It is early to hold inquest upon European civilization. But to attempt to forecast the findings of the historian-crowners of the next period of peace, is neither presumptuous nor premature. Experience has taught us much of the evolution of the written record of a war. After our Civil War we had two distinct historical traditions, Northern and Southern. Nearest the event, personalities, deified and damned, loomed portentously. “If Lincoln’s character had been different—if Jeff Davis had been more forceful”—why, perhaps there might have been no war, or its issue might have been other than it was. In a later stage, Civil War history, though still sectional, accepted the obligation to set forth and make plausible the motives animating either side. Finally, sectionalism is fading from Civil War history, at least in so far as the work of the trained writer is concerned. Whether we are Northerners or Southerners, we see in the great war the natural outcome of the irreconcilable conflict between two economic and social systems, each seeking expansion to the detriment of the other. A particular personality may have worked to bring some of the contending forces to a focus; a particular political movement may have hastened, another may have retarded, the final appeal to arms. Given, however, the underlying social economic situation, given, too the existing limitations upon the political intelligence, North and South, and the appeal to arms was inevitable. Neither party, to be sure, can be absolved from the charge of wrong-doing, or even of crime. But it is not now so important to strike a balance of guilt as it is to determine the conditions that made wrong seem right in the eyes of otherwise moral men.
When the present war is over there will be a flood ofnationalistic histories. The literary representatives of each party will endeavor to roll the whole blame upon the enemy. Vast significance will be attached to personalities; emperors and kings, statesmen, prelates, journalists, will stand forth in light supernal or infernal, according to the point of view. Were the Servian authorities in league with the assassins of the Archduke? Did the German emperor dictate the terms of the Austrian ultimatum? Was the Czar preparing war while pretending peace? Was Sir Edward Grey watching for an opportunity to crush the German fleet? In a later stage impersonal political forces will assert their claim to the foreground of history: the expansive tendencies of Russia; the fatal pride of armed Germany; the pretensions of England to the empire of the seas. Ancient antagonisms of race and nationality, of culture and religion, will aid in explaining what would otherwise remain inexplicable.
No one will dispute the fact that certain individuals in positions of power worked actively to bring on the present crisis, nor that acts were committed that deserve the execration of mankind. It will not be denied that ancient political and cultural antagonisms essentially conditioned the present war; but for such antagonisms the peace would have remained unbroken. Still, these forces are, in a sense, static, and hence not adequate to explain change. The Russian is not more aggressive, the German is not more arrogant, nor the Englishman more intent upon naval dominance, than they were twenty years ago. Pride of race and intolerance of religion have been with us always, and there is no evidence of their recent intensification. What chiefly needs explanation is that for a generation the consciousness of Europe has been filling up with fighting concepts. The fact has been noted by all serious students of European international relations. It is forcibly demonstrated by the enthusiasm with which the several nations, each with a reason of its own, has entered the present conflict. Desperate efforts have been making,for years, to prepare for the struggle that was regarded as inevitable.
Accordingly we can impute to the acts of particular persons little more than the choice of time and occasion for the outbreak of hostilities. The time may have been inauspicious; the occasion may have been one that will not look well in history. For the underlying forces working cumulatively toward an issue, we must, however, look elsewhere than to personal volition.
The greed of the armament industries and the incessant playing upon popular opinion by their subsidized organs have often been assigned to a chief rôle in the drama of international discord. Competitive military preparations, drawing to themselves an increasing share of the intellectual energies of a nation, have long been regarded as a menace to the peace of the world. Every organ seeks to exercise a function. The Crown Prince of Germany, in his panegyric of militarism, expresses poignant regret that all the splendid military forces of the Empire should be expended futilely, in peaceful show. Professional warriors want war, and will work to bring it about.
The future historian will doubtless give weight to the above mentioned forces, as well as to many others that can not here be touched upon. But he will assign vastly more importance than we of today, to the national antipathies engendered by the scramble for colonial possessions, and to the motives giving rise to it. It may be worth our while, even now, to fix our attention upon this aspect of the question. Not only for the light that may be thrown upon the fundamental causes of the present conflict, but also for the grounds we may discern for conjectures as to the international relations of the future.
