:
:
Empire and Expansion,
1890-1909
It has been a splendid little war [with Spain]; begun
with the highest motives, carried on with magnificent
intelligence and spirit, favored by that fortune which
loves the brave.
John Hay, 1898
ninete~nth century neared its sunset, as the frontier closed and
factories and farms poured out exportable surpluses, Americans increasingly looked
outward. Spain, struggling to crush a rebellion in Cuba, became the focus of American wrath and ambition. Goaded by the new "yellow journalism," the probusiness
administration of William McKinley forced a showdown with Spain over Cuba and
soon found itself at war in both the Caribbean and the far Pacific, where Spain's
Philippine colony was ripe for plucking. Although Cuba was freed from Spanish
domination, the United States long compromised Cuba's full independence under
the terms of the controversial Platt Amendment. The liberated Filipinos also chafed
under American rule, mounting a bloody insurrection that dragged on for seven
years. Imperialists and anti-imperialists hotly debated the wisdom and morality of
America's new international role . Theodore Roosevelt, assuming the presidency
after McKinley's assassination in 1901, pursued an especially assertive foreign policy. He secured the Panama Canal Zone for the United States and proceeded to
build an isthmian canal. With the "Roosevelt Corollary" to the Monroe Doctrine, he
asserted the right of the United States to intervene throughout the Caribbean and
Central America. By mediating a settlement at the end of the Russo-Japanese War in
1905, he won the Nobel Peace Prize. And by interceding in the quarrel between California and Japan over Japanese immigration, he hammered out the "Gentlemen's
Agreement" to stem the flow of Japanese immigrants.
Prologue: As the
171
172
A
Chapter 27
Empire and Expansion, 1890-1909
~~wjouma~m~Rower~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~-
I. Joseph Pulitzer Demands Intervention ( 189 7)
Tbe oppressed Cubans revolted in 1895, and the Spanish commander, General Valeriano ("Butcher") Weyler, tried to crush them by herding them into pesthole concentration camps. Atrocities on both sides were inevitable, but the United States heard
little of Cuban misdeeds. Tbe American yellow press, with joseph Pulitzer's New York
World and William Randolph Hearst's New York Journal competing in sensationalism, headlined lurid horror tales. Tbe basic principle of the so-called new journalism
seemed to be "Anything to Sell a Paper, " regardless of the truth. A World reporter
wrote from Cuba that slaughtered rebels were fed to dogs and that children of highranking Spanish families clamored for Cuban ears as playthings. Tbe following editorial in Pulitzer's World demanded action. What point or points probably made the
heaviest impact on the American public?
How long are the Spaniards to drench Cuba with the blood and tears of her
people?
How long is the peasantry of Spain to be drafted away to Cuba to die miserably
in a hopeless war, that Spanish nobles and Spanish officers may get medals and
honors?
How long shall old [Cuban] men and women and children be murdered by the
score, the innocent victims of Spanish rage against the patriot armies they cannot
conquer?
How long shall the sound of rifles in Castle Morro [in Cuba] at sunrise proclaim
that bound and helpless prisoners of war have been murdered in cold blood?
How long shall Cuban women be the victims of Spanish outrages and lie sobbing and bruised in loathsome prisons?
How long shall women passengers on vessels flying the American flag be unlawfully seized and stripped and searched by brutal, jeering Spanish officers, in violation of the laws of nations and of the honor of the United States?*
How long shall American citizens, arbitrarily arrested while on peaceful and legitimate errands, be immured in foul Spanish prisons without trial?t
How long shall the navy of the United States be used as the sea police of barbarous Spain?
How long shall the United States sit idle and indifferent within sound and hearing of rapine and murder?
How long?
1
New York World, February 13, 1897.
*The most highly publicized case actually involved an examination by a police matron.
tBy 1897 there were few, if any, U.S. citizens in Cuban prisons, even naturalized Americans of Cuban
birth.
173
A . Yellow journalism in Flower
2. William Randolph Hearst Stages a Rescue ( 189 7)
William Randolph Hearst, the irresponsible California playboy who had inherited
some $20 million from his father, was even more ingenious than his arch rival joseph
Pulitzer. He is said to have boasted (with undue credit to himself) that it cost him $3
million to bring on the Spanish-American War. He outdid himself in the case of
Evangelina Cisneros, a "tenderly nurtured" Cuban girl of eighteen who was imprisoned in Havana on charges of rebellion and reportedly faced a twenty-year incarceration with depraved fellow inmates. The y ellow press pictured her as a beautiful
young woman whose only crime had been to preserve her virtue against the lustful
advances of a "lecherous" Spanish officer. Hearst 's New York Journal whipped up a
storm of sympathy for the girl and inspired appeals to the Spanish queen and to the
pope. All else failing, a Journal reporter rented a house next to the prison, drugged
the inmates, sawed through the cell bars, and-using a forged visa-escaped with
Senorita Cisneros disguised as a boy. What does this account in the Journal reveal
about the character and the techniques of the new yellow journalism?
EVANGELINA CISNEROS RESCUED BY THE JOURNAL
AN AMERICAN NEWSPAPER ACCOMPLISHES AT A SINGLE
STROKE WHAT THE RED TAPE OF DIPLOMACY
FAILED UITERLY TO BRING ABOUT IN
MANY MONTHS
By Charles Duval
(Copyright, 1897, by W. R. Hearst)
Havana, Oct. 7, via Key West, Fla. , Oct. 9.-Evangelina Cosio y Cisneros is at liberty, and the journal can place to its credit the greatest journalist coup of this age. It
is an illustration of the methods of new journalism and it will find an endorsement
in the heart of every woman who has read of the horrible sufferings of the poor girl
who has been confined for fifteen long months in Recojidas Prison.
The journal, finding that all other methods were unavailing, decided to secure
her liberation through force , and this, as the specially selected commissioner of the
journal, I have succeeded in doing.
