-government? Is the end in sight?

From the historical point of view, it is instructive to note the exactly
different results reached through the truly American policy we have
pursued in the not dissimilar cases of Hayti and Mexico. While Hayti, it
is true, has failed to make great progress in one century, it has made
quite as much progress as England made during any equal period
immediately after Rome withdrew from it. And that degree of slowness in
growth, which with equanimity has been endured by us in Hayti, could
certainly be endured by us in islands on the coast of Asia. It cannot be
gainsaid that, through our insisting on the policy of non-interference
ourselves, and of non-interference by European nations, Hayti has been
brought into a position where it is on the high road to better things in
future. That has been the result of the prescriptive American policy.
With Mexico, the case is far stronger. We all know that in 1848, after
our war of spoliation, we had to bolster up a semblance of a government
for Mexico, with which to negotiate a treaty of peace. Mexico at that
time was reduced by us to a condition of utter anarchy. Under the theory
now gaining in vogue, it would then have been our plain duty to make of
Mexico an extra-territorial dependency, and protect it against itself.
We wisely took a different course. Like other Spanish communities in
America, Mexico than passed through a succession of revolutions, from
which it became apparent the people were not in a fit condition for
self-government. Nevertheless, sternly insisting on non-interference by
outside powers, we ourselves wisely left that country to work out its
own salvation in its own way.

In 1862, when the United States was involved in the War of the
Rebellion, the Europeans took advantage of the situation to invade
Mexico, and to establish there a "stable government." They undertook to
protect that people against themselves, and to erect for them a species
of protectorate, such as we now propose for the Philippines. As soon as
our war was over, we insisted upon the withdrawal of Europe from Mexico.
What followed is matter of recent history. It is unnecessary to recall
it. We did not reduce Mexico into a condition of "tutelage," or
establish over it a "protectorate" of our own. We, on the contrary,
insisted that it should stand on its own legs; and, by so doing, learn
to stand firmly on them, just as a child learns to walk, by being
compelled to