The more things change

Just in case you’re wondering how long the Republicans have been using the same script…

“...Did the Democrats, asked Republicans, intend to give Puerto Rico back to Spain?  Or forget that American lives had been lost in the Philippines?  Weren’t Democratic anti-imperialists like Stevenson, as President McKinley asked, similar “to guerrillas who shoot at American soldiers?“

Sensitive to the concentration of power that accompanied war, Stevenson informed Bryan that imperialism must remain the central issue of the campaign.  His constant subject, after his brief complaints about high tariffs, “which secure unjust advantages for the few”, remained “the greedy spirit of commercialism which has embroiled our government in an unnecessary war, sacrificed valuable lives and placed the American Republic in deadly antagonism to our former allies in their effort to secure their liberties.  For the first time in our history we are boldly confronted with the question of imperialism - the spirit of empire.“

Jean H. Baker, The Stevensons, W.W. Norton & Company, p. 176, on the 1900 presidential race between William McKinley and William Jennings Bryan

 

Posted by George on 04/25/08 at 12:22 PM
Politics • (7) Comments • Link
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