Latin America and the United States / Addresses by Elihu Root

by Elihu Root

MEXICAN ACADEMY OF LEGISLATION AND JURISPRUDENCE

Speech of Licentiate Luis Méndez

President of the Academy

At the Installation of Mr. Root as an Honorary Member, October 4, 1907

Honored Sir: Because of the office I am temporarily holding, I am given the unexpected honor of placing in your hands the diploma that entitles you to honorary membership in the Mexican Academy of Legislation and Jurisprudence.

You have come to the country of snowy mountains and flowering valleys which perfume our tropical breezes, preceded by the meritorious fame of having preserved always, unblemished during the course of your fruitful life, the reputation and profession of a lawyer, of having penetrated the secrets of the juridical science and of consecrating today all your energies and abilities to the service of your country.

By a happy coincidence, you will find engraved in this parchment as our motto: "Professional Honor, Science, and Country"—the same great ends that have consecrated your life. Never was the diploma bearing this motto conferred upon a more meritorious or greater man.

In science, you have not been the selfish investigator nor in the service of your country have you confined yourself to directing from your place in the Cabinet the important matters of the foreign relations of a world-power.

Knowing that the time has passed for studies merely speculative, and that at the present day every scientific truth cannot be such unless it is applicable, you have most happily found time to scatter the treasures of your studies, either when carrying them as the apostle of peace and concord to other countries, or through your invaluable publications.

The Academy could hardly be indifferent to this phase of your labors, as we owe to it the great satisfaction of knowing you intellectually and personally; and we pay you our profound respect.

Therefore, selecting from among your works the last you have published, entitled The Citizen's Part in Government,[6] it was agreed that we should offer you a translation of the same, in the hope that it may please you as it comes from the able and learned pen of an Academician for whom you have shown particular friendship prior to this time, and who feels for you the just admiration expressed in the eloquent words of welcome that we have all seconded.

We find in this illuminating work of yours the double revelation of the genius that pursues the development of a great idea, and of the generous heart that instills it with an ardor that will make it successful.

I will not take the liberty, Mr. Secretary, of commenting on the selection made by the Academy; but I can assure you that the collection of your lectures at Yale University, appear to me worthy, for the clear observation and teaching they contain, to be designated as the text-book to be read in all schools by youths preparing to exercise the rights of citizenship. Therefore, I beg you, kindly to accept the special copy of this translation presented by the Academy.

Among those who devote themselves to the study of science in general, Mr. Secretary, and more particularly among those who cultivate one special branch, is formed a sort of fraternity of feelings and affections—the fruit of the communion of ideas—and also of respect caused in every really broad man, for the talents and learning of others.

This fraternal feeling has always existed among the jurists of all nations, and in every language there is a word to describe it: compañero, in our Castilian tongue; confrère, in French; and in yours, the most virile and the most expressive, you use the word brother.

As a brother, therefore, this Academy has the honor to receive you in its midst. Foreign though it is by virtue of its by-laws to all matters of militant politics, the Academy hopes and desires that, forgetting for a moment the high official functions with which you are vested and recalling the happy times when you were simply a lawyer, you may come to us to aid with your vast knowledge and generosity of character, in the success of this ideal: "Justice among men and justice among nations."

We hope, sir, that when once more in the calm of your honored home, far from the madding crowd and the cares of business, in the company of the two beings most dear to you, who as a blessing may come to your side to fill your affections and to venerate your white head; when in that tranquillity of the soul you may recall the incidents of your busy life, we hope that the recollection of the brief days you are passing among us may be pleasing, and that in the depths of your heart you may be able to say: "I went to Mexico in search of friends, and I found brothers...."

Members of the Academy, and Committees of Scientific Societies, and all you who have kindly contributed with your presence to enhance the solemnity of this function in honor of an illustrious lawyer: this is a time when he who gives gains more than those who receive. Let us all greet the reception of the new Academician!

