In dealing with the Philippine people we must show both patience and strength, forbearance and steadfast resolution.

We do not desire to do for the islanders merely what has elsewhere been done for tropic peoples by even the best foreign governments.

We hope to do for them what has never before been done for any people of the tropics--to make them fit for self-government after the fashion of the really free nations.

History may safely be challenged to show a single instance in which a masterful race such as ours, having been forced by the exigencies of war to take possession of an alien land, has behaved to its inhabitants with the disinterested zeal…

To leave the islands at this time would mean that they would fall into a welter of murderous anarchy.

Such desertion of duty on our part would be a crime against humanity.

In our anxiety for the welfare and progress of the Philippines, may be that here and there we have gone too rapidly in giving them local self-government.

No competent observer, sincerely desirous of finding out the facts and influenced only by a desire for the welfare of the natives, can assert that we have not gone far enough.

We have gone to the very verge of safety in hastening the process.

To have taken a single step farther or faster in advance would have been folly and weakness, and might well have been crime.

There need not be the slightest fear of our not continuing to give them all the liberty for which they are fit.

The only fear is test in our overanxiety we give them a degree of independence for which they are unfit, thereby inviting reaction and disaster.

As fast as there is any reasonable hope that in a given district the people can govern themselves, self-government has been given in that district.

There is not a locality fitted for self-government which has not received it.

But it may well be that in certain cases it will have to be withdrawn because the inhabitants show themselves unfit to exercise it; such instances have already occurred.

The insurrection has become an affair of local banditti and marauders, who deserve no higher regard than the brigands of portions of the Old World.

The heartiest praise is due to large numbers of the natives of the islands for their steadfast loyalty.

The Macabebes have been conspicuous for their courage and devotion to the flag.

Nothing better can be done for the islands than to introduce industrial enterprises.

The connection between idleness and mischief is proverbial, and the opportunity to do remunerative work is one of the surest preventatives of war.

Not to permit this is to do a wrong to the Philippines.

The franchises must be granted and the business permitted only under regulations which will guarantee the islands against any kind of improper exploitation.

But the vast natural wealth of the islands must be developed, and the capital willing to develop it must be given the opportunity.

The field must be thrown open to individual enterprise, which has been the real factor in the development of every region over which our flag has flown.

These laws will give free play to industrial enterprise; and the commercial development which will surely follow will accord to the people of the islands the best proofs of the sincerity of our desire to aid them.