Josiah Strong, Our Country: Its Possible Future and Its Present Crisis (1885) Again, nothing more manifestly distinguishes the Anglo-Saxon than his intense and persistent energy; and he is developing in the United States an energy which, in eager activity and effectiveness, is peculiarly American. This is due partly to the fact that Americans are much better fed than Europeans, and partly to the undeveloped resources of a new country, but more largely to our climate, which acts as a constant stimulus… Every one is free to become whatever he can make of himself; free to transform himself from a rail-splitter or a tanner or a canal-boy, into the nation's President. Our aristocracy, unlike that of Europe, is open to all comers. Wealth, position, influence, are prizes offered for energy; and every farmer's boy, every apprentice and clerk, every friendless and penniless immigrant, is free to enter the lists. Thus many causes co-operate to produce here the most forceful and tremendous energy in the world… It seems to me that God, with infinite wisdom and skill, is training the AngloSaxon race for an hour sure to come in the world's future. Heretofore there has always been in the history of the world a comparatively unoccupied land westward, into which the crowded countries of the East have poured their surplus populations. But the widening waves of migration, which millenniums ago rolled east and west from the valley of the Euphrates, meet to-day on our Pacific coast. There are no more new worlds. The unoccupied arable lands of the earth are limited, and will soon be taken. The time is coming when the pressure of population on the means of subsistence will be felt here as it is now felt in Europe and Asia. Then will the world enter upon a new stage of its history--the, final 1 competition of races, for which the Anglo-Saxon is being schooled. Long before the thousand millions are here, the mighty centrifugal tendency, inherent in this stock and strengthened in the United States, will assert itself. Then this race of unequaled energy, with all the majesty of numbers and the might of wealth behind it--the representative, let us hope, of the largest liberty, the purest Christianity, the highest civilization--having developed peculiarly aggressive traits calculated to impress its institutions upon mankind, will spread itself over the earth. If I read not amiss, this powerful race will move down upon Mexico, down upon Central and South America, out upon the islands of the sea, over upon Africa and beyond. And can any one doubt that the result of this competition of races will be the "survival of the fittest"? ... Nothing can save the inferior race but a ready and pliant assimilation. Whether the feebler and more abject races are going to be regenerated and raised up, is already very much of a question. What if it should be God!s plan to people the world with better and finer material? Certain it is, whatever expectations we may indulge, that there is a tremendous overbearing surge of power in the Christian nations, which, if the others are not speedily raised to some vastly higher capacity, will inevitably submerge and bury them forever. These great populations of Christendom--what are they doing, but throwing out their colonies on every side, and populating themselves, if I may so speak, into the possession of all countries and climes?"* To this result no war of extermination is needful; the contest is not one of arms, but of vitality and of civilization. ... Some of the stronger races, doubtless, may be able to preserve their integrity; but, in order to compete with the Anglo-Saxon, they 2 will probably be forced to adopt his methods and instruments, his civilization and his religion. … The contact of Christian with heathen nations is awaking the latter to new life. Old superstitions are loosening their grasp. The dead crust of fossil faiths is being shattered by the movements of life underneath. In Catholic countries, Catholicism is losing its influence over educated minds, and in some cases the masses have already lost all faith in it. Thus, while on this continent God is training the Anglo-Saxon race for its mission, a complemental work has been in progress in the great world beyond. 3 Clemencia Lopez, "Women of the Philippines: Address to Annual Meeting of the New England Woman's Suffrage Association, May 29, 1902," The Woman's Journal, 7 June 1902. It gives me very great pleasure to greet the Massachusetts Woman Suffrage Association on behalf of the women of my own country. I have yielded to your kind invitation to tell you something about the condition of women in the Philippine Islands, in spite of my inexperience and lack of literary skill, for which I pray your indulgence, and have had the courage to speak to you [so you] may form a different and more favorable opinion of the Filipinos, than the conception which ... the American people have formed, believing us to be savages without education or morals. I believe that we are both striving for much the same object—you for the right to take part in national life; we for the right to have a national life to take part in. And I am sure that, if we understood each other better, the differences