BANQUET AT THE GOVERNMENT PALACE, LIMA
Speech of His Excellency JosÉ Pardo y Barreda
President of the Republic
September 10, 1906
With the most sincere good will, I cordially welcome you in the name of my country and of its Government, and I believe I faithfully interpret the sentiments that rule in Peru in telling you of its sincere good will toward the United States, their illustrious President, and toward your own distinguished person. These feelings which unite the two countries began in the dawn of independence, because the founders of the great republic showed our forefathers the way to become free; and they strengthened us from the first days of our independent life by the safeguard which the admirable foresight of another great statesman of your country placed around American soil.
Since then the closest friendship has united the two nations. Peru has received from the United States proofs of a very special deference, and has appreciated the efforts made by your government to establish political relations between the American peoples upon the basis of right and justice. In this most noble aspiration, worthy of the greatness of your country, Peru, on her part, unreservedly acquiesces.
The lofty ideas which you have expressed since your arrival in South America, the frank expressions of cordiality, the concepts of stimulus and aid to induce us, the Americans of the South, to work in the same way as those of the North, with earnestness and unflinching hope in the future, have found in every breast the most pleasing echo, and they direct toward your person the most lively sympathy.Closely associated fellow-worker with the illustrious statesman who rules the destinies of your country, to you belongs, in a great measure, the acclamation with which America and the entire world would greet the great nation that has constituted the most perfect democratic society, that has made the most surprising progress in industrial and economic order, and that has placed the prestige of its greatness at the service of peace all over the world.
Gentlemen, I invite you to drink to the United States; to its President, Mr. Roosevelt; and to its Secretary of State, Mr. Root.
Reply of Mr. Root
I thank you sincerely, both in my own behalf and in behalf of my country, for your kind welcome and for the words, full of friendship and of kindly judgment, you have uttered regarding my country and regarding her servants, the President and myself. The distinguished gentleman who represents Peru in the capital of the United States of America, and who shares with you, sir, the inheritance of a name great and honored, not only in Peru but wherever the friends of constitutional freedom are found—in his note of invitation to me, upon which I am now a visitor to your city, used a form of expression that has dwelt in my memory, because it was so true. He spoke of the old, sincere, and cordial friendship of our two countries—that is indeed true of the friendship of the United States of America and the republic of Peru. It is an old friendship, a sincere friendship, and a cordial friendship. I have come here not to make new friends, but to greet old ones; not to announce a new departure in policy, but to follow old and honored lines; and I should have thought that in coming to South America in answer to the invitations of the different countries, all down the east and up the west coast, to have passed by Peru would indeed be to have played "Hamlet" with Hamlet left out. It is still a more natural and still a stronger impulse to visit Peru at this time, as a part of a mission of friendship and good will, when the relations between the two countries are about to be drawn even closer.
The completion of the canal across the Isthmus of Panama will make us near neighbors as we have never been before, so that we may take our staterooms at the wharf at Callao or at New York, and visit each other without change of quarters during the journey. And no one can tell what the effect of the canal will be. We do know that nothing of the kind was ever done before in human history without producing a most powerful effect upon mankind. The course of civilization, the rise and fall of nations, the development of mankind, have followed the establishment of new trade routes. No one can now tell just what the specific effect of the cutting of the canal across the isthmus may be; but it will be great and momentous in the affairs of the world. Of this we may be certain, that for the nations situated immediately to the south and immediately to the north of the canal, there will be great changes in their relations with the rest of the world; and it is most gratifying to know that this great work which the United States of America is now undertaking—the cost of which she never expects to get back—a work which she is doing not merely for her own benefit, but because she is moved by the belief that great things are worth doing, is going to bring great benefits to the entire world, and to her old and her good friend, the republic of Peru.
I thank you, Mr. President, for your kind reception, and I beg you to permit me to ask the gentlemen here to join me in proposing in behalf of President Roosevelt the health and long life and prosperity of the President of Peru.
BANQUET OF THE MINISTER FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS
Speech of His Excellency Javier Prado y Ugarteche
Minister for Foreign Affairs
At the Union Club, September 11, 1906
With the liveliest feelings of consideration and sympathy I have the honor to offer this manifestation to His Excellency Mr. Elihu Root, Secretary of State of the United States of America.
Yielding to the generous impulses of your American heart, and of your brain of a thinker and of a statesman, you have felt a desire, Mr. Root, to visit these countries, to address to them words of friendship and of interest in their welfare, in the name of the honorable government which you represent, and to shed over this continent the rays of the noble ideal of American fraternity.
Your visit will undoubtedly produce fruitful results on behalf of liberty and of justice, of peace and of progress, of order and of improvement, which you have proclaimed as being the highest principles inspiring the policy of the United States in the special mission for which their peculiar virtues and energy have marked them out in the destiny of humanity.
When those austere founders of American independence laid the foundations of the great republic of the North, and gave it its constitution, they were not inspired by narrow-minded ideas or by selfish and transitory interest, but by a profound conviction of the rights of man and a deep feeling of liberty and of justice, which, in its irresistible consequences, would bring about the social and political transformation which came to pass in the world at the end of the eighteenth century, and was destined to constitute the gospel of liberty and of democracy in our modern rÉgime.
This same people, although still in its youth, did not hesitate, shortly after, all alone, to guarantee the independence of all the American countries, placing before the great powers of the world the pillars of Hercules of the Monroe Doctrine, forming an impassable gateway to a free and unconquerable America.
