with the
blood of the Red Sea, through which they led us out of the land of
bondage, their locks still moist with the mists of the Jordan, across
which they brought us to this land of liberty."[16]

[16] Thomas Corwin of Ohio, in United States Senate, 1848.

[Sidenote: To be Taken for Granted now.]

Yet, even with those from whom we must thus part company there are
elemental truths of the situation on which we must still agree. Some
things reasonable men may take for granted--some that surely have been
settled in the conflict of arms, of diplomacy, and of debate since the
spring of 1898. Regret them if you choose, but do not, like children,
seek to make them as though they were not, by shutting your eyes to
them.

The new territories in the West Indies and the East are ours, to have
and to hold, by the supreme law of the land, and by a title which the
whole civilized world recognizes and respects. We shall not speedily
get rid of them--whoever may desire it. The American people are in no
mood to give them back to Spain, or to sell them, or to abandon them.
We have all the power we need to acquire and to govern them. Whatever
theories men may quote from Mr. Calhoun or from Mr. Chief Justice
Taney, the uniform conduct of the National Administration throughout a
century, under whatever party, justifies the triumphant declaration of
Daniel Webster to Mr. Calhoun, over half a century ago, and the
consenting opinions of the courts for a long term since, down to the
very latest in the line, by your own Judge Morrow, to the effect, in a
word, that this Government, like every other one in the world, has
power to acquire "territory and other property" anywhere, and govern it
as it pleases.[17]

[17] Over a month after the above was delivered came the first
recent judicial expression of a contrary view. It was by Judge
William Lochren of the United States Circuit Court at St. Paul,
in the case of habeas corpus proceedings against Reeve, warden of
the Minnesota State Prison at Stillwater, for the release of a
Porto Rican named Ortiz. He was held for the murder of a private
soldier of the United States, sentenced to death by a Military
Commission at San Juan, and, on commutation of the sentence by
the President of the United States, sent to this State Prison for
life. Judge Lochren denied the writ on the ground that the
conviction took place before the Tr