which now exist between your country and mine would soon disappear. You will no doubt be surprised and pleased to learn that the condition of women in the Philippines is very different from that of the women of any country in the East [i.e., Asia], and that it differs very little from the general condition of the women of this country. Mentally, socially, and in almost all the relations of life, our women are regarded as the equals of our men...Long prior to the Spanish occupation, the people were already civilized, and this respect for and equality of women existed... Before closing, I should like to say a word about the patriotism of the women. This is a delicate subject, for to be patriotic to our country means that we must oppose the policy of yours. But patriotism is a quality which we all ought to be able to admire, even in an opponent. I should indeed have reason to be ashamed if I had to come before this Association with the admission that our women were indifferent to the cause of their country's 1 independence. You would have a right to despise me and my countrywomen if we had so little love for our native land as to consent that our country should be governed by foreign hands.... In conclusion, in the name of the Philippine women, I pray the Massachusetts Woman Suffrage Association to do what it can to remedy all this misery and misfortune in my unhappy country. You can do much to bring about the cessation of these horrors and cruelties which are today taking place in the Philippines, and to insist upon a more humane course. I do not believe that you can understand or imagine the miserable condition of the women of my country, or how real is their suffering. Thousands have been widowed, orphaned, left alone and homeless, exposed and in the greatest misery. It is, then, not a surprising fact that the diseases born of hunger are increasing, and that to-day immorality prevails in the Philippines to an extent never before known. After all, you ought to understand that we are only contending for the liberty of our country, just as you once fought for the same liberty for yours. 2 Samuel Gompers, President of the American Federation of Labor, “Imperialism—Its Dangers and Wrongs,” October 18, 1898. If the Philippines are annexed, what is to prevent the Chinese, the Negritos and the Malays coming to our country? How can we prevent the Chinese coolies from going to the Philippines and from there swarm into the United States and engulf our people and our civilization. If these new islands are to become ours, it will be either under the form of Territories or States. Can we hope to close the flood-gates of immigration from the hordes of Chinese and the semi-savage races coming from what will then be part of our own country? … If we attempt to force upon the natives of the Philippines our rule, and compel them to conform to our more or less rigid mold of government, how many lives shall we take? Of course, they will seem cheap, because they are poor laborers. They will be members of the majority in the Philippines, but they will be ruled and killed at the convenience of the very small minority there, backed up by our armed land and sea forces. The dominant class in the islands will ease its conscience because the victims will be poor, ignorant and weak. When innocent men can be shot down on the public highway as they were in Lattimer, Pa., and Virden, Ill., men of our own flesh and blood, men who help to make this homogenous nation great, because they dare ask for humane conditions at the hands of the moneyed class of our country, how much more difficult will it be to arouse any sympathy, and secure relief for the poor semi-savages in the Philippines, much less indignation at any crime against their inherent and natural rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? 1 Hiram W. Evans, “The Klan’s Fight for Americanism,” North American Review (March–April–May 1926) The [Ku Klux] Klan…has now come to speak for the great mass of Americans of the old pioneer stock. We believe that it does fairly and faithfully represent them, and our proof lies in their support. To understand the Klan, then, it is necessary to understand the character and present mind of the mass of old-stock Americans. The mass, it must be remembered, as distinguished from the intellectually mongrelized “Liberals.” These are, in the first place, a blend of various peoples of the socalled Nordic race, the race which, with all its faults, has given the world almost the whole of modern civilization. The Klan does not try to represent any people but these. There is no need to recount the virtues of the American pioneers; but it is too often forgotten that in the pioneer period a selective process of intense rigor went on. From the first only hardy, adventurous and strong men and women dared the pioneer dangers; from among these all but the best died swiftly, so that the new Nordic blend which became the American race was bred up to a point probably the highest in history. This remarkable race character, along with the new-won continent and the new-created nation, made the inheritance of the old-stock Americans the richest ever given to a generation of men. In spite