I have broken the bars of Recojidas and have set free the beautiful captive of
monster Weyler, restoring her to her friends and relatives, and doing by strength,
skill, and strategy what could not be accomplished by petition and urgent request of
the Pope.
Weyler could blind the Queen to [the] real character of Evangelina, but he could
not build a jail that would hold against journal enterprise when properly set to work.
Tonight all Havana rings with the story. It is the one topic of conversation;
everything else pales into insignificance.
2
New Yorkjournal, October 10, 1897.
174
a
Chapter 27
Empire and Expansion, 1890-1909
TheDedarotionof~r~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I. President McKinley Submits a War Message ( 1898)
Despite Spain 's belated concessions, McKinley sent his war message to Congress on
Aprilll, 1898. His neroes were giving way under the constant clamor for war; his
heart went out to the mistreated Cubans. (He had anonymously contributed $5,000
for their relief) He realized that Spain 's offer of an armistice, at the discretion of its
commander, did not guarantee peace. Tbe rebels had to agree on terms, and Spain
had shown a talent for breaking promises and protracting negotiations. Further
delay would only worsen the terrible conditions. Among the reasons that McKinley
here gives Congress for interoention, which are the soundest and which the weakest?
Was there danger in interoening for humanitarian reasons?
The grounds for such intervention may be briefly summarized as follows:
First. In the cause of humanity and to put an end to the barbarities, bloodshed,
starvation, and horrible miseries now existing there, and which the parties to the
conflict are either unable or unwilling to stop or mitigate. It is no answer to say this
is all in another country, belonging to another nation, and is therefore none of our
business. It is specially our duty, for it is right at our door.
Second. We owe it to our citizens in Cuba to afford them that protection and indemnity for life and property which no government there can or will afford, and to
that end to terminate the conditions that deprive them of legal protection.
Third. The right to intervene may be justified by the very serious injury to the
commerce, trade, and business of our people and by the wanton destruction of
property and devastation of the island.
Fourth, and which is of the utmost importance. The present condition of affairs
in Cuba is a constant menace to our peace, and entails upon this government an
enormous expense. With such a conflict waged for years in an island so near us and
with which our people have such trade and business relations; when the lives and
liberty of our citizens are in constant danger and their property destroyed and themselves ruined; where our trading vessels are liable to seizure and are seized at our
very door by warships of a foreign nation; the expeditions of filibustering [freebooting] that we are powerless to prevent altogether, and the irritating questions and entanglements thus arising-all these and others that I need not mention, with the
resulting strained relations, are a constant menace to our peace and compel us to
keep on a semi-war footing with a nation with which we are at peace.
These elements of danger and disorder already pointed out have been strikingly
illustrated by a tragic event which has deeply and justly moved the American people.
I have already transmitted to Congress the report of the Naval Court of Inquiry on the
destruction of the battleship Maine in the harbor of Havana during the night of the
15th of February. The destruction of that noble vessel has filled the national heart with
inexpressible horror. Two hundred and fifty-eight brave sailors and marines and two
1
James D. Richardson, ed. , Messages and Papers of the Presidents (New York: Bureau of National Literature, 1899), vol. 10, pp . 147, 150, passim.
B . The Declaration ofWar
175
officers of our Navy, reposing in the fancied security of a friendly harbor, have been
hurled to death, [and] grief and want brought to their homes and sorrow to the nation.
The Naval Court of Inquiry, which, it is needless to say, commands the unqualified confidence of the government, was unanimous in its conclusion that the destruction of the Maine was caused by an exterior explosion-that of a submarine
mine.* It did not assume to place the responsibility. That remains to be fixed.
In any event, the destruction of the Maine, by whatever exterior cause, is a
patent and impressive proof of a state of things in Cuba that is intolerable. That condition is thus shown to be such that the Spanish government cannot assure safety
and security to a vessel of the American Navy in the harbor of Havana on a mission
of peace, and rightfully there ....
[McKinley here refers to the offer by the Spanish minister to arbitrate the Maine,
and simply adds, "To this I have made no reply. "1
The long trial has proved that the object fot which Spain has waged the war
cannot be attained. The fire of insurrection may flame or may smolder with varying
seasons, but it has not been, and it is plain that it cannot be, extinguished by present
methods. The only hope of relief and repose from a condidon which can no longer
be endured is the enforced pacification of Cuba. In the name of humanity, in the
name of civilization, in behaif of endangered Americah interests which give us the
right and the duty to speak and to act, the war in Cuba must stop ....
The issue is now with the Congress. It is a solemn responsibility. I have exhausted every effort to relieve the intolerable condition of affairs which is at our
doors. Prepared to execute every obligation imposed upon me by the Constitution
and the law, I await your action.
Yesterday, and since the preparation of the foregoing message, official information was received by me that the latest decree of the Queen Regent of Spain directs
General Blanco, in order to prepare and facilitate peace, td proclaim a suspension of
hostilities, the duration and details of which have not yet been communicated to me.
This fact, with every other pertinent consideration, will, I am sure, have your just
and careful attention irt the solemn deliberations upon which you are about to
enter. If this measure attains a successful result, theh our aspirations as a Christian,
peace-loving people will be realized. If it fails, it will be only another justification for
our contemplated action.
[The president had prepared the foregoing war message a week or so before he
submitted it; the delay was primarily to permit U.S. citizens to flee Cuba. A few hours
before McKinley finally moved, cablegrams from Minister Stewart Woodford in
Madrid brought the news that Spain, having already revoked reconcentration (the
policy of herding Cuban rebels into concentration camps), had met the rest of the
president's demands by authorizing an armistice. So, at the end of a message that
urged war, McKinley casually tacked on the two foregoing paragraphs hinting that
hostilities might be avoided. Eight days later a bellicose Congress overwhelmingly
passed what was in effect a declaration of war. Several ye_ars after the event General
*Assuming that the outside-explosion theory is correct-and it has been seriously challenged-the Maine
might have been blown up by Cuban insurgents seeking to involve the United States in the war.
