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| The Twentieth |
| Century American |
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| Being |
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| A Comparative Study of the Peoples of |
| the Two Great Anglo-Saxon Nations |
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| BY |
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| H. PERRY ROBINSON |
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| AUTHOR OF "MEN BORN EQUAL," "THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY |
| OF A BLACK BEAR," ETC. |
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| [Illustration] |
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| The Chautauqua Press |
| CHAUTAUQUA, NEW YORK |
| MCMXI |
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COPYRIGHT, 1908
BY
G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS
The Knickerbocker Press, New York
TO
THOSE READERS,
WHETHER ENGLISH OR AMERICAN,
WHO
AGREE WITH WHATEVER IS SAID IN THE
FOLLOWING PAGES IN LAUDATION OF
THEIR OWN COUNTRY
THIS BOOK
IS INSCRIBED IN THE HOPE
THAT THEY WILL BE EQUALLY READY TO ACCEPT
WHATEVER THEY FIND IN PRAISE
OF
THE OTHER.
[Illustration: The British Isles and the United States.
A Comparison (see Chapter IV.)]
PREFATORY NOTE
There are already many books about America; but the majority of these
have been written by Englishmen after so brief an acquaintance with the
country that it is doubtful whether they contribute much to English
knowledge of the subject.
My reason for adding another volume to the list is the hope of being
able to do something to promote a better understanding between the
peoples, having as an excuse the fact that I have lived in the United
States for nearly twenty years, under conditions which have given rather
exceptional opportunities of intimacy with the people of various parts
of the country socially, in business, and in politics. Wherever my
judgment is wrong it is not from lack of abundant chance to learn the
truth.
Except in one instance--very early in the book--I have avoided the use
of statistics, in spite of frequent temptation to refer to them to
fortify arguments which must without them appear to be merely the
expression of an individual opinion.
H. P. R.
February, 1908.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
PAGE
AN ANGLO-AMERICAN ALLIANCE 5
The Avoidance of Entangling Alliances--What the Injunction
Meant--What it Cannot Mean To-day--The Interests of the United
States, no less than those of England, Demand an Alliance--But
Larger Interests than those of the Two Peoples are
Involved--American Responsiveness to Ideals--The Greatest
Ideal of All, Universal Peace: the Practicability of its
Attainment--America's Responsibility--Misconceptions of the
British Empire--Germany's Position--American Susceptibilities.
CHAPTER II
THE DIFFERENCE IN POINT OF VIEW 35
The Anglo-Saxon Family Likeness--How Frenchmen and Germans
View it--Englishmen, Americans, and "Foreigners"--An Echo of
the War of 1812--An Anglo-American Conflict Unthinkable--
American Feeling for England--The Venezuelan Incident--The
Pilgrims and Some Secret History--Why Americans still Hate
England--Great Britain's Nearness to the United States
Geographically--Commercially--Historically--England's Foreign
Ill-wishers in America.
CHAPTER III
TWO SIDES OF THE AMERICAN CHARACTER 60
Europe's Undervaluation of America's Fighting Power--The
Americans as Sailors--The Nation's Greatest Asset--Self-reliance
of the People--The Making of a Doctor--And of a Surveyor--
Society in the Rough--New York and the Country--An Anglo-Saxon
Trait--America's Unpreparedness--American Consuls and Diplomats--
A Homogeneous People--The Value of a Common Speech--America
more Anglo-Saxon than Britain--Mr. Wells and the Future in
America.
CHAPTER IV
MUTUAL MISUNDERSTANDINGS 94
America's Bigness--A New Atlantis--The Effect of Expansion on
a People--A Family Estranged--Parsnips--An American Woman in
England--An Englishman in America--International Caricatures--
Shibboleths: dropped H's and a "twang"--Matthew Arnold's
Clothes--The Honourable S---- B----.
CHAPTER V
THE AMERICAN ATTITUDE TOWARDS WOMEN 111
The Isolation of the United States--American Ignorance of the
World--Sensitiveness to Criticism--Exaggeration of their Own
Virtues--The Myth of American Chivalrousness--Whence it
Originated--The Climatic Myth--International Marriages--English
Manners and American--The View of Womanhood in Youth--
Co-education of the Sexes--Conjugal Morality--The Artistic
Sense in American Women--Two Stenographers--An Incident of
Camp-Life--"Molly-be-damned"--A Nice Way of Travelling--How do
they do it?--Women in Public Life--The Conditions which
Co-operate--The Anglo-Saxon Spirit again.
CHAPTER VI
ENGLISH HUMOUR AND AMERICAN ART 145
American Insularity--A Conkling Story--English Humour and
American Critics--American Literature and English Critics--The
American Novel in England--And American Art--Wanted, an
American Exhibition--The Revolution in the American Point of
View--"Raining in London"--Domestic and Imported Goods.
CHAPTER VII
ENGLISH AND AMERICAN EDUCATION 166
The Rhodes Scholarships--"Pullulating Colleges"--Are American
Colleges Superior to Oxford or Cambridge?--Other Educational
Forces--The Postal Laws--Ten-cent Magazines and Cheap Books--
Pigs in Chicago--The Press of England and America Compared--
Mixed Society--Educated Women--Generals as Booksellers--And as
Farmhands--The Value of War to a People.
CHAPTER VIII
A COMPARISON IN CULTURE 191
The Advantage of Youth--Japanese Eclecticism and American--The
Craving for the Best--_Cyrano de Bergerac_--Verestschagin--
Culture by Paroxysms--Mr. Gladstone and the Japanese--Anglo-Saxon
Crichtons--Americans as Linguists--England's Past and America's
Future--Americanisms in Speech--Why They are Disappearing in
America--And Appearing in England--The Press and the Copyright
Laws--A Look into the Future.
CHAPTER IX
POLITICS AND POLITICIANS 226
The "English-American" Vote--The Best People in Politics--What
Politics Means in America--Where Corruption Creeps in--The
Danger in England--A Presidential Nomination for Sale--Buying
Legislation--Could it Occur in England?--A Delectable Alderman--
Taxation while you Wait--Perils that England Escapes--The
Morality of Congress--Political Corruption of the Irish--
Democrat and Republican.
CHAPTER X
AMERICAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND 260
The System of Parties--Interdependence of National and Local
Organisations--The Federal Government and Sovereign States--
The Boss of Warwickshire--The Unit System--Prime Minister
Crooks--Lanark and the Nation--New York and Tammany Hall--
America's Superior Opportunities for Wickedness--How England
Is Catching up--Campaign Reminiscences--The "Hell-box"--Politics
in a Gravel-pit--Mr. Hearst and Mr. Bryan.
