be as necessary to the commerce of this country as Malta or Aden or Gibraltar are to the Suez route. It lies athwart the greatest commerce that will cleave the seas. With the friendly influence of Cuba and Haiti the commerce of the United States will have a tremendous advantage in case of war or unfriendliness on the part of any nation, even if Jamaica is held by an unfriendly power. Modern nations with the shortening of trade routes, the touching of countries, and their demand for sure commercial conditions, are unfortunately arriving at the thought that there is no inalienable right on the part of any people to control any region to the detriment and injury of the world at large. SUMMARY While many believe that the United States has thrown aside her lofty ideals to take on a program of imperialism, there is a growing colonial interest and expansion which does not, probably due to the very nature of conditions, extend these ideals. Whether the condition is one acceptable to us or not, says the business world, we are no longer merely a continental power. We already hold an Asiatic colony. A weak African state founded from this country has asked us for a protectorate and is already under our benevolent supervision. Toward the south we hold a colony, Porto Rico, and are the protectors of Cuba, Panama, the Dominican Republic, and Haiti. We have responsibilities in Nicaragua. That the end of this development has come is highly unlikely. Political parties may differ as to national policies, internal and external, but they will bend before the natural cause of economic and political development. Our latest three administrations, those of Roosevelt, Taft, and Wilson, have represented widely divergent political views, but the general policy of all toward the Caribbean countries has been fundamentally the same, and the Harding administration has not yet departed therefrom. All have been willing to "assume increasing responsibilities toward our weaker neighbors" to secure economic advantage. It has been a development which is the response of the nation to its larger economic and political interests in the Larger Canal Zone.