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CHAPTER XXIX

WHAT LIES AHEAD

HAT conclusions may a citizen derive from a survey of our foreign policy? Should it minister to his pride or cause searchings of the heart? Will he see in the operations of our State Department an overruling Providence? Will he accept Manifest Destiny as a necessary slogan? Will he attribute the action of Americans at the leading crises of our history to the determining influence of their heroes and great men? Or will he yield to a belief that all our decisions made apparently of our own volition were but the resultant equation of a parallelogram of forces whose origin and nature transcend all definition and to man himself seem blind?

The citizen's reaction to political phenomena will be determined by his own experience and philosophy. The events of American history can be marshaled to support whatever conclusion he prefers. If he is naturally reverent, he will find warrant for confidence in an overruling Providence. For American diplomacy, like other avenues of American activity, has undoubtedly been richly blessed. If he is objective in his search, proving nothing, but observing, he will note a marvelous growth in strength, a towering from infancy to manhood. But not committed to the Providence idea, he will seek for forces of decay, will balance strength and weakness and wonder possibly what future dangers will beset our path of empire.

Whatever the citizen's philosophy, be it objective or subjective, he will find in the thread of American diplomacy an extraordinary continuity. Diplomacy from 1783 to 1815 was a steadfast assertion of independence newly won and not completed till the War of 1812 had established our position on the sea. The Monroe Doctrine is perhaps most

accurately viewed as an extension of this independence to an intercontinental scope. Monroe served notice, and his successors reiterated it, that America would protect herself against threats aimed at her welfare from whichever continent directed. As thus construed the Monroe Doctrine has necessarily endured and will endure so long as the United States remain a nation.

Coördinate with independence as a motivating force in American experience has been expansion. Much diplomacy has focused on territorial acquisitions. Louisiana, Florida, Texas, Oregon, the Gadsden Purchase, Alaska, Samoa, Hawaii, the Philippines and Porto Rico, Panama, and finally the Virgin Islands are landmarks late or early in the enlargement of our territory. Each has occupied the State Department in the acquiring or maintaining. And the creation of a continental empire and then of an overseas dominion has familiarized Americans with all the problems of imperialism.

Seeking for the ultimate mainspring of our foreign policy, the citizen will find it in enlightened selfishness. The nature of governments is selfish. The individual citizen may frequently indulge in generosity. His immediate necessities once gratified, he seeks a subtle satisfaction in diminishing the misery of others in order that his own prosperity may seem less odious by contrast, and less offensive to the Gods. But nations by their very nature are less capable of altruism. The nation exists for the benefit of its own citizens. It is their machinery for effective action. For a nation to neglect the interests of its citizens is to belie its mission.

With selfishness a primal urge, that nation is civilized indeed which adequately realizes that its own welfare is bound up with the welfare of the world. Only the most prosperous and enlightened nations ever rise to such a concept. The traditions of diplomacy look to national aggrandizement at the expense of other nations. The citizen may therefore feel a justifiable pride when he finds his country in the rôle of benefactor.

To the American several incidents in his diplomatic history minister to this pride. True the generous impulse has

always been the wise one, and the benefactor has been so truly benefited that one inclines to suspect his motives as selfish after all. But without too critical a dissection one may admire the policy that fought for Cuba, and then left Cuba free, subject only to the Platt Amendment. Also one may feel a thrill that the Boxer Indemnity was partially refunded, and furnishes the nucleus for Chinese education in American schools.

These are positive expressions of magnanimous diplomacy. Less easily demonstrated because negative, are very numerous illustrations of national self-restraint in dealings with the weaker nations, particularly Mexico and other Latin neighbors. Irritation has been frequent; temptation has been strong. At almost any time since Diaz was overthrown, Mexico might have been our prey. Our refusal to take advantage of a neighbor's weakness has demonstrated a measure of idealism.

