John R. Dos Passos

“ Will not the whole Anglo-Saxon race be practically united for the propagation of peace and civilisation? Will not the effect of common citizenship be to establish and enforce common rules of liberty and equality if, and where, they do not now already exist? Maintaining intact the peculiar governments which they now individually enjoy, will not the citizens of each feel that they are henceforth all interested in the welfare and glory of the whole race, and in the development of a common purpose? ”

“ I therefore lay it down as a basis of an alliance, or union, that the British. Empire and the United States mean, in all sincerity and good faith, when they establish co-operation, to work for civilisation and peace; to move harmoniously and sympathetically together for the accomplishment of this great object—namely, the benefit of mankind. This, then, is the central, true, deep, absorbing purpose of their alliance, an interfusion of ideas, principles, sympathies and thoughts of the people of both countries ”

“ Can there be a unification of the Spanish and Portuguese people? Can they cure their present political imperfections? Can they make a thorough introspection of their condition, and follow the proper remedies which it suggests? Can they turn their faces towards the common goal of a free government? Is there a Moses among them, who can lead this great people from the wilderness of political, moral, and financial confusion into the broad plain of a free, enlightened, and modern government? ”

“ The foreigners who have immigrated to this country, and embraced, through the naturalisation laws, American citizenship, have come here, for the most part, to make this their permanent abode. In assuming this citizenship, their foreign prejudices, thoughts, and habits have become absorbed in their new political life and duties. As rain, falling upon banks of sand, leaves no trace of its existence, so these foreigners, swallowed up in the immense and busy life of this country, soon pass unnoticed and undistinguished, into the walks of American citizenship. ”

“ Much has been said for an Anglo-American alliance. Perhaps 'alliance' is not the right word. We are already of the same blood, the same feeling, the same religion, and the same language. Now all that is necessary is to know each other better. England and America could form the most powerful alliance possible, because they are the two most patriotic countries in the world; because they alone, of all the nations, have an army and navy without conscription. . . . With the United States and England combined, we could well afford to smile at our enemies. ”

“ If the genius of the race fail not; if calm submission to the law, unwavering devotion to the task in hand, steady refusal to follow glittering allurements or hasty choices, may still be our leading traits; if we may trust our sons to equal our fathers' deeds of self-devotion without the hope of fame, then is the achievement of the nineteenth century but a preparing of the way for the vaster expansion of the twentieth,—for the founding, not of the empire of the race, but of the united commonwealth of all nations. ”

“ I believe that the twentieth century is par excellence "The Anglo-Saxon Century," in which the English-speaking peoples may lead and predominate the world. My mind recoils from any other picture, because the failure of our people to assume the power committed to their hands means the segregation of nations and states, and the general disorganisation of society through cruel, bloody, and fratricidal wars. The elimination of war and the advancement of civilisation have been the motive of my book. ”

“ France seems to be lacking the few great men who could turn her course into better roads of national policy and prosperity. She has no real leaders. Nor is the nation united in its sympathies with a republican government. That form has no great, genuine lovers in France. They love their country, but not the political mantle which envelops it. Her leading men doubt whether it is the best form for the government of her people, or whether she should not be a monarchy. Democracies thrive upon the love and enthusiasm of the people. ”

“ Why is literature an important, natural factor, in the proposed alliance? As I take it, it is because we gather most of our knowledge and mental training from the same intellectual fountainhead. English literature tells us how the English-American people think; it shows what their process and basis of reasoning and feeling are, upon all subjects, small and great. If we are the same in our ideas, we behold its reflection in this vast mirror of thought and opinion; if we are divergent, we know the reason ”

“ Nothing is finer than the pictured eloquence of the Indian chiefs as they spiritedly protested against the invasion of their soil and the dispersion and extinguishment of their tribal governments. But before the march of progress and the underlying necessities of civilisation, these cries of sentiment and sympathy will not long be heard. The invincible spirit of progress must go on. Like quicksilver, it will noiselessly run into every portion of the globe where voids created by political weakness and barbarism exist. Sympathy cannot be allowed for ever to block human advancement. ”

“ It is also true that we do not exist under the same form of political government. We are, nevertheless, one family, descended from the same stock, and attached to each other by the inseparable chain of political, religious, and moral sympathies. We are inspired by the same conceptions of truth, justice, and right. We are living separately, as families live apart who are too great, or too numerous, to exist under the same roof; or who have separated to extend or enlarge their wealth, influence, and power ”