of it, however, these Nordic Americans for the last generation have found themselves increasingly uncomfortable, and finally deeply distressed…Finally came the moral breakdown that has been going on for two decades. One by one all our traditional moral standards went by the boards, or were so disregarded that they ceased to be binding. The sacredness of our Sabbath, of our 1 homes, of chastity, and finally even of our right to teach our own children in our own schools fundamental facts and truths were torn away from us. Those who maintained the old standards did so only in the face of constant ridicule. Along with this went economic distress. The assurance for the future of our children dwindled. We found our great cities and the control of much of our industry and commerce taken over by strangers, who stacked the cards of success and prosperity against us. Shortly they came to dominate our government. The bloc system by which this was done is now familiar to all. Every kind of inhabitant except the Americans gathered in groups which operated as units in politics, under orders of corrupt, self-seeking and unAmerican leaders, who both by purchase and threat enforced their demands on politicians. Thus it came about that the interests of Americans were always the last to be considered by either national or city governments, and that the native Americans were constantly discriminated against, in business, in legislation and in administrative government. So the Nordic American today is a stranger in large parts of the land his fathers gave him. Moreover, he is a most unwelcome stranger, one much spit upon, and one to whom even the right to have his own opinions and to work for his own interests is now denied with jeers and revilings. “We must Americanize the Americans,” a distinguished immigrant said recently. Can anything more clearly show the state to which the real American has fallen in this country which was once his own?... All this has been true for years, but it was the World War that gave us our first hint of the real cause of our troubles, and began to crystallize our ideas. The war revealed that millions whom we had 2 allowed to share our heritage and prosperity, and whom we had assumed had become part of us, were in fact not wholly so. They had other loyalties: each was willing—anxious!—to sacrifice the interests of the country that had given him shelter to the interests of the one he was supposed to have cast off; each in fact did use the freedom and political power we had given him against ourselves whenever he could see any profit for his older loyalty. This, of course, was chiefly in international affairs, and the excitement caused by the discovery of disloyalty subsided rapidly after the war ended. But it was not forgotten by the Nordic Americans. They had been awakened and alarmed; they began to suspect that the hyphenism which had been shown was only a part of what existed; their quiet was not that of renewed sleep, but of strong men waiting very watchfully. And presently they began to form decisions about all those aliens who were Americans for profit only. They decided that even the crossing of salt-water did not dim a single spot on a leopard; that an alien usually remains an alien no matter what is done to him, what veneer of education he gets, what oaths he takes, nor what public attitudes he adopts. They decided that the melting pot was a ghastly failure, and remembered that the very name was coined by a member of one of the races—the Jews—which most determinedly refuses to melt. They decided that in every way, as well as in politics, the alien in the vast majority of cases is unalterably fixed in his instincts, character, thought and interests by centuries of racial selection and development, that he thinks first for his own people, works only with and for them, cares entirely for their interests, considers himself always one of them, and never an American. They decided that in character, instincts, 3 thought, and purposes—in his whole soul—an alien remains fixedly alien to America and all it means. They saw, too, that the alien was tearing down the American standard of living, especially in the lower walks. It became clear that while the American can out-work the alien, the alien can so far under-live the American as to force him out of all competitive labor. So they came to realize that the Nordic can easily survive and rule and increase if he holds for himself the advantages won by strength and daring of his ancestors in times of stress and peril, but that if he surrenders those advantages to the peoples who could not share the stress, he will soon be driven below the level at which he can exist by their low standards, low living and fast breeding. And they saw that the low standard aliens of Eastern and Southern Europe were doing just that thing to us. They learned, though more slowly, that alien ideas are just as dangerous to us as the aliens themselves, no matter how plausible such ideas may sound. With most of the plain people this conclusion is based simply on the fact that the alien ideas do not work well for them. Others went deeper and came to understand that the differences in racial background, in