Hudson Maxim

"If you want war, nourish a doctrine. Doctrines are the most frightful tyrants to which men ever are subject, because doctrines get inside of a man's own reason and betray him against himself."

William Graham Sumner, "War and Other Essays."

A doctrine is a creed, usually mandatory, framed by one person or set of persons, for the belief or conduct of another person or set of persons. A doctrine is not necessarily based upon principles of right, equity, justice, or even expediency.

Doctrines are directions written on the guide-boards of fanaticism. An exact truth is never proclaimed as a doctrine: there is no doctrine of mathematics.

The Monroe Doctrine, which pledged the United States to defend American republican institutions, north and south, against monarchical encroachments from the Old World, with the dependable support of England, was proclaimed in 1823, mainly in response to a Continental doctrine called the Holy Alliance, formed in 1815 by and between Austria, Russia, Prussia, and France. The Holy Alliance was in effect a system of mutual political monarchical insurance, under which the forces of the allied Powers could be used to subdue revolution against the institution of kingship.

The French Revolution, followed by the democratic empire of Napoleon, had severely shaken the old intolerant and intolerable order of things. The Holy Alliance was an expedient of the old order to insure itself against democratic institutions.

A revolution in Spain in 1820 was promptly suppressed by the Holy Alliance, and the Spanish people, who had raised their heads and begun to look around for freedom, were again bowed under the yoke of the detested Bourbons. The Holy Alliance was surely a most unholy alliance.

Russia, by a ukase in 1821, claimed the right to keep the vessels of all other Powers out of the North Pacific Ocean. That was a Russian "Monroe Doctrine" which helped to make Monroe a doctrinaire.

In 1823 Spain lost, through revolutions, all of her American possessions except Cuba and Porto Rico, and Portugal had lost Brazil. France had lost the island of Haiti.

The United States naturally sympathized with the newly-formed states built on the ruins of the Spanish and Portuguese empires. They had mostly adopted republican institutions, becoming sisters of the great northern republic.

James Monroe was not the father of the child named for him, for the actual formulator of the Monroe Doctrine was John Quincy Adams, at that time Secretary of State, who got the cue from George Canning.

England wanted unrestricted trade with the Spanish-American countries; she had no need of additional territory on the American continent, but she saw danger in its acquisition by other nations. George Canning tried four times in 1823 to get the United States to join England in her declaration of the open-door policy. Monroe favored the proposal, but finally Adams convinced the President that it would be better to avoid any entangling arrangement with England, and to stand alone.

On the second of December, 1823, in his annual message to Congress, President Monroe made the following declaration on behalf of the United States:

"The American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintain, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by European powers.... We should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety. With the existing colonies or dependencies of any European power we have not interfered and shall not interfere. But with the governments who have declared their independence and maintained it, and whose independence we have, on great consideration and on just principles, acknowledged, we could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them or controlling, in any other manner, their destiny, by any European power, in any other light than as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition toward the United States."

Such was the birth of the famous Monroe Doctrine. Its recognition by England made it effective. The Monroe Doctrine has nothing whatever to do with international law. It is simply an expression of British national policy for the United States.

Our diplomacy, being a branch of our politics, is often inconsistent with our national policy. American justification for the doctrine appears to have been mainly dependent upon the fact that we had no intentions of encroaching upon the spheres of influence of any of the nations of the Old World, but that we intended to safeguard what we conceived to be our legitimate sphere of influence.

The American Republic was very young when the Monroe Doctrine was proclaimed—a doctrine which, as one writer has said, is "the most magnificent bluff in all history, and so far the most successful."

During the American Civil War, France, with the connivance of England, conceived the plan of establishing in Mexico the empire of Maximilian. We were too busy at the time, settling some little differences of opinion within our family of states, to exact recognition of our protest. After the memorable exchange of compliments and courtesies between Grant and Lee at Appomattox, however, Uncle Sam indicated to Napoleon the Little that the Imperialists must be kicked out. Lacking the support of France, they were kicked out by the Mexicans.

While through the Monroe Doctrine the United States served notice on the nations of the Old World to keep hands off the American continent, the doctrine at the same time constituted an implied promise on our part to keep hands off any territory beyond the confines of America. So long as the policies of Great Britain did not run counter to our Monroe Doctrine, it was destined to be quite effective in preventing land-grabbing on the American continent by other European Powers. But the Monroe Doctrine possesses an innate dog-in-the-manger aspect, certain some day to bring trouble, for the great nations of the world have far outgrown the expectations of our forefathers; their commerce has become an inseparable part of the commerce of South American countries, and their interests in like measure have become identified with the interests of those countries. Just to the extent that their welfare and the welfare of the South American republics become mutual are they likely to be brought into collision with the Monroe Doctrine, and, when the collision comes, it means war, unless the United States abandons that doctrine.

Our self-assumed protectorate over the South American republics is not welcomed by those countries. They resent our arrogance. We have never cultivated trade with them, nor joined them in the development of their industries, and have never financed their enterprises. Even when an American citizen has paid a visit to a South American country, he has first found it necessary to go to England and take ship from there.

The European countries, on the other hand, have promoted business relations with the South American republics, have supplied them with working capital and cultivated their friendship, confidence, and respect, while we have done nothing of the sort.

The citizens of the United States whom the South Americans have seen in their dominions have usually been adventurous, irresponsible fortune-hunters. Their trouble-breeding propensities have not tended to foster amicable feeling between the great Republic of the North and her Southern sisters.

