The Pacific Triangle

Doubtless the fathers of this scheme were seeking to overcome the fear of forced transplantation which had made of Australia a land of horror in anticipation, and hence they spread broadcast accounts of the sort of colony New Zealand was to be, which made it alluring. But such are the erring tendencies of human nature that Australia, intended to be the land of one of the worst forms of indentured and penal servitude and the perpetuation of unprogressiveness, set the pace for the entire world in untried liberalism in industry, while New Zealand, likewise advanced, has developed her latent conservatism in regard to imperialism to a marked degree.

For apart from the experiments in labor legislation, New Zealand has never lost any of the dependence on England. She seems to be afraid of her isolation, lest, deprived of communication with the world, she should be forced into a condition such as that in which the white man found the heliolithic Maories. Canada might become a nation separate from Britain; so might Australia. But New Zealand has not even that proximity to a continent which made England what she is, for she is twelve hundred miles from her nearest neighbor. In consequence, the New Zealanders have always maintained a strong leaning toward the homeland, whereas in Australia early resentment alienated the settlers. The New Zealander to-day is the exact replica of the Englishman as we knew him; the Australian is a compromise between an Englishman and an American. The modern Australian on the east coast of the continent is as little an Englishman as possible. I have heard any number of Australians resent being called English. The last "convict" was brought to Australia in 1840; yet the Australians are very conscious of this stigma on them. The other day an English engineer told me that in Subiaco, one of the suburbs of Perth, it was impossible for one to join the tennis-club whose grandfather was born in Australia—lest that ignoble ancestor should have passed on some of the "taint" to his unfortunate offspring. Yet in the eyes of enlightened legislation, the taint involved is of course questionable.

It is therefore not to be wondered at that Australia kept growing farther and farther from England. In the early days each settlement maintained its own government, and so great was the jealousy among the settlements that they sought to bar one another even in the construction of railroads. Victoria built a broad-gage line, New South Wales, a narrower, and Queensland the narrowest,—not mere engineering accident due to any notion of superiority of the special line, but clearly and openly to make communication of one with another difficult. But by 1900 the settlements had outgrown their childish squabbling, and they became federated into the Commonwealth of Australia.

Though this brought them together within Australia, it awoke New Zealand to the danger of being drawn into that union against her will. "The Melbourne Age" prophesied that in a quarter of a century they would be federated. "The fate and destiny of Australia and New Zealand were the same and they should be united in the defense of these distant lands that were held by people of the same thought and same political system." But there never has been much love lost between them. New Zealanders have been anathema in Australia, and Australians hadn't a ghost of a chance of getting a job in New Zealand. Nor was this a matter of different standards of living, except that they both discriminated against the Englishman. And not without reason, for the type of Englishman who set out for the Antipodes was one who generally had nothing to sustain him at home. To the Australasians he was virtually a foreigner, and foreigners of any sort are few in the far South, and are encouraged still less. Yet there is excessive pride in the fact that something like 98 per cent. of the inhabitants are British.

In view of the economic departures they have taken from European conceptions, this would seem a paradox. But even among the workers, the psychological effect of "home" is apparent to the most casual observer. Though material security has been assured by the State, the result of much of the legislation in the Antipodes seems to me to have been something akin to the class system in England. The worker has become legally recognized as a worker, he has been given a minimum wage and protection against imposition, but any effort on the part of labor to crystallize its ideals is still obnoxious to the masses. There is not even any of the impulse found among American workers toward that rise in the social scale which is essentially bourgeois. There is a most decided tendency to accept the status of worker in the good old English fashion. Working-people do not regard themselves as "gentlemen" or as "ladies," these terms in New Zealand having the same significance they have in the old country. Deference to one who does not look like a laborer is pronounced, and the average workman is more ambitious for the "gentleman" than he is for himself. This spirit obtains much more in New Zealand than in Australia.

Than dignity in labor nothing in the world could be more worthy. But if that dignity spells merely content, it lays society open to a renewal of the very class divisions industrial progress has sought to remove. The laborer is too content to remain a laborer actively to enter the lists against injustice. And in a short time you have those who refused to be doped by the talk of virtue in labor on the top, and the laborer at the bottom.