“ While there was no actual compact or treaty between the English and Americans, the diplomats of Europe were quick to imagine one. A spectre is always more alarming, and often more effective, than a reality. The situation of affairs was the same as if a treaty had actually existed. The friction, the misunderstandings, the fretfulness, which theretofore existed between the United States and England, and which the other powers of Europe relied upon as a sufficient barrier to prevent any concerted policy between them, suddenly disappeared, and they stood before the world as friends and allies. ”

“ The same religious impulses, thoughts, freedom, education, and growth; a family physically disunited, with one religious conception moulding their convictions in the same groove of thought. In England and the United States, for example, the Catholic religion flourishes and expands even more than in those countries where it is the established and official worship! Every branch of Protestantism is encouraged and grows in this congenial soil of English liberty. Religious independence and toleration are conspicuously planted in the heart of every true Anglo-Saxon. ”

“ They go to the form and substance of government, not to its policy, as in America, where every party cry, radical or conservative, is attuned to the music of a republican federation, and which is the sine qua non to all political conclusions. How can a nation progress until its people have chosen, or are competent to choose, a stable form of government, and are satisfied with certain organic political principles? ”

“ Common citizenship, or isopolity, has no necessary connection whatever with national or political unity. My proposal is not designed to limit the complete national independence either of England or of the United States. It would be not only an absurdity, but almost an act of lunacy, to devise or defend a scheme for turning England and America into one state. It is as impossible, as, were it possible, it would be undesirable, that Washington should be ruled by a government in London, or that London should be ruled by a government in Washington. ”

“ The sands of the seashore, the drops of the ocean, are few when compared to the mighty current of words which are poured into the world by millions upon millions of human tongues. It is the tie of a common language which indefinably and inexpressibly knits together all those who have inherited it. "The tie of language is perhaps the strongest and most desirable that can unite mankind." [2] The English language is a synonym of English thought, passion, pleasure, pain, suffering. It expresses all our intimate and fundamental ideas of law, religion and politics. ”

“ England can be forced into a war because of her empty and hollow sovereignty over Canada; Canada is subject to destruction because she officially acknowledges England's sovereignty. Either nation is liable to invasion and devastation, if not ruin, because of formal ties. If the power of England were to decline and wane,—which Heaven forbid!—what would be the future of Canada? Isolated from England, where could she turn, except to the one contiguous power of the United States, and perhaps under circumstances far less pleasant than those which would accompany a voluntary union. ”

“ But if these things fail us, if this so rapid growth has exhausted the moral stamina of the race, if by its unsettling hurry it has destroyed our power of patient self-control, then shall we repeat the history of other empires. This great fabric of ours, which, as far as human judgment can discern, needs but closer union to be secure against the shock of every danger from without, will in that case break asunder and fall, from its own inner decay. History will then record that the nineteenth century was our greatest but our final era of expansion. ”

“ When an Englishman and an American meet, no matter how casually, their common tongue furnishes, immediately, a means of communication which makes them "Native to the manner born." A few spoken words, a few lines of correspondence, open up, if need be, the whole life of each nation: its politics, its forms and principles of justice, its religion, its domestic interests and feelings, its science, its drama, its literature, its past, present, and future. It establishes a sympathy and bond in all common things. ”

“ United and acting sympathetically, we can more or less shape the events of the future by a wise and truly beneficent policy. If the English and American statesmen do not agree with me, but leave this question to fate, as it were, there may come storms, cross-currents, deflections, and all manner of unforeseen opposing forces, which will render the unification of our people impossible or futile. Perhaps this is our destiny—but I think not. ”

“ Border disputes, commercial jealousies, wrongs done to individual citizens, the mere vague dislike which turns a neighbour into a natural enemy, all exist, and that in a form condensed and intensified by the very minuteness of the scene on which they have to act. A rival nation is, to all but the inhabitants of a narrow strip of frontier, a mere matter of hearsay: but a rival whose dwelling-place is within sight of the city gates quickly grows into an enemy who can be seen and felt. ”

“ As nothing is more pleasing and striking to the human eye than a well-regulated and orderly household, everything in its place, clean, refined, and harmonious, so nothing is so necessary to a good government as simple, proper, well-defined, orderly rules of conduct for its citizens. A nation which invades and conquers a savage tribe, or uncivilised nation, and in place of the chaos, confusion, and at times unspeakable cruelties which there prevail, introduces order, civic government, and humanity, is creditably fulfilling its ambition and national purposes. ”

“ The sublimest is now before us. The unification of the English-American people in the glorious mission of civilisation and peace is the next great preordained step in their national life. Diplomacy might have laboured in vain to create it; but neither prejudice nor demagogism can now thwart or prevent it. Who will stand forth to challenge or prohibit the banns of such a national matrimony? Let him show cause in the Court of Civilisation why the doctrines of religion, liberty, humanity, and peace should not control the result. ”