]
The attorney for the company airily says: "The labor problem will
not be formidable."
If the man knows what he is talking about, he can mean but one
thing.
The motives that led Leopold to grant these concessions are possibly
various. The motives that induced the Americans to take his offer
were probably less complicated. With them it was no question of
politics. They wanted the money; they did not need it, for they all
are rich--they merely wanted it. But Leopold wants more than the
half profits he will obtain from the Americans. If the Powers should
wake from their apathy and try to cast him out of the Congo, he
wants, through his American partners, the help of the United States.
Should he be "dethroned," by granting these concessions now on a
share and share alike basis with Belgians, French, and Americans, he
still, through them, hopes to draw from the Congo a fair income. And
in the meanwhile he looks to these Americans to kill any action
against him that may be taken in our Senate and House of
Representatives, even in the White House and Department of State.
For the last two years Chester A. Beatty has been visiting Leopold
at Belgium, and has obtained the two concessions, and Leopold has
obtained, or hopes he has obtained, the influence of many American
shareholders. The fact that the people of the United States
possessed no "vested interest" in the Congo was the important fact
that placed any action on our part in behalf of that distressed
country above suspicion.
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