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SUMMARIZATION,

RESULTS OF THE STUDIES OF THE SIX GREAT QUESTIONS OF COLONIAL ADMINISTRATION.

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It may not be improper, in closing this study of the six great questions into which the subject at the beginning divided itself, to briefly summarize the facts developed by the investigation. Necessarily, much of the material gathered among the people and publications of all the great nations now maintaining colonies could not be presented in the detailed form that might be desirable for those wishing to make an exhaustive study of this subject, while on the other hand the presentation, even in its present length, may exceed the limits of time at the command of many desiring concise information upon this important subject. For these reasons the following summarization is offered as a result of the study of the six great questions named at the opening of this study (page 1217).

Before stating these conclusions it is proper to again call attention to the fact that this study and the conclusions drawn therefrom relate especially to conditions in tropical and subtropical colonies. As was stated upon the opening page of the work, it is in colonies of this class that the people of the United States are especially interested at the present time from the practical standpoint. The conclusions do not relate, therefore, as a general rule to conditions in the great self-governing colonies inhabited chiefly by people of the mother country, such, for example, as Canada, Australia, and South Africa.

It has been assumed in this study that the chief purpose in the management of tropical and subtropical colonies is the development and advancement of the people of the colony and the territory which they occupy, and that when this is accomplished the result will be beneficial to the commerce of the mother country and the world through both the increased production and consumption which will follow such development of the territories in question.

It is along the lines above indicated that this study has been made and the conclusions which follow reached.

(1) What share of the government of the successfully managed colony originates at the seat of the home government and what share in the colony; and by whom and in what manner are the laws and regulations created?

The general system of government adopted for the colony is determined by action of the legislative body of the home government, and when this is done the conduct of the details is placed in the hands of a department of the government. All nations now attempting the government of communities differing in race, customs, and climatic conditions from those of the home government, appoint from their own people a governor and other executive officers, and these officials, with others named by the home government, form the law-making body in the colony, though in the more advanced colonies a popular branch of the lawmaking body is also elected by the people of the colony. The more important of the laws and regulations formed by this lawmaking body are submitted to the home government and are subject to its final action, but the details of framing and administering the laws and regulations are left to the representatives in the colony of the home government. (For detailed discussion see p. 1218.)

(2) What share of the administration within the colony is conducted by representatives of the home government, and what share is intrusted to the natives in conjunction with the representatives of the home government?

The general administration of government in the colony is performed by the governor and other executive officers, and the lawmaking is by the legislative bodies above described; but the details of administration are largely carried out by natives, in conjunction with, and under the supervision of, the direct representatives of the home government. Local and municipal legislation and administration is left to the natives wherever practicable, and they are encouraged to assume the duties of administering law and order and improving and developing the community. (For detailed discussion see p. 1237.)

(3) What steps are taken and methods applied to improve the material, mental, and moral condition of the people of the colony?

The first and most important steps after the development of order are the creation of roads, railways, telegraphs, steamship lines, and other methods of communication and transportation by which the natural products of the colony can be sent to the markets of the world, where they will find ready sale. With this the native finds his earning power increased, and with this increase of earnings comes increased desire for the comforts and conveniences of civilization, which in turn are followed by better homes, education, newspapers, schools, churches, and increased powers of self-government. The public works for the development and improvement of the colony are usually created with funds raised by local taxation or loans based upon future revenues, and not with funds supplied by the home government, nor does the home government usually make itself responsible for the loans raised by the colony. (For detailed discussion see p. 1278.)

(4) How are habits of industry and thrift inculcated among the natives and the necessary labor supply obtained for the development of industries which shall render the colony self-supporting and its people prosperous?

The methods above described, by which the earning power of the native is greatly enhanced and his desire for the comforts of civilization correspondingly increased, stimulate industry and thrift. The diversification of industries and the individual ownership of land by the natives also develop habits of industry and increase their earning power. In those industries which require large establishments and a steady labor supply, such as sugar, tobacco, and coffee, or in the construction of great public works, a part of the labor supply has been in some colonies obtained from other sources; but as a rule native labor, when properly stimulated by the methods above referred to, proves sufficient for the requirements of the colony. (For detailed discussion see p. 1278.)

(5) How are the necessary funds for the conduct of the colonial government raised, and is any part of such funds supplied by the home government?

