I am aware that any remarks made at upon this occasion to be appropriate and to be in harmony with the thoughts suggested by the day must have at least some connection with the past history of our nation. This thought makes me hesitate to speak to an audience that I know is well informed in regard to the events connected with our past history and I do not feel qualified to give any advice or counsel, nor have I any warning to give or any criticisms to make. I feel satisfied that all I can do here to day, in fact all I desire to do is to assist in celebrating the deeds and in rendering tribute to the worth of the "Grand Old Fathers"—the men who "trusted in God and were willing to clothe the people with sovereign power."                 Lord Bacon gives the first place among the benefactors of mankind "to the founders of states and empires". We certainly are willing to concede the first place to the men who had the courage, the faith and the wisdom to form what has been termed "a new state of a new species," that has grown stood for over a century and grows stronger as the years roll / by. We know that statesmen of other countries had often tried to create and successfully conduct "a new state of a new species" and had often failed. We know that Cromwell and the great men who were with him failed in making a permanent change in the form of government of England and we know that there was once an attempt to change the government of France that was worse than a failure, for it resulted in giving free course to the worst passions of the people, that almost destroyed religion and society. But the new state created by our fathers has so far proved to be a success and even at this time we can scarcely comprehend the importance, the boldness and the effect of their undertaking. It was Burk that said of the effect of the American Independence upon the world that "it produced it has made as great a change in all the relations and balances and gravitations of power as the appearance of a new planet in the system of the solar world."

 

            Now while we know what our Revolutionary fathers done and see and enjoy the results of their courage and wisdom we hardly stop to think that had they showed less wisdom and / less forecast—had they been actuated by any other motives than the noblest and the most patriotic, our present condition might be far different from what it is. As a child reared among all the comforts and luxuries that wealth can give, is liable to forget that its good fortune is the result of the toil and the energy of its parents, so I fear we at times almost forget that our great inheritance—the liberty and the equality we enjoy, came to us through trials, privations and sufferings battle and blood and after long and anxious deliberations. I think it is highly proper for us important that at this time we to stop for a moment and consider the circumstances of our Revolutionary fathers their surroundings and their political education of our Revoutionary fathers and especially notice the proceedings of that memorable congress of 1776. If we do this we will be better able to understand their trials, the obsticles they had to contend with and we will also be able to understand the reason for the long and anxious deliberations of that congress memorable Congress of 1776. For this new departure or rather this bold step they that that Congress took did not meet with the hearty and unanimous approval of all the American people of that time, but in some quarters it / met with doubt, hesitancy and even with bitter opposition, and we find that even among the men who composed that congress there were some who for a time doubted and hesitated in regard to the policy to pursue. We also find that there were many men of that time who were wealthy and influential that "had no faith in Republican ideas, they spurned the doctrine of political equality, they denounced universal suffrage and adheared to the old notions of kingly government." Of course these men were not in the Patriot Army nor were their sympathies with it, but they formed a considerable portion of the American people of that time, so much so, that we are told that "in South Carolina these tories of the Revolution occupied the cities, towns and cultivated fields, while Francis Marion and his gallant band held only the swamps and morasses."

 

            Though the ancestors of our Revolutionary fathers, the Puritans, the Presbyterians, the Catholics, the Quakers, the Hugenots and others came to America in search of civil and religious liberty and though our Revolutionary fathers themselves had the habits of freemen and / possessed some of the institutions of liberty it is evident that at the beginning and even for a time during the Revolutionary war, they were not all of one mind in regard to the great questions of the rights of the people and the complete independence of the colonies, and their representatives in their Congress less than one year before the Declaration of Independence was signed, expressed by resolution their great desire for peace and declared that "they had no wish to throw off their allegiance" and as late as the 7^th of June 1776, less than one month before the Declaration of Independence was signed by the delegates from all the colonies, the resolution that "the colonies ought to be free and independent states", was carried by a majority of only one state, seven states in favor and six states against the resolution. We are also informed that "afterwards, after the Declaration of Independence was signed when the affairs of the Colonies were at a low ebb, that there were not wanting those who censured the leaders of that Congress for what they termed "inconsiderate haste in cutting of all hopes of reconciliation with the Mother Country." From all this we can well believe / that our Revolutionary fathers entrusted the final decision upon this all important question to their representatives—that the Declaration of Independence was more the result of long and anxious deliberations of the Continental Congress than the expressed wish of all the people.

