Following Secretary Root's visit to South America, with its auspicious results, the President of Mexico, Porfirio Díaz, extended an official invitation to visit the republic immediately to the south of us, in the belief that such a visit would have equally happy results in strengthening and increasing the "steadfast friendship" existing between the two neighboring nations.Mr. Root, together with his wife and daughter, started for Mexico by special train, arriving in San Antonio on September 28, 1907. On the evening of the day of his arrival in San Antonio, a banquet was tendered to Mr. Root and the Mexican Committee which had come to San Antonio to welcome him and escort him into their country.On Sunday the 29th, the Root party, together with the Mexican Committee, proceeded across the boundary into Mexico, and were met at the station of Nuevo Laredo by a Mexican delegation. Thence they continued to Mexico City, where the honors extended to Mr. Root were in keeping with the traditional hospitality of the ancient capital of the Montezumas. During his stay the degree of honorary member of the Mexican Academy of Legislation and Jurisprudence was conferred upon him.A Mexican publication of 314 pages, entitledEl Señor Root en Mexico, contains in parallel Spanish and English columns a detailed account of the visit, which extended from September 28 to October 16. It is to be regretted that this volume is defective in that many of the speeches made during the visit are not fully reported. It is possible, however, to gather from those which have been preserved, a keen sense of the cordial reception accorded him by the officials and representative citizens of the republic, and the earnest and eloquent terms in which he reciprocated the expressions of regard for his country and of appreciation of his own services to his country and the world.The most progressive epoch in Mexico's history was the thirty years of Díaz's supremacy; and it was in the heyday of that period that Mr. Root made his visit to Mexico and paid to President Díaz the tributes which appear in the following pages. During these thirty years, he was always a firm friend of the United States, and no diplomatic misunderstandings arose which were not peaceably adjusted in a spirit of neighborly friendship. Díaz shares with President Roosevelt the honor of submitting the first international controversy to the Hague Tribunal of Arbitration for determination, in what is known as "The Pious Fund of the Californias."
Following Secretary Root's visit to South America, with its auspicious results, the President of Mexico, Porfirio Díaz, extended an official invitation to visit the republic immediately to the south of us, in the belief that such a visit would have equally happy results in strengthening and increasing the "steadfast friendship" existing between the two neighboring nations.
Mr. Root, together with his wife and daughter, started for Mexico by special train, arriving in San Antonio on September 28, 1907. On the evening of the day of his arrival in San Antonio, a banquet was tendered to Mr. Root and the Mexican Committee which had come to San Antonio to welcome him and escort him into their country.
On Sunday the 29th, the Root party, together with the Mexican Committee, proceeded across the boundary into Mexico, and were met at the station of Nuevo Laredo by a Mexican delegation. Thence they continued to Mexico City, where the honors extended to Mr. Root were in keeping with the traditional hospitality of the ancient capital of the Montezumas. During his stay the degree of honorary member of the Mexican Academy of Legislation and Jurisprudence was conferred upon him.
A Mexican publication of 314 pages, entitledEl Señor Root en Mexico, contains in parallel Spanish and English columns a detailed account of the visit, which extended from September 28 to October 16. It is to be regretted that this volume is defective in that many of the speeches made during the visit are not fully reported. It is possible, however, to gather from those which have been preserved, a keen sense of the cordial reception accorded him by the officials and representative citizens of the republic, and the earnest and eloquent terms in which he reciprocated the expressions of regard for his country and of appreciation of his own services to his country and the world.
The most progressive epoch in Mexico's history was the thirty years of Díaz's supremacy; and it was in the heyday of that period that Mr. Root made his visit to Mexico and paid to President Díaz the tributes which appear in the following pages. During these thirty years, he was always a firm friend of the United States, and no diplomatic misunderstandings arose which were not peaceably adjusted in a spirit of neighborly friendship. Díaz shares with President Roosevelt the honor of submitting the first international controversy to the Hague Tribunal of Arbitration for determination, in what is known as "The Pious Fund of the Californias."
