Press and daily Dakotaian. (Yankton, Dakota Territory [S.D.]) 1880-1889, 1889-02-01
SUNSET cox's SPEECH.


ing was done.
SUNSET GOx's SPEECH.
Dakota Stands Unexampled In the
Anuais of Mankind.
Extracts from the speech OF Sunset
Cox in the house OF representatives
while the omnibus bill was under dis
cuEsion:
Dakota in length and breath, IN popu-
lation, In area, ia wealth and in progress,
stands unexsmpled in the annals # man.
kind for material, political, and, may
say, Intellectual and spiritual, advance
ment. (Oheers.)
Il is impossible, Mr.. Speaker, to re-
sist the demand OF such a state, even
when divided. You cannot chain this
Prometheus to rock. Its organisms
counties, towns and cities-governed
just now as Indians are governed. by o
remote department In this city, can not
sfford to wait upon congress whose
recreHtions are ilhbustering and whose
best business habits are the ridicule OF
the nation. Why should such coun.
try, SO rich, and prosperous, and in
teliigent, be governed differently from
Georgia, Or Massachusetts, Illinois or
New YORK? You cannot keep such o
people down. Your territorial organiza-
tion and your two hundred federal Of
ficers chosen outside; your governor,
with his little brief authority, exscting
every dollar spent OF the peoples money
should pass through his palm, is an alien
system. Our fathers would have none
of il in the revolution, and our country
men were prompt to be rid OF il after
our civil war.
| Refuse to admit this state and its terri
torial sisters? Why, sir, you may enact
| that frost shall cease In the north, and
blooms in the south, or try to fix the
| figure of Proteus by statute, but you
cannot prevent the people of this terri
! .c.y from their demand, and you mus.
sccede 60 il; and II this congress duss
not, We know the next congress- will.
The spirit OF the people OF the north
west is that OF unbounded push and
energy. These are the men who have
| tunneIed our mountains. who have del
| we'd our mines, who have bridget our
rivers, who have brought every part ol
our empire within the reach OF foreign
aud home markets, who have made pos
sihle our grand growth and splendid de
velopment. They are the men who have
made our national life. There is nj
persllel in history to their achievements
You cannot hold them as captive to the
federal system. You must give them
self reliant statehood. We should bt
mindful of those laws which bring to tn,
front those stats upon our borde
whose destiny will be our own. viii
not say that ell the hardy sons of New
England, New York, and the other mid
die and eastern states have emigrate ec
to the west and followed the isotherma
line to make up the million of men WHIT
now ask under this bill for statehood
But such an emigration of men who CO,
grspple with the nardships of pionee
life does drain the best element of ou
older states.
The emigration from the eastern state
does constitute the nerve, the sinew, tht
muscle, aud the mind which penetratel
the wilderness and builds up the com
monweslth. 1t is the unaided energy
which he's made million of men stant
in intelligent masses and asked of th,
federal government participation in it
blessings and it's Rlories. The pionee
recks not of the past; he works in ths
living present. All the energies of hi
nature are aroused by the splendid pros
pect and by the glowing inspiration o
budding commonwealths. Governmen
, itself is bat an incident in the march o
!: civilization. No figures of speech, M
flights of imagination, can picture q
compass the achievements OF this state
! creating and man-ennobling advance
ment. Like the eagle, to which on
nation is often compared, ne seeks
wider ether for his wings, and the fir
, within his heart seeks the source OF al
!, llllumination--the sun itself. (Oheers.
II How much nobler and wiser il th
effort 20 install and institute such state
I in our own land, rather than chase th
ienis fatuus OF Canadian annexation
There will be time for that when on
nebulous territories put off their rudi
: men tary, and don their stately stoles c
= independence!
. All this time in the worlds histor,
, when the oYergrown nations OF Europ
} are seeking fresh colonial Dependence
o when the centers of Asia and Afriol
!. and the coasts and islands of every ses
are scrutinizsd as homes for immigra
> tion, is 1t not ennobling to contemplat
: the quiet, yet immense, expansion I
: our own numbers, and our realm With
l. our own boundaries during the pal
g hundred years, and to feel shat CLOWN
: pride over the prediction what onr cou
try shall be when another centul
comes aroundf
q This energetic and hopeful peop
j. have in their veins the vigorous blot
= of many races. They have inheritt
). the material, intellectual, and NOR
triumphs Of the old and new world. al
+ their civilizations. They have sett!,
,e upon soil which has no rival In sicknat
n and no peer in production. Their fsi
!. in their future is buoyant. No perple
% ity about their fortune, no weariness
le their work, no dependency in sht
q, hope, but exultinR ever in their streug
ar these millions move on to fill np O.
:. territory from ses to sea, from Cana
- to she gulf, and from ncrth to sou!
or Restless, active, and yet ready, tn,
l. movements ere like those Of the heaven
a bodies, and shining like them they mo
!. Ia orbits of their own. and are as fix
in ouf heavens as the stars.
OF supreme Court Decision,
ne Washington special: The suprel
D. court OF the United States rendered