 

            One orator has said that these men "by a voluntary and responsible choice willed to do what was done, and which without their will would not have been done." Another orator has said "if the body, the spirit, the texture of our political faith had not been collectively declared on this day, who can be bold enough to say when and how independence, liberty and union would have been combined, confirmed and assured to this people." With all this evidence before us, I ask are we not permitted to think that had our fathers in that Congress been more ambitious and less patriotic, that there might have been principles proclaimed and practiced that are altogether different from those contained in the Declaration of Independence? Suppose we go further than this and fancy for a moment that they could have created a kingdom or an empire or that they could have assumed absolute power themselves. As / Napoleon, when in power said "I am the people crowned," they might have said "We are the people crowned", but we know, instead of that, they crowned the people and gave the power to the people. This thought or rather this supposition that the men who proclaimed the Declaration of Independence, would under any circumstances have usurped power is repugnant to our feelings. We believe that they were too patriotic and too fully imbued with the spirit of liberty to have harbored the thought for a moment. But there was another policy that had they adopted would no doubt have been acquiesed in by a considerable portion of their people. We know that at first it was Englishmen maintaining their rights against Parliamentary usurpation, that it was more the acts of the English Parliament than the acts of the English king that caused the colonies to become dissatisfied with English rule. Suppose that Congress of the Colonies had said "simply emancipate us from the English Parliament and give us a Parliament of our own and we will be loyal to the British Sovereign". If they had said that it is possible and perhaps probable that to day we would be like / Canada, a part of Britains possesions with a titled aristocrat or a royal son in law to lord it over us, but instead of that they "dissolved the political bands which connected them with the Mother Country" and they declared that they "were no longer "these United Colonies are and of right ought to be free and independent states." They declared that they "were no longer the subjects of the British King" and they proclaimed to the world the principles of the Declaration of Independence, that has just been read to you, the opening lines of which declare that "all men are created equal". Our fathers published to the world that a new nation had been created and that its foundations were laid on the principles of liberty and equality. The great principles of liberty, equality and fraternity had never before been fully and freely applied to the government of any nation. No powerful and mighty government based on the wisdom, justice and fortunes of the people then existed. Only the wild dreamer or the rash enthusiast had dared to intimate that there could be such a thing as a purely republican govern / -ment. It was held that the right of kings to rule was divine. The great common people, the toiling, laboring millions had never before been entrusted with full sovereign power—they had never been permitted a voice or an influence in forming and directing the governments under which they lived.                    It is true that the free cities of Germany posessed the form of free institutions. It is also true that Greece and Rome had for a time what was termed political freedom, but it had no likeness to what we understand to be true liberty. There the citizens wealth, his labor and his time was taken to increase the wealth and the power of the state. In those petty republics of Greece, their political freedom, if you call it such, banished the benefactors of the state and it is said "made the philosopher Socrates drink the fatal cup for attempting the exercise of liberty of opinion. In some of those states it was only the wealthy and the aristocratic that could attain power. Those petty republics became famous for the tyranny and corruption practiced and the power finally passed / into the hands of the few.                   The history of the past leads us to believe that the tyrants and despots and perhaps the statesmen of the past opposed and prevented the growth of national liberty, but there was one thing they could not do, they were powerless to crush out or subjugate personal liberty—a principle that is older, yes centuries older than this American republic. A Poet has said that

            "The love of liberty with life is given

            And life itself the inferior gift of heaven."

 

I do not undertake to say when this principle of personal liberty had its commencement, nor can I tell you the name of the wild unfettered being who first felt the sentiment that a patriot has since expressed "Give me liberty or give me death", but I have read the history of the rude barbarian, of the fierce and reckless Scythian, of the Celt, the Gaul and the Hun, but above all of the Saxon, who Hume tells us "carried to the highest pitch the virtue of valor and the love of liberty." These tribes that I have mentioned—these wild wandering tribes, that once roamed over Europe / and Asia, possessed this principle of personal liberty and they cherished and defended it. It was like a diamond in the roughest of surroundings. These tribes were rude, restless, barbarous and ignorant, but such as they were they would suffer war, starvation, famine and even death before they would give up their personal liberty. Perhaps time has rendered dark and obscure many things connected with this principle that would be of interest to us, but I believe if we were permitted to trace it down the stream of time, we would find that it has assisted in civilizing men and nations—that it has assisted the christian religion in its warfare with and in its victory over Superstition and tyranny, and I believe that we would also find, that all through the centuries past, this love of liberty has nerved men to deeds of heroism and bravery in the fight against tyrants and despots, and I further believe that out of this fight or rather out of this struggle came the national freedom we enjoy to day, for I believe the liberty and the equality in this republic is to a great extent the / result of a struggle between nomadic or wandering freedom and government rule and restriction. It has been a struggle that has raged through the centuries past. It has been a continuous struggle between love of liberty and a tendency to centralization of power in the hands of the few.