Every one at all familiar with recent German literature will recall frequent references to theDrang nach Morgenland. The “impulse toward the Land of the Morning”—fitinspiration for a sentimental nation. It has been pointed out, again and again, that the open road to German expansion lies in the direction of Anatolia, Syria and Mesopotamia. Indeed, the expansion has been actually taking place, by a process of infiltration, as it were. Recall the Bagdad Railway, the German incursions into Ottoman finance, the German reorganization of the Turkish army. All that lay between the Germans and their dream of the Morgenland was a group of petty states, easily to be subjugated or overleaped, and the decaying Turkish political organization.
But there was an irreconcilable Russian dream of Constantinople and the Eastern Mediterranean, and a British dream of a sub-tropic zone, all the way to India, taking laws, if from any power, from Britain.
For years, as every one knows, these dreams have played at cards with the Balkans. Not to go beyond the present century, did we not see Russian influence steadily advancing there, until rudely checked by Austrian annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina? Again, the insidious development of Russian influence, culminating in the humiliation of Bulgaria in the Second Balkan War, but checked by the creation of an independent Albania under a German prince. Russian influence encroaching once more, stimulated by the Albanian fiasco and the intensification of Pan-Serbism, to be checked—for no doubt so it was intended—by the utter humiliation of Servia. Probably it was not believed that Russia would trump the Austrian ace. But who could suppose that, in such a game, the trumps would not, sooner or later, be drawn out?
It would be interesting to know why the ace was led just now, and why it was trumped at this precise moment. What is of more importance, however, is to know why the game was set. What did Germany want with the Land of the Morning? What does the Eastern Mediterranean mean to Russia? And what would it signify to England if either dream were realized? Is it matter of sentiment,of “historic mission,” or is it matter of practical interest? And if matter of practical interest, whose interest weighs so heavily that it must be bought with cities in ruins and provinces devastated, with hundreds of thousands of the best and most useful lives sent down to dusty death?
Manifestly, not the interest of the mass of humanity.
The Morgenland, be it understood, is only one of the rotten stones in the arch of civilization. Mexico is another. India, China, Africa are of similar character. But the Morgenland may serve as type for our study, and we may profitably confine our analysis to the German yearnings for the Morgenland, not because they are in any way unique, but because they are typical.
There are political scientists who tell us that Germany is forced by her teeming population to seek this outlet to the East. This would imply that the impulse toward expansion is similar to that which carried the Anglo-Saxons to England and the Lombards to Italy. Let us consider whether this is really the case.
It is admitted, of course, that never before was the population within the present borders of the German Empire so great as it is today. Mere physical density of population is, however, a fact of no direct political significance. The important question is, whether the population is too dense to be comfortably maintained. Now, there is undoubtedly much privation in Germany, but it appears to be almost the unanimous verdict of economists and statisticians that the standard of welfare in Germany is constantly rising. Of this fact we have indirect evidence in our own immigration statistics. In the early eighties Germany sent us 200,000 immigrants a year; now she sends less than 40,000. Why have the numbers dwindled? Not because our free land is gone: for the Germans never were distinctively pioneers. In so far as they turned to agriculture, they settled in the older communities, and bysuperior thrift and industry, took the land away from the native born. This was never easier to do than today. Such of the Germans as remained in our cities occupied themselves with small business, the mechanical trades and the professions. The demand for such services is greater today than ever. The costs and hardships of oversea migration are less now than formerly. If the Germans stay at home, it must be because Germany, in spite of its great population, offers better opportunities for life and work than formerly.
It is not the land area of a nation that determines the magnitude of the population that can be supported in comfort. Rather, it is the organized intelligence of the people; and this, as every one knows, has been steadily advancing in Germany. There are, of course, ultimate limits beyond which organized intelligence can not provide for an increasing population under the handicap of restricted natural resources. Was it perhaps a recognition of this fact that led the statesmen to seek new territories for the Germans of the future?
The birth rate in Germany is declining, as in every other modern state. Conservative statisticians have estimated that, unless the tendency to decline is checked, the German population will come to a standstill within a generation. Germany has now no excess of population wherewith to plant colonies, and will probably never have such excess. Accordingly, it can have been no part of theMorgenlanddream that the mongrel population of Turks and Armenians, Syrians and Arabs, was to be supplanted by GermanBiedermänner. It can not have been imagined that Antioch and Bagdad were to become German cities, the seats of German universities; that Gothic spires were to rise among the ruins of Palmyra, and over the redeemed wastes of Bassorah. The life of theMorgenlandwill pursue its dark and furtive ways, whether under German rule or the rule of any other Power of the light or of the darkness.
