by personal contact with some one whose
interest in Indian affairs and whose authority in the Indian Bureau
were greater than his own, and such contact would be certain to arouse
and constantly increase the interest he takes in his work.
The distance which separates the agents—the workers in the field—from
the Indian Office in Washington is a chief obstacle to Indian progress.
Whatever shall more closely unite these two branches of the Indian
Service, and shall enable them to co-operate more heartily and more
effectively, will be for the increased efficiency of the work and the
betterment of the race for whose improvement the Indian Bureau was
established. The appointment of a field assistant to the Commissioner
of Indian Affairs would be certain to ensure this good end. Such an
official, if possessed of the requisite energy and deep interest in
the work, would be a most efficient factor in bringing into closer
relationship and a more direct union of effort the Bureau in Washington
and its agents in the field; and with the co-operation of its branches
thus secured the Indian Bureau would, in measure fuller than ever
before, lift up the savage toward that self-help and self-reliance
which constitute the man.
* * * * *
In 1907 there will be held at Hampton Roads the tricentennial
celebration of the settlement at Jamestown, Va., with which the history
of what has now become the United States really begins. I commend this
to your favorable consideration. It is an event of prime historic
significance, in which all the people of the United States should feel,
and should show, great and general interest.
* * * * *
In the Post Office Department the service has increased in efficiency,
and conditions as to revenue and expenditure continue satisfactory.
The increase of revenue during the year was $9,358,181.10, or 6.9
per cent, the total receipts amounting to $143,382,624.34. The
expenditures were $152,362,116.70, an increase of about 9 per cent over
the previous year, being thus $8,979,492.36 in excess of the current
revenue. Included in these expenditures was a total appropriation
of $12,956,637.35 for the continuation and extension of the rural
free-delivery service, which was an increase of $4,902,237.35 over
the amount expended for this purpose in the preceding fiscal year.
Large as this expenditure has been, the beneficent results attained
in extending the free distribution of mails to the residents of rural
districts have justified the wisdom of the outlay. Statistics brought
down to the 1st of October, 1904, show that on that date there were
27,138 rural routes established, serving approximately 12,000,000 of
people in rural districts remote from post offices, and that there were
pending at that time 3,859 petitions for the establishment of new rural
routes. Unquestionably some part of the general increase in receipts
is due to the increased postal facilities which the rural service has
afforded. The revenues have also been aided greatly by amendments in
the classification of mail matter, and the curtailment of abuses of the
second-class mailing privilege. The average increase in the volume of
mail matter for the period beginning with 1902 and ending June, 1905
(that portion for 1905 being estimated), is 40.47 per cent, as compared
with 25.46 per cent for the period immediately preceding, and 15.92 for
the four-year period immediately preceding that.
* * * * *
Our consular system needs improvement. Salaries should be substituted
for fees, and the proper classification, grading, and transfer of
consular officers should be provided. I am not prepared to say that a
competitive system of examinations for appointment would work well; but
by law it should be provided that consuls should be familiar, according
to places for which they apply, with the French, German, or Spanish
languages, and should possess acquaintance with the resources of the
United States.
* * * * *
The collection of objects of art contemplated in Section 5586 of the
Revised Statutes should be designated and established as a National
Gallery of Art; and the Smithsonian Institution should be authorized to
accept any additions to said collection that may be received by gift,
bequest, or devise.
* * * * *
It is desirable to enact a proper National quarantine law. It is
most undesirable that a State should on its own initiative enforce
quarantine regulations which are in effect a restriction upon
interstate and international commerce. The question should properly
be assumed by the Government alone. The Surgeon-General of the
National Public Health and Marine-Hospital Service has repeatedly and
convincingly set forth the need for such legislation.
* * * * *
I call your attention to the great extravagance in printing and binding
Government publications, and especially to the fact that altogether too
many of these publications are printed. There is a constant tendency to
increase their number and their volume. It is an understatement to say
that no appreciable harm would be caused by, and substantial benefit
would accrue from, decreasing the amount of printing now done by at
least one-half. Probably the great majority of the Government reports
and the like now printed are never read at all, and furthermore the
printing of much of the material contained in many of the remaining
ones serves no useful purpose whatever.
* * * * *
The attention of the Congress should be especially given to the
currency question, and that the standing committees on the matter in
the two Houses charged with the duty take up the matter of our currency
and see whether it is not possible to secure an agreement in the
business world for bettering the system; the committees should consider
the question of the retirement of the greenbacks and the problem of
securing in our currency such elasticity as is consistent with safety.
Every silver dollar should be made by law redeemable in gold at the
option of the holder.
* * * * *
I especially commend to your immediate attention the encouragement of
our merchant marine by appropriate legislation.
