LATIN AMERICA
Latin America is the world's great example of race-mixture. Europeans
and Indians have intermixed from Terra del Fuego to the northern
boundary of Mexico, and the resultant race, with some differences due to
climate, has general points of resemblance over all that vast territory.
There is prompting to speculation as to the reasons why in Spanish and
Portuguese America race mixture was the rule, in Anglo-Saxon America the
exception. It was not the superior kindness of the Latin people which
paved the way to confidence and inter-marriage. No one can doubt that,
badly stained as are the records of the Anglo-Saxons in America, the
records of the Latins are far, far worse. Yet the Latin, between
intervals of massacre, prepared the nuptial couch, and a Latin-Indian
race survives to-day whilst there is no Teutonic-Indian race.
Probably it is a superior sense of racial responsibility and racial
superiority which has kept the Anglo-Saxon colonist from mingling his
blood with that of the races he made subject to him. He shows a
reproduction in a modern people of the old Hebraic spirit of elect
nationality. In truth; there may be advanced some excuse for those
fantastic theorists who write large volumes to prove that ten tribes
were once lost from Israel and might have been found soon after in
Britain. If there were no other circumstances on which to found the
theory (which, I believe, has not the slightest historical basis), the
translation of the Old Testament into the English language would amply
serve. It is the one great successful translation of the world's
literary history: it makes any other version of the Bible in a European
language--including that pseudo-English one done at Douai--seem pallid
and feeble; it rescues the Hebrew sentiment and the Hebrew poetry from
out the morass of the dull Greek translation. And it does all this
seemingly because the Elizabethan Englishman resembled in temperament,
in outlook, in thought, the Chosen People of the time of David.
The Elizabethan Anglo-Saxon wandering out on the Empire trail treated
with cruelty and contempt the Gentile races which he encountered. He has
since learned to treat them with kindness and contempt. But he has never
sunk the contempt, and the contempt saves him from any general practice
of miscegenation. In ruling the blind heathen, more fussy peoples fail
because they wish to set the heathen right: to induce the barbarian to
become as they are. The Anglo-Saxon does not particularly wish to set
the heathen right. He is right: that suffices. It is not possible for
inferior races ever to be like him. It is wise, therefore, to let them
wallow. So long as they give to him the proper reverence, he is
satisfied. Thus the superb, imperturbable Anglo-Saxon holds aloof from
inferior races: governs them coolly, on the whole justly; but never
attempts to share their life. His plan is to enforce strictly from a
subject people the one thing that he wants of them, and to leave the
rest of their lives without interference. They may fill the interval
with hoodoo rites, caste divisions or Mumbo-Jumbo worship, as they
please. So long as such diversions have no seditious tendencies they are
viewed, if not with approval, at least with tolerance. Indeed, if that
be suitable to his purpose, the Anglo-Saxon governor of the heathen will
subsidise the Dark Races' High Priest of Mumbo-Jumbo. Thus a favourite
British remedy for the sorcerer, who is the great evil of the South Sea
Islands, is not a crusade against sorcery, which would be very
troublesome and rather useless, but to purchase over the chief
sorcerers--who come very cheap when translated into English
currency--and make them do their incantations on behalf of orderly
government (insisting, by the way, on more faithful service than Balaam
gave).
It is his race arrogance, equally with his robust common-sense, that
makes the Anglo-Saxon the ideal coloniser and governor of Coloured
Races: and there is no room for miscegenation in an ideal system.
America, considered in its two sections, Latin America and Anglo-Saxon
America, gives a good opportunity for comparison of colonising methods.
To-day North of the 30th parallel the Republic of the United States
shows as the greatest White nation of the world, greatest in population
and material prosperity; and the young nation of Canada enters buoyantly
upon the path of a big career. South of that parallel there are great
populations, but they are poor in resources, and as a rule poorly
governed, poorly educated. Some of the Latin-American races show
promise--Chili and the Argentine Republic most of all,--yet none is
comparable or ever likely to be comparable with the Republic of North
America.
