'914.] A FACTOR IN WORLD POLITICS. 81 



series of massacres, beginning with the Chinese massacre at Rock 

 Springs, Wyoming, in 1895 and ending with the lynching of Italians 

 in 1899, 1901 and 1910, have placed our national government in the 

 humiliating position of acknowledging to foreign powers that al- 

 though the sole responsibility for the conduct of our foreign rela- 

 tions rests with the federal authorities, they lack the power to fulfill 

 the most fundamental of international obligations — the duty to bring 

 to justice the persons responsible for such crimes. The matter was 

 referred to as early as 1899 by President AIcKinley, who, in his 

 annual message of December 5th, said: 



" For the fourth time in the present decade a question has arisen with 

 the government of Italy in regard to the lynching of Italian subjects. The 

 latest of these deplorable events occurred at Tallulah, Louisiana, whereby 

 five unfortunates of Italian origin were taken from jail and hanged. . . . The 

 recurrence of these distressing manifestations of blind mob fury directed at 

 dependents or natives of a foreign country suggests that the contingency has 

 arisen for action by Congress in the direction of conferring upon the Federal 

 courts jurisdiction in this class of international cases where the ultimate 

 responsibility of the Federal Government may be involved." 



The matter was again vigorously taken up by President Roose- 

 velt in his message of December, 1906, in which he said in referring 

 to the difificulties that had arisen because of educational discrimina- 

 tion against the Japanese in California: 



"One of the great embarrassments attending the performance of our in- 

 ternational obligations is the fact that the statutes of the United States are 

 entirely inadequate. They fail to give to the national government sufficiently 

 ample power, through United States courts, and by the use of the army and 

 navy, to protect aliens in the rights secured to them under solemn treaties 

 which are the law of the land. I, therefore, earnestly recommend, that the 

 criminal and civil statutes of the United States be so amended and added to 

 as to enable the president, acting for the United States government, which is 

 responsible in our international relations, to enforce the rights of aliens under 

 treaties. There should be no particle of doubt as to the power of the national 

 government completely to perform and enforce its own obligations to other 

 nations. The mob of a single city may at any time perform acts of lawless 

 violence against some class of foreigners which would plunge us into a war. 

 That city by itself would be powerless to make defense against the foreign 

 power thus assaulted, and if independent of this government it would never 

 venture to perform or permit the performance of the acts complained of. The 

 entire power and the whole duty to protect the offending city or the offending 

 community lie in the hands of the United States government. It is unthink- 

 able that we should continue a policy under which a given locality may be 



PROC. .-^MER. PHIL. SOC. Li:i, 213, F, PRINTED JUNE I9, I914 



