The Telegraph-courier. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1888-1946, 1896-03-12
HE TAKES EXCEPTION
To an Item in the Bristol Correspondence
of Last Week.

gives His IGdSOIS why HIS organization
objects to the Marquette statue being
placed in Statuary hall:
" The fanatical protest from the A. P.
A. lodges throughout the country
against the placing of the statue of
Father Marquette in the national capt.
toll is in full keeping with the small p0-
tat0 character of that organization.
Probably not one member in a hundred
of that society knows who Father Mar
quette was. 1t is by such petty eXhi-
billions of spite that they are losing the
respect of the best people of the coun-
try"
If the Bristol correspondent will look
up section 1914 Of the revised statutes
of the United states, he will find that
it provides that the president is au-
thorized to invite all the states to pro-
vide and furnish statues, in marble or
bronze, not exceeding two in number
for each state, of deceased persons who
have been citizens thereof, and illustri-
Gus for distinguished civic or military
services and when SO furnished the
same shall be placed in the old hall of
the house of representatives, in the
capitol of the United States, which is
set apart, or so much thereof as may be
necessary, as a national statuary hall
for the purposes herein Indicated"
Marquette was Jesuit priest and
missionary among the Indians Of the
northwest territory during the last half
of the seventeenth century. He came
! to this country from his native country
France, fired with a zeal to advance
and widen the sphere Of his church, and
that alone, as witness this from his re-
ported "talk0 to the assembled Indi-
ans: He told them that Joliet had
been sent by the governor of Canada to
discover new countries, and himself
upon the part Of God, to spread the
light of the holy evangelists. = Voyage
of Marquette -Thevenot &C., l. e. 1851
reprint Rich & Sons Paris and Lon
don 1845)
He was priest only, who did not
seek this country to discover territory
to make commonwealth, which have
in time become states Of this union, but
to plant the standard Of his religion,
and no act Of his ever identified him
with our settlement, our growth of de-
velopment, with our experience as a
territory, or with our statehood.
In fact Marquette was never citizen
of this state, illustrious for civic or
military services" as contemplated by
the statutes, neither did he represent
the idea of liberty of thought, of speech,
or Of conscience. Neither did he rep
resent, in any way, that corner stone
of Americanism, the free public school,;
but what he did represent was, and is
opposed in spirit, and in fact, to our
American institutions, and the A. p.
AS of the country are opposed to his
statue being placed in sTatuary hall,
not only for the reasons that he does
not " fill the bill" by having been a
citizen of the state, or that he did not
represent the spirit of American insti-
buttons, but that there have been men
in this state who were " Industrious in
civil and military service"
Were those being looked for who
had been illustrious in civic affairs the
name of James Duane Doty, would
seem to suggest itself. Always being
connected with the civic affairs of state
or nation from the time that lie was
admitted to practice law at Detroit,
Mich, in 1918 to his death while
Governor Of Utah June 13, 1865.
Were statesmen being looked for,
there was the deep thinking logical
Timothy 0. Howe, always at the fore
front in things pertaining to the good
of our state; or our Matt. FL. Carpenter,
matchless as a councillor, and leader, i'll
the councils of our state, and nation
during it's frey ordeals of 1861 to 1865,
peerless as an orator.
Were those " Industrious in military
being looked for, there is Gen. Dodge,
an old indian fighter, closely indenti-
fed with our early history; or the grand
jeremiah M. Rusk, illustrious in both
civic, and military services" of the
state, whose military achievements
carried him from major of the 10Th
Wis. Inf, to a Brig. Gen. of Vols, in
less than three years and who as gov
ernor of the state, when the followers
of the tenets of Marquette, opposed the
civil government of the state" seen his
duty and did it,"
But if. your Bristol correspondent in
sists that the religious idea ought to be
represented, why here is Kenosha
county's pioneer of 1885, the Rev. Jason
Lothrop. A Baptist minister locating
here in 1885, and if not the absolute
founder of Americas grandest institu-
ton, the free public school system, he
was one of it's earliest and most ardent
advocates and supporters.
The A. p. AS are willing to give
Marquette all the honors due him, as
an explorer, the records showing that
he passed across the state two or three