176
Chapter 27 Empire and Expansion, 1890-1909
Woodford told the journalist and reformer 0. G. Villard, "When I sent that last cable
to McKinley, I thought I should wake up the next morning to find myself acclaimed
all over the United States for having achieved the greatest diplomatic victory in our
history." Instead, he learned of the war message. (0 . G. Villard, Fighting Years [New
York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., 1939}, p . 136.)}
2. Professor Charles Eliot Norton's
Patriotic Protest ( 1898)
Lovable and immensely popular, Charles Eliot Norton served for many years at Harvard as professor of the history of the fine arts. After war broke out, he shocked public opinion with a speech in Cambridge urging young men not to enlist. The press
denounced him as one of the "intellectual copperheads." McKinley had recommended war in the interests of civilization; Norton here urges an opposite course.
Who had the sounder arguments? Was it more patriotic to protest than to acquiesce?
And now of a sudden, without cool deliberation, without prudent preparation,
the nation is hurried into war, and America, she who more than any other land was
pledged to peace and good will on earth, unsheathes her sword, compels a weak
and unwilling nation to a fight, rejecting without due consideration her [Spain's]
earnest and repeated offers to meet every legitimate demand of the United States. It
is a bitter disappointment to the lover of his country; it is a turning back from the
path of civilization to that of barbarism.
"There never was a good war," said [Benjamin] Franklin. There have indeed
been many wars in which a good man must take part .... But if a war be undertaken for the most righteous end, before the resources of peace have been tried and
proved vain to secure it, that war has no defense. It is a national crime. The plea that
the better government of Cuba, and the relief of the reconcentrados, could only be
secured by war is the plea either of ignorance or of hypocrisy.
But the war is declared; and on all hands we hear the cry that he is no patriot
who fails to shout for it, and to urge the youth of the country to enlist, and to rejoice
that they are called to the service of their native land. The sober counsels that were
appropriate before the war was entered upon must give way to blind enthusiasm,
and the voice of condemnation must be silenced by the thunders of the guns and
the hurrahs of the crowd.
Stop! A declaration of war does not change the moral law. "The Ten Commandments will not budge" at a joint resolve of Congress .... No! the voice of protest, of
warning, of appeal is never more needed than when the clamor of fife and drum,
echoed by the press and too often by the pulpit, is bidding all men fall in and keep
step and obey in silence the tyrannous word of command. Then, more than ever, it
is the duty of the good citizen not to be silent, and spite of obliquity, misrepresentation, and abuse, to insist on being heard, and with sober counsel to maintain the
everlasting validity of the principles of the moral law.
2
Public Opinion 24 (June 23, 1898): 775-776.
C. The Debate over Imperialism
C
177
TheDeba~o~rlmperi~~m ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I. Albert Beveridge Trumpets Imperialism ( 1898)
Albert]. Beveridge delivered this famous speech, "Tbe March of the Flag, " at Indianapolis on September 16, 1898, before McKinley had decided to keep the Philippines. Born to an impoverished family, Beveridge had spent his youth at hard
manual labor but ultimately secured a college education with prizes won in oratorical contests. Tbe cadences of his spellbinding oratory were such that "Mr. Dooley"
(F P. Dunne) said you could waltz to them. Tbe year after making this address, Beveridge was elected to the U.S. Senate from Indiana at the remarkably youthful age of
thirty-six. How convincing is his reply to the anti-imperialists' warnings against the
annexation of noncontiguous territory and to their argument that no more land was
needed? What were his powers as a prophet?
Distance and oceans are no arguments. The fact that all the territory our fathers
bought and seized is contiguous is no argument. In 1819 Florida was further from New
York than Porto Rico is from Chicago today; Texas, further from Washington in 1845
than Hawaii is from Boston in 1898; California, more inaccessible in 1847 than the
Philippines are now. . . . The ocean does not separate us from lands of our duty and
desire-the oceans join us, a river never to be dredged, a canal never to be repaired.
Steam joins us; electricity joins us-the very elements are in league with our
destiny. Cuba not contiguous! Porto Rico not contiguous! Hawaii and the Philippines not contiguous! Our navy will make them contiguous. [Admirals] Dewey and
Sampson and Schley have made them contiguous, and American speed, American
guns, American heart and brain and nerve will keep them contiguous forever.
But the Opposition is right-there is a difference. We did not need the western
Mississippi Valley when we acquired it, nor Florida, nor Texas, nor California, nor
the royal provinces of the far Northwest. We had no emigrants to people this imperial w ilderness, no money to develop it, even no highways to cover it. No trade
awaited us in its savage fastnesses. Our productions were not greater than our trade.
There was not one reason for the land-lust of our statesmen from Jefferson to Grant,
other than the prophet and the Saxon within them.
But today we are raising more than we can consume. Today we are making more
than we can use. Today our industrial society is congested; there are more workers
than there is work; there is more capital than there is investment. We do not need
more money-we need more circulation, more employment. Therefore we must find
new markets for our produce, new occupation for our capital, new work for our labor.
And so, while we did not need the territory taken during the past century at the time
it was acquired, we do need what we have taken in 1898, and we need it now.
Think of the thousands of Americans who will pour into Hawaii and Porto Rico
when the republic's laws cover those islands with justice and safety! Think of the
tens of thousands of Americans who will invade mine and field and forest in the
1C. M. Depew, ed., The Library of Oratory (New York: The Globe Publishing Company, 1902), val. 14, pp.
438-440.
178
Chapter 27 Empire and Expansion, 1890-1909
Philippines when a liberal government, protected and controlled by this republic, if
not the government of the republic itself, shall establish order and equity there!