* * * * *
The growing importance of the Orient as a field for American exports
drew from my predecessor, President McKinley, an urgent request for its
special consideration by the Congress. In his message of 1898 he stated:
“In this relation, as showing the peculiar volume and value of our
trade with China and the peculiarly favorable conditions which exist
for their expansion in the normal course of trade, I refer to the
communication addressed to the Speaker of the House of Representatives
by the Secretary of the Treasury on the 14th of last June, with
its accompanying letter of the Secretary of State, recommending an
appropriation for a commission to study the industrial and commercial
conditions in the Chinese Empire and to report as to the opportunities
for and the obstacles to the enlargement of markets in China for the
raw products and manufactures of the United States. Action was not
taken thereon during the last session. I cordially urge that the
recommendation receive at your hands the consideration which its
importance and timeliness merit.”
In his annual message of 1899 he again called attention to this
recommendation, quoting it, and stated further:
“I now renew this recommendation, as the importance of the subject has
steadily grown since it was first submitted to you, and no time should
be lost in studying for ourselves the resources of this great field for
American trade and enterprise.”
The importance of securing proper information and data with a view to
the enlargement of our trade with Asia is undiminished. Our consular
representatives in China have strongly urged a place for permanent
display of American products in some prominent trade centre of that
Empire, under Government control and management, as an effective means
of advancing our export trade therein. I call the attention of the
Congress to the desirability of carrying out these suggestions.
* * * * *
In dealing with the questions of immigration and naturalization it is
indispensable to keep certain facts ever before the minds of those
who share in enacting the laws. First and foremost, let us remember
that the question of being a good American has nothing whatever to do
with a man’s birthplace any more than it has to do with his creed.
In every generation from the time this Government was founded men of
foreign birth have stood in the very foremost rank of good citizenship,
and that not merely in one, but in every field of American activity;
while to try to draw a distinction between the man whose parents
came to this country and the man whose ancestors came to it several
generations back is a mere absurdity. Good Americanism is a matter of
heart, of conscience, of lofty aspiration, of sound common-sense, but
not of birthplace or of creed. The medal of honor, the highest prize
to be won by those who serve in the Army and the Navy of the United
States, decorates men born here, and it also decorates men born in
Great Britain and Ireland, in Germany, in Scandinavia, in France, and
doubtless in other countries also. In the field of statesmanship, in
the field of business, in the field of philanthropic endeavor, it is
equally true that among the men of whom we are most proud as Americans
no distinction whatever can be drawn between those who themselves
or whose parents came over in sailing ship or steamer from across
the water and those whose ancestors stepped ashore into the wooded
wilderness at Plymouth or at the mouth of the Hudson, the Delaware,
or the James nearly three centuries ago. No fellow-citizen of ours is
entitled to any peculiar regard because of the way in which he worships
his Maker, or because of the birthplace of himself or his parents, nor
should he be in any way discriminated against therefor. Each must stand
on his worth as a man and each is entitled to be judged solely thereby.
There is no danger of having too many immigrants of the right kind. It
makes no difference from what country they come. If they are sound in
body and in mind, and, above all, if they are of good character, so
that we can rest assured that their children and grandchildren will
be worthy fellow-citizens of our children and grandchildren, then we
should welcome them with cordial hospitality.
But the citizenship of this country should not be debased. It is
vital that we should keep high the standard of well-being among our
wage-workers, and therefore we should not admit masses of men whose
standards of living and whose personal customs and habits are such that
they tend to lower the level of the American wage-worker; and above all
we should not admit any man of an unworthy type, any man concerning
whom we can say that he will himself be a bad citizen, or that his
children and grandchildren will detract from instead of adding to the
sum of the good citizenship of the country. Similarly we should take
the greatest care about naturalization. Fraudulent naturalization, the
naturalization of improper persons, is a curse to our Government; and
it is the affair of every honest voter, wherever born, to see that
no fraudulent voting is allowed, that no fraud in connection with
naturalization is permitted.
In the past year the cases of false, fraudulent, and improper
naturalization of aliens coming to the attention of the executive
branches of the Government have increased to an alarming degree.
Extensive sales of forged certificates of naturalization have been
discovered, as well as many cases of naturalization secured by perjury
and fraud; and in addition, instances have accumulated showing that
many courts issue certificates of naturalization carelessly and upon
insufficient evidence.
Under the Constitution it is in the power of the Congress “to establish
a uniform rule of naturalization,” and numerous laws have from time
to time been enacted for that purpose, which have been supplemented
in a few States by State laws having special application. The Federal
statutes permit naturalization by any court of record in the United
States having common-law jurisdiction and a seal and clerk, except the
police court of the District of Columbia, and nearly all these courts
exercise this improper function. It results that where so many courts
of such varying grades have jurisdiction, there is lack of uniformity
in the rules applied in conferring naturalization. Some courts
are strict and others lax. An alien who may secure naturalization
in one place might be denied it in another, and the intent of the
constitutional provision is in fact defeated. Furthermore, the
certificates of naturalization issued by the courts differ widely in
wording and appearance, and when they are brought into use in foreign
countries are frequently subject to suspicion.
* * * * *
There should be a comprehensive revision of the naturalization laws.