Speech of Licentiate Joaquín D. Casasus

The Mexican Academy of Legislation and Jurisprudence has intrusted me with the most gratifying task of expressing in its name its good wishes for your safe arrival in our midst, and of voicing the joy it experiences at being afforded the opportunity of publicly testifying to the high respect and esteem in which it holds the great statesman, the eminent jurisconsult, and the illustrious orator who in his position as Secretary of State of the United States of America is now amongst us, the distinguished guest of the Mexican nation.

Had I taken into account solely my own merits, notably deficient, especially when measured by the side of those possessed by the other members composing our academy, I should have refused such a high distinction. I thought, however, I could discern in its resolution the marked purpose that its homage should reach your ears through the echoes of a friend's voice, and so be all the more welcome to you. With this reason, therefore, in mind, I did not hesitate to accept it. Nay, more; this has made me think once and again that the abundant proofs of your good-will—for which I shall ever remain indebted to you—the very base and foundation of our friendship, were those which you earnestly desired to convey to Mexico in the person of him who was then its representative in Washington.

The Mexican people, from the very moment in which you set foot on their soil, and our Government from the time it tendered you the invitation that your visit to Latin America should have in Mexico its fitting end and crowning point, have proved to you, in abundant measure, by manifestations of every kind, that their earnest desire is that the ties which have for so many years bound us to your country, united by common interests and strengthened by common ideals, should every day grow closer and closer. They have also applauded the constant zeal shown by your Government in fostering relations more and more cordial with the republics of America, so that, inspired by the same spirit and guided by the same policy, they should make this western continent of ours the arena of the peaceful struggle of human effort. Nor do we deny you the enthusiastic and universal praise of which your labor as Secretary of State of the United States of America is deserving, since the program of your international policy, later incorporated by President Roosevelt into his last message to Congress, found a sympathizing echo in every Mexican heart; that program which you made known to the world when, having the Pan American conference for your tribune and the whole of America grouped around you for your audience, we were all welcomed on the hospitable soil of the noble and heroic Brazilian people.

Nevertheless, the Mexican Academy of Legislation and Jurisprudence, while recognizing your merits as a statesman, has desired to confine itself to honoring the lawyer who has brought fame and glory to the American bar, the jurisconsult who has won the unstinted admiration of all the nations ruled by democratic institutions, and the orator whose eloquence takes us back to the times of the Latins, be his voice resounding in the courts of justice, or heard in the academies and universities, or pealing forth clear and inspired in the popular tribune.

You, honored sir, we regard as the perfect type of the lawyer who has known how to perform the sacred task commended to him by modern society. The lawyer is a priest whose duty it is, in the bitter battles of life waged by human conflicting interests, to fulfill a mission of peace and harmony. He is indeed, the champion of homes when persecuted by human cruelty; he who strengthens the bonds of love which maintain the family union untainted, when the depravity of customs threatens its downfall. In stretching out a helping hand to the toiler he is ever a master; in carrying out an equitable distribution of fortunes made, an adviser; in proclaiming the respect due to the law, an example and an authority in maintaining its prestige in the social community. His knowledge should be an arsenal from which to arm the weak and a shield with which to protect the powerful; his voice should be beseeching in its pleading for pardon from society for those who by their crimes undermine its foundations, but inexorable in its demand when in the name of society he calls for punishment. To the poor who strive to defend the bread earned for their children, he is a stay; to the rich who worry over productive investment for their fortunes, a guide; and if, in the errors committed by both sides and which ever tend to separate them, he should be equity; then to put an end to the struggles into which they will irreparably be drawn, he must ever be justice itself.

And you have been all this in your exemplary life of lawyer; this is what has won for you the love of the poor, the confidence of the rich, and the respect of the whole of society; which has placed you in the fore rank of the distinguished men of the American bar, from which only the pressing need of serving the greater political interests of your country could draw you.

Your important labors as a statesman and jurisconsult do not call forth our admiration any the less.