CHAPTER XI
SOME QUESTIONS OF THE MOMENT 285
Sovereign States and the Federal Government--California and
the Senate--The Constitutional Powers of Congress and the
President--Government by Interpretation--President Roosevelt
as an Inspiration to the People--A New Conception of the
Presidential Office--"Teddy" and the "fraid strap"--Mr.
Roosevelt and the Corporations--As a Politician--His
Imperiousness--The Negro Problem--The Americanism of the South.
CHAPTER XII
COMMERCIAL MORALITY 308
Are Americans more Honest than Englishmen?--An American
Peerage--Senators and other Aristocrats--Trade and the British
Upper Classes--Two Views of a Business Career--America's Wild
Oats--The Packing House Scandals--"American Methods" in
Business--A Countryman and Some Eggs--A New Dog--The Morals of
British Peers--A Contract of Mutual Confidence--Embalmed Beef,
Re-mounts, and War Stores--The Yellow Press and Mr. Hearst--
American View of the House of Lords.
CHAPTER XIII
THE GROWTH OF HONESTY 347
The Superiority of the Anglo-Saxon--America's Resemblance to
Japan--A German View--Can Americans Lie?--Honesty as the Best
Policy--Religious Sentiment--Moral and Immoral Railway
Managers--A Struggle for Self-preservation--Gentlemen in
Business--Peculation among Railway Servants--How the Old
Order Changes, Yielding Place to New--The Strain on British
Machinery--Americans as Story-Tellers--The Incredibility of
the Actual.
CHAPTER XIV
A CONTRAST IN PRINCIPLES 371
The Commercial Power of the United States--British Workmanship--
Tin-tacks and Conservatism--A Prophetic Frenchman--Imperialism
in Trade--The Anglo-Saxon Spirit--About Chaperons--"Insist upon
Thyself"--English and American Banks--Dealing in Futures--Dog
Eat Dog--Two Letters--Commercial Octopods--Trusts in America
and England--The Standard Oil Company--And Solicitors--Legal
Chaperons--The Sanctity of Stamped Paper--Conclusions--Do
"Honest" Traders Exist?
CHAPTER XV
THE PEOPLES AT PLAY 408
American Sport Twenty-five Years Ago--The Power of Golf--A
Look Ahead--Britain, Mother of Sports--Buffalo in New York--
And Pheasants on Clapham Common--Shooting Foxes and the
"Sport" of Wild-fowling--The Amateur in American Sport--At
Henley--And at Large--Teutonic Poppycock.
CHAPTER XVI
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 429
A New Way of Making Friends--The Desirability of an Alliance--
For the Sake of Both Peoples--And of all the World--The Family
Resemblance--Mutual Misunderstandings--American Conception of
the British Character--English Misapprehension of Americans--
Foreign Influences in the United States--Why Politicians
Hesitate--An Appeal to the People--And to Caesar.
APPENDIX 451
INDEX 453
The Twentieth Century
American
"_If I can say anything to show that my name is really
Makepeace, and to increase the source of love between the two
countries, then please, God, I will._"--W. M. Thackeray, in
_Letters to an American Family_.
"_Certainly there is nothing like England, and there never has
been anything like England in the world. Her wonderful
history, her wonderful literature, her beautiful architecture,
the historic and poetic associations which cluster about every
street and river and mountain and valley, her vigorous life,
the sweetness and beauty of her women, the superb manhood of
her men, her Navy, her gracious hospitality, and her lofty
pride--although some single race of men may have excelled her
in some single particular--make up a combination never
equalled in the world._"--The late United States Senator Hoar,
in _An Autobiography of Seventy Years_.
"_The result of the organisation of the American colonies into
a state, and of the bringing together of the diverse
communities contained in these colonies, was the creation not
merely of a new nation, but of a new temperament. How far this
temperament was to arise from a change of climate, and how far
from a new political organisation, no one could then foresee,
nor is its origin yet fully analysed; but the fact itself is
now coming to be more and more recognised. It may be that
Nature said at about that time: 'Thus far the English is my
best race; but we have had Englishmen enough; now for another
turning of the globe, and for a further novelty. We need
something with a little more buoyancy than the Englishman; let
us lighten the structure, even at some peril in the process.
Put in one drop more of nervous fluid and make the American.'
With that drop, a new range of promise opened on the human
race, and a lighter, finer, more highly organised type of
mankind was born._"--Thomas Wentworth Higginson, _Atlantic
Monthly_, 1886.
"_The foreign observer in America is at once struck by the
fact that the average of intelligence, as that intelligence
manifests itself in the spirit of inquiry, in the interest
taken in a great variety of things, and in alertness of
judgment, is much higher among the masses in the United States
than anywhere else. This is certainly not owing to any
superiority of the public school system in this country--or,
if such superiority exists, not to that alone--but rather to
the fact that in the United States the individual is
constantly brought into interested contact with a greater
variety of things and is admitted to active participation in
the exercise of functions which in other countries are left to
the care of a superior authority. I have frequently been
struck by the remarkable expansion of the horizon effected by
a few years of American life, in the minds of immigrants who
had come from somewhat benighted regions, and by the mental
enterprise and keen discernment with which they took hold of
problems to which, in their comparatively torpid condition in
their native countries, they had never given thought. It is
true that in the large cities with congested population,
self-government as an educator does not always bring the most
desirable results, partly owing to the circumstance that
government, in its various branches, is there further removed
from the individual, so that he comes into contact with it and
exercises his influence upon it only through various, and
sometimes questionable, intermediary agencies which frequently
exert a very demoralising influence._"--Carl Schurz's
_Memoirs_, II, 79.
"_Anglo-Saxon Superiority! Although we do not all acknowledge
it, we all have to bear it, and we all dread it; the
apprehension, the suspicion, and sometimes the hatred provoked
by l'Anglais proclaim the fact loudly enough. We cannot go one
step in the world without coming across the Anglo-Saxon. . . .
He rules America by Canada and the United States; Africa by
Egypt and the Cape; Asia by India and Burmah; Australasia by
Australia and New Zealand; Europe and the whole world, by his
trade and industries and by his policy._"--M. Edmond Demolins
in _Anglo-Saxon Superiority_ "_A quoi tient la Superiorite des
Anglo-Saxons?_"
"_It may be asking too much, but if statesmanship could kindly
arrange it, I confess I should like to see, before I die, a
war in which Britain and the United States in a just quarrel
might tackle the world. After that we should have no more
difficulty about America. For if the Americans never forget an
injury, they ever remember a service._"--The late G. W.
