Famous Givers and Their GiftsBolton, Sarah Knowles
History
Famous Givers and Their Gifts
Bolton, Sarah Knowles
Philanthropists
While Mr. Carnegie admires and loves the Republic, he is devoted to the
mother country, and is a most earnest advocate of peace between us. He
writes: "Of all the desirable political changes which it seems to me
possible for this generation to effect, I consider it by far the most
important for the welfare of the race, that every civilized nation
should be pledged, as the Republic is, to offer peaceful arbitration to
its opponent before the senseless, inhuman work of human slaughter
begins."
In his "Imperial Federation" he writes: "War between members of our race
may be said to be already banished; for English-speaking men will never
again be called upon to destroy each other.... Both parties in America,
and each successive government, are pledged to offer peaceful
arbitration for the adjustment of all international difficulties,--a
position which it is to be hoped will soon be reached by Britain, at
least in regard to all the differences with members of the same race.
"Is it too much to hope that, after this stage has been reached, and
occupied successfully for a period, another step forward will be taken,
and that, having jointly banished war between themselves, a general
council should be evolved by the English-speaking nations, to which may
at first only be referred all questions of dispute between them?...
"The Supreme Court of the United States is extolled by the statesmen of
all parties in Britain, and has just received the compliment of being
copied in the plan for the Australian Commonwealth. Building upon it,
may we not expect that a still higher Supreme Court is one day to come,
which shall judge between the nations of the entire English-speaking
race, as the Supreme Court at Washington already judges between States
which contain the majority of the race?"
Mr. Carnegie believes that the powers of the council would increase till
the commanding position of the English-speaking race would make other
races listen to its demands for peace, and so war be forever done away
with. Mr. Carnegie rightly calls war "international murder," and, like
Tennyson, looks forward to that blessed time when--
"All men's good
Be each man's rule, and universal Peace
Lie like a shaft of light across the land,
And like a lane of beams athwart the sea."
Mr. Carnegie has also written, in the _North American Review_ for June,
1891, "The A. B. C. of Money," urging the Republic to keep "its standard
in the future, as in the past, not fluctuating silver, but unchanging
gold."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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