 

While we have gained this great blessing—this liberty and equality and while the citizens of many of the nations of Europe have had their liberties enlarged, there are yet other nations and other peoples whose condition as far as their rights and their liberties are concerned, is not seemingly in advance of the condition of their ancestors, who lived way back in the time of those wild nomadic tribes. We can hardly perceive that there is any change for the better going on in those old and despotic governments of the East. The Oriental, the Turk and the Persian are still under the heel of the oppressor. Their rights, wishes and necessities are not consulted or even considered by those who rule over them. The Persian is today and has been for centuries forced to bow low in the / dust on sight of any of his rulers, in fact he is forced to slave and bow to every stupid and brainless nabob that he meets. When we contemplate his abject condition and think of the insults and the tyranny he is forced to submit too, we appreciate more fully than ever the liberty and equality in this young and free republic. We are ready to exclaim with the Poet,

            "A day, an hour of virtuous liberty

            Is worth more a whole eternity of bondage".

 

                                    This liberty, that I have mentioned—this real untrammeled liberty that was in the care and keeping of those wild nomadic tribes, was a crude reckless liberty, that only required the refining influences of law and christianity to make it an inestimable blessing to the generations to come. Through the long historical night—through the conflict and confusion of ages this germ of liberty has been preserved. Through the centuries that are past it has been cherished, defended and handed down untill finally planted on the genial and fruitful soil of America it has grown with / a rapidity I believe far exceeding the expectations of the men who planted the seed and it is now "a stately tree" deep rooted and strong, that all the storms engendered by tyranny and despotism have not been able to uproot.

 

It is the planting of that tree upon American soil that we celebrate today—the work done by the "Grand old fathers" when they "proclaimed liberty throughout the world". The "Grand old fathers" of the Republic. May they we cherish the memory of those wise and brave men. May those heroes peacefully rest. It is for us and those that come after us to cherish and defend the liberty and equality that they periled their lives for and far be it from me to detract from the honor they have so well earned. I would be sorry to lessen the affection or the reverance of any one for those "Grand old men" but I do not believe it is possible that they ever fully realised the glorious and magnificent changes that were to ensue as a result of their courage and wisdom. They little dreamed that their infant nation would so soon reach robust manhood. At that time they could have but a faint idea of this great continent / its immense resources, its great rivers and lakes, its mighty forests and broad and fertile prairies, its almost inexhaustible mines of coal, iron and precious metals. The must have had a still fainter idea of the railroads, telegraphs, manufactories, mills and other improvements that can now be seen in almost every part of our land. What to them was an unknown and almost impenetrable forest has given way before the labor and energy of the freeman.                                But after all the work done on the day we celebrate was well done. It has been said that "our fathers appealing to the God of Justice and of battle for the rectitude and firmness of their purpose pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to the great principles of liberty and equality" and after years of suffering, of battle and blood, independence was secured.

 

Over Afterwards they formed a more perfect union the Constitution of 1789. Our fathers formed a "government based solely on the consent of the governed". That [?] & deeply rooted They formed a unanimous union out of [?] and discordant states. They formed a nation that is to day "a monument /

 

Afterwards, they formed not a single confederation of states loosely bound together but they formed "a more perfect union," the Constitution of 1789. They formed a Constitution adapted to meet the demands and the necessities of a mighty nation. Daniel Webster has said of that convention that framed our Constitution that " if any historical fact be plain and undeniable it is that they were asked to preserve the league, they rejected the proposition, they were asked to continue the existing compact between the States, they rejected it. They rejected compact, league and confederation and set themselves about forfming the Constitution of a national government and they accomplished what they undertook." Our fathers framed a Constitution that has in it this clause, "This Constitution and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof and all treaties made or which shall be made under the authority of the United States shall be the surpreme law of the land, and the Judges in every / state, shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding".

 

It seems to me this is sufficient to show that our fathers at the outset intended this to be what it really is A Nation.