Yet before Columbus sailed from Europe the position was exactly
reversed. North of the 30th parallel of northern latitude there was but
a vagabond beginning of civilisation. South of that parallel two fine
nations had built up polities comparable in many respects with those of
the European peoples of to-day. What Peru and Mexico would have become
under conditions of Anglo-Saxon conquest, it is, of course, impossible
to say. But there is an obvious conclusion to be drawn from the fact
that the Anglo-Saxon colonists found a wilderness and built up two great
nations: the Latin colonists found two highly organised civilisations,
and left a wilderness from which there now emerges a hope, faint and not
yet certain, of a Latin-American Power.
The story of Peru is one of the great tragedies of history. The Peruvian
Empire at the time of the Spanish invasion stretched along the Pacific
Ocean over the territory which now comprises Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, and
Chili. Natural conditions along that coastal belt had been favourable to
the growth of civilisation. A strip of land about twenty leagues wide
runs along the coast, hemmed in by the Andes on one side, by the sea on
the other. This strip of coast land is fed by a few scanty streams.
Above, the steppes of the Sierra, of granite and porphyry, have their
heights wrapped in eternal snows. Here was the call for work, which is
the main essential of civilisation. The Peruvians constructed a system
of canals and subterranean aqueducts, wrought with extraordinary skill
by instruments and tools made of stone and copper (though iron was
plentiful its use had not been learned). Thus they cultivated the waste
places. In some respects their life conditions were similar to those of
the Egyptians. Their agriculture was highly advanced and comprehensive.
Their religion was sun-worship, and on it was based a highly organised
theocracy. Tradition said that a son and daughter of the Sun, who were
also man and wife, were sent by their father to teach the secrets of
life to the Peruvians. These divinities were the first Incas.
The civil and military systems of the Peruvians were admirable in
theory, though doomed to break down utterly under the savage test of the
Spanish invasion. The Empire was divided into four parts; into each ran
one of the great roads which diverged from Cuzco ("the navel"), the
capital. The provinces were ruled by viceroys, assisted by councils; all
magistrates and governors were selected from the nobility. By law, the
Peruvian was forced to marry at a certain age. Sufficient land was
allotted him to maintain himself and his wife, and an additional grant
was made for each child. There was a yearly adjustment and renewal of
land grants. Conditions of theocratic and despotic socialism marked most
departments of civil life. In what may be called "foreign politics" the
Incas pursued conquest by a Florentine policy of negotiation and
intrigue. In dealing with neighbouring foes they acted so that when they
at last came into the Peruvian Empire, they should have uncrippled
resources and amicable sentiments. The Spaniards have described the
Peruvians as "lazy, luxurious and sensual." It would have been equally
correct to have said that they were contented, refined and amiable.
Their very virtues made it impossible for them to defend themselves
against the Spaniards.
The Spanish adventurers who were destined to destroy the elegant and
happy civilisation of the Peruvians--a civilisation which had solved the
problem of poverty, and gave to every citizen a comfortable
existence--were children of Spain at her highest pitch of power and
pride. Gold and his God were the two objects of worship of the Spaniard
of that day, and his greed did no more to sully his wild courage with
cruelty than his religion, which had been given a fierce and gloomy bent
towards persecution by the struggles with the Moors.
In 1511 Vasco Nunez da Balboa was told in Mexico of a fabulously rich
land where "gold was as cheap as iron." Balboa in the search for it
achieved the fine feat of crossing from Central America the mountain
rampart of the isthmus. Reaching the Pacific, he rushed into its waters
crying, "I claim this unknown sea with all it contains for the King of
Castile, and I will make good this claim against all who dare to gainsay
it." There Balboa got clearer news of Peru, and pushed on to within
about twenty leagues of the Gulf of St Michael. But the achievement of
Peru was reserved for another man. In 1524 Francisco Pizarro set out
upon the conquest of Peru. Pizarro had all the motives for wild
adventure. An illegitimate child--his father a colonel of infantry, his
mother of humble condition,--he had reached middle age without winning a
fortune, yet without abating his ambition. He was ready for any
desperate enterprise. After two unsuccessful attempts to reach Peru, the
Spanish freebooter finally succeeded, leading a tiny force across the
Andes to Caxamalco, where he encountered the Inca, who received the
strangers peaceably. But no kindness could stave off the lust for gold
and slaughter of the Spaniards. Because the Inca refused at a moment's
notice to accept the Christian God, as explained to him by a Spanish
friar, a holy war was declared against the Peruvians. The wretched
people understood as little the treachery and the resolute cruelty of
the Spaniards as their gunpowder and their horses. Paralysed by their
virtues, they fell easy victims, as sheep to wolves.
