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to fight against any aggression, whether from without or from within. But we must guard ourselves against the sort of aggression which would be unworthy of America. We are ready to fight for our rights when those rights are coincident with the rights of man and humanity. It was to set those rights up, to vindicate them, to offer a home to every man who believed in them, that America was created and her Government set up. We have kept our doors open because we did not think we in conscience could close them against men who wanted to join their force with ours in vindicating the claim of mankind to liberty and justice.

America does not want any additional territory. She does not want any selfish advantage over any other nation in the world, but she does wish every nation in the world to understand what she stands for and to respect what she stands for; and I can not conceive of any men of any blood or origin failing to feel an enthusiasm for the things that America stands for, or failing to see that they are indefinitely elevated above any purpose of aggression or selfish advantage.

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I said the other evening in another place 1 that one of the principles which America held dear was that small and weak States had as much right to their sovereignty and independence as large and strong States. She believes that because strength and weakness have nothing to do with her principles. Her principles are for the rights and liberties of mankind, and this is the haven which we have offered to those who believe that sublime and sacred creed of humanity.

And I also said that I believed that the people of the United States were ready to become partners in any alliance of the nations that would guarantee public right above selfish aggression. Some of the public prints have 1 Infra, Statement No. 60, p. 325.

reminded me, as if I needed to be reminded, of what Gen. Washington warned us against. He warned us against entangling alliances. I shall never myself consent to an entangling alliance, but I would gladly assent to a disentangling alliance-an alliance which would disentangle the peoples of the world from those combinations in which they seek their own separate and private interests and unite the people of the world to preserve the peace of the world upon a basis of common right and justice. There is liberty there, not limitation. There is freedom, not entanglement. There is the achievement of the highest things for which the United States has declared its principle.

62. Extract from an Address of President Wilson. June 13, 1916

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(New York Times, June 14, 1916)

In your case there are many extraordinary possibilities, because, gentlemen, no man can certainly tell you what the immediate future is going to be either in the history of this country or in the history of the world. It is not by accident that the present great war came in Europe. Every element was there, and the contest had to come sooner or later, and it is not going to be by accident that the results are worked out, but by purpose-by the purpose of the men who are strong enough to have guiding minds and indomitable wills when the time for decision and settlement comes. And the part that the United States is to play has this distinction in it, that it is to be in any event a disinterested part. There is nothing that the United States wants that it has to get by war, but there are a great many things that the United States has to do. It has to see

that its life is not interfered with by anybody else who wants something.

These are days when we are making preparation, when the thing most commonly discussed around every sort of table, in every sort of circle, in the shops and in the streets, is preparedness, and undoubtedly, gentlemen, that is the present imperative duty of America, to be prepared. But we ought to know what we are preparing for. I remember hearing a wise man say once that the old maxim that "everything comes to the man who waits" is all very well provided he knows what he is waiting for; and preparedness might be a very hazardous thing if we did not know what we wanted to do with the force that we mean to accumulate and to get into fighting shape.

America, fortunately, does know what she wants to do with her force. America came into existence for a particular reason. When you look about upon those beautiful hills, and up this stately stream, and then let your imagination run over the whole body of this great country from which you youngsters are drawn, far and wide, you remember that while it had aboriginal inhabitants, while there were people living here, there was no civilization which we displaced. It was as if in the Province of God a continent had been kept unused and waiting for a peaceful people who loved liberty and the rights of men more than they loved anything else, to come and set up an unselfish commonwealth. It is a very extraordinary thing. You are so familiar with American history. . . that it does not seem strange to you, but it is a very strange history. There is none other like it in the whole annals of mankind-of men gathering out of every civilized nation of the world on an unused continent and building up a polity exactly to suit themselves, not under the domination of any ruling dynasty or of the ambitions of any royal family; doing what they

pleased with their own life on a free space of land which God had made rich with every resource which was necessary for the civilization they meant to build up. There is nothing like it.

Now, what we are preparing to do is to see that nobody mars that and that, being safe itself against interference from the outside, all of its force is going to be behind its moral idea, and mankind is going to know that when America speaks she means what she says.

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You have read a great deal in the books about the pride of the old Roman citizen, who always felt like drawing himself to his full height when he said, "I am a Roman," but as compared with the pride that must have risen to his heart, our pride has a new distinction, not the distinction of the mere imperial power of a great empire, not the distinction of being the masters of the world, but the distinction of carrying certain lights for the world that the world has never so distinctly seen before, certain guiding lights of liberty and principle and justice. We have drawn our people, as you know, from all parts of the world, and we have been somewhat disturbed recently, gentlemen, because some of those - though I believe a very small number whom we have drawn into our citizenship have not taken into their hearts the spirit of America and have loved other countries more than they loved the country of their adoption; and we have talked a great deal about Americanism. It ought to be a matter of pride with us to know what Americanism really consists in.

Americanism consists in utterly believing in the principles of America and putting them first as above anything that might by chance come into competition with it. And I, for my part, believe that the American test is a spiritual test. If a man has to make excuses for what he has done as an American, I doubt his Americanism. He ought to know

at every step of his action that the motive that lies behind what he does is a motive which no American need be ashamed of for a moment. Now, we ought to put this test to every man we know. We ought to let it be known that nobody who does not put America first can consort with us.

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But we ought to set them the example. We ought to set them the example by thinking American thoughts, by entertaining American purposes, and those thoughts and purposes will stand the test of example anywhere in the world, for they are intended for the betterment of mankind. You have heard of the Monroe Doctrine, gentlemen. You know that we are already spiritual partners with both continents of this hemisphere and that America means something which is bigger even than the United States, and that we stand here with the glorious power of this country, ready to swing it out into the field of action whenever liberty and independence and political integrity are threatened anywhere in the Western Hemisphere. And we are ready - nobody has authorized me to say this, but I am sure of it ready to join with the other nations of the world in seeing that the kind of justice prevails anywhere that we believe in.

we are

. . . I am an American, but I do not believe that any of us loves a blustering nationality, a nationality with a chip on its shoulder, a nationality with its elbows out and its swagger on.

We love that quiet, self-respecting, unconquerable spirit which does not strike until it is necessary to strike, and then strikes to conquer.

So my conception of America is a conception of infinite dignity, along with quiet, unquestionable power. I ask you, gentlemen, to join with me in that conception, and let us all in our several spheres be soldiers together to realize it.

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