the American people will accept the decision, as they would have accepted the reverse decision had it been given, as they did accept first one decision, then the reversal of that decision, in the income tax case. There is no appeal from this decision-neither to Congress nor to the people; it is final. Of course The Outlook welcomes the decision, not only nor chiefly because it sustains the opinion expressed by The Outlook on this subject for over two years, but because it removes what would have been, under a reverse decision, a serious if not an insuperable obstacle to a policy which we believe to be for the advantage both of the United States and of those peoples dependent upon the United States for guidance, protection, United States for guidance, protection, and emancipation. But the duty of the press is not to reopen, by either praise or censure, the question now closed by this decision, but to interpret the decision and show its bearing on the future policy of the country.

We doubt whether any decision of the Supreme Court since the formation of the Constitution has been more important. It decides that the United States may own territory which is not a part of the United States, and may govern dependent peoples who are not citizens of the United States. It gives the Nation a free hand in dealing with foreign problems. It leaves the people of the United States absolutely free to determine by general considerations of expediency and humanity whether the Nation shall have colonies or not. It removes all Constitutional hindrance to expansion and colonization. It leaves Congress in its legislation for foreign colonies limited only by such express provisions as declare, for instance, that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," or by such limitations on its powers as by necessary implication result from the Constitution of a free people organized under a republican form of government.

That this is the significance of the decision is evident alike from the decision itself, from the reasoning of the judges in support of that decision, and from the arguments of the dissenting judges in opposition to it. Congress has not merely power to tax, but full power to govern, such territorial possessions as belong to but

are not a part of the United States. Says Justice Brown:

gress

The practical interpretation put by Congress upon the Constitution has been long continued and uniform to the effect that the Constitution chase or conquest only when and so far as is applicable to territories acquired by purCongress shall so direct. Notwithstanding its duty to "guarantee every State in this Union a republican form of government," Contion of the Territories of Louisiana, Florida, did not hesitate, in the original organizathe Northwest Territory and its subdivisions of Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois, and Wisconsin, and still more recently in the case of Alaska, to establish a form of government bearing a much greater analogy to a British crown colony than a republican State of America, and to vest the legislative power either in a Governor and Council, or a Governor and

Judges, to be appointed by the President. The inhabitants of such territory are not citizens of the United States, and Con

gress has power to determine on what terms and conditions they may be admitted to citizenship, if at all:

We are also of opinion that power to acquire territory by treaty implies not only the power to govern such territory, but to prescribe upon what terms the United States will receive its

inhabitants and what their status shall be in what Chief Justice Marshall termed the "American Empire." There seems to be no middle ground between this position and the doctrine that, if their inhabitants do not become, immediately upon annexation, citizens born, whether savages or civilized, are such of the United States, their children thereafter and entitled to all the rights, privileges, and immunities of citizens.

The extent of the power thus affirmed to belong to Congress is unhesitatingly recognized, and the peril which the misuse of such powers might involve is frankly admitted:

Large powers must necessarily be intrusted to Congress in dealing with these problems, and we are bound to assume that they will be be abused is possible. But the same may be judiciously exercised. That these powers may said of its powers under the Constitution as well as outside of it. Human wisdom has never devised a form of government so perfect It is never conclusive to argue against the that it may not be perverted to bad purposes. possession of certain powers from possible abuses of them.

The remedy for this, in Justice Brown's opinion, is not a Constitutional limitation on Congress, making it impossible for that body to legislate for foreign possessions, but an enlightened public opinion calling it to account if its legislation is dictated by selfish interests. Nor is he less ready to recognize with equal frankness the possible results of such Congressional

freedom on the colonists themselves. These results he does not deprecate; he welcomes them:

Choice in some cases, the natural gravitation of small bodies toward large ones in others, the result of a successful war in still others, may bring about conditions which would render the annexation of distant possessions desirable. If those possessions are inhabited by alien races, differing from us in religion, customs, laws, methods of taxation, and modes of thought, the administration of government and justice, according to Anglo-Saxon principles, may for a time be impossible; and the question at once arises whether large concessions ought not to be made for a time, that ultimately our own theories may be carried out and the blessings of a free government under the Constitution extended to them. We decline to hold that there is anything in the Constitution to forbid such action.

