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Americans of today can hardly realize the nature of the chauvinisticelation which came to us as a result of our new colonial world.I listened to almost all the debates in Congress on that subject. Forthe first time in our history men began to roll under their tonguesthe phrase "American empire." It would be an interesting exampleof verbal statistics if someone were to go through those debatesand number the times the imperialists of that day referred withgrowing pride to the great American "empire." The advocates ofthat policy scoffed at the attempts to apply the principles of theDeclaration of Independence and of the Constitution to our newsituation. There was no end of statements by the leaders of the daycalling attention to the fact that the new American empire had outgrownthese simple-minded illusions of the fathers who uttered them.The world had changed and grown and America had expanded andwas now an empire. There was a great deal of solid pride in thatfact.As an example of this let me quote what one of the leaders in thismovement had to say. Senator Albert Beveridge, on January 9, 1900,made his first speech in the Senate. 1 He began it with this extraordinarysentence:The times call for candor. The Philippines are ours forever—-countrybelonging to the United States—as the Constitution calls them, and justbeyond the Philippines are China's illimitable markets. We will not retreatfrom either. We will not repudiate our duty in the archipelago. We willnot abandon one opportunity in the Orient. We will not renounce ourpart in the mission of our race, trustee under God, of the civilizationof the world. And we will move forward to our work, not howling outour regrets, like slaves whipped to their burdens, but with gratitude fora task worthy of our strength and thanksgiving to Almighty God that Hehas marked us as His chosen people to lead in the regeneration of the world.Here is the whole complex gospel. Our duty under God to leadin the regeneration of the world on one side, and to stay in thearchipelago "beyond which are China's illimitable markets." He toldthe Senate that the Pacific is "our ocean" although half a dozenother large nations had extensive territories along that ocean. And*$6th Congress, ist Session, Vol. 33, p. 704.217

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