Camas Prairie chronicle. [volume] (Cottonwood, Idaho) 1901-1917, 1905-03-10
INAUGURAL ADDRESS
PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT MADE A
MASTERLY SPEECH.
At the East Front Of the Capitol
says our People Have Cause to be
Thankful for Things Of the Past and
No Good Reason Why We Should
Fear the Future-Lauds Lincoln.

Fear the Future-Lauds Lincoln.
my Fellow Citizens: No people on
earth have more cause to be thankful
than ours, and this is said reverently,
and in no spirit of boastfulness in our
own strength, but with gratitude to
the Giver Of good who has blessed us
with the conditions which have enabl-
ed us to achieve so large measure
of well-being and of happiness. To
us as people it has been granted to
lay the foundations Of our national life
in new continent. We are the heirs
of the ages, and yet we have had to
pay fey of the penalties which in old
countries are exacted by the dead hand
of bygone civilization. We have not
been obliged to fight for our existence
against any alien race; and yet our
life has called for the vigor and effort
without which the manlier and harder
virtues wither away. Under such con-
ditions it would be our own fault ifI
we failed; and the success which we
have had in the past, the success that
we confidently believe the future will
bring, should cause in us no feeling
of vainglory, but rather a deep and
abiding realization of all which life has
offered us; a full acknowledgment of
responsibility which is ours; and a
fixed determination to show that under
free government a mighty people
can thrive best, alike as regards the
things of the body and the things of
the soul.
Duties Must Not Be shirked.
'sMuch has been given to us, and
much will rightfully be expected from
us. We have duties to others, and du-
ties to ourselves; and we can shirk
neither. We have become great ma
ton, forced by the fact of its great
mess into relations with the other ma
tions of the earth; and we must be-
have as beseems people with such
responsibilities Toward all other ma
lions, large and small, our attitude
must be one Of cordial and sincere
friendship. We must show not only
} in our words but in our deeds that we
are earnestly DESTROYS of securing
their good will by acting toward them
in a spirit of just and generous recog-
milton of all their rights. But justice
and generosity in a nation, as in an
individual, count most when shown not
by the weak but by the strong. While
ever careful to refrain from wronging
! others we must be no less insistent
~
We wish peace; but we wish the
peace of justice, the peace of righte-
BUSINESS. We wish it because we
think it is right and not because we
are afraid. No weak nation that acts
: manfully and justly should ever have
cause to fear us, and no strong power
should ever be able to single us out
as subject for insolent aggression.
Foreign Relations.
Our relations with the other pow
ers of the world are important; but
still more important are our relations
: among ourselves. Such growth in
wealth, in population, and in power,
as this nation has seen during the
century and a quarter of it's national
life is inevitably accompanied by a
like growth in the problems which are
ever before every nation that rises to
greatness. Power invariably means
both responsibility and danger. Our
forefathers faced certain perils which
we have outgrown. We now face 9TH
er perils the very existence of which
: it was impossible that they should
foresee.
Modern life is both complex and in
tense, and the tremendous changes
wrought by the extraordinary indus
trial development of the last half cen
fury are felt in every fibre of our so
cial and political being. Never before
have men tried so vast and formidable
an experiment as that Of administering
the affairs of a continent under the
forms of a democratic republic. The
conditions which have told for our
marvellous material wellbeing, which
have developed to very high degree
our energy, self reliance and individ-
ual initiative, have also brought the
care and anxiety inseparable from the
accumulation of great wealth in in
dustrial centers. Upon the success of
our experiment much depends. not on
ly as regards our own welfare but is
regards the welfare of mankind. If
we fail, the cause of free self govern
ment throughout the world will rock
to its foundations; and therefore our
i Responsibility is heavy, to ourselves,
to the world as it is today and to the
generations yet unborn.
Faith in the Future.