It will be said that the standard of wellbeing of the German Empire has advancedpari passuwith her foreign trade, and that trade needs a secure market. Hence the requirement of a rich colonial domain, from which the German trader can not be excluded by hostile customs laws. Perhaps we have here an adequate justification for Germany’s Morning Land aspirations. Germany is an industrial nation; so also are England and the United States and France, and Russia will soon become one. Now, is it not inevitable that the trade of the industrial nations shall be directed toward the non-industrial? That is, towards the tropics and the subtropical belts? The argument is trite, but it looks reasonable enough to deserve consideration.
Germany is indeed an industrial nation, and so are we. But the German industries are not the same as ours, nor can they ever be the same, so long as the German genius and natural environment continue to differ from ours. So long as difference exists, some German goods will command our markets, whether we pursue protectionist policies or not. Germany need not write our laws for us in order to control our markets; she has an indefeasible title to those markets so long as she maintains superiority in supplying our needs. And the same thing is true of the markets of England and France and Russia. They take German goods eagerly, in vast quantities. Wipe out Germany’s trade with industrial states, and her commerce is practically at an end.
The trade between nations of rich and varied industries is alone capable of indefinite expansion. Yet the delusion persists that a nation’s closed trade with a subject state is somehow of superior importance. Such trade is admittedly incapable of great development. Only semi-barbarous peoples will submit to foreign control of their trade; and such peoples produce little beyond the requirementsof home consumption, and therefore, having hardly anything to sell, can buy but little. But colonial trade, meagre as it is, may be monopolized and made to yield large profits. The trade between industrial nations, since it is essentially competitive, diffuses its benefits throughout the trading nations. Hence these benefits are easily overlooked. The rapid enrichment of a few houses engaged in the colonial trade gives visible evidence of national gain.
Out of the overestimation of the value of the colonial trade arises, unquestionably, some part of the international jealousies now working out their nature upon the field of battle. Control of the trade of the Levant would advance the general welfare of the German people in very limited measure; but it would greatly enrich a small number of traders, and this very fact of the concentration of the gains gives them added potency in determining political relations.
The colonial trader was once the chief cause of wars, and he still contributes his quota to international misunderstanding and hostility. But there is another interest that has grown to far greater importance in the colonial domain. This we may describe as the concessionary interest. Vast fortunes have been accumulated, in the semi-barbarous belt, by the exploitation of natural resources and works of public utility. The Land of the Morning would be exceptionally rich in concessions to the nationals of any imperial state. There are oil fields and mines to open, railways and irrigation works to construct. Some of these opportunities are already in German possession; their security, however, depends upon continued exercise, by Germany, of influence upon the Ottoman government. That government is notoriously shifty, and the interests involved will never be wholly safe until the Levant is a German colony.
The concessionary interest, like the colonial trading interest, offers chances of sudden wealth. The former, however, is far more vulnerable than the latter. The fixed investment of the concessionary is far greater than that of the trader. Hence, while the colonial trading interest thrives best with the support of the home government, to the concessionary interest such support is indispensable. Politics is a necessary part of the concessionary business.
How far is the concessionary interest identical with the national interest? Let us consider what difference it makes to you and me whether the Pearson interests, or the Waters-Pierce interests, control the oil fields of Mexico. If the Pearson interests, several great fortunes will be constituted in England; if the Waters-Pierce, similar fortunes will be constituted here. In either case the money will lie at an infinite distance from you and me. Still, we are patriots, and would rather have it here than in England.
Patriotism aside, the great fortune here will pay income tax to our own treasury. Its spending will afford many golden crumbs to fellow citizens of ours. The exploitation of the oil fields will require much machinery, for which, under Waters-Pierce control, the first bid would be offered to our own industry. Many young men of our nationality would find employment as engineers, foremen, superintendents. Undoubtedly, it is better for the national interest to have the concession in national hands.
But what is the magnitude of the concessionary interest, and how many votes should it have on questions of peace and war? Of the whole capital of Great Britain, not one-fifth consists in foreign investments; and of that fifth scarcely a quarter can be concessionary. One-tenth of Germany’s capital is invested abroad; probably not a fifth of that is concessionary. Of our own capital one part in a hundred is in foreign investments, of which one-half is in Mexico. Not nearly all of that half is concessionary. It did not prove to be enough to go to war over.