The jurisconsult of our days is not only he who in the Roman Forum ex solio tanquam ex tripode solved the conflicts which arose from the applying of the law; because now the part taken by the people in governmental affairs and the ever-increasing necessities of democratic life have widened his sphere of influence, and he has become to society what the lawyer has been to the individual and the family. The jurisconsult is a mentor of nations; in the midst of our eagerness to achieve greater prosperity and in our constant wrestle as citizens to form part of the public administration, he it is who points out the path of our social and political life, and has to dictate the laws which should conform to our customs as well as those which should be necessary to determine its evolution. He it is who, standing in the prow, with gaze fixed on the distant horizon, steers the ship through the paths which guide nations to the haven of greater prosperity.

And you belong to the assembly of jurisconsults who are the glory and pride of the American continent.

Still fresh in men's minds are the honors you reaped in Yale University with the course of lectures you delivered on the part to be taken by citizens in the government. Your lessons have taught what are the rights to be exercised by citizens in nations ruled by democratic institutions and what their duties in order that governments should be the true representatives of the people's will.

But again, the academy deems it but just to accord all honor to the great orator whose voice all America has been heeding with universal approval for more than a year; heeding, because that voice has ever been the expression of the lofty ideals which America has been pursuing from the earliest days of her freedom and independence.

Nor is your eloquence the fruit of meditation and study; it savors not, like that of Demosthenes, of the midnight oil. It is fresh and spontaneous, such as ought to be at the command of men ever ready to speak to the people of their rights and duties in democracies. It abounds always in that cold reasoning and that inflexible logic which alone can persuade and convince.

But your eloquence contains, besides, all the warmth, all the majesty, and all the sparkle of the Latin eloquence.

Plutarch relates, in his life of Cicero, that when the great orator thrilled the inhabitants of Rhodes with his speeches, Apollonius Molon, after listening to him one day, showed no sign of admiration, but that when Cicero had finished he said: "Cicero, I, no less than the others, praise and admire thee; but I weep for the fate of Greece, for thou hast taken to Rome the best that was left to Greece—wisdom and eloquence."

We in Latin America, less selfish than Apollonius Molon, do not weep; rather do we cheer and reward the orator from whose lips we have heard resound the accents of the Latin eloquence.

The Mexican Academy of Legislation and Jurisprudence, on presenting you today with the diploma which confers upon you the degree of honorary member, has desired to make known to the whole country your undoubted merits as lawyer, jurisconsult, and orator, and on this solemn occasion to bestow upon you its highest possible distinction.

Welcome to our midst. May your visit to Mexico be fruitful in good results to both countries; may it be, above all, one more tie to bind the sincere and unshaken friendship which unites them both; and, since it is the end of your triumphal journey to Latin America, may it add, in your great career as a statesman, fresh fame to your labor and glory to your illustrious name.

Mr. Root's Reply

I am highly appreciative of the very great honor which you have now conferred upon me. It is all the more grateful to me that in the ceremony which makes me an associate of this distinguished body, so prominent a part should be taken by a gentleman who, as the representative of Mexico in the capital of the United States, has not only taught me to admire his rare intellectual ability, but has won from me, by the grace and purity of his character, the warmth of friendship which adds especial pleasure to every new association with him into which I can enter. I feel, sir, that the compliment which you have paid to this little work of mine, produced without any idea that it should receive so distinguished an honor or find its way so far from home, I must ascribe rather to friendship than to any intrinsic merit of the work; but I thank you, and I am most appreciative of the honor that you do me in causing it to be translated into Spanish and making it the subject of your resolution.

