Part 8 (1/2)

BANQUET AT THE GOVERNMENT HOUSE

SPEECH OF HIS EXCELLENCY DR. J. FIGUEROA ALCORTA

PRESIDENT OF ARGENTINA

At a Banquet given by him, August 14, 1906

The American republics are at this moment tightening their traditional bonds at a congress of fraternity whose importance has been indicated by the presence of our ill.u.s.trious guest, who pa.s.ses across the continent as the herald of the civilization of a great people.

The world's conscience being awakened by the progress of public thought, the members of the family of nations are trying to draw closer together for the development of their activities, without fetters or obstacles, under the olive branch of peace and the guaranty of reciprocal respect for their rights.

International conferences are a happy manifestation of that tendency, because, in the contact of representatives of the various states, hindrances and prejudices are dissipated, and there is shown to exist in the collective mind a common aspiration for the teachings of liberty and justice.

America gives a recurring example of such congresses of peace and law.

As each one takes place it is evident that the attributes of sovereignty of the nations which const.i.tute it are displayed more clearly; that free government is taking deeper root, that democratic solidarity is more apparent, and that force is giving way more freely to reason as the fundamental principle of society.

The congress of Rio de Janeiro has that lofty significance. Its material, immediate consequences will be more or less important, but its moral result will be forever of transcendent benefit--a new departure and a step in advance in the development of liberal ideas in this part of the American Continent.

Mr. Secretary of State, your country has taken gigantic strides in the march of progress until it occupies a position in the vanguard. It has set a proud and s.h.i.+ning example to its sister nations.

As in the dawn of their emanc.i.p.ation it recognized in them the conqueror's right to stand among the independent states of the earth, so likewise it later stimulated the high aspiration to establish a political system representing the popular will, now inscribed in indelible characters in the preambles of American legislation.

The Argentine Republic, after rude trials, has completed its const.i.tutional regime, gathering experience and learning from the great republic of the North.

The general lines of our organization followed those of the Philadelphia convention, with the modifications imposed by circ.u.mstances, by the irresistible force of tradition, and by the idiosyncrasies peculiar to our race. The forefathers who drafted the Argentine const.i.tution were inspired in their work by those who, to the admiration of the world, created the Const.i.tution of the United States.

Many of our political doctrines are derived from the writings of Hamilton, Madison, and Jay; the spirit of Marshall and Taney are seen in the hearings of our tribunals; and even the children in our schools, where they learn to personify the republican virtues, the love and sacrifice for country, respect for the rights of man, and the prerogatives of the citizen, speak the name of George Was.h.i.+ngton with that of the foremost Argentines.

Our home inst.i.tutions being closely united and the shadows on the international horizon having disappeared, the Argentine Republic can occupy itself in fraternizing with other nations; and, like the United States, she aspires to strengthen the ties of friends.h.i.+p sanctioned by history and by the ideal philanthropy common to free inst.i.tutions.

Your visit will have, in this aspect, great results. We have invited you to visit our territory in order to link the two countries more intimately; and your presence here indicates that this n.o.ble object will be realized, inspired as it is by the convenience of mutual interests and the sharing of n.o.ble aims.

You are a messenger of the ideals of brotherhood, and as such you are welcome to the Argentine Republic.

I salute you, in the name of the Government and the people who have received you, as the genuine representative of your country, with that sincere desire for friends.h.i.+p which is loyally rooted in the national sentiment of Argentina.

Gentlemen: To the United States of America; to its ill.u.s.trious President, Theodore Roosevelt; to the Secretary of State of North America, Honorable Elihu Root!

REPLY OF MR. ROOT

I thank you, sir, for your kind welcome and for your words of appreciation. I thank you for myself; I thank you for that true and n.o.ble gentleman who holds in the United States of America the same exalted office which you hold here. I thank you in behalf of the millions of citizens in the United States. When your kind and courteous invitation reached me, I was in doubt whether the long absence from official duties would be justified; but I considered that your expression of friends.h.i.+p imposed upon me something more than an opportunity for personal gratification; it imposed upon me a duty. It afforded an opportunity to say something to the Government and the people of Argentina which would justly represent the sentiments and the feelings of the people of the United States toward you all. We do not know as much as we ought in the United States; we do not know as much as I would like to feel we know; but we have a traditional right to be interested in Argentina. I thought today, when we were all involved in the common misfortune, at the time of my landing, that, after all, the United States and Argentina were not simply fair-weather friends. We inherit the right to be interested in Argentina, and to be proud of Argentina. From the time when Richard Rush was fighting, from the day when James Monroe threw down the gauntlet of a weak republic, as we were then, in defense of your independence and rights--from that day to this the interests and the friends.h.i.+p of the people of the United States for the Argentine Republic have never changed. We rejoice in your prosperity; we are proud of your achievements; we feel that you are justifying our faith in free government, and self-government; that you are maintaining our great thesis which demands the possession, the enjoyment, and the control of the earth by the people who inhabit it. We have followed the splendid persistency with which you have fought against the obstacles that stood in your path, with the sympathy that has come from similar struggles at home. Like you, we have had to develop the resources of a vast unpeopled land; like you, we have had to fight for a foothold against the savage Indians; like you, we have had conflicts of races for the possession of territory; like you, we have had to suffer war; like you, we have conquered nature; and like you, we have been holding out our hands to the people of all the world, inviting them to come and add to our development and share our riches.

We live under the same const.i.tution in substance; we are maintaining and attempting to perfect ourselves in the application of the same principles of liberty and justice. So how can the people of the United States help feeling a friends.h.i.+p and sympathy for the people of Argentina? I deemed it a duty to come, in response to your kind invitation to say this, to say that there is not a cloud in the sky of good understanding; there are no political questions at issue between Argentina and the United States; there is no thought of grievance by one against the other; there are no old grudges or scores to settle. We can rejoice in each other's prosperity; we can aid in each other's development; we can be proud of each other's successes without hindrance or drawback. And for the development of this sentiment in both countries, nothing is needed but more knowledge--that we shall know each other better; that not only the most educated and thoughtful readers of our two countries shall become familiar with the history of the other, but that the entire body of the people shall know what are the relations and what are the feelings of the other country. I should be glad if the people of Argentina--not merely you, Mr. President; not merely my friend, the minister of foreign affairs; not merely the gentlemen connected with the Government, but the people of Argentina--might know that the people of the United States are their friends, as I know the people of Argentina are friends of the United States.

I have come to South America with no more specific object than I have stated. Our traditional policy in the United States of America is to make no alliances. It was inculcated by Was.h.i.+ngton; it has been adhered to by his successors ever since. But, Mr. President, the alliance that comes from unwritten, unsealed instruments, as that from the convention, signed and ratified with all formalities, is of vital consequence. We make no political alliances, but we make an alliance with all our sisters in sentiment and feeling, in the pursuit of liberty and justice, in mutual helpfulness; and in that spirit I beg to return to you and to your Government and the people of this splendid and wonderful country my sincere thanks for the welcome you have given me and my country in my person.

RECEPTION BY AMERICAN AND ENGLISH RESIDENTS

SPEECH OF MR. FRANCIS B. PURDIE