immense cost, fettered trade, lavish expenditure, clashing jurisdiction, corruption in governments and indigence among the people. What have Mexico and Peru done for Spain, the Brazils for Portugal, Batavia for Holland? Or, if the experience of others is lost upon us, shall we not profit by our own? What have we not sacrificed to our infatuated passion for transatlantic dominion? This it is that has so often led us to risk our own smiling gardens and dear firesides for some snowy desert or infectious morass on the other side of the globe; this induced us to resign all the advantages of our insular situation, to embroil ourselves in the intrigues and fight the battles of half the continent, to form coalitions which were instantly broken, to give subsidies which were never earned; this gave birth to the fratricidal war against American liberty, with all its disgraceful defeats, and all its barren victories, and all the massacres of the Indian hatchet, and all the bloody contracts of the Hessian slaughter-house; this it was which, in the war against the French Republic, induced us to send thousands and tens of thousands of our bravest troops to die in West Indian hospitals, while the armies of our enemies were pouring over the Rhine and the Alps. When a colonial acquisition has been in prospect, we have thought no expenditure extravagant, no interference perilous. Gold has been to us as dust, and blood as water. Shall we never learn wisdom? Shall we never cease to prosecute a pursuit wilder than the wildest dreams of alchemy, with all the credulity and all the profusion of Sir Epicure Mammon?

"Those who maintain that settlements so remote conduce to the military or maritime power of nations, fly in the face of history."

The war of the Revolution-the war which effected the separation between these United States and Great Britain-was fundamentally, and was fought for four long years exclusively, against the colonial system of Europe. This is the most important fact. In a war against that system, this nation originated, not as a matter of policy, but as a matter of principle. In the commencement of that struggle the Fathers of this nation did not contemplate independence from the mother land. "When the people of Rhode Island burned the British war sloop 'Gaspee' in Narragansett Bay," said Senator Vest, in a recent speech, "and the people of Massachusetts threw overboard the cargo of tea in Boston harbor, they acted as British subjects, proclaiming their loyalty to the crown of England. When Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, and Light-Horse Harry Lee met at the old Raleigh tavern in Williamsburg, Va., and in

dorsed the action of Rhode Island and Massachusetts, they proclaimed themselves English subjects, loyal to the king, and only demanded the rights that were given to them as Englishmen by Magna Charta, and the Bill of Rights.

"What is the colonial system against which our Fathers protested?— It is based upon the fundamental idea that the people of immense areas of territory can be held as subjects, never to become citizens; that they must pay taxes, and be impoverished by governmental exaction without having anything to do with the legislation under which they live.

"Against taxation without representation our Fathers fought for the first four years of the Revolution, struggling against the system which England then attempted to impose upon them, and which was graphically described by Thomas Jefferson as the belief that nine-tenths of mankind were born bridled and saddled, and the other tenth booted and spurred to ride them."

CHAPTER IV.

THE LAW VERSUS IMPERIALISM

It is not contended that this nation is prohibited by any natural or human law from acquiring territory, but always within the limitations of right. All territory that is acquired outside of the seat of the National capital, dockyards, arsenals, etc., must be acquired with the idea that it will be admitted to statehood just as soon as possible, and the government has no right to acquire territory with any other purpose in view.

This principle has been laid down by the Supreme Court of the United States, in the famous Dred Scott decision:

"There is certainly no power given by the Constitution to the Federal Government to establish or maintain colonies bordering on the United States or at a distance, to be ruled and governed at its own pleasure, nor to enlarge its territorial limits in any way except by the admission of new States. That power is plainly given; and if a new State is admitted, it needs no further legislation by Congress, because the Constitution itself defines the relative rights and powers and duties of the State and the citizens of the State and the Federal Government. But no power is given to acquire a territory to be held and governed permanently in that character.

"And, indeed, the power exercised by Congress to acquire territory and establish a government there, according to its own unlimited discretion, was viewed with great jealousy by the leading statesmen of the day. And in the Federalist (No. 38), written by Mr. Madison, he speaks of the acquisition of the Northwestern Territory by the Confederated States, by the cession from Virginia, and the establishment of a government there, was an exercise of power not warranted by the articles of confederation, and dangerous to the liberties of the people. And he urges the adoption of the Constitution as a security and safeguard against such an exercise of power.