From the foregoing review it might appear to be the natural conclusion that the economic element in the present war is practically negligible. By far the greater proportion of the trade relations of the world—and the relations most significant to the general welfare—obtain between the very nations that are now endeavoring to destroy one another. The opportunities for concessionary capital that could be secured by any nation, if completely victorious, can hardly be equivalent to the losses of the far more important industrial capital at home. It is certain that if all capital had been conscious of its interest, and the question of peace or war had been left to capital, each hundred dollars having one vote, there would have been no war. There is a war: costly demonstration to the Socialists that capital does not, as alleged, enjoy control of modern political society.
Before we accept this view, however, let us look somewhat more closely upon the structure of capital as a social economic force. We shall find that it is not homogeneous, but embraces two elements differing widely in character. The one, which we may denominate capital proper, is characterized by cautious calculation, by a preference for sure if small gains, to dazzling winnings. The other, which we may call speculative enterprise, is characterized by a readiness to take risks, a thirst for brilliant gains. The relative political power of the two elements, as we shall see, is not proportioned to their respective pecuniary volumes. Accordingly, altho it may easily enough be demonstrated that the majority interest of European capital has been seriously prejudiced by the present war, it does not follow that a large share of the responsibility for the war may not be fixed upon capital. The minority interest may have determined a majority vote.
Capital proper thrives best in a settled order of society,where the risks of loss are at a minimum. It accepts favors from government, to be sure, but politics is no part of its game; peace, and freedom from disturbing innovations, are its great desiderata. Speculative enterprise, on the other hand, thrives best in the midst of disorder. Its favorite field of operations is the fringe of change, economic or political. It delights in the realm where laws ought to be, but have not yet made their appearance. To control the course of legal evolution, to retard it or divert it, are its favorite devices for prolonging the period of rich gains. Politics, thus, is an essential part of the game of speculative enterprise.
At the outset of the modern era, speculative enterprise quite overshadowed capital proper. Colonial trade, government contracts, domestic monopolies were the chief sources of middle class fortunes. But with the progress of industry, slow, plodding capital has been able steadily to encroach upon the field of enterprise, or to create new fields of its own. In our own society the promoter of railway, and public utilities, the exploiter of public lands, the trust organizer, are as prominent, relatively, as in any modern nation. Quantitatively their interests are, however, greatly inferior to those of the trader, manufacturer, banker, the small investor and the farmer, to whom a ten per cent return is a golden dream, and twenty per cent a temptation sent by the Evil One.
But quantitatively inferior as the speculative capitalist really is, his hold upon the popular imagination is vastly more powerful than that of his slow-going colleague. Say that an employer of this type prefers to spend money on machine guns to repress strikes rather than in better wages: instantly it is declared by all the radicals of the earth that such is the general spirit of capitalism. No radical is able to keep clearly in mind that the overwhelming majority of employers are doing their best to keep their working forces contented, and are succeeding fairly well. The radicals, however, are not the only persons whoseminds are overcrowded with the doings of the speculative capitalist. You and I read eagerly the lives of Jay Gould, Oakes Ames, Harriman and Morgan, feeling that somehow we are thereby brought nearer to the spirit of modern life. We find it impossible to sustain an interest in the account of the life of James Metzger, grocer, who set out in life worth ten thousand, and by faithful attendance upon his customers, without ever once taking a risk, ended life with an estate of one hundred thousand. James Metzger is a type of the thousands making up the ranks of capital proper. His story is told in statistics, which you and I won’t read.
We may love or we may hate the speculative capitalist, but at all events we admire him. We admire him when he works for the public interest, and we admire him when his efforts are subversive of the public good. We admired Harriman when he built the Salt Lake cut-off, and we admired him when he cut the Alton melon. Now, is it to be supposed that the speculative capitalist does not turn this popular admiration to use as a political force, since politics is a part of his game? Inconceivable! As compared with his brother of the small profits and quick return, he enjoys a plural vote in our political scheme.
