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"Really," said the President, "it was a psychological moment, if that phrase is not too trite to be used. There was no great disaster like the sinking of the Maine, and there was an adequate reason for our action in this culminating insult of a series of insults to our country and our flag."

The President followed with his emphatic declaration that his pas sion is for the great masses of the Mexican people, and his statement that his sole object in Mexico is to help the people secure the liberty which he holds is fully theirs by right.

"The function of being a policeman in Mexico has not appealed to me, nor does it appeal to our people," he said. "Our duty is higher than that. If we are to go in there, restore order, and immedi ately get out, and invite a repetition of conflict similar to that which is in progress now, we had better have remained out.

"What we must do and what we hope to do are twofold: First, we hope to show the world that our friendship for Mexico is a disinterested friendship, so far as our own aggrandizement goes; and, second, we hope to prove to the world that the Monroe Doctrine is not what the rest of the world, including some of the countries in this hemisphere, contends-merely an excuse for the gaining of territory for ourselves.

"I hold this to be a wonderful opportunity to prove to the world that the United States of America is not only human but humane; that we are actuated by no other motives than the betterment of the conditions of our unfortunate neighbor, and by the sincere desire to advance the cause of human liberty."

The situation, he pointed out, is intolerable, and requires the strong guiding hand of the great Nation on this continent that, by every appeal of right and justice, and the love for order, and the hope for peace and prosperity, must assist these warring people back into the paths of quiet and prosperity. We have an object lesson to give to the rest of the world: an object lesson that will prove to the skeptical outsiders that this Nation rises superior to considerations of added power and scorns an opportunity for territorial aggrandizement; an object lesson that will show to the people of this, our own, hemisphere that we are sincerely and unselfishly the friends of all of them, and particularly the friends of the Mexican people, with no other idea than the idea and the ideal of helping them compose their differences, starting them on the road to continued peace and renewed prosperity, and leaving them to work out their own destiny, but watching them narrowly and insisting that they shall take help when help is needed.

"I have not permitted myself to think of what will be the outcome of these plans for mediation," the President said. "I hope they may be successful. In any event, we shall deem it our duty to help the Mexican people, and we shall continue until we have satisfactory knowledge that peace has been restored, that a constitutional government is reorganized, and that the way is open for the peaceful reorganization of that harassed country.

"We shall not demand a foot of territory nor a cent of moneyexcept, of course, the settlement of such claims as may justly be made by American citizens for damages to their property during these disturbances-individual claims. There will be no money demand in a national sense. Then we shall have shown the entire world that the Monroe Doctrine means an unselfish friendship for our neighbors-a disinterested friendship, in the sense of not being interested in our aggrandizement-and that our motives are only the motives inspired by the higher humanity, by our sense of duty and responsibility, and by our determination that human liberty shall prevail in our hemisphere."

The President paused. He had been intensely in earnest in his talk. He smiled, and his long white fingers wove themselves in and out. Then, with a little gesture that betokened amused contempt, he continued:

"They say the Mexicans are not fitted for self-government; and to this I reply that, when properly directed, there is no people not fitted for self-government. The very fact that the extension of the school system by Diaz brought about a certain degree of understanding among some of the people, which caused them to awaken to their wrongs and to strive intelligently for their rights, makes that contention absurd. I do not hold that the Mexican peons are at present as capable of self-government as other people-ours, for example-but I do hold that the widespread sentiment that they never will be and never can be made to be capable of self-government is as wickedly false as it is palpably absurd."

He paused again.

"Did you see that dispatch we gave out, from Consul General Hanna, which detailed his experiences with the army at Torreon? It was a sort of diary of his adventures and a record of what he saw. We gave it all out; but the latter part of it was not widely printed, for the first part of it was full of bloody details of the battle. I suppose" and he smiled whimsically again-"I suppose the editors felt there was no particular interest in the peaceful and gratifying information that was in the latter portion of the dispatch.

"Well, if you read that dispatch, you learned that Mr. Hanna was most agreeably surprised and greatly gratified by the treatment Villa's men gave their prisoners; how they endeavored to live up to the rules of civilized warfare; how they were constantly on the lookout for new information that would relieve them of the stigma of being barbarians. This merely shows that these people, if they get the chance, are capable of learning and are anxious to learn."

