proposals were never reduced to writing, that at the time of our war with Spain an effort was made by the Powers of Continental Europe, who were all strongly pro-Spanish and anti-American in their sympathies, to band Europe together and to intervene unitedly between the United States and Spain, but in the interests of Spain and to the detriment of the United States. This scheme was only blocked by the attitude of England.

At Manila

We should do well also to remember the day in Manila Bay when the English Fleet steamed and anchored between the German ships and Admiral Dewey's squadron and when Admiral Chichester practically gave von Diderich to understand that a shot fired against America would hit England first. Just before this war broke out, Germany went to England, unofficially, to say that that Government had it in mind to seize parts of Argentine and of Brazil and to establish Imperial colonies there, and wished to know the attitude of the English in such a contingency. England replied, also unofficially, that Germany had forgotten the Monroe Doctrine. Germany responded that she had not forgotten the Monroe Doctrine, but that she was prepared to meet that issue with America if, and when, America raised that issue. England then said that she could only consider such an act by Germany as an expression of unfriendliness and the German fleet never sailed.

Let us remember that Germany has never assented to the Monroe Doctrine. In 1898 Count von Goetzen said "About fifteen years from now my country will begin a great war. In two months she will be in Paris; then will come the crushing of England. Some months after we have finished our work in Europe we will take New York and probably Washington and hold them for some time. We will put your country in its place with reference to Germany. We will take a billion of dollars or more from New York and other places. The Monroe Doctrine will be taken charge of by us, as we will then have put you in your place and we will take charge of South America as far as we want to."

"An Impertinence"

"The Monroe Doctrine cannot be justified, it is only an aspiration which we Europeans consider an impertinence. The inviolability of American soil is invoked without there being at hand the slightest means of warding off an attack of a respectable European Power." So said Johannes Vollert in 1903.

I am told by men who freely admit England's friendliness and its value to America that after all, England is not disinterested. She saw herself confronted by the hostility of great powers abroad and needed the support of America; hence her friendliness. Is it not asking a great deal of any Government that we should demand that it should rest its policies on disinterested affection for another people and not upon the welfare of those for whose wellbeing they have been placed in office? But, if we discount English friendship on that ground, let us be logical and consistent. We have publicly and enthusiastically admitted our debt to France for the help she gave us in our Revolution. But before the year 1776 Vergennes, who was over the Foreign Office in Paris, had written a memorial on American affairs. "In the document the importance of maintaining a close alliance between the different branches of the House of Bourbon and of opposing on all occasions the interests of Great Britain was clearly demonstrated and especial stress was laid upon the necessity of aiding the Americans in their struggle for independence. The defeat and submission of the colonies would, Vergennes declared, be followed by disastrous consequences for the French and Spanish possessions in the West Indies. If, however, the Americans won by their own exertions, they would be themselves disposed to conquer the French and Spanish West Indies, so as to provide fresh outlets for their productions. Hence it was of supreme importance that France should at once lay the colonists under a debt of gratitude...."

"Let Us Be Just"

I yield to none in my admiration and affection for France, but let us be just in the application of our standards and criterions of judgment. If we are to condemn and repudiate our debt to England because we deny it the element of disinterestedness, let us also, and for the same reason, repudiate our admitted debt to France. It is admitted that we were utterly unprepared for war even as late as 1917. Mr. George Creel defends our unpreparedness and says that we could not logically and consistently work for peace while we prepared for war, but even in defending he admits the fact. While we have been so unprepared it has been the English fleet that has been defending our Monroe Doctrine; it is the English fleet that has kept our coasts unscarred; it is the English fleet that has enabled our commerce and our transports to cross the seas; it is that Imperial line of ships and guns and men that have protected us through our uneasy slumbers, that have given us time to wake up to the issues of this war and upon which we have depended for the opportunity to make ready and prepare.

Again and again has England saved the world; once when the white sails of the Armada rounded Ushant and spread out over the English Channel; again when Louis XIV was threatening the Old World and the New; again when Bonaparte was making and unmaking kings from Madrid to Warsaw; but never did England give to the world a greater service than when she offered up that little Expeditionary Army and threw herself, all unprepared, across the pathway of victorious Germany. Not one of us can look at the ruins of the cities of France and Belgium and remember the threats of Germany directed towards ourselves without thinking with a shudder at what might be the condition of our own cities and citizens had England failed the world in that dreadful summer of 1914.

"Poison of Hatred"

The American citizen who is opposed to England because of the memories of 1776, or because of the attitude of the English Government in 1861, we can understand. We can argue with him sympathetically, for his antagonism is based on American history imperfectly studied. But the German-American who hates England, not because of what she has at any time done to America, but because of what he thinks she has done or would do to Germany and who spreads the poison of his hatred through America, is admittedly disloyal. The Irish-American who hates England, not because of anything she has done to America, but because of what Cromwell did in Ireland nearly three hundred years ago or because of what English Cabinets may not have done in more recent years may not be disloyal in intent, but he stands upon the same basis as the German-American in this, that he imports antagonism; he does not base it on American soil but on a soil that is three thousand miles away. His antagonism is not due to his Americanism, but to his affections for another land. But exactly the same must be said of the German-American who preaches hate for England. To-day English ships convoy our squadrons safely through the seas made dangerous by Germany; American destroyers are helping to guard English shores; American regiments are merging with English regiments and are acting as reserves and reinforcements for the English