Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1907-10-10
LAUD'S M'KINLEY'S LIFE.
President Roosevelt Speaks at Tomb
of Martyred President.


of Martyred President.
President Roosevelt, speaking at the
dedication of the Mckinley mausoleum
in Canton, said:
We have gathered to-day to pay our
need of respect and affection to the men,
DRY of William Mckinley, who as Presi-
dent won a place in the hearts of the
American people such as but three or four
OF all the Presidents of this country have
ever won. He was of singular upright
ness and purity Of character, alike in pub
lie and in private life; citizen who loved
peace, he did his duty faithfully and well
for four years of war when the honor OF
the nation called him to arms. As Con-
gresham, as Governor of his State, and
finally as President, he rose to the fore
most place among our statesmen. reach
ing a position which would satisfy the
keenest ambition; but he never lost that
simple and thoughtfui kindness toward
every human being, great or small, lofty
or humble. with whom he was brought
into contact. which so endeared him TO
our people.
He had to grapple with more serious
and complex problems than any President
since Lincoln, and yet, while meeting ev-
cry demand of craftsmanship, he contin-
ued to live a beautiful and touching FAM
lily life, life very healthy for this nation
to see in its foremost citizen; and now
the woman who walked in the shadow
even after his death, the wife to whom his
loss was calamity more crushing than it
could be to any other human being, lies
beside him here in the same sepulcher
Here the President made his illusions
to the epitaph written by DR.. Wheeler
and chosen by Secretary Hay. Continu-
ing, he said
Many lessons are taught US by his
career but none more valuable than the
lesson of broad human sympathy for and
among all of our citizens of all classes
and creeds. No other President has ever
more deserved to have his life work char
acterized in Lincoln's words as being car
ried on with malice toward none, with
charity toward ALL" As boy he worked
hard with his hands; he entered the army
as a private soldier; he knew poverty he
earned his own livelihood, and by his own
exertions he finally rose TO the position
of a man of moderate means. Not mere
ly was he in personal touch with farmer
and town dweller, with capitalist and
wa ge-worker, but he felt an intimate I'M
Outstanding of each and therefore an in
innate sympathