"The system of immigration and labor lately organized within the limits of the island, and the tyranny and oppression which characterize its immediate rulers, threaten an insurrection at every moment which may result in direful consequences to the American people. "Cuba has thus become to us an unceasing danger, and a permanent cause for anxiety and alarm. "Should Spain reject the present golden opportunity for developing her resources and removing her financial embarrassments, it may never come again. "Extreme oppression, it is now universally admitted, justifies any people in endeavoring to free themselves from the yoke of their oppressors. The sufferings which the corrupt, arbitrary and unrelenting local administration necessarily entails upon the inhabitants of Cuba cannot fail to stimulate and keep alive that spirit of resistance and revolution against Spain which has of late years been so often manifested. In this condition of affairs it is vain to expect that the sympathies of the people of the United States will not be warmly enlisted in favor of their oppressed neighbors. "The United States has never acquired a foot of territory except by fair purchase, or, as in the case of Texas, upon the free and voluntary application of the people of that independent State, who desired to blend their destinies with our own. "It is certain that, should the Cubans themselves organize an insurrection against the Spanish government, no human power could, in our opinion, prevent the people and government of the United States from taking part in such a civil war in support of their neighbors and friends." We have quoted thus largely from the Ostend manifesto, because it seems to us, with one exception, to be so pertinent to the present status of affairs. The one exception is: We no longer desire the annexation of Cuba. The present war is a holy war. It has been entered into wholly and entirely from motives of philanthropy, to give to a suffering and downtrodden people the blessings of freedom which we ourselves enjoy. Moreover, the manifesto clearly shows that the causes of Cuban uprising are of no recent date; and that, before the United States rose in its wrath, it was patient and long-suffering. Although the Senate debated the questions raised by the manifesto for a long time, nothing resulted from the deliberations. Questions of extraordinary moment were arising in our own country, from which terrible results were to ensue, and for the time being, indeed for years to come, everything else sank into insignificance. Meantime, the question of independence was still being agitated in Cuba.