"We do not take possession of our ideas, but are possessed by them. They master us and force us into the arena, Where, like gladiators, we must fight for them.”

-HEINE

THE ARENA

VOL. XXV.

JUNE, 1901.

No. 6.

THE

IMPERIALISM.

HE lexicographers inform us that the words imperialism, empire, and emperor, are derived from the Latin nouns imperium and imperator-derivatives of the verb impero. The primary meaning of impero is, I command. Impero is the strongest word in Latin, and command is the strongest word in English, to express absolute authority. Walter Scott says that Queen Elizabeth could so pronounce "I command" as to make it seem an entreaty, and could so pronounce "I entreat" as to make it seem a command. But no trick of pronunciation can change the fact that impero and command in their respective languages imply absolute and irresistible authority.

The word imperialism expresses the nature of the government called an empire, and emperor implies uncontrolled and uncontrollable command in the civil and military head of the government. By common consent Rome, from the time of Julius Cæsar, is taken as the greatest example in history of the empire, and to Rome modern historians, statesmen, and philosophers turn with great unanimity for instruction and warning.

It is not intended in this paper, nor is it necessary for the present purpose, to inquire in detail how the Roman republic became an empire with all power in the hands of one man. It is sufficient to say that, at the time Julius Cæsar became one of

the leaders of the Roman people, the Senate was, and for many years had been, the ruling power in the State. In the great struggle for supremacy between Cæsar and Pompey the Senate sided with Pompey, and with his defeat and death its waning authority ended.

But Cæsar did not abolish it. On the contrary, he continued it and all the other offices in form as he found them, and at the very time of his death was acting as president of the Senate. But the power of that body was merely nominal. The great dictator had usurped and absorbed all the powers of the government and ruled the Roman world with unlimited sway. He knew the feeling of his countrymen against a "kingly crown," and refused it. But he demanded and received the popular title of Imperator (commander, or emperor), and under the form of a republic laid the foundations of an empire that his nephew, heir, and successor, Octavius, with great prudence, craft, and skill, completed and transmitted to his successors. As Triumvir, and in obtaining power, Octavius was guilty of great crimes, but after he became emperor his remarkable discretion prevented any serious abuse of his power. Under his successors, his comparatively mild rule degenerated into a cruel and bloody military despotism.

The final change in Rome from republic to empire is thus described by an able writer in the Encyclopædia Britannica:

"The concentration in Cæsar's hands of all authority outside Rome completely and finally severed all real connection between the old institutions of the republic of Rome and the government of the Roman empire. And, though Augustus and Tiberius elevated the senate to a place beside themselves in this government, its share of the work was a subordinate one, and it never again directed the policy of the State; while, from the time of Cæsar onward, the old magistracies were merely municipal offices, with a steadily diminishing authority, even in the city, and the comitia retain no other prerogative of imperial importance but that of formally confirming the ruler of the empire in the possession of an authority which is already his. But the institutions of the republic not merely became, what they had ordinarily been, the local institutions of the city of Rome; but they were also subordinated even

within these narrow limits to the paramount authority of the man who held in his hands the army and the provinces. And here Cæsar's policy was closely followed by his successors. Autocratic abroad, at home he was the chief magistrate of the commonwealth; and this position was marked in his case, as in that of those who followed him, by a combination in his person of various powers, and by a general right of precedence which left no limits to his authority but such as he chose to impose upon himself."

It is clear that the great military successes of Cæsar in the provinces, his popularity with the army and the people in consequence of his victories, led to his successful usurpations, and to the establishment of an empire under the name and with the form of a republic. The empire began by foreign conquest and was completed by domestic usurpation. In four years from the time Cæsar crossed the Rubicon he became master of the Roman world. In that time he had created an empire and was its absolute ruler.

It is said that the great American Republic is following fast in the footsteps of ancient Rome and becoming an empire in substantially the same way, i. e., by the enormous power acquired by the Commander-in-chief of her armies through foreign war, and the consequent subserviency of all departments of the government at home to the President.

Let us see if this is true. At the close of the war with Spain in 1898, our Commander-in-chief instructed his Peace Commissioners at Paris to demand of Spain a relinquishment of all her insular possessions in the Western hemisphere, and a cession to the United States of the entire Philippine archipelago; and the demand was complied with. Before the treaty was ratified, he, by proclamation, claimed the sovereignty of those islands and directed his subordinate officers there to take military possession and control of them for the United States. The Filipinos refused to surrender their country to him, and declared their determination to keep and govern it themselves. Whereupon he made war upon them to force them to submit, without consulting Congress and upon his own responsibility. This was clearly unconstitutional and an

exercise of imperial power. But it is said that, inasmuch as the treaty conveyed those islands to the United States, it was the duty of the President to take possession of them, and, if the inhabitants resisted, they and not the President were the authors of the war.

The answer to this is that the treaty did not convey and could not convey a good title to the United States and that the legal status of the inhabitants was not changed by it. And this for several reasons. First, at the time of the making of the treaty the Filipinos were, and for months had been, the allies of the United States in the war against Spain, and as such, by a well settled principle of the law of nations, could not be bound by a treaty to which they were not parties. That they were allies. conclusively shown by the history of the civil and military transactions in that country as given by the parties to them, including our own civil and military officers.

Another reason why the treaty conveyed no title to the United States is that the Filipinos never consented to it, denied that they were bound by it, repudiated the sovereignty of the United States, and claimed and insisted upon their right to freedom and independence. (Their right to participate in the treaty was treated with contempt.)

A third reason why by the law of nations the treaty was not good as to the Filipinos is that Spain did not have, and could not give, possession of the islands she assumed to cede to the United States. Even the city of Manila after it had been taken from Spain by the "coöperation" of the Filipinos, as shown above, was in w and in fact as much in their possession as in that of the United States, and they were deprived of their possession by a mixture of force and fraud.

In the January nuinber of the North American Review, ExPresident Harrison has an article entitled "The status of annexed territory and of its free civilized inhabitants." In the beginning of his paper he says: "A legal argument upon this subject is quite outside of my purpose, which is to consider in a popular rather than a professional way some of the ques