They formed a government to be directed and controlled by the governed. /

 

of their wisdom and forecast." They formed a nation that for over a hundred years has stood to use the expression of a Poet "four square to every whi wind that blew". Even in its youth it boldly met in bloody struggle one of the most powerful nations of Europe and came out of the contest with honor to itself. It has stood the acquisition of territory both "by conquest and by purchase". It has stood more than this, it has stood more than the Revolutionary fathers could have possibly dreamed of, it has stood four years of terrible and bloody civil war, but terrible and bloody as was that war, it did not tear away a single state or an inch of our territory. It did not change our form of government or destroy its constitution but it left the grand old Union strengthened purified and thank God emancipated. Yes that terrible war destroyed one thing, it wiped away slavery from our land, no more can be seen "the slave pen and the auction block of the manseller," and all our territories must become free states and whatever territory we hereafter acquire, no matter in what part or corner of the globe it is situated / it must come to us without a slave.

 

Speaking of that war, we know that a million of our young men left farms, counting rooms and workshops to fight for liberty and Union, but we know that many of these were never not permitted to come back to us for they sleep on many a battlefield of the sunny south. In regard to these dead heroes I can only quote the beautiful words of a gifted Orater. "These heroes are dead. They died for us—they are at rest. They sleep in the land they made free, under the flag they rendered stainless; under the solemn pines, the sad hemlocks, the tearful willows and the embracing vines. They sleep beneath the shadows of the clouds, careless alike of sunshine or of storm, each in the windowless palace of rest. Earth may run red with other wars—they are at peace. In the midst of battle, in the roar of conflict they found the serenity of death. We have one sentiment for the soldiers living and dead—cheers for the living and tears for the dead." In regard to the living, we can also say of them, that after weary campaigns and bloody battles, after saving the union, though they came back to us triumphant and victorious, they / quietly laid aside all the paraphernalia of war and again engaged in the duties and labors of peace, proving to the world that the American citizen can be loyal and brave in time of war and law abiding and industrious in time of peace.                          (Our republic

has withstood terrible storms, storms that have completely wrecked older nations and it still survives erect and unharmed. It is strong and enduring because the people rule—because it represents their ideas, wishes and convictions. As Lincolon said "it is a government of the people, for the people and by the people".

 

            Our boiling, laboring millions are not forced to give their time and their wealth to increase the comfort and the wealth of of the favored few, nor are they forced to doff the hat or bend the knee to lords, Dukes, kings and Emperors. They take no stock in this pack of titled aristocrats of whom it has been said with considerable truth that "their ancient but ignoble blood has coursed through scoundrals ever since the flood." Every business, position and profession—every avenue of advancement / is open to all our people. More than this, our country has become is the asylum and the chosen home of the opressed, the down-trodden and the liberty-loving of all nations.

 

^XThe "other" nations are constantly sending us brains, industry and power, in fact they are sending us all the elements of national greatness. Europe is constantly pouring out to us the active the life giving blood of the industrious common people, not the effete corrupt and stagnant bood of the aristocracy. These additions to our strength and our population are just what we need to assist in developing and building up this great Country. All the avenues of advancement are open to these also, no business or profession is denied them. They may win their way in any business or profession to any position, up to a seat in the senate of the nation. they may even become the teachers and leaders of this people. They meet Young America upon his own ground in a cheerful and manly competition. It is here in America that the best elements of all nations meet and form a strong and harmonious combination or /

 

as expressed in Bayard Taylor's lines slightly changed

            "Her Germany dwells by a gentler Rhine,

            Her Ireland sees the old sunburst shine,

            Her France pursues some dream divine,

            Her Norway keeps her mountain fine,

            Her Italy waits by the western brine,

            And broad based under all

            Is Englands oaken hearted wood

            As rich in fortitude

            As e^er wend worldward from the Island wall

            Fused in her candid light,

            To one strong race all races hers unite,

            Tongues melt in hers, hereditary foeman

            Forget their sword and slogan.

            Twas glory once to be a Roman

            Tis glory now to be a man".

