of circumstances, has practically been taken into the continental vassalage of England. We say under those conditions that the English fleet can be directed or used as a weapon of menace against nobody except the United States of America, and we point out that even though, as many Englishmen contend, it is only a matter of coincidence it is a fact that at any time when any country has put itself or been put in the position of being an economic rival or being an industrial competitor of England ruin has overtaken that country in every way; and we say in the interest of a just and permanent peace, if it can be made under these conditions at all, it can be made only by taking care to see that England should not be put in a position where she can menace the commerce of the United States, and menace the commerce of the world, whenever it suits her interest or whenever it suits her whim to do so. We suggest with relation to that, that in any peace that should be made precaution should be taken to see that there be a general disarmament not only on land but also on sea, so that there will be actual freedom of all the world and not freedom simply of part of the world. We point out the importance of Ireland in any scheme that would practically bring about the fredom of the sea. We say, again in no spirit of hostility to England at all, but only taking conditions into account as they exist, that England can not continue to be the dominant power of the earth; that England can not continue to control the world unless she controls the sea, and that her continued control of the sea is dependent upon her continued control of Ireland; and we say that she can make no better contribution to the general freedom of the world, she can give no better evidence of her desire to make a just and durable and permanent peace, than by consenting to the disarmament of this fleet, which now is so very much larger than the fleet of any other nation or practically any combination of nations. Senator BRANDEGEE. Do you object to being asked a question, or do you want to proceed without interruption? Judge COHALAN. I do not mind, at all. Senator BRANDEGEE. I wanted, if it would not interrupt the continuity of your thought, to have you state a little more in detail what you mean when you say that the continued supremacy of the sea depends upon this control of Ireland by England. I did not quite get it. Judge COHALAN. For your consideration, I would present the geographical position of Ireland with relation to England, the thing to which you remember George Washington referred when he said that if Ireland were 500 miles from England there would be no Irish question. When you think of the relation of Ireland to England, you see it puts England in a place where she can control the ocean, as she can not control the ocean unless she controls Ireland. While it is true that England made last year $225,000,000 out of the control of Ireland, the real secret for insisting upon keeping her control of Ireland is that she wants to be able to control the seas. She can do that because of the geographical position of Ireland only if she controls Ireland. You will remember that you can not approach the Southern coast of England without passing the southern coast of Ireland, and can not approach the northern coast of England without passing the northern coast of Ireland. Under the circumstances, England is going to insist on control of Ireland. As I say, she can make no greater contribution to the freedom of the world, can give no greater evidence of the desire to bring about a just and permanent peace, than to give her consent to having the republican form of government which has been set up in Ireland recognized by herself as well as the other nations of the world. Passing from that we contend that we must as Americans take a position in opposition to this proposed league of nations because of what it does with relation to the Monroe doctrine. We insist that the Monroe doctrine is one of the fundamental principles upon which American power has been reared, and that our foreign policy has recognized it as the great principle of American statesmanship, of American interests, and if this peace convention is going to give its attention to the settling of all problems in the future so as to do away with the probability of some great war occurring in the world, it ought to take into question conditions as they have existed up to the present time, and then the interests of America are the first thing that should be looked out for by those who represent and speak for America. We point out that under the Monroe doctrine, as it has been established, we have grown in wealth, prosperity, and power as no nation in the history of the world has grown. And we say that the Monroe doctrine if it is to be changed should be changed not in the way of diminishing its power, but in the way of strengthening its power. If there shall be a desire to make a permanent peace, the Monroe doctrine should be extended so that it shall include any European interests in the Western Hemisphere. Any European country which is represented here by territory should depart. Since the Monroe doctrine has been enunciated all the territory which is possessed in western America by them has been given up by Denmark, France, Russia, Spain, and Portugal, and the only power remaining in any large way upon this hemisphere, the only European power possessing territory of any extent in this country, is