It is folly to permit freedom of speech about
foreigners as well as ourselves--and the peace-at-any-price persons are
much too feeble a folk to try to interfere with freedom of speech--and
yet to try to shirk the consequences of freedom of speech. It is folly
to try to abolish our navy, and at the same time to insist that we have
a right to enforce the Monroe Doctrine, that we have a right to control
the Panama Canal which we ourselves dug, that we have a right to retain
Hawaii and prevent foreign nations from taking Cuba, and a right to
determine what immigrants, Asiatic or European, shall come to our
shores, and the terms on which they shall be naturalized and shall
hold land and exercise other privileges. We are a rich people, and
an unmilitary people. In international affairs we are a short-sighted
people. But I know my countrymen. Down at bottom their temper is such
that they will not permanently tolerate injustice done to them. In the
long run they will no more permit affronts to their National honor than
injuries to their national interest. Such being the case, they will do
well to remember that the surest of all ways to invite disaster is to be
opulent, aggressive and unarmed.
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