The courts having power to naturalize should be definitely named by
national authority; the testimony upon which naturalization may be
conferred should be definitely prescribed; publication of impending
naturalization applications should be required in advance of their
hearing in court; the form and wording of all certificates issued
should be uniform throughout the country, and the courts should be
required to make returns to the Secretary of State at stated periods
of all naturalizations conferred.
* * * * *
Not only are the laws relating to naturalization now defective, but
those relating to citizenship of the United States ought also to
be made the subject of scientific inquiry with a view to probable
further legislation. By what acts expatriation may be assumed to have
been accomplished, how long an American citizen may reside abroad
and receive the protection of our passport, whether any degree of
protection should be extended to one who has made the declaration of
intention to become a citizen of the United States, but has not secured
naturalization, are questions of serious import, involving personal
rights and often producing friction between this Government and
foreign Governments. Yet upon these questions our laws are silent. I
recommend that an examination be made into the subjects of citizenship,
expatriation, and protection of Americans abroad, with a view to
appropriate legislation.
* * * * *
The power of the Government to protect the integrity of the elections
of its own officials is inherent and has been recognized and affirmed
by repeated declarations of the Supreme Court. There is no enemy of
free government more dangerous and none so insidious as the corruption
of the electorate. No one defends or excuses corruption, and it would
seem to follow that none would oppose vigorous measures to eradicate
it. I recommend the enactment of a law directed against bribery and
corruption in Federal elections. The details of such a law may be
safely left to the wise discretion of the Congress, but it should go
as far as under the Constitution it is possible to go, and should
include severe penalties against him who gives or receives a bribe
intended to influence his act or opinion as an elector; and provisions
for the publication not only of the expenditures for nominations and
elections of all candidates, but also of all contributions received and
expenditures made by political committees.
* * * * *
No subject is better worthy the attention of the Congress than that
portion of the report of the Attorney-General dealing with the long
delays and the great obstruction to justice experienced in the cases
of Beavers, Green and Gaynor, and Benson. Were these isolated and
special cases, I should not call your attention to them; but the
difficulties encountered as regards these men who have been indicted
for criminal practices are not exceptional; they are precisely similar
in kind to what occurs again and again in the case of criminals who
have sufficient means to enable them to take advantage of a system of
procedure which has grown up in the Federal courts and which amounts in
effect to making the law easy of enforcement against the man who has
no money, and difficult of enforcement, even to the point of sometimes
securing immunity, as regards the man who has money. In criminal cases
the writ of the United States should run throughout its borders. The
wheels of justice should not be clogged, as they have been clogged in
the case above-mentioned, where it has proved absolutely impossible to
bring the accused to the place appointed by the Constitution for his
trial. Of recent years there has been grave and increasing complaint
of the difficulty of bringing to justice those criminals whose
criminality, instead of being against one person in the Republic, is
against all persons in the Republic, because it is against the Republic
itself. Under any circumstances and from the very nature of the case it
is often exceedingly difficult to secure proper punishment of those who
have been guilty of wrongdoing against the Government. By the time the
offender can be brought into court the popular wrath against him has
generally subsided; and there is in most instances very slight danger
indeed of any prejudice existing in the minds of the jury against him.
At present the interests of the innocent man are amply safeguarded;
but the interests of the Government, that is, the interests of honest
administration, that is the interests of the people, are not recognized
as they should be. No subject better warrants the attention of the
Congress. Indeed, no subject better warrants the attention of the bench
and the bar throughout the United States.
* * * * *
Alaska, like all our Territorial acquisitions, has proved resourceful
beyond the expectations of those who made the purchase. It has become
the home of many hardy, industrious, and thrifty American citizens.
Towns of a permanent character have been built. The extent of its
wealth in minerals, timber, fisheries, and agriculture, while great,
is probably not comprehended yet in any just measure by our people. We
do know, however, that from a very small beginning its products have
grown until they are a steady and material contribution to the wealth
of the Nation. Owing to the immensity of Alaska and its location in the
far north, it is a difficult matter to provide many things essential to
its growth and to the happiness and comfort of its people by private
enterprise alone. It should, therefore, receive reasonable aid from the
Government. The Government has already done excellent work for Alaska
in laying cables and building telegraph lines. This work has been done
in the most economical and efficient way by the Signal Corps of the
Army.
In some respects it has outgrown its present laws, while in others
those laws have been found to be inadequate. In order to obtain
information upon which I could rely I caused an official of the
Department of Justice, in whose judgment I have confidence, to visit
Alaska during the past summer for the purpose of ascertaining how
government is administered there and what legislation is actually
needed at present. A statement of the conditions found to exist,
together with some recommendations and the reasons therefor, in
which I strongly concur, will be found in the annual report of the
Attorney-General. In some instances I feel that the legislation
suggested is so imperatively needed that I am moved briefly to
emphasize the Attorney-General’s proposals.
