The Monroe Doctrine; An Obsolete Shibboleth (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1913 edition. Excerpt: ...Doctrine to claim that the United States is to do whatever seems to the United States good and proper so far as the western hemisphere is concerned? Is there not a dangerous tendency in our country to believe so far in our own rectitude, that we may be excused from any restrictions either in the law of nations, or in our treaty obligations, that seem unjust, trivial, or inconvenient, notwithstanding the established practices of civilized nations? Our attitude on the Panama tolls question, our former disregard of treaty rights with China, our hesitation at passing Mr. Taft's carefully considered arbitration treaties, and our willingness to read into or read out of existing treaties whatever appears to us justifiable and proper, have aroused deep-seated suspicion in our Southern neighbors which it seems to me we should endeavor to eradicate if we have our own highest good at heart. Are we not too much in the state of mind of Citizen Fix-it, who was more concerned with suppressing the noisy quarrels of his neighbors than with quietly solving his own domestic difficulties? Could we see ourselves as our Southern neighbors see us in the columns of their daily press, where the emphasis is still on the prevalence of murder in the United States, the astonishing continuance of lynching, the freedom from punishment of a majority of those who commit murder, our growing disregard of the rights of others, bomb outrages, strikes, riots, labor difficulties, --could we see these things with their eyes, we should realize how bitterly they resent our assumed right to intervene when they misbehave themselves, or when a local revolution becomes particularly noisy. So firmly fixed in the Latin-American mind is the idea that our foreign policy today means intervention..