Think of the hundreds of thousands of Americans who will build a soap-and-water,
common-school civilization of energy and industry in Cuba, when a government of
law replaces the double reign of anarchy and tyranny!-think of the prosperous millions that Empress of Islands will support when, obedient to the law of political
gravitation, her people ask for the highest honor liberty can bestow, the sacred
Order of the Stars and Stripes, the citizenship of the Great Republic!
What does all this mean for every one of us? It means opportunity for all the
glorious young manhood of the republic-the most virile, ambitious, impatient, militant manhood the world has ever seen. It means that the resources and the commerce of these immensely rich dominions will be increased as much as American
energy is greater than Spanish sloth ; for Americans henceforth will monopolize
those resources and that commerce.
[The Treaty of Paris, by which the United States acquired the Philippines, received Senate approval by a close vote on February 6, 1899. The imperialists had little to add to the materialistic-humanitarian arguments presented by McKinley and
Beveridge. The anti-imperialists stressed the folly of annexing noncontiguous areas
in the tropics thickly populated by alien peoples. They also harped on the folly of departing from the principles offreedom and nonintervention as set forth in the Declaration of Independence, Washington 's Farewell Address, the Monroe Doctrine, and
the Emancipation Proclamation. Senator George F Hoar of Massachusetts assailed
the imperialists with these words: "Ifyou ask them what they want, you are answered
with a shout: 'Three cheers for the flag! Who will dare to haul it down? Hold on to
everything you can get. The United States is strong enough to do what it likes. The
Declaration ofIndependence and the counsel ofWashington and the Constitution of
the United States have grown rusty and musty. They are for little countries and not
for great ones. There is no moral law for strong nations . .Jlmerica has outgrown
Americanism. "' (Congressional Record, 55th Gong., 3d sess., [1899}, p. 495)}
2. Professor William Sumner Spurns Empire ( 1898)
The "magnificently bald" and "iron-voiced" Professor William G. Sumner of Yale was
an immensely popular lecturer and a leading anti-imperialist. Fearlessly outspoken,
he offended influential alumni by opposing tariffprotection and by turning a cynical eye on the United States' "civilizing mission " in the Philippines. The truth is that
the more obvious the natural resources of the islands became, the less capable the inhabitants seemed of self-rule. The moral obligation of the "white man 's burden, "
which the British poet Kipling urged the United States to shoulder, had many of the
earmarks of the loot sack. The British welcomed Americans as fellow civilizers, no
doubt in part because imperialistic misery loved company. Why did Sumner believe
that the conquered peoples would be unlikely to accept U.S. rule, and that such rule
was a perversion ofAmerican principles?
2
W. G. Sumner, War and Other Essays (1919), pp. 303-305.
C. The Debate over Imperialism
179
There is not a civilized nation which does not talk about its civilizing mission
just as grandly as we do. The English, who really have more to boast of it in this
respect than anybody else, talk least about it, but the Phariseeism with which they
correct and instruct other people has made them hated all over the globe. The
French believe themselves the guardians of the highest and purest culture, and
that the eyes of all mankind are fixed on Paris, whence they expect oracles of
thought and taste. The Germans regard themselves as charged with a mission, especially to us Americans, to save us from egoism and materialism. The Russians, in
their books and newspapers, talk about the civilizing mission of Russia in language
that might be translated from some of the finest paragraphs in our imperialistic
newspapers.
The first principle of Mohammedanism is that we Christians are dogs and infidels, fit only to be enslaved or butchered by Moslems. It is a corollary that wherever Mohammedanism extends it carries, in the belief of its votaries, the highest
blessings, and that the whole human race would be enormously elevated if Mohammedanism should supplant Christianity everywhere.
To come, last, to Spain, the Spaniards have, for centuries, considered themselves
the most zealous and self-sacrificing Christians, especially charged by the Almighty,
on this account, to spread true religion and civilization over the globe. They think
themselves free and noble, leaders in refinement and the sentiments of personal
honor, and they despise us as sordid money-grabbers and heretics. I could bring
you passages from peninsular authors of the first rank about the grand role of Spain
and Portugal in spreading freedom and truth.
Now each nation laughs at all the others when it observes these manifestations
of national vanity. You may rely upon it that they are all ridiculous by virtue of these
pretensions, including ourselves. The point is that each of them repudiates the standards of the others, and the outlying nations, which are to be civilized, hate all the
standards of civilized men.
We assume that what we like and practice, and what we think better, must come
as a welcome blessing to Spanish-Americans and Filipinos. This is grossly and obviously untrue. They hate our ways. They are hostile to our ideas. Our religion, language, institutions, and manners offend them. They like their own ways, and if we
appear amongst them as rulers, there will be social discord in all the great departments of social interest. The most important thing which we shall inherit from the
Spaniards will be the task of suppressing rebellions.
If the United States takes out of the hands of Spain her mission, on the ground
that Spain is not executing it well, and if this nation in its turn attempts to be schoolmistress to others, it will shrivel up into the same vanity and self-conceit of which
Spain now presents an example. To read our current literature one would think that
we were already well on the way to it.
Now, the great reason why all these enterprises which begin by saying to somebody else, "We know what is good for you better than you know yourself and we
are going to make you do it, " are false and wrong is that they violate liberty; or, to
turn the same statement into other words, the reason why liberty, of which we
Americans talk so much, is a good thing is that it means leaving people to live out
their own lives in their own way, while we do the same.
180
Chapter 27 Empire and Expansion, 1890-1909
If we believe in liberty, as an American principle, why do we not stand by it?
Why are we going to throw it away to enter upon a Spanish policy of dominion and
regulation?