Speech of Mr. Root
At a Banquet of the International Club in Honor of Mr. Root and the Mexican Envoys,September 28, 1907
Upon his arrival in San Antonio, Texas, on his way to Mexico, Mr. Root was met by a reception committee designated by President Díaz, which had come to San Antonio to welcome him and to escort him to the national capital. While in San Antonio, Mr. Root and the Mexican Reception Committee were the guests of the International Club of that city; and on the evening of the day of their arrival, a banquet was tendered them by that club. At this banquet Mr. Root made what may be called the first address of his Mexican visit. The opening remarks of this speech were not reported in full in the volume entitledEl Señor Root en Mexico, or elsewhere; nor were the speeches of the members of the Mexican Reception Committee. Mr. Root began by a reference to the ideals adopted by men and by nations, declaring his opinion that a nation has a right to exist only in so far as it shows its ability to care for the welfare of other nations and the relations of every man with his fellowmen. He spoke of the rising tide of American business which is powerfully spreading towards the south by reason of the financial conditions in the east of the United States, every day becoming more stringent through the volume and accumulation of resources. After this introduction, he spoke at some length about the Panama Canal, the construction of which already was in its opening stage. On this subject he said:
Upon his arrival in San Antonio, Texas, on his way to Mexico, Mr. Root was met by a reception committee designated by President Díaz, which had come to San Antonio to welcome him and to escort him to the national capital. While in San Antonio, Mr. Root and the Mexican Reception Committee were the guests of the International Club of that city; and on the evening of the day of their arrival, a banquet was tendered them by that club. At this banquet Mr. Root made what may be called the first address of his Mexican visit. The opening remarks of this speech were not reported in full in the volume entitledEl Señor Root en Mexico, or elsewhere; nor were the speeches of the members of the Mexican Reception Committee. Mr. Root began by a reference to the ideals adopted by men and by nations, declaring his opinion that a nation has a right to exist only in so far as it shows its ability to care for the welfare of other nations and the relations of every man with his fellowmen. He spoke of the rising tide of American business which is powerfully spreading towards the south by reason of the financial conditions in the east of the United States, every day becoming more stringent through the volume and accumulation of resources. After this introduction, he spoke at some length about the Panama Canal, the construction of which already was in its opening stage. On this subject he said:
The Panama Canal is now an unquestionable certainty. Relations between the United States and the different nations which are grouped around the Caribbean Sea, are becoming every day closer. It is impossible to anticipate at present the tonnage which will pass through that waterway, nor can we predict the number of vessels which will be required for its transportation; but we do already know, that never in the world has a new and universal trade route been opened, without bringing about a change in the history of the entire world. And it is for this reason I feel that upon us has fallen the mission of assisting all those nationswhich will find themselves involved in the new influence. At present we are doing everything within our power to assist Cuba in establishing self-government. We have endeavored to stretch out our hand to unhappy Santo Domingo, ruined by its civil wars, so that it may rise and also govern itself. We have plunged into a discussion which really has no further object than that of settling the disputes and the differences which have arisen between the United States and the republic of Colombia. And all this we do, not only through the new interest which the prosperity of all those countries develops in ourselves, but principally through a profound comprehension of the truth contained in the principle above enunciated, that a nation only lives as far as it demonstrates its right to existence by its usefulness to humanity. And one of the most conclusive guarantees of the success of this effort is found in the solid and loyal friendship which exists between the United States and Mexico, with which nation, day after day, and year after year, we are working within the limits of a peaceful and humanitarian national policy, which at the same time is wise and intelligent. Our two republics, now so prosperous, harmoniously work to promote a similar prosperity amongst their sister republics to the south; and I sincerely hope that this happy state of affairs may be prolonged for a long time to come, and that success may finally crown our united efforts. In this manner the two republics will fully prove their right to live, and will show the world that their citizens are able and competent to govern themselves without the assistance of either kings or aristocracies, seeing that they can fill the highest mission of man, which consists in the maintenance of law, order, justice, liberty, and peace....
I also desire to say how greatly I appreciate the distinguished courtesy shown to myself and to the Government of the United States, by the long journey which has beenundertaken by the committee charged with the representation of President Díaz and the Mexican Government, crossing the frontier of their country into the state of Texas, in order to give me welcome on the occasion of the visit I am about to make. Indeed, it causes me the greatest satisfaction to be able to declare, without any reserve whatever, that this action is entirely in accordance with the conduct observed by Mexico in all international matters which have arisen between the two countries, since I have taken any part in the government of our own. With an immense boundary line which is only marked by the changeable and capricious currents of the Río Grande; with the constant traffic across our common frontier; with thousands of Americans residing in that country; with the countless number of enterprises in which Americans are interested on the other side of the Río Grande, and with the resources of the two countries, there are always a number of questions to be solved by the representatives of one and the other, and there can be no doubt that they will always be solved with the same good-will and courtesy of which such evident proof has been given by General Rincón Gallardo, by Mr. Limantour and by their travelling companions in coming here tonight.[5]
Speech of Welcome by General Pedro Rincón Gallardo
September 29, 1907
Especially appointed for this purpose by the President, in behalf of the government of the republic, we have the honor to tender to your excellency the most cordial welcome on your happy arrival in Mexico, whose people, of whom wemust consider ourselves the faithful echo, pledge the continued good relations with the people of the United States. The reception is an homage to your well-known merits, and the people are anxious to receive your excellency as their illustrious guest and highly esteemed friend. The people of Mexico, during your excellency's brief sojourn amongst us, will show how true is their esteem for you and how proud they will feel on the occasion of this visit of your excellency, accompanied by Mrs. and Miss Root; an event the memory of which will remain forever engraved on our hearts.