Yet, socially and outwardly, there are not the gaps between the classes in New Zealand that are found in Australia. There are no great restaurants and pleasure places for the rich. All people visit the dainty little tea-rooms, and often workingmen come dressed in their working-clothes, with unwashed hands. In Dunedin the proprietor of one of the best tea-rooms handed out little cards to laborers with "Your Patronage is Undesirable" on them, but the public howled his practice out of existence. This is largely because the level of life in New Zealand is more even. The wealthy do not display themselves over-much, and the most obvious club life is that among the workers. Workingmen's clubs are equipped with very good libraries and reading-rooms, but also with tremendous circular bars fully as much frequented as the book-shelves.

The result is that though, from a progressive point of view, New Zealand is outwardly tame and sober, from a consideration of health, the standard of life is universally good. Any great influx of peoples with standards of living that would of necessity demoralize this normality, would give the country a setback which might take generations to overcome. On the other hand, though the present state of affairs might continue indefinitely, unless New Zealand gains in numbers, her place among the influential members of the Pacific Ocean nations is certain to be strained, if not jeopardized.

Torn between these economic enthusiasms of a small country and the restraining influences of a tradition that is essentially imperialistic, New Zealand has a pretty hard time of it. Naturally enough, she is holding on to her beloved mother country with an excessive amount of talk, while at the same time nibbling away at the ties that bind her. She is in the hardest position of any of the Pacific countries. By tradition adoring England and scorning Australia, emulating the one and trying to keep peace with the other, realizing that proximity makes her more than a brother of her continental kin, looking toward America for applause and assistance, New Zealand is shaping a policy that will probably become a patchwork of colors,—and most interesting to look at.

But Australia is cutting the waters with the force of a triple-screw turbine. And toward Australia we shall have to look for the leadership of British policy in the Pacific. Canada is too close to Europe and America ever to become the real leader in the destinies of the Pacific. The truth of this statement becomes manifest when one watches the inner workings of the island continent. Though New Zealand is more widely known for its great liberalism, there is really more freedom of thought in Australia, more freedom from traditional thinking, more boldness of expression. That was manifest during the war when the conscription issue came up. The New Zealand Legislature simply enacted a conscription measure. In Australia, the Government tried twice to force it through by way of a referendum, and twice it failed. William Morris Hughes, the Prime Minister, had gone to England to attend a conference, promising that conscription would never be proposed. He was wedded to voluntaryism. When he returned, Australians suspected him of having conscription up his sleeve. There was an outburst of indignation. Australians charged him with having had his head turned by fawning lords and ladies at "home" and with sidling up to a title himself. Australians are not very keen about rank; in that matter they are more like Americans. Hughes nearly committed political suicide by declaring himself in favor of conscription. It is said that he was warned by labor not to try to put it through without a referendum. What happened then illuminates the Australian character.

For weeks the country was in as wild a state as pending civil war could produce anywhere. The feeling was tense. Conflicts and wrangling occurred everywhere. Up to the last night of the discussion it seemed as though there would be war. Then came the day of the vote. The quiet and the orderliness was one of the greatest boosts for democracy ever staged. Everything was bathed in sunny restfulness. Workingmen lay upon the grass of the public domain like seals. When they talked it was about anything but conscription. Conscription lost. It lost a second time the year after. Two main factors stood out against the sending of more men to Europe,—labor and Asia.

Almost immediately after the referendum the coal strike occurred. The situation became grave. To conserve fuel for industrial purposes, the Government prohibited the use of electricity and gas except during specified hours. Places of business on the main streets were lit with kerosene lamps, movies were closed, the ferry stations stood in semi-darkness. People conversed as though certain doom were impending. Things looked forlorn indeed. Shops and factories were closing down, throwing thousands out of work. One heard remarks about things heading for a revolution.

Australia is reputed to have done wonders in the way of solving the problems of capital and labor, but there are as many strikes in that Commonwealth as in any other state. The country is crystallizing quickly and is bound to become more and more conservative. Despite the worthy democracy to be found there, every public utterance seemed to bear itself as though made by a lord. One is constantly aware of the presence of the crown, even though it has been removed, like the sense of pressure behind one's ears after having taken off one's spectacles. For notwithstanding its democracy, Australia is bound up in the monarchy. Revolution was hinted at every now and then, but at its mention one also heard the creaking of the bones of empire. It was evident and clear, though hardly spoken. One felt the security which comes from the accumulation of tradition and custom, but it was not comfortable. Even in Australia change seems to be regarded as synonymous with destruction. A marvelous structure, this British Empire, and fit for the residence of any human being,—but not an American. He is too dynamic, too restless, too eager for creation.

