The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1905-03-07
MY FELLOW CITIZENS:

stitution.
| MY FELLOW CITIZENS:
No people on earth have more cause
to be thankful than ours, and this is
said reverently, In no spirit of boast
fulness in our own strength, but with
gratitude to the Giver of Good who
has blessed us with the conditions
which have enabled us to achieve so
large measure of well-being and
happiness. To us as a people 1t has
been granted to lay the foundations of
our national life In a new continent.
We are the heirs of the ages, and yet
we have had to pay few of the PEN
alties which in old countries are ex-
acted by the dead hand of a bygone
civilization. We have not been Obliged
to fight 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 conditions it would
be our own fault If we failed; and the
success which we have had in the past
the success which we confidently be-
lieve the future will bring, should
cause in us no feeling of vainglory,
but rather deep abiding realization
of all which life has offered us: full
Acknowledgement of the responsibility
which is ours: and fixed determin-
alton to show that under free
government mighty people can
thrive best, alike as regards the
things of the body and the things Of
the soul.
Much has been given to US, and
much will rightfully be expected
from us. We have duties to others
and duties to ourselves; and we can
shirk neither. We have become a
great nation, forced by the fact of its
greatness into relations with the
other nations of the earth: and we
must behave as beseems people with
such responsibilities. Toward all other
nations, 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 desirous of Sc
curing their good will by acting to-
ward them in a spirit of just and gen.
erous recognition of all their rights.
But justice and generosity in nation,
as in an individual, count most when
shown not by the weak but by the
strong While ever careful to re-
frain from wronging others, we must
be no less insistent that we are not
wronged ourselves. We wish peace;
but we wish the peace of justice, the
peace of righteousness. We wish it
because we think 1t is right and not
because we are afraid. No weak ma
tion 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.
Our relations with the other powers
of the world are important; but still
more important are our relations
among ourselves. Such growth In
wealth, in population, and in the
power as this nation has seen dur
ing the century and a quarter OF its
national life is inevitably accompanied
by a like growth in the problems
which are ever before every nation
that rises to greatness. Power invar-
IDLY means both responsibility and
danger. Our forefathers faced certain
perils which we have outgrown. We
now face other perils the very exls-
tence of which it was impossible that
they should foresee. Modern life Is
both complex and intense. and the
tremendous changes wrought by the
extraordinary Industrial development
of the last half century are felt In
every fiber of our social 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 well-being. which have de-
veloped to very high degree our ener-
gy, self-reliance, and individual ini-
tiative, have also brought the care and
anxiety inseparable from the accum-
ulation of great wealth In industrial
pertinent much depends; not only as
regards our own welfare, but as re-
CARDS the welfare Of mankind. II we
fail, the cause of free self-government
throughout the world will rock to its
foundations; and therefore onr re-
sponsibility is heavy, to ourselves, to
the world as 1t is today, and to the
generations yet unborn. There is nc
good reason why we should fear the
future, but there is every reason why
we should face 1t seriously, neither
hiding from ourselves the gravity OF
the problems before us nor fearing
| to approach these problems with the