"We do not mean, however, to question the power of Congress in this respect. The power to expand the territory of the United States by the admission of new States is plainly given; and in the construction of this power by all the departments of the Government, it has been held to

authorize the acquisition of territory not fit for admission at the time, but to be admitted as soon as its population and situation would entitle it to admission. It is acquired to become a State, and not to be held as a colony and governed by Congress with absolute authority; and as the propriety of admitting a new State is committed to the sound judgment of Congress, the power to acquire territory for that purpose, to be held by the United States until it is in a suitable condition to become a State upon an equal footing with the other States, must rest upon the same discretion."

While the court was not unanimous upon all the points in this decision, all the nine justices concurred in the principles above stated, and, moreover, in his dissenting opinion, Mr. Justice McLean took the same position with even greater emphasis:

"In organizing the government of a Territory, Congress is limited to means appropriate to the attainment of the constitutional object. No powers can be exercised which are prohibited by the Constitution, or which are contrary to its spirit; so that, whether the object may be the protection of the property and persons of purchasers of the public lands or of communities who have been annexed to the Union by conquest or purchase, they are initiatory to the establishment of State governments, and no more power can be claimed or exercised than is necessary to the attainment of that end. This is the limitation of all the Federal powers."

These opinions clearly set forth the absence of power in this government to hold Territories as colonies not to be admitted as States, and with no prospect of becoming States. In both of the opinions quoted "the fundamental idea is conveyed that all the power of Congress in regard to the Territories is to be exercised as an initiatory process to their becoming States of the American Union."

And these principles have formed a part of the political faith of Americans of all parties until within the last few months; the actions of the Government have uniformly been in harmony with them.

The first land held by the United States not in the form of a State was the Northwestern Territory ceded by Virginia. It embraced the area now occupied by the States of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, and a part of Minnesota. While the constitutional convention was sitting, the Congress of the Confederation was considering the matter of the government of the Northwest Territory. On July 13, 1787, that body passed the ordinance for the government of the Northwest Territory, drawn by the same hand that chiseled the Declaration of In

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dependence. Its existence and binding efficacy were expressly recognized in the legislation of the first Congress under the Constitution, that of 1789. It contains this provision:

"Sec. 13. And for extending the fundamental principles of civil and religious liberty, which form the basis whereon these republics, their laws and constitutions, are erected; to fix and establish those principles as the basis of all laws, constitutions, and governments which forever hereafter shall be formed in the said Territory; to provide, also, for the establishment of States and permanent government therein, and for their admission to a share in the federal councils on an equal footing with the original States, at as early periods as may be consistent with the general interest.

"Sec. 14. It is hereby ordained and declared, by the authority aforesaid, that the following articles shall be considered as articles of compact between the original States and the people and the States of the said Territory, and forever remain unalterable unless by common consent."

The ordinance distinctly mentions the "establishment of States and permanent government," showing conclusively that in the minds of the Fathers the power of the federal government to hold and rule this Territory was only temporary.

Again, on April 30, 1803, the United States government completed the purchase of Louisiana from France. "The territory thus acquired embraced the area now occupied by the States of Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri, all but the southwest corner of Kansas, Iowa, Minnesota west of the Mississippi river, Nebraska, Colorado east of the Rocky mountains and north of the Arkansas river, the two Dakotas, Montana, Idaho, Oregon, Washington, most of Wyoming, and the present Indian Territory." The treaty with France by which this cession was achieved contains a statement of the same principle:

"The inhabitants of the ceded territory shall be incorporated into the Union of the United States, and admitted as soon as possible, according to the principles of the Federal Constitution, to the enjoyment of all the rights, advantages, and immunities of citizens of the United States; and in the meantime they shall be maintained and protected in the free enjoyment of their liberty, property, and the religion which they profess."

Thomas Jefferson was at this time President of the United States, and James Madison was secretary of state. The treaty was signed by James