Steevens in _The Land of the Dollar_.
The Twentieth Century
American
CHAPTER I
AN ANGLO-AMERICAN ALLIANCE
The Avoidance of Entangling Alliances--What the Injunction
Meant--What it Cannot Mean To-day--The Interests of the United
States, no less than those of England, Demand an Alliance--But
Larger Interests than those of the Two Peoples are Involved--
American Responsiveness to Ideals--The Greatest Ideal of All,
Universal Peace: the Practicability of its Attainment--
America's Responsibility--Misconceptions of the British
Empire--Germany's Position--American Susceptibilities.
The American nation, for all that it is young and lacks reverence, still
worships the maxims and rules of conduct laid down by the Fathers of the
Republic; and among those rules of conduct, there is none the wisdom of
which is more generally accepted by the people than that which enjoins
the avoidance of "entangling alliances" with foreign Powers. But not
only has the United States changed much in late years, but the world in
its political relations and sentiments has changed also and the place of
the United States has changed in it. That sacred instrument, the
Constitution itself, holds chiefly by virtue of what is new in it.
Whatever is unaltered, or is not interpreted in a sense quite other than
the framers intended, is to-day comparatively unimportant. It must be
so. It would be impossible that any code or constitution drawn up to
meet the needs of the original States, in the phase of civilisation and
amid the social conditions which then prevailed, could be suited to the
national life of a Great Power in the twentieth century. In internal
affairs, there is hardly a function of Government, scarcely a relation
between the different branches of the Government itself, or between the
Government and any of the several States, or between the Government and
the people, which is not unlike what the framers of the Constitution
intended or what they imagined that it would be.
But it is in external affairs that the nation must find, indeed has
found, the old rules most inadequate. The policy of non-association
which was desirable, even essential, to the young, weak state, whose
only prospect of safety lay in a preservation of that isolation which
her geographical position made possible to her, is and must be
impracticable in a World-Power. Within the last decade, the United
States has stepped out from her solitude to take the place which
rightfully belongs to her among the great peoples. By the acquirement of
her colonial dependencies, still more by the inevitable exigencies of
her commerce, she has chosen (as she had no other choice) to make
herself an interested party in the affairs of all parts of the world.
All the conditions that made the old policy best for her have vanished.
A child is rightly forbidden by his nurse to make acquaintance with
other children in the street; but this child has grown to manhood and
gone out into the world to seek--and has found--his fortune. The old
policy of isolation has been cast aside, till nothing remains of it but
a few old formulae which have no virtue--not even significance--now that
all the conditions to which they applied are gone. The United States has
been compelled to make alliances (some, as when she co-operated with the
other Powers in China, of the most "entangling" kind), and still the old
phrase holds its spell on the popular mind.
The injunction was originally intended to prevent the young Republic
from being drawn into the wars with which Europe at the time was rent,
by taking sides with any one party against any other. It was levelled
not against alliances, but against entanglements. It was framed, and
wisely framed, to secure to the United States the peace and isolation
necessary to her development. The isolation is no longer either possible
or desirable, but peace remains both. The nation would in fact be living
more closely up to the spirit of the injunction by entering into an
alliance which would secure peace and make entanglements impossible,
than she is when she leaves herself and the world exposed to the
constant menace of war, merely for the sake of seeming to comply with
the letter of a maxim which is now meaningless. If Washington were alive
to-day, it does not seem to me possible to doubt that he would favour a
new English treaty, even though he might have more difficulty in
compelling Congress to accept his views than he had once before.
As the case stands, the United States may easily become involved in war
with any one of the Great Powers, no matter how pacific or benevolent
her intentions may be. There are at least three Powers with which a
trivial incident might precipitate a conflict at almost any time; while
the possibilities of friction which might develop into open hostilities
with some one of the lesser states are almost innumerable. It is beside
the question to say that the United States need have no fear of the
result: indeed that very fact contributes largely to the danger. It is
ever the man who can fight, and knows it, who gets into trouble. Every
American who has lived much in the farther West knows that he who would
keep clear of difficulties had best not carry a revolver. In its very
self-confidence--a self-confidence amply justified by its strength--the
American people is, measured by the standards of other nations, an
eminently bellicose people--much more bellicose than it supposes.
Great Britain's alliance with Japan has with reasonable certainty, so
far as danger of conflict between any two of the Great Powers is
concerned, secured the peace of Asia for some time to come. The
understanding between Great Britain and France goes some way towards
assuring the peace of Europe, of which the imminent _rapprochement_ with
Russia (which all thinking Englishmen desire[8:1]) will constitute a
further guarantee. But an alliance between Great Britain and the United
States would secure the peace of the world. There is but one European
Power now which could embark on a war with either Great Britain or the
United States with any shadow of justification for hopefulness as to the
result; and no combination of Powers could deceive itself into
believing that it could make head against the two combined or would dare
to disturb the peace between themselves when the two allies bade them be
still.
In the days of her youth,--which lasted up to the closing decade of the
nineteenth century,--provided that she did not thrust herself needlessly
into the quarrels of Europe, her mere geographical position sufficed to
secure to America the peace which she required. The Atlantic Ocean, her
own mountain chains and wildernesses, these were bulwarks enough. She
has, by pressure of her own destiny, been compelled to come out from
behind these safeguards to rub shoulders every day with all the world.
If she still desires peace, she will be more likely to realise that
desire by seeking other shields. Nor must any American reader
misunderstand me, for I believe that I estimate the fighting power of
the United States more highly than most native-born Americans. She needs
no help in playing her part in the world; but no amount of
self-confidence, no ability to fight, if once the fight be on, will
serve to protect her from having quarrels thrust upon her--not
necessarily in wilfulness by any individual antagonist but by mere force
of circumstance. Considered from the standpoint of her own expediency,
an alliance with Great Britain would give to the United States an
absolute guarantee that for as many years as she pleased she would be
free to devote all her energies to the development of her own resources
and the increase of her commerce.
