well look that question straight in the face. There is no way
around it, or over or under or out of it; and no way of aimlessly and
helplessly shuffling it off on the future, for it presses in the
legislation of Congress to-day. Wards, flung on our hands by the
shipwreck of Spain, helpless, needy, to be cared for and brought up and
taught to stand alone as far as they can; or full partners with us in
the government and administration of the priceless heritage of our
fathers, the peerless Republic of the world and of all the
centuries--that is the question!

Men often say--I have even heard it within a week on this coast--that
all this is purely imaginary; that nobody favors their admission as
States. Let us see. An ounce of fact in a matter of such moment is
worth tons of random denial. Within the month a distinguished and
experienced United States Senator from the North has announced that he
sees no reason why Porto Rico should not be a State. Within the same
period one of the leading religious journals of the continent has
declared that it would be a selfish and brutal tyranny that would
exclude Porto Rico from Statehood. Only a few weeks earlier one of our
ablest generals, now commanding a department in one of our
dependencies, a laureled hero of two wars, has officially reported to
the Government in favor of steps for the admission of Cuba as a State.
On every hand rise cries that in any event they cannot and must not be
dependencies. Some of these are apparently for mere partizan effect,
but others are the obvious promptings of a sincere and high-minded,
however mistaken, conviction.

I shall venture, then, to consider it as a real and not an abstract
question,--"academic," I think it is the fad of these later days to
say,--and I propose again (and again unblushingly) to consider it from
what has been called a low and sordid point of view--so low, in fact,
so unworthy the respect of latter-day altruistic philosophers, that it
merely concerns the interests of our country!

For I take it that if there is one subject on which this Union has a
right to consult its own interests and inclinations, it is on the
question of admitting new States, or of putting territory in a position
where it can ever claim or expect admission; just as the one subject on
which nobody disputes the right of a mercantile firm to follow its own
inclinations is on that of taking in some unfortunate business man as a
partner; or the right of