Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, With the Annual Message of the President Transmitted to Congress December 3, 1906, (In two parts), Part II
Minister O’Brien to the Secretary of State .
Montevideo, Uruguay , August 23, 1906 .
Sir: I think it proper that I should, in a dispatch to the department, give full account of the visit to Uruguay of the Secretary of State, Mr. Elihu Root, and for this purpose I am inclosing clippings [Page 1421] from local newspapers covering the period of his stay in Uruguay—August 10–13, 1906—which it is thought furnishes complete information.
It is difficult for me to describe adequately the vast advantages to the humanity of Uruguay to be gained from Secretary Root’s visit.
I will state, however, that it is the consensus of opinion among those whose first concern is the welfare of the Avhole country that Secretary Root has, by his declarations before the Pan-American Congress at Rio cle Janeiro, given a better direction to the political affairs of South America than any other public man who has addressed himself to pan-American fraternity.
A careful perusal of the inclosures herein will show that his declarations have been received and accepted in Uruguay as the fundamental principles only under which pan-American fraternity can be attained.
I have no hesitancy in saying that time will fully justify this high estimate of the good which will follow Secretary Root’s visit to Uruguay.
I am, etc.,
mr. root’s voyage—programme of festivities—other resolutions-to-morrow declared holiday—other notices—committee on festivities.
To the end of formulating the definite programme of the festivities, the committee on festivities met yesterday in the salons of the Jefatura Politica, Mr. Sumaran being in the chair, Messrs. Bias Vidal, jr., Salgado, Garcia Acevedo (C), Saavedra (L.), Brizuela, Manini Rios, Arena, Oneto y Viana, Vidiella, Garcia Acevedo (I.), Amezaga, Blanco Acevedo (P.), Pier a (A.), Prat, and del Castillo.
After a long deliberation it was agreed to give the complete programme to publicity, which is below, of the festivities to take place on August 10, 11, and 12.
Lastly, a new number was introduced into the programme, fireworks in Plaza Independencia on Saturday night.
The programme of festivities:
August 10—10 a.m., reception. The committee will go out in the national steamer Triton, which will anchor near the Charleston. A delegation will go aboard said cruiser to invite Mr. Root and suite to land.
12 m., breakfast in the American legation.
3 p.m., reception in the Government House and military defile.
7.30 p.m., banquet offered by the minister for foreign affairs.
9.30 p.m., gala performance in honor of Mr. Root in the Urquiza theater.
August 11—10 a.m., excursion through the suburbs of Montevideo and breakfast at Villa Colon.
3.30 p.m., garden party offered by the students in Prado.
4.30 p.m., reception in the municipal building.
7.30 p.m., banquet offered by the President of the Republic in the Government house.
9.30 p.m., fireworks in Plaza Independencia.
10 p.m., gala performance in Solis theater, the public powers assisting.
August 12—12 m., breakfast offered by the committee on honors in the salon of the Atheneum.
5.30 p.m., fete offered by Mr. Rossell y Rius in Villa Dolores.
7.30 p.m., banquet in the American legation.
11 p.m., ball at Uruguay Club.
August 13, embarkment of Mr. Root and reception aboard cruiser Charleston.
message of the executive.
The executive power passed yesterday the following message to the general assembly, asking authority to declare to-morrow a holiday.
“Executive Power,
“Montevideo, August 8, 1906.
“Honorable General Assembly: The executive power, as an act of deference toward the illustrious respresentative of the Government of the United States of America, Mr. Elihu Root, and in order that it may be possible—with the greatest aptitude—for the public to be present at the celebrations with which he is to be received, believes it opportune to ask of your highnesses the sanction of the adjoined project of law which declares the 10th of August a holiday.
“The executive power is confident that your highnesses, taking into account the purposes which inspire the project, and also the urgency of the matter, will give immediate approbation thereto.
“He salutes your highnesses attentively.
“Jose Batlle y Ordonez.
“Claudio Williman.”
Ministry of
Government.
Project of
Law.
The senate and house of representatives of the Oriental Republic of Uruguay decree:
- Article 1. August 10 is declared a holiday on account of the festivities in honor of the representative of the Government of the United States of America, Mr. Elihu Root.
- Art. 2. Communicate, etc.