But there are other considerations far larger than that of her own
expediency. This is no question of the selfish interests either of the
United States or of Great Britain. There is no people more responsive
than the American to high ideals. Englishmen often find it hard to
believe that an American is not talking mere fustian when he gives
honest expression to his sentiments; but from the foundation of the
Republic certain large ideas--Liberty, Freedom of Conscience,
Equality--have somehow been made to seem very real things to the
American mind. Whether the Englishman does not in his heart prize just
as dearly as the American the things which these words signify, is
another matter; it is not the Englishman's habit to formulate them even
to himself, much less to talk about them to others. Most Englishmen have
large sympathy with Captain Gamble who, bewailing the unrest in Canada
at the outbreak of the Revolutionary War, complained that the Colonials
talked too much about "that damned absurd word Liberty."[10:1]
It is rarely that an English political campaign is fought for a
principle or for an abstract idea, and equally rarely that in America
the watchword on one side or the other is not some such high-sounding
phrase as Englishmen rather shrink from using. It is true that behind
that phrase may be clustered a cowering crowd of petty individual
interests; the fact remains that it is the phrase itself--the large
Idea--on which orators and party managers rely to secure their hold on
the imaginations of the mass of the people. It does not necessarily
imply any superior morality on the part of the Americans; but is an
accident of the different conditions prevailing in the two countries.
British politics are infinitely more complex than American, and foreign
affairs play a much larger part in public controversies. The people of
the United States have been throughout their history able to confine
their attention almost wholly to their home affairs, and in those home
affairs, the mere vastness of the country, with the diverse and
conflicting interests of the various parts, has made it as a rule
impossible to frame any appeal to the minds of the voters as a whole
except in terms of some abstract idea. An appeal to the self-interests
of the people in the aggregate in any matter of domestic policy is
almost unformulable, because the interest of each section conflicts with
the interest of others; whence it has necessarily followed that the
American people has grown accustomed to be led by large
phrases--disciplined to follow the flag of an ideal.
Not all the early colonists who emigrated, even to New England, went
solely for conscience' sake. Under the cloak of the lofty principle for
which the Revolutionary War was fought there were, again, concealed all
manner of personal ambitions, sectional jealousies, and partisan
intrigues. It was in truth (as more than one American historian has
pointed out) a party strife and not a war of peoples. The precipitating
cause of the Civil War was not the desire to abolish slavery, but the
bitterness aroused by the political considerations of the advantage
given to one party or the other by the establishment or
non-establishment of slavery in a new territory. The motive which
impelled the United States to make war on Spain was not, as most
Europeans believe, any desire for an extension of territory, any more
than it was, as some Americans would say, a yearning to avenge the
blowing up of the _Maine_; it was the necessity of putting an end to the
disturbed state of affairs in Cuba, which was a constant source of
annoyance, as well as of trouble and expense, to the United States
Government. If a neighbour makes a disturbance before your house and
brings his family quarrels to your doorstep, you must after a time ask
him to stop; and when, after a sufficient number of askings, he fails to
comply with your request, it is justifiable to use force to make him.
That was America's justification--the real ground on which she went to
war with Spain. But the thing which actually inflamed the mind of the
American people was the belief that the Spanish treatment of Cuba was
brutal and barbarous. It was an indignation no less fine than that which
set England in a blaze in the days of the Bulgarian atrocities. The war
may been a war of expediency on the part of the Government; it was a
Crusade in the eyes of the people. Thus it may be easy to show that at
each crisis in its history there was something besides the nobility of a
Cause or the grandeur of a Principle which impelled the American nation
on the course which it took, but it has always been love of the Cause or
devotion to the Principle which has swayed the masses of the people.
And this people now has it in its power to do an infinitely finer thing
than ever it did when it established Liberty of Conscience, or founded a
republic on broader foundations than had been laid before, or abolished
slavery within its borders, or when it won Cuba's independence of what
it believed to be an inhuman tyranny. I believe that it has it in its
power to do no less a thing than to abolish war for ever--to give to
the peoples of the earth the blessing of Perpetual Peace. The question
for it to ask itself is whether it can, with any shadow of
justification, refuse to take this step and withhold this boon from
humanity.
If it does refuse and wars continue--if, within the coming decade, war
should break out, whether actually involving the United States itself or
not, more bloody and destructive than any that the world has seen--and
if then the facts should be presented to posterity for judgment,--will
the American people be held guiltless? It is improbable that the case
ever could be so presented, for there is none to put the United States
on trial, none to draw an indictment, none to prosecute. The world has
not turned to the United States to ask that it be saved; no one has
arisen to point at the United States and say, "Thou art the one to do
this thing." The historians of another generation will have no
depositions before them on which to base a verdict. But if the facts are
as stated and the United States knows them to be so, does the lack of
common knowledge of them make her responsibility any the less? It
remains that the nation has the power to do this, and it alone among
nations.
* * * * *
The first idea of most Americans, when a hard and fast alliance with
Great Britain is suggested to them, usually formulates itself in the
statement that they have no wish to be made into a cat's-paw for pulling
England's chestnuts out of the fire. America has no desire to be drawn
into England's quarrels. Until less than ten years ago, there was
justification for the point of view; for while England seemed to be
ever on the brink of war, the United States lived peacefully in her
far-off Valley of Avilion. But the map of the world has changed, and
while the United States has left her seclusion and come out to play her
part in the world-politics, England has been buttressing herself with
friendships, until it is at least arguable whether the United States is
not the more exposed to danger of the two. But it is no question now of
being dragged into other people's quarrels; but of making all
quarrelling impossible.
Again, the American will say that the United States needs no allies. She
can hold her own; let Great Britain do the same. And again I say that it
is no question now of whether either Power can hold its own against the
world or not. Great Britain, Americans should understand, has no more
fear for herself than has the United States. England "does not seek
alliances: she grants them." There is not only no single European Power,
but there is no probable combination of European Powers, which England
does not in her heart serenely believe herself quite competent to deal
with. British pride has grown no less in the last three hundred years:
"Come the four corners of the World in arms
And we shall shock them."
Americans should disabuse themselves finally of the idea that if England
desires an alliance with the United States it is because she has any
fear that she may need help against any other enemy. Englishmen are too
well satisfied with themselves for that (with precisely the same kind of
self-satisfaction as the United States suffers from), and much too
confident that, in whatever may arise, it will be the other fellow who
will need help. But if England has no misgiving as to her ability to
take care of herself when trouble comes, she is far from being ashamed
to say that she would infinitely prefer that trouble should not come,
either to her or to another, and she would join--oh, so gladly!--with
the United States (as for a partial attainment of the same end she has
already joined with France on the one hand and with Japan on the other)
to make sure that it should never come. Has the United States any right
to refuse to enter into such an alliance--an alliance which would not be
entangling, but which would make entanglements impossible?