A career of rapine and bloodshed led to the complete occupation of the
country by the Spaniards, and the vassalage of the natives. Civil war
amongst the conquerors, into which the natives were willy-nilly dragged,
aggravated the horrors of this murder of a nation. The Spaniards looted
and tortured the men, violated the women, and were so merciless as to
carry on their war even against the natural resources of the country.
They used to kill the llama or native sheep for the sake of its brains,
which were considered a delicacy. Yet Pizarro, in his instructions from
Spain, which secured to him the right of conquest and discovery in Peru,
and various titles and privileges, was expressly enjoined "to observe
all regulations for the good government and protection of the natives."
The fact that the Spaniards condescended to racial mixture with the
Indians did nothing to heal the scars of such suffering. The half-breeds
grew up with a hatred of Spain, and they had borrowed from their fathers
some of their savagery. The mild Peruvian would have bred victims for
generation after generation. The Spanish-Peruvian cross bred avengers.
Early in the nineteenth century Spain was driven out of South America
and a series of Latin-American Republics instituted.
In 1815 the Napoleonic wars having ended with the caging of the great
soldier, Spain proposed to the Holy Alliance of European monarchs a
joint European effort to restore her dominion over the revolted colonies
in South America. But Napoleon had done his work too well to allow of
any alliance, however "holy," to reassert the divine right of kings.
Whilst he had been overthrowing the thrones of Europe, both in North and
South America free nations had won recognition with the blood of their
people. The United States, still nationally an infant, but sturdy
withal, promulgated the Monroe doctrine as a veto on any European war of
revenge against the South American Republics. Great Britain was more
sympathetic to America than to the Holy Alliance. The momentarily
re-established Kings and Emperors of Europe had therefore to hold their
hand. It was a significant year, creating at once a free Latin America
and a tradition that Latin America should look to Anglo-Saxon America
for protection.
Passing north of the Isthmus of Panama, there come up for consideration
another group of Latin-American States of which the racial history
resembles closely that of South America. The little cluster of Central
American States can hardly be taken seriously. Their ultimate fate will
probably be that of Cuba--nominal independence under the close
surveillance of the United States. But, farther north, Mexico claims
more serious attention. Some time before Peru had received the blessings
of civilisation from Pizarro, Mexico had reluctantly yielded her
independence to Cortez, a Spanish leader whose task was much more severe
than that of Pizarro. Whilst the mild Peruvians gave up without a
struggle, the fierce Mexicans contested the issue with stubbornness and
with a courage which was enterprising enough to allow them to seize the
firearms of dead Spanish soldiers and use them against the invaders.
The original Aztec civilisation was warlike and Spartan. Extreme
severity marked the penal codes. Intemperance, the consuming canker of
Indian races, was severely penalised. There were several classes of
slaves, the most unhappy being prisoners of war, who were often used as
sacrificial victims to the gods. Sacrificed human beings were eaten at
banquets attended by both sexes. The Aztecs were constantly at war with
their neighbours, and needed no better pretext for a campaign than the
need to capture sacrifices for their gods.
Grijalba was the first Spaniard to set foot on Mexico. He held a
conference with an Aztec chief, and interchanged toys and trinkets for a
rich treasure of jewels and gold. Cortez, the conqueror of Mexico, was
sent to Mexico by Velasquez, conqueror of Cuba. He landed in Mexico with
the avowed object of Christianising the natives, and considered himself
a Soldier of the Cross. Like a good Crusader, he was ready to argue
with the sword when words failed to convince. For some while he engaged
in amicable relations with the Mexicans, exchanging worthless trifles
for Mexican gold. But eventually various small wars led up to a three
months' siege of the Aztec capital, which fell after a display of grand
courage on the part of the Mexicans. Their civilisation, when at a point
of high development, was then blotted out for ever.