In a new country of vast natural resources, especially if it is not too well governed, there is sufficient scope for both speculative enterprise and capital proper. The United States has been such a country, at least down to a very recent date. There was easy money enough for all men of shrewdness and resolution possessed of the necessary initial stake—public forests to be leveled, railways to be built or wrecked, trusts to be organized, cities to be provided with public utilities. But all this easy money now appears to be in danger of being locked up. We have a conservation movement in full swing, and a civic reform tendency that is no longer a mere cloak for the insatiableappetite of plunderers out of power. The popular attitude toward monopolistic combinations is growing ominously serious; if old and strong combinations do not dissolve in fear before it, yet those who would organize new combinations are deeply discouraged. We have an Interstate Commerce Commission with the will and the power to choke all railways when some are believed to have stealings in their gorge. Already we are beginning to hear murmurs about town, that in view of the popular hostility to wealth, it will be necessary for American capital to look to foreign investments. Not foreign investments in England and France and Germany, where government is efficient and capital proper prevails. But foreign investments in the undeveloped countries, in a Land of the Morning, “east of Suez.”
In England the domestic field for capitalistic speculation has long been restricted. For generations the British citizen has been taught to look to Asia, Africa, America, for the opportunities for sudden wealth. Germany, more recently launched upon an industrial career, might have offered many rich opportunities at home. But Germany has been well governed. The early nationalization of railways closed one lucrative field; the cities, with their excellent business governments, have taken control of their own utilities, or have driven hard bargains with private enterprise. Industrial combinations have been as numerous as with us; but they have assumed the form of the Kartell—a legally binding agreement between independent producers, fixing prices and volume of production. Such a form of organization, like our former “pools,” distributes the profits of combination fairly equitably among all the producers, and therefore has offered little opportunity for such promoter’s gains as we are familiar with in American trust finance. Some opening there was, of course, for speculative enterprise. The launching of new industrial companies, dealings in real estate, the military and naval industries, laid the basis for many astoundingmushroom fortunes. But the progress of governmental effectiveness has been steadily encroaching upon these fields. The German internal situation, then, has been such as to recommend theAuslandto those who wish to risk large stakes on the chance of brilliant returns.
The progress of modern industrial society, with its parallel development in the art of government, tends to the extrusion of speculative capital, and its concentration in the tropical and subtropical belts. In the older societies the process has been in operation for a considerable time; with us it is just beginning. But in a generation, we may be sure, much of our own speculative capital, like that of the older countries, will be engaged in colonial exploitation.
Capital, it is often said, is cosmopolitan; capital knows no such thing as patriotism. This may be true of the cautious, colorless capital of ordinary finance and industry. It is not true of the capital upon which speculative enterprise is based. It was an intense patriotism that was avowed by Jay Gould and Harriman; intense is the patriotism of J. J. Hill, of the DuPonts and the Guggenheims. Even Mellen is, or was, patriotic in his feelings toward New England. But most intense of all is the patriotism of the capitalist whose interests lie in the twilight zone of the barbaric belt. Purer expressions of devotion to America, of deep concern for her future, than those issuing from the lips of American concessionaries in Mexico, you never hear. We were all moved by the grandiose African dream of Cecil Rhodes. “All red”—i. e. British—a British heart within every black skin, from the Cape to Cairo. The case is typical of the capitalist speculator abroad. He is a patriot through thick and thin, not a white-blooded “cit” like you and me, who before volunteering support for our country’s acts would presume to pass judgment upon them. He is a patriot whowould knock a chip off the shoulder of the meanest upstart of a barbarian dictator—without regard to the cost of doing it: not a calculator, like you and me.
By interest, the concessionary capitalist is a patriot. He needs his country in his business. But this is by no means the whole explanation of his patriotism. His type is reckless, and therefore generous and idealistic. He must love and admire great things, and what thing is greater than the imperial dominion of his country? One must have a mean opinion of human nature to suspect the purity of the motives of Cecil Rhodes. Doubtless Rhodes began with selfish motives, but his private interests were soon submerged in his imperial ambitions. We may not be justified in assuming that selfish interest operates, to the utter exclusion of all patriotic motives. It does not necessarily follow that because Mr. William Randolph Hearst, for example, has mines in Mexico, his motives are determined by them. His Mexican interests would be advanced if the American boundary were extended to include all on this side of Panama. Is this, however, the whole tale of his aggressive Americanism? Patriotism has always burned more brightly in border provinces than in the heart of the national territory. It is natural, then, that patriotism should be still more intense in those extensions of the national domain represented by permanent interests abroad.