At Christmas time in 1906, the following suggestion was made in the
London correspondence of an American paper[15:1]:
"The new ideals which mankind has set before itself, the infinitely
larger enlightenment and education of the masses, the desperate struggle
which every civilised people is waging against all forms of social
suffering and vice within itself, the mere complexity of modern commerce
with its all-absorbing interest--these things all cry aloud for peace.
War does not belong to this phase of civilisation. Least of all can it
have any appeal to the two peoples in whom the spirit of the Twentieth
Century is most manifest. Of all peoples, Great Britain and the United
States have most cause to desire peace.
"There should be a Christmas message sent from the White House which
should run something like this:
"TO HIS MAJESTY KING EDWARD THE SEVENTH:
"To your majesty, to her majesty the Queen, and to the people
of the British empire, I desire to express the best wishes of
myself and of the people of the United States. At the same
time, I wish to assure your majesty that you will have both
the sympathy and the practical support of the American people
in such action as it may seem right to you and to the British
people to take in the direction of securing to the nations of
the world that peace of which your majesty has always shown
yourself so earnest an advocate.
"(Signed), THEODORE ROOSEVELT.
"Some such an answer as this would be returned:
"TO HIS EXCELLENCY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES:
"In acknowledging with gratitude the expression of good wishes
to ourselves, to her majesty the Queen, and to the people of
the British empire of yourself and the population of the
United States, I desire most cordially to reciprocate the
sentiments of good will. Even more cordially and gratefully, I
acknowledge the assurance of sympathy and support of the great
American people in action directed to securing peace to the
nations of the world. It will be my immediate care to propose
such a course of joint action between us as may secure that
blessing to all peoples in the course of the coming year.
"(Signed), EDWARD.
"Does anybody doubt that, if the two nations bent themselves to the task
in earnest, universal peace could be so secured to all the peoples of
the earth in the course of the coming year? And if it is in truth in
their power to do this thing, how can either conceivably convince itself
that it is not its duty?
"And what a Christmas the world would have in 1907!"
* * * * *
Does any one doubt it? Does any one doubt that, if the two peoples were
in earnest, though the thing might not be brought about in one year, it
is far from improbable that it could be achieved in two years or three?
Since the paragraphs which I have quoted were published, a year has
passed and for a large part of that year the Conference has been in
session at The Hague; and of the results of that Conference it is not
easy for either an Englishman or an American to speak with patience.
Does any one doubt that if the two Governments had set themselves
determinedly, from the beginning of the _pourparlers_, to reach the one
definite goal those results might have been very different?
During the last few years, the two Powers, each acting in her own way,
have done more to establish peace on earth than has been done by all the
other Powers in all time; and I most earnestly believe that it only
needs that they should say with one voice that there shall be no more
wars and there will be none. Nor am I ignoring the complexities of the
situation; but I believe that all the details, the first step once
taken, would settle themselves with unexpected facility through the
medium of international tribunals. Of course this will be called
visionary: but whosoever is tempted so to call it, let him read history
in the records of contemporary writers and see how visionary all great
forward movements in the progress of the world have seemed until the
time came when the thing was to be accomplished. What we are now
discussing seems visionary because of its unfamiliarity. It has the
formidableness of the unknown. The impossible, once accomplished, looks
simple enough in retrospect. The fact is that never before has there
been a time when boundaries all over the world have been so nearly
established--when there were so few points outstanding likely to embroil
any two of the Great Powers in conflict--so few national ambitions
struggling for appeasement. It is easy not to realise this unless one
studies the field in detail: easy to fail to see how near is the
attainment of universal peace.
The Councils of the Powers have in the past been so hampered by the
traditions of a tortuous diplomacy, so tossed and perturbed within by
the cross-currents of intrigue, that they have shown themselves almost
childishly incapable of arriving at clear-cut decisions. Old policies,
old formulae, old jealousies, old dynastic influences still hold control
of the majority of the chancelleries of Continental Europe, and these
things it is that have made questions simple in themselves seem complex
and incapable of solution. But there is nothing to be settled involving
larger territorial interests or more beset with delicacies than many
questions with which the Supreme Court of the United States has had to
deal--none so large as to seem formidable to his Majesty's Privy Council
or to the House of Lords. And under the guidance of Great Britain and
the United States acting in unison, assured in advance of the sympathy
of France and Japan and of whatever other Powers would welcome the new
order of things, a Hague committee or other international tribunal could
be made a businesslike organisation working directly for results,--as
directly as the board of directors of any commercial corporation. And it
is with those who consider this impracticable that the onus lies of
pointing out the direction from which insuperable resistance is to be
expected,--from which particular Powers in Europe, in Asia, or in
Central or South America.
The ultimate domination of the world by the Anglo-Saxon (let us call him
so) seems to be reasonably assured; and no less assured is it that at
some time wars will cease. The question for both Englishmen and
Americans to ask themselves is whether, recognising the responsibility
that already rests upon it, the Anglo-Saxon race dare or can for
conscience' sake--or still more, whether one branch of it when the other
be willing to push on, dare or can for conscience' sake--hang back and
postpone the advent of the Universal Peace, which it is in its power to
bring about to-day, no matter what the motives of jealousy, of
self-interest, or of self-distrust may be that restrain it.
It has been assumed in all that has been said that the onus of refusal
rests solely on the United States; as indeed it does. Great Britain, it
will be objected, has asked for no alliance. Nor has she. Great Britain
does not put herself in the position of suing for a friendship which may
be denied; and is there any doubt that if Great Britain had at any time
asked openly for such an alliance she would have been refused? Would she
not be bluntly refused to-day? Great men on either side--but never, be
it noted, an Englishman except for the purpose of agreeing with an
American who has already spoken--have said many times that a formal
alliance is not desirable: that things are going well enough as they are
and that it is best to wait. Things are never going well enough, so
long as they might go better. And these men who say it speak only with
an eye to the interests of the two countries, not considering the
greater stake of the happiness of the world at large; and even so (I say
it with deference) they know in their own minds that if indeed the thing
should become suddenly feasible, neither they nor any thinking man, with
the good of humanity at heart, would dare to raise a voice against it or
would dream of doing other than rejoice. It is only because it has
seemed impossible that it has been best to do without it; and it is
impossible only because the people of the United States have not yet
realised the responsibilities of the new position which they hold in the
councils of the world, but are still bound by the prejudices of the days
of little things, still slaves--they of all people!--to an old and
outworn formula. They have not yet comprehended that within their arm's
reach there lies an achievement greater than has ever been given to a
nation to accomplish, and that they have but to take one step forward to
enter on a destiny greater than anything foreshadowed even in the
promise of their own wonderful history.