3. William Jennings Bryan
Vents His Bitterness ( 190 I)
In 1900 the Republican president McKinley, who favored keeping the Philippines,
again ran against the Democrat William]. Bryan, who favored giving them independence. Republicans accused Bryan ofprolonging the insurrection by holding out
false hopes. One popular magazine published a picture of the Filipino leader on its
front cover, with the query, "W'ho is behind Aguinaldo?" The curious reader lifted a
flap and saw the hawklike features of Bryan. McKinley triumphed by a handsome
margin, and Republicans misleadingly hailed the results as a national mandate to
retain the islands. The next year Bryan expressed his bitterness as follows, several
months after the United States had captured Aguinaldo. What is his strongest rebuttal to Republican charges that the Democrats were responsible for prolonging the insurrection? How good a prophet was Bryan?
In the campaign of 1900 the Republican leaders denied that their party contemplated a permanent increase in the standing army. They asserted that a large army
was only necessary because of the insurrection in the Philippines, and they boldly
declared that the insurrection would cease immediately if the Republican ticket was
successful. The Democratic platform and Democratic speakers were blamed for the
prolongation of the war. "Just re-elect President McKinley," they said, "and let the
Filipinos know they are not to have independence, and they will lay down their
arms and our soldiers can come home."
Well, the Republican ticket was elected, and the Filipinos were notified that they
were not to have independence. But a month after the election the Republicans
rushed through Congress a bill authorizing the President to raise the regular army to
100,000, and now, after a year has elapsed, the insurrection is still in progress and
the end is not yet. Some of the worst losses of the year have been suffered by our
troops within two months . ...
After the Republican victory made it impossible for the imperialists to blame the
anti-imperialists for the continuation of hostilities, the Republican leaders declared
that Aguinaldo, actuated by selfish ambition, was compelling his countrymen to
continue the war. But even after his capture and imprisonment-yes, even after his
captors had secured from him an address advising his comrades to surrender-the
insurrection continued.
How long will it take the imperialists to learn that we can never have peace in
the Philippine Islands? That we can suppress open resistance is certain, although the
cost may be far beyond any gain that can be derived from a colonial government,
but that we can ever make the Filipinos love us or trust us while we rule them
through a carpetbag government is absurd.
3Commoner, Novembe r 22, 1901.
C. The Debate over Imperialism
181
If the Republicans had read the speeches of Abraham Lincoln as much recently
as they did in former years, they would have known that hatred of an alien government is a natural thing and a thing to be expected everywhere. Lincoln said that it
was God himself who placed in every human heart the love of liberty ....
4. The Nation Denounces Atrocities ( 1902)
Many of the Filipino tribes were simple peoples who knew little of so-called civilized
warfare. Some of them would horribly mutilate and torture American captives,
sometimes fastening them down to be eaten alive by insects. The infuriated white soldiers retaliated by shooting a few prisoners and by administering the "water cure':...__
forcing buckets of dirty water into Filipinos, deflating them with rifle butts, and
repeating the painful process. In certain areas the Americans herded the populace
into reconcentration camps, somewhat after the manner of "Butcher" Weyler in
Cuba. Genera/jacob ( "Hell Roaring jake ') Smith was "admonished" by the War Department for an order (not carried out) to kill all males over ten years of age on the
island of Samar. How sound is the parallel that the New York Nation here draws between Spanish behavior in Cuba and U.S. behavior in the Philippines?
Even if the condemnation of barbarous warfare in the Philippines by the imperialist press is somewhat belated, we welcome it, as we welcome everything that
compels Americans to give attention to a subject to which too many of them have
become increasingly indifferent. Silence, we know, is consistent with shame, and
may be one of the signs of its existence; and the fact that only a few of the more unblushing or foolish newspapers have defended Gen. Smith's policy of extermination
shows what the general sentiment is.
To allege the provocation which our soldiers had is to set up a defense which
President Roosevelt brushed aside in advance. To fall back on the miserable
sophistry that "war is hell" is only another way of making out those who engage in
that kind of war to be fiends. It is, besides, to offer an excuse for ourselves which
we did not tolerate for an instant in the case of Spanish atrocities. That is our present moral humiliation in the eyes of the world.
We made war on Spain four years ago for doing the very things of which we are
now guilty ourselves. As the Chicago News pointedly observes, we are giving Spain
as good reason to interfere with us on the ground of humanity as we had to interfere with her. Doubtless she would interfere if she were strong enough and thought
she could acquire some islands in the virtuous act.
4Nation
(New York) 74 (May 8, 1902): 357.
182
Q
Chapter 27 Empire and Expansion, 1890-1909
The~nama~~~tioo
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ __
I. John Hay Twists Colombia's Arm ( 1903)
The Spanish-American War, which netted a far-flung empire, increased public pressure for an isthmian canal. Nicaragua had long been the favored route, but in 1902
Congress approved Colombia 's Isthmus ofPanama. Secretary of State Hay, by threatening to revert to the Nicaragua route, finally secured a treaty from the reluctant
Colombian envoy in Washington. But the senate of Colombia delayed ratification,
for it was dissatisfied with the rather niggardly financial terms offered for this priceless asset-$1 0 million plus an annual payment of $250,000. Secretary Hay thereupon sent the following telegram to the U.S. minister in Bogota, the capital of
Colombia. Critics have contended that this statement contains an intolerable threat
to a sovereign republic. Does it?
Department of State
Washington, June 9, 1903
The Colombian Government apparently does not appreciate the gravity of the
situation. The canal negotiations were initiated by Colombia, and were energetically
pressed upon this Government for several years. The propositions presented by
Colombia, with slight modifications, were finally accepted by us. In virtue of this
agreement our Congress reversed its previous judgment [favoring Nicaragua] and
decided upon the Panama route . If Colombia should now reject the treaty or unduly
delay its ratification, the friendly understanding between the two countries would
be so seriously compromised that action might be taken by the Congress next winter which every friend of Colombia would regret. Confidential. Communicate substance of this verbally to the minister of foreign affairs. If he desires it, give him a
copy in form of memorandum.