[Inclosure 3.—Article from the Buenos Aires Herald of August 11, 1906.]
The Herald’s special commissioner to meet the Hon. Elihu Root, American Secretary of State, at Montevideo, wires:
“Montevideo, Friday evening.
“Never, perhaps, in the history of the Uruguayan Republic has popular feeling been more visibly demonstrated than by the remarkable manifestations of satisfaction of all classes of the community at the visit of the eminent American statesman to this picturesque capital. Though necessarily not on the same scale of magnificence as the reception accorded him by Brazil, and that which is in course of preparation by Argentina, Montevideo has extended a welcome full of spontaneous warmth and cordiality. Since early morning huge crowds had assembled at every point of vantage in the vicinity of the port and moles, and these continually grew until it appeared as though the entire population were present to greet the visitors. As the popular American minister here, General O’Brien, embarked to meet the Charleston in the outer roads, and boarded the cruiser to welcome the distinguished travelers, the enthusiasm of the spectators was roused to its highest pitch. The “vivas” and the applause were repeated as Mr. Root and his party landed. Here the minister of foreign affairs tendered a formal welcome, to which Mr. Root briefly but suitably replied. After driving to the magnificent residence secured by Mr. John Adams for the American minister during his visit to this city, Mr. Secretary Root proceeded to Government House, where he was received by the President and the various ministers. There was also a military parade. Later this evening there was an official banquet, at which cordial speeches were delivered by the minister of foreign affairs and by Mr. Root. Subsequently, there was a gala performance at the principal theater. The streets are beautifully decorated and illuminated, and the whole city has apparently abandoned itself to the occasion of the festivities. Everything here to-day is North American, the only discordant note being the signboard over the shop door of a native tailor immediately opposite Mr. Root’s residence, on which is boldly described the word ‘todos mis articulos son ingleses.’”
speech of his excellency josé batlle y ordoñez, president of uruguay, at the banquet given by him to mr. root at the government house, august 11, 1906.
We celebrate an event new to South America—the presence in the heart of our republics of a member of the Government of the United States of the North. That grand nation has wished thus to manifest the interest that her sisters of the South inspire in her and her purpose of strongly drawing together the links that bind her to them.
Born on the same continent and in the same epoch, ruled by the same institutions, animated by the same spirit of liberty and progress, and destined alike to cause republican ideas to prevail on earth, it is natural that the nations of all America should approach nearer and nearer to each other, and unite more and more amongst themselves; and it is natural, also, that the most powerful and the most advanced amongst them should be the one to take the initiative in this union.
Your grand Republic, Mr. Secretary of State, is consistent in confiding to you this mission of fraternity and solidarity with the ideas and intentions manifested by her at the dawn of the liberty of our continent. The same sentiment that inspired the doctrine of Monroe brings you to our shores as the herald of the concord and community of America.
We welcome you most cordially. You find us earnestly laboring to make justice prevail, enamored of progress, confident in the future. Far removed from the European Continent, whence emerges the wave of humanity that peoples the American territories and becomes the origin of nations so glorious as yours, the growth and organization of the peoples in these regions have been slow, and public and social order has been frequently upset in our distant and scarcely populated prairies. But in the midst of these disturbances that have likewise afflicted, in their epochs of formation, almost all the present best constituted nations sound tendencies and true principles of order and liberty prevail, nationalities are constituted in a definite manner, and republican institutions are consecrated.
Your great nation, Mr. Secretary of State, is not new to this work. She has had important participation in it. I do not refer to the Monroe doctrine that made the elder sister the zealous defender of the younger ones. I speak of the radiant example of your republican virtue, your industrial initiative, your economic development, your scientific advances, your ardent and verile activity that has reenforced our faith in right, in liberty, in justice, in the republic, and has animated us—as a noble and victorious example does animate—in our dark days of disturbance and disaster.
Yes, the epoch of internl convulsions is drawing to its close in this part of America, and the peoples, finding themselves organized and at peace, are dedicating themselves to all those tasks that exalt the human mind and originate, in modern times, the greatness of nations. You tread upon a land that has recently been watered abundantly with blood—upon one in which, nevertheless, the love of liberty, within the limits of order, the love of well-being, and the love of progress under legal and upright governments is intense; upon one in which we live earnestly dedicated, in all branches of activity, to the labor that dignifies and fortifies, certain that for us has commenced an honorable era of internal peace. You have said it, Mr. Secretary of State: Out of the tumult of wars strong and stable governments have arisen; law prevails over the will of man; right and liberty are respected.