Mr. Root's Reply
I beg you to believe that I am highly appreciative of the cordial and hospitable greeting with which I have been received by you on the threshold of your beautiful and wonderful country. I hope that the visit which now begins will not merely give me personally the opportunity I have long desired, to see this great country and its marvels, to meet its public men, and especially to see its illustrious President. I hope that it will also serve, as it is intended to serve, as evidence of the desire of the government and people of the United States to strengthen and increase the steadfast friendship which they have long felt for the people and government of Mexico.
Speech of Porfirio Díaz
President of the Republic
At a Banquet at the National Palace, October 2, 1907
In the name of the Mexican people and of their government I tender you this banquet, acknowledging thereby those sentiments of sympathy which are felt and which distinguishone and another, the people of the United States, the great citizen who presides over its high destinies, and the illustrious statesman who honors us with his interesting and very welcome visit. Bonds of sympathy and fellow-feeling, Mr. Secretary, which are not new, but which germinated in the breasts of our fathers at the inception of the independence of our country, our fathers who contemplated with patriotic enthusiasm the daring exploits in war and imitated the political examples set by your heroic liberators; sentiments which we, of subsequent generations, have also cultivated; because, in studying the causes which produce the prodigious national prosperity with which your country has astounded the world, we become accustomed to admire, to magnify perhaps, the indomitable will, energy, labor, and civic and patriotic solidarity which constitute the energetic and abundantly productive type of your countrymen.
The Mexican people, Mr. Secretary, are honored as well as pleased to have you in their midst—honored, because you are the fountain of honor as a noted statesman of our century, and highly pleased because your clear and rapid conception promises us that, seeing with your own eyes the kind and well-merited feelings with which we harbor your countrymen who seek in our land the generous treatment proportionate to their intelligence, perseverance, and indefatigable labor, you may affirm that in Mexico we profess ideas which, carried out in cordial reciprocity, must make happy and loyal friends the two nations which are united by contiguity.
In conclusion, gentlemen, I extend my thanks to the distinguished ladies who have had the kindness to honor and embellish our tables with their presence; and permit me to invite you to drink with them and with me, hoping that the national harmonizing of individual rights and just liberties, which is called the United States of America, may beperpetuated in its increasing moral and material progress, which has given prestige throughout the world to government by popular representation.
I drink also to the personal happiness of that great friend of universal peace, president of the grand republic, the Honorable Theodore Roosevelt, and to the hope that our illustrious guest and his lovable family may find in Mexico a reception as pleasing as their interesting visit is to the Mexican people.
Mr. Root's Reply
I thank you most sincerely for the kind and gracious words which you have used regarding my poor self, regarding my President, from whom I bring to you and to the Mexican people a message of deep and warm friendship and good wishes, and regarding my country, which I believe is fitly represented by this brief visit of friendship, made with the purpose, not of creating, for they are already created, but of increasing and advancing the ideas of amity and mutual helpfulness between two great republics.
I cannot keep my mind from reverting to a former visit by an American Secretary of State to the republic of Mexico. Thirty-eight years ago, Mr. Seward, a really great American Secretary of State, visited your country. How vast the difference between what he found and what I find! Then was a country torn by a civil war, sunk in poverty, in distress. Now I find a country great in its prosperity, in its wealth, in its activity and enterprise, in the moral strength of its just and equal laws, and unalterable purpose to advance its people steadily along the pathway of progress.
Mr. President, the people of the United States feel that the world owes this great change chiefly to you. They are grateful to you for it, for they rejoice in the prosperity and happiness of Mexico. We believe, sir, that we are richerand happier because you are richer and happier, and we rejoice that you are no longer a poor and struggling nation needing assistance, but that you are strong and vigorous, so that we can go with you side by side in demonstrating to the world that republics are able to govern themselves wisely; side by side in helping to carry to our less fortunate sisters the blessing of peace.
Mr. President, I have said that we need not create, but wish to strengthen, the ties of friendship. It is my hope that through more perfect understanding, through personal intercourse, through the more complete unity of action to be acquired by the individual intercourse of the men of Mexico and the men of the United States, not only may our friendship be increased, but our power for usefulness—for that usefulness which demonstrates the right of nations to be perpetuated—may be enlarged.
For the generous hospitality, for the spirit of friendship with which you and the people of Mexico have welcomed me as a representative of the United States, I thank you and them, and I hope that there may be found in this visit and in this welcome not merely the pleasure of a holiday, but a step along the pathway of two great nations in their service to humanity.
Speech of Governor Guillermo de Landa y Escandón
October 3, 1907
Last year, in accordance with the wishes of your President, you undertook to visit and become acquainted with Latin America, and for that purpose you made an extended voyage which was fruitful in happy results.
At the beginning of the sixteenth century adventurous Spanish and Portuguese navigators sailed from the Atlanticinto the Pacific, effecting important discoveries of which the object was to rescue from darkness populous regions which, since then, have become part of the civilized world. You have sailed over nearly the same route four centuries later, proclaiming a message of peace and concord in all those regions whose inhabitants greeted you with acclamations from the northern ports of Brazil around to those of Colombia and Panama.
You are now crowning your mission by visiting the Mexican Republic, and you arrive at this capital animated by the same aspirations which actuated you when you set foot on the cruiserCharlestonin the port of New York on July 4, 1906.
Your aims are so noble and great that they cannot but be sincere. The course you have set before yourself would not be possible for one whose head did not harbor the loftiest ideals, and whose heart did not quicken to the finest sentiments.
Your President is a great man; rectitude and loyalty are the dominant features of his character. A soldier, and a brave one, he knows what war is, and therefore he abhors it with all the force of his large heart; the war which engages his thoughts is war upon war itself.
It would not befit me at this moment, much as I should wish to do so, to extol the character of the supreme magistrate of my country. But I may say that, though a soldier like your own President, he detests war in the same degree, and that the ideals and aims of both these great men are alike directed toward an object sublime and desired of all men—peace.
The nations which both statesmen govern follow their lead in this respect with energetic unanimity; and it is safe to augur the happiest results from a concert so auspicious.
You, sir, second the purposes of both of those leaders with a zeal which nothing can cool; your mind has been formedat the bar—in the school of justice; and, like our two Presidents, you abominate injustice and insincerity.
You also know what war is, and you share the aversion of the two great American statesmen who are the standard bearers of peace in the new world.
Welcome, excellency, to this ancient capital of the empire of Montezuma. She opens her gates to you and to your family, and offers you the sincerest hospitality, hoping you may preserve of her recollections as lasting as will be her memory of the visit of one whose happy mission it has been to carry everywhere the spirit of peace, good-will, and fraternity.
Mr. Root's Reply
Governor Landa, your welcome now is as it has been from the first instant of my visit, both graceful and grateful. I have been most delighted by the many interesting things I have seen here.
Above all things, I feel impelled to say that the most interesting thing in Mexico, so far as my knowledge goes, is your President. It has seemed to me that of all the men now living, Porfirio Díaz, of Mexico, is best worth seeing. Whether one considers the adventurous, daring, chivalric incidents of his early career; whether one considers the vast work of government which his wisdom and courage and commanding character have accomplished; whether one considers his singularly attractive personality, no one lives today whom I would rather see than President Díaz. If I were a poet, I would write poetry; if I were a musician, I would compose triumphal marches; if I were a Mexican, I should feel that the steadfast loyalty of a lifetime could not be too much in return for the blessings that he had brought to my country. As I am neither poet, musician, nor Mexican, but only an American who loves justice and liberty and hopes tosee their reign among mankind progress and strengthen and become perpetual, I look to Porfirio Díaz, the President of Mexico, as one of the great men to be held up for the hero worship of mankind.
Speech of Licentiate Manuel Calero
President of the Chamber
October 3, 1907
Honorable Secretary of State, welcome; the national representation, the chamber that constitutionally symbolizes that people which in this section of the western hemisphere, is ever striving, ever struggling to attain a higher civilization, to win for itself a respected name among nations, feels pleasure in welcoming you to its midst. You are at the present moment the symbolical representation of a great and friendly people and the personification of its brotherly feelings toward us. You, honored sir, are our guest; and were the traditional chivalry of our people not sufficient justification for our cordiality toward you, the high character of your office, the luster encircling your name, and the mission of peace which brings you to this land, would all move us to open our arms to you, to show you what we are and what we would be, so that, on returning to your country, you may tell the millions of your fellow-citizens who will hang upon your words with rapt attention, that Mexico is not that mythical land, which legends shroud in the mists of the adventurous romance of the old Latin countries, restless, mistrustful, dreamy; nay rather, you will tell them, that it is a sturdy young nation, starting out, aye, already started, on the highroad of civilization and industrialism; that it pursues lofty ideals and strives to attain them, that its heart beats at the thought of universal solidarity, that it sees in the foreigner a friend, that it answers your brotherly messagewith a frank and kindly greeting, free from resentment for the past, and trusting in the omens of the future.
Your name is not unknown to us. We have followed the trail of your labors and triumphs for the last decade. We know, too, the people from whom you have come; and setting aside all false modesty, can truly say we know them better than they know us. The last thirty years of free intercourse between this country and yours have seen an overflow of men and money from north to south; we have dashed the mist from our eyes and have endeavored to wring from you, more fortunate and wiser than ourselves, the secrets of your greatness and the causes of your astounding prosperity.