The funds for the conduct of the government of the colony are raised by methods similar to those utilized in the more advanced communities of the world. In most cases customs duties supply a larger share of the revenues than any other single item. In a few instances, notably India and Java, the ownership of land is retained by the government, the land being leased to the natives at a low rental under leases usually renewable perpetually, and a large share of the revenue is obtained from these sources. The colonies are required to raise sufficient revenue to meet all their expenses, both of current administration and permanent improvements, and in many cases the railroads, telegraph lines, etc., are also constructed from public funds and are owned by the colony. (For detailed discussion see p. 1356.)

(6) The commercial relation between the colony and the mother country; its ability to supply the articles required in the home country and to absorb those produced for export by the mother country, and the extent to which the tariff and other regulations between the colony and the mother country are adjusted to encourage this mutual interchange.

The principal productions of the colony are usually raw materials and natural food products, and these are usually the principal importations of the mother country. The principal productions of the mother country are manufactures and prepared food products, and these are also the principal importations of the colony. This is especially the case if the colony is located in the Tropics and the mother country in the Temperate Zone. A free interchange of products between the two communities thus mutually dependent upon each other for necessary supplies and a necessary market for the surplus of each is therefore essential. This condition, coupled with the growth of facilities for cheap and rapid transportation and intercommunication, has led in many cases to the removal of restrictive tariffs between the mother country and the colony for the encouragement of the same free interchange between the colony and the mother country as that which exists between the States or provinces of the mother country itself. Specific articles, however, such as sugar for example, which the mother country produces or may produce, are excepted from this general system. This is especially true in countries having a high tariff. In low-tariff countries, which already admit most of the products of all countries free of duty, the tariff regulations naturally make no discriminations relative to the products of the colony, and those of the colony make no discrimination relative to the mother country, except in the case of Canada, which grants to the products of the United Kingdom and certain of the British colonies a reduction of one-third in tariff rates. (For detailed discussion see p. 1390.)

COLONIAL METHODS
METHODS COMPARED.

CAUSES OF THE SUCCESSES AND FAILURES OF THE NATIONS WHICH HAVE GOVERNED COLONIAL TERRITORY.

[From introductory volume of "Historical Geography of British Colonies," by Hon. C. P. Lucas, late of Balliol College, Oxford, now assistant under secretary of state, British Colonial Office.-Republished by consent of author and publisher: The Clarendon Press, Oxford, England.]

If the work done by the English nation has in the end proved to be of better quality and more lasting character than that of other peoples; if the English succeeded in India, while the Portuguese failed; if British America has prospered, while Spanish America has not; if the United States grew and developed out of all proportion to the French colony in Canada; one great reason for the difference seems to be that the members of the English-speaking race, as compared with other races, have throughout its history, both at home and abroad, relied not so much on their government as on themselves. * *

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GOVERNMENT MORE DIFFICULT THAN CONQUEST.

Conquest is a temporary matter only; the colonization of an uninhabited country may begin with conquering, but it requires in addition some element of greater permanence. This is found in the two remaining characteristics of colonizing races-power of assimilation and capacity for government. It is not difficult for a strong nation to subdue a savage tribe or people; the difficulty comes later, and consists in finding a modus vivendi between the conquerors and the conquered. It is comparatively easy to extend English conquests in South Africa and annex fresh square miles of territory; but the difficulty of teaching English, Dutch, and natives to live side by side has at present proved almost insurmountable. Here, then, a race which can adapt itself to others has a great advantage; while even at the earlier the conquering-stage, the power of assimilation has been shown in history to be of the greatest value.

ASSIMILATION OF NATIVES.

The Spaniards, for instance, were notably helped in their conquest of America by the facility with which they intermixed with the natives; and it is a matter of story how much Cortes was helped in his Mexican campaigns by his Indian mistress and interpreter, Marina.

The French afford a still more striking instance of the influence which attaches to a race ready to adopt the customs and manners of the natives of the country, or to find means of engrafting upon the latter their own civilization. In Canada, we read of Champlain spending his life in great measure in the Indian lodges, and of a later French governor, de Frontenac, taking part in the savage rites of the Indians and joining in the war dance. And in the East Indies, when French and English were striving for the mastery, Dupleix not only converted himself for the time being into an oriental prince, but achieved the more difficult feat of habituating the natives to the discipline and drill of European soldiers, showing thereby the way by which a few Europeans might conquer and hold a great Eastern empire.