Hay
[When the American envoy in Bogota conveyed this stern message to the foreign
minister, the latter asked whether the threat meant hostile measures against Colombia or the adoption of the Nicaragua route. The American was unable to answer. Actually, Secretary Hay took liberties with the truth when he stated that Colombia had
"energetically pressed" canal negotiations for several years. In fact, Washington had
done the pressing.}
2. Theodore Roosevelt Hopes for Revolt ( 1903)
The Colombian senate unanimously rejected the canal zone treaty on August 12,
1903. Among other motives, it hoped to secure for Colombia an additional $40
1
Foreign Relations of the United States, 1903 (Washington, D.C. : Government Printing Office, 1904), p. 146.
The Letters of Theodore Roosevelt by E. E. Morrison, ed. Copyright © 1951 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. Reprinted by permission of Harvard University Press.
2From
D. Tbe Panama Revolution
183
million-the sum that Washington was proposing to pay the heirs of the French company that had started the canal in the 1870s. Tbe Panamanians feared that the
United States would now turn to Nicaragua, as the law required Roosevelt to do if
blocked, and thus deprive the Panamanians of the anticipated prosperity that the
canal would bring. Tbey had revolted against Colombia 's misrule fifty-three times in
the past fifty -seven years (by Roosevelt's count), and they were now riper than ever
for rebellion. Tbe following letter that Roosevelt sent to Dr. Albert Shaw, editor of the
Review of Reviews, is often cited as evidence that he connived at the revolt. Does it
provide good supporting evidence for that conclusion?
My dear Dr. Shaw: I enclose you, purely for your own information, a copy of a
letter of September 5th from our Minister to Colombia. I think it might interest you
to see that there was absolutely not the slightest chance of securing by treaty any
more than we endeavored to secure. The alternatives were to go to Nicaragua,
against the advice of the great majority of competent engineers-some of the most
competent saying that we had better have no canal at this time than go there--or
else to take the territory by force without any attempt at getting a treaty.
I cast aside the proposition mack at this time to foment the secession of
Panama. Whatever other governments can do, the United States cannot go into the
securing by such underhand means, the secession. Privately, I freely say to you thqt
I should be delighted if Panama were an independent State, or if it made itself so at
tqis moment; but for me to say so publicly would amount to an instigation of revolt,
and therefore I cannot say it.
3. Official Connivance in Washington ( 1903)
Tbe rebels in Panama, encouraged by Roosevelt's ill-concealed anger, revolted on
November 3, 1903. Under the ancient treaty of 1846 with Colombia, the United
States had guaranteed the neutrality of the isthmus, obviously against foreign invaders. In this case Roosevelt guaranteed the neutrality of the isthmus by having orders issued to the Nashville and other U.S. naval units to prevent Colombian troops
from landing and crossing from the Atlantic port of Colon to Panama City and
crushing the rebellion. On November 4, 1903, Panama proclaimed its independence. A little more than an hour after receiving the news, Roosevelt hastily authorized de facto recognition, which was extended on November 6, 1903. Tbis unseemly
haste suggested improper connivance by Washington, and in response to a public demand Roosevelt sent the following official documents to Congress. Tbey consist of interchanges between Acting Secretary of State Francis B. Loomis (Hay was then
absent) and the U.S. vice-consul at Panama City, Felix Ehrman. What do these documents suggest about U.S. complicity in the Panamanian revolution?
3Foreign Relations of the Un ited States (Washington , D.C. : Government Printing Office, 1903), p. 231.
184
Chapter 27 Empire and Expansion, 1890-1909
'R,OOS£V.ELT
a,na, the.
CA'&IBB:EAN
0
:Bosota
Mr. Loomis to Mr. Ehrman
Department of State
Washington, November 3, 1903
(Sent 3:40 P.M.)
Uprising on Isthmus reported. Keep Department promptly and fully inf,Jrmed.
Loomi~,
Acting
Mr. Ehrman to Mr. Hay
Panama, November 3, 1903
(Received 8:15P.M.)
No uprising yet. Reported will be in the night. Situation is critical.
Ehrman
Mr. Ehrman to Mr. Hay
Panama, November 3, 1903
(Received 9:50P.M.)
Uprising occurred [at Panama City] tonight, 6; no bloodshed. [Colombian] Army
and navy officials taken prisoners. Government will be organized tonight, consisting
185
E. Tbe Monroe Doctrine in the Caribbean
three consuls, also cabinet. Soldiers changed. Supposed same movement will be effected in Colon. Order prevails so far. Situation serious. Four hundred [Colombian]
soldiers landed Colon today [from] Barranquilla.
Ehrman
Mr. Loomis to Mr. Ehrman
Department of State
Washington, November 3, 1903
(Sent 11:18 P.M.)
Message sent to Nashville to Colon may not have been delivered. Accordingly
see that following message is sent to Nashville immediately: Nashville, Colon:
In the interests of peace make every effort to prevent [Colombian] Government
troops at Colon from proceeding to Panama. The transit of the Isthmus must be kept
open and order maintained. Acknowledge.
(signed) Darling, Acting [Secretary of Navy]
Secure special train [to deliver message], if necessary. Act promptly.
~mander
Loomis, Acting
[Resolute action b··
Hubbard of the Nashville, in response to his instructions from Was6f::;;~:: forced the Colombian troops to sail away from Colon on
November 5, two days after the revolutionists seized Panama City.}
E. The Monroe Doctrine in the Caribbean _______________
I. Roosevelt Launches a Corollary ( 1904)
Tbe corrupt and bankrupt "banana republics" of the Caribbean were inclined to
overborrow, and Roosevelt believed they could properly be "spanked" by European
creditors. But the British-German spanking of Venezuela irz 1902 resulted in the
sinking of two Venezuelan gunboats and the bombardment of a fort and village.
