2 A- 1804 PLEASE RETURN TWIS. WHEN FILL:ED. CHARL-ES RUSSELL LOWELL, IO E-; TREET. NEW YORK.. 4 TO THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATE -- THE undersigned citizens of the United States, deepl anxious that peace may be restored in the Philippine7 Islands, and that a contest professedly waged in the interest of humanity may not be degraded into a inhuman war of extermination, would lay before you the following statement and petition: In his first annual message to Congress the late President McKinley said: "The cruel policy.of concentration was initiated [in Cuba]February I6, I896. The productive districts con-. trolled by the Spanish armies were depopulated. The agricultural inhabitants were herded in and about the garrison towns, their lands laid waste, and.their dwellings destroyed. This policy the late cabinet of Spain justified as a necessary measure of war and as a means of cutting of supplies from the insurgents. It has utterly failed as a war measure. Itwas notcivilized warfare. It was extermination. "Against this abuse of the right of war I have felt constrained on repeated occassions to enter the firm and earnest protest of this Government." In his special message preceding the declaration of war against Spain in April, 1898, the President-spoke, yet more strongly, saying:.. ' The efforts of Spain were increased both by the dist patch of fresh levies to Cuba and by the addition to the horrors of the strife of anew and inhuman phase happily unprecedented in the modern history of civilized Chris tian peoples. The policy of devastation and concentration inaugurated by the Captain-General's bando of October 2i, I896, in the province of Pinar del Rio.was thence extended to embrace all of the island to which the power of the Spanish arms was able to reach by occupation or, by military operations. The peasantry, including all dwelling in the open agricultural interior, were driven into the garrison towns or isolated places held by the troops... "The agricultural population, to the estimated; number Of 300,000 or more, was herded withi:n the towns and their immediate vicinage, deprived o;the meansof -. t;,! 28n:~~~i~ `iii.~_.'~ -- i?V)I.i.;... i. i. - — i.~.~ ~~::;~~~-~-,:1~ ':i,c~ -~:. "" r, - iI 9'ft cl.,. I C-I. 'I... IL': - 15, F.,.... v. "^ i; support, rendered destitute of shelter, left poorly clad, and exposed to the most unsanitary conditions. Reconcentration, adopted avowedly as a war measure in order to cut off the resources of the insurgents, worked its predestined result. As Isaid in my message of last December, it was not civilized warfare; it was extermination. The only peace it could beget was that of the wilderness and the grave." Under conditions not differing from. those which conf onted Spain, and for the very reasons which in her case we held insuffic;ent, the Government of the nited States seems to have adopted the same policy.( In the " Manila News," an American paper published in Manila, which cordially supports the course which it chronicles, appeared the following statement on Nov\ember 4th last. "The transport ' Lawton' returned yesterday afternoon from a two-weeks cruise, touching at Catbalogan, Cebu. Perang-Perang and Davao. On her outward passage she took two hundred Ilocano scouts for the Samar service. "On the arrival of the 'Lawton' at Catbalogan, Brigadier-General Smith had been in Samar about ten days, and his strong policy was already making itself felt. He had already ordered all natives to present themselves in certain of the coast towns, saying that those who were found outside would be shot and no questions asked. The time limit had expired when the 'Lawton'reached Catbalogan, and General Smith was as good as his word. His policy of reconcentration is said; to be the most effective thing of the kind ever seen in these islands, under any flag. All suspects, including Spaniards and halfreeds, were rounded up in big stockades and kept under guard. Among these were numerous presidentes of sbme towns on the western coast of Samar, who assisted in smuggling rill to the insurrectos. A number - of these rascals were gathered in and made to give up, the proceeds of their traffic, amounting to thousands of dollars, which were confiscated." Samar, according to the American: Encyclopedia in r18I, had a population.of over 250,000 persons and an area of over 5,000 square miles. These figures enable us to understand what General Smith's orders meant. The "Philadelphia Public Ledger," lone of the oldest and most respected newspapers in Philadelphia, is in political sympathy with the administration. In a recent letter to that journal from its correspondent in 'Manila, who is evidently not a hostile critic, occurs the follow2 ing passage: "The present war is no bloodless, fake, opera bouffe engagement: our men have been relentless, have killed to exterminate men, women, children, prisoners and captives, active insurgents and suspected people from lads of ten up, an idea prevailing that the Filipino as such was little better than a dog, a noisome reptile in some instances, whose lest disposition was the rubbish heap. Our soldiers have pumped salt water into men to 'make them talk,' have taken prisoners, people who held up their hands and.peacefully