Circumstances have not permitted, and do not permit, that I should present to the Academy any thesis or discussion adequate to be associated with the admirable and well-considered papers which have been read by Mr. Casasus and yourself. I wish, however, in addition to expressing my thanks, to indicate in a few words the special significance which this academy and my new association with it seem to me to have. We are passing, undoubtedly, into a new era of international communication. We have turned our backs upon the old days of armed invasion, and the people of every civilized country are constantly engaged in the peaceable invasion of every other civilized country. The sciences, the literature, the customs, the lessons of experience, the skill, the spirit of every country, exercise an influence upon every other. In this peaceful interchange of the products of the intellect, in this constant passing to and fro of the people of different countries of the civilized world, we find in each land a system of law peculiar to the country itself, and answering to what I believe to be a just description of all laws which regulate the relations of individuals to each other, in being a formulation of the custom of the civil community. These systems of law differ from each other as the conditions, the customs of each people differ from those of every other people. But there has arisen in recent years quite a new and distinct influence, producing legal enactment and furnishing occasion for legal development. That is the entrance into the minds of men of the comparatively new idea of individual freedom and individual equality. The idea that all men are born equal, that every man is entitled to his life, his liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; the great declarations of principle designed to give effect to the fundamental ideas of liberty and equality, are not the outcome of the conditions or customs of any particular people, but they are common to all mankind.

Before the jurists and lawyers of the world there lies the task of adapting each special system of municipal law to the enforcement of the general principles which have come into the life of mankind within so recent a time, and which are cosmopolitan and world-wide and belong in no country especially. These principles have to be fitted to your laws in Mexico and our laws in the United States and to the French laws in France and the German laws in Germany; and the task before the jurists and lawyers of the world is to formulate, to elaborate, to secure the enactment and the enforcement of such practical provisions as will weld together in each land the old system of municipal law, which regulates the relations of individuals with each other in accordance with the time-honored traditions and customs of the race and country, and these new principles of universal human freedom.

Now, that task is something that cannot be accomplished except by scientific processes, by the study of comparative jurisprudence, by the application of minds of the highest order in the most painstaking and practical way. In the adaptation of these new ideas common to all free people, the best minds of every people should assist every other people and receive assistance from every other people. The study of comparative jurisprudence, apparently dry, purely scientific, is as important to the well-being of the citizen in the streets of Mexico or Washington, as those scientific observations and calculations which seem to be purely abstract have proved to be to the mariner on the ocean or the engineer of the great works of construction which are of such practical value; and we ought to promote by the existence of societies of this character in every civilized land and the free intercourse and intercommunication of such societies, the existence of such a spirit of comradeship between them that they can freely give and take the results of their labors, of their experience, and of their skill.

This is of immense practical importance in the administration of government and the progress of ordered liberty in the world; for, after all, the declaration of political principles is of no value unless laws are framed adequate to bring principles down to the practical use of every citizen, and the framing of such laws in every land is the work of the jurists of the land. It is because I may be associated with you in doing what little a lawyer can do toward helping to the accomplishment of this great, beneficent, and necessary work for civilization, that I find the greatest pleasure in accepting your election as a member of this Academy, and find cause for gratification beyond that of mere personal vanity or personal feeling.

Permit me to express the warmest good wishes for the continued activity, prosperity, and usefulness of this distinguished body which has so greatly honored me by this election.

BANQUET OF THE AMERICAN AMBASSADOR

Speech of Ambassador Thompson

October 5, 1907

Probably not before has there been such a gathering of distinguished men as are tonight seated at this table at the foot of the famous Castle of Chapultepec. The honored Secretary of State of the American nation is here, the guest of the great Mexican Republic, with such honors showered upon him as should not and will not soon be forgotten by a friendly and appreciative people, nor by the immediate recipient of Mexico's greeting.

Personally, I feel, I am sure, no less satisfaction than Mr. Root on this occasion, a dinner given by me in honor of chiefs of the Mexican nation and other distinguished Mexicans, for the purpose of demonstrating, as best I can, my regard for them, not only because of the very great honor Mexico is doing my country and my chief, but in part for many kindly and friendly acts of the past. That the chiefs of staff of the Mexican President, and many other high officials of nation and state, have responded to an invitation with their presence on this occasion, thus further honoring my country, Mr. Root, and myself, calls for an expression of good-will that I offer as a toast to Mexico and its illustrious President, General Díaz.

Response of Vice-President Corral

In the name of my colleagues in the Mexican Cabinet and other national functionaries, invited to this banquet, I thank you for this very gracious distinction.

