ke his advice,
that the Democratic Party could not hope to win a victory
on the financial questions at stake after they had been beaten
on them in a time of adversity; and that they must have this
issue for the coming campaign. He was besought by his wiser
political associates to go away and leave the Senate to settle
the matter. But he remained.

After that it became impossible, not only to defeat the Treaty,
but to defeat the policy which had inspired it. The Treaty
pledged that the Philippine Islands should be governed by
Congress. It undertook obligations which require for their
fulfillment, at least ten years' control of the Islands.
It put the people of the Philippine Islands in the attitude
of abandoning the Republic they had formed, and of acknowledging
not only our supremacy but that they were neither entitled
or fit to govern themselves or to carry on the war which had
unfortunately broken out. I do not mean to imply that, as
I have said, a large number of the Democratic Party both in
public life and out of it, were not sincere and zealous in
their opposition to this wretched business. But next to a
very few men who controlled the policy of the Republican Party
in this matter, Mr. Bryan and his followers who voted in the
Senate for the Treaty are responsible for the results.

I have been blamed, as I have said already, because, with
my opinions, I did not join the Democratic Party and help
to elect Mr. Bryan. I disagreed with him and his party as
to every other issue then pending before the American people.
So differing from him, I found nothing in his attitude or
that of his party, to induce me to support him, or even to
inspire my confidence in their settlement of the question of
Imperialism or expansion.

In my opinion, if he had been elected, he would have accepted
the result, have put the blame for it on his predecessor
in office, and matters would have gone on very much as they
have under Republican control.

I have been told by many Senators who voted for the Treaty,
that they regretted that vote more than any other act of their
lives. Enough Senators have said this to me in person, not
only to have defeated the Treaty, but if they had so voted,
to have defeated it by a majority. A very eminent Republican
Senator told me that more than twenty Senators, who voted
for the Treaty, had given the same assurance to him. But
they are very unwilling to make the declaration public. Several
g