That you once wronged us, that, when burning political, economic, and humane problems beset you, the course of justice was momentarily hampered, we have not forgotten; we have not. But as the years have rolled on you have won back, inch by inch, your place in our affections; the intercourse every day has become closer and closer between your people and ours, stepping over the bounds set by race and tongue, infusing new life into this feeling of mutual good will and friendship, which tends to establish harmony of ideals and close similarity of destiny.
So it is happening and so should it be. Offsprings of the same continent, your institutions point out the path for the development of ours, your mental and moral advance fires the vigor of our spirit, your tireless activity excites us to action; in a word, your progress uplifts our noblest ambitions. We are both marching on to the victories of civilization, although your lot, in the course of history, shall have been that of forerunners.
One of your scholars has said that the American nation has rendered five eminent services to the world's civilization. True are his words. For the American nation has, in the first place, sustained by word and by deed, the principle thatthe medium of bringing differences between nations to an end, is arbitration; it has accepted and practised religious toleration as has no other nation; it has known how to raise the dignity of man, by giving to the political vote the development which a true democracy calls for; it has thrown open its doors to all such as seek progress and liberty in your country, and it has taken them in to form part of one and the same great soul; and lastly, it has known, as no other nation has, how to scatter abroad material benefits, the very basis of the moral and mental perfection of the individual. To these factors and to others derived from the conditions of its privileged soil, is due the great importance of the American people as a powerful force in the progress of humanity.
I shall not attempt to analyze in their essence these five glorious victories of civilization. My mind is dazed by the victory of democracy through the true action of the suffrage. This is the germ, the primary origin of your greatness as a people, which makes you the beacon for the eager gaze of all those who, down-trodden by power or by poverty, seek under the shelter of your wise laws, the guarantee of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, to quote the sacred formula of your Declaration of Independence; this it is which explains why neither the difference of race and language, nor the morbid influence produced in the mind by secular despotism, nor the infinite diversity of religion, is an obstacle to the hundreds of thousands of helpless beings whom year by year the Old World is casting on your shores, to be transformed into citizens and become identified with the new fatherland, as if the national spirit had breathed into the souls of these new arrivals love for your glorious traditions and your lofty ideals of liberty, justice, and progress. The American fatherland is not hemmed in by battlements; it is the redeemer of all miseries, it is the refuge of all those who,in their flight from tyranny, like your illustrious Carl Schurz, exclaim:ubi libertas, ibi patria!
We, less blessed by fortune, but no whit less rich in ideals and lofty aspirations, find pleasure in studying your people. We shall endeavor to reap benefits from the lessons of your success, and we shall try to avert the great evils which are born of a prosperity such as yours, and which would undermine the walls of your civilization, did there not arise from out of your midst men of great virtue and indomitable strength of will, armed for the fray against guilt, combating evil, true apostles of right. Theodore Roosevelt is such a man, the most conspicuous of our times, the ardent devotee of justice, who claims for good citizens, for the rich and the poor, the proud and the humble, perfect equality and liberty unrestrained, without which lawful energies may not expand; and demands alike for all equal justice, equal treatment, "a square deal"—to use his own concise and vigorous phrase.
This it is which explains the whole-hearted prestige won by your Chief Executive within the limits of your own country, and which has passed the bounds of your territory and been merged in the international prestige accorded to him by all cultured nations. And, in no small measure, did you with your knowledge, your ceaseless labor and your delicate tact contribute to this happy end. Thus the world has seen how the voice of Theodore Roosevelt, outreaching the roar of the cannons of Mukden, put an end to the war which in shame to human culture heralded the dawn of the twentieth century; it has seen how, in deference to his initiative, the cultured nations of the world hastened to meet at The Hague Conference, and how, as a reward for his constant efforts, united with those of the glorious Chief Executive of this republic, who now receives you with every mark of honor, the disorders in the neighboring republics to the south werepacified, and these are now making ready for a work of peace and harmony,—the beginning of that longed-for era of prosperity.
The international importance achieved by your government and your country had its beginning when President Monroe gave to the world his famous doctrine, so debated, so misunderstood, and perhaps so dangerous, if—as has sometimes been thought—it might be used as a means of illegitimate preponderance at the expense of the sovereignty of other nations. The Monroe Doctrine embodies, nevertheless, and we should not hesitate to say so, the first principle of international law of a great part of this continent, if not the whole. This it means for us Mexicans, ever since the President of the Republic announced it to Congress in his memorable message of April, 1896, received with general acclamation by the national representatives, and later by the whole country. The integrity of the nations of this continent is of vital interest to all, collectively, and not alone to the country immediately affected. Any attack on this integrity should constitute an offense in the eyes of the other nations of America. Accordingly, one of our great thinkers and statesmen has wisely said: "America for Americans means each country for its own people, to the exclusion of all foreign interference, whether this comes from other countries of this continent or whether it comes from any other nation whatsoever. And we in our trying struggles of the past have given ample proof to the whole world of our homage to independence and our hatred of all foreign intervention"—to use President Díaz's own words.