I consider myself very fortunate to address such a distinguished gathering in these memorable moments, when the Mexican public offers its hospitality to the honorable Secretary of State of the United States, Mr. Elihu Root, one of the most eminent men in the world, both for his wisdom and his political works, as a defender of the rights of nations, and as the courageous knight of American democracy and universal peace.

It is very satisfactory for Mexico to demonstrate her sympathy to a guest of such high merit; and I assure you, Mr. Ambassador, that his visit to this country will create new and stronger bonds of durable friendship between the two sister republics of North America, and will be a new element of the highest value, in the mission of concord you have accomplished with such great ability, and which is a profound cause of satisfaction to us.

I thank you once more for your good wishes for Mexico and the President of our republic; and, in my turn, I have the honor to invite all present to raise their cups to the powerful nation, the United States, and to its great President, Theodore Roosevelt.

Reply of Mr. Root

I appreciate the high honor conferred upon me by the presence of the Vice-President, the members of the Cabinet, and so many representatives of foreign nations, so many of whom are old acquaintances of mine. It is very pleasing to me to find myself among you, as the guest of the official representative of the United States in Mexico.

I beg you to join me in a sentiment which is not personal—the economic coöperation of Mexico and the United States. This is a sentiment which will be concurred in by all those present, as it will redound to the benefit of all civilized countries who are engaged in commercial pursuits. I hope that the development of progress may follow its course to the end that the two countries adjoining each other for thousands of miles, may, by means of mutual commerce, interchange of capital, labor, and the fruits of intelligence and experience, attain the results reached by the states of the American Union, regardless of the distance between us, because of our mutual coöperation. The signs of the times, as I understand them, show a possibility of an increase in the relations between the two countries, situated so closely on this continent. The whole world has reached a state of progress which renders possible better economic, political, and social relations. A repetition of the war of 1846 between Mexico and the United States would be impossible today;—it would be impossible because the progress of each country, the experience, the prudence of their governments, the knowledge of the business of Mexico would prevent it; general public sentiment in the United States would also be opposed to it.

The European invasion of Mexico, in the year 1861, would be impossible today; no one of the three nations would have any thought of attempting it today. An attempt to establish an empire here neither would nor could be thought of as possible.

The whole world has advanced to a degree when international relations and interchange of courtesies between nations have facilitated the establishment of peaceful correspondence, which would not have been possible before, because of the want of a stability in their relations.

The desire to advance a degree towards the assurance of intimate relations and greater friendship has caused us to accept with pleasure the kindly and gracious invitation of President Díaz to visit Mexico—a visit which shall remain a source of pleasure during all of my life, and during which I have received proofs of friendship and kindness and generous hospitality beyond anything I expected, and for which I beg you, citizens of Mexico, to kindly accept my sincerest gratitude.

Response of Señor Licenciado Don José Ives Limantour

Minister of Finance

You have come to this country with the assurance, often reiterated and always received with applause, of close and sincere brotherly feeling between our two countries, the permanence of which is guaranteed by our common ideals and our mutual respect.

Your mission challenges our warmest sympathy. Voices more authoritative than mine have informed you of this fact, and the attitude of the Mexican people is its corroboration. You have been the apostle of a grand idea, the most vital, perhaps, of any affecting the international politics of this continent and assuredly the only one capable of harmonizing the interests and the hearts of all the inhabitants of the New World. This idea consists in laying down, as the invariable basis for the relations of the countries of America with one another, the sacred principles of justice, and the territorial integrity of each one of them.

Such being the pledge which we have from your lips, and feeling confident that the immense majority of your countrymen endorse the declaration to that effect made by you during your memorable journey of last year, and during the journey that is now in progress, we welcome you as one welcomes a loyal and disinterested friend, without the mental reservation that one sometimes feels in clasping the hand of the great, and moved by the hope of thus contributing, in the best manner possible, to us, towards the realization of an aim that is commended by a high and enlightened patriotism.

