Another exception to this assumption that the Orientals cannot do without opium lies in the Philippines. When America acquired those islands some twenty years ago, our first act was to eliminate the opium traffic, which had been established there by our predecessors. It had been in existence for decades, but we immediately set about to abolish it. Root and branch we did away with it, and shed no crocodile tears as to the "hardship" this would be to the people who had come under our protection. We wished no revenue coming from such a source as this. Yet we might have cut in half the cost of our Philippine budget had we followed the example set by other nations. We have seen that certain British colonies, Hongkong and the Straits Settlements, for example, derive from one-third to one-half of their upkeep expenses from this traffic. But we refrained from treating our Filipinos in this manner. We are called sentimentalists out in the East--at such times as we are not called money-getters. To-day, the Philippines are very nearly ready for self-government. Would they have been so nearly ready had we continued to drug them as they had been drugged before we took possession? Drugged peoples are usually docile and submissive--perhaps that is the secret of much of the successful colonizing, about which we hear so much. But let us leave aside the question of the Orientals, and whether or no opium is good for them. We recognize quite clearly that it is not good for ourselves, for Americans. We recognize that fact quite as clearly as England realizes that it is not good for the inhabitants of the British Isles. Quite as clearly as France, while setting up opium shops in her colony of Indo-China, refuses to establish them in Paris or Marseilles. America is unique in the fact that although we have colonial possessions, we do not have a double standard of morality. We attempt to throw around our colonies the same safeguards that we throw around ourselves at home. But the question arises, how successful are we in protecting ourselves at home? Not particularly so, according to the daily press. How great the danger to ourselves was recognized some thirty-seven years ago by an Episcopal missionary to China, the Rev. John Liggins. In 1882 he published a small book, already referred to, entitled: "England's Coercive Opium Policy and Its Disastrous Results in China and India." The preface to this unheeded warning runs thus. "Our aim in this sketch is to present, as briefly as possible, the most important facts and testimonies concerning a traffic which is as disgraceful to England as it is ruinous to China and hurtful to India.... It is also of the highest importance that the people throughout our wide domain should be aroused concerning the new, fascinating and deadly foe which has entered our country through the Golden Gate, and which already numbers its victims by the thousands, and will soon do so by the tens of thousands."