It would
not do to burn the Constitution anywhere in this United and Standardized
States. As for mocking the flag, one might be lynched on the spot.
The Filipinos have taken literally the Declaration of Independence,
which is the platform upon which Lincoln was elected; and they are
fighting us in the name of Lincoln. We have an army over there
sustaining the honor of the flag, under William McKinley, President of
the United States and Commander in Chief of its Army and Navy. Mr.
McKinley was a soldier in the war under Lincoln. He, therefore, knows
something about military matters. He has demonstrated that he has
something in his head beyond the theory of protection to American
industries. He is demonstrating that he knows how to lift the United
States out of its isolation, and to carry it beyond its place in the
Western Hemisphere with nothing but satellites like the West Indies and
Hawaii to be trailed by its gravitational movements. Also he learned how
to put down rebellion in the Southern States, and that is the same
thing, of course, as putting down rebellion in the Philippine Islands.
We have bought the islands. They are ours. They are farther away, to be
sure, than Cuba which Douglas wanted for his ocean-bound republic. But
though farther away, civilization, our duty, and the manifest destiny of
old compel us to hold them.
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