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But there is a possible drawback to this power of assimilation; it lies in this, that the colonizing race may in time be merged in the lower native race, and become degraded in its new home. This has been the case with the Spanish in America-the Spaniard has in course of years rather become assimilated to the Indian than the Indian to the Spaniard. A mixed race has sprung up of lower type than that of the original immigrant, and the final result, as seen in the South American States, compares unfavorably with that which has been produced in other cases where the incoming race has, as in North America, shown less adaptability to, and less inclination to, mix with the native inhabitants of the country.

The last and most important characteristic to be looked for in colonizing races is the power of governing. It is a quality which would seem to be found more especially among peoples which are deficient in capacity for assimilation. A ruler must possess strength of character, and strength of character is not often compatible with flexibility. The Romans in ancient, the English in modern times stand out above all peoples for having built up and maintained a great empire of colonies and dependencies. There was little power of assimilation in the Romans, and there is little in the English; but in the character of both nations might be traced a strong leaning to system, a strong love of justice and law, and some idea of governing for the sake of the governed. *

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SPANISH COLONIAL METHODS.

A mixed race themselves, the Spaniards were ready to intermingle with the races with whom they were brought into contact. A fighting, ruthless, and fanatical people, having vanquished the heathen at home, they were prepared to carry their conquests into other lands. At the end of the fifteenth century the spirit of adventure, the desire of gold, and the crusading impulse all combined to stimulate and influence the Spanish mind; and the strong and ambitious Government of Spain was only too ready to sanction schemes of annexation and conquest, hoping by such means to increase the prestige of the country, to add to its material resources, and so to make it the leading power of the world.

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Her vast American dominions were the result of rapid conquest, not of gradually growing commercial settlement. In North America the English made slow way in a desolate land, among scattered savage tribes which could be exterminated but not enslaved. The course of the Spaniards was widely different. In Mexico and Peru they conquered at a blow nations which were rich, powerful, and well organized, but which had long been broken in to despotism, and when once subdued became the slaves of the conquerors. The conquest of Mexico was effected in less than three years; that of Peru in some ten or eleven years; and nearly the whole of the

Spanish possessions in America were acquired within sixty years from the date when Columbus first set sail from Spain. English colonization in North America was from the first colonization in its true sense. It consisted of settlements in which there was no native element to be found, and in spite of isolated instances of intermingling, such as are portrayed in the romantic story of Pocahontas, the English and the Indians lived entirely outside each other. The Spanish-American colonies, on the other hand, were simply conquered dependencies, containing a large native population. The Spanish conquest was too rapid to produce sound and beneficial results; the conquerors lost their heads, plunged into cruelty and extravagance, glutted themselves with gold and silver instead of quietly developing commerce and agriculture; and, yielding to the temptations of their position and the enervating influence of the climate, in no long time degenerated in mind and body. The home Government might have checked the pace at which the work was carried on; but if well-meaning it was unwise; it constantly sanctioned fresh conquests and encouraged the colonization of the mainland before the colonies on the islands were well and healthily established. * *

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DUTCH COLONIAL METHODS.

When we turn to the Dutch, we come to a new phase of colonization. The work is now taken up by one of the northern nations of Europe, and by a people of the Teuton breed, embodying the spirit of opposition to political and religious despotism, a trading and seafaring race. The struggle between Spain and Holland was a struggle between Latin and Teuton, between absolutism and democracy, between Roman Catholic and Protestant, between continental imperialism and a people who sought for trade, not for empire, who looked to the sea, not to the land, and who represented the rise of the middle class in the modern social system, as opposed to the old monarchy, church, and aristocracy.

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Among the causes of the success of the Dutch colonization in past time, writers have noticed their strict attention to business, involving dogged maintenance of their commercial monopolies, the rigid supervision kept over their subordinate officers, and the combination in the case of the latter of regular payment and systematic promotion with absolute prohibition of private trading. In these respects they stand out in contrast to the Portuguese: They were more honest and more systematic in their dealings; at the same time they treated the natives with greater humanity. Apart, too, from the respective characters of the two peoples, the Dutch gained by coming after the Portuguese, just as the English gained by coming after the Dutch. The natives, who hated all foreign interference, naturally hated most their masters for the time being, so the newcomers were welcomed as in some sort deliverers and friends. Further, the Dutch were well aware of the danger of undue extension of empire, and were carried beyond the limits of their power as a trading nation by force of circumstances, not by their own inclinations. Their likeness to the Carthaginians of old in partiality for island settlements has already been noticed, and the Netherlands Indies at the present day are a collection of island dependencies.