surrendered and an hour later without an atom of eN idence to show that they were even insurrectos stood them on a bridge and shot them down one by one, to drop into the water below and float down, as examples to those who found their bullet-loaded corpses. " It is not civilized warfare; but we are not dealing with a civilized people. The only thing they know and fear if force, violence, and brutality, and we give it to them. "The new military plan of settling the trouble by.; setting them at each other is one that looks promising. We have now sent a thousand Maccabebees to Samar to avenge the treacherous murder of Co. C of the 9th Infantry. They are hereditary enemies of the ' Ladrones' and go forth to the slaughter gayly." Statements like this constantly recur in private communications from the islands and in the letters of newspaper correspondents. They find a ghastly confirmation in the official reports of Filipino losses, in which the killed many times exceed the wounded; and they are not contradicted. If any official attempt has been made to prevent these cruelties-or punish their authors it has not been made known to us. If these charges are not true, the honor of the country requires that their falsity should be proved. The Filipinos have asked us again and again to hear them-have begged that some of their leaders might be allowed, to visit the United States and here in person state their position. This humble position has been denied. We strike, but will not hear. Again the words of President McKinley in his message of April, 1898, about Cuba seem pertinent: "My predecessor made an effort to bring about a peace through the mediation of this government in any way that might tend to an honorable adjustment of the contest between Spain and -her revolted colony on the basis of some effective scheme of self government for Cuba under the flag and sovereignty of Spain. It failed through the refusal of the Spanish government then in power to consider any form of mediation or indeed any plan of settlement which did not begin with the actual submission of the insurgents to the mother country, and then only on such terns as Spain herself might s'e fit to grant." Does not this state our position to-day? Do wee not' insist on unconditional submission and propose for the Philippines such form of government as we ourselves see fit to grant "? Men differ as to whether this country should pursue the attempt to conquer these islands or should leave their people to govern themselves, and upon this point we say nothing n6w; but there should be no room for difference amon- civilized men as to the use of torture and other inhuman methods of waging war. -Every American citizen must be glad to believe that his country's purposes are benevolent and that his fellow countrymen mean to gi ve the unhappy people of the Philippine Islands civilization and good government,,ut our present methods seem ill-adapted to secure the only foundcation on which any good government can rest, the contented acquiescence of the governed. Until we can win the confidence of the Filipinds-can satisfv them that we mean them nothing but good-our professions of benevolence fall upon ears as deaf to our words as ours are to their entreaties. While human nature remains unchanged, cruelty begets cruelty and hate. kindness and sympathy inspire affection. Our policy in the Philippines may extermrinate the natives; but every day that it continues it plants fresh seeds of undying hostility, breeds wrath and suspicion on both sides, and makes the task of dealing justly with this weaker people more and more difficult. The more we learn to despise and distrust the Filipinos the more we become unfit to rule them. A teacher or a ruler must believe in his pupils or his subjects in order to teach or rule successfully. Is it not time to change our course? It is not for the United States to imitate the practices, the policy, the stubborn attitude which we condemned as barbarous and inhuman when they were adopted by Spain. It was for these things that we took her colonies from her. We respectfully petition First.-That an investigation be made in regard. to the practices of our army in the Philippine Islands by a committee of the Senate, and that the exact truth be laid before the people of the United States. 4' Second.-That, if these reports are true, steps ihe taken at once to stop recoiicentration, the killinL of prisoners, the shooting without trial of suspected persons, the use of torture, the employment of savage allies, the wanton destruction of pri\vate property. and every' other barbarous method of waging war, which this nation from its infancy has ever contlemnedl. Th-ird.-That appropriate stcps be taken at once, by treating with the representatlves of the Filipinos iln arms, to secure a suspension of hostilities in ordier that an opportunity be given for a discussion of the situatlon between the Government and the Filipino leadlers, who should be permitted to visit this country for this )uLrpose. olu'eh. — 'I'hat pending th,. negotiations, strict orders be given to the officers in corllland of our troops to ileal with the inhabitatnts of the Philippine ls'ands with persons whom one daly we hope to make our friends. NAME ADDRESS