Under the Code of Alaska as it now stands many purely administrative
powers and duties, including by far the most important, devolve upon
the district judges or upon the clerks of the district court acting
under the direction of the judges, while the Governor, upon whom these
powers and duties should logically fall, has nothing specific to do
except to make annual reports, issue Thanksgiving Day proclamations,
and appoint Indian policemen and notaries public. I believe it
essential to good government in Alaska, and therefore recommend that
the Congress divest the district judges and the clerks of their courts
of the administrative or executive functions that they now exercise and
cast them upon the Governor. This would not be an innovation; it would
simply conform the government of Alaska to fundamental principles,
making the Governorship a real instead of a merely nominal office,
and leaving the judges free to give their entire attention to their
judicial duties and at the same time removing them from a great deal of
the strife that now embarrasses the judicial office in Alaska.
I also recommend that the salaries of the district judges and district
attorneys in Alaska be increased so as to make them equal to those
received by corresponding officers in the United States after
deducting the difference in the cost of living; that the district
attorneys should be prohibited from engaging in private practice;
that United States commissioners be appointed by the Governor of the
Territory instead of by the district judges, and that a fixed salary be
provided for them to take the place of the discredited “fee system,”
which should be abolished in all offices; that a mounted constabulary
be created to police the territory outside the limits of incorporated
towns—a vast section now wholly without police protection; and that
some provision be made to at least lessen the oppressive delays and
costs that now attend the prosecution of appeals from the district
court of Alaska. There should be a division of the existing judicial
districts, and an increase in the number of judges.
Alaska should have a Delegate in the Congress. Where possible, the
Congress should aid in the construction of needed wagon roads.
Additional lighthouses should be provided. In my judgment, it is
especially important to aid in such manner as seems just and feasible
in the construction of a trunk line of railway to connect the Gulf of
Alaska with the Yukon River through American territory. This would be
most beneficial to the development of the resources of the Territory,
and to the comfort and welfare of its people.
Salmon hatcheries should be established in many different streams,
so as to secure the preservation of this valuable food fish. Salmon
fisheries and canneries should be prohibited on certain of the rivers
where the mass of those Indians dwell who live almost exclusively on
fish.
The Alaskan natives are kindly, intelligent, anxious to learn,
and willing to work. Those who have come under the influence of
civilization, even for a limited period, have proved their capability
of becoming self-supporting, self-respecting citizens, and ask only
for the just enforcement of law and intelligent instruction and
supervision. Others, living in more remote regions, primitive, simple
hunters and fisher folk, who know only the life of the woods and the
waters, are daily being confronted with twentieth-century civilization
with all of its complexities. Their country is being overrun by
strangers, the game slaughtered and driven away, the streams depleted
of fish, and hitherto unknown and fatal diseases brought to them, all
of which combine to produce a state of abject poverty and want which
must result in their extinction. Action in their interest is demanded
by every consideration of justice and humanity.
The needs of these people are:
The abolition of the present fee system, whereby the native is
degraded, imposed upon, and taught the injustice of law.
The establishment of hospitals at central points, so that contagious
diseases that are brought to them continually by incoming whites may
be localized and not allowed to become epidemic, to spread death and
destitution over great areas.
The development of the educational system in the form of practical
training in such industries as will assure the Indians self-support
under the changed conditions in which they will have to live.
The duties of the office of the Governor should be extended to include
the supervision of Indian affairs, with necessary assistants in
different districts. He should be provided with the means and the power
to protect and advise the native people, to furnish medical treatment
in time of epidemics, and to extend material relief in periods of
famine and extreme destitution.
* * * * *
The Alaskan natives should be given the right to acquire, hold,
and dispose of property upon the same conditions as given other
inhabitants; and the privilege of citizenship should be given to
such as may be able to meet certain definite requirements. In Hawaii
Congress should give the Governor power to remove all the officials
appointed under him. The harbor of Honolulu should be dredged. The
Marine-Hospital Service should be empowered to study leprosy in the
islands. I ask special consideration for the report and recommendations
of the Governor of Porto Rico.
* * * * *
In treating of our foreign policy and of the attitude that this great
Nation should assume in the world at large, it is absolutely necessary
to consider the Army and the Navy, and the Congress, through which the
thought of the Nation finds its expression, should keep ever vividly
in mind the fundamental fact that it is impossible to treat our foreign
policy, whether this policy takes shape in the effort to secure justice
for others or justice for ourselves, save as conditioned upon the
attitude we are willing to take toward our Army, and especially toward
our Navy. It is not merely unwise, it is contemptible, for a nation,
as for an individual, to use high-sounding language to proclaim its
purposes, or to take positions which are ridiculous if unsupported by
potential force, and then to refuse to provide this force. If there is
no intention of providing and of keeping the force necessary to back up
a strong attitude, then it is far better not to assume such an attitude.
