Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1883-06-08
GRAFTON OF HON. A. L. HART.
Delivered at Laying the Corner Stone o
the Agricultural Exposition Building.

Park. LStenographically reported by W.
E. Doan.l
Mr. President, Members of the Grand
Lodge, Ladies and Gentlemen The i'm.
posing ceremonial we have Just witnessed,
performed by the Lodge of Free Masons,
is but an expression upon the part of an
honorable Order of its conception OF the
Importance of the occasion that has called
you together to-day. The large mass OF
people who have come to witness these
rites evidences the appreciation which the
people of the State have for the ceremony
and the objects for which it has been per.
formed 1t might be well to-day, under
the blast of a heavy north wind and be-
meath the burning rays of summer sun,
for me to content myself with congratu
lating the people of California-and par.
tioularly the people of Sscramento-upon
this great accession TO the industries ard
the future wealth of California and
of this city. But the Importance OF
this occasion demands further notice. We
who have been born here, and those who
came here in the earlier days of California,
remember when the vast plains that now
surround this beautiful city constituted
|
vast field of Natures productions. Thirty
years of progress has made us that which
has required century to make the people
of the older States. And when with pride
we congratulate ourselves upon this sub
iect, we look back to the history of Cali
! fornia and ask ourselves why it is that this
structure has not been erected before.
In 1881, for the first time in the history of
| California, the people Of this State, by
their Legislature, passed law providing
for the construction of building, which
was to be devoted to the education of this
State upon matters of industry, and by
this means to create an cumulative and COM
petitive spirit, which would result in plac.
ing our products and our industries above
those of the civilized word. When this
building was provided, for Sacramento city
the City of the Plains-with that spirit
of enterprise which has characterized its
| citizens since the time of its infancy, con-
tributed one-haf 20 the construction
of a magnificent fabric, which was
! to stand as monument of honor to
| the Agricultural Society of the State /;
to the Legislature which passed the law !;
TO his ExcellencY, Governor Stoneman,
who signed the bill. [Applause.l When
this Act of the Legislature was passed,
some question as to its constitutionality
was mooted but the great heart of the
people came out, and with the slightest
effort imaginable the people placed in the
| Treasury of California the funds that were
necessary for the construction of this
building. Fellow citizens, this is not a
trivial occasion. 1t is an occasion which
demands the imposing ceremonies of the
honorable Grand Lodge of California. 1t
is an occasion which demands that the
people of this great State shall assemble
and give honor to the men who authorized
the construction of this building. 1t has
| been said by men learned in the philosophy
| of government that the character of peo-
pie depends to some extent upon the
nature of their laws. Il has been said,
and may be truthfully said, that the laws
of people depend entirely upon their
prosperity, their industry and their intellI-
eence. To-day we are living as people
under the benign influences of Constitu-
ton that spreads it's holy principles of
liberty about every ireside. To-day we
live under Constitution that gives US all
sunlight in our homes-but still we live in
q country which demands the fostering of
of industries the raising of the poor PEG.
pie the division to some extent of the re.
sponsibility of government (; the education
of the poor the maintenance of the work.
ing classes the sustaining of the bone and
sinew of the land; the upholding of the
men who till the farms, who raise the grain
upon which We subsist, who invent the
machinery by which it is cut. Nos, fel-
low citizens, said moment ago that we
live in a great country. It is true we do ;
but without institutions Of this nature,
without the construction of buildings in.
tended to get up competition among men
of art and of agriculture, without getting
up a competitive spirit among the
people, we may live upon the most
fertile soil in the world and yet will not
find that the industries of the people are
sustained by the proper energy. 1t re-
! ouires that there shall be something done
by the great law-making powers, by the
exercise of the powers OF government,
which shall arouse the energies Of great
people. When l speak of California my
heart is full of patriotism. | am sorry
cannot claim to be native of this
golden west. In state of unimproved
and uncultivated nature, California pre-
of a sublime God. Nature, in the distri-
button of her fsvors, had gifted her with a
lavish hand-had bedecked her with all
the magnificent adornments and unexampled
picturesqueness of her native shrubbery,
and clad her in the spring time in the in
spring clusters of her many -colored flow
ers. The valley of the Sacramento, from
the midst of which the dome of the Capitol
now reaches far up toward the armament,
extending from the green bills of the Sierra
Nevada on the east to the coast range on
the west, was vast garden, cultivated by
the gracious and propitious rays of our
splendid sun California was gifted, as have
said, with her lovely flowers, meek and
maidenlike her towering pine trees and
her sturdy oaks her lowly valleys, TEEN.
ing with all the elements necessary to
healthy and prosperous agriculture, and
her tall and splendid mountains, clad in
their everlasting green and filled with a
world of wealth Well and righteously
was che named the Golden State, for those
sturdy pioneers who came to this land Of
tabled gold we're not disappointed in their
expectations They found vast gold fields
beneath her mountain tops, along her ra.
vines and in her canyons. But it was not
dreamed that In such q State, with her
abundance OF golden wealth and
precious gems, there could be found
fields and broad acres fit for
the pursuit Of the farmer. Experience,
however, has begun to demonstrate that
her resources are boundless and with a
climate as diversified IS her SOL is fertile,
she has already in her infancy won a re-
! noySn which places her first in the sister.
hood OF States. for the amount, splendor
and variety OF her products. Where once
the wild animals sported ever the green
fields and aower-bsds Of nature, the olive,
the lemon and the orange, the peach, the
apple and the pear are seen in superabund.
ance and the vast plains Of our splendid
valleys. once devoted 20 the pasturage Of
the herds belonging to the native sons. are
covered with golden heads of cereals, the
products of the busy husbandman. Home
stesds, in which may be seen the lovely
and honored housewives, with little native
,o,a ,,d d.u,htarz Of The Golden West