File, No. 710.11/134.

[Untitled]

To the American Diplomatic Officers in Latin America.

Gentlemen: Referring to the Department’s unnumbered instruction of January 14 last, concerning the publication in “El Cronista,” a newspaper in Tegucigalpa, of an alleged speech of Senator Root dealing with Latin-American affairs, the Department encloses herewith a copy of the Congressional Record of January 16, 1913, beginning on page 1609 of which is printed the public repudiation in the Senate by Senator Root of the sentiments attributed to him in the article. [Page 5] Accompanying the Record is a translation into Spanish of Senator Root’s remarks.

These papers have been sent to the Department at Senator Root’s instance with the request that they be sent, through the channel of the Legation, to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of [name of country].

You are instructed to carry out this wish of Senator Root.

I am [etc.]

Huntington Wilson.
[Inclosure.]

Speech of Senator Elihu Root in the United States Senate, January 16, 1913.

[Extract from Congressional Record of January 16, 1913.]

question of personal privilege.

Mr. ROOT. Mr. President, I ask the indulgence of the Senate while I make a statement in a matter of personal privilege.

On the 26th of October last there was published in the newspaper “El Cronista” in Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras, a false and fabricated pretended speech alleged to have been made by me regarding the relations between the United States and Central and South America. I send to the desk a translation of this pretended speech, and will ask that it be printed in the Record as a part of my statement, without detaining the Senate by reading it in full.

elihu root before latin america.

The following paragraphs of a recent speech of Mr. Root, United States Senator, ex-Secretary of State, and one of the most eminent personages of the Yankee country, ought to be known in Central America.

As follows:

“Our position in the Western Hemisphere is unique and without example in modern history. This Nation is a greater and nobler Rome, placed by God to act as arbitrator, not only in the destinies of all America, but also in Europe and Asia, through its natural resources and industrial products which supply the world. The English and German Armies are fed with the meat which we send them. The supplies which Europe buys of us it could not obtain in any other world market if our exportation was suspended.

“Our manifest destiny as controller of the destinies of all America is a fact so inevitable and logical that only the means which we should employ in order to arrive at this end are left to be discussed; but no one doubts our mission and our intention to fulfill it, or, what is more significant, of our power to accomplish it.

“In the second half of the twentieth century they who study the map will be very surprised that we should have ‘waited so long’ to round out the natural frontiers of our territory to the Panama Canal, and on the other side, to the Southern Continent, and that in the same manner (haya pasado con las Antilias todas, coma en el viejo mundo, do no haberse encontrado el nuevo) the same should have happened to all the Antilles as happened in the Old World—that is, not to have discovered the New World, with the difference that we have no need of a Columbus, but rather of a simple joint resolution of our Congress.

“It is a question of time when Mexico, Central America, and the islands which we still lack in the Caribbean Sea shall fall beneath our flag. When the Panama Canal is open it would be as insufficient to place a sentinel only in Porto Rico, without doing the same in Cuba, as if a man tied one arm in order to row, or a lady to put in one earring to adorn herself for a feast.

“Not long ago the Porto Rican delegates, headed by the representative of that island, who has a seat in our Congress, but does not vote, visited me in order that I, as president of the committee on Latin America affairs, should inform them what policy we proposed to follow in Porto Rico, and I expressed myself more or less as follows:

“I told them that I have been, and always shall be, opposed to granting North American citizenship to the Porto Ricans, as well as to other Latin Americans who, for inevitable reasons, pass under our control. I believe that it would be prejudicial for both parties.

“As this desired citizenship from the outset would have to be understood in autonomous form, once granted greater discontent would not be long in following, maintaining that as citizens they are not equal to those of the Union.

“The granting of citizenship implies many other things and is clothed with uncertainty; and in any case it is too much to ask that we compromise ourselves for the Antilles with their handful of millions of inhabitants whose race, civilization, aspirations, and customs are not only distinct, but even antagonistic to ours.

“I told them that they were, after all, Latins, and as such, although the inheritors of glorious historic and artistic traditions and possessed of great domestic virtue and instruction, above all in abstract sciences, and a disposition for the arts, as Latins, I repeat, they understood citizenship and other fundamental principles in a different way to the Saxons; and as these principles are judged by results, we are right and they are wrong. With the Latin Americans there does not exist, nor can we have anything in [Page 6] common, if we except the good will which we mutually profess; but great as are these good wishes, they do not suffice to nib the gulf which separates us.

“The United States augments in population, riches, and importance daily, and we can with difficulty take care of our own affairs, but being the case, ‘why complicate our task with new lodgers in the house, as the Latin Americans converted into citizens of our great Nation cannot help but be?’

“I understand and confess that we are governing badly in Porto Rico, as we governed badly in Cuba the second time. But though we may do it badly we shall always do it better than the natives. In the Philippines, where our rule has been more strict, the results have been admirable. And the Porto Ricans, Cubans, and Filipinos should be convinced of the fact that, since our experience with the annexation of Hawaii, we will not repeat the expedient of citizenship.

“If it were possible for these Latin America nationalities to understand ‘self-control’ and ‘self-government,’ as is the case with our northern neighbors, then Pan Americanism would be a beautiful reality, without necessitating our learning to command in Spanish; but can they or do they know how to govern themselves? Let Haiti say; let Mexico say; let Colombia, Panama, Nicaragua, and, above all, Cuba, twice instructed by us, watched diplomatically since and whose present economical disorganization is as disastrous as in the colonial epochs, say. In the hands of these people is their fate; but I doubt whether it will be good unless it is beneath our protectorate.

“Did not the North American Government find itself on the eve of change to replace the present administration or to confirm it in power, no one would deny that in these hours we would have already solved the Mexican and Central American complication and given special attention to the economical affairs of the Great Antilla (Cuba). And whoever speaks of national finances, speaks of all the Government and national system. Fortunately, and soon, we shall reach a tragical position, since ‘alea jacta est,” and whoever of the three candidates occupies the White House, as they are of one opinion regarding foreign policy and, above all, expansion in America, the country can trust in the Congress, which with hands free will know how to second the Chief of State, as in 1812, 1845, 1861, and 1898.”

This pretended speech contains most arrogant and offensive statements as to the relations which do and should exist between the United States and the Latin-American countries of these continents. I have denied over my own signature the authenticity of this speech, and my denial has been, published in Tegucigalpa. I should let the matter rest there were it not that this pretended speech is being published all over Central and South America, and that some years ago, while Secretary of State, I made a visit to South America and represented the United States in many expressions of friendship toward the people of the Latin-American countries. Owing to this and to the fact that I am still connected with the Government of the United Sates, these expressions in this pretended speech are being treated by the people of Latin America as indicating either a change in the attitude of the people of the United States or insincerity in the former expressions of friendship.

I send to the desk and ask to have the Secretary read one illustration of the way in which this paper is being used. It is an extract from an editorial published in the newspaper “El Fonógrafo,” of Maracaibo, Venezuela, on the 28th day of November, 1912.

The PRESIDENT PRO TEMPORE. It will be read as desired.

The Secretary read as follows:

Senator Elihu Root, who before the whole Spanish America protested, when he was Secretary of State, that the United States did not desire even 1 inch more of territory than that which it already possessed and that the sovereignty of our different States would be respected, and who praised us for our ability and aptness for self-government, by one stroke of the pen has blotted out those statements and other still stronger ones which he made in regard to the autonomy and independence of Spanish America. In his last speech he says: “All America down to Panama, including the islands of the Caribbean Sea, must be under our flag. We need Cuba, Mexico, and Central America as n man needs his two arms and a woman her two earrings.”

In view of this flagrant contradiction, will there be anyone amongst us who will have a particle of faith in the friendly protests of the United States?

We must not entertain any illusions. It is evident that the United States not only do not intend to endeavor to prevent Europe from taking possession of Latin America, but they themselves pretend to become the arbiters of our political and commercial destinies.

Mr. ROOT. Because of the use which is being made of this publication by the enemies of the United States, by the men who wish to stir up strife and create ill feeling between the Latin-American countries and the United States, I wish to repeat here in the most formal and public manner, and to make a public record of the denials which I have already made as to the authenticity of this pretended speech.

The alleged expressions which are thus imputed to me are impudent forgeries. I never made any such speech. I never said any such things or wrote any such things. The expressions contained in these spurious and pretended extracts are inconsistent with my opinions and abhorrent to my feelings. They are the exact opposite of the views which I have expressed on hundreds of occasions during many years, both publicly and privately, officially and personally, and which I now hold and maintain. I will add. Mr. President, that they are inconsistent with the views and the feelings of the great body of the American people.