 

                        With this combination of the best elements of all nations, with the energy and genious already shown and with "a government based solely on the consent of the governed" there can be no question in regard to our future. Our vast Country awaits a dense population. Our territories ere long will be densly populated and divided into many states. Our nation has lived but a century, think of the century / yet to come. Hon Horatio Seymore estimates the increase in our population at "a million and a half a year—more than four thousand each day and more than one hundred and seventy each fleeting hour." The hum of industry will be heard in every valley and on every mountain side. There are countless numbers of churches, schoolhouses and other institutions of learning yet to be built in our land. It was prophesied over a half a century ago and it is being rapidly fulfilled that "as the sun rises on a sabath morning and travels westward from Newfoundland to the Oregon it would behold the countless millions assembling as if by common impulse in the temples with which every valley mountain and plain will be adorned. The morning psalm and the evening anthem will commence with the multitudes on the Atlantic coast, be sustained by the loud chorus of ten thousand times ten thousand in the valley of the Mississippi and be prolonged by the thousands of thousands on the shores of the Pacific".

This is not all, there are yet vast coalfields and mines that only await mans good time /

 

to give up their treasures and Emory Stowe says "our sails will yet whiten every sea and our flag float in every port upon the civilized globe." Our great country is capable of a development and a growth that its present condition is but the beginning. The indications plainly tell us that we are almost certain to eclipse the other nations in productions and we will soon rival the best of them in the Arts, sciences and learning.               I may

 

be to sanguine, of course I cannot foretell what trials and sufferings are yet in store for us, nor can I say to a certainty that our nation will successfully meet every foe and every danger in the future, but knowing what it has already suffered and withstood and the fact that our people still meet and joyfully commemorate the day of our birth as a nation and that they still cherish the memory of the "Grand old fathers" leads me to think that the old ship of state can ride on any sea and live through every storm. I have no fears for the future. I see in it nothing but hope and promise. I have no warnings to give, no theories to promulgate and I firmly believe / that though war and pestilence come, though the commune unfurl its red flag, though monopoly bear hard upon us, though all our crops fail and hard times come and though they all come together, I believe the great mass of our people will through it all patiently adhere to law and order. Though we may be strong partisans and differ widely on questions of public policy, though political excitement and bitterness may rage at times I confidently trust that no man, clique or section will ever attempt the life of the nation. I care not who is the chief executive of the nation or who is in yonder halls of national legistlation for I have that confidence in the great good sense of this American people that tells me "all will be well. Our executive and our Congress may go wrong but the great heart of this people will continue to beat steady and true to the principles enunciated one hundred and      years ago to-day. We all have an equal interest in the prosperity and perpetuity of this glorious Union. We have a common heritage in the fame and the names of Washington Jefferson Jackson and Loncolon. And so long as we have / the ballot box, education and industry, so long will the nation endure. We must strengthen and support these for they stand between us and the encroachments of centralization and political power. It has been truthfully said that "the pen is more powerful than the sword" and also that "mind when trained and educated is more than a match for mere physical power" and also that "institutions of learning are a surer means of defense than standing armies or powerful navies, for it is the mind trained and educated that builds our ships, that forms our arms for defense, that organizes, equips and directs our armies". Then I say educate and stand by every man in his right to the ballot and our glorious Republic is safe.

 

While we have this confidence in regard to the future of our country I think we are justified in pointing with pride to its past history and its progress. With "Just defference to the age the power and the greatness of other nations" we point with pride to this land "where the majority have the power and the rights of the minority are fully and amply protected"—this land of "free thought, free speech, free press / and unfettered religious sentiments."

 

I also think that we have a right to exult in its strength, in the strength of this young giant that can count but a hundred and              , whose "flag is respected by every nation on the globe", this union grown from thirteen states to thirty             , that is said to be "as broad as all Europe", that extends from ocean to ocean, from the Gulf of Mexico to the Lakes, this nation of ours, this happy home of over fifty millions of free and prosperous people. More than this, we know full well, that the oppressed, the priest ridden, the downtrodden and liberty-loving people every-where, all over the world are today looking with longing, wistful eyes at free, happy America and though an ocean separates them from us, their hopes and their best wishes are with us and they gladly will join us in the lines of the Poet, Sail on, Sail on, O Ship of State:

            Sail on O Union, strong and great:

            Humanity, with all its fears,

            With all the hopes of future years

            Is hanging breathless on thy fate: /

 

            Sail on, nor fear to breast the sea:

            Our hearts, our hopes are all with thee,

            Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears,

            Our faith triumphant or^e our fears,

            Are all with thee, are all with thee."

 

They join with us in the hope that this nation will continue to be the home of liberty, equality and Justice and that its government will continue to be "a government of the people, by the people and for the people" as long as the earth itself shall endure.

SOURCES