Today this same people excites the admiration of the whole world by its grandeur. Its government brings to its level the harmony of humanity; reËstablishes, on the one hand, peace between the empires of Europe and of Asia, and, on the other, between the republics of Central America; patronizes the congress of The Hague, and in it obtains the recognition of the personality of the American nations, thus giving proof of the interest it takes, with equal concern, in the future of the peoples civilized for a century, as well as in that of the countries just commencing their existence. The American Constitution, the Monroe Doctrine, together with the policy of President Roosevelt, and of his Secretary of State, Mr. Root, voice in this manner, through the pages of history, the same language of liberty, of justice, humanity, and Americanism.
How deep is the lesson to be learned from these facts!
The ancient ideas founded right upon force, the rÉgime of the social bodies was that of privilege, and individual efforts were tied by bonds imposed in the name of the authorities. The modern ideas, such as the United States proclaim, found all right upon justice, and the social rÉgime upon liberty and equality. The human being is not an instrument for the display of arbitrary power, but is the whole object of social life, the mission of which is the development of its energies, its moral conscience, the improvement and welfare of individuals and of nations.
According to the ancient ideas, the greatness of the nations was measured by their military power and by the limits of their conquests of force. According to modern ideas, as represented by the United States, the greatness of nations is measured by the conquests obtained by individual and collective efforts, thereby creating the fruitful and happy reign of truth, of justice, of labor, and of peace.
War was formerly a glory; nowadays it is a calamity. Later on it will be condemned as the sad ancestral remains of barbarism and savagery.
The evolution of ideas is that which now rules the world; and if people do not always comprehend this fact it is because the selfish and personal prejudices, passions, and interests disturb and impair their judgment.
In modern progress, the rÉgime of privilege and of force can no longer create rights nor lend security for the future or the aggrandizement of nations; and nowadays those individuals do not render a service to their native land who, while they sacrifice permanent interests, think they can calculate the meridian of their country by the artificial reflections of a moment, transitory and perishable.
The rÉgime of force or of armed peace consumes the vital forces and the resources of nations; and then from the abyss of inequality, of affliction, and danger produced, bursts forth once more the social and political problem demanding, with threats, the reform of the evil, and laying down the maxim that only the ideal of justice, of liberty, and of human solidarity can possibly stand forth, firm and unshaken, amidst the ruins in which the wild ideas of greatness held by the military powers of the world will remain buried forever.
It is not by means of a rÉgime of force, but by that of liberty, peace, and labor, that the United States of America has been enabled to form a marvelous abode of vitality and human progress; and its government, with a perfect insight into the greatness of that country and of its destiny, today addresses the present and the future of our world, and with special interest explains to America the only paths that will lead the nations to the attainment of tranquillity and well-being.
Once that existence is obtained, you have said, Mr. Root, that it is necessary to live and advance worthily and honorably,—and that this object cannot be attained by a rÉgime of domestic oppression and of privilege, nor by the external one of isolation or of war, but by that of liberty, order, justice, economical progress, moral improvement, intellectual advance, respect for the rights of others, and a feeling of human solidarity. You have clearly stated:
No nation can live unto itself alone and continue to live. Each nation's growth is a part of the development of the race.... A people whose minds are not open to the lessons of the world's progress, whose spirits are not stirred by the aspirations and achievements of humanity, struggling the world over for liberty and justice, must be left behind by civilization in its steady and beneficent advance.
In the life of nations there must always prevail an ideal and a harmony of right, of liberty, of peace, and fraternity, although this can only be obtained by persevering efforts, by sacrifices, and by a long and distressing march. It is necessary to "labor more for the future than for the present" and unite together all the nations engaged in the same great task, inspired by a like ideal and professing similar principles.
Peru has read your words, Mr. Root, with profound attention. She is proud to say that in the modest sphere she occupies in the concert of nations, she accepts your ideas as her own, and declares that they also constitute her profession of faith as regards her international policy.
With your superior judgment you have exactly comprehended the difficulties, critical moments, and convulsions which the countries of this continent have undergone in order to establish a republican government, together with a rÉgime of liberty and democracy. They are still in the first period of their development and have yet many problems to solve.
To develop the immense resources and wealth with which nature has so wonderfully endowed these countries; to render their territory accessible to labor and civilization by opening up means of communication, granting all facilities and giving security for the life, health, and welfare of their inhabitants; to obtain the population which their immense territories require: to educate and instruct the people, making them understand their liberty, their duties, and their rights; to develop their faculties and energies, their labor forces, their industrial and commercial capacity and power; to elevate their moral dignity; to consolidate and strengthen the national unity; to insure definitely the government of the people, in justice, in order, and in peace; to attract capital and foreign immigration; to develop and give impulse to commercial relations with other countries; to maintain a frank and true international harmony and solidarity; to respect all mutual and reciprocal rights and settle all disagreements by friendly, just, and honorable means—to perform, in short, the work of human civilization; these are undoubtedly the points which ought to occupy, first of all, the thoughts of the administration of these countries, in order to secure their tranquillity, their welfare, and their aggrandizement, just as the United States have secured theirs by the genius of their people and the power of their ideals.
If the nations of America, instead of living apart from each other and separated by distrust, threats, and quarrels—which unsettle them, rendering their energy and development fruitless, just as they have kept up a state of anarchy, for a long time, in their internal existence—would unite themselves together by the natural ties which the community of their origin, of their civilization, of their necessities, and their destinies clearly indicate, we should then witness the realization of the ideal you have conceived of a great, prosperous, and happy America; the union of sister republics, free, orderly, laborious, lovers of justice, knowledge, sciences, and arts, coÖperating, each one and all of them worthily and effectively, for the realization of the great work of human civilization and culture.
The standard and observance of justice should bring about the definite disappearance of the disagreements which may have caused separation among the South American countries, just as family quarrels are effaced on the exhibition of a just and generous sentiment of sincere brotherhood and harmony which vibrates throughout this continent as an intense aspiration of the American soul, and as a noble ideal of concord and of justice.
It is never too late to recognize what is right and to proceed with rectitude. My memory suggests an important event some few years back in the history of the relations between Peru and the United States, described most correctly by the representative of your government as one of those most worthy of note in the annals of diplomacy. I refer to the serious question which arose in 1852 between our respective countries relative to the Lobos guano islands, when the United States held that they did not belong to the territory and sovereignty of Peru, and that as they had been occupied by American citizens your country would uphold these parties in the work of exploitation; but as soon as the Government of the United States, after a lengthened and lively controversy, became convinced of the right which Peru had on her side, it at once spontaneously put an end to the question by a memorable note of its Secretary of State, recognizing the absolute sovereignty of Peru over those islands and declaring that "he makes this avowal with the greater readiness, in consequence of the unintentional injustice done to Peru, under a transient want of information as to the facts of the case."[3]
When powerful nations, laying aside the instruments of oppression and violence which they have in their hands, rise to such a height of moral elevation, universal respect and sympathy will form the unfading halo of their grandeur.
And thus it happened with the United States of America; and Peru has now the honor once more to express its thanks for the generous friendship and constant interest with which the United States have always paid attention to everything affecting the welfare and progress of our country.
Peru, which is the depositary of the secrets of wondrous and unknown civilizations; which possesses great historical traditions; which was long ago the metropolis of this continent, and then a Spanish colony; which has an enormous extent of territory, with the most varied and wonderful climates and wealth; after grievous domestic and foreign vicissitudes, has firmly taken in hand the great work of its reorganization; has acquired the knowledge of its public and private duties; has given vigor to its character and to its spirit of enterprise; has founded industries and labor centers; has fostered agriculture, mining, and commerce; is using every effort to foster public instruction, increasing the number of schools throughout the country and giving civic education to its children; constructing railroads and public works of national and future interest; opening the minds and intelligence of its people to the currents of culture and modern progress, and endeavoring to establish a solid and well-directed public administration; her fiscal revenues, her trade, and the general capitalization of fortunes have reached in a few years an extraordinary development which demonstrates the potentiality of the country. Enjoying public peace, she is using every effort to maintain a policy of frank understanding and friendship with all nations, and sustains the principle of arbitration for the solution of all her international controversies, thus giving evident proof of the rectitude of her sentiments, and that the only settlements which she defends and to which she aspires are the honorable settlements dictated by right.
These ideas are likewise yours, Mr. Root. And I invite you, gentlemen, to unite with us in expressing the hope that the principles proclaimed by our enlightened guest, to whom we today offer the homage of our respect and sympathy, may everlastingly rule in America.
Reply of Mr. Root
I should be insensible, indeed, were I not to feel deeply grateful for your courtesy, your hospitality, and your kindness; nor can I fail to be gratified by the words of praise which you, Mr. Minister, have spoken of my beloved country, and by the hearty and unreserved approval with which you have met my inadequate expression of the sentiments the people of my country feel toward their sister republics of South America. The words which you have quoted, sir, do represent the feelings of the people of the United States. We are very far from living up to the standards which we set for ourselves, and we know our own omissions, our failings, and our errors; we know them, we deplore them, and we are constantly and laboriously seeking to remedy them; but we do have underneath as the firm foundation of constitutional freedom, the sentiments which were expressed in the quotations which you have made.
No government in the United States could maintain itself for a moment if it violated those principles; no act of unjust aggression by the United States against any smaller and weaker power would be forgiven by the people to whom the government is responsible.Mr. Minister, my journey in South America is drawing to a close. After many weeks of association with the distinguished men who control the affairs of the South American republics, after much observation of the widely different countries I have visited, it is with the greatest satisfaction that I find, in reviewing the new records of my mind, that the impressions with which I came to South America have been confirmed—the impression that there is a new day dawning, a new day of industry, of enterprise, of prosperity, of wider liberty, of more perfect justice among the people of the southern continent.