The President returned to the question of mediation and what it might bring forth, but has not information beyond the general knowledge that Huerta had accepted the friendly offices of the self-proposed mediators. I asked him whether, in the event of successful mediation, his plans for the betterment of Mexico would be carried out.

"I hope so," he replied, "for it is not my intention, having begun this enterprise, to turn back-unless I am forced to do so until I have assurances that the great and crying wrongs the people have endured are in process of satisfactory adjustment. Of course, it would not do for us to insist on an exact procedure for the partition of the land, for example, for that would set us up in the position of dictators, which we are not and never shall be; but it is not our intention to cease in our friendly offices until we are assured that all these matters are on their way to successful settlement. It is a great and a complicated question, but I have every hope that a suitable solution. will be found, and that the day will come when the Mexican people will be put in full possession of the land, the liberty, and the peaceful prosperity that are rightfully theirs."

President Wilson banged the desk again. His smile vanished and his face became stern and set.

"And eventually," he said slowly, "I shall fight every one of these men who are now seeking and who will then be seeking to exploit Mexico for their own selfish ends. I shall do what I can to keep Mexico from their plundering. There shall be no individual exploitation of Mexico if I can stop it."

He walked over to the big blue globe.

"It is a wonderful country," he said as he put his finger on Mexico, "a wonderful country. There is every advantage there for the peaceful and prosperous pursuit of happiness. Have you ever noticed that if you draw a line straight south from New York it will touch the western coast of South America instead of the eastern, and that it runs along by Chile and Peru, and the other countries on the western side of the southern continent?

"Thus, with the Panama Canal running practically north and south, this brings these countries which have been so remote into close

touch with us, and the commerce of this Western Hemisphere will brood over Central America.

"What we desire to do, and what we shall do, is to show our neighbors to the south of us that their interests are identical with our interests; that we have no plans or any thoughts of our own exaltation, but have in view only the peace and the prosperity of the people in our hemisphere."

The little clock on the bookcase struck nine. The President rose. He walked down the stairs with me, and took his hat to go across to his office, where there was to be a conference on the vexing situation in Colorado. As we parted at the end of the corridor he held out his hand and said:

"It will be a great thing not only to have helped humanity by restoring order, but to have gone further than that by laying the secure foundations for that liberty without which there can be no happiness."

(2) THE PRESIDENT'S MEXICAN POLICY-PRESENTED IN AN AUTHORIZED INTERVIEW BY SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR FRANKLIN K. LANE, JULY 16, 1916

"President Wilson's Mexican policy is one of the things of which, as a member of his administration, I am most proud. It shows so well his abounding faith in humanity, his profound philosophy of democracy, and his unshakable belief in the ultimate triumph of liberty, justice, and right. He has never sought the easy solution of any of the difficult questions that have arisen in the last three years. He has always sought the right solution.

"Mr. Wilson's Mexican policy has not been weak and vacillating. It has been definite and consistent, firm and constructive. How firm is already known to those who have sought to force American intervention in Mexico; how constructive will best be appreciated fifty years from now by the whole world. It was to Mexico perhaps more than to anything that the President referred the other day when he said that he was playing for the verdict of mankind.

"The policy of the United States toward Mexico is a policy of hope and of helpfulness; it is a policy of Mexico for the Mexicans. That, after all, is the traditional policy of this country-it is the policy that drove Maximilian out of Mexico."

Secretary of the Interior Lane made this statement to me at his summer camp on the shores of Lake Champlain, and then he launched out into a forceful declaration of the principles underlying President Wilson's Mexican policy and proceeded to give the reasons for his conviction that the President was right when he refused to recognize Huerta, and declared that the murderer of Madero must go, right when he occupied the port of Vera Cruz, right when he accepted the offer of mediation extended by the A B C, right when he abided by the agreement reached at Niagara Falls, right when he withdrew from Vera Cruz, right when he recognized Carranza as head of the de facto Government, and right when he sent the United States Army into Mexico after the bandit raid on Columbus. Mr. Lane said:

"The doctrine of force is always fighting with the doctrine of sympathy, and the trouble with the two schools of warism and pacifism is that neither one will recognize that both philosophies have a part to play in the life of every individual and of every nation and in

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