But this progress of public reason must be complemented. It is not sufficient that internal peace should be assured; it is necessary to secure external peace also. It is necessary that the American nations should’ draw near to each other; should know, should love each other; it is requisite to drive away, to suppress the danger of distrust, of rivalry, and of international conflicts; that the same sentiment that repudiated internal struggles should rise within as against the struggles of people against people, and that these should also be considered as the unfruitful shedding of the blood of brethren; that the calamitous armed peace may never appear in our land, and that the enormous sums used to sustain it on the European and Asiatic continents be employed amongst us in the development of industries, commerce, arts, and sciences.
The work may be realized by determination and constancy. The republican institutions that everywhere prevail on our continent are not propitious to the [Page 1424] Caesars who make their glory consist in the sinister brilliancy of battles and In the increase of their territorial domains. These same institutions give voice and vote in the direction of public affairs to the multitudes, whose primordial interest is ever peace, the sparing of their own blood, that is so unfruitfully shed in the great catastrophes of war.
America will be, then, the continent of peace, of a just peace, founded on respect for the rights of all nations, a respect which—as you, Mr. Secretary of State, have said, in tones that have resounded all over the surface of the earth, deeply moving all true hearts—must be as great for the weakest nations as for the most vast and most powerful empires. This Pan-American public opinion will be created and will be made effective, a public opinion charged to systematize the international conduct of the nations, to suppress injustice, and to establish among them relations ever more and more profoundly cordial.
Your country and your Government fulfill the part, not of the false friend that anarchizes and weakens her friends that she may prevail over them and dominate them, but that of the faithful and true one who exerts herself to unite them, and, that they may become good and strong, concurs with all her moral power in the realization of this work of the Pan-American Congresses, destined to become a modern amphictyon to whose decisions all the great American questions will be submitted, already giving prestige thereto by such words as you have spoken to the heart of the Congress of Rio de Janeiro, which present to the American world new and grand perspectives of peace and progress.
Mr. Secretary of State, ladies, and gentlemen, in the presence of deeds of this magnitude, inspired and filled with enthusiasm by them, let us pour out a libation to the United States of the North, to its vigorous President, to you and to your distinguished family, the herald of continental friendship, and to the American fatherland, from the Bering Straits to Cape Horn.
Reply of Mr. Root.
Mr. President: I thank you for the kind reference to myself, and I thank you for the high terms in which you have spoken of my country, from which I am so far away. Do not think, I beg you, sir, if I accept what you have said regarding the country I love, that we, in the north, consider ourselves so perfect as your description of us. We have virtues, we have good qualities, and we are proud of them; but we ourselves know in our own hearts how many faults we have. We know the mistakes we have made, the failures we have made, the tasks that are still before us to perform. Yet from the experiences of our efforts and our successes, and from the experiences of our faults and our failures, we, the oldest of the organized Republics of America, say to you of Uruguay, and to all our sisters, “Be of good cheer and confident hope.”
You have said, Mr. President, in your eloquent remarks this evening, that the progress of Uruguay has been slow. Slow as measured by our lives, perhaps, but not slow as measured by the lives of nations. The march of civilization is slow; it moves little in single human lives. Through the centuries and the ages it proceeds with deliberate and certain step. Look to England, whence came the principles embodied in your constitution, and ours, where first were developed the principles of free representative government. Remember through how many generations England fought and bled in her wars of the White and the Red—her blancos and colorados—the white rose of York and the red rose of Lancaster, before she could win her way to the security of English law.
Look to France, whence came the great declarations of the rights of man, and remember—I in my own time can remember—the Tuilleries standing in bright and peaceful beauty, and then in a pile of blackened ruins bearing the inscription, “Liberty, equality, and fraternity,” doing injustice to liberty, to equality, and to fraternity. These nations have passed through their furnaces. Every nation has had its own hard experience in its progressive development, but a nation is certain to progress if its tendency is right. It is so with Uruguay. You are passing through the phases of steady development. The restless and [Page 1425] untiring soul of José Artigas, who made the independence of Uruguay possible, did its work in its time, but its time is past; it is not the day of Artigas now.
The genius of the two great men, for the love of whom your political parties crystallized upon one side and upon the other, had its day, but that day has passed away. Step by step Uruguay is taking its course, as the elder nations of the earth have been taking theirs, steadily onward and upward, seeking more perfect justice and ordered liberty.
One of the most deeply seated feelings in the human heart is love of approbation. May we not have such relations to each other that the desire for each other’s approbation shall sustain us in the right course and warn us away from the wrong, and help us in our development to preserve high ideals, the ideals of justice and humanity necessary to free self-government? It is with that hope that I am here, your guest. It is with that desire that my people send the message of friendship to yours.
In the name of my President, Theodore Roosevelt, I offer to you, Mr. President, the most sincere assurance of friendship and confidence.
Speech of His Excellency José Romeu, minister for foreign affairs of the Republic of Uruguay, at a banquet given by him to Mr. Root in the foreign office at Montevideo on August 10, 1906.
When, after plowing through the waters of the Caribbean Sea and running along the eastern coast of Brazil, the North American cruiser Charleston entered into the magnificent bay of Rio de Janeiro, I had the opportunity of sending to the illustrious representative of the United States, who to-day is our distinguished guest, a telegraphic greeting on the occasion of his arrival in South America and expressing the desire that with his arrival might be the beginning of an era of fraternity and of labor advantageous to all the nations of the American Continent.
The words of that telegram, the significent reply of the Secretary, and the very eloquent words he delivered before the Pan-American Congress at Rio de Janeiro are not, in this case, a mere act of international courtesy; they are, in my judgment, the expression of the popular sentiment. They constitute the aspiration of all America. They are, at the least, the fervent desires of the Uruguayan people and of its Government, who see in the visit of the illustrious Secretary of State the foreshadowing of progress, of culture, and fraternity, which bring the peoples closer together, contributing to their prosperity and to their greatness, through which they may figure with honor in the concert of civilized nations.
These sentiments, as is well known, have been increasing along with the events that have made a vigorous people of the great northern Republic, capable of preponderating in the destinies of humanity on account of the enterprising genius of all its sons, on account of the irresistible force of its energies and of its abundant riches, and, very especially, on account of its redeeming influence of republican virtues, a characteristic mark of the Puritans and the other elements who organized the Federal Government on the immovable base of liberty, justice, and democracy.
The pages of history show us that the ideals of its own Constitution, like every great and generous ideal, passing over the distance from the Potomac to the banks of the River Plate, penetrated immediately to the farthest corner of the American Continent, there arising soon afterwards a new world of free countries where the undertakings of Solis or Pizarro and of Cortes will initiate a civilization destined to prosper in the life-giving blast of liberty and in the vigorous impulse which democracy infused into the old organizations of the colonial régime. The example of the United States and its moral assistance animated the patriots.
Put to the proof in the memorable struggle for emancipation, its fortitude and its heroism overturned all obstacles until the desired moment of consolidation, by its own effort, of the independence of the American Continent. Indeed, the influence of the United States in the diplomatic negotiation which preceded the recognition of the new nationalities and the chivalrous declaration which President Monroe launched before the world contributed efficaciously to assure [Page 1426] the stability of the growing Republic. Its development and its greatness were, from that instant, intrusted to the patriotism of its sons, to the confraternity of the American peoples, and to the fecund labor of the coming generations.
In spite of such social upheavals, which bring with them the ready-made collisions of arms, the antagonism of interests, and the struggle of ideas—inherent factors of every movement of emancipation—the nations of the new continent should not, nor will they, ever forget that from Spanish ground Columbus’s three-masted vessel—a Homeric expedition—set forth, founders of numerous peoples and flourishing colonies, leaving in our land mementos, tongue, customs, sentiments, and traditions which the evolutions of the human spirit do not easily obliterate. From noble France and its glorious revulsion against the remnants of feudalism arose the declaration of the rights of man and equitable ideas which are faithfully portrayed in our democratic institutions. Italy, Germany, and Spain send to America a valuable contingent of their emigration. The currents of commerce and progress were at one time, and they are at the present time, largely fomented by the navy and the capital of Great Britain. From the foreign office of that nation, among all the powers of old Europe, emanated the first disposition toward the recognition of American independence. All these circumstances are bonds of consideration which tie us to the European countries, but which do not hinder, nor can they hinder, our relations with the great northern Republic, as with all those of Latin origin, always being cordially maintained, strengthened, tightened, and increased toward the ends of highly noble and patriotic progress, developing a world policy of wise prevision, tending to consolidate the destinies of the American countries.