And when those who would be their coadjutors are willing and waiting and
beckoning them on, have they any right to hold back? Is it anything
other than moral cowardice if they do?
* * * * *
I wish that each individual American would give one hour's unprejudiced
study to the British Empire,--would sit down with a map of the world
before him and, summoning to his assistance such knowledge of history as
he has and bearing in mind the conditions of his own country, endeavour
to arrive at some idea of what it is that Englishmen have done in the
world, what are the present circumstances of the Empire, what its aims
and ambitions. I do not think that the ordinarily educated and
intelligent American knows how ignorant he is of the nation which has
played so large a part in the history of his own country and of which he
talks so often and with so little restraint. The ignorance of Englishmen
of America is another matter which will be referred to in its place. For
the present, what is to be desired is that the American should get some
elementary grasp of the character of Great Britain and her dependencies
as a whole.
In the first place it is worth pointing out that the Empire is as much
bigger than the United States as the United States is bigger than the
British Isles. I am not now talking of mere geographical dimensions, but
of the political schemes of the two nations. Americans commonly speak of
theirs as a young country--as the youngest of the Great Powers,--but in
every true sense the British Empire is vastly younger. The United States
has an established form of government which has been the same for a
hundred years and, all good Americans hope, will remain unchanged for
centuries to come. The British Empire is still groping inchoate: it is
all makeshift and endeavour. It is in about that stage of growth in
which the United States found herself when her transcontinental railways
were still unbuilt, when she had not yet digested Texas or California,
and the greater part of the West remained unsettled and unsurveyed.
If the American will look to the north, he will see Canada in
approximately the phase in her material progress which the United
States had reached in, let us say, 1880 to 1885. Australia and New
Zealand are somewhat further behind; South Africa further still. Behind
that again are the various scattered portions of the Over-Sea Dominions
in divers states of political pupilhood. In some there are not even yet
the foundations on which a Constitutional or commercial structure can be
built. And while each unit has to be led or encouraged along the path of
individual development, beyond all is the great vision which every
imperially-thinking Englishman sets before himself--the vision of a
Federation of all the parts--a Federation not unlike that which the
United States has enjoyed for over a hundred years (save that Englishmen
hope that there will always be a monarchy at the centre) but which, as
has been said, is almost incomparably larger in conception than was the
Union of the States and requires correspondingly greater labour in its
accomplishment.
If the American will now consider the conditions of the growth of his
own country, he will recognise that the only thing which made that
growth possible was the fact that the people was undistracted by foreign
complications. The one great need of the nation was Peace. It was to
attain this that the policy of non-entanglement was formulated. Without
it, the people could not have devoted its energies with a single mind to
the gigantic task of its own development.
But the task before the British Empire is more gigantic; the need of
peace more urgent. It is more urgent, not merely in proportion to the
additional magnitude and complexity of the task to be done, but is
thrice multiplied by the conditions of the modern world. The British
Empire must needs achieve its industrial consolidation in the teeth of
a commercial competition a thousand times fiercer than anything which
America knew in her young days. The United States grew to greatness in a
secluded nursery. Great Britain must bring up her children in the
streets and on the high seas, under the eyes and exposed to the
seductions of the peoples of all the world.
The American is a reasoning being. A much larger portion of the American
people is habituated to reason for itself--to think independently--to
form and to abide by its individual judgment--than of any other people
in the world. No political fact is more familiar to the American people
than the immense advantage which it derived, during the period of its
internal development, from its enjoyment of external peace. Will not the
American people, then, reasoning from analogy, believe that, under more
compelling conditions, England also earnestly desires external peace?
I can almost hear the retort leaping to the lips of the American reader
who holds the traditional view of the British Empire. "It is all very
well for you to talk of peace now!" I hear him say. "Now that the world
is pretty well divided up and you have grabbed the greater part of it.
You haven't talked much of peace in the past." And here we are
confronted at once with the fundamental misconception of the British
Empire and the British character which has worked deplorable harm in the
American national sentiment towards England.
First, it is worth remarking that with the exception of the Crimean War
(which even the most prejudiced American will not regard as a war of
aggression or as a thing for which England should be blamed) Great
Britain has not been engaged in hostilities with any European Power
since the days of Napoleon. Nor can it be contended that England's share
in the Napoleonic wars was of England's seeking. Since then, if she has
avoided hostilities it has not been for lack of opportunity. The people
which, with Britain's intricate complexity of interests, amid all the
turmoils and jealousies of Europe, has kept the peace for a century can
scarcely have been seeking war.
And again the American will say: "That's all right; I am not talking of
Europe. You've been fighting all over the world all the time. There has
never been a year when you have not been licking some little tin-pot
king and freezing on to his possessions."
Americans are rather proud--justly proud--of the way in which their
power has spread from within the narrow limits of the original thirteen
States till it has dominated half a continent. It has, indeed, been a
splendid piece of work. But what the American is loth to acknowledge is
that that growth was as truly a colonising movement--a process of
imperial expansion--as has been the growth of the British Empire. Of
late years, American historical writers have been preaching this fact;
but the American people has not grasped it. Moreover there were tin-pot
kings already ruling America. Sioux, Nez Perce, or Cree--Zulu, Ashanti,
or Burmese: the names do not matter. And when the expansive energy of
the American people reached the oceans, it could no more stop than it
could stop at the Mississippi. Hawaii, the Philippines, and Puerto Rico
were as inevitable as Louisiana and Texas. And the acquisition of the
two last-named was precisely as imperial a process as the acquisition
of the others. It is only the leap over-seas that, quite illogically,
gives the latter, to American eyes, a different seeming. It matters not
whether you vault a boundary pillar on the plain, a river, a mountain
barrier, or seven thousand miles of sea-water. The process is the same.
Nor in any of the cases was the forward movement other than commendable
and inevitable. It was the necessary manifestation of the unrestrainable
centrifugal impulse of the Anglo-Saxon.
The impulse which sent the first English colonists to North America sent
them also to Australia, to India and the uttermost parts of the earth.
