Excerpt from The Anti-Imperialist League: Apologia Pro Vita Sua

The anti-imperialist League has faith to believe that in spite of all that has come and gone, Senator Hoar's prediction that the fall of the Republic would date from the seizure or purchase of the Philippine Islands may'not be realized. As with an individual so with a nation, a new birth into righteousness may be accomplished through repentance and restitution. The atonement made in giv ing back their independence to the Philippine Islands might purge the United States from that treason to democracy into which it has been betrayed and from which it has suffered at home by the reac tion of foreign imperialism, in the assumption by the Executive in the last few years that the end justifies the means, that any methods of procedure, however illegal and violent, may be taken to bring about the object of its desire.

The present programme of the anti-imperialists is simple and hopeful. With whatever degree of sincerity, independence is now found in the mouths of the responsible representatives of the Repub lican party, the President and the President-elect. The anti-im perialists must see that the hope of independence is preserved and strengthened; not betrayed by an idle use of the name, to quiet the agitation of the matter in the United States and in the Philippine Islands; they must demonstrate the inconsistency of Mr. Taft's suggestion that the Filipinos may prefer at the end of a consider able period a relation to the United States like that of Australia and Canada to Great Britain; they must expose the unfairness by which Mr. Roosevelt tries to prejudice the situation when he urges the desirability that the Filipinos at the end of a generation should choose to continue under the protection of a strong and disinter ested Power, able to guarantee to the Islands order at home andprotection from foreign invasion; they must protest against all measures tending to the exploitation of the Islands by private selfish interests, which would crush out the native Filipino and render him as incapable of voicing his desires as are the Hawaiians today; they must endeavor to secure at the earliest possible date a congressional promise of independence which will produce tran quility in the Islands, warn off the speculator and vindicate the good faith of the vague encouragement now given to the Filipinos' undy ing desire for liberty, and the hope and confidence of the Anti Imperialists for the restoration of the Republic to the principles of democracy.

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