I find that the difference between the South America of today and the South America as the records show it to have been a generation ago, is as wide as the difference marked by centuries in the history of Europe. Why is it? You are the same people—not so much better than your fathers. The same fields offered to the hand of the husbandman their bounteous harvests then as now; the same incalculable wealth slept in your mountains then as now; the same streams carried down from your mountain sides the immeasurable power ready to the hand of man for the production of wealth then as now; the same ocean washed your shores ready to bear the commerce of the world then as now. Whence comes the change? The change is not in material things, but in spiritual things. The change has come because in the slow but majestic progress of national development, the peoples of South America have been passing through a period of progress necessary to their development, necessary to the building of their characters, up from a stage of strife and discord, of individual selfishness, of unrestrained ambition, of irresponsible power, and out upon the broad platform of love for country, of national spirit, of devotion to the ideal of justice, of ordered liberty, of respect for the rights of others; because the individual characters of the peoples of the South American republics have been developed to that self-control, to that respect for justice toward their fellowmen, to that regard for the rights and feelings of others which inhere in true justice. The development of individual character has made the collective character competent for self-government and the maintenance of that justice, that ordered liberty, which gives security to property, security to the fruits of enterprise, security to personal liberty, to the pursuit of happiness, to the home, to all that makes life worth living; and under the fostering care of that character, individual and national, the hidden wealth of the mountains is being poured out to enrich mankind; under the fostering care of that character, individual and national, new life is coming to the fields, to the mines, to the factories, to commerce, to all the material interests of South America.
Mr. Minister, this is but a part of a great world movement on a wider field. It is no idle dream that the world grows better day by day. We cannot mark its progress by days or by years or by generations; but marking the changes by the centuries mankind advances steadily from brute force, from the rule of selfishness and greed toward respect for human rights, toward desire for human happiness, toward the rule of law and the rule of love among men. My own country has become great materially because it has felt the influence of that majestic progress of civilization. South America is becoming great materially because it, too, is feeling the influence that is making humanity more human.
We can do but little in our day. We live our short lives and pass away and are forgotten. All the wealth, prosperity, and luxury with which we can surround ourselves is of but little benefit and little satisfaction; but if we—if you and I—in our offices and each one of us in his influence upon the public affairs of his day, can contribute ever so little, but something, toward the tendency of our countries, the tendency of our race, away from greed and force and selfishness and wrong, toward the rule of order and love—if we can do something to contribute to that tendency which countless millions are working out, we shall not have lived in vain.
You were kind enough to refer to an incident in the diplomatic history of the United States and Peru, when my own country recognized its error in regard to the Lobos Islands and returned them freely and cheerfully to their rightful owner. I would rather have the record of such acts of justice for my country's fair name than the story of any battle fought and won by her military heroes.
We cannot fail to ask ourselves sometimes the question, What will be the end of our civilization? Will some future generation say of us, in the words of the Persian poet, "The lion and the lizard keep the courts where JamshÝd gloried and drank deep"? Will the palaces we build be the problem of the antiquarians in some future century? Will all that we do come to naught? If not—if our civilization is not to meet the fate of all that have gone before—it will be because we have builded upon a firm foundation, a foundation of the great body of the plain, the common people, and upon a character formed on the principles of justice, of liberty, and of brotherly love. Our one hope for the perpetuity of our civilization is that quality in which it differs from all civilizations that have gone before—its substantial basis. I find that here in Peru you are building upon that firm rock.
I find that here individual character is being developed so that the people of Peru are collectively developing the necessary and essential national character.
I find that the riches of your wonderful land are in the hands of a people who are worthy to enjoy them.
I shall take away with me from Peru not only the kindest feelings of friendship and of gratitude but the highest and most confident hope of a great and glorious future for the people to whom I wish so well.
Mr. Minister, will you permit me the honor of asking all to join me in drinking to the health of His Excellency the President of Peru?
RECEPTION AT THE MUNICIPAL COUNCIL
Speech of Doctor Federico Elguera
Mayor of Lima
September 10, 1906
The citizens of Lima welcome you and are glad to have you amongst them.
You arrive at the capital of Peru, after visiting the leading cities in South America and receiving the greetings so justly due the great American nation and your own personal merits.
You are an ambassador of peace, a messenger of good will, and the herald of doctrines which sustain America's autonomy and strengthen the faith in our future welfare.
The wake left by the vessel which has brought you hither serves as a symbol, indicating union, fraternity, and friendship between the northern and southern states of this continent.
You have been able to form a general opinion as to the present state of the political, economical, and social development of Latin America. You also know now what her resources are and to what conditions the growth and progress of this southern continent are due.
After visiting prosperous countries, whose peaceful labor on behalf of civilization has not been disturbed by the sorrows of war, you reach a land where once flourished the greatest empire which ever arose in America.
You have arrived at the ancient metropolis of Spanish America; you are now at the heart of a nation which attracted the world's attention in former days on account of its greatness and the treasures it possessed—a nation which fought the final battles for independence; and, more important than all, a country which, having been shaken and convulsed by dissension, has risen once more to a life of well-being through a supreme effort of will and a firm belief in its future.
The Peru you are visiting is not only the country of olden times, which tradition has made known for its fabulous wealth, but it is a modern country, versed in the principles of order, industry, and labor.
Nations which live exclusively on the wealth given them by nature make no effort to become greater, nor do they consider their future welfare, but perish, crushed by those whose envy and greed they excite.
On the other hand, those countries whose prosperity is based on the principles of justice, trade, and peace attain success and incite others to follow, contributing thus to the great work of universal civilization.
Unfortunately, this peace, based on those principles, must be sustained abroad, following the example of the Old World, by the acquisition of elements of warfare only useful for the destruction and ruin of men and progress, wasting the national vitality and prosperity, earned by dint of the labors of the citizens and the products of the resources that nature has given.
To change this system for another which will insure to our nations the tranquil possession of what lawfully belongs to them, allowing them to devote their efforts fearlessly to their own advancement, is the noble work to which the endeavors of the great nation which has risen up in the New World should be directed, just as the sun rises in the celestial dome to give light, heat, and life; to maintain the equilibrium and prevent the collision of lesser stars.
