The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1902-08-31
FIRST SPEECH IN VERMONT.
The President Addresses 10000 PeO-
pie Mt Fair Grounds.

WINDSOR, VT, Aug. 3.-President
Roosevelt spoke to nearly 10000 people at
the fair grounds here this afternoon. He
said:
Mr.. Evarts and you men and women Of
Vermont, my fellow-citizens, my fellow
Americans: 1 am glad, indeed, TO have the
chance of greeting you and of saying a
word to you to-day. This is the place
where the Constitution of your State was
formulated; the first Constitution definitely
to forbid human slavery in this continent.
Your State was founded by men who
knew how to fight when the need was to
fight, and who knew that fighting was not
all; that they had to work in civil life also.
Vermont has done what ii has done
throughout our history, and furnished the
leadership in our public life, which it al
ways has furnished-has shown that
healthy sanity of public sentiment which
has so prominently distinguished it, be-
cause has understood that while
II was a mighty good thing TO produce ma
terial prosperity, il was a better thing to
produce men and women fit 10 enjoy it.
You look through our history and you will
see that, while, of course, material pros
perity is the basis, the foundation upon
which we build, yet that the leadership of
the Nation has always lain with those who
realize that material property was an in
dispensable foundation, but useless If
there was not a superstructure upon it
the superstructure of the lofty life toward
things better which only a great and gen.
erOus people can feel.
land your forefa thers-the men who
founded this country-they understood that
no one quality was sufficient for the sue
cessful founding of a country, any more
than any one quality will do to make a
citizen a success. You have got to make a
number of different qualities. In the first
place, you must recognize the sphere that
the Nation has. Something. a good deal,
can be done by wise laws-by fearless ad-
ministration Of the laws. But after that
has been done there remains the fact that
you must trust TO the citizen himself to
work out the ultimate salvation of the
state. You can restrain men by the law
and by the execution of the law from
wrongdoing. And the wrongdoing man
takes either of two steps; took those steps
a century ago; takes those steps now. The
crimes OF craft and the crimes of violence
both are equally dangerous. And we must
remember after all that those who come
from the set where one kind of crime is
dangerous are apt TO denounce the other
type of crime. Both must be put down. The
man who commits violence-above all, the
body of men who commit violence, commit
an outrage, not merely against their fellow
Americans, but against the whole body
polite to which they belong. Violence of
the individual, above all violence of a mob
that type of violence is Incompatible with
free government, with free and orderly
liberty in our Republic.
9Th first requisite of liberty as we and
our forefathers have known it is the will
ingness to abide the law. The government
must be just; the law must be no respecter
of persons. The law must get the big man
who goes wrong just as it gets at the small
man who goes of That's
right cheersl-and IL must get at him in
his own interest. You can protect the man
of big means against wrongdoing by the
law, and just as long as you make him him.
self responsible TO the law. On the other
hand, the worst enemy of the people on
whose behalf mob violence is often invoked
Is the man who invokes II. the man who
%connives at il or incites il. The worst wrong
that can be done TO our people is to try TO
teach them that aught can be obtained by
mob rule or violence of any kind. We can
make this government, we can keep it what
it is: we cannot only make il what it is, but
we can raise IT to still loftier height, but il
! must be done through orderly. decent proc
ess of liberty working through law.
1T is not a kindness TO bring up a child
in the belief that it can get through life by
Sinking the difficulties. The child who is
going to be worth its salt must be taught
to face difficulties and overcome them. Is
not that so? You know IL is so. | pity no
man because he has got to work. 1 despise
the man who will not work. He is not
worth envying. no matter at which end Of
the social scale he Is. The man who can
not pull his own weight. that man is not
any good in our public life. Now we have
got to do il IN widely different wavs: each
man has got TO at least pull his own weight,
and IL he Is worth his salt he will pull a lit
tie more. L~Applause.l And we cannot af-
ford as a nation any more than as a fam
lily can AFFORD II in the training OF the men,
bers of the f~amily-we canno afford to have
our citizens brought up in any other the
DRY. Each man of you who looks back on
his life will feel proud TO hand or 10 his
children. not the memory OF the DAYS Of
ease, but the days that were pretty hard.
that meant hard work. but wherein he did
something. lApplause.l
Now. in every audience that / speak 10
here all through New England I see men
like your friend there, who wear the button
that shows that you fought in the great
war. You did not go down there TO have an
easy time. did you? You did not go down
there for the pay; 1t was less than ss a
month IL I You went down in
the nrime Of youth. the nrira ~ ,.o,r
strength. leaving all that there was at
home. to spend four years, showing defeat
as well as victory, until with stern courage
from defeat you wrested ultimate victory.
But they were not easy years. not a bit OF
il. They were years OF heart-wearing work
for a righteous end. and thrice fortunate
borders who in time of peace and i'm time OF
war alike are willing and anxious 10 spend
the best there is in them to do all that their