Justice White's opinion not only reaches the same general conclusion, but, it appears to us, is not less radical in its reasoning. He affirms that the United States possesses the same power to acquire territory as does any other nation, but that, though the treaty-making power can acquire territory, it cannot incorporate territory in the United States; that can

Supreme Court has now decided that Congress can deal with new territories substantially as other nations have done with their new territories, and that this country may acquire new territory anywhere by conquest or treaty and hold it as mere colonies or provinces. It now remains for the people to determine whether they will do so, to what extent they will do so, and, if they do so, on what principles, under what motives, and through what instruments they will govern such territories. That the people have power to acquire foreign territories was determined for them by Dewey and Sampson and Schley. That they have a Constitutional right to the free exercise of this power, when circumstances arise which justify it, is determined for them by the Supreme Court of the United States. How they will exercise this power it remains for them to determine by their general elections and through their legislative, executive, and administrative departments.

the people.

The significance of the decision is made even clearer by the dissenting opinions, since they emphasize the issue before the Court. For this reason the decision is more significant than if it had been unanimous, or if the dissenting opinions had been vague or feeble, a charge which can certainly not be brought against them. Justice Harlan makes the issue perfectly

clear:

In my opinion, Congress has no existence and can exercise no authority outside of the Constitution. Still less is it true that Congress can deal with new territories just as other nations have done or may do with their new territories. This Nation is under the control of a written Constitution, which is the supreme law of the land, and the only source of the powers which our Government, or any branch or officer of it, may exercise at any time or at any place. The idea that this country may acquire territory anywhere upon the earth, by conquest or treaty, and hold it as mere colonies or provinces, is wholly inconsistent with the spirit and genius as well as with the words of the Constitution.

The negative of this position is now the law of the land. For the decision of the Supreme Court determines what is Constitutional, and to that extent makes Constitutional the policy it approves; and the

To the Editors of The Outlook:

In The Outlook of April 20 I found, on page 918, in the article of Dr. Abbott on "The Rights of Man," two statements that I cannot at all understand; the article reads that "universal redemption is God's purpose," that "if all men are not brought at last to holiness and life it is because His purpose is frustrated and His love disappointed "—surely a thing impossible?-to frustrate or disappoint ing Dr. George A. Gordon, of Boston, he says: Omnipotence. Again, a little further on, quot

"And if God shall succeed, universal salvation will be the result." How can there be any question as to God's success in anything he wills to do? I cannot understand this, and as there may be others as dull as I am, will you give an explanation to your readers?

New York City.

M. K. C.

We publish this letter not so much for the purpose of giving it a categorical reply as for the purpose of pointing out what we believe to be a popular error respecting the teaching of the Bible, and the teaching also, as we believe, of any true and rational philosophy. The Biblical doctrine of omnipotence is not that God can do anything by a mere utterance of his will; that to him there are no impossibilities; that he has only to will and what he wills is accomplished. Such a doctrine of metaphysical omnipotence,

of power without bounds or difficulties or need of instruments, is wholly foreign to the Bible and indeed to the Hebrew mind, which had no love and little apparent ability for metaphysics, and never concerned itself with what in later time would be called scholastic theology. Such a notion is, indeed, quite inconsistent with the representations of God furnished by the Hebrew writers. They represent God as wise; but if God has only to will and the thing willed comes to pass, there is small room for the exercise of wisdom, which, as we know it, consists mainly in the use of means to accomplish ends. They represent God as patient; but if God has only to speak and all burdens are removed, not only from himself but from all whom he loves, there would be no opportunity for him to exercise patience, which is the bearing of necessary burdens for love's sake. They represent God as longsuffering in love; but if God has only to resolve and all good is instantly achieved for his loved ones, as the wand of the fairy godmother in the stories of our childhood brought the perfection of gifts to the child, there would be no opportunity for long-suffering and little for the highest manifestation of the supremest love, which is never truly tested or attested until it is called on to suffer for the loved one.

as

The Biblical doctrine of omnipotence is expressed in such declarations "Power belongeth unto God," or "All power is given unto me in heaven and earth," or "I am the Almighty God," or "In Him we live and move and have our being." All the powers of nature are represented as emanating from him; all the fountain of human life is in him; he is the spring and source of all power, because of all life. The metaphysical doctrine that there is nothing impossible to God, that to him there are no self-contradictions, that he can make two and two five, or what is morally hate ful morally praiseworthy and what is morally praiseworthy morally hateful, or a free moral agent virtuous in spite of himself without violating his moral freedom, presents no end of both intellectual and moral difficulties and affords no inspiration either to thought or to life. Why should such a God make such a world as this? If he could make of free moral agents a perfectly holy world, he would

make a perfectly holy world or he would not be a perfectly holy God.

