Teddy Roosevelt

Peace can only be kept with certainty where both sides wish to keep it; but more and more the civilized peoples are realizing the wicked folly of war and are attaining that condition of just and intelligent regard for the rights of others…

The true end of every great and free people should be self-respecting peace; and this Nation most earnestly desires sincere and cordial friendship with all others.

It specifically provides that the United States alone shall do the work of building and assume the responsibility of safeguarding the canal and shall regulate its neutral use by all nations on terms of equality without the guaranty or…

Its importance to the Nation is by no means limited merely to its material effects upon our business prosperity; and yet with view to these effects alone it would be to the last degree important for us immediately to begin it.

No single great material work which remains to be undertaken on this continent is of such consequence to the American people as the building of a canal across the Isthmus connecting North and South America.

Either the Congress should immediately provide for the construction of a Government cable, or else an arrangement should be made by which like advantages to those accruing from a Government cable may be secured to the Government by…

It is demanded not merely for commercial but for political and military considerations.

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.

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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

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

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

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.