Our diplomacy in first avoiding and then entering the World War defies reduction to a formula. Primarily, of course, it served the nation's welfare. Neutrality was traditional, it was the path of least resistance, and it was profitable. But German pressure and the imminent collapse of Europe exposed America without allies to face a Europe Germanized. Our answer was dictated by self-interest, and yet Mr. George Harvey belied the nation's spirit when he told his British hosts that this was all that brought us into war. Americans as individuals were fired with ever mounting indignation at the war's barbarities, and the spirit thus developed influenced diplomacy as such.

To most students the philosophy of history is subordinate to human interest in its characters. The record of American diplomacy is here particularly inspiring. The subtle yet idealistic Jefferson, the pompous Pickering, the quietly efficient Madison, the unlucky Monroe, and the querulous but capable John Quincy Adams, gave to the initial stages of American diplomacy an extraordinary impetus. Of equal interest with these pioneers, Van Buren, Webster, Calhoun, Buchanan, Marcy, and Cass upheld the State Department's record for character and talent. In the Civil War, Seward,

notwithstanding serious mistakes, was certainly a colossus. And in the united nation that has followed, Fish and Blaine, Hay and Root, as well as Bayard, Gresham, and Olney have been illustrious figures. In the World War Wilson was his own Secretary of State in all that concerned our major policies. And under Secretary Hughes the long line of distinguished statesmen was brilliantly perpetuated. It is a commonplace of criticism that our secretaries of state have averaged higher in ability than our presidents, particularly in the period since the state portfolio ceased to be the avenue of succession to the White House.

Our representatives in the foreign field have been equally distinguished. Many of his countrymen regard Benjamin Franklin as the first American. Others accord that honor to Thomas Jefferson. Both represented the infant nation at Versailles. John Adams founded the long line of our distinguished ministers at the Court of St. James. Among them Thomas Pinckney, William Pinkney, James Monroe, Richard Rush, Martin Van Buren, Edward Everett, James Buchanan, and Charles Francis Adams are names that stand for character and achievement. And since the Civil War, James Russell Lowell, John Hay, Whitelaw Reid, Walter Hines Page, and John W. Davis, to mention but a few, have well maintained the average.

Quite as picturesque though perhaps a shade less influential, one names at random ministers to other nations, John Randolph off to Russia on his flying visit; Pierre Soulé dueling in Spain and writing his Ostend Manifesto; Nicholas Trist concluding his solitary peace with Mexico; Commodore Perry opening up Japan; Anson Burlingame entering China's diplomatic service; George Bancroft charming Bismarck into friendship; Andrew D. White surveying Santo Domingo; Dr. James B. Angell propitiating China; Henry Morgenthau protecting American Christians in Turkey;— everywhere one turns, the Department and its agents extend the range of America's constructive leadership.

With respect to America's world position the student must do his own constructive thinking. His duty as a citizen, not only of the United States but also of the world, is

to formulate a definite philosophy concerning his country's relation to the rest of mankind. This duty he cannot evade. It faces him at every turn. Its solution is the supreme problem of modern citizenship not only in the United States but elsewhere.

Surveying the course of American diplomacy, will the modern citizen cling to the dicta of the Fathers? Will he hold that they foresaw America's opportunity to lead the world but deliberately turned their back upon it? Or will he say that their great wisdom was the wisdom of their times, and that times inevitably change? On his answer and that of his contemporaries depends the destiny of mankind.

Supposing that he takes an independent course, following the lead of his own reason, how far can he embark on international coöperation? Other nations must be reckoned with. The ideal is not always practicable. Specific issues may arise of which he scarcely dreamed. How far toward the millennium of human brotherhood can he advance with safety?

The answer to these vital questions will vary with the temperament and other influences of the judge. Equal intelligence and equal heart will be oppositely arrayed. But it is certain that no opinion respecting America's future course of international relations can be intelligently formed without a knowledge of America's action in the past. The more profound that knowledge, the more worthy of respect will be the citizen's opinion.