Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1900-05-31

| ion, broke down these barriers, and lei
in the light that China had sworn
should never shine above her people.
For such achievements as these, and
| Tor the great work that our own army
wrought, every man who loves liberty
and light should echo the utterance of
the eloquent Ingersoll: have one SEN
timent for the soldiers living and dead
Cheers for the living and tears for
! the dead. The dead and the living,
like a bow of peace, spans and arches
all the clouds of war There is a vol
ume in that utterance, and I adopt it
as my own sentiment to-day.
| No SectionaIfsm.
There is another fact to which de-
| sire briefly to allude, and that is the
WOUNDS OF the war in our country have
Deen completely healed The soldiers
VINO wore the gray are now beginning
TO feel and see and understand that the
soldiers who wore the blue saved the
South as we'll as the North There are
no better loyalists to-day than the SOL
dlers OF the Southland The blue and
gray are clasping hands across the
deep, broad chasm that could never be
arched. But it is now being arched by
the brilliant bow OF fraternity and en-
during peace.
MY countrymen, we are beginning
10 feel that there is no north, no south.
Sectionalism bothers us no longer. and
is now thing of the past. and we re-
1olce that it is SO. Cooperation is the
controlling spirit of the present. and
the soldiers of both armies are leading
on. All ideal citizens are workers.
The hand that is hardened by toll is
an honest hand. There are two class
es OF men in a repuhlic-workers and
shlrkers. No man is honest who does
not toll. The workers of the north and
the workers of the south join hands
IN helping one another on. There is
true Fellowship in that. All workers
should be brothers, and should crowd
the shirkers to the rear. In all hives
the workers kill the drones. The bees
do it; and if a lazy drone. with two
good legs, gets in the way of the driy-
Ing, working multitude, he should be
crushed by the press. Every avenue,
IN these free, pushing times, is open
to all alike, and the war made it SO.
Education, enterprise, honesty, sebri-
ETY., labor-all are free. There is no
prescription anywhere. The chain that
bound the humble and the poor has
been broken. The weak has been made
strong, and the poor of the past are the
rich of the present. Genius and labor
produce wealth, and the patriots. north
and south, will always see that it is
properly protected. Anarchism will
lind no foothold here. They say they
Will blow us up. We will blow them
up. The honest impulses of the Amer
lean people will always swing them
on the side of fair dealing between
man and man. The men who attempt
to steal any part of our great country
or shall try to steal a living out of it,
will fall short of their undertakings.
Our people, north and south, will see
to it that all outsiders shall tote fair
or leave. Naughter) Our soldiers
preserved this country as our heritage,
and we are going to keep it for our
selves and our posterity forever.
AS to Pensions.
There is another fact which | de-
sire to mention to-day, my friends, be-
cause it is one of the live questions of
the hour. 1t is this: If the govern
ment had the right to require men to
serve in the army, it is honor bound
to protect them in their declining
years. A government that does not
protect the men that protected it, is
only a government in name. Our SOL
diers from 81 to '65 were the govern
ment. In those trying hours in the
life of the republic our army was our
only stay. The soldiers were the ma
ton then, and now they are the ma
TONS wards; and it is the few and not
the many who have the temerity
to say that they shall not be munifi-
Gently cared for now, as their ranks
are thinning out in the quick-step
march they are making towards life's
golden sunset yonder in the west.
Occasionally we hear a whine from
some emhling- headed croaker about
our soldiers drawing pensions Let
them whine on. The time ds at hand
when every soldier that carried a
saber or a musket ought to draw a
pension. The charge has been made
that thousands of fraudulent pension
ers are on the rolls. There never was
a baser Islander uttered. After the
closest possible scrutiny of the pension
rolls, out of $40, 600 pensioners, thirty
nine alleged frauds were discovered.
This was less than one in $4,000, and it
proves that the surviving veterans of
the war are more honest than the
twelve Apostles who followed our Saw
dor through his ministry on the earth.
Soldiers of the Grand Army, let not
your hearts be troubled. Amid the
clash of battle you trusted your coun-
try, and it is going to trust you. The
great mass of the people are with you
and behind you. You stood as a wall
of iron before shot and shell, and the
American people will stand as a wall
of protection around all of you
(Cheers). You have our sympathy, but
you deserve more than that Sympa-
thy is a comfort, but it will not keep
the wolf from the old, decrepid, sick
mans door. Every soldier will be
granted a pension from the govern
ment, commensurate with the services
he rendered and the sacrifices he made;
and, in addition to this, he will have
indeed, he now has-the sympathy of
the loyal millions whose arms are
thrown around him as he is rapidly
marching towards his final camping
ground.
True Friends.
Il wish l had time to pay proper
tribute to the loyal, patriotic, liberty
loving women of the republic. When
the war clouds hing lilo q r,idricb+