The Path of Empire. A Chronicle of the United States as a World Power
by Carl Russell Fish
Many of the publicists of these three powers, however, doubted their capacity to walk entirely alone. On
the one hand they noted the growing influence of the Germans in Brazil and the indications of Japanese
interest in many places, and on the other they divined the fundamental sincerity of the professions of the
United States and were anxious to cooperate with this nation. Not strong enough to control the policy of
the various countries, these men at least countered those chauvinists who urged that hostility to the
United States was a first duty compared with which the danger of non-American interference might be
neglected.
Confronted by this divided attitude, the United States sought to win over but not to compel. Nothing
more completely met American views than that each power should maintain for itself the principles of
the Monroe Doctrine by excluding foreign influences. Beyond that the United States sought only
friendship, and, if it were agreeable, such unity as should be mutually advantageous. In 1906 Elihu Root,
the Secretary of State, made a tour of South America with a view of expressing these sentiments; and in
1913-1914 ex-President Roosevelt took occasion, on the way to his Brazilian hunting trip, to assure the
people of the great South American powers that the "Big Stick" was not intended to intimidate them.
Pan-American unity was still, when President Taft went out of office in 1913, an aspiration rather than a
realized fact, though the tangible evidences of unity had vastly multiplied since 1898, and the recurring
congresses provided a basis of organization upon which some substantial structure might be built.
The United States had sincerely hoped that Mexico, like the "A.B.C." powers, was another Latin
American power which had found itself. Of all it was certainly the most friendly and the most intimate.
The closeness of its relations with the United States is indicated by the fact that in the forty years
between 1868 and 1908, forty agreements, treaties, and conventions had been concluded between the two
countries. Nor was intimacy confined to the Governments. The peace arranged by President Diaz had
brought foreign capital by the billion to aid the internal development of the country, and of this money
more had come from the United States than from any other nation. Nor was it financial aid alone which
had gone across the border. There was but little American colonization, it is true, but business managers,
engineers, mine foremen, and ranch superintendents formed thousands of links binding the nations
together. The climax of intimacy seemed reached when, in 1910, a general treaty of arbitration was made
after President Taft and President Diaz had met at El Paso on the Mexican border in a personal
conference. A personal interview between the President of the United States and the chief of a foreign
state was almost unique in American history, owing to the convention that the President should not
depart from the national territory.
It was, therefore, with a bitter sense of disappointment that Americans heard of the revolution
inaugurated in 1910 by Francisco Madero. In common with France, Spain, Great Britain, and Germany,
the United States was disturbed for the safety of the investments and persons of its citizens. The
Government was also concerned because the points of first and most persistent fighting were where the
various railroads crossed the American boundary. This circumstance brought the whole border within the
range of disturbance. The Government was apprehensive, too, as to the effect of long-continued war
upon territories within the circle of its chief interest, the Caribbean area. Yet, when the first surprise
caused by the revolution had passed and the reason for the outbreak was perceived, - the fact that the
order and apparent prosperity of the Diaz regime had been founded upon the oppression and exploitation
of the masses, - public sympathy in the United States went out to Madero and his supporters.
The Diaz Government collapsed with surprising suddenness. The resignation of President Diaz in May,
1911, was accepted as a proof of the popular character and the success of the revolution, and Madero,
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