Such interventions foreshadowed a possibly permanent foothold and a consequent
violation of the Monroe Doctrine. Sensing this danger, Roosevelt, in his annual message to Congress of 1904, sketched out his famous corollary to the Monroe Doctrine.
Monroe had in effect warned the European powers in 1823, "Hands off" Roosevelt
was now saying that since the United States would not permit the powers to lay their
hands on, he had an obligation to do so himself In short, he would intervene to keep
1A
Compilation of the Messages and Papers qf the Presidents (New York: Bureau of National Literature,
1906), vol. 16 (December 6, 1904), pp. 7053-7054.
186
Chapter 27 Empire and Expansion, 1890-1909
them from intervening. In the statement embodied in his annual message, how does
he justify this newly announced U.S. role, and what assurances does he give to the
Latin American countries?
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 cannot be separated from the responsibility of making good
use of it.
2. A Latin American Protests ( 1943)
Following up his new corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, Roosevelt arranged with the
local authorities to take over and administer the customshouses of the bankrupt
Santo Domingo. The European creditors then had no real excuse for interfering, for
they received their regular payments. In his annual message of 1905, Roosevelt
added a refinement to his corollary to the Monroe Doctrine: to prevent European
creditors from taking over customshouses (and perhaps staying), the United States
had an obligation to take over the customshouses. In subsequent years, and pur2
Luis Quintanilla, A Latin American Speaks (New York: The Macmillan Company 1943), pp. 125-126. By
permission of the author.
E. Tbe Monroe Doctrine in the Caribbean
187
suant to the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, the marines landed and
acted as international policemen, notably in Haiti, Santo Domingo, and Nicaragua.
The Latin Americans, cherishing their sovereign right to revolution and disorder, bitterly resented this bayonet-enforced twisting of Monroe 's protective dictum. Below,
an outspoken Mexican diplomat, with a Ph.D. from johns Hopkins University, expresses his wrath. It has been said that the Roosevelt Corollary was so radically different from the original Monroe Doctrine (see Vol. I, p. 254) that the two should
never have been associated. Was Roosevelt's corollary a logical extension or a radical
revision of the Monroe Doctrine?
No document has proved more harmful to the prestige of the United States in
the Western Hemisphere [than the Roosevelt Corollary]. No White House policy
could be more distasteful to Latin Americans-not even, perhaps, outspoken imperialism. Latin Americans are usually inclined to admire strength, force , a nation muy
hombre [very manly]. This was imperialism without military glamour.. . . Moreover,
it was a total distortion of the original Message. Monroe's Doctrine was defensive
and negative: defensive, in that it was essentially an opposition to eventual aggression from Europe; negative, in that it simply told Europe what it should not do--not
what the United States should do.
The Monroe Doctrine of later corollaries became aggressive and positive; aggressive, because, even without actual European attack, it urged United States "protection" of Latin America-and that was outright intervention; positive, because
instead of telling Europe what not to do, it told the United States what it should do
in the Western Hemisphere. From a case of America vs. Europe, the corollaries made
of the Doctrine a case of the United States vs. America.
President Monroe had merely shaken his head, brandished his finger, and said
to Europe, "Now, now, gentlemen, if you meddle with us, we will not love you any
more," while Teddy Roosevelt, brandishing a big stick, had shouted, "Listen, you
guys, don't muscle in-this territory is ours. "
In still another corollary, enunciated to justify United States intervention [in
Santo Domingo], the same Roosevelt said: "It is far better that this country should
put through such an arrangement [enforcing fulfillment of financial obligations contracted by Latin American states] rather than to allow any foreign country to undertake it. " To intervene in order to protect: to intervene in order to prevent others
from so doing. It is the "Invasion for Protection" corollary, so much in the limelight
recently, in other parts of the world.
[Latin American bitterness against this perversion of the Monroe Doctrine festered for nearly three decades. A sharp turn for the better came in 1933, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt, implementing a policy initiated by President Herbert
Hoover, formally renounced the doctrine of intervention in Latin America. Thus
what the first Roosevelt gave, the second Roosevelt took away.}
188
E
Chapter 27 Empire and Expansion, 1890-1909
~~e~hand~pan~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I. President Roosevelt Anticipates Trouble ( 1905)
Secretary of State john Hay, attempting to halt European land-grabbing in China, had
induced the reluctant powers to accept his famed Open Door policy in 1899-1900. But
Russia 's continued encroachments on China :s- Manchuria led to the exhausting Russojapanese War of 1904-1905, during which the underdog japanese soundly thrashed
the Russian army and navy. President Roosevelt, who was finally drafted as peace
mediator, wrote the following letter to his close friend Senator Henry Cabot Lodge.
Victory-drunk, japan was becoming understandably cocky, while the race-conscious
California legislature was preparing to erect barriers against japanese immigrants. W'hy
did Roosevelt regard the attitude of Californians as bigoted, foolish, and dangerous?
That Japan will have her head turned to some extent I do not in the least doubt,
and I see clear symptoms of it in many ways. We should certainly as a nation have
ours turned if we had performed such feats as the Japanese have in the past sixteen
months; and the same is true of any European nation. Moreover, I have no doubt
that some Japanese, and perhaps a great many of them, will behave badly to foreigners. They cannot behave worse than the State of California, through its Legislature, is now behaving toward the Japanese.
The feeling on the Pacific slope, taking it from several different standpoints, is as
foolish as if conceived by the mind of a Hottentot. These Pacific Coast people wish
grossly to insult the Japanese and to keep out the Japanese immigrants on the
ground that they are an immoral, degraded, and worthless race; and at the same time
that they desire to do this for the Japanese, and are already doing it for the Chinese,
they expect to be given advantages in Oriental markets; and with besotted folly are
indifferent to building up the navy while provoking this formidable new power-a
power jealous, sensitive, and warlike, and which if irritated could at once take both
the Philippines and Hawaii from us if she obtained the upper hand on the seas.