In an ideal scheme of things, love of one’s own country would not involve hatred and contempt for other countries. But patriotism compounded with financial interest does usually produce detestation for the corresponding alien compound. We who meet the Germans in America, in England, in Germany, engaged in the common labor of advancing man’s control over nature, respect them, and if we see much of them, love them. Our capitalist speculators in South America and in the Orient, meeting their similars of German nationality, hate them heartily. Those speculators are the nerve ends of modern industrialnationalism, and they are specialized to the work of conveying sensations of hate. For the present we have few nerves of the kind, and all they have succeeded in conveying to us is a vague feeling of uneasiness over the German advance in the colonial field. Far more powerful must have been the reaction upon nations like England and France that are serious competitors in the same field. And German capitalist speculators, thwarted in their designs by the English and the French, have contributed to the popular feeling that Germany must fight for what she gets.
The capitalistic speculator, even when operating at home where his action may be directed against us, enjoys a power over the popular imagination, and a political influence quite incommensurate with the extent of his interests. When the seat of his operations is a foreign territory, whence flow back reports of his great achievements—achievements that cost us nothing, and that bring home fortunes to be taxed and spent among us—his social and political influence attains even more exaggerated proportions. And this is the more significant in view of the fact that his relations with government—now even a more important part of his business—are concentrated upon that most sensitive of governmental organs, the foreign office.
When diplomatic questions concerning the non-industrial belt arise, and most modern diplomatic questions concern this belt, the voice of the concessionaries is heard in the councils of state. This voice is the more convincing because of the patriotism that colors its expression of interest. What is perhaps more important, the ordinary conduct of exploitative business in an undeveloped state keeps the concessionary in constant relation with the consular and diplomatic officers established there. In a sense, such officers are the concessionary’s agents, yet their communications to the home office are the material out of which diplomatic situations are created.
It is accordingly idle to suppose that exploitative capital in foreign investments weighs in foreign policy only as an equal capital at home. When we consider the personality of the director of colonial enterprise, the conditions in which he meets competitors of foreign nations, and his relations with the foreign service of his home government, we can readily understand how a very small investment may prove a great menace to the peace of nations. For years the popular consciousness, in the several nations, has been steadily absorbing conceptions of rivalry of interest that have no meaning except to the category of concessionary capital. Germany, Russia, England and France have been brought to the belief that something very vital turns upon the control of the Land of the Morning. Indeed the whole civilized world has been seduced into accepting the view that something very vital turns upon the control of the tropics. Yes, something very vital for exploitative capital. Indirectly vital for the rest of society: for from such delusions spring wars that sow the unwilling fields with the shattered limbs of the best of our youth.
It is the interest of exploitative capital that makes the Morning Land, Mexico, China and Africa rotten stones in the arch of civilization. But for exploitative capital, those regions might remain backward, socially and politically: this would not greatly concern any industrial nation, except in so far as it responded to a missionary impulse. The backward states afford, however, possibilities of sudden wealth; and since this is the case, they must attract exploiters, who must seek, and obtain, the backing of their home governments, with resultant international rivalry, hostility, war.
If we could confidently predict the industrialization of the backward countries, we should be able to foresee an end of this one most fruitful of all sources of internationalstrife. But China will not be industrialized for a generation, at least; and many generations must elapse before the tropics are concession proof. Accordingly the one hope for universal peace would appear to lie in the possibility of divorcing, in the popular consciousness, the concessionary interest from the national interest.
For the present war will settle nothing. When it is over, the skeleton titles thrown about the undeveloped lands may have undergone change; but underneath the new order, the struggle of exploitative capital will emerge as before. Diplomatic squabbles will again arise; popular envy will be wrought upon; international hostility will be fomented; military and naval rivalry will again crush out progress. The minor interest will once more drag the major interest to ruin.
There will, however, be in the situation one element new, at any rate, to us. In a generation we shall not be, as now, a nation with almost all its capital secure within its own boundaries. Our strong men of speculative finance will be established in the undeveloped countries; concessions will figure conspicuously among the items of our national wealth. The foreign contingent of our capital will join battle with that of the group of nations destined to fare best in the present struggle: if Germany and Austria, in South America; if Russia and Japan, in the Orient. And who shall say that our country may not be a protagonist in the next great war? One half of one per cent of our capital just failed of forcing us to subjugate Mexico.
The concession and the closed trade are the fault lines in the crust of civilization. Solve the problems of the concession and the closed trade, the earth hunger will have lost its strongest stimulus, and peace, when restored, may abide throughout the world.