G. G. Vest

“ When a colonial acquisition has been in prospect, we have thought no expenditure extravagant, no interference perilous. Gold has been but as dust, and blood as water. Shall we never learn wisdom? Shall we never cease to prosecute a pursuit wilder than the wildest dream 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 colonies of Spain were far more extensive and populous than ours. ”

“ Webster’s ability and learning, it must be emphatically stated that his position is too monstrous for serious discussion. That Congress can ignore the Bill of Rights, and deprive citizens in a territory of the right to trial by jury, security from unlawful search and seizure, freedom of religious opinion, and the other rights guaranteed by the Constitution, cannot be defended successfully even by Webster.
The Supreme Court of the United States has repeatedly determined that the Federal Constitution, with all its provisions, applied to all territory under the jurisdiction of our Government. ”

“ Besides this, it is stated that by the terms of the treaty signed at Paris, Spain is to have equal trade privileges with this country for ten years in the Philippines.
We are assured that American capital and labor will rush to our new possession~ and that the enormous mineral and agricultural resources of the islands will soon change them into American communities.
No intelligent man can be made to believe that our laborers can be induced to make homes in the tropics, amidst a population like that of the Philippines, and where the wages and comforts of the temperate zone are impossible. ”

“ No intelligent American can see why we should leave the safe and sure policy of a century for this dangerous experiment.
Great Britain has in her colonies 16,662,073 square miles, containing 322,000,000 inhabitants, while the mother country has 39,825,000 people, and 120,979 square miles. The United States has no colonies, yet our exports are larger than those of Great Britain, and our export trade in the last seven years has gained eighteen, while that of Great Britain has lost five per cent. ”

“ The expansionists, made desperate by the plain teaching of our early history, and the unanimous opinion of nine Supreme Court Justices, representing all sections and political opinions, contend that the Constitution does not apply to the Territories, and that Congress has unlimited power to control new territory as colonies if it believes this condition to be needful. ”

“ Has Spain any time in the last two centuries been a match for England, either by land or sea? Fifty years ago our colonial dominions in America were far larger and more prosperous than those which we now possess. ”

“ The principal argument of the expansionists is addressed to the greed of our merchants and exporters, in the assertion that large profits will accrue to this country from the trade of the Philippines and of China and Japan, which can be secured through our people in the archipelago. ”

“ While mineral deposits are found, they have not been developed to such an extent as will justify the certainty of profitable returns for the miner, and Spain has granted to an English company exclusive mining rights in Luzon, not to expire for many years. The valleys are fertile, but the largest part of the tillable land is owned by the Catholic Church and the priests, making it certain that the United States will be confronted with temporal and ecclesiastical claims of the most serious nature. ”

“ What have we not sacrificed to our Infatuated passion for trans-Atlantic dominion? This it is that has so often led us to risk our own smiling gardens and dear firesides for snowy desert and infectious morass on the other side of the globe. ”

“ The sum of £5 will provide a native household with a dwelling of its own and ample furniture. Under a genial climate; on a soil lavishly grateful for the slightest tending; by waters teeming with fish, they know naught of hunger, and have much time left for amusements—such as dancing and public rejoicings on the smallest occasion. ... Cockfighting is the national sport, and no mean source of revenue to the authorities. Almost every native owns a fighting fowl, which is as dear to him as her lap-dog to a European lady. ”

“ It is respectfully suggested to the farmers and manufacturers of the United States, who are told by the expansionists that a great market for their products will be furnished in the Philippines, that the population of those islands, as described by reliable observers, will furnish very poor customers for the agricultural and manufactured exports of this country. ”

“ Madison, in number 38 of the Federalist, complained that the Northwestern Territory had been received from Virginia, and a territorial government established there by Congress, without any authority, and upon this he based an argument for the adoption of the Constitution of 1789, in which he claimed there were limitations of Congressional power necessary to the preservation of those great principles of free government for which the war against England had been waged. ”

“ The favorite pastime of a Malay, when cockfighting becomes monotonous, is to “run-amuck,” which means an indiscriminate and murderous attack upon everybody within reach until physical exhaustion terminates the innocent recreation. ”

“ The official record shows that we expend each year more than thirty dollars per capita in educating and governing the Indians, and if one-third this amount is expended upon the Filipinos the annual expenditure would be $100,000,000, with no certainty of making them law abiding and intelligent citizens. ”

“ It being certain from these amendments that the children of the Filipinos will be citizens and voters, in case of annexation, it follows that they must be educated and civilized in order to fit them for the duties imposed by our jurisdiction over their country. ”

“ The magnitude of the task is shown by the fact that in Manila, by far the most civilized community in the archipelago, there are in its population of about 300,000, 200,000 Chinese, 50,000 Japanese, 40,000 natives, principally Malays, and 3,000 whites. ”

“ That the heroic men who fought against the colonial system in the Revolution did not intend to abandon their position and surrender to absolutism, is evident from the fact that the Articles of Federation contained no provision for acquiring new territory, and Mr. ”