to me, why it is unspeakable folly for the United States. to erect a permanent colonial dependency in the Philippine Islands is that it will distract our attention from the study and solution of the gravest social, economic, and industrial problems in our domestic life, and must needlessly multiply the tasks of democratic government at exactly the time when, in its natural development, it is being subjected to a crucial strain.

We are constantly reminded by writers of great learning and insight, like the historian Lecky, Sir Henry, Maine, Mr. E. L. Godkin, and Professor Hyslop, that democracy is still in the experimental stage. It seems to me a folly bordering on lunacy that men should now soberly propose to add the burdens that have invariably crushed every other republic in the history of the world that assumed them to those under which the people of this country are already staggering, doubtful of solving them to the credit and glory of democratic institutions. Their temerity will be appreciated if we barely enumerate, without pausing to discuss, some of the chief problems before which the genius of our Republic has already paused: Questions of municipal government; of just taxation; of the equitable distribution of produced wealth; of the administration of natural monopolies, and the control of artificial combinations of capital in trusts and otherwise, and the organization of labor; racial problems; and the abuses of our partisan political system with its evolution of boss tyranny, official irresponsibility, and public apathy. Until these questions are settled we have "room and verge enough" at home. Let us not be deceived by the specious plea of "duty." Our greatest, until we shall have made much more progress in them, practically our only, duty is with these im

mediate, immense domestic problems; and not for ourselves alone, but for all mankind.

So far as I have observed, little attempt has been inade in the way of affirmative argument by the advocates of the imperialistic programme. By so managing as to set the Government drifting inevitably toward their object, so that if nothing at all be done we shall find ourselves perforce in due time completely given over to their policy, they have shrewdly maneuvered the burden of proof upon their antagonists. When circumstances compel them to utterance, the results, if I may be permitted in all candor to say so, are exceedingly disappointing. It would seem as if so momentous a departure from our ancient and traditional policy ought to be justified by very weighty considerations. On the contrary, however, they are for the most part of such a character as to remind one, when observing the aspect and demonstrations of the audiences to whom they are addressed, of what Cleon said of the Athenian democracy under somewhat similar circumstances: "That as they listened to the orators for expansion they resembled men sitting to be amused by rhetoricians rather than deliberating on state affairs."

Vague mention is made by them of supposed commercial advantages to accrue to the United States from the acquisition of the Philippines. When it is remembered that the total foreign trade of the islands is only about $30,000,000 a year, and that under the so-called "open door" policy which the great commercial nations have introduced in their colonial management, and which we have already announced we propose to pursue, we can increase our share of this precisely as well without owning the islands as we can by owning them, and without any of the expense entailed by the

latter policy, this contention thins to a vanishing point. So far as Chinese and oriental trade in general is concerned, the maintenance of a coaling station in Luzon, which could easily be arranged, would afford all the facilities that full possession of the archipelago would give. Under modern colonial policies the tendency of trade is not, as it was in the era of navigation laws and similar monopoly regulations, to "follow the flag," but to seek the avenues of least resistance and of greatest profit to those conducting it. The way to augment our trade is to undersell our competitors, to increase the desirability of our goods, and to improve our consular arrangements and foreign business methods. Yankee ingenuity and mechanical skill, which have already trebled our exports to China during the last eight years, while England was doubling hers, will do infinitely more for our commerce than the costly purchase of a market of which we can possess no more after paying the price than would be freely ours without it.

It is said that the home market is overstocked; that there is a glut of all kinds of goods, due to overproduction, and that what the American citizen can not eat and wear must be worked off on the Malay and the Chinamen. Nothing better than this claim illustrates the baselessness of the imperialistic argument. I assert with all confidence that under a proper distribution of the burdens of government and opportunities of wealth in the United States no more of the comforts and luxuries of life can be created by American skill than can be profitably consumed and wisely enjoyed by American manhood, American womanhood and childhood. When men freeze at the mouth of the coal mine and starve in front of the bake shop, when the per capita consumption of wheat decreases as popu