Senator Beveridge's speech "March of the Flag" (1898)

ALBERT J. BEVERIDGE, “MARCH OF THE FLAG”
(16 SEPTEMBER 1898)

«Fellow-citizens: It is a noble land that God has given us; a land that can feed and clothe the world (...). What does all this mean for every one of us? First of all, it means opportunity for all the glorious young manhood of the republic. It means that the resources and the commerce of these immensely rich dominions will be increased as much as American energy is greater than Spanish sloth; for Americans, henceforth, will monopolize those resources and that commerce. In Cuba, alone, there are 15,000,000 acres of forest unacquainted with the ax. There are exhaustless mines of iron. (...) There are millions of acres yet unexplored. (…) Fellow-Americans, we are God’s chosen people.»