And here is where we arrive at the point of meeting and of parting in our relations with Australia. America has determined upon keeping the country "white" against the invasion of Asia. So has Australia. But America has the inclusive tendencies of an empire; Australia the exclusive. America is heterogeneous; Australia is homogeneous. American strikes are regarded as importations, but what about the strikes in Australia? America has a population of 110,000,000 in an area but a little larger than Australia, while Australia has only a paltry 4,500,000. America is trying to amalgamate the diverse races it already has without taking in such people as the Asiatics, whose racial characters are so unyielding. But Australia is herself unyielding. Homogeneous as her population is, she has great difficulty in keeping it from disagreement. With a vast region not likely to be touched by labor in generations, Australia uses the same arguments against outsiders coming in as does America in regions already well developed.

Keeping Australia "white" is the keynote of all Australian politics. For this reason half of the leaders waged war against Germany; while to keep Australia white, the other half stayed conscription. Labor is at the bottom of the "white" Australia policy. The most serious problem the country has to face is her insufficient population. Yet what labor is to be found there receives no more consideration than anywhere else in the world. It is no better off than elsewhere. There is less poverty simply because poverty is synonymous with over-population. To protect itself against invasion of cheap (not necessarily Asiatic) labor, Australia passed the Immigration Restriction Act of 1901. To speak of restricting immigration into a country containing only four and a half million seems suicidal, but Australia went at it without any trepidation and declared for the exclusion from "immigration into the Commonwealth ... any person who fails to pass the dictation test; that is to say, who, when an officer dictates to him not less than fifty words in any prescribed language in the presence of the officer" fails to pass in the judgment of the immigration officer. This is the crux of the Act; other than that, restriction is placed only on those diseased or incapable. In other words, this restriction places a person failing in the test on a level with the criminal, lunatic, and the leper. It is obviously a snare, for it means that an officer may spring any language he may choose on an immigrant. He may ask a Frenchman to write Greek, or a Greek Spanish, failure to comply giving the officer the power to exclude the applicant. The law has kept Australia white, but with pallor rather than purity.

Veiled and unveiled, this White-Australia policy was at the bottom of the failure of conscription. The spirit which dominated both camps was fear of invasion. Argued the pro-conscriptionist: "If we do not stand behind the empire and the Allies in this war, Prussia or whoever may become her ally in future will swoop down upon us." Argued the anti-conscriptionist: "If that is the danger, then let us keep our men at home to protect us against this possible peril." The antis were more open. They pictured an invasion following the sending of men to Europe, and pointed to the importation of coolies for labor in Europe. One member of Parliament was fined a thousand dollars and made to enter into "cognizance and comply with the provisions of the Regulation" because he specified whom they were afraid of,—Japan. And to add grist to their mill, a hundred natives of the island of Malta (British subjects, mind you) appeared at the beautiful front door of Australia, Sydney Harbor, and asked for admission. They did not land. Even Indians are excluded, a deposit of five hundred dollars being required of any admitted, to guarantee his return. A transport has been fitted out in Java with native labor, but Australian workers refused to load it till the fittings were torn out and done over by Australian labor.

Now, the White-Australia policy is, if you care to stretch a point, a humane attempt to avoid conflict. The Australians say to themselves and to the world: "We would rather call you names across the sea than scratch your eyes or pull your ears over a wooden fence." They point to the American Civil War and the present problem in the South as an example. They wish to save themselves future operations by avoiding the cancer and are willing to bear the burden of retarded development for this promised peace. Let us see how it worked out.