Mexico's course for the future is clearly marked out, at any rate as far as human foresight can safely reach. Her geographical situation and the conditions governing the international politics of America assure her, as long as the views which you have proclaimed with a conviction so sincere, predominate in your country, the tranquillity in her international relations which she needs in order to devote herself to intellectual culture and to the development of her abundant and varied natural resources, while at the same time offering hospitality to all well-meaning persons who bring here their contingent of industry and civilization. With a program such as this, it has been easy—and will be still more easy in the future—to regulate our conduct towards you, the citizens of the great nation beyond the Río Grande. You will always be welcome, as it is right and proper that useful and agreeable neighbors who give proofs of their desire to be on good terms and to coöperate in all of the works of progress, should be; and I believe that you are quite convinced that both out of interest and good-will, the Mexican people will offer you every facility that may enable you to take an active part in the social and economic development of this republic.

It is far from my thoughts, at the present moment, to extol the virtues and the good qualities of my countrymen. I may be permitted, however, as a minister of finance, to say a few words in regard to one or two economic facts that have an important bearing on business relations.

Mexico, at the present time, as you well know, is not a country exclusively engaged in mining and farming, but also carries on an extensive commerce and possesses fairly prosperous manufacturing industries. There are many lines of activity demanding industry, intelligence, and capital, and there is an ample field for the utilization of all elements of that nature coming to us from abroad. But a point which all persons interested in Mexico's business affairs will do well to realize is the honesty and prudent habits which characterize mercantile transactions in this country. "Booms" and "bluffs" are exotic plants which can with difficulty be acclimatized here, and speculative combinations rarely enter into the calculations of the merchant.

A single example will suffice to illustrate the characteristics to which I am referring. In that period of stress from 1892 to 1894 when the country, after suffering the loss of several harvests in succession and the ravages of a severe epidemic, was further tried by sudden depreciation of silver, which in the course of a few months cut the gold value of our currency in half, every one thought that the economic constitution of the nation would not be able to withstand shocks so repeated and formidable; and yet we continued to meet our debts with religious punctuality and it was noted with surprise that not a single failure of importance occurred in any part of the republic.

We may be charged with undue timidity, with slender experience, in certain methods that are common elsewhere in the initiation of business undertaking. But these deficiencies and others which no doubt are ours will not debar us, let us hope, from being permitted to join the grand onward march of humanity, and particularly of that portion of the human family inhabiting the New World, towards higher conditions of physical and moral welfare.

Gentlemen, let us raise our glasses to the health and happiness of our distinguished guest and his most estimable family. Let us drink to the hope that his countrymen, taking to heart the gospel which he has proclaimed throughout the length and width of America, may become the firmest guarantors of lasting peace between the two nations, consolidated by warmth of mutual regard and the continued growth of common interests.

BANQUET OF THE MINISTER FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS

Speech of Licentiate Ignacio Mariscal

October 7, 1907

Your presence amongst us as our illustrious guest is an event which will leave a mark in the history of Mexico, for yours is not only the visit of a most distinguished American, but also of the best representative, without the usual credentials, of a great government and a great people. The fact that your visit aims at no diplomatic business, except the tightening of the bonds of friendship between our two countries, has made it the more important and congenial to all Mexicans. Some years ago we had here other prominent and representative Americans, such as General Grant and the Honorable William H. Seward, who came as friendly visitors wanting to know Mexico personally and be known by us. Their flying visits did a great deal of good in promoting official and popular relations, for they tended to a real sisterhood between the two republics of North America. Yours, sir, will complete that most important international work, since your high personality is eminently qualified, especially under the present circumstances, to increase the admiration and respect of all my thinking fellow-citizens for the country of Washington, Lincoln, and Grant.

We know, sir, as the whole world knows, the considerable part you have taken in the peace-promoting, civilizing foreign policy of President Roosevelt, and we fully appreciate your frequent, unequivocal demonstrations of amicable feeling toward our government and our people. For that reason you have been cordially welcomed by us as a friend coming among true friends. May your brief sojourn in this country leave you a souvenir as pleasant as the one it has already engraved in our memory and our hearts.

