The Blow from Behind

the Philippine question had really ceased to be an important subject of dissension between the two prominent parties and had become a question with which we were willing to deal as a nation. To the writer's mind that time has now arrived.

At first, those who read these pages will probably be intensely surprised to learn that the literature of the Anti-Imperialists was so largely made up of ridiculous exaggerations, barefaced misquotations, misrepresentations and falsehoods, and to learn that an individual who has gained a national reputation as a statistician would stoop to such methods to prove his points; and yet, to the mind of the author of this book, such indefensible methods are the most likely weapons in the world to be employed by American men who can see nothing wrong in encouraging a public enemy to shoot down American soldiers. In passing, it may also be properly observed that if a person's statistics are taken at their face value it seems easy for anyone to obtain a national reputation as a statistician. Perhaps this indicates the explanation of the reputation of at least

one man.

The conviction, based upon purely psychological grounds and after much thought, was forced upon

[ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]

me that such men would do anything to gain their
point-that they were outside the pale that covers
sound, careful, considerate, responsible minds, and
that, therefore, we must, in whatever they do, look
for everything and anything that is unjustifiable, un-
fair, and irresponsible-and the disclosures herein
set out of their work support strongly this theory-
and it was this belief that led to the minute exami-
nation contained in this book of the literature and
statistics presented to the country by the Anti-
Imperialists.

The discovery of the fact that there are practically
no men among the Anti-Imperialists who ever
carried a musket in war, although the most of them
were, at the time of the Civil War, of enlistment
age, was also the result of reasoning and reflection,
and not of any mere chance.

The author has hope that there will be many people in the country who will be glad that this book. has been written. He will be especially pleased if it is welcomed by those who are or have been American soldiers and by those who are especially interested in them, for he will then feel as if he had done something for them. That is what, above all else, he desires to accomplish; and he seeks no

other reward nor, indeed, is any other conceivable, for the many hours which the preparation of this volume has consumed than the satisfaction which the fulfillment of this desire would bring to him.

F. C. C.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

DEWEY AND OUR INTERNATIONAL OBLIGATIONS

Why

How carefully we prepared for Manila Bay.

Dewey's problems after Manila Bay.

Dewey could not accept the surrender of

Manila. The International Law on this point.

Military occupation under the constitution of

the United States

CHAPTER II