It is interesting to note that in 1915, 890 Germans were admitted to Australia, and only 423 Japanese; in 1914, 3,395 Germans and 387 Japanese. The number of Germans for the two years previous was virtually the same, whereas that of Japanese fluctuated from 698 in 1912 to 822 in 1913, and 387 in 1914. From 1908 to 1915 the Germans entered in increasing numbers, while the Japanese decreased. Chinese gained admission in vastly greater number than the Japanese, exceeding them by 1,500 and 2,000 yearly. On the whole the preponderance of arrivals over the departure was seldom excessive, most of the steamers from the south bound for the Orient being taken up by returning Asiatics. With the vast regions of the island continent uninhabited and untouched, this movement of Orientals is only evidence of the check the Government keeps on invasion. The fallacy in the White-Australia policy is obvious. Its psychological significance was pointed to above,—a tendency on the part of Australians, though politically democrats, to revert to habits of thought inherited from England. England is an island kingdom, but the Englishman cannot forget this even when he has taken up his home on a vast continent like Australia. In this day and age of steel ships and submarines, with possibilities of the airship clear before us, for any one to think in an insular way is to lack the common sense of a King Canute. Australia has shown that even with an enemy recognized and fought she has been unable to remain unified in thought, yet she thinks that merely by excluding the Asiatic she will be able to maintain her integrity. Capital in Australia would be willing to admit the Oriental in order to reduce the cost of labor; but as soon as he becomes a factor in commerce—as in the case of the Chinese furniture-makers who exploit Chinese laborers and undersell Australian furniture manufacturers—Capital becomes wroth and shouts for the exclusion of the coolie. Labor, on the other hand, swaggering about the brotherhood of man and the common cause of labor throughout the world, becomes just as nationalistic when "foreign" labor threatens to undersell it. True that it would be easy enough to establish a minimum wage by law, so that no Chinese would be allowed to receive less than that wage for his work, but the principle doesn't work out so easily. Even with a minimum wage and an eight-hour day, the Chinese with his intense application to his job and his manner of living would threaten the white man. But have we not the same difficulty even among a given number of white men, where some are ready to undersell others? Australia, the experiment-station for labor legislation, is the last country where one would expect to find the exclusiveness which she condemns so vigorously. She has shown herself exclusive in her discrimination against the English workingman; she has even been exclusive in her attitude toward her neighbor, New Zealand (an exclusiveness, which is reciprocated, of course); and finally and foremost, she is exclusive of Asiatic and colored people.

This exclusiveness has left a continent with barely the fringe of it scratched. To people like the Japanese, Chinese and Indians, this must indeed seem the height of selfishness. True, that sparse as her population is, Australia has done more to better the condition of her people than has Japan or China; and there is the rub. That mere excessive breeding gives a nation a right to invade other lands is a principle that no decent-minded man could tolerate for a moment. Only people to whom woman is merely a breeding-machine would advance such an argument. And in the chapter on Japan and the Far East I shall elucidate the basic facts in that contention for the elimination of a White-Australia policy.

From the Australian point of view, though admitting that hardships are bound to result, admitting that ethically discrimination is unprogressive, the country is faced by the danger of sheer numbers. Idealistically the Australian policy is wrong. Individually, those of us who know the Japanese and the Chinese would just as soon live next door to them as to any other human beings. But as long as numbers are the racial ideal of the East, there is no solution that would not undermine quality if quality did not defend itself against quantity. I am ready to admit that there are many Australians who are as inferior to the Chinese as the coolie is to us. But the Australasian has one virtue: he does not breed like the Oriental.

The problem of assimilation and Australianization is intricate and sometimes extremely unjust. There is the case of the young Chinese boy born and brought up in Port Darwin, North Australia. In every way he is an Australian citizen. To further his education and westernization, he came to America to study at Harvard, and here fell in love with a Chinese student born in Boston. Now, she is an American citizen. They are to be married. He has every reason for wishing to return to Port Darwin with his wife. But, says the Australian Immigration Law, you can't come in because you're a Chinese. "But I'm an American Citizen, and the wife of an Australian," she argues. "That doesn't matter. We exclude Indians, who are British subjects, from entering Australia, and we intend to exclude you. Australia is the only country in the world in which the white race is still free to expand, and we intend to keep it free for them." "What is America going to do about it?" I asked my informer. "What can she do? The only thing she could do would be to come to a clash of arms with us, and we intend to let the Chinese do their own fighting if they want to. We won't let Japanese who are American-born citizens enter Australia; we may seem a bit piggish about it, but we intend to hold to our own nevertheless." This question was up for the British Minister to decide upon, but at the time of writing no decision has yet been arrived at.

That injustice such as the above is bound to result is obvious. But for generations to come the onus rests on the Orientals, and on those white men who would profit by either cheap or untiring laborers whose minds ask for nothing, and whose bodies are content with little.

Though Australia's contribution to the intellectual welfare of the world has as yet been slim, the advance in political and economic thought has been exceedingly worth while. The freedom of the individual to go his way in life, to develop the best that is in him, the standard of general welfare and the quality of life as a whole so far excels the average of Oriental social life that Australasia is justified in trying to prevent the dilution of its concentrated comfort. We all know and admit that both China and Japan have civilizations, intellectual and artistic, the like of which might well be emulated in the West. But beneath it all is the dreadful waste of human life for which China and Japan must give answer before demanding of the West certain physical and material advantages which we have.