On the contrary, the Biblical doctrine that all power belongs to God, that in him are the secret and source of all nature's forces and of all human life, is full of inspiration. All the movements of nature— the voice of many thunders and the whisper of the summer breeze, the diapason of the ocean and the flute-note of the bird, the gigantic California pine and the tiniest blade of grass-are witnesses of his presence, for wherever life is there he is. As he is in all nature, so he is in all life, not playing on men as one plays on a machine which he can make do what he will because it has no will of its own, but moving on men as a father moves on his children, guiding, counseling, directing, governing, rewarding, punishing, but always respecting their wills as the very citadel of their being, always acting on the assumption that a world of men in which there are the wicked as well as the good is better than a world of machines in which there can be no vice nor any virtue, and for the same reason, because there is no freedom to choose the one and reject the other.

This is our answer to our correspondent's question. God is making children of God-children in this, that, like him, they are free to choose between good and evil. All powers inhere in and come forth from him. But this does not mean that there is no question as to God's success in anything he wills to do. He wills to have all men come to a knowledge of the truth; but they do not all come to a knowledge of the truth. He wills not that any should perish; but some apparently do perish. He certainly does not will that any should commit sin, and as certainly some do commit sin. He uses means to accomplish his ends; he chooses between the alternatives which lie before him. And he chooses to make a world of men free to do right, and therefore free to do wrong, that out of their freedom and in their freedom he may develop some of them into an independent moral life like his own, rather than to make a world of slaves who can practice neither virtue nor vice because not endowed with a power of choice. He makes man free that he may make him a man. He wishes man to be a virtuous man, but is determined that he

shall be a man, and man can neither be virtuous nor a man unless his virtue is the offspring of his own free will.

The Spectator

The Spectator took a walk on a recent spring Sunday afternoon. The sunshine and air suggested green fields, budding trees, apple-blossoms, songs of birds; but he ignored these suggestions, and took his walk through the lower East Side in New York, where not a tree is growing except where the houses have been torn down and spaces cleared for parks, some in embryo, some delightful facts.

manners, full of the joy of youth and freedom from care, one would despair.

On the return the Spectator went into the College Settlement, hoping to gain even a slight glimpse into the life of the Settlement. The stoop was crowded with children, evidently waiting to get in. Chairs arranged in the parlor, the atmosphere of preparation, were the evidences that the children would not be disappointed. One meager bunch of appleblossoms was moved again and again to make it tell most largely in the room. The Spectator knew of the orchard of apple-blossoms that would have been in that room if only the people knew how

attracted to an impressive gray building, which proves to be Mills Building No. 2. On the opposite corner, extending the whole block to the east, is one of the

most beautiful and commodious of the new

Be

school buildings in New York. On the next block rises the beautiful building of the University Settlement, each window having a window-box of flowers-the last bit of green for blocks. A few blocks beyond is the fine old residence now occupied by the College Settlement. yond this are two more school buildings, a Children's Aid Society building, De Witt Memorial, Clark Neighborhood House, the new baths—a beautiful building-and at the East River the yard known as the Corporation Yard, which it is hoped will yet be utilized as a park, the present contents of old carts, trucks, etc., being deposited under the new bridge, one block away. As one thinks of all these agencies one feels that the needs of the people are being met. A walk from the Bowery to the East River soon dispels the idea. Such teeming streets and doorways, so many tired women, sick and emaciated babies, so many neglected children! streets are shockingly dirty. Were it not for the gay spring hats of the young girls and their equally gay dresses and still gayer

The

Sunday afternoon. The door was opened, and in rushed the children. "Good Seeds" they called themselves. Every chair was filled. The children sang of flowers, of God, of birds, song after song. A story was told, there was more singing, and the "Good Seeds were dismissed, Soldiers," to the inspiring strain of "Onsinging a recessional of "Onward, Onward, ward, Christian Soldiers" of the churches. Every Good Seed came from a more or less orthodox Jewish home, where the thought suggested of proselytizing these children, trusted so implicitly to the Residents, would mean so many lost opportu nities in redeeming this part of the world to a nobler, better manhood and womanhood. Wise methods have proved their wisdom and brought their reward.