From among the various formulas adopted by the interpreters of the Monroe Doctrine, we Latin American nations should gather and keep as a precious pledge, that which Theodore Roosevelt embodied in his famous speech delivered on the occasion of the opening of the Buffalo Exposition.Addressing the republics of the New World, the illustrious statesman, then Vice-President of the United States of America, said:
I believe with all my heart in the Monroe Doctrine. This doctrine is not to be invoked for the aggrandizement of any one of us here on this continent at the expense of any one else on this continent. It should be regarded simply as a great international Pan American policy, vital to the interests of all of us. The United States has and ought to have, and must ever have, only the desire to see her sister commonwealths in the western hemisphere continue to flourish, and the determination that no Old World power shall acquire new territory here on this western continent. We of the two Americas must be left to work out our own salvation along our own lines; and if we are wise we will make it understood as a cardinal feature of our joint foreign policy that, on the one hand, we will not submit to territorial aggrandizement on this continent by any Old World power, and that, on the other hand, among ourselves each nation must scrupulously regard the rights and interests of the others, so that, instead of any one of us committing the criminal folly of trying to rise at the expense of our neighbors, we shall all strive upward in honest and manly brotherhood, shoulder to shoulder.
I believe with all my heart in the Monroe Doctrine. This doctrine is not to be invoked for the aggrandizement of any one of us here on this continent at the expense of any one else on this continent. It should be regarded simply as a great international Pan American policy, vital to the interests of all of us. The United States has and ought to have, and must ever have, only the desire to see her sister commonwealths in the western hemisphere continue to flourish, and the determination that no Old World power shall acquire new territory here on this western continent. We of the two Americas must be left to work out our own salvation along our own lines; and if we are wise we will make it understood as a cardinal feature of our joint foreign policy that, on the one hand, we will not submit to territorial aggrandizement on this continent by any Old World power, and that, on the other hand, among ourselves each nation must scrupulously regard the rights and interests of the others, so that, instead of any one of us committing the criminal folly of trying to rise at the expense of our neighbors, we shall all strive upward in honest and manly brotherhood, shoulder to shoulder.
And you, honored sir, have not been less explicit. Your words, pronounced on a memorable occasion during your recent visit to South America, before all the free peoples of this continent gathered together at the third Pan American Conference, should be disclosed, should reach the ears of my fellow-citizens, for these very words of yours, as President Roosevelt solemnly declared in his last message to the Congress of the United States, have revealed to all who doubted the spirit of complete equality which inspired the Monroe Doctrine, what is the attitude of the United States towards the other American republics, and what its purposes. You declared then:
We wish for no victories but those of peace; for no territory except our own; for no sovereignty except the sovereignty over ourselves. We deem the independence and equal rights of the smallest and weakest member of the family of nations entitled to as much respect as those of the greatest empire; and we deem the observance of that respect the chief guaranty ofthe weak against the oppression of the strong. We neither claim nor desire any rights or privileges or powers that we do not freely concede to every American republic. We wish to increase our prosperity, to expand our trade, to grow in wealth, in wisdom, and in spirit; but our conception of the true way to accomplish this is not to pull down others and profit by their ruin, but to help all friends to a common prosperity and a common growth, that we may all become greater and stronger together.
We wish for no victories but those of peace; for no territory except our own; for no sovereignty except the sovereignty over ourselves. We deem the independence and equal rights of the smallest and weakest member of the family of nations entitled to as much respect as those of the greatest empire; and we deem the observance of that respect the chief guaranty ofthe weak against the oppression of the strong. We neither claim nor desire any rights or privileges or powers that we do not freely concede to every American republic. We wish to increase our prosperity, to expand our trade, to grow in wealth, in wisdom, and in spirit; but our conception of the true way to accomplish this is not to pull down others and profit by their ruin, but to help all friends to a common prosperity and a common growth, that we may all become greater and stronger together.
You spoke words of truth, and know, honored sir, that those are also our aspirations, those our aims; and thither we wend our way, with the constant steadiness which the Mexican people showed in its struggles for liberty and the attainment of the great principles already embodied in our constitution and laws. Deign to believe it, and when you return to the fatherland, pray do not ever forget that, if we have showered on you the hospitality such as is only offered to a friend, it is because your ideals are ours, because we citizens of this land, no less than those of yours, accept as the supreme dogma of our political religion the immortal words of President Lincoln, that "government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth."