Their decline was natural. Many causes have been assigned for it-constant little wars with the natives, English competition, decay of the energy which had formed and sustained their great trading companies-decay which was evidenced in the constant change of governors and in the corruption of too poorly paid subordinate officials. But the simple account of their decline is, that their commercial system was unprogressive and unsound, and that they themselves, instead of growing out of the merchant stage, fell back more and more into the position of mere traders.

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No people ever had so definite an aim in foreign and colonial policy as the Dutch, and none ever realized their aim more completely. From the first their one object was to secure the trade of the Spice Islands. They tried to avoid collision with other powers, they did not want to conquer, they did not want to acquire territory, they wanted only to trade. And when in 1824, after the Napoleonic wars, Holland having become a political cipher in Europe, and having lost Ceylon and the Cape, gained by treaty with England recognition of her possessions in the East Indian Archipelago, the object with which she became a colonial power was finally attained.

FRENCH COLONIAL METHODS.

France, like Spain and unlike Portugal and Holland, has filled the place in history of a great continental power, and her career in the field of colonization has been that of a nation seeking for empire, rather than of a commercial people bent on quietly planting settlements and by slow degrees extending its trade.

CAUSES OF FRENCH FAILURES.

The successive failures of the French are attributed by historians to the bad policy and mismanagement of their rulers, and though every nation must be held responsible for the kind of government which it produces or to which it submits, yet it is true that the history of France beyond that of any other country can be read aright only by constantly distinguishing between the people and the Government.

The French have in many respects always been eminently suited for colonizing. They have never been found wanting in enterprise, in fighting qualities, or power of adapting themselves to new peoples and new countries. Their history, in the East and West alike, proves that they reached a point far beyond that of merely intermarrying with Indians and falling in with native ways and savage modes of life. Their leaders showed a definite policy in dealing with the native races. They treated them with humanity and consideration, they organized them and gave them cohesion, they formed alliances and counter-alliances, and carried the spirit of European politics into Asia and America. Such were the dealings of Dupleix in India, of Champlain at one time and Montcalm at another in Canada. To quote Mr. Parkman's words, in his comparison of the English and French in America: "The scheme of English . colonization made no account of the Indian tribes. In the scheme of French colonization they were all in all."

TOO MUCH GOVERNMENT.

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Politically, they made two mistakes: In the first place, they tried to do too much; in the second place, they wanted a settled, a continuous, and a reliable policy. As regards the first point, Professor Seeley points out that France had too many irons in the fire; that her European policy was fatal to her colonial empire, and that "she lost the New World because she was always divided between a policy of colonial extension and a policy of European conquest." Similarly, Professor Freeman shows that "the time of the greatest power of France in Europe" (the end of the last and the beginning of the present century) "was by no means equally favorable to her advance in other parts of the world," and that, while she conquered her neighbors on the Continent, she lost her dependencies abroad. It need hardly be added that the same fault of taking up too much at once has been conspicuous in French foreign policy in late years.

EXCESSIVE RELIGIOUS ZEAL.

But if the political mistakes of the French Government were great, its attitude in the matter of religion was even more fatal to the strength and permanence of the French colonial empire. French colonization was in its origin in great measure the work of the Huguenots, who formed no small portion of the industrial classes of France, and who numbered in their ranks the sailors and merchants of the west coast. Yet, as we have seen, when the Huguenots in the sixteenth century settled in Brazil and Florida, they were neglected or betrayed by the French Government. In 1685 they were driven out of France by the revocation of the Edict of Nantes; and they were deliberately excluded from Canada, the one part of the world which, greatly through their instrumentality, bade fair to become in fact as in name New France. When in 1627 Richelieu incorporated the company of the 100 associates to carry on the colonization of Canada, one of the terms of the charter of incorporation was that no Huguenot should be allowed to settle there, and through the influence of the Jesuits this suicidal policy was steadily maintained as long as Canada remained a French possession. Persecuted creeds were sure to find a refuge in one or other of the English colonies; but the religious control of the Canadians was placed absolutely in the hands of Jesuit missionaries or of French priests, whose bigotry, in Acadia at least, was, by the testimony of their own countrymen, the main cause of the sufferings and misery of the settlers during the struggle between England and France. The judgment of history is that France lost Canada through the policy of religious exclusiveness which her rulers pursued. Nor can it be supposed that the effects of this policy ended here. Though the large majority of Frenchmen professed the Roman Catholic faith, measures of intolerance which drove from France her most industrious citizens and which blighted the progress and caused the loss of her most promising colony must necessarily have widened the gulf between the French Government and the French people, and made it clear, if evidence were wanted, that the policy of the court was opposed to the interests of the nation.