Difficulties, soon to disappear, due to the distance and lack of rapid and direct communications, have impeded the active interchange between the United States and this country, barring which no reason exists why their social and commercial relations may not be extended and fomented with reciprocal advantages.
In giving welcome to Mr. Root on his arrival in Uruguayan territory, I consider as one of my most pleasing personal gratifications the fact of having initiated the idea of inviting our distinguished guest to visit the River Plate countries.
If, as I do not doubt, the visit of the distinguished member of the Government of the United States contributes toward the peoples of the north and the south knowing one another—if the era of pan-American fraternity takes the flight to which we should aspire—if these demonstrations of courtesy are to tend, therefore, toward the progress of the nations of the continent and the mutual respect and consideration of their respective governments, the satisfaction of having promoted some of these benefits and the honor of a happy initiative, deferentially received by the illustrious Secretary of State, to whom the oriental people to-day offer the testimony of their esteem and sympathy, belong, at least in part, to the Uruguayan foreign office.
I drink, ladies and gentlemen, to pan-American fraternity, to the greatness of the United States of North America, to the health of His Excellency President Roosevelt, to the happiness of Mr. Elihu Root and of his distinguished family.
Reply of Mr. Root
Your Excellency: I have already thanked you for that welcome message which greeted my first advent in the harbor of Rio de Janeiro. I have now to add my thanks, both for the gracious invitation which brings me here and for the surpassing kindness and hospitality with which I and my family have been welcomed to Montevideo. It is most gratifying to hear from the lips of one of the masters of South American diplomacy, one who knows the reality of international politics, so just an estimate of the attitude of my own country toward her South American sisters. The great declaration of Monroe, made in the infancy of Latin-American liberty, was an assertion to all the world of the competency of Latin Americans to govern themselves and their countries. That assertion my country has always maintained, and my presence here is, in part, for the purpose of giving evidence of her belief that the truth of the assertion has been demonstrated; that, in the progressive development which attends the course of nations, the peoples of South America have proved that their national tendencies and capacities are, and will be, on and ever on in the path of ordered [Page 1427] liberty. I am here to learn more, and also to demonstrate our belief in the substantial similarity of interests and sympathies of the American self-governing republics.
You have justly indicated that there is nothing in the growing friendship between our countries which imperils the interests of those countries in the Old World from which we have drawn our languages, our traditions, and the bases of our customs and our laws.
I think it may be safely said that those nations who planted their feeble colonies on these shores, from which we have spread so widely, have profited far more from the independence of the American republics than they would have profited if their unwise system of colonial government had been continued. In the establishment of these free and independent nations in this continent they have obtained a profitable outlet for their trade, employment for their commerce, food for their people, and refuge for their poor and their surplus population. We have done more than that. We have tried here their experiments in government for them. The reflex action of the American experiments in government has been felt in every country in Europe without exception, and has been far more effective in its influence than any good quality of the old colonial system could have been. And now our prosperity but adds to their prosperity. Intercourse in trade, exchange of thought in learning, in literature, in art—all add to their power and their prosperity, their intellectual activity, and their commercial strength. We still draw from their stores of wealth commercially, spiritually, intellectually, and physically, and we are beginning to return, in a rich measure, with interest, what we have got from them. We have learned that national aggrandizement and national prosperity are to be gained rather by national friendship than by national violence. The friendship for your country that we from the North have is a friendship that imperils no interest of Europe. It is a friendship that springs from a desire to promote the common welfare of mankind by advancing the rule of order, of justice, of humanity, and of the Christianity which makes for the prosperity and happiness of all mankind. It is not as a messenger of strife that I come to you; but I am here as the advocate of universal friendship and peace.