The steady aim of this Nation, as of all enlightened nations, should
be to strive to bring ever nearer the day when there shall prevail
throughout the world the peace of justice. There are kinds of peace
which are highly undesirable, which are in the long run as destructive
as any war. Tyrants and oppressors have many times made a wilderness
and called it peace. Many times peoples who were slothful or timid or
shortsighted, who had been enervated by ease or by luxury, or misled by
false teachings, have shrunk in unmanly fashion from doing duty that
was stern and that needed self-sacrifice, and have sought to hide from
their own minds their shortcomings, their ignoble motives, by calling
them love of peace. The peace of tyrannous terror, the peace of craven
weakness, the peace of injustice, all these should be shunned as we
shun unrighteous war. The goal to set before us as a Nation, the goal
which should be set before all mankind, is the attainment of the peace
of justice, of the peace which comes when each nation is not merely
safeguarded in its own rights, but scrupulously recognizes and performs
its duty toward others. Generally peace tells for righteousness; but if
there is conflict between the two, then our fealty is due first to the
cause of righteousness. Unrighteous wars are common, and unrighteous
peace is rare; but both should be shunned. The right of freedom and the
responsibility for the exercise of that right can not be divorced. One
of our great poets has well and finely said that freedom is not a gift
that tarries long in the hands of cowards. Neither does it tarry long
in the hands of those too slothful, too dishonest, or too unintelligent
to exercise it. The eternal vigilance which is the price of liberty
must be exercised, sometimes to guard against outside foes; although of
course far more often to guard against our own selfish or thoughtless
shortcomings.
If these self-evident truths are kept before us, and only if they are
so kept before us, we shall have a clear idea of what our foreign
policy in its larger aspects should be. It is our duty to remember that
a nation has no more right to do injustice to another nation, strong
or weak, than an individual has to do injustice to another individual;
that the same moral law applies in one case as in the other. But we
must also remember that it is as much the duty of the Nation to
guard its own rights and its own interests as it is the duty of the
individual so to do. Within the Nation the individual has now delegated
this right to the State, that is, to the representative of all the
individuals, and it is a maxim of the law that for every wrong there is
a remedy. But in international law we have not advanced by any means as
far as we have advanced in municipal law. There is as yet no judicial
way of enforcing a right in international law. When one nation wrongs
another, or wrongs many others, there is no tribunal before which the
wrong-doer can be brought. Either it is necessary supinely to acquiesce
in the wrong, and thus put a premium upon brutality and aggression,
or else it is necessary for the aggrieved nation valiantly to stand
up for its rights. Until some method is devised by which there shall
be a degree of international control over offending nations, it would
be a wicked thing for the most civilized powers, for those with most
sense of international obligations and with keenest and most generous
appreciation of the difference between right and wrong, to disarm.
If the great civilized nations of the present day should completely
disarm, the result would mean an immediate recrudescence of barbarism
in one form or another. Under any circumstances a sufficient armament
would have to be kept up to serve the purposes of international police;
and until international cohesion and the sense of international duties
and rights are far more advanced than at present, a nation desirous
both of securing respect for itself and of doing good to others must
have a force adequate for the work which it feels is allotted to it
as its part of the general world duty. Therefore it follows that a
self-respecting, just, and far-seeing nation should on the one hand
endeavor by every means to aid in the development of the various
movements which tend to provide substitutes for war, which tend to
render nations in their actions toward one another, and indeed toward
their own peoples, more responsive to the general sentiment of humane
and civilized mankind; and on the other hand it should keep prepared,
while scrupulously avoiding wrongdoing itself, to repel any wrong, and
in exceptional cases to take action which in a more advanced stage of
international relations would come under the head of the exercise of
the international police. A great free people owes it to itself and to
all mankind not to sink into helplessness before the powers of evil.
* * * * *
We are in every way endeavoring to help on, with cordial goodwill,
every movement which will tend to bring us into more friendly relations
with the rest of mankind. In pursuance of this policy I shall shortly
lay before the Senate treaties of arbitration with all powers which
are willing to enter into these treaties with us. It is not possible
at this period of the world’s development to agree to arbitrate all
matters, but there are many matters of possible difference between us
and other nations which can be thus arbitrated. Furthermore, at the
request of the Interparliamentary Union, an eminent body composed of
practical statesmen from all countries, I have asked the Powers to join
with this Government in a second Hague conference, at which it is hoped
that the work already so happily begun at The Hague may be carried some
steps further toward completion. This carries out the desire expressed
by the first Hague conference itself.
