this Eastern area was a course quite open to the United
States and one which some of the powers at least would have welcomed.
Hay, however, wrote to Paul Dana on March 16, 1899, as follows: "We are,
of course, opposed to the dismemberment of that empire [China], and we
do not think that the public opinion of the United States would justify
this Government in taking part in the great game of spoliation now going
on." He felt also that the United States should not tie its hands by
"formal alliances with other Powers interested," nor was he prepared "to
assure China that we would join her in repelling that demand by armed
force."

It remained, then, for the Secretary of State to find a lever for
peaceful interference on the part of his country and a plan for future
operations. The first he found in the commercial interest of the United
States. Since the Government refrained from pressing for special favors
in any single part of the Chinese Empire, it could demand that American
interests be not infringed anywhere. The Secretary of State realized
that in a democracy statesmen cannot overlook the necessity of
condensing their policies into popular catchwords or slogans. Today
such phrases represent in large measure the power referred to in the old
saying: "Let me make the songs of a nation, and I care not who makes its
laws." The single phrase, "scrap of paper," probably cost Germany more
than any one of her atrocious deeds in the Great War. Hay's policy
with regard to China had the advantage of two such phrases. The "golden
rule," however, proved less lasting than the "open door," which was
coined apparently in the instructions to the Paris Peace Commission.
This phrase expressed just what the United States meant. The precise
plan of the American Government was outlined and its execution
undertaken in a circular note of September 6, 1899, which the Secretary
of State addressed to London, Berlin, and St. Petersburg. In this
he asked the powers to agree to respect all existing open ports and
established interests within their respective spheres, to enforce the
Chinese tariff and no other, and to refrain from all discrimination
in port and railroad charges. To make such a proposal to the European
powers required courage. In its essential elements the situation in the
Far East was not unlike the internal economic condition prevailing at
the same time in the United States. In this country great transportation
monopolies had been