Most certainly the Japanese soldiers and sailors have shown themselves to be
terrible foes. There can be none more dangerous in all the world. But our own navy,
ship for ship, is I believe at least as efficient as theirs, although I am not certain that
our torpedo boats would be handled as well as theirs. At present we are superior to
them in number of ships, and this superiority will last for some time. It will of course
come to an end if Hale* has his way, but not otherwise.
I hope that we can persuade our people on the one hand to act in a spirit of
generous justice and genuine courtesy toward Japan, and on the other hand to keep
the navy respectable in numbers and more than respectable in the efficiency of its
units. If we act thus we need not fear the Japanese. But if, as Brooks Adams [a
prominent historian, whose work The Law of Civilization and Decay (1895) deeply
influenced Roosevelt] says, we show ourselves "opulent, aggressive, and unarmed,"
the Japanese may sometime work us an injury.
1
From The Letters of Theodore Roosevelt by E. E. Morrison, ed. Copyright© 1951 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. Reprinted by permission of Harvard University Press.
*Maine Senator Eugene Hale, chairman of the Senate Naval Affairs Committee.
F Roosevelt and japan
189
2. japan Resents Discrimination ( 1906)
The San Francisco Board of Education precipitated a crisis in 1906 by ordering all
Asian students to attend a specially segregated school. The sensitive japanese rose in
instant resentment against what they regarded as a deliberate and insulting act of
discrimination. The Tokyo Mainichi Shimbun, a reputable journal, reacted as follows. Where was japanese national pride most deeply wounded?
The whole world knows that the poorly equipped army and navy of the United
States are no match for our efficient army and navy. It will be an easy work to
awake the United States from her dream of obstinacy when one of our great admirals appears on the other side of the Pacific .. . . The present situation is such that
the Japanese nation cannot rest easy by relying only upon the wisdom and statesmanship of President Roosevelt. The Japanese nation must have a firm determination to chastise at any time the obstinate Americans.
Stand up, Japanese nation! Our countrymen have been H UMILIATED on the other
side of the Pacific. Our poor boys and girls have been expelled from the public
schools by the rascals of the United States, cruel and merciless like demons.
At this time we should be ready to give a blow to the United States. Yes, we
should be ready to strike the Devil's head with an iron hammer for the sake of the
world's civilization .... Why do we not insist on sending [war]ships?
3. The Gentlemen's Agreement ( 1908)
The San Francisco school incident revealed anew that a municipality or a state could
take legal action that might involve the entire nation in war. Roosevelt soothed the
japanese, but not the Californians, by adopting the Asians' side of the dispute. He publicly branded the action of the school board as a "wicked absurdity, " and he brought
that entire body to Washington, where he persuaded the members to come to terms. The
San Franciscans agreed to readmit japanese children to the public schools on the condition that Roosevelt would arrange to shut off the influx ofjapanese immigrants. This
he did in the famous Gentlemen 's Agreement, which consisted of an understanding
growing out of an extensive exchange of diplomatic notes. These were officially summarized as follows in the annual report of the US. commissioner-general of immigration. In what ways did these agreements leave the fundamental issues unresolved?
In order that the best results might follow from an enforcement of the regulations, an understanding was reached with Japan that the existing policy of discouraging the emigration of its subjects of the laboring classes to continental United
States should be continued and should, by cooperation of the governments, be
made as effective as possible.
This understanding contemplates that the Japanese Government shall issue passports to continental United States only to such of its subjects as are non-laborers or are
2
T. A. Bailey, Theodore Roosevelt and the japanese-American Crises (Stanford University Press, 1934),
p. 50, October 22 , 1906.
3Annual Report of the Secretary of Commerce and Labor, 1908 (1908), pp. 221-222.
190
Chapter 27 Empire and Expansion, 1890-1909
laborers who, in coming to the continent, seek to resume a formerly acquired domicile, to join a parent, wife, or children residing there, or to assume active control of an
already possessed interest in a farming enterprise in this country; so that the three
classes of laborers entitled to receive passports have come to be designated "former
residents," "parents, wives, or children of residents, " and "settled agriculturists."
With respect to Hawaii, the Japanese Government stated that, experimentally at
least, the issuance of passports to members of the laboring classes proceeding
thence would be limited to "former residents" and "parents, wives, or children of
residents." The said government has also been exercising a careful supervision over
the subject of the emigration of its laboring class to foreign contiguous territory
[Mexico, Canada].
[The honor-system Gentlemen 's Agreement worked reasonably well until 1924,
when Congress in a fit of pique slammed the door completely in the faces of the
japanese. The resulting harvest of ill will had much to do with the tragic events that
eventually led to Pearl Harbor and World War II.}
Thought Provokers
1. Does the press in a democracy have an ethical responsibility to pursue sober policies,
even if such tactics hurt circulation? Has the press shown more responsibility in recent
years than in 1898?
2. Were patriotic Spaniards justified in resenting American attitudes and accusations in
1897-1898? Should the United States have accepted arbitration of the Maine dispute?
3. To what extent were the anti-imperialists idealists? Was there anything morally objectionable in their attitude?
4. Would it have been better to delay construction of the Panama Canal for ten years or so
rather than have the scandal that attended the Panama coup? Was the scandal necessary?
5. With reference to the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, are nations entitled to
complete sovereignty if they fail to exercise it properly? When certain states of the
United States defaulted on their debts to British creditors in the 1830s, Britain did not attempt to take over American customshouses. Why? Are there different rules of international behavior for small nations and large nations?
6. Why did Japan especially resent California's discrimination in 1906, and why was the
Gentlemen's Agreement better than exclusion by act of Congress?