Annexation

“ Pride in national feeling has made the country strain every nerve to bind still further with the sentiment of confidence the unity of the Confederation. (Applause.) Where is now the old talk which we used to hear from a few of the faint-hearted of a change in destiny or of annexation? (Cheers.) It does not exist. To be sure, here I have heard some vague terror expressed, but it is a terror which I have heard expressed among our friends on the American Pacific Slope also, and it is to the effect that annexation must soon take place to the Celestial Empire. ”

“ Annexation turns the conquest into subjugation. It is the very annexation which uno actu makes the vanquished State cease to exist and brings the territory under the conqueror's sovereignty. Thus the subjugated territory has not for one moment been no State's land, but comes from the enemy's into the conqueror's sovereignty, although not through cession, but through annexation.
[456] Holtzendorff, II. p. 255; Heimburger, p. 128; Salomon, p. 24. [Pg 304]
Justification of Subjugation as a Mode of Acquisition. ”

“ The policy of the reversal of annexation is likely to remain a topic of endless dispute.30 As Sir Hercules Robinson put [pg 043]
Case Considered it in a letter to Lord Kimberley, written a week before Majuba (Feb. 21) , no possible course was free from grave objection. If you determine, he said, to hold by the annexation of the Transvaal, the country would have to be conquered and held in subjection for many years by a large force. Free institutions and self-government under British rule would be an impossibility. ”

“ If there were an Imperialist Primer or a Grammar of Land-Grabbing, the first and simplest exercise in the encouragement of the art would be this example of the refusal of the provinces to France. It is an exercise in the encouragement of territorial theft; it is annexation made easy; it is a military model for invasion. But it is, from the standpoint of a democrat and Anti-Imperialist, something yet more than that. It not only smooths the path of invaders, but it quite specially smooths the path of despotic invaders. ”

“ CHAPTER IX CANADA AND THE UNITED STATES In a long letter which he wrote to Earl Grey in August, 1850, Lord Elgin used these significant words: "To render annexation by violence impossible, or by any other means improbable as may be, is, as I have often ventured to repeat, the polar star of my policy." ”

“ Better subjugation than surrender, cried some in desperation; while others believed that an American conquest and annexation would extinguish privilege and monopoly, set up a pure democracy, ensure stability and order, bring in a flood of enterprising northerners, and make the country prosper. ”

“ We have this day to announce a step which, simple and unpretending as it may seem, is really a greater move towards a complete unity of our independent empire than the most splendid conquest or the largest annexation. ”

“ For the idea of rushing through Congress a measure of such incalculable importance as the annexation of a distant country by such a trick is so monstrous that even the most fanatical Jingo may well recoil from it. ”

“ Does all this imply annexation? Call it what you will. As one of your Canadian statesmen said to the people of a lesser province, "If you do not want us to annex you, we are willing that you should annex us." If you are more conservative than we are, a little conservatism will do [114] us no harm; and the interests you would conserve would be quite as safe under the eagle's beak as under the lion's paw. If one be a bird, the other is surely a beast of prey; and we believe that harmless folk have less to apprehend from one alone than from the jealous rivalries of both. ”

“ In every part of the world, where British interests are at stake, I am in favour of ad- vancing and upholding these interests, even at the cost of annexation and at the risk of war. The only qualification I admit is that the country we desire to annex, or take under our protection, the claims we choose to assert, and the cause we desire to espouse, should be calculated to confer a tangible advantage upon the British Empire. ”

“ It is time now for opposition to the Annexation of Texas to cease, all further agitation of the waters of bitterness and strife, at least in connexion with this question,—even though it may perhaps be required of us as a necessary condition of the freedom of our institutions, that we must live on for ever in, a state of unpausing struggle and excitement upon some subject of party division or other. ”

“ Vast territories inhabited by uncivilized masses are occupied by more highly civilized States, and made subject to their rule. Higher civilization and the correspondingly greater power are the foundations of the right to annexation. This right is, it is true, a very indefinite one, and it is impossible to determine what degree of civilization justifies annexation and subjugation. ”

“ When we hear advocated in the American Senate so wild a heresy, as that the President, by a mere sleight-of-hand, may steal from Congress the war-making power, does it not occur to you, Senators, that it is at last time that such theories and such acts should be sifted to the bottom by independent men?
But I am asked, may not the United States during the pendency of a treaty of annexation assume a protectorate over the country to be annexed, so as to prevent foreign intervention? Most assuredly the United States may do that. ”

“ If the court shall hold that the constitution, in the parts not in themselves inapplicable, covers all territory made a permanent part of our domain, from the moment of annexation and as a necessary part of the United States, then we will conform our legislation, with deep regret that we assumed a construction contrary to liberty, and with some serious embarrassments that might have been avoided. ”

“ And there were other lands beyond the borders of Transalpine Gaul, which had formed part of Gaul in the earlier sense of the name, and whose annexation, when annexation had once begun, was hardly less wonderful than that of the lands within the Rhine and the Alps. ♦Piedmont, &c.♦ The incorporation of Piedmont and Genoa was not wonderful after the incorporation of Savoy. ♦Distinction between conquests under the Republic and under the ‘Empire.’♦ In short, the annexations of republican France are at least intelligible. They have a meaning; we can follow their purpose and object. ”