breeding, instinct, character and emotional point of view are more important than logic. So ideas which may be perfectly healthy for an alien may also be poisonous for Americans… As they learned all this the Nordic Americans have been gradually arousing themselves to defend their homes and their own kind of civilization. They have not known just how to go about it; the idealist philanthropy and good-natured generosity which led to the philosophy of the melting pot have died hard. Resistance to the peaceful invasion of the immigrant is no such simple matter as 4 snatching up weapons and defending frontiers, nor has it much spectacular emotionalism to draw men to the colors. The old-stock Americans are learning, however. They have begun to arm themselves for this new type of warfare. Most important, they have broken away from the fetters of the false ideals and philanthropy which put aliens ahead of their own children and their own race. To do this they have had to reject completely—and perhaps for the moment the rejection is a bit too complete—the whole body of “Liberal” ideas which they had followed with such simple, unquestioning faith. The first and immediate cause of the break with Liberalism was that it had provided no defense against the alien invasion, but instead had excused it—even defended it against Americanism. Liberalism is today charged in the mind of most Americans with nothing less than national, racial and spiritual treason. . . . We are a movement of the plain people, very weak in the matter of culture, intellectual support, and trained leadership. We are demanding, and we expect to win, a return of power into the hands of the everyday, not highly cultured, not overly intellectualized, but entirely unspoiled and not de-Americanized, average citizen of the old stock. Our members and leaders are all of this class—the opposition of the intellectuals and liberals who held the leadership, betrayed Americanism, and from whom we expect to wrest control, is almost automatic. . . . Our critics have accused us of being merely a “protest movement,” of being frightened; they say we fear alien competition, are in a panic because we cannot hold our own against the foreigners. That 5 is partly true. We are a protest movement—protesting against being robbed. We are afraid of competition with peoples who would destroy our standard of living. We are suffering in many ways, we have been betrayed by our trusted leaders, we are half beaten already. But we are not frightened nor in a panic. We have merely awakened to the fact that we must fight for our own. We are going to fight—and win! . . . 6 1920 Immigrations Laws Emergency Quota Act, also known as the Immigration Restriction Act of 1921 H.R. 4075; Pub.L. 67-5; 42 Stat. 5. 67th Congress; May 19, 1921. Sec. 2. (a) That the number of aliens1 of any nationality who may be admitted under the immigration laws to the United States in any fiscal year shall be limited to 3 per centum2 of the number of foreign-born persons of such nationality resident in the United States as determined by the United States census of 1910. 1924 Immigration Act, also known as the Johnson-Reed Act H.R. 7995; Pub.L. 68-139; 43 Stat. 153. 68th Congress; May 26, 1924. Sec. 11. (a) The annual [immigrant] quota of any nationality shall be 2 per centum of the number of foreign-born individuals of such nationality resident in continental United States as determined by the United States census of 1890. 1 2 foreigners; immigrants per centum = percent 1 1920 Immigrations Laws Emergency Quota Act, also known as the Immigration Restriction Act of 1921 H.R. 4075; Pub.L. 67-5; 42 Stat. 5. 67th Congress; May 19, 1921. Sec. 2. (a) That the number of aliens1 of any nationality who may be admitted under the immigration laws to the United States in any fiscal year shall be limited to 3 per centum2 of the number of foreign-born persons of such nationality resident in the United States as determined by the United States census of 1910. 1924 Immigration Act, also known as the Johnson-Reed Act H.R. 7995; Pub.L. 68-139; 43 Stat. 153. 68th Congress; May 26, 1924. Sec. 11. (a) The annual [immigrant] quota of any nationality shall be 2 per centum of the number of foreign-born individuals of such nationality resident in continental United States as determined by the United States census of 1890. 1 2 foreigners; immigrants per centum = percent 1 Emilio Aguinaldo, “Aguinaldo’s Case against the United States (1899) We Filipinos have all along believed that if the American nation at large knew exactly, as we do, what is daily happening in the Philippine Islands, they would rise en masse, and demand that this barbaric war should stop. There are other methods of securing sovereignty—the true and lasting sovereignty that has its foundation in the hearts of the people…And, did America recognize this fact, she would cease to be the laughing stock of other civilized nations, as she became when she abandoned her traditions and set up a double standard of government— government by consent in America, government by force in the Philippine Islands… You have been deceived all along the line. You have been greatly deceived in the personality of my countrymen. You