Delaware gazette. [volume] (Delaware, Ohio) 1855-1886, 1866-01-12

ties We find no such heavy responsibility
as rests upon the shoulders of the off
GERS of our National government Tht
close of the war has taken from Us tht
nee essity for putting armies in the field
an d relieved US, In our State capacity, o
th labOrs incident to close cooperation
with the general Government In all the
great affairs which have made the pas
five years so memorable In our history
We are subsiding into the quiet routine
of peaceful times, and as our young meL
are returning to their farms, their mer-
chandise, and their shops. the great drain
upon our physical strength being renoy-
ed. the energetic use of intelligent labor
will soon prove how rapidly the recupera-
tive powers Of this people act, and how
true it is that the times which make least
show In the worlds history are very CON-
monty those Of greatest happiness and
prosperity to a State. Our veterans will
not be adding new names to the long list
of their fields of glory, but they viii be
winning victories over physical nature
and Transforming the fruits Of the soil
and the minerals of the earth into that
wealth which shall spread comfort and
happiness everywhere. We, who have
been called to guide the movement of our
State Government, will connect our names
with no such brilliant acts as have given
widespread reputation for high states
GERS who have preceded US during these
troubled times; but in the humber duties
which will fall to us, we may rejoice that
these quiet days are, IN some sense, our
best days, because they are, as we hope,
the beginning Of an era of puFer and more
rapid advancement in everything which
tends to the highest civilization.
The habit of grasping great thoughts
and of daring to do great deeds has ap-
parently begOtten In our people dispO-
sition which makes all business enter
prise take wider scope than heretofore,
and the keen insight with which all our
resources are scanned, and the adventur-
Gus energy with which their development
is pushed, leave nothing to be desired in
a business point of view, unless it be an
increase of that sagaciOus caution which
may save US from the danger of those
commercial revulsions which have, with
considerable regularity, followed great
expansions of currency. The late change
in the banking system of the country has
transferred the control of the circulating
medium to Congress, and comparatively
little can be done by US directly to pro-
vide against the threatened evils to which
have alluded, except to exhort our fell
low citizens to prepare in season for every
contingency.
The large tracts Of valuable lands with
in the State which are still uncultiVated |
reminds us of the desirability of encOur-
aging immigration, and of the evident
policy Of seeking to attract the most
thrifty and valuable classes Of immigrants |
within our borders. Wise foresight and
prompt action may unQuestiOnably do |
much to induce the best class of foreign
ers who are hocking to our shores to set |
tie amongst us, where they will find in |
the highest degree the advantages which |
have allured them to this country, with |
many of those pleasures of society and of
an older civilization which they must
forego in the sparsely settled regions of
the far west to which the great current |
of migration is tending. 1t will also be |
our duty to promote the most rapid as
similation of the foreign element with |
our native population. The events |
through which we have just passed have |
proven how rapidly the foreign settler |
has become American in interest in |
thought and In patriotism but the good /
results we have seen should only encour- |
age us to more systematic use of the means |
which tend to so disiTable a result. A |
nation Is strong In proportion to the hO-
mogeneity of its people. To be country |
men should in itself be pledge of brother
hood wherever we meet, and brotherhood |
implies community of language and sim
ilarity of habit and thought. To encOur- |
age and stimulate our naturalized fellow |
becoming such, to adopt our language, !
to educate their children with ours, and |
to identify themselves with US as rapidly |
as possible, is the dictate of true patriot !
ism in US, and at the same time, Is the best |
welcome we can give to them, since there |
can be no question that they will thus be- |
come most quickly acquainted with their !
rights as citizens, will be least likely to be
overreached and made dUpes of in bust
ness or in politics, and will find the road |
to pecuniary profit and personal advance
ment most rapidly open before them.
Our common school system is to be fos-
tered and improved, and there is nothing
in which our people have a deeper inter
est than this. If there be any one thing
to which, under Providence, more than
to another we owe our safe passage
through our recent perils, | believe it is
the intelligence which our common
schools have universally diffUsed. It has /
not been simply the power to read, but /
that larger and wider culture which has
made the American people capable of
weighing and deciding upon grave argu-
ments of right and of policy in the midst
of greatest excitement. The Government
appealed to them as to men able to com
prehend any argumentO of State policy, and
the steady loyalty of the people and their
Dersevering support of the national cause
was in direct proportion to the intelli-
gence and education of different states or
Communities. I will even go further, and
declare my belief that, outside the imme-
diate theatre of hostile operations, the
cause of the Government never lost any
thing BY the most untrammeled Freedom
of public discussion and printing, because
the people were always able to detect the
sophisms of disloyalty, and their patriotic
purposes were strengthened rather than
weakened by seeing the whole force of
the enemy they had to meet. Among the
safeguards of our liberties and guarantees
Of the permanence of our institutions, I
reckon our school system the very chief.
Blind and devoted love of country may
exist under despotism, if ignorance be
the mother of superstitious or childish
attachment; but liberty and republican
ism can be built on no other solid foun-
dation than intelligence nthe whole mass
of the people. A wise self-interest is
made the basis of all scientific political
economy, and when a whole people have
learned to estimate that interest truly,
besides loving their country dearly, you
have ground for faith in the stability of
their government, such as can be got in
no other way. 1t is because of the gen
eraI conviction that our common schools
NAV be made to secure this result, that
there is an equally general belief that no
money used for public purposes is so well