* * * * *
It is not true that the United States feels any land hunger or
entertains any projects as regards the other nations of the Western
Hemisphere save such as are for their welfare. All that this country
desires is to see the neighboring countries stable, orderly, and
prosperous. Any country whose people conduct themselves well can count
upon our hearty friendship. If a nation shows that it knows how to
act with reasonable efficiency and decency in social and political
matters, if it keeps order and pays its obligations, it need fear
no interference from the United States. Chronic wrongdoing, or an
impotence which results in a general loosening of the ties of civilized
society, may in America, as elsewhere, ultimately require intervention
by some civilized nation, and in the Western Hemisphere the adherence
of the United States to the Monroe Doctrine may force the United
States, however reluctantly, in flagrant cases of such wrongdoing or
impotence, to the exercise of an international police power. If every
country washed by the Caribbean Sea would show the progress in stable
and just civilization which with the aid of the Platt amendment Cuba
has shown since our troops left the island, and which so many of the
republics in both Americas are constantly and brilliantly showing,
all question of interference by this Nation with their affairs would
be at an end. Our interests and those of our southern neighbors are
in reality identical. They have great natural riches, and if within
their borders the reign of law and justice obtains, prosperity is sure
to come to them. While they thus obey the primary laws of civilized
society they may rest assured that they will be treated by us in a
spirit of cordial and helpful sympathy. We would interfere with them
only in the last resort, and then only if it became evident that
their inability or unwillingness to do justice at home and abroad
had violated the rights of the United States or had invited foreign
aggression to the detriment of the entire body of American nations.
It is a mere truism to say that every nation, whether in America or
anywhere else, which desires to maintain its freedom, its independence,
must ultimately realize that the right of such independence can not be
separated from the responsibility of making good use of it.
In asserting the Monroe Doctrine, in taking such steps as we have
taken in regard to Cuba, Venezuela, and Panama, and in endeavoring to
circumscribe the theatre of war in the Far East, and to secure the
open door in China, we have acted in our own interest as well as in
the interest of humanity at large. There are, however, cases in which,
while our own interests are not greatly involved, strong appeal is made
to our sympathies. Ordinarily it is very much wiser and more useful for
us to concern ourselves with striving for our own moral and material
betterment here at home than to concern ourselves with trying to better
the condition of things in other nations. We have plenty of sins of our
own to war against, and under ordinary circumstances we can do more for
the general uplifting of humanity by striving with heart and soul to
put a stop to civic corruption, to brutal lawlessness and violent race
prejudices here at home than by passing resolutions about wrongdoing
elsewhere. Nevertheless there are occasional crimes committed on so
vast a scale and of such peculiar horror as to make us doubt whether it
is not our manifest duty to endeavor at least to show our disapproval
of the deed and our sympathy with those who have suffered by it. The
cases must be extreme in which such a course is justifiable. There
must be no effort made to remove the mote from our brother’s eye if we
refuse to remove the beam from our own. But in extreme cases action
may be justifiable and proper. What form the action shall take must
depend upon the circumstances of the case; that is, upon the degree
of the atrocity and upon our power to remedy it. The cases in which
we could interfere by force of arms as we interfered to put a stop
to intolerable conditions in Cuba are necessarily very few. Yet it
is not to be expected that a people like ours, which in spite of
certain very obvious shortcomings, nevertheless as a whole shows by
its consistent practice its belief in the principles of civil and
religious liberty and of orderly freedom, a people among whom even the
worst crime, like the crime of lynching, is never more than sporadic,
so that individuals and not classes are molested in their fundamental
rights—it is inevitable that such a nation should desire eagerly to
give expression to its horror on an occasion like that of the massacre
of the Jews in Kishineff, or when it witnesses such systematic and
long-extended cruelty and oppression as the cruelty and oppression of
which the Armenians have been the victims, and which have won for them
the indignant pity of the civilized world.
* * * * *
Even where it is not possible to secure in other nations the observance
of the principles which we accept as axiomatic, it is necessary for us
firmly to insist upon the rights of our own citizens without regard
to their creed or race; without regard to whether they were born here
or born abroad. It has proved very difficult to secure from Russia
the right for our Jewish fellow-citizens to receive passports and
travel through Russian territory. Such conduct is not only unjust
and irritating toward us, but it is difficult to see its wisdom from
Russia’s standpoint. No conceivable good is accomplished by it. If
an American Jew or an American Christian misbehaves himself in Russia
he can at once be driven out; but the ordinary American Jew, like the
ordinary American Christian, would behave just about as he behaves
here, that is, behave as any good citizen ought to behave; and where
this is the case it is a wrong against which we are entitled to protest
to refuse him his passport without regard to his conduct and character,
merely on racial and religious grounds. In Turkey our difficulties
arise less from the way in which our citizens are sometimes treated
than from the indignation inevitably excited in seeing such fearful
misrule as has been witnessed both in Armenia and Macedonia.
* * * * *
The strong arm of the Government in enforcing respect for its just
rights in international matters is the Navy of the United States.
I most earnestly recommend that there be no halt in the work of
upbuilding the American Navy. There is no more patriotic duty before
us as a people than to keep the Navy adequate to the needs of this
country’s position. We have undertaken to build the Isthmian Canal. We
have undertaken to secure for ourselves our just share in the trade of
the Orient. We have undertaken to protect our citizens from improper
treatment in foreign lands. We continue steadily to insist on the
application of the Monroe Doctrine to the Western Hemisphere. Unless
our attitude in these and all similar matters is to be a mere boastful
sham we can not afford to abandon our naval programme. Our voice is now
potent for peace, and is so potent because we are not afraid of war.