Mr. Root's Reply
I am doubly sensible of the high honor which you have conferred upon me by this audience today. I am sensible also of the great mark of friendship to my country involved in the reception of one of her officers in this distinguished manner by the lawmaking—the popular lawmaking—body of this great republic. I sincerely hope, not merely that I personally may never do aught to show myself unworthy of your consideration, but that my country may forever, in its attitude and conduct toward the people of Mexico, justify your kindness.
You will gather from my words, which your president has been good enough to quote in the admirable and graceful address he has just made, that I am one of those who believethat the old days when nations sought to enrich themselves by taking away the wealth of others by force, ought to pass and are passing. I believe, and I am happy to know that the great mass of my countrymen believe, that it is not only more Christian, not only more honorable, but also more useful and beneficial for all nations, and especially all neighboring nations, to unite in helping each other create more wealth, so that all may be rich and prosperous, rather than to seek to take it away from each other.
I find here in this sanctuary of laws, in this body charged with making the laws, the most interesting, the most important, and the most sacred thing in the republic of Mexico. I am not unmindful of the difficulties which confront you, gentlemen of the Chamber of Deputies, in the task that you perform for your country. The discussion of public questions, the reconciliation of differing opinions, the adjustment of different local interests all over this vast country, the reaching of just conclusions, the compromises necessary so often between different interests, present to the members of a legislative body of a republic difficulties little understood by the people at large and requiring for their solution the highest order of ability, self-denial, and love of country. I beg you to take my testimony, coming from another land long engaged in grappling with the same kind of difficulties; I beg you to take my testimony that the troubles of your body in legislating for your country, and those which you are to encounter in the future, are not peculiar to your country, to your race, to your institutions, to your customs. They inhere in the task before every legislative body representing the vastly differing interests, opinions, sentiments, and desires of a people.
Mr. President and gentlemen of the Chamber of Deputies, it is my sincere desire and the desire of my countrymen, that in the performance of this task for the republic of Mexicoyou may be guided in wisdom and in peace. May you possess that self-restraint which is so necessary to the preservation and security for property, for enterprise, and for life, guarding you always from unwise extremes, leading you always to test every question of legislation by sound principles taught by history. May you always, and every one of you, be so inspired by love of country, that you may be able to sink all personal ambitions and interests, to do only that which is for the benefit of your country; so that through your actions and inspired by your example the spirit of nationality which I see growing among the people of Mexico, may continue to increase until it is the living and controlling spirit of all the people from the Gulf to the Pacific. May you have in your deliberations and your action something of the self-sacrificing spirit of the humble priest Hidalgo, which, without ambition on his part, with no other motive but the love of his country, has written his name among the great benefactors of humanity. May you have something of the patriotism and genius of Benito Juárez, which enabled him with his strong hand to take Mexico out of the conditions of warring factions when individual ambition rose above the love of country. May you have something of that constancy and high courage which has made for the soldier and the statesman who now sits in the chair of the chief magistrate of Mexico, a place in history above scores and hundreds of emperors and kings with high-sounding title and no record in life but the desire for personal advancement.
And so, members of the Chamber of Deputies—may I say, my friends—brothers in the work of seeking by law to advance the peace and prosperity of mankind—may you be able to bring in the rule of justice, of ordered liberty, of peace, of happy homes, of opportunity for children to rise, of opportunity for old age to pass its days in peace. My brother workers in the cause of popular government, ofhuman rights and human happiness, I thank you for the opportunity to say, "God bless you in your labors", which will always have my sympathy and the sympathy of my people.
Speech of General C. H. M. y Agramonte
At the Mexican Country Club, October 4, 1907
As chairman of a committee of the American colony, the pleasant duty devolves upon me to welcome, in behalf of the colony, an illustrious countryman, and a prominent member of the official family of the President of the United States, the Secretary of State.
The opportunity has been afforded us through one of those many acts of exquisite courtesy for which the Government of Mexico is noted in its intercourse with those of us from north of the Río Grande, and to which unfailing courtesy we can all bear witness.
For the kindly spirit that actuated the Mexican Government in breaking in upon the official program for the entertainment of its guest—our countryman—and placing him in our hands for this occasion, we are extremely grateful. For the graceful act of the Mexican Country Club in permitting us the use of this magnificent building in which to entertain our guest there is no lack of appreciation.
As Americans, knowing our own people and our own country as we do, and keenly alive to everything that may obtain for its weal or its woe, our very absence from it making our hearts grow fonder of it, the joy we feel in welcoming one who has held the bright banner of our country full high advanced, is greater than any words of mine can express.
We love our country; we love it as the blessed consummation of human hopes. The world has been full of sorrow. The tearful eyes of humanity have never been dry; but in thiswestern world, on this new continent, stretching from ocean to ocean, in the maturity of the ages has come forth a nation whose institutions and example shall aid in lifting the nations of the world into the sunlight of God's glorious liberty.