went to the Philippines under the impression that their inhabitants were ignorant savages, whom Spain had kept in subjection at the bayonet’s point…We have been represented by your popular press as if we were Africans or Mohawk Indians… In the struggle for liberty which we have ever waged, the education of the masses has been slow; but we are not, on that account, an uneducated people… It is the fittest and the best of our race who have survived the vile oppression of the Spanish Government, on the one hand, and of their priests on the other; and, had it not been for their tyrannous “sovereignty” and their execrable colonial methods, we would have been, ere this time, a power in the East, as our neighbors, the Japanese, have become by their industry and their modern educational methods. You repeat constantly the dictum that we cannot govern ourselves…With equal reason, you might have said the same thing 1 some fifty or sixty years ago of Japan; and, little over a hundred years ago, it was extremely questionable, when you, also, were rebels against the English Government, if you could govern yourselves. You obtained the opportunity, thanks to political combinations and generous assistance at the critical moment. You passed with credit through the trying period when you had to make a beginning of governing yourselves, and you eventually succeeded in establishing a government on a republican basis, which, theoretically, is as good a system of government as needs be, as it fulfils the just ideals and aspirations of the human race. Now, the moral of all this obviously is: Give us the chance; treat us exactly as you demanded to be treated at the hands of England, when you rebelled against her autocratic methods… Now, here is an unique spectacle—the Filipinos fighting for liberty, the American people fighting them to give them liberty. The two peoples are fighting on parallel lines for the same object. We know that parallel lines never meet. Let us look back to discover the point at which the lines separated and the causes of the separation, so that we may estimate the possibility of one or the other or both being turned inwards so that they shall meet again. You declared war with Spain for the sake of Humanity…[Y]our object and ours was a common one. We were your accepted allies; we assisted you at all points. We besieged Manila, and we prevented the Spaniards from leaving the fortified town. We captured all the provinces of Luzon. We received arms from you. Our chiefs were in constant touch with your naval authorities...We hailed you as the long-prayed-for Messiah. Joy abounded in every heart, and all went well . . . until . . . the Government at Washington…commenc[ed] by ignoring all promises that had been made and end[ed] by ignoring the 2 Philippine people, their personality and rights, and treating them as a common enemy. Never has a greater mistake been made in the entire history of the nations. Here you had a people who placed themselves at your feet, who welcomed you as their savior, who wished you to govern them and protect them. In combination with the genius of our countrymen and their local knowledge, you would have transformed the Philippine Islands from a land of despotism, of vicious governmental methods and priestcraft, into an enlightened republic, with America as its guide—a happy and contented people—and that in the short space of a few months, without the sacrifice of a single American life... You took a wrong step, and you had not sufficient moral courage to retrace it. You must begin by conquering the hearts of the Philippine people. Be absolutely just, and you can lead them with a silken cord where chains of steel will not drag them… But this question of sovereignty—why, such a transparent farce has never before been flouted before an intelligent people and the world in general. Can you wonder our people mistrust…? They do not even regard you as being serious—a nation which professes to derive its just power of government from the consent of the governed. 3 Ernestine Alvarado, “Mexican Immigration to the United States,” Proceedings of the National Conference of Social Work (1920). The Mexicans of the lower class who constitute the greater part of the immigration element to this country, respond generously when rightly treated. They are intelligent and indefatigable workers when they are put in the right place. They are reliable, serious, of quick comprehension, and at the same time calm and reflective. In our country, and owing to causes against which the revolution is still fighting, those men have received almost no education; many of them do not know how to read and write. It is imperative that they be educated by you. You can make of them a very useful element in your social life and in the prosperity of the nation. They come from Mexico in search of new horizons. They have been told about the prosperity of this country, of the liberty that they may enjoy here, of the big salaries they may obtain, of the practicability and value of your methods, of the low cost of living, and thousands of other things which are growing obsolete. They come seeking that wonderful country wherein they hope to find greater liberty than in their own… Up to the present the majority of these men have returned to Mexico taking with them disappointment instead of fortune. They have complained of being treated like cattle; that no one knew how to understand their personality, their individuality; that they have fallen into hands that intended only to exploit their physical resistance, frugality, and unselfishness. They have rarely found anyone who has wisely opened to them the path of education, a course which would have been a thousand times more profitable and more human. 