The same impulse drove the American colonists westward, northward,
southward, in whatever direction they met no restraining force equal to
their own expansive energy. It drove them to the Pacific, to the Rio
Grande, to the Sault Ste. Marie; and it has driven them over oceans into
the Arctic Circle, to the shores of Asia, down the Caribbean. And as it
drove them it drove also those Englishmen who were left at home and they
too spread on all lines of least resistance. But no American (I have
never met one, though I must have talked on the subject to hundreds)
will agree that the dispersal of the Englishmen left at home was as
legitimate, as necessary, and every whit as peaceful as the dispersal of
those Englishmen who went first and made their new home in America.
With the acquisition of over-sea dominions of their own, many Americans
are coming to comprehend something of the powerlessness of a great
people in the grip of its destiny. They are also beginning to understand
that the ruling and civilising of savage and alien peoples is not
either all comfort or all profit. If Americans were given the option
to-day to take more Philippines, would they take them? Great Britain has
been familiar with _her_ Philippines for half a century and more. Does
America suppose that she also did not learn her lesson? Will not
Americans understand with what utter reluctance she has been compelled
again and again to take more? Some day Americans will come to believe
that England no more desired to annex Burmah than the United States
deliberately planned to take the Philippines; that Englishmen were as
content to leave the Transvaal and the Orange Free State alone as ever
Americans were to be without Hawaii or Puerto Rico. Egypt was forced
upon Great Britain precisely as Cuba is being foisted on America
to-day--and every Englishman hopes that the United States will be able
to do as much for the Cubans as Great Britain has done for the
Egyptians.
Great Britain would always vastly prefer--has always vastly
preferred--to keep a friendly independent state upon her borders rather
than be compelled to take over the burden of administration. The former
involves less labour and more profit; it retains moreover a barrier
between the British boundaries and those of any potentially hostile
Power upon the other side. England has shown this in India itself and in
Afghanistan. She tried to show it in South Africa. She has shown it in
Thibet. More conclusively than anywhere perhaps she has shown it in the
Federated Malay States--of which probably but few Americans know even
the name, but where more, it may be, than anywhere are Englishmen
working out their ambition--
"To make the world a better place
Where'er the English go."
It might happen that, under a weak and incompetent successor to
President Diaz, Mexico would relapse into the conditions of half a
century ago and the situation along the border be rendered intolerable
to Americans. Sooner or later the United States would be compelled to
protest and, protests being unheeded, to interfere. The incompetence of
the Mexican Government continuing, America would be obliged to establish
a protectorate, if not over the whole country, at least over that
portion the orderly behaviour of which was necessary to her own peace.
Thereafter annexation might follow. Now, at no stage of this process
would Englishmen, looking on, accuse the United States of greediness, of
bullying, or of deliberately planning to gratify an earth-hunger. They,
from experience, understand. But when the same thing occurs on the
British frontiers in Asia or South Africa, Americans make no effort to
understand. "England is up to the same old game," they say. "One more
morsel down the lion's throat."
I am well aware of the depth of the prejudice against which I am
arguing. The majority of Americans are so accustomed to consider their
own expansion across the continent, and beyond, as one of the finest
episodes in the march of human progress (as it is) and the growth of the
British Empire as a mere succession of wanton and brutal outrages on
helpless and benighted peoples, that the immediate impulse of the vast
majority of American readers will be to treat a comparison between the
two with ridicule. Minnesota Massacres and the Indian Mutiny--Cetewayo
and Sitting Bull--Aguinaldo and the Mahdi--Egypt and Cuba; the time
will come when Americans will understand. It is a pity that prejudice
should blind them now.
And if the American reader will refer to the map, which presumably lies
open before him, he might consider in what part of the world it is that
England is now bent on a policy of aggression--where it is that
collision with any Power threatens. In Asia? England's course in regard
to Afghanistan and Thibet surely shows that she is content with her
present boundaries, while her alliance with Japan and the
_rapprochement_ with Russia at which she aims should be evidences enough
of her desire for peace! In Africa? Where is it that spheres of
influence are not delimited? That there will be disturbances, ferments,
which will have to be suppressed at one time and another at various
points within the British sphere is likely--as likely as it was that
similar disturbances would occur in the United States so long as any
considerable number of Indians went loose unblanketed,--but what room is
left for anything approaching serious war? With the problem of the
mixture of races and the necessity of building up the structure of a
state, does not England before all things need peace both in the south
and north? In America? In Australia? With whom? That perils may arise at
almost any point--in mid-ocean even, far away from any land--of course
we recognise; but Americans can hardly fail to see, with the map before
them, that England cannot seek them, but must earnestly desire to avoid
them as she has avoided them with any European Power for this last
century. To borrow a happy phrase, Great Britain is in truth a
"Saturated Power." She has been compelled to shoulder burdens which she
would feign have avoided, to assume obligations which were not of her
creating and which she fulfils with reluctance. And she can assume no
more, or, if she must, will do it only with the utmost unwillingness.
What she needs is peace.
And now one must go as delicately as is compatible with making one's
meaning clear.
* * * * *
There is one Power in Europe whose ambitions are a menace to the peace
of the world--one only. I do not think that Americans as a rule
understand this, but it is true and there can be no harm in saying so,
for neither in her press nor in the mouths of her statesmen are those
ambitions denied by that Power herself. Indeed they are insisted on to
the taxpayer as the reason why she needs so powerful an army and a
fleet. It is not suggested that Germany's ambitions are other than
legitimate and inevitable: it would be difficult for either Englishman
or American to say that with grace. I am not arguing against Germany; I
am arguing for Peace.
Germany says frankly enough that she is cooped up within boundaries
which are intolerable--that she is an "imprisoned Power." She argues,
still with perfect frankness, that it was a mere accident that, to her
misfortune, she came into being as a great Power too late to be able to
get her proper share of the earth's surface, wherein her people might
expand and put forth their surplus energy. The time when there was
earth's surface to choose was already gone. But that fact has in no way
lessened the need of expansion or destroyed the energy. She must burst
her prison walls, she says. It would have been better could she have
flowed out quietly into unoccupied land--as the United States has done
and as Great Britain has done--but that being impossible, she must flow
where she can. And ringed around her are other Powers, great or small,
which bar her way. Therefore she needs the army and the fleet. It is
logical and it is candid.
It is evident that the Franco-Russian Alliance makes the bursting of her
banks difficult in what might seem to be the most natural direction. The
Anglo-French _entente_ and the Anglo-Japanese Alliance--perhaps even
more Germany's own partnership in the Triple Alliance with Italy and
Austria--also constitute obstacles which at least necessitate something
more of an army and more of a fleet than might otherwise have been
sufficient for her purpose. But those barriers are not in the long run
going to avert the fulfilment of--or at least the endeavour to
fulfil--that purpose.
