The Soul of Democracy | Page 8

of claim-jumping, reprehensible in varying degrees.
I suppose no thoughtful Englishman would attempt to justify, on high
moral grounds, the building up of the British empire: for instance, the
possession of Egypt and India by Britain. How does India happen to be
a part of the British realm? Every one knows the answer. The East
India Company was simply the most adventurous and enterprising
trading company then in the world. It grew rich trading with the Orient,
established the supremacy of the British merchant marine, got into
difficulties with French rivals and native rulers, fought brilliantly for its

rights, as it had every reason to do, conquered territory and
consolidated its possessions, ruling chiefly through native princes. It
became so powerful that it did not seem wise to the British government
to permit a private corporation to exercise such ever-growing political
authority. It was regulated, and in the end abolished, by act of
Parliament; its possessions were taken over by the Crown; the
conquests were extended and completed, and India today is a gem in
the crown of the British empire.
What justifies Britain, as far as she has justification, is the remarkable
wisdom and generosity with which she has extended, not onlylaw and
order and protection to life and property, but freedom and autonomous
self-government, to her colonies and subject populations, with certain
tragic exceptions, about as fast as this could safely be done. It is that
which holds the British empire together. Great irregular empire,
stretching over a large part of the globe: but for this it would fall to
pieces over night. It would be impossible for force, administered at the
top, to hold it together. The splendid response of her colonies in this
War has been purely voluntary. That Canada has four hundred thousand
trained men at the front, or ready to go, is due wholly to her free
response to the wise generosity of England's policy, and in no degree to
compulsion, which would have been impossible. This justification of
the British empire is, nevertheless, as in the case of Rome, after the fact,
and does not justify morally the building up of the empire.
Our own hands are not entirely clean. It is true we came late on the
stage of history, and, starting as a democracy, were instinctively
opposed to empire building. Thus our brief record is cleaner than that
of the older nations. Nevertheless, there are examples of claim-jumping
in our history. The most tragic of all is a large part of our treatment of
the American Indians. It is true, with Anglo-Saxon hypocrisy, we tried
to make every steal a bargain. Many an expanse of territory has been
bought with a jug of rum. The Indian knew nothing about the
ownership of land; we did. So we made the deed, and he accepted it.
Then, to his surprise, he found he had to move off from land where for
generations his ancestors had hunted and fought, with no idea of private
ownership. So we pushed him on and on. Of late decades we have
become ashamed, tried in awkward fashion to render some
compensation for the wrongs done, but the larger part of the story is sad

indeed.
There is, of course, another side to all this: the more highly developed
nations do owe leadership and service in helping those below to climb
the path of civilization; but let one answer fairly how much of empire
building has been due to this altruistic spirit, and how much to
selfishness and the lust for power and possession.

VI
THE ETHICS OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONSHIP
We have seen that all empires have been built up by a series of
successful aggressions, and that claim-jumping still characterizes the
relations of the nations. Nevertheless, there has been some progress in
applying to groups and nations the moral principles we recognize as
binding upon individuals. Consider again our internal life: it was
twenty years ago that we coined and used so widely the phrase
"soulless corporations" for our great combinations of capital in industry.
To-day that phrase is rarely heard. One sees it seldom even in the pages
of surviving "muck-raking" magazines. Why has a phrase, used so
widely in the past, all but disappeared? Again the answer is
illuminating: there has been tremendous growth in twenty years, on the
part of our great corporations, in treating their employees as human
beings and not merely as cog-wheels in a productive machine. When
the greatest corporation in the United States voluntarily raises the
wages of all its employees in the country ten per cent., five several
times, within a few months, as the Steel trust has recently done,
something has happened. It may be said, "they did it because it was
good business": twenty years ago they would not