From the Settlement the Spectator turned south. How do these thousands live? Again and again the Spectator had to walk in the street. Women and babies filled the doorways; children sat on the sidewalks, on the curb. Baby-carriages, bicycles, soap-box carriages, filled the sidewalk and the street near the curb not occupied by human beings. Fire-escapes were often brilliant with comfortables and the gay ticking of beds stored on them. Here and there the family wash was drying. Women too little and too much dressed hung from windows. What a babble of sound!-conversations carried on from the sidewalk with people two and three stories above, with people across the street. On the sidewalk all seemed to be talking

in talking with the lowly and learning something of their lives. In fact, their lives are often more interesting than a well-written book. Miguelito called himself "a son of Granada," "and, as you know," said he, "we are mostly all descendants of the Moors."

I was soon deep in Miguelito's confidence. He had been an altar-boy in the Cathedral, and, learning that foreigners gave away coins to be shown things, he left the church to become a guide. When I told him I had no money to pay guides, he looked at me incredulously. He had never known but one foreigner without money, and he was a youth walking around the world on a bet. Convinced that I was not a tourist to be duped, nor above taking a cup of coffee with him, he related to me the secrets of his trade, and the tricks he and his fellows sometimes played upon the guileless stranger. He told me how he had on one occasion fixed up an ordinary Andalusian girl with a hired coachman and livery, and had passed her off on a young English nobleman as the daughter of a Spanish marquis. It was a story of the Spanish picaro sort, worthy an Alfarache or a Gil Blas.

Miguelito insisted upon showing me the Alhambra, although I told him I should not pay him. "But you shall see it," said he; "people come from all parts of the world to see it." He fairly pulled me along up the old Gomares street, saying he would show me everything, be my secretary, my guide, and manage my finances, and when we got through he would present me with my account.

At the head of the winding, up-hill street we came to the massive Grecian gateway erected by Charles I. as the entrance to the Alhambra grounds. With in, a dripping forest, with a steep, winding road and a small torrent of foaming, rushing water down one side, gave me a temporary chill. But, following But, following Miguelito around a sudden, sharp angle, I looked up at what is called the Gate of Justice, and my interest was awakened. It was only a square tower, stucco crumbling off exposing its brown-red bricks, with a horseshoe-arched passageway, not half as elaborate as the Grecian gateway below, but it recalled the many strange scenes which it had looked down upon in the centuries gone by.

Within the passageway under the tower there was a partially demolished gun-rack, but the guard of Washington Irving's time, "wrapped in their tattered cloaks," were no longer there.

On the other side of the tower we climbed up a narrow passage on the left to a broad esplanade on which stands the attempt of Charles I. to build a palace on the site occupied by the winter palace of the Moorish kings. Like the Grecian gateway, it is an incongruous pile, seeming very much out of place. Miguelito declared that the Spanish king was crazy to have attempted such a thing, and, pulling me away from half a dozen Gypsy beggars who at once surrounded me, he turned down by a corner of the unfinished palace to the obscure entrance of a series of unimportant-looking old buildings.

"There you are !" exclaimed Miguelito as I suddenly found myself within what had been the summer palace of Boabdil. "Superb! Beautiful! Original work of the Arabs! Restoration! Court of the Lions!" were the words I caught as he endeavored to hurry me through the labyrinth of beauty which greeted us on every hand.

I tried to detain him, I plied him with questions, but Miguelito hurried on with a word of explanation here and there, as a muffled guard kept ever behind us, watchful lest we carry away some bit of cherished azulejos which a single peseta perhaps would have rendered him blind to. As we left the ancient halls, I asked Miguelito why he had hurried so. “Oh, it wouldn't do to let you see everything at once. If I were to show you everything in one day, my work would be finished and I could only charge you for that one day; but if I show you a little each day, then I can charge you more days." I admired Miguelito's frankness.

"I was able to visit the Alhambra to-day in peace," I heard a guest say at the hotel. "It rained so that not a single beggar dared to come out."

That is the one trouble you suffer at the Alhambra. You are persistently followed by beggars, Gypsies, and would-be guides, unless it should rain sufficiently to beat them off. But there is one picturesque figure among the group, who without doubt repays the stranger the trouble he causes. He prowls around the old palace, the