There is only one instrumentality, humanly speaking,--one Power,--which
can ultimately prevent Germany from using that army and that fleet for
the ends for which they are being created; and that instrumentality
happens to be the United States. It is difficult to see how Germany can
make any break for freedom without coming in conflict not only with one
of the Great Powers but with a combination of two or more. It is
improbable that she will attempt the enterprise without at least the
benevolent neutrality of the United States. Assurances of positive
sympathy would probably go a long way towards encouraging her to the
hazard. But if the United States should range herself definitely on the
side of peace the venture would become preposterous.
I am not arguing against Germany; I am arguing for Peace. Least of all
am I arguing for an American alliance for England in the event of
Germany's dash for liberty taking an untoward direction. England needs
no help. What does need help is Peace--the Peace of Europe--the Peace of
the World.
There is no talk now of stifling Germany's ambitions: of standing in the
way of her legitimate aspirations. It may be that under other
conditions, under a different form of government, or even under another
individual ruler, those aspirations and ambitions would not appear to
the German people so vital as they do now. They certainly do not appear
so to an outsider; and the German people is far from being of one mind
on the subject. But assuming the majority of Germans to know their own
business best, and granting it to be essential that the people should
have some larger sphere, under their own flag, in which to attain to
their proper growth, if they were compelled to drop war as the means for
obtaining that larger sphere out of their calculations, it would not
mean that those ambitions and aspirations would have to go unsatisfied.
Violence is not the only means of obtaining what one wants.
There was a time when, as between individuals, if one man desired a
thing which his neighbour possessed he went with a club and took it; but
civilised society has abandoned physical force as a medium for the
exchange of commodities and has substituted barter. If physical force
were once discountenanced among nations, any nation which needed a thing
badly enough could always get it. Everybody who had facilities for sale
would be glad to sell, if the price was sufficiently high. It is not
unlikely that, in an age of compulsory peace, Germany would be able to
acquire all that she desires at a less price than the expenditure of
blood and treasure which would be necessary in a war. It would almost
certainly cost her less than the price of war added to the capitalised
annual burden of the up-keep of her army and navy.[32:1]
But the real cost of war does not fall upon the individual nation. And
for the last time let me say that I am not arguing against Germany: I am
arguing for Peace. It has been necessary to discuss Germany's position
because she is at the moment the only factor in the situation which
makes for war. All other Powers are satisfied, or could be satisfied,
with their present boundaries. Outside of the German Empire, the whole
civilised world earnestly desires peace. It may be that Great Britain,
acting in concert with France, Russia, and Japan, will in the near
future be able to take a longer step towards securing that peace for the
world than seems at present credible. But England's natural coadjutor is
the United States. The United States has but to take one step and the
thing is done. It is a _role_ which ought to appeal to the American
people. It is certainly one for the assumption of which all posterity
would bless the name of America.
* * * * *
Critics will, of course, ridicule this offhand dismissing in a few
sentences of the largest of world problems. Each one of several
propositions which I have advanced breaks rudely ground where angels
might fear to tread; each one ought to be put forth cautiously with much
preamble and historical introduction, to be circuitously argued through
several hundred pages; but that cannot be done here because those
propositions are not the main topic of this book. At the same time they
must be stated, however baldly, because they represent the basis on
which my plea for any immediate Anglo-American co-operation in the cause
of peace must rest.
I am also fully conscious of the hostility which almost everything that
I say will provoke from one or another section of the American people,
but I am not addressing the irreconcilables of any foreign element of
the population of the United States. I am talking to the reasoning,
intelligent mass of the two peoples as a whole. The subject of an
Anglo-American alliance is one of which it is the fashion to hush up any
attempt at the discussion in public. It must be spoken of in whispers.
It is better--so the argument runs--to let American good-will to England
grow of itself; an effort to hasten it will but hurt American
susceptibilities.
In the first place this idea rests largely on an exaggerated estimate of
the power of the Irish politician, a power which happily is coming every
day to be more nearly a thing of the past,--"tending," as Carlyle says,
"visibly not to be." In the second place, I believe that I understand
American susceptibilities; and they will not be hurt by any one who
shows that he does understand. What the American resents bitterly is the
arrogant and superficial criticism of the foreigner who sums up the
characteristics and destiny of the nation after a few weeks of
observation. Moreover, Americans do not as a rule like whispering or the
attempt to come at things by by-paths--in which they much resemble the
English. When they want a thing they commonly ask for it--distinctly.
When they think a thing ought to be done they prefer to say
so--unequivocally. They have not much love for the circuitousnesses of
diplomacy; and if England desires American co-operation in what is a
great and noble cause she had much better ask for it--bluntly.
Personally I wish that forty million Englishmen would stand up and shout
the request all at once.
FOOTNOTES:
[8:1] Since this was written, the Anglo-Russian agreement has been
arrived at.
[10:1] Justin H. Smith, _Our Struggle for the Fourteenth Colony_,
Putnams, 1907.
[15:1] _The Bellman_, Minneapolis, Dec. 22, 1906.
[32:1] A point which there is no space to dwell upon here but which I
would commend to the more leisurely consideration of readers--especially
American readers--is that under a _regime_ of physical force there can
in fact be hardly any transfer of commodities at all. What a man has, he
holds, whether his need of it be greater than another's, or whether he
needs it not at all. There is no inducement to part with it and pride
compels him to hold; so that only the strongest can come by the
possession of anything that he desires. If the dollar were substituted
for the club in the dealings of nations, the transfer of commodities
would forthwith become simplified, and such incidents as the purchase of
Alaska and the cession of Heligoland, instead of standing as isolated
examples of international accommodation, would become customary. To take
an example which will bring the matter home at once, many imperialist
Englishmen on visiting the West Indies have become convinced that
certain of England's possessions in those regions could with advantage
to all parties be transferred to the United States. But so long as the
military idea reigns--so long as an island must be regarded primarily as
an outpost, a possible naval base, a strategic point--so long will the
obstacles to such a transfer remain. As soon as war was put outside the
range of possibilities, commercial principles would begin to operate and
those territories, however much or little they might be worth, would be
acquired by the United States. The same thing would happen in all parts
of the world. Possessions, instead of being held by those who could hold
them, would tend to pass to those who needed them or to whom they
logically belonged by geographical relation, and neither Germany's
legitimate aspirations nor those of any other country would need to go
unsatisfied.