598 CONSTITUTIONAL LAW 



exigencies of a colonial or imperial policy, the possession of insular 

 territory was thrust upon the great Republic. We had to take first, 

 and then, by force of necessity, adjust our political situation to the 

 requirements of the situation. It has not been an easy problem, 

 and no one pretends that we have solved it perfectly or completely. 

 Both the Congress, the executive, and the courts have shared in the 

 work and in the responsibility, but candor compels us to say that 

 if we are to continue in this sort of work, it would be desirable, to 

 say the least, so to amend the constitution as to relieve the different 

 branches of the government from the necessity of making usurpa- 

 tions of power, or something very like it, to meet urgent con- 

 ditions. 



It is only since the 21st of June of the present year that we have 

 been able to state with any certainty what the colonial policy, or 

 imperial policy, of the Republic is. I think it can be now briefly 

 expressed. It is that all of the territory of the North American 

 continent over which the sovereignty of the United States shall 

 become extended will be made ultimately states of the Union, and 

 that all extra-continental territory over which it shall become 

 extended will be made, ultimately, either states of the Union, as 

 possibly the Hawaiian Islands and Porto Rico, or be erected into 

 still more completely self-governing communities than states of the 

 Union, under the protectorate of the United States, that protect- 

 orate to be exercised chiefly for the purposes of preventing them 

 from lapsing into barbarism internally or from becoming a prey to 

 the greed of other powers, as Cuba already, and later on the Philip- 

 pines. This is a policy worthy of the great Republic. It is the true 

 imperial policy for a great civilized state engaged in the work of 

 spreading civilization throughout the world. In comparison with 

 it, the colonial policies of other countries appear mean and sordid 

 and altogether lacking in the element of altruism necessary to real 

 success in executing the mission of civilization. 



Following such a noble policy as this, it is not difficult to forecast 

 something of the future of this country. I would venture to say 

 that the child is now born who will see the states of this Union 

 stretching from the Isthmus of Panama to the North as far as civil- 

 ized man can inhabit, peopled by two hundred and fifty millions of 

 freemen, exercising a free protectorate over South America, most 

 of the islands of the Pacific, and a large part of Asia. We possess 

 already the extremes of this vast continental territory as well as 

 the great heart of it, and the most important Pacific islands, and 

 we have already a footing of influence in Japan and China hardly 

 enjoyed by any other power. The exalted policy which I have 

 declared to be the imperial policy of this nation cannot fail to extend 

 that influence, prestige, and power almost bej^ond measure. 