But our protestations upon behalf of peace would neither receive nor
deserve the slightest attention if we were impotent to make them good.
The war which now unfortunately rages in the Far East has emphasized
in striking fashion the new possibilities of naval warfare. The
lessons taught are both strategic and tactical, and are political as
well as military. The experiences of the war have shown in conclusive
fashion that while sea-going and sea-keeping torpedo destroyers are
indispensable, and fast lightly armed and armored cruisers very useful,
yet that the main reliance, the main standby, in any navy worthy the
name must be the great battleships, heavily armored and heavily gunned.
Not a Russian or Japanese battleship has been sunk by a torpedo boat,
or by gunfire, while among the less protected ships, cruiser after
cruiser has been destroyed whenever the hostile squadrons have gotten
within range of one another’s weapons. There will always be a large
field of usefulness for cruisers, especially of the more formidable
type. We need to increase the number of torpedo-boat destroyers, paying
less heed to their having a knot or two extra speed than to their
capacity to keep the seas for weeks and, if necessary, for months at a
time. It is wise to build submarine torpedo boats, as under certain
circumstances they might be very useful. But most of all we need to
continue building our fleet of battleships, or ships so powerfully
armed that they can inflict the maximum of damage upon our opponents,
and so well protected that they can suffer a severe hammering in return
without fatal impairment of their ability to fight and manœuvre. Of
course ample means must be provided for enabling the personnel of
the Navy to be brought to the highest point of efficiency. Our great
fighting ships and torpedo boats must be ceaselessly trained and
manœuvred in squadrons. The officers and men can only learn their trade
thoroughly by ceaseless practice on the high seas. In the event of war
it would be far better to have no ships at all than to have ships of
a poor and ineffective type, or ships which, however good, were yet
manned by untrained and unskilful crews. The best officers and men in
a poor ship could do nothing against fairly good opponents; and, on
the other hand, a modern warship is useless unless the officers and
men aboard her have become adepts in their duties. The marksmanship in
our Navy has improved in an extraordinary degree during the last three
years, and on the whole the types of our battleships are improving; but
much remains to be done. Sooner or later we shall have to provide for
some method by which there will be promotions for merit as well as for
seniority, or else retirement of all those who after a certain age have
not advanced beyond a certain grade; while no effort must be spared to
make the service attractive to the enlisted men in order that they may
be kept as long as possible in it. Reservation public schools should be
provided wherever there are navy-yards.
* * * * *
Within the last three years the United States has set an example in
disarmament where disarmament was proper. By law our Army is fixed at
a maximum of one hundred thousand and a minimum of sixty thousand men.
When there was insurrection in the Philippines we kept the Army at
the maximum. Peace came in the Philippines, and now our Army has been
reduced to the minimum at which it is possible to keep it with due
regard to its efficiency. The guns now mounted require twenty-eight
thousand men, if the coast fortifications are to be adequately manned.
Relatively to the Nation, it is not now so large as the police force
of New York or Chicago, relatively to the population of either city.
We need more officers; there are not enough to perform the regular
army work. It is very important that the officers of the Army should
be accustomed to handle their men in masses, as it is also important
that the National Guard of the several States should be accustomed to
actual field manœuvring, especially in connection with the regulars.
For this reason we are to be congratulated upon the success of the
field manœuvres at Manassas last fall, manœuvres in which a larger
number of Regulars and National Guard took part than was ever before
assembled together in time of peace. No other civilized nation has,
relatively to its population, such a diminutive Army as ours; and while
the Army is so small we are not to be excused if we fail to keep it at
a very high grade of proficiency. It must be incessantly practiced;
the standard for the enlisted men should be kept very high, while at
the same time the service should be made as attractive as possible;
and the standard for the officers should be kept even higher—which, as
regards the upper ranks, can best be done by introducing some system of
selection and rejection into the promotions. We should be able, in the
event of some sudden emergency, to put into the field one first-class
army corps, which should be, as a whole, at least the equal of any body
of troops of like number belonging to any other nation.
Great progress has been made in protecting our coasts by adequate
fortifications with sufficient guns. We should, however, pay much more
heed than at present to the development of an extensive system of
floating mines for use in all our more important harbors. These mines
have been proved to be a most formidable safeguard against hostile
fleets.
* * * * *
I earnestly call the attention of the Congress to the need of amending
the existing law relating to the award of Congressional medals of honor
in the Navy so as to provide that they may be awarded to commissioned
officers and warrant officers as well as to enlisted men. These justly
prized medals are given in the Army alike to the officers and the
enlisted men, and it is most unjust that the commissioned officers and
warrant officers of the Navy should not in this respect have the same
rights as their brethren in the Army and as the enlisted men of the
Navy.