“ The subject of annexation addresses itself, most fortunately, to every portion of the Union. The Executive would have been unmindful of its highest obligations if it could have adopted a course of policy dictated by sectional interests and local feelings. On the contrary, it was because the question was neither local nor sectional, but made its appeal to the interests of the whole Union, and of every State in the Union, that the negotiation, and finally the treaty of annexation, was entered into ”

“ Certain business men who had sugar and other products to sell in the United States, believed that they would gain, financially, by annexation. They engineered the revolution of 1893 and they were actively engaged in the agitation for annexation that lasted until the treaty of annexation was confirmed by the United States in 1898. ”

“ You did not go further than you ought, in assuring the king that the object of annexation would be pursued with unabated vigor, and in giving your opinion that a decided majority of the American people were in its favor, and that it would certainly be annexed at no distant day. I feel confident that your anticipation will be fully realized at no distant period.
"Every day will tend to weaken that combination of political causes which led to the opposition of the measure, and to strengthen. ”

“ Whether this justified or not the act of annexation I do not pretend to judge. The results, however, for the Republic were for the time, financial relief and prosperity, and better treatment of the natives. The financial condition of the country, as I have said, at the time of the annexation, was one of utter bankruptcy. "After three years of British rule, however, the total revenue receipts for the first quarter of 1879 and 1880 amounted to £22,773 and £47,982 respectively. ”

“ By annexation, as between civilized peoples, the annexing state takes over the whole succession with the rights and obligations attaching to the ceded territory, subject only to any modifying conditions contained in the treaty of cession. ”

“ With no friendship for slavery, though unprepared to excommunicate to eternal damnation, with bell, book, and candle, those who are, we see nothing in the bearing of the Annexation of Texas on that institution to awaken a doubt of the wisdom of that measure, or a compunction for the humble part contributed by us towards its consummation. ”

“ We seek no conquest made by war. No intrigue will have been resorted to or acts of diplomacy essayed to accomplish the annexation of Texas. Free and independent herself, she asks to be received into our Union. It is a question for our own decision whether she shall be received or not.
The two Governments having already agreed through their respective organs on the terms of annexation, I would recommend their adoption by Congress in the form of a joint resolution or act to be perfected and made binding on the two countries when adopted in like manner by the Government of Texas. ”

“ Before I go on to the actual history of the Annexation there is one point I wish to submit to my reader. In England the change of Government has always been talked of as though it only affected the forty thousand white inhabitants of the country, whilst everybody seems to forget that this same land had about a million human beings living on it, its original owners, and only, unfortunately for themselves, possessing a black skin, and therefore entitled to little consideration,—even at the hands of the most philanthropic Government in the world. ”

“ We should take a different line, no doubt, and if these Provinces felt themselves strong enough to stand upon their own ground, and if they should desire no longer to maintain their connection with us, we should say, 'God speed you and give you the means to maintain yourselves as a nation!' That has not happened; but, on the contrary, they much dislike the notion of annexation to their neighbours and cling to their connection with this country. ”

“ The great annexations of France at the expense of the German kingdom and the lands more closely connected with it begin in the middle of the sixteenth century. ♦Annexation of Metz, Toul, and Verdun. 1552.♦ The first great advance was the practical annexation of the three Lotharingian bishoprics, though their separation from the Empire was not formally acknowledged till the Peace of Westfalia. ♦Effect of isolated conquests.♦ This kind of conquest can hardly fail to lead to other conquests. ”

“ Resolved, That we are unchangeably opposed to the annexation of any territory to this Union, either directly by conquest, or indirectly as payment for expenses of the war; but if additional territory be forced upon us, or be acquired by purchase, or in any other way, then we will demand that there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude therein, otherwise than for the punishment of crime. ”

“ It is among strangers that we hear such theories propounded by destiny men. With you the word "annexation" has in the last years only been heard in connection with the annexation of more territory to Manitoba. I must apologise to a Canadian audience for mentioning the word at all in any other connection. In America the annexation of this country is disavowed by all responsible leaders. As it was well expressed to me lately, the best men in the States desire only to annex the friendship and good will of Canada. ”

“ England, Germany, and Italy would surely protest against any projects of annexation. But there is still scope for them in the desert. The nomadic tribes will hardly stop the southward course of empire when French industry and capital fan the breeze of progress. ”

“ It is Impossible to cast a look at the map of the United States and Texas, and to note the long, artificial and inconvenient line which divides them, and to take into consideration the extraordinary increase of population and growth of the former, and the source from which the latter must derive its Inhabitants, institutions, and laws, without coming to the conclusion that it is their destiny to be united, and of course, that annexation is merely a question of time and mode. ”

“ I regard the question of annexation as belonging exclusively to the United States and Texas. They are independent powers competent to contract, and foreign nations have no right to interfere with them or to take exceptions to their reunion. Foreign powers do not seem to appreciate the true character of our Government. ”

“ In no single instance of virtual annexation or protectorate have we consulted by popular vote either the desires of those inhabiting the respective territories annexed or The Hague Tribunal. In every case we have had one single plea and one only—self-interest. ”

“ I would say that the real activity of the Indian Government has been an activity of conquest and annexation—of conquest and annexation which after a time has led to a fearful catastrophe which has enforced on the House an attention to the question of India, which but for that catastrophe I fear the House would not have given it. ”