CHAPTER XIX
JAPAN AND ASIA

However, enough has happened to make it necessary for me to extend and enlarge upon some of the phases of the Japanese situation as they now obtain. In my former book I handled Japan as an integer, avoiding implications. Here I shall attempt to show how the Japanese phase of the problem of the Pacific affects the three important elements round the Pacific,—America, Australasia, and Asia. Under that head I shall have to begin where I left off in "Japan: Real and Imaginary," with the question of emperor-worship and its natural offspring, Pan-Asianism and the so-called Monroe Doctrine of Asia; with the ingrowing phases of it, democracy in Japan, and the Open Door without; with Japan's new mandates and what she is doing with them; with the fortification of the Bonin Islands and the Pescadores.

At the very outset, let me crystallize in one short paragraph the essence of the whole situation. We have in Japan now a heterogeneous nation whose ideals are essentially those of imperialism, the political grip on the people being based on the worship of the emperor. The outward consequence of this is that the entire nation is fairly united upon the questions that affect the nation as a whole, such as Pan-Asianism, the leadership of Asia. But if that were all, Japanese rulers would have things pretty much their own way. This strange consequence results, however,—that having been stimulated to feeling that a Japanese is the most superior person on earth, the populace, in this pride, is demanding greater recognition for themselves as individuals. Hence that which the military and naval parties in Japan win in their hold upon the people through increased pride of race, they lose in the enhanced difficulty which comes from a restive population. Added to which are the numerous alien elements that aggression has inherited,—a rebellious Korea and Formosa, a boycotting China, and a native element that sees itself being flaunted by world powers and unable to obtain recognition of racial equality.

It is Japan's misfortune that she is still unable to live down her reputation. With all her might she is trying to stand up to the world as a man, and not as a pretty boy such as she has been regarded heretofore. Hence, it is necessary, that after having paragraphed the make-up of Japan, I do the same with the attitude of the world toward Japan. Wherever I have gone I have been asked a certain type of question that seems to me to hold the mirror up to Japan. The questions are generally these: What business is it of ours, after all, what Japan does in Asia? Isn't it only the conceit of the white man that makes him regard himself as superior to the Japanese? Isn't it true that the Japanese haven't any room for their surplus population? Or, the more knowing, those who have read up on the subject—like the man who signed a contract with a publisher to produce four boys' books at once, one of which was on Shintoism in Japan—assume this attitude: "Let them adore their emperors; it's a charming little peculiarity." There is still a third group. It belongs to the adolescent class, to the age of boys who threaten to lick other boys with their little finger, or "I'll fight you with my right hand tied behind my back," and has been fed by the romancers who portrayed everything Japanese as petite and charming. The Miles Gloriosus, suffering from political second childhood, asserts: "America could wipe the floor with Japan with one hand, just as she could Ecuador." This statement was made by an Englishman with remarkably wide international experience.

Now, until Japan lives down this reputation she will be forced to make as big a showing of her might as is safe, and until then we shall doubtless have ample reason for shouting for an increased navy and an increased army. In other words, as long as we continue to publish the impression that Japan need not be regarded seriously, so long will Japan have to continue to convey the impression that she might become a menace. To deny that Japan is a disconcerting problem is to stick one's head in the sand. But Japan is no more of a menace to us than we are to her. Japan is not simply going to walk across the Pacific and slap us in the face. If any such catastrophe takes place over there, it will be a conflict. "A conflict supposes a violent collision, a meeting of force against force; the unpremeditated meeting of one or more persons in a violent or hostile manner" with another, according to Crabb. On the other hand, it is equally true that those who urge and stimulate war talk with Japan are playing into the hands of special interests that are too narrow in their thinking and too broad in their avarice, and make war inevitable.

There is only one solution, and that is the presentation of facts. But facts alone are sometimes worse than figures. They lie like a trooper. Hence we are in the habit of saying: It is an honest fact. Facts are the most irresponsible things in the world, and without the motives and the spirit that underlie every circumstantial thing in life, they are the source of all conflict and all sorrow. Therefore, let us consider the questions that appear to be typical enough to clarify the situation, but with the motives and spiritual factors included in the answer.

