Great Presidential Moments, #25

From Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States (emphasis added):

In December of 1898, the peace treaty was signed with Spain, officially turning over to the United States Guam, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines, for a payment of $20 million.

There was heated argument in the United States about whether or not to take the Philippines. As one story has it, President McKinley told a group of ministers visiting the White House how he came to his decision:

Before you go I would like to say just a word about the Philippine business… The truth is I didn’t want the Philippines, and when they came to us as a gift from the gods, I did not know what to do with them… I sought counsel from all sides – Democrats as well as Republicans – but got little help.

I thought first we would only take Manila; then Luzon, then other islands, perhaps, also.

I walked the floor of the White House night after night until midnight; and I am not ashamed to tell you, gentleman, that I went down on my knees and prayed Almight God for light and guidance more than one night. And on night late it came to me this way – I don’t know how it was, but it came:

1. That we could not give them back to Spain – that would be cowardly and dishonorable.
2. That we could not turn them over to France or Germany, our commercial rivals in the Orient – that would be bad business and discreditable.
3. That we could not leave them to themselves – the were unfit for self-government – and they would soon have anarchy and misrule over there worse than Spain’s was; and
4. That there was nothing left for us to do but to take them all and to educate the Filipinos, and uplift and civilize and Christianize them, and by God’s grace to the very best we could by them, as our fellow men for whom Christ also died. And then I went to bed and went to sleep and slept soundly.

The Filipinos did not get the same message from God.

Perhaps as many as 1,000,000 Filipinos died as a consequence of their resulting revolution for independence, and countless attrocities were committed.