* * * * *
In the Philippine Islands there has been during the past year a
continuation of the steady progress which has obtained ever since our
troops definitely got the upper hand of the insurgents. The Philippine
people, or, to speak more accurately, the many tribes, and even races,
sundered from one another more or less sharply, who go to make up the
people of the Philippine Islands, contain many elements of good, and
some elements which we have a right to hope stand for progress. At
present they are utterly incapable of existing in independence at all
or of building up a civilization of their own. I firmly believe that we
can help them to rise higher and higher in the scale of civilization
and of capacity for self-government, and I most earnestly hope that in
the end they will be able to stand, if not entirely alone, yet in some
such relation to the United States as Cuba now stands. This end is not
yet in sight, and it may be indefinitely postponed if our people are
foolish enough to turn the attention of the Filipinos away from the
problems of achieving moral and material prosperity, of working for a
stable, orderly, and just government, and toward foolish and dangerous
intrigues for a complete independence for which they are as yet
totally unfit.
On the other hand, our people must keep steadily before their minds
the fact that the justification for our stay in the Philippines must
ultimately rest chiefly upon the good we are able to do in the islands.
I do not overlook the fact that in the development of our interests in
the Pacific Ocean and along its coasts, the Philippines have played
and will play an important part, and that our interests have been
served in more than one way by the possession of the islands. But our
chief reason for continuing to hold them must be that we ought in good
faith to try to do our share of the world’s work, and this particular
piece of work has been imposed upon us by the results of the war with
Spain. The problem presented to us in the Philippine Islands is akin
to, but not exactly like, the problems presented to the other great
civilized powers which have possessions in the Orient. There are points
of resemblance in our work to the work which is being done by the
British in India and Egypt, by the French in Algiers, by the Dutch in
Java, by the Russians in Turkestan, by the Japanese in Formosa; but
more distinctly than any of these Powers we are endeavoring to develop
the natives themselves so that they shall take an ever-increasing
share in their own government, and as far as prudent we are already
admitting their representatives to a governmental equality with our
own. There are commissioners, judges, and governors in the islands who
are Filipinos and who have exactly the same share in the government
of the islands as have their colleagues who are Americans, while in
the lower ranks, of course, the great majority of the public servants
are Filipinos. Within two years we shall be trying the experiment of
an elective lower house in the Philippine legislature. It may be that
the Filipinos will misuse this legislature, and they certainly will
misuse it if they are misled by foolish persons here at home into
starting an agitation for their own independence or into any factious
or improper action. In such case they will do themselves no good, and
will stop for the time being all further effort to advance them and
give them a greater share in their own government. But if they act
with wisdom and self-restraint, if they show that they are capable
of electing a legislature which in its turn is capable of taking a
sane and efficient part in the actual work of government, they can
rest assured that a full and increasing measure of recognition will
be given them. Above all they should remember that their prime needs
are moral and industrial, not political. It is a good thing to try the
experiment of giving them a legislature; but it is a far better thing
to give them schools, good roads, railroads which will enable them to
get their products to market, honest courts, an honest and efficient
constabulary, and all that tends to produce order, peace, fair dealing
as between man and man, and habits of intelligent industry and thrift.
If they are safeguarded against oppression, and if their wants,
material and spiritual, are studied intelligently and in a spirit of
friendly sympathy, much more good will be done them than by any effort
to give them political power, though this effort may in its own proper
time and place be proper enough.
Meanwhile our own people should remember that there is need for the
highest standard of conduct among the Americans sent to the Philippine
Islands, not only among the public servants, but among the private
individuals who go to them. It is because I feel this so deeply that in
the administration of these islands I have positively refused to permit
any discrimination whatsoever for political reasons, and have insisted
that in choosing the public servants consideration should be paid
solely to the worth of the men chosen and to the needs of the islands.
There is no higher body of men in our public service than we have
in the Philippine Islands under Governor Wright and his associates.
So far as possible these men should be given a free hand, and their
suggestions should receive the hearty backing both of the Executive and
of the Congress. There is need of a vigilant and disinterested support
of our public servants in the Philippines by good citizens here in the
United States. Unfortunately hitherto those of our people here at home
who have specially claimed to be the champions of the Filipinos have in
reality been their worst enemies. This will continue to be the case
as long as they strive to make the Filipinos independent, and stop all
industrial development of the islands by crying out against the laws
which would bring it on the ground that capitalists must not “exploit”
the islands. Such proceedings are not only unwise, but are most harmful
to the Filipinos, who do not need independence at all, but who do need
good laws, good public servants, and the industrial development that
can only come if the investment of American and foreign capital in the
islands is favored in all legitimate ways.
Every measure taken concerning the islands should be taken primarily
with a view to their advantage. We should certainly give them lower
tariff rates on their exports to the United States; if this is not done
it will be a wrong to extend our shipping laws to them. I earnestly
hope for the immediate enactment into law of the legislation now
pending to encourage American capital to seek investment in the islands
in railroads, in factories, in plantations, and in lumbering and mining.