the British Empire, and we say that if there is going to be a permanent settlement to come out of these peace negotiations, the people of Canada, our great neighbor on the north, ought to have submitted to them the question of taking their place among the republics of the Western Hemisphere. or even if an arrangement could be made of joining our country, and in the same way the territory that England has in the West Indies should be turned over to America or turned over to the people of those islands in order that there may be no further menace of American commerce, so far as the Western Hemisphere is concerned. We Irish think that there should be no abandonment of the policy laid down by Washington in his Farewell Address of keeping away from permanent entangling alliances with any of the countries of the Old World. We point out that this has been the policy which has been followed strictly by America and has resulted probably more than anything else in strengthening the extraordinary posi tion we occupy to-day. As the Senator from Pennsylvania said so well yesterday, the only great solvent power left, practically, on the earth is the United States, and it is the duty of those representing America to continue this policy, and we urge that in acting for the welfare of America care should be taken to see that that doctrine should be upheld, and that the advice of Washington should be con tinued and lived up to in such a way that we should neither take part in the quarrels of the Old World nor permit them to take part in our quarrels. Coming down to specific things, as far as article 10 of the proposed league of nations is concerned, we most emphatically protest against that. Under it we are asked to make the greatest departure from American traditions of statesmanship that has ever been made. We are asked to abandon the position that we have taken up to this day, as we did in Cuba, to give aid where people have been struggling to be free, and we would be unable to extend our sympathies to people all over the world who are struggling to be free, if we guarantee the territorial integrity of existing nations. Under the proposed league of nations we should have to guarantee the territorial integrity of the Japanese Empire, the British Empire, the only two empires remaining, and guarantee to them the possession of all the spoils and the loot that they have gathered up in their existence in all parts of the world. No relief could be given Ireland as in the sixteenth century Spain gave aid to Ireland in her fight against England, for we would be compelled to make a fight, and would be compelled to send our men into Ireland, not for the purpose of helping them in their struggle but in order to help England to rivet the chains upon her. We point out that if France should desire to assist Ireland as she did in the seventeenth century and the eighteenth century that she would be unable to do so. We say that it is utterly un-American, that it is against our best interest, against our highest ideals and against our highest ambition, and we point out the facts so well known that if a league of nations had been in existence at the time of the Revolution that France could not have come to the asssitance of the 13 Colonies, or if it had been in existence at the time of the Spanish-American War, that we could not have gone to the assistance of Cuba, to help Cuba to obtain the position that she now occupies among the Republics of the world. Now, so far as Ireland is concerned, of course we understand that this discussion here should be very largely confined to the proposed league of nations. But we want to point out some of the conditions over there that show the state of affairs in the British Empire. We say that no people on earth held in oppression, held practically in slavery, have ever shown such an extraordinary political unanimity in the expression of their desire to change the form of government under which they live, and to become again one of the free nations of the world. Ireland is able to support herself to stand upon her feet. England last year made from Ireland $225,000,000. She gathered in taxation, according to her own figures, some £34,000,000, equivalent to $170,000,000; she spent for the government of Ireland some £13,000,000, leaving a profit of £21,000,000, or $105,000,000, taking $5 as the value of a pound. Last year by reason of her absolute control of the sea, by reason of the fact that she shut Ireland off absolutely from contact with the rest of the world, so far as commerce is concerned, compelling Ireland to sell everything she has to sell through an English channel and compelling her to buy everything she has to buy from the western world through an English channel, she did 95 per cent of the business of Ireland. Sir Horace Plunkett says that Ireland's business with the rest of the world amounted to $820,000,000. The English statistics, so far as we can get them, show that this amount was $860,000,000 instead of $820,000,000. And we say that the English trader, who has no peer in ability, has made profit on the turnover of $120,000,000. This, together with the excess taxation, makes a total of $225,000,000. We say that since the Act of Union the Childers Commission, which was appointed by Gladstone in 1894, composed of 15 men (9 Englishmen), after two years of investigation of English data, reported that Ireland, instead of costing the English money, from January, 1861 to 1896, had overpaid