102 THE CLASS STRUGGLE EDITORIALS 103 The Capitalism of no belligerent nation with the incidental exception of Japan has profited the way American Capitalism has. Capitalism in Russia has been annihilated; Capitalism in Germany is on the verge of being annihilated; the Capitalism of Great Britain, France and Italy is staggering under a disastrous national debt, apprehensive of the approach of proletarian revolution, overwhelmed by the problems of resuming industrial and trade relations. American Capitalism alone is bloated, aggrandized, supreme. From a debtor nation, the United States has become a creditor nation, France and Italy being virtually its financial vassals; its Capitalism has monopolized the foreign markets of its beloved allies, while industry has been given a tremendous impetus, finance acquired a new vision, and Imperialism developed more savage appetites.
There was much criticism of President Wilson democratic program; but it is now being made apparent to the critics that this democracy is the characteristic expression and necessity of American Imperialism. This, of course, alters the case; and while the peoples of Europe, who have been captivated by the words of democracy, are being prepared for a great deception, American Imperialism is preparing to satiate its appetites and acquire supremacy.
Mexico, which is considered by the imperialist as our Balkans, is again appearing as the immediate objective of American Imperialism. The New York Evening Sun says editorially, in its issue of December 26. With his usual acumen and his familiar directness of speech, Colonel Roosevelt goes right to the point when he says that Mexico is our Balkan Peninsula. Some day we shall have to deal with it. The letter of our correspondent, Mr. Gardner, gives one concrete reason why Colonel Roosevelt is right. The American owned company which he represents has over 2000 stockholders. Their money was invested in good faith in a legitimate industry. But, says Mr. Gardner, the property has been non productive for the past five yars, owing to the lawlessness, banditry and Governmental incompetence, to use no harsher word, in Mexico. The rubber company experience is but a small item among many, but it means an injury to thousands of our own people, as well as dangerous economic anarchy to the Mexican himself. Some day, as Colonel Roosevelt says, we shall have to deal with it.
The correspondent is Gardner, Vice President of the Obispo Plantation Company, and the gist of his appeal is this. Lives have been sacrificed, property has been destroyed, industries abandoned and foreign capital appropriated or rendered unproductive, all to no purpose whatever, for Mexico appears to be utterly incompetent to establish for herself a stable ernment or afford protection to life and property worth while. Is it not time for the peoples of other nations to take a hand for the good of Mexico herself, and is it not the plain duty of other Governments to see to it that money invested there by their subjects be properly protected and safeguarded in accordance with international law?
Strange international law has during the war been invoked against Germany for its invasion of Belgium; now it is invoked to justify an invasion of Mexico and its conquestfor that is precisely what the gentleman proposes.
Memory informs one that intervention in Mexico was proposed some years ago because that unhappy country was being ravaged by revolution, and that revolution was a menace to all. But now the revolution is no more revolutionary ideals have decayed and become maggots. The regime of Carranza, according to all reports, is a brutal one, using the utmost in violence against the workers and the peons, the methods of suppression used by American Capital at Ludlow, at McKees Rocks, at Passaic. The Mexican Government is a typical government of Capitalism, of bourgeois law and order. Accordingly, the American press, church and capital should praise, bless and encourage this government after their own heart. Why do they not? Because the Carranza Government insists that the larger share of the profits sweated out of the Mexican workers and peons should go into the pockets of the Mexican exploiters. The Carranza Government is trying to make Mexican Capitalism national and independent, instead of being a satrapy of international Imperialism. But this, clearly, means that foreign investors, particularly the innocent, religious and meek American investor, does not squeeze profits out of his investments as easily and plentifully as one squeezes juice out of an orange. We shall have to deal with Mexico!