The Anti-Imperialist League: Apologia Pro Vita Sua
The League is now making an earnest, repeated demand for the passage of a resolution by Congress similar to the “Teller amendment” in the Cuban settlement, promising independence to the Filipinos, so that content and good order may be established in the Philippines and hopeful and legitimate progress be made toward the goal which is pointed out to them; the only real security for the fulfilment of the pledge “the Philippines for the Filipinos.” . . .
Those who oppose the end which the Anti-Imperialists have in view may be divided into three classes, leaving aside that inert mass of our citizenship which accepts any existing conditions, not concerning their immediate well being, as inevitable and irremediable.
The first class, the altruists, are, of course, as out-spoken as they are sincere. They believe that roads and bridges, sewers and docks, schools and missions, are vital benefits which make the demand for independence superfluous and vain. Why liberty, when you have bread and circuses? The things are done. What does it matter how or by whom they are done? The despot is benevolent. He points out with complacency the “cleaning up” to his subjects and to mankind! But, as Mr. Thomas Mott Osborne has recently said: “There are no places in the world so offensively and tragically clean as your prisons.” Nothing can palliate the wrong we are doing to the Filipinos in hindering their own national development, however slow it might be, through whatever social and political disturbances it might be brought about. The foreign graft is abnormal and cannot be persistent. No foreign civilization was ever successfully imposed upon a people, and the longer the effort is made, the more certain and the more serious will be the upheaval which must follow when the nation claims its own rights.
Those who believe that the predominance of the United States as a world-power is secured by our possession of the Philippine Islands, include the bureaucracy, the army, and navy classes, whose views and whose ambitions do not make for peace and are not characterized by any breadth of statesmanship. The proper influence of the United States, moral, commercial and social, is unchallengeable and unchallenged. The only serious threat to it lies in the retention of the Philippine Islands and not in our withdrawal from them. National power has been always undermined and will ever be undermined by remote and alien colonial possessions, the easy spoil of an antagonist, ready as opportunity offers to turn against the sovereign who has kept them in chains.
The third class, the class of exploiters, does not make itself so much heard, but it is probable that its influence against the cause of justice is the strongest and most persistent. It can not be converted—it must be attacked and exposed, with its grasping efforts after land grants, concessions and franchises. No benefit can be derived to the country at large from “possessions,” but, especially if they were included within the tariff wall of the United States, they may become profitable to the few capitalists who despoil the land of its wealth, ever clamorous (and often thus successful in destroying a native population), for the introduction of coolie or contract labor, the returns from which will alone satisfy their greed. Against this class appeal can be confidently made to those home industries which would be menaced or destroyed by competition with the products of such labor.
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 giving 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 reaction 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.
—Erving Winslow, secretary, Anti-Imperialist League, Boston, 1908
give me 3 anti imperialism arguments
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Based on the excerpt from Erving Winslow's writings for the Anti-Imperialist League, here are three arguments against imperialism:
Violation of Self-Determination and National Development: The Anti-Imperialist League argues that imperialism hinders the natural national development of subjugated peoples, such as the Filipinos. By denying them independence, the United States is preventing them from pursuing their own social and political progress. The imposition of foreign governance disrupts local autonomy and development, ultimately leading to resentment and instability.
Negative Impact on American Values and Democracy: The league contends that engaging in imperialism contradicts the core principles of democracy and self-governance that the United States espouses. The act of seizing or retaining colonies can lead to moral degradation within the U.S. itself, betraying its democratic ideals. The belief that "the end justifies the means" undermines the ethical foundation of the nation and could have long-lasting repercussions on its political integrity.
Economic Exploitation and Inequity: The argument also highlights the exploitative nature of imperialism, where powerful nations seek to benefit economically from occupied territories at the expense of local populations. The interests of capitalists who aim to profit from these colonial possessions often diminish the benefits that could be derived from independence. This exploitation can lead to social and economic harms for the indigenous people and may negatively impact domestic industries in the imperial nation itself due to competition from cheap labor tapped into through colonial ventures.
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