It was in 1521 that the Spaniards first landed in Mexico. Their rule
extended over three centuries. In 1813 Mexico first declared her
independence, and in 1821 achieved the separation from Spain. The war of
liberation had been fierce and sanguinary. It was succeeded by civil
wars which threatened to tear to pieces the new nation. In 1822 an
Empire was attempted. It ended with the assassination of the Emperor,
Augustin de Yturbidi. A series of military dictatorships followed, until
in 1857 a Republican constitution was promulgated. Because this
constitution was strongly anti-clerical, it led to another series of
wars.
Meanwhile greedy eyes were fixed upon the rich territories thus ravaged
by civil strife. The United States to the north coveted the coastal
provinces of California. Napoleon III. of France conceived the idea of
reviving French influence on the American continent, and in 1864 helped
to set up the second Empire of Mexico with the unhappy Maximilian at its
head. Maximilian left Europe in the spring of 1864. After three years
of civil war he was shot by the revolutionary commander. His rule had
not commended itself to the Mexicans and was viewed with suspicion by
the United States, which saw in it an attempt to revive European
continental influences.
Then anarchy reigned for many years, until in 1876 the strong hands of
Diaz, one of the great men of the century, took control. He did for the
Mexican revolutionaries what Napoleon had done for the French
Terrorists. But it was different material that he had to work upon. The
Mexicans, their Aztec blood not much improved by an admixture of
European, gave reluctant obedience to Diaz, and he was never able to
lead them towards either a peaceful and stable democracy or a really
progressive despotism. For more than a quarter of a century, however, he
held power, nominally as the elected head of a Republic, really as the
despotic centre of a tiny oligarchy. The country he ruled over, however,
was not the old Spanish Mexico. There had been a steady process of
absorption of territory by her powerful northern neighbour. Over
1,000,000 square miles, included in the rich Californian and Texas
districts, had passed over by right of conquest or forced sale to the
United States. The present area of Mexico is 767,000 square miles. So
more than half of this portion of Spanish America has passed over to the
Stars and Stripes.
The fall of Diaz in 1911 seemed to presage the acquirement by the
United States of the rest of Mexico. There had been for some months
rumours of an alliance between Mexico and Japan, which would have had an
obviously unfriendly purpose towards the United States. The rumours were
steadily denied. But many believed that they had some foundation, and
that the mobilisation of United States troops on the Mexican frontier
was not solely due to the desire to keep the frontier line secure from
invasions by the Mexican revolutionaries. Whatever the real position,
the tension relaxed when the abdication of Diaz allayed for a while the
revolutionary disorders in Mexico. Now (1912) disorder again riots
through Mexico, and again the authorities of the United States are
anxiously considering whether intervention is not necessary.[5]
I am strongly of the opinion that by the time the Panama Canal has been
opened for world shipping, the United States will have found some form
of supervision over all Latin North America necessary: and that her
diplomacy is now shaping also for the inclusion of Latin South America
in an American Imperial system by adding to the present measure of
diplomatic suzerainty which the Monroe doctrine represents a
preferential tariff system. Before discussing that point, the actual
strength of Latin America should be summarised. To-day the chief nations
of Latin America--all of Spanish-Indian or of Portuguese-Indian
origin--are:--
The Republic of Argentina, area 3,954,911 square miles; population,
6,489,000 (increasing largely by immigration from all parts of Europe);
revenue, about £20,000,000 a year.
The Republic of Bolivia, area 605,400 square miles; population
2,049,000; revenue, about £1,300,000 a year.
The Republic of Brazil, area 3,218,991 square miles; population
21,461,000 (there is a great European immigration); revenue, about
£18,000,000 a year.
The Republic of Chili, area 2474 square miles; population about
4,500,000; revenue about £1,400,000 a year.
The Republic of Ecuador, area 116,000 square miles; population about
1,400,000; revenue about £1,400,000.
The Republic of Uruguay, area 72,210 square miles; population 1,042,668;
revenue about £5,000,000.
The Republic of Venezuela, area 393,870 square miles; revenue about
£2,000,000.
The Republic of Paraguay, area 98,000 square miles; population about
650,000.
The Republic of Mexico, area 767,000 square miles; population about
14,000,000.
The total of populations is between 50,000,000 and 60,000,000.
