The daily silver state. [volume] (Winnemucca, Nev.) 1903-1907, 1903-07-06

WAS SUCCESS


Meeting here in niial respect TO COM
memorate the deeds that made good
the Declaration of Independence, we
are discharging a duty that will be
emulated by posterity in all ages to
come.
That duty involves a debt of graft
tude that the American people can
only feebly repay, by a constant con-
power to do so.
Personal welfare and happiness were
purely incidental with the heroes of
the Revolution; their first thought was
to benefit those who would succeed
them.
The sacrifices they made we're to OBJ
tain justice for their children, though
they could hardly expect to enjoy it
themselves. They knew from the ex-
perience of mankind that the fruits of
their great struggle would never ma
ture in time for them to gather the
harvest.
The various addresses, petitions and
appeals of that stirring period reveal
this heroic fcrgetfulness of self.
And further, our forefathers had not
yet felt the worst form of arbitrary y
power.
They were not bondsmen goaded be-
yond endurance by intolerab'e acts of
oppression, but free men who beheld
from afar the approach of tyranny.
They had borne many insolent in
vasions of their rights in the past and
might have borne them again with
equal patience in the future. Con-
sulting only their own interests
X would have been far better for them
to have suffered the indignities heap
ed upon them by the power across the
sea-
They might have forgone for the
time being their claim of right to
representation in all matters of taxa
tion.
How easily they could have paid the
taxes and duties prescribed by the
British Ministery, and left the issue OF
American liberty with poeterity.
But they had no thought of be-
queathing to their children the ordeal
OF long and terrible war.
They saw "the bow bent and drawn
but they were not the men to make
from the shaft"
Few in number, but of dauntless
spirit and determined purpose, they
engaged in an unequal contest which
they might have Stunned without dis
honor.
They felt, too, that the great prob
lem of civil government must then be
designed by Providence for its SOU
ton.
Their ancestors had sounded all the
I2xx xL arc 1f cntn
aS it then prevailed. without finding
the essential principles OF personal
liberty.
Fleeing from an existence grown in
toierable by repeated abuses and
usurpations, they established their
humble homes on a new continent
whose virgin soil had never yet been
pressed by the footsteps of King.
For awhile they lived in peace but
not for long. Colonial vassalage pur-
sued them hither. And soon their de-
scendents beheld the hated hand OF
tyranny reaching across the Atlantic,
1t grasped their revenues, curtailed
their liberties and desecrated the tenn
pies of their God.
There was no longer any cause to
doubt the true nature of their mission
in this holy land. They could retreat
no further. Liberty and religious
freedom had been hunted to their last
asylum.
The uniform misrule of the past and
the present-the future happiness OF
their posterity-the mighty circum-
stances of their emigration here, in
dicated all, that their high Office was
20 separate the colonies from Euro
pean control and institute new gov
eminent among men.
They realized that the hour had ar
rived when this political idea must be
carried into actual effect, or aband-
oned, perhaps, forever. Once fully
determined in their course all doubt
and hesitation vanished. Already the
bold yeomanry had met the King S
forces in the field and found them not
invincible.
The heroic stand made by the pat
riots on the crimson slopes of Bunker
Hill and subsequent brave exploits
dissipated all trace of opposition to
a declaration of freedom; and on July
ith, seventeen hundred and seventy
six, that immortal document was
adopted which forms the basis OF
American government.
For it's support the colonists had
pledged their lives, their fortunes and
their sacred honor.
They girded on the old sword grown
rusty from long years of idleness. took
down the ancient musket from the
cabin wall, and made ready for the
| frav they knew to be inevitable.
That clause in the Declaration OF
independence which announces that
men are capable of governing them
selves was of startling import to the
world
Prior to Its enunciation in that in
strument. that theory had been held
| by a few scientists and philosophers
but no statesman had considered II o1
practical value in the affairs of men
II was regarded as dream OF an idle
mind. incapable of intelligent inter
nretation. or at the most. mere spec
ulation upon which II was folly for q
~easonsb be man to mediate.
| Besides IL was against the traditions
and customs of me world. and foreign
| Continued on page ~