1 Unfortunately, our country is misrepresented and abused nearly everywhere in the United States, in theaters, moving pictures, newspapers, books, and private conversations. Perhaps (I would prefer to believe it so), it is done without ill intention, probably thoughtlessly, but it is done. Mexicans find an antagonistic atmosphere for everything that is Mexican, and this fact necessarily tends to make difficult their uniting with you. You could hardly become friends with one who begins by insulting your mother; and for us Mexicans love for our country is not less than love for our mothers. Both American and Mexican workers have a lot to learn from each other. When the time comes that you understand our country, as great as it is unfortunate, you will respect and love those good Mexicans who come to you full of hopes, and then you will know how to treat them in order that those hopes may not be in vain. 2 American Anti-Imperialist League Platform, 1899. We hold that the policy known as imperialism is hostile to liberty and tends toward militarism, an evil from which it has been our glory to be free. We regret that it has become necessary in the land of Washington and Lincoln to reaffirm that all men, of whatever race or color, are entitled to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. We maintain that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. We insist that the subjugation of any people is "criminal aggression" and open disloyalty to the distinctive principles of our government. The United States have always protested against the doctrine of international law which permits the subjugation of the weak by the strong. A self-governing state cannot accept sovereignty over an unwilling people. The United States cannot act upon the ancient heresy that might makes right. Imperialists assume that with the destruction of self-government in the Philippines by American hands, all opposition here will cease. This is a grievous error. Much as we abhor the war of "criminal aggression" in the Philippines, greatly as we regret that the blood of the Filipinos is on American hands, we more deeply resent the betrayal of American institutions at home. The real firing line is not in the suburbs of Manila. The foe is of our own household. The attempt of 1861 was to divide the country. That of 1899 is to destroy its fundamental principles and noblest ideals. 1 Senator Albert Beveridge (IN), “The March of the Flag,” campaign speech, September 16, 1898. [I]n this campaign, the question is larger than a party question. It is an American question. It is a world question. Shall the American people continue their march toward the commercial supremacy of the world? Shall free institutions broaden their blessed reign as the children of liberty wax in strength, until the empire of our principles is established over the hearts of all mankind? Hawaii is ours; Porto Rico is to be ours; at the prayer of her people Cuba finally will be ours; in the islands of the East, even to the gates of Asia, coaling stations are to be ours at the very least; the flag of a liberal government is to float over the Philippines, and may it be the banner that Taylor unfurled in Texas and Fremont carried to the coast. The Opposition tells us that we ought not to govern a people without their consent. I answer, The rule of liberty that all just government derives its authority from the consent of the governed, applies only to those who are capable of self-government We govern the Indians without their consent, we govern our territories without their consent, we govern our children without their consent. How do they know what our government would be without their consent? Would not the people of the Philippines prefer the just, humane, civilizing government of this Republic to the savage, bloody rule of pillage and extortion from which we have rescued them?... But the Opposition is right- there is a difference. We did not need the western Mississippi Valley when we acquired it, nor Florida! nor Texas, nor California, nor the royal provinces of the far northwest We had no emigrants to people this imperial wilderness, 1 no money to develop it, even no highways to cover it. No trade awaited us in its savage fastnesses. Our productions were not greater than our trade There was not one reason for the land-lust of our statesmen from Jefferson to Grant, other than the prophet and the Saxon within them But, to-day, we are raising more than we can consume, making more than we can use. Therefore we must find new markets for our produce…Within five decades the bulk of Oriental commerce will be ours. 2
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