First of all, then, is it really any of our business what Japan does in Asia? I shall have to split this question in two. The "our" side of the matter will have to be answered in the succeeding chapter on America in this Pacific Triangle. Here I shall handle it by inverting it. Is it any of Japan's business what interest we take in Asia? This may sound like a pugnacious question, but it is asked with all due respect to Japan. It raises the question of the Open Door in China, of Pan-Asianism, of the misnamed Monroe Doctrine of Asia. We have come to a new stage in the history of the world. People with a developed sense of justice no longer admit that a man may declare himself monarch of all he surveys without consideration of the rights of the inhabitants of the "surveyed" areas. When, during the war, everything was being done to placate Japan, a certain "understanding" was reached between Secretary Lansing and Viscount Ishii. While declaring for the Open Door it acknowledged the precedence of propinquity over distance, of time, place, and relationship. That is, it admitted that Japan was nearer the continent of Asia geographically than was America. A very remarkable observation it was. Certainly had that not been put in black and white, "understanding" would never have been possible. But what was the result of that "understanding"? Japan immediately translated it into a "Monroe Doctrine of Asia." Here, then, was a fact. Japan most decidedly is nearer Asia than are we. Ergo, Japan has the right to set herself up as the god and little Father of China, to declare the Mikado Doctrine of Asia. But is there any parallel whatsoever? Not only no parallel, but an apparent contradiction in the use of the Monroe Doctrine from the American angle; for that pronouncement involved non-interference in European or foreign affairs. If we adhere strictly to the Monroe Doctrine we have no right to set any limitations for Japan. Our concern is only with the Americas. Even the amount of understanding involved in the Ishii-Lansing agreement is in violation of our doctrine of isolation. On the other hand, we virtually pledged ourselves to keep our own hands off South America, Hence, the Monroe Doctrine, if applied to Asia by Japan, would mean the denouncement of the Twenty-one Demands made on China in 1915, the withdrawal of Japanese troops from Shantung and Siberia, the return of independence to Korea,—and then the demand on the part of Japan that all European powers abstain from further extension of their influence on the continent of Asia. If ever a Monroe Doctrine of Asia was really declared, it was in the principles of Hay in his Open-Door policy. If Japan should set herself up as the guardian of Asia in this wise, she would never raise the question of whether we have any business in Asia or not. It would not be necessary. And Japan would be able to enjoy the fruits of propinquity to her heart's content. Then Japan would truly be the sponsor for a doctrine that could be called the Mikado's Doctrine of Asia and its worth would recommend itself to the respect and admiration of the world. But this, of course, is a dream, and in the words of a worthy Japanese author who "deplored" in his book "the gross diplomatic blunder which Japan made in 1915 in her dealings with China" and the "atrocities perpetrated in the attempt to crush the Korean uprising": "Manifestly, the dawn of the millennium is still far away. We have to make the best of the world as it is."

Into these criticisms of Japan's foreign policies one could read the usual white man's conceit,—asking that a yellow man make such sacrifices as no white man has ever made. There is nothing further from my mind. There is only a groping down into the depths of Japanese practices to discover, if possible, a real basis for the justification of her Pan-Asiatic pretensions.

To me, Oriental civilization is something to conjure with.

There is in the Far East more art and beauty than there is in America. When Europe was so poor as to make the Grand Moguls laugh at the simple presents which Englishmen brought them, to remark with scorn and truth that nothing in Europe compared with the silks and gold and silver of the East, the white man was humble. He wandered all over the world in search of riches which were unknown to him except by hearsay. His dominions never extended over such vast spaces as seemed mere checker-boards to Oriental monarchs. But the white man had his ships, his latent genius, and these he has developed to where his realms now so far outstrip the realms of old as thought outstrips creation. With these the white man has secured for himself a place in the world which the brown and the yellow man now greatly envy. But the Asiatics have much to look back upon and be proud of.

How much of this splendor is Japan's? A great deal! But not as much as the splendor of China, nor as much as that of India. Japan is to the East what England is to Europe. Japan is building up her ships and her material arts to such an extent that she is destined to wield and does now partly wield the same influence in Asia that England wields in Europe. But is that to be her sole contribution? Is that to justify her place as leader of Asia? Let us see.

In Europe to-day there is no crowned head who really rules. The monarch, where he does exist, is the memorial symbol of the nation's past. But the basis of rule is the people. The extent to which democracy exists in fact is not for this chapter to discuss. The slogan of rulership is democracy. Even China calls itself a republic. Round the Pacific alone are three great republican or democratic countries—Australia, New Zealand, America—whose people are reaching for greater and greater independence in the working out of their own destinies.