So long as the Monroe Doctrine did not circumscribe the ambitions of the United States the institution possessed some semblance of vitality; but, when the explosion came that blew up the Maine, it also exploded the Monroe Doctrine, for immediately the United States, abandoning its time-honored policy of keeping within American confines, and out of entangling alliances and complications with other nations, reached out a grasping hand and seized upon the Far Pacific possessions of Spain, right at the door of China and within the legitimate sphere of influence of Japan. Yet, curiously enough, we still adhere to the old proclamation, America for the Americans, oblivious of the equal right of China and Japan to proclaim, Asia for the Asiatics.

Several years ago, I spoke at a luncheon of the Twentieth Century Club in Boston. I was seated beside a noted Japanese diplomat. He said, "Mr. Maxim, you have a Monroe Doctrine—America for the Americans; we also have a similar doctrine—Asia for the Asiatics; but we are not ready to enforce ours yet, and you are not ready, and are not likely to be ready, to enforce yours. A little later, we shall inquire by what logic you can proclaim America for the Americans, and disclaim our right equally to proclaim Asia for the Asiatics."

The Japanese are a far-seeing and a patient people. They know how to wait, but they know also when to strike, and how to strike with the force of a Jovian thunderbolt. They are no longer merely a cute little picture-book people. They have risen with stupendous strides into a very eminent position as a World-Power, a Power to be reckoned with. They are different from us, but we have no right to consider them our inferiors. They may very possibly prove to be our superiors. A government of the people and for the people is a failure if the government does not take measures for the adequate defense of the people. Self-preservation is the first law of nature. Consequently, it is a law which must be observed as the chief element of greatness.

I quote the following from "The Valor of Ignorance," by General Homer Lea:

"How unreasonable is it to expect that the combined nations of Europe, with all their military strength, shall remain restricted to one-twelfth of this world's land, burrowed into and hewn over for the last thousand years, while this Republic, without armies, shall maintain dominion over one-half the unexploited lands of the world! Or that Japan, possessed of two-thirds the population of this nation and a military organization fifty-fold greater, shall continue to exist on her rocky isles that are, inclusive of Korea, but one-two-hundred-and-fiftieth of the earth's lands, while an undefended one-half lies under the guns of her battleships!

"The Monroe Doctrine is Promethean in conception, but not so in execution. It was proclaimed in order to avoid wars; now it invites them....

"The Monroe Doctrine, if not supported by naval and military power sufficient to enforce its observance by all nations, singly and in coalition, becomes a factor more provocative of war than any other national policy ever attempted in modern or ancient times.... Societies, religions, unions, business men, and politicians on the one hand, spare no effort to debase every militant instinct and military efficiency or preparation necessary for its enforcement, while, on the other, they demand that the Chief Executive shall assert to the entire world this Republic's intention to maintain, by the force of arms if necessary, this most warlike and encompassing policy ever enunciated by man or nation."

The Monroe Doctrine did not require that any American possessions of the European monarchies should be relinquished, but simply that they should not be extended; and that, if relinquished or lost, they should not be re-established as monarchical possessions.

England, being in possession of the vast domain of Canada in North America, British Honduras and British Guiana in South America, and a goodly number of the West Indian islands, was in a position to look with favor on the Monroe Doctrine, because in the event of Great Britain being defeated in war by any of the Great Powers, her victor or victors would be unable to seize any of her American possessions, for automatically the United States would become an ally of Great Britain, and would, in order to defend the Monroe Doctrine, have to defend these possessions.

When Sir Charles Tupper was High Commissioner of Canada, the writer saw him in London, and suggested to him that it would be a good idea for the Canadians to buy some automatic guns. He replied that Canada was very peculiarly situated; that she could not be attacked successfully by any Power unless the British fleet were first destroyed, which was not likely, and, in the possible event of that fleet being destroyed, then the United States would be obliged to defend Canada in order to defend the Monroe Doctrine.

The peace sophists often refer to the unfortified border-line between the United States and Canada as an argument in favor of the abolition of armaments throughout the world. They fail to perceive that the same unarmed condition would not work between European countries, as, for example, between France and Germany. If the people of Canada and the United States were as different in race, language, ideals, and ambitions as are the French and Germans; and if, also, the two countries were as thickly settled and the inhabitants as land-hungry; and if each had a history as antagonistic as the French and Germans; then fortifications would be needed on the Canadian border. But the Canadians and ourselves are of the same race, we speak the same tongue, we have similar ideals and ambitions, and our history is not antagonistic; on the contrary, it has been largely a common history—the history of England, the mother country.

England and France were obligated to defend Belgium against Germany. Their defenses consisted mainly in bluff, but they were, nevertheless, far better prepared to support Belgium than we would be to support any South American country against German aggression.

The navy of England is so far superior to ours that should she at any time care to ignore the Monroe Doctrine and colonize in South America we should be absolutely unable to prevent her. She would be able to isolate us from South America and from the rest of the world, within the continental territory of the forty-eight states. An impenetrable barrier of British warships would lie between us and the Panama Canal. Therefore, it will be seen that our Monroe Doctrine is an Anglo-American compact, an entente, which we are obliged to defend if it should be in the interest of Great Britain, and which Great Britain would not be obliged to observe in case she might want to ignore it:

Let us invite Admiral Mahan to conclude this chapter:

"In the Monroe Doctrine, as now understood, and viewed in the light of the Venezuela incident, with the utterances then made by our statesmen of all parties, we have on hand one of the biggest contracts any modern state has undertaken."