The Pan-Angles: A Consideration of the Federation of the Seven English-Speaking NationsKennedy, Sinclair
History
The Pan-Angles: A Consideration of the Federation of the Seven English-Speaking Nations
Kennedy, Sinclair
Anglo-Saxon race; Great Britain -- Colonies; Great Britain -- Relations -- United States; United States -- Relations -- Great Britain
What the Pan-Angle has, he got by taking land {45} and making
the best use he knew of it. For years the British Isles alone of
the Pan-Angle nations sent out migrants. For years the British
Isles alone was the manufacturing country, the others growing
food for themselves and for export. The United States is now
sending out migrants; it is likewise sending out less and less
food. Pownall foresaw that "when the field of agriculture shall
be filled up . . . the moment that the progress of civilisation,
carried thus on its natural course, is ripe for it, the branch
of manufactures will take its shoot and will grow and increase
with an astonishing exuberancy."[45-1] The same future doubtless
faces the other five of us. New lands are less easy of
acquisition in these days. We have recently enlarged our
holdings in the neighbourhood of the two poles, but the
opportunities even there grow fewer. Lands are becoming more
thickly populated and better defended. But beyond that, we have
developed certain scruples that our forefathers in their takings
did not know. Only a need equal to theirs will perhaps impel us
to similar exercise of force. That need will not come until our
standard of living is threatened. Colonizing apart, there is
left to us trade; and trade apart, we still have our present
lands to develop to their highest point. This problem of
development is now receiving our best attention. We support
costly bureaus and experiment stations to discover and teach us
the means of so intensively cultivating that we may get the
highest possible yield from our land. We shall not relax these
efforts.
But as we utilize our lands and increase our {46} trade, other
civilizations will be desiring to raise the standards of living
among their increasing populations. They will need more land.
They will covet some of our little-used pieces, Northern Canada
or Northern Australia, lands we mean to develop ourselves. No
Pan-Angle is minded to part with them. Our rivals, as they grow,
will need more trade in order to keep more factories busy to buy
more food. They may covet our markets, so that rice and tea and
rubber from our present possessions may come to them. If at any
time we lose land or trade, by so much must part of our numbers
suffer, must be less well housed, and less well nourished, less
well cared for if sick. No Pan-Angle sees his way to closing up
his factories or to putting himself in a position where he and
his children can build no more. More babies mean a demand for
more food, and we hope to give them more advantages of every
sort. The only way to retain our lands and our trade is to be
strong enough to protect them. There is no cheaper nor more
effective strength than in co-operation.
[22-1] _Whitaker's Almanack_, London, 1913, p. 484: 454,527
British and Irish emigrants left the British Isles in 1911. Of
these 80,770 went to Australasia; 30,767 to South Africa;
184,860 to Britannic North America; and 121,814 to the United
States.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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