But what have we in Japan? We have a monarchy with a "constitutional" form of government. The monarch is said to have held his power from the beginning of time. He is literally regarded as a descendant of the gods who created Japan,—which was then the world entire. The myth of his origin would not be very different from any other myth of the origins of rulers, were it not for the recent developments in the history of Japan. At the time of the restoration of the previous emperor to power, it was decided by the rebellious daimyo that the long-neglected mikado, he who for hundreds of years had had absolutely no say in the government of his lands, should be restored to power. That is to say, because there was no one daimyo who could himself take the leadership and become shogun, they determined to rule with the tenno as nominal leader, but themselves as the real rulers. Other than in the superstitious reverence of the ignorant masses for the symbol of the tenno—whose person they had never seen—that lowly illustrious one might just as well have been non-existent for all the say he had in his country's affairs. So far, the situation might not be different from that in England, but England's Parliament is in the control of the Commons, while Japan's Diet—both upper and lower houses—is at the mercy of the cabinet, which, though ostensibly responsible to the emperor, is actually in the control of the genro and the military and naval clans. The worship of the emperor, on the other hand, is made part of the political function, the better to cow the masses into reverential obedience to the wishes of the actual rulers.

The basis for this theocratical grip on the people is Shintoism. With the Restoration in 1868, Shintoism, that ancestor-worshiping cult, was revived as the spiritual core of the new empire; Buddhism was sent packing, and all the cunning of pseudo-historians was resorted to to bolster up this effete and primitive national ideal.

"Let them worship their old emperor," say some, largely those with a love of pageantry in their unconscious. And no one could raise an argument against this if that was where it ended. If it merely meant the binding together in a communal nationalism the thought and devotion of the people, it would be a desirable performance. But the natural result of an artificially stimulated nationalism based on a myth and a deception is that it becomes proselytic in its tendencies. It is not satisfied with its native influence, but begins to reach out. In other words, it takes upon itself the duty of making the entire world one, just as religion and democracy seek to convert the world. And Shintoism is a short step to Pan-Asianism. Pan-Asianism is the logical consequence of Shintoism.

What is Shintoism? In this connection, none is more authoritative than Basil Hall Chamberlain, Emeritus Professor of Japanese and Philology at the Imperial University of Tokyo, and author of numerous scientific works on Japan. In "The Invention of a New Religion" he says (page 6):

Thus Shintoism, a cult without any code of morals, in which nature was worshiped in primitive fashion, was made the basis of the national ideal. There is nothing in Shintoism that might with the greatest possible stretch of imagination become the ideal of any other nation in the world. However much Japan might assume the economic leadership of Asia, it would never be because she could obtain a following for her Shinotistic ideals. "Democracy" has become a rallying cry even to the Japanese, but there is nothing in Shintoism that might counteract that appeal.

"What about Bushido?" Japanese will ask. Regarding this, it is also well to read what Professor Chamberlain has to say:

And when it is further taken into consideration that Bushido, or the so-called code of the samurai, was the ideal of a special class, a class that held itself aloof from contact with the heimin, or common people, whom it at at all times treated with contempt, and cut down even for no other reason than that of trying the edge of a new sword, one sees how utterly unacceptable it would be to peoples of other races and nations asked to come to the support of its standards. And according to one Japanese spokesman in America, only by methods that "had the appearance of browbeating her to submission by brandishing the sword" was China brought to accept the infamous Twenty-one Demands.

I search my memory and experience earnestly trying to find a basis for Japan's leadership in Asia that is not materialistic, and I cannot find any. Energy and intellectual capacity Japan has. Her present leadership in practical affairs is a great credit to her. In time, when greater leisure will become the possession of her teeming millions, there is doubtless going to appear much more that is fine and valuable in the fabric of the race. For Japan has fire. Her people are an excitable, flaming people who may burst out in a spasmodic revulsion against their commercialization. But for the time being, her only right to a voice in the destinies of Asia is found in her industrial leadership of the East, but that is a leadership which is fraught with more menace to Japan than to the world.

Let us review hastily the results of this preëminence. From being one of the most admired nations in the world, Japan has suddenly become the object of almost universal suspicion. To a very great extent, commercial jealousy is playing its part in this change. But that is not all, by any means. There is as much enmity between British and American traders in the Far East as there is between Japanese and American, or any other two groups of nationals.