We have no king, no royal family upon which can be centered the loyal emotions of a great people. To us the only representative of the whole people is the glorious banner "thick sprinkled" with stars and striped with vivid red and white.
You, sir, have held aloft that banner. You have added to the glory of our country.
On the sacred field of Gettysburg, ground consecrated by torrents of American blood, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, gave to us a classic which will live while our country exists. You, sir, in your exposition of the attitude of the United States toward other countries, have enunciated a classic that also will live and be a bond of friendship between us and all the nations of this hemisphere.
Gentlemen, I will read to you that classic:
We wish for no victories but those of peace; for no territory except our own; for no sovereignty except the sovereignty over ourselves. We deem the independence and equal rights of the smallest and weakest member of the family of nations entitled to as much respect as those of the greatest empire; and we deem the observance of that respect the chief guaranty of the weak against the oppression of the strong. We neither claim nor desire any rights or privileges or powers that we do not freely concede to every American republic.
We wish for no victories but those of peace; for no territory except our own; for no sovereignty except the sovereignty over ourselves. We deem the independence and equal rights of the smallest and weakest member of the family of nations entitled to as much respect as those of the greatest empire; and we deem the observance of that respect the chief guaranty of the weak against the oppression of the strong. We neither claim nor desire any rights or privileges or powers that we do not freely concede to every American republic.
With such dignified sentiments resounding in our ears, have we not reason to be proud of our guest?
And now, sir, in the name of the American colony of Mexico, I bid you welcome. Yes, thrice welcome! May every choice blessing attend upon you and those you hold dear.
Mr. Root's Reply
It is a long way from the Bowery, but I feel quite at home! It is delightful to feel that my country is represented in this land of beauty by so many handsome and cheerful-looking men; it is delightful to see the evidences of prosperity in every American here, and it is delightful to see that that subtle, indefinable quickening of spirit that comes from separation has given to each of you, exiles in a foreign land, a new significance in every star and stripe and every reference to the old flag and the old home.
Your welcome is very grateful to me; your kind expressions I most heartily reciprocate. I do not wish to return evil for good by preaching, but it occurs to me that you have—I will not say that you have left your country for your country's good—you have not abandoned your opportunities to serve her; you have rather reached the position where you have new opportunities for service as American citizens. One serious fault which formerly existed to a very great extent among Americans, and which has been growing less, was a certain provincial and narrow way of looking at foreigners. There was a good deal of truth underlying the observations and characterizations of Mr. Dickens which made our people so angry sixty or seventy years ago. One of our American humorists refers to the people of a western mining camp as looking upon a newcomer with the idea that he had the defective moral quality of being a foreigner. Now the residuum of that old feeling stands in the way of American trade and American intercourse generally with other nations. No one can do more to hasten the disappearance of that attitude than you who have experienced the friendship and kindliness of the people of this foreign country; you who have learned by your personal experience how many and how noble are the characteristics of this foreign people; youwho have been able to see how much we Americans may well learn from them; you can, each one of you, be a teacher of your countrymen in your continued intercourse with your homes and your home associates in the gospel of courtesy and kindliness toward all mankind.
There is one other thought that comes naturally to my mind. You not only have not abandoned your duties toward your country by coming to this foreign land, but you have acquired new duties toward the community and the nation which has given you welcome and shelter and prosperity. There is underlying all the materialism and the hard practical sense of the American people regulating its own government for its own interests—there is underlying that a certain idealism which carries a conception of a missionary calling to spread through the length and breadth of the world the blessing of justice and liberty and of the institutions which we believe make for human happiness and human progress. That mission is to be fulfilled, not by making speeches and the giving of advice, the writing of books, or even the publication of newspapers; it can best be fulfilled by personal influence and intercourse of men one with another. No American who is in a foreign land can help representing his country; its honor and its good name rest upon each one of us the moment we cross the border. You not only represent your country, but you have a duty to perform toward the country in which you live, giving to her and to her people through your efforts and all your association the best contribution that your training as American citizens, that the traditions of centuries of American life enable you to give, toward the maintenance of law and order, toward the promotion of all ideas that you have been taught in your youth to consider sacred, toward holding up the hands of authority, toward the inculcation of the sentiment of loyalty, toward the perpetuity of thegovernment which gives you security for your lives and your property in your new home.
I have one prominent thought in meeting you today; it is, while you continue to be good, loyal American citizens, you should be good and loyal Mexican residents. I can no better voice the sentiment of all of my countrymen here I know, and I can no better represent the feelings of our friends who remain at home, than by asking you to rise and join me in drinking to the long continuance of life, strength, and usefulness for the man who, more than any other, or all others, has given you the opportunities that you now enjoy, President Porfirio Díaz.