Seeking to show you our sincere esteem and regard, I propose a toast to your honor, not as a ceremonious courtesy, but as a really heartfelt sentiment:

"Brindemos, Señores, por nuestro ilustre huésped, el Honorable Señor Elihu Root."

Mr. Root's Reply

It is my happy fortune to reap where others have sown and enter into the fruits of others' labors. When Mr. Seward and General Grant visited Mexico, your people, sir, were little known to the people of the United States. The shadow of a war still recent in the memory of men hung over the relations that existed between the two countries, the shadow of a war which, thank Heaven, would now be impossible. The commanding personality of General Grant made his warm friendship for Mexico the beginning of a new era of feeling and appreciation on the part of the people of the United States; and now I come in response to the kind and hospitable invitation of your distinguished President, not to mark out the pathway to friendship, but as the representative of an existing feeling of friendship on the part of my countrymen.

I have been deeply appreciative of all the delicate courtesy, the warmth of friendship and hospitality which have welcomed me and my family here. But I was not surprised. It is but in conformity with all the relations which have existed between the department of foreign affairs of Mexico and the department of foreign affairs of the United States, since you, sir, have held your present eminent position.

I wish not merely to express grateful appreciation for the kindness I have received here, but to express the same sentiment for all that you have done and all you have been in the relations between the two countries. The unvarying courtesy, the genuine and sincere desire for the reasonable and friendly disposal of all questions that have arisen between the two countries, which have characterized the office of foreign affairs of Mexico have been a great factor in bringing about the happy relations that now exist. And we may say, with gratification, that there are no questions between Mexico and the United States which can give the slightest apprehension or cause the slightest concern as to their easy and satisfactory adjustment.

Of course, between two countries with so long a common boundary, whose citizens are passing to and fro, whose citizens are investing money, each in the country of the other, questions are continually arising; but the all-important element for the decision of every question, the good understanding, kindly feeling, and the habit of conducting relations upon the basis of reason and friendship, practically disposes in advance of all questions which can arise.

I suppose it is impossible to read the history of any country without feeling that the mistakes in its history have been the result of a shortsighted, narrow view on the part of its statesmen, its rulers, its legislators, under the influence at a particular time of particular local conditions.

We can all of us look back in the history of our own country and of other countries and see how we now, with a broader view and free from the prejudices of the hour, would settle questions and solve difficulties in a far more satisfactory way.

I suppose that the true object which should be held before every statesman is so to deal with the questions of the present that the spirit in which they are solved will commend itself to the generations of the future.

I think, sir, that the government of Mexico has attained that high standard of statesmanship to an extraordinary degree. It certainly has done so in its relations with the government of the United States; and as a result of the reasonable and kindly way in which we have been treating each other for these past years we behold not merely the fact that of your $240,000,000 of foreign trade, two-thirds of your exports are purchased by the United States and two-thirds of your imports are purchased from the United States; not merely that of your vast exports to the United States, notwithstanding our high protective policy, nine-tenths are free from all duty; not merely that $700,000,000 of capital of the United States has been invested in your thriving and progressive enterprises, so that, while for three centuries and a half the people of Mexico were hiding their wealth under the ground to keep it from being taken away from them, now for a quarter of a century you have been taking out from under the ground a wealth far surpassing any dreams of avarice in the days of old. But more than all that, there has grown up and is continually developing between the people of the two countries a knowledge of each other, an appreciation of each other, a kindly feeling toward each other, which make for the perpetuity of good government in both countries and for the development of all the finer and better qualities of citizenship in both countries; which will help both of us to advance along the pathway of progress; which will make every school in Mexico in which the future government and rulers of this vast land are being trained a better school, and make every school in the United States a better school; which will make every officer conscious of being one of a community of nations, conscious of having in his charge the good name of the country which is known to the people of the whole continent, a better officer than he would be if he were responsible only to his narrow community. As the result of these kindly relations we see two happy, progressive, prosperous nations; and, sir, it is my sincere hope that following the footsteps of the great Americans you have named, through your kindness and hospitality I may be able to add my little contribution toward this great work of national benefit and of international advancement in the cause of liberty, justice, and humanity.