into the English treasury in the form of overtaxation annually the sum of £2,715,000, or the equivalent of $14,000,000, which means that for the 120 years since the formation of the union England had taken out of Ireland over $1,700,000,000. your attention to that staggering sum even in these days. When they wanted to destroy France they imposed an indemnity of $1,000,000,000, but here they have taken from Ireland in overtaxation a much greater sum. In the last 70 years, between 1845 and 1915, the population of Ireland has been practically cut in two. In 1845 the population was practically 8,500,000-between 8,250,000 and 8,500,000. According to the census taken in 1915 by the British Government the population was a little over 4,000,000. We say that you can not find any parallel in the history of the world as that. Senator Knox. From what years? Judge COHALAN. Seventy years; from 1845 to 1915. Judge COHALAN. I would say, in relation to that, by way of comparison, that the peoples of the continent of Europe that were most strongly tyrannized over-if you put it in that way, the nations against whose governments the strongest complaints were made by those over whom they were working and who suffered most under such a condition of affairs, during the time that Alsace-Lorraine was under German rule she grew and prospered in population: Schleswig-Holstein under German rule grew and prospered: Poland under Russian rule; and there has been no parallel, except as Senator Knox has indicated as to Central America. We say that we are dependent for four months of every year upon the foreign markets of the world to find some place in which to sell our goods in order that our factories may run to their full capacity and the men may be employed. In 1913 the business between England and the United States amounted to $875,000,000. The exports from America to England were $700,000,000, while the imports from England to America were $175,000,000. The business between England and Ireland was $675, 000,000 in that year, and the imports were around $350,000,000, so that England found in Ireland a place to which to send her manufactured goods to the extent of twice that she found in this country. In 1801 the population of England was 9,000,000 and the popula tion of Ireland was 6,000,000. The size of England is 50,000 square miles and Ireland 32,000 square miles, showing that the proportion of population of Ireland should be two-thirds that of England. That was the condition when the act of union, passed on the 1st of January, 1801, which Gladstone characterized as the most corrupt act ever passed in England. We say that the proposed league of nations is un-American and that it can not be depended on to guard the interests of America, that it can not safeguard the interest of America. We speak for people who are devoted to America above everything else, who have done everything possible to stand by American traditions and ideals. We urge upon you very strongly, speaking practically for one of every five persons in America, that the Senate report against this proposed league of nations and recommend that the Senate reject. it, and if under any circumstances any part of it should be accepted that under no condition should article 10 or article 11 be accepted, or any other things from which there would be a curtailment of American sovereignty and American independence. We are opposed to the whole league of nations. We believe it is un-American, and urge and insist that in it there can be no justice and no just and permanent peace, and that by adopting it you are only making for a continuance of the war. Senator Moses. Judge Cohalan, you spoke of your speaking for one of every five persons in the United States. Do you intend to imply that there are 20,000,000 of inhabitants of this country who are of Irish origin? Judge COHALAN. We think there are many more than that. Senator MOSES. And the views that you express are shared by that 20,000,000? Judge COHALAN. Suppose I give you some evidence of it. I would like to put in the record the reasons I have for that opinion. On the 22d and 23d of February, in the city of Philadelphia, I had the honor of presiding over the most patriotic gathering of American citizens that I have ever seen. There were 5,132 accredited delegates to the convention. The resolutions that were passed were offered by Cardinal Gibbons, seconded by a distinguished Episcopalian minister and by a distinguished Presbyterian minister and by a famous Jewish rabbi. Among those thousands of delegates were hundreds representing the Friends of Irish Freedom, hundreds representing the Ancient Order of Hibernians, with its more than quarter million members, and represented at this hearing by its national president, Judge Deery of Indianapolis, and its other national officers. Many speakers there represented the Women's Auxiliary of the Ancient Order of Hibernians, and that order is today represented here by its national president, Mrs. McWhorter, and its other national officers; and present also were representatives from practically every Irish American society in this country. From compilations frequently made from statistics as to the racial origin of the people of our country, we feel that we are well within bounds in claiming that without regard to religious belief, at least 1 in every 5 of our citizens is of Irish origin. Senator MOSES. Can you explain, then, why it is that the Irish Senators are so lukewarm? |