But the animosity toward Japan is deeper than that of mere trade. It lies at the bottom of much of the seeming equivocation of Japan's best foreign friends. I was talking recently to one of the leading members of the Japan Society in New York, and said of myself that I deplored being regarded as anti-Japanese in some quarters, because I was not. "But," spoke up this Japanophile, "the majority of the members of the Japan Society are anti-Japanese, or pro-Chinese, if you will." They are trying their best to defend Japan, it would seem, and to cement bad relations with good, but the result is that the ground of many sympathizers of Japan is constantly shifting, though perhaps unconsciously. It is due, I presume, to the disappointment of people in that, having regarded Japan as worthy of their sympathy and adoration, they are now finding that all is not as well as it might be.

Then there is that peculiar twist to Japanese psychology that somewhat unnerves the Westerner. This is not a language difficulty, though it is best illustrated by a linguistic example. A Canadian in Kobe told me that he felt a strange shifting in his own mentality as a result of the study of Japanese, something queer entered his thinking processes. This is of course absurd as a concrete argument, but it indicates that which I am striving to uncover in the Japanese mind and method which works upon the Western mind, and puzzles and perplexes the white man in his relations with the Japanese. And in the wider fields of Japanese life, it makes us tighten our muscles when we survey and weigh the expressions of the best Japanese minds, expressions by which they hope, earnestly no doubt, to better our relations with them.

Take, for instance, the growth of democracy. As I have said, when I left Japan it was with a sense of revolution impending. Agitation had got so far out of bonds that it seemed nothing but complete collapse of the Government could follow. The agitation has gone on, violent expressions are often used, democracy is hailed and Japanese "propagandists" abroad assert with a boldness that is inexplicable their faith in democracy and their hatred of militarism and bureaucracy. But democracy in Japan is virtually non-existent. Japan is to-day no nearer liberalism than Russia was in 1905. One dreads to make parallels, when one thinks how it was that Russia got rid of her czars, that the dreadful war in Europe alone made it possible for a change in the Russian Government. Is it going to take such a war to accomplish this in Japan? Some of the most ardent Japanese in America boldly answer, "Yes."

Again, China! Many Japanophiles will say that our love of China is based on our trade with her, and her own weakness to resist it, while at the same time pointing to our enormous trade with Japan as proof of friendship. That is false. True, that, compared with Japan, China is no "menace" to America. But though China is the root of our problem, there is something in the nature of the true Oriental that makes him charming, jovial, childlike and lovable. Japan is, of course, not truly Oriental. Japan is essentially Malay, mixed with some Oriental and a little Caucasian. But in the two and a half years of my residence in Japan I did not once come across a white person who had that same unexplainable admiration for the native that is the outstanding characteristic of white men in China. Be that as it may—and that is, after all, a personal matter—that which enters into the Sino-Japanese problem is the attitude of the Japanese to the Chinese. None was so ready to exalt the Japanese as were the foreigners after the Boxer uprising in 1900. Then the Japanese were hailed for their helpfulness and their dexterity. But the manner of Japanese in China to-day goes against the grain of people. They ask themselves constantly: For nearly seven years Japan has promised faithfully to withdraw from Shantung, and her promises are as earnestly being expressed to-day. Is it, then, so hard to remove troops? Not so hard to move them in, it seems.

Those of us who listen to Japanese promises are from Missouri. Japan in conjunction with the Allies sent troops to Siberia to "protect" Vladivostok. Each of the Allies were supposed to send seven thousand troops. Japan sent close to one hundred thousand. She has earnestly promised to withdraw them ever since. Why are they not withdrawn?

Then comes the hardest thing of all to reconcile with her promises,—Japan's actions in Korea. It is easy to sentimentalize over the fate of nations. Korea's independence is a slogan that doesn't mean much, though Korea claims four thousand years of civilized existence. An independent Korea doesn't offer very great promise, even if one is constrained to sympathize with her aspiration for independence. Korea might just as well be an integer of the Japanese Empire. She had ample time in which to expel foreign intriguers and denounce her own grafters, for the sake of independence, years ago. But what has that to do with Japanese atrocities in Korea? What has that to do with the action of Japanese merchants who, according to Japan's own envoy to Korea, Count Inouye, acted worse than conquerors. Count Inouye said: