re convictions of either party, there is
also apt to be considerable yielding to the temptation to persuade
the world that the other party is the aggressor, merely to get the
sympathy that usually goes to the innocent victim--the support
of what Bismarck called "the imponderables." Few wars have been
frankly "offensive," like the conquests of Alexander, Caesar, and
Pizarro, at least in modern times; each side has usually claimed
(and often sincerely believed) that its action was demanded in
self-defense and that its cause was just.

To some in the United States naval defense means merely defense
against invasion. This notion is of recent growth, and certainly was
not held by the framers of our Constitution. Section 8 of Article
I defines the powers of Congress; and although eight of the eighteen
paragraphs deal exclusively with measures of defense on sea and land,
only one of those paragraphs (the fifteenth) deals with invasion.
The, first paragraph reads:

The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties,
imposts, and excises, _to pay the debts and provide for the common
defense and general welfare of the United States_; but all duties,
imposts, and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States.

The juxtaposition of the words "common defense" and "general welfare"
in this admirably written paragraph could hardly have been accidental,
or have been due to any other cause than a juxtaposition of those
ideas in the minds of the Constitution's framers. And what more
natural connection can there be between any two ideas than between
those of common defense and general welfare, since the general
welfare of no country has ever continued long unless it was defended.
Now the general welfare of every maritime power has always been
intimately concerned with its sea-borne commerce. It is only by
means of sea-borne commerce, for instance, that Americans can live
in the way Americans wish to live. "General welfare" means more
than mere existence. A mere existence is the life a savage lives.
Furthermore, the general welfare of a country requires the safety
of its exported and imported goods while on the sea, and includes
the right of its citizens to travel with safety in every land,
to buy and sell in foreign ports, to feel a proper measure of
self-respect and national respect wherever they may go, and to
command from the people of the lands they visit a proper recognition
of their claims to justice.

Nava