GOVERNMENT BY AN ARISTOCRACY.

The evils of a despotic government may be to some extent discounted if it reduces all classes of its subjects to the same political and social level, but this redeeming feature was wanting under the despotism of the Bourbons. The laws, the administration, and the social system of France during their reigns were such as to favor the aristocratic classes at the expense of the general community; and the inequalities which pressed so hardly upon the lower orders, and which finally gave birth to the French revolution, were not confined to the mother country, but were perpetuated in the colonies. The result was seen in Canada. Once conquered by the English, the Canadian people tasted better liberty and felt the benefit of more democratic institutions. They were given a just criminal law, and were allowed to retain their old civil rights and customs and their old religion. Though but sixteen years after the conquest of Canada

the revolt of the United States gave them a most favorable opportunity for rising against their English masters, they showed no disposition to upset the new order of things. They rested contented with an alien rule, and practically gave out to the world that their own French Government-selfish, corrupt, and out of sympathy with national growth and progress-had shown itself unfitted to maintain and develop a great colonial system.

In spite, however, of the loss of their dependencies in the last century, the French at the present day fill a very different position among colonizing nations from that of the Spaniards or Portuguese. France is still a power and a forward power in all parts of the globe, conquering rather than settling, and still as of old interfering in too many places at once.

BRITISH COLONIAL METHODS.

The great success of the English at once in planting colonies and in retaining them when planted must be mainly attributed to the character of the country and the race.

Great Britain stands alone in Europe in being an island power. For over two hundred years she has had no part or lot in the continent of Europe; and the one geographical fact of being bounded on all sides by the sea accounts, as writers have time without number pointed out, for the special course taken by English history.

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The insular position of England has made the English a race of sailors. It has given the country a temperate climate, far more favorable to systematic effort than the more intense heat and cold of inland countries in the same latitude. Most of all, it has kept the people from being perpetually entangled, like their French neighbors, in foreign troubles, leaving them free to develop and extend their commerce and empire in Europe and the East. In the early days of restless migration England was not left to herself, and many streams from many lands have combined to give her a mixed population. The English-speaking breed is one composed of various elements-English, Saxons, Jutes, Danes, Northmen, Flemings; while the Welsh, the Irish, the Manx, and the Northern Scotch are distinct offshoots of the Celtic stock. In short, there is no more sameness in the inhabitants of these islands than there is in the home which they inhabit. Differences of race, too, have been accompanied by varieties of religion; for the line is sharply drawn between the English Episcopalian, the Scotch Presbyterian, the Welsh Methodist, and the Irish Roman Catholic.

These diversities of geography, of breed, and religious thought give some clue to the history of the English as a colonizing nation. The sea bade them colonize, and as colonization takes men into various parts of the earth, and places them in very varying circumstances, it seems to follow that the inhabitants of a country which is a miniature world in itself will be more successful colonizers than those whose land and breed and thought are all of one uniform type.

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It has been said that the English come last in the list of colonizing peoples, and it is true that in founding settlements and acquiring territory beyond the seas they were at first outstripped by other European nations.

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At the same time England was worthily represented in early maritime enterprise. * But, bold and energetic as were the English voyagers of the sixteenth century, their enterprise produced at the time no tangible result. For a century and more after the first discovery of the New World and the rounding of the Cape of Good Hope the English people were merely training themselves for the coming time. Spain and Portugal had made their colonial empires and were beginning to decay before our fathers had planted a single settlement or won a single colonial dependency. The Dutch secured a foothold in the East and posseesed themselves of the rich heritage of the Portuguese, while the English trading vessels were still slowly and painfully finding their way into the Indian seas. The French outpaced us in North America. It was only after long years of hard struggle that English colonization in the West, deriving its strength and solidity from independence of the home Government, proved its superiority

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