ot further refer to the
debt or give any specific reason either for a cession or for a
payment. They simply said they now presented "a new proposition,
embodying the concessions which, for the sake of immediate peace,
their Government is, under the circumstances, willing to tender."

But it was really the old proposition (with the "Open Door" and
"Mutual Relinquishment of Claims" clauses added), with the
mention for the first time of a specific sum for the payment, and
without any question of "pacific improvements." That sum just
balanced the Philippine debt--40,000,000 Mexican, or, say,
20,000,000 American dollars.

All these are acts distinctly in accord with International Law so far
as it exists and applies, and distinctly tending to promote its humane
and Christian extension. Let me add, in a word, that the peace
negotiations in no way compromised or affected the Monroe Doctrine,
which stands as firm as ever, though much less important with the
disappearance of any probable opposition to it; and that the prestige
they brought smoothed the way for the one hopeful result of the Czar's
Conference at The Hague, a response to the American proposal for a
permanent International Court of Arbitration.

A trifling but characteristic inaccuracy concerning the Peace
Commission may as well be corrected before the subject is left. This is
the statement, apparently originating from Malay sources, but promptly
indorsed in this country by unfriendly critics, to the effect that the
representative of Aguinaldo was uncivilly refused a hearing in Paris.
It was repeated, inadvertently, no doubt, with many other curious
distortions of historic facts, only the other day, by a distinguished
statesman in Chicago.[13] As he put it, the doors were slammed in their
faces in Washington as well as in Paris. Now, whatever might have
happened, the door was certainly never slammed in their faces in Paris,
for they never came to it. On the contrary, every time Mr. Agoncillo
approached any member of the Commission on the subject, he was
courteously invited to send the Commissioners a written request for a
hearing, which would, at any rate, receive immediate consideration. No
such request ever came, and any Filipino who wrote for a hearing in
Paris was heard.

[13] General Carl Schurz, at the Chicago Anti-Expansion
Convention, October, 1899.

[Sidenote: The Present Duty.]