These peoples have the possibility--but as yet only the possibility--of
organising appreciable naval power, and are possessed now of a military
power, not altogether contemptible, and equal to the task at most points
of holding the land against a European or Asiatic invader, if that
invader had to face the United States' naval power also. Presuming their
peaceable acceptance of a plan to embrace them in the ambit of an
American Imperial system--a system which would still leave them with
their local liberties,--there is no doubt at all that they could add
enormously to the strength of the United States. Presuming, on the other
hand, a determined plan on their part to form among themselves a grand
Federal League, and to aim at a Latin-American Empire, they might make
some counterbalance to the power of the United States on the American
continent and in the Pacific.
Neither contingency seems immediately likely. These Latin-American
peoples have not yet shown any genius for self-government. They produce
revolutionary heroes, but not statesmen. Among themselves they quarrel
bitterly, and a Latin-American Confederation does not seem to be
possible. On the other hand, Latin America is jealous of the United
States: resents, whilst it accepts the benefits of, the Monroe doctrine,
and would take as a danger signal any action hostile to the Mexican
Republic which the Anglo-Celtic Republic should be forced to take. Any
attempt on the part of the United States to "force the pace" in regard
to Latin America would saddle her with half a dozen annoying wars.
What seems to be the aim of United States diplomacy, and what seems to
be an attainable aim, is that very gradually the countries of South
America will be brought closer to the northern Republic, coaxed by a
system of reciprocity in trade which would offer them advantageous
terms. Commercial union would thus pave the way to a closer political
union. Such a development would be a very serious detriment to British
trade interests, and to the British position in the Pacific. British
export trade with Latin America is very considerable, amounting to some
£60,000,000 worth a year. The two greatest contributors to the total are
Brazil (£16,426,000 in 1910) and the Argentine Republic (£19,097,000 in
1910). Their communications with Great Britain will be left unchanged
with the opening of the Panama Canal: and that event consequently will
not strengthen American influence there. The same remark applies to
trade with Mexico (£2,399,000 in 1910), with Columbia (£1,196,000), with
Uruguay (£2,940,000). But trade with Peru (£1,315,000) and Chili
(£5,479,000) will be affected by the canal bringing New York competition
nearer.
There would, however, be a very serious position created for British
trading interests if a proposal were carried out of an American
preferential tariff system embracing the United States and Latin
America. The total of British trade with Latin America (about
£60,000,000) is nearly one-third of the total of British foreign trade
(£183,986,000 in 1910), and is more than half the total British trade
with British possessions. Moreover, it is almost exclusively in lines in
which United States competition is already keenly felt. A tariff
preference of any extent to the United States would drive British goods,
to a large degree, out of the Latin-American market.
The position of Latin America in its effect on the dominance of the
Pacific may be summed up as this: racial instability will probably
prevent the Latin-American nations from federating and forming a great
Power; the veto of the United States will prevent them from falling into
the sphere of influence of any European Power; their jealousy and
distrust of the United States, whether it be without or with reason,
will stand in the way of their speedy absorption in an American Imperial
system. But that absorption seems ultimately inevitable (though its form
will leave their local independence intact). Its first step has been
taken with the Monroe declaration; its second step is now being prepared
with proposals for trade reciprocity.
FOOTNOTES:
[5] A dispatch from Washington, February 7, 1912, stated:
President Taft and Secretary Knox held a long conference this morning on
the state of affairs in Mexico, which, it is believed, are worse than is
officially admitted. Reluctant as the President is to take any steps
that might compel intervention or the military occupation of Mexico, he
is forced to view both as ultimate possibilities, and to make
preparations accordingly. Thus the Army on the border is being
strengthened, although thus far no important military movements have
taken place, but the plans are complete for mobilisation.
While Congress is opposed to involving the country in war, or to any
action which will lead to hostilities with Mexico, it will support the
President if war is the only alternative, and the large amount of
British and other foreign capital invested in Mexico makes it incumbent
upon the United States, in view of the Monroe doctrine, to protect the
lives and property of foreigners in the Republic. Otherwise, the duty of
protection must be undertaken by the Governments whose nationals are in
jeopardy, which would be an admission on the part of the United States
that the Monroe doctrine exists for the benefit of the United States,
but imposes no obligations. That is an admission Congress will not make
so long as there is an Army ready to take the field.