Such ideals of civilization and fraternity have always guided the conduct of Peru, whose influence and predominance in other times enabled her to watch over justice, to render assistance to the weak, to fight oppression, and to defend the rights of America.
For this reason we heartily sympathize with the doctrines you proclaim; for this reason we extend to you, with sincere regard, the hand of friendship; for this reason we feel satisfaction and pride when we behold the marvelous progress of your country.
When nations succeed in reaching the degree of prosperity at which yours has arrived they do not excite envy, but emulation; they do not inspire fear, but confidence.
Ere long the vigorous arm of your people will tear away the strip of land which still keeps us apart; and in the union of the two oceans surrounding our hemisphere may we hope that the spirits of Washington and BolÍvar will watch the maintenance of peace and justice and follow the destinies of the republics they created.
Mr. Root, may the days you are about to spend amongst us be happy and agreeable, and may their memory ever accompany you, as ours will ever retain the grateful impression of your visit.
Reply of Mr. Root
I beg you to believe that I appreciate most highly your kind welcome and the friendly terms with which you have greeted me. I did not feel as though I were coming among strangers when I entered Peru; I do not feel that I am treading on unknown soil when I set foot upon the streets of your famous and historic city. I think no city in the world, certainly no city in the western hemisphere, is better known in the United States of America then the city of Lima. Almost every schoolboy in the United States has read in the books of our own historians the story of the founding of this city. We all know the wonderful and romantic history of your four centuries of life; we all know the charms, the graces, and the lovable qualities of your people.We know that you are the metropolis of a people who carry the art of agriculture to the highest degree of efficiency, a people frugal, industrious, and of domestic virtue. We have seen with gratification that you are becoming also the metropolis of a people capable of winning from your mountains the inexhaustible wealth they contain, the metropolis of a great mining people; and within the past few years we have rejoiced to see that you are also on the road to become the metropolis of a great manufacturing people.
We have read, too, the story of your struggles—first for independence, then for liberty, then for justice and order and peace; and with the memory of our own struggles for liberty and justice, with the experience of our own trials and difficulties, rejoicing in our own success and prosperity, Mr. Mayor, the feeling of sympathy and rejoicing in your success in overcoming the obstacles that have stood in your way, in your growth in capacity for self-government, in the continuing strength of all the principles of justice and of order and of peace, is universal in my country and among my people.
So I come to you not to make friends, but as a friend among friends. I thank you with all my heart, both for myself and for my people, for the kindness of your welcome and for what I know to be the sincerity of your friendship.
RECEPTION BY THE SENATE
Speech of Senator Barrios
At an Extraordinary Session, September 13, 1906
The Senate of Peru, honored by your official visit, greets you as the representative of a great democratic people, whose juridical methods, founded on liberty and equality, are a model for all the American parliaments.
I regard your visit to our young republic as one of most important and lasting effect in the history of the continent. When these peoples have reached the power and development which the United States of America enjoys; when the citizens and the public authorities keep within the bounds imposed by the legitimate demands of liberty and justice and the requirements of order and progress; when all this is obtained by means of social well-being, of economic strength, and the political predominance which passes beyond the native land—then the legitimate and noble influence exercised on the life of other peoples is based, not on narrow schemes of national egotism, but on the broad and humane qualities of civilization.
This your government has understood in sending a full representation to these republics, in harmony with the American idea of union and progress, which the illustrious statesman who today presides over the glorious destinies of the American people—to the admiration and respect of all—expounds and accomplishes by his thoughtful work.
In the dawn of the twentieth century may be seen in this part of the world communities of peoples who, with analogous institutions, must fulfill in history a single and great destiny. This part which the future reserves for us cannot be other than an effective and true realization of democracy at home and of justice in international affairs.
Such is the direction in which Peru is developing her energies, after her past and now remote vicissitudes. Such is the ideal that animates her in pursuing her efforts for reconstruction, because a people without an aim in the struggle are unworthy of victory. "It is no more than a scratch on the ground", using the words of your illustrious President.
As the principal co-worker for the exalted international policy of the present government of the United States, receive, Mr. Root, the assurances of the highest consideration and sympathy of the Peruvian Senate.
Reply of Mr. Root
I feel most keenly the great honor conferred upon me by this distinguished legislative body. I thank you for your courtesy personally; still more I thank you for the exhibition of friendship and sympathy for my country,—an exhibition which corresponds most perfectly to the spirit and purpose actuating my visit to Peru.
I do not think, sir, that any one long concerned in government can fail to come at last to a feeling of deep solicitude for the welfare of the people whom he serves. He must come to feel toward them somewhat as the lawyer does toward his clients, as the physician feels toward his patients, as the clergyman feels toward his parishioners—the advocate, the friend of the people whose interests are committed to his official action; and, as a member of the government of a friendly republic, I feel toward you that sympathy which comes from a common purpose, from engagement in the same task, from being actuated by the same motive. The work of the legislator is difficult and delicate. Governments cannot make wealth; governments cannot produce enterprise, industry, or prosperity; but wise government can give that security for property, for the fruits of enterprise, for personal liberty, for justice, which opens the door to enterprise, which stimulates industry and commercial activity, which brings capital and immigration to the shores of the country that is but scantily populated; and which makes it worth while for the greatest exertions of the human mind to be applied to the development of the resources of the country. How difficult is the task! As the engineer controlling a great and complicated machine does not himself furnish the motive power or do the work, yet by a wrong turn of the lever may send the machine to ruin; so the legislative body cannot itself do the work that the people must do, yet by ill-advised, inconsiderate, and unwise legislation, it may produce incalculable misery and ruin. The wisdom that is necessary, the unselfishness that is necessary, the subordination of personal and selfish interests that is necessary, has always seemed to me to consecrate a legislative body seeking to do its duty by its country and make it worthy not only of respect but of reverence.
Mr. President and Senators, in your deliberations and your actions, so fraught with results of happiness or disaster for the people of your beloved country, we of the North, the people of a republic long bound to Peru by ties of real and sincere friendship, follow you with sympathy; with earnest, sincere desire that you may be guided by wisdom; that you may work in simplicity and sincerity of heart for the good of your people; and that your labors may be crowned by those blessings which God gives to those who serve His children faithfully and well.
INSTALLATION OF MR. ROOT AS A MEMBER OF THE FACULTY
OF POLITICAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE SCIENCES OF THE UNIVERSITY OF SAN MARCOS, LIMA
SEPTEMBER 14, 1906
Speech of Doctor Luis F. VillarÁn
Rector of the University
The University of San Marcos of Lima heartily shares in the national rejoicing consequent on your visit to us, and greets you as the representative of the great republic which holds so many claims to the high esteem and consideration of the Spanish-American states of this continent.
Your country, indeed, furnished valuable coÖperation to the Spanish colonies in the establishment of their independence. With the example of your own emancipation, forming one of the greatest events of history, the longing for liberty deepened in their breasts. It gave them courage in the struggle by frank declarations of friendship and sympathy; bestowed prestige on their cause by recognizing them as free states at a time when their emancipation was not entirely accomplished; and finally added strength to their victory by declaring before the whole world that the independence and integrity of these republics would be maintained at all costs.
You, the Americans of the North, were the founders and defenders of the international and political liberty of these states. Washington, whose greatness has alone been given worthy expression in the inspired words of Byron—Washington, "the first, the last, the best of men", and the glorious group of illustrious citizens who aided him in his work, were the apostles of democracy and of the republic. The American Constitution is an admirable structure, built on the immovable foundations of justice and the national will, which will never be overthrown by social or political upheavals.
Half a century ago, Laboulaye, the illustrious professor of the College of France, said:
Washington has founded a wise and well-organized republic and has bequeathed to history, not the fatal spectacle of crime triumphant, but a beneficent example of patriotism and virtue. In less than fifty years, thanks to the powerful influence of Liberty, an empire has been raised which before the end of the century will be the greatest state of the civilized world, and which, if it remain true to the ideals of its founders, if ambition does not check the era of its fortune, will furnish the world the spectacle of a republic of one hundred million men, richer, happier, and more glorious than the monarchies of the Old World. This is the work of Washington!
This prophecy has been fulfilled; that half-century has passed by, and the great republic goes on its career of greatness, and no eye can discern the ultimate reach of its magnificence.
Today, with the kind name of sister, it sends to us, through you, its worthy messenger, fresh words of encouragement, and invites us in a gracious manner to exert ourselves to greater efforts in the work of peace, of labor, and of the aggrandizement of the American continent.You tell us that—
Nowhere in the world has this progress been more marked than in Latin America. Out of the wrack of Indian fighting and race conflicts and civil wars, strong and stable governments have arisen. Peaceful succession in accord with the people's will has replaced the forcible seizure of power permitted by the people's indifference. Loyalty to country, its peace, its dignity, its honor, has arisen above partizanship for individual leaders.
The University of Lima, an important factor in our national life, accepts on its part, and in harmony with public thought, your noble invitation.
This University, the distinguished creation of the great Spanish monarchs, proud of its noble lineage of five centuries, jealous of its glories, believes it to be its duty and considers it a special honor to offer you, the illustrious messenger, the deep thinker, and the highest co-worker in the government of Theodore Roosevelt, the peacemaker of the world, a post of honor.
The Faculty of Political and Administrative Sciences, founded thirty years ago by the distinguished President Manuel Pardo, and organized by the eminent public writer Pradier FodÉrÉ—this Faculty, which professes, without limitations, the doctrines of international and political law as proclaimed in your country, is the one which with just right offers you this University emblem, which I am pleased to place in the hands of Your Excellency [addressing the President of Peru, and handing him the medal of the University] that you may kindly deliver it to our illustrious guest.
The presence among us of the eminent statesman, the Secretary of State of the United States, is indeed of great significance and surpassing importance in the course of our political life, as a singular and unmistakable token of friendship offered by that powerful republic, and as a generous effort to create between the nations of America a stable rÉgime of true understanding and concord.
This work of peace, which is linked with an unvarying respect for the rights of all without regard to the extent of their power, with the close union of their interests, and with a political unity of purpose which springs from the historical origin of the republics of America and the analogy of their institutions, is outlined in a masterly manner in the address which our illustrious guest recently delivered before the congress of American delegates convened at Rio de Janeiro.
The general idea he has expressed therein of the principles of democratic rÉgime, of its severe trials and accidental mistakes, of the virtues which sustain popular government, and of the public education that must prepare and secure it, reveals to us the secret of the prosperity and welfare of the freest and most flourishing republic that has ever existed, and how it has reached the preponderant rank it now occupies among nations.
The noble purpose of our powerful sister of the North, who with a persevering and ever steadfast persistency presses on, is the endeavor to combine continental interests lacking sufficient cohesion, and to promote their common development, thus seeking to reach "the complete rule of justice and peace among nations in lieu of force and war."These words of Mr. Root contain, in their severe simplicity, a complete statement of his mission of friendship and advice. He seeks to stimulate the common aim of harmonizing the several interests on a permanent basis upon which is to be established the uniform rule of our common existence, the rule of justice never subservient to private and selfish convenience; a barrier against the arbitrary and brutal decisions of force, nearly always dissembled under plausible forms and motives of international tradition.
There exists a fundamental sentiment which opposes the cumulus of violence and usurpation, which in a great degree constitutes historic international law and corrects the deductions made from purely speculative theories,—a sentiment we accept without demur, and which is asserted like the axioms that serve as the basis and foundation of all reasoning and as a rule inspiring human actions.
This concept is that of a law of coexistence, an intuition of the universal conscience, which all human society upholds by reason of the sole fact of its existence.
But the completely empiric and egotistical manner in which nations have understood and applied the right of sovereign independence in their outward dealings, has, up to the present time, been the almost insuperable obstacle to the universal establishment of a rule of justice which governs, in a permanent and uniform manner, the concourse of interests; each state following one of its own modeling, in accordance with the power it holds and the ambitions it is thereby enabled to pursue.
This tendency, whether open or covert, hardly restrained by the formalities of modern civilization, which seldom succeeds in masking the painful reality, has created the singular spectacle witnessed at the present time,—that is, the undefined aggravation of a military situation which absorbs the greater part of the resources of nations, wrung from the labor of humanity.
The constant fear of armed aggression has brought about political alliances of a purely transitory character, which assure nothing and, in truth, mean nothing but the mutual imputation of violence and outrage, unhappily but too well demonstrated as justifiable motives for apprehension, by reason of the ominous antecedents of an international rÉgime founded on the supremacy of power.
This precarious guaranty, the fruit of an unsteady and purely political combination which may undergo the most unexpected alterations, cannot assure a stable situation, because it is not in itself the constitution of a common, strong, and commanding law; but, on the contrary, is the distrust of the efficacy of the latter and a certain traditional disdain for a humane and peaceful solution of international affairs.
When the anxiety of danger or an unforeseen obstacle does not prevent recourse to arms, war breaks out if the motive is simply the securing of an advantage sustained by a military power which the country chosen as the object of aggression cannot forcibly check.
True it is that at the present time wars are less frequent and more humane in the manner they are conducted than heretofore; but their causes are ever the same, and the intervals between them are only due to the increasing number of military powers, and to the fear of consequent complications of political interests which it is hazardous to provoke.
Treaties of peace since the seventeenth century, which recorded the birth of the modern law of nations, have on some occasions passed through real transformation in obedience to the law of evolution of human societies, which favor equilibrium, not as established by frail or artificial alliances, nor by combinations of the powerful, but by its ethnical factors and the amplitude of the national life based primarily on the progress of its institutions, in the ever-increasing intervention of the people in their own affairs and the reality and soundness of its political and civil liberty.
The definite establishment of an international juridical organ, sufficiently authorized and efficacious in its action, is yet a future event. Law in this respect has not as yet gone beyond the limits of a sphere that is at most one of pure speculation,—a worthy ideal, it is true, but one which in actuality has only succeeded in modifying the forms of violence by recording in the customary code of nations a few rules to lessen the brutality of the action, without eliminating the arbitrariness inherent in the sovereignty of arms.
In the work of common security and prosperity that involves the future of this continent, and once carried into effect, will signalize the most effective advance in the law of nations, a prominent part belongs to the great republic that has staked her power and fortune on peace. In this work we have endeavored to coÖperate in good faith and without reserve, and in it, also, the ardent sympathy and the boundless confidence of the Peruvian people will follow.
And since the unmerited honor has fallen to my lot to address myself on this memorable occasion to the distinguished personage, to the high dignitary of the nation which represents the greatest intensity of national life on account of the unrestricted development of the human faculties and the most certain and practical evolution of law among nations, I believe that I interpret the unanimous sentiment of my colleagues and of my country, in furnishing him the complete evidence of our cordial adherence and of our faith in the work intrusted to his talents and to his high character.
I am deeply sensible of the great honor which you confer upon me, an honor coming from this primate of the universities of the New World; an honor which receives me into the company of men learned, devoted to science, the disciples of truth, men eminent in the republic of letters. I am the more appreciative of this emblem because I am myself the son of a college professor, born within the precincts of a learned institution, and all my life closely associated with higher education in the United States of America. But I realize, sir, that my personality plays no considerable part in the ceremony of today. Happy is he who comes, by whatever chance, to stand as the representative of a great cause; as the representative of ideas which conciliate the feelings and arouse the enthusiasm of men; for the cause sheds light upon his person, however small, and the honor of his purpose reflects honor on him.
With the greatest satisfaction I have heard from the lips of the learned rector and professor of this university so just and high an estimate of the contributions made by my country to the cause of ordered liberty and justice in the world. I feel that what has been said here today is of far greater weight than any ordinary compliment, because it comes from men who speak under the grave responsibility of their high station as instructors of their countrymen, and after deliberate study, resulting in definite and certain conclusions.
It is a matter of most interesting reflection that after the nations of the Old World, from which we took our being, had sought for many years to gain wealth and strength and profit by the enforcement of a narrow and mistaken colonial policy, the revolt of the colonies of the New World brought to the mother nations infinitely greater blessings even than they were seeking. The reflex action of the working of the spirit of freedom on these shores of the new hemisphere upon the welfare of the countless millions of the Old World, has been of a value incalculable and inconceivable to the minds against whose mistaken policy we revolted.
I have always thought, sir, that the chief contribution of the United States of America to political science, was the device of incorporating in written constitutions an expression of the great principles which underlie human freedom and human justice, and putting it in the power of the judicial branch of the government to pass judgment upon the conformity of political action to those principles.
When in the fullness of time the hour had come for the new experiment in government among men, and it was the fate of the young and feeble colonies upon the coast of the North Atlantic to make the experiment, the Old World was full of the most dismal forebodings as to the result. The world was told that the experiment of democratic government meant the rule of the mob; that it might work well today, but that tomorrow the mob which had had but half a breakfast and could expect no dinner, would take control; and that the tyranny of the mob was worse than the tyranny of any individual.
The provisions of our constitutions guard against the tyranny of the mob, for at the time when men can deal in harmony with the principles of justice, when no selfish motive exists, when no excited passions exist, the constitution declares the great principles of justice—that no man shall be deprived of his property without due process of the law; that private property shall not be taken for public use without just compensation; that a person accused of crime shall be entitled to be informed of the charge against him, and given opportunity to defend himself. These provisions are essential to the preservation of liberty; and in the hands of judicial power rests the prerogative of declaring that whenever a congress, or a president, or a general, or whatever officer of whatever rank or dignity infringes, by a hair's breadth, upon any one of these great impersonal declarations of human rights, his acts cease to have official effect. The substitution of the divine quality of judgment, of the judicial quality in man, that quality which is bound by all that honor, by all that respect for human rights, by all that self-respect can accomplish, to lay aside all fear or favor and decide justly—the substitution of that quality for the fevered passions of the hour, for political favor and political hope, for political ambition, for personal selfishness and personal greed,—that is the contribution, the great contribution, of the American Constitution to the political science of the world.
If we pass to the field most ably and interestingly discussed in the paper to which we have just listened, to the field of international justice, we find the same principle less fully developed. I had almost said we find the need for the application of the same principle. All international law and international justice depend upon national law and national justice. No assemblage of nations can be expected to establish and maintain any higher standard in their dealings with one another than that which each maintains within its own borders. Just as the standard of justice and civilization in a community depends upon the individual character of the elements of the community, so the standard of justice among nations depends upon the standard established in each individual nation. Now, in the field of international arbitration we find a less fully developed sense of impersonal justice than we find in our municipal jurisprudence. Many years ago the Marquis of Salisbury, in a very able note, pointed out the extreme difficulty which lies in the way of international arbitration, arising from the difficulty of securing arbitrators who will act impartially, the trouble being that the world has not yet passed, in general, out of that stage of development in which men, even if they be arbitrators, act diplomatically instead of acting judicially. Arbitrations are too apt, therefore, to lead to diplomatic compromises rather than to judicial decisions. The remedy is not in abandoning the principle of arbitration, but it is by pressing on in every country and among all countries the quickened conscience, the higher standard, the judicial idea, the sense of the responsibility for impartial judgment in international affairs, as distinguished from the opportunity for negotiation in international affairs. We are too apt, both those who are despondent about the progress of civilization and those who are cynical about the unselfishness of mankind, to be impatient in our judgment, and to forget how long the life of a nation is, and how slow the processes of civilization are; how long it takes to change character and to educate whole peoples up to different standards of moral law. The principle of arbitration requires not merely declarations by governments, by congresses; it requires that education of the people of all civilized countries up to the same standard which now exists regarding the sacredness of judicial functions exercised in our courts.
It does not follow from this that the declaration of the principle of arbitration is not of value; it does not follow that governments and congresses are not advancing the cause of international justice; a principle recognized and declared always gains fresh strength and force; but for the accomplishment of the results which all of us desire in the substitution of arbitration for war, we must not be content with the declaration of principles; we must carry on an active campaign of universal national and international education, elevating the idea of the sacredness of the exercise of the judicial function in arbitration as well as in litigation between individuals. Still deeper than that goes the duty that rests upon us. Arbitration is but the method of preventing war after nations have been drawn up in opposition to each other with serious differences and excited feelings. The true, the permanent, and the final method of preventing war, is to educate the people who make war or peace, the people who control parliaments and congresses, to a love for justice and regard for the rights of others. So we come to the duty that rests here—not in the whims or the preference or the policy of a monarch, but here, in this university, in every institution of learning throughout the civilized world, with every teacher—the responsibility of determining the great issues of peace and war through the responsibility of teaching the people of our countries the love of justice, teaching them to seek the victories of peace rather than the glories of war; to regard more highly an act of justice and of generosity than even an act of courage or an act of heroism. In this great work of educating the people of the American republics to peace, there are no political divisions. As there is, and has been since the dawn of civilization, but one republic of science, but one republic of letters, let there be but one republic of the politics of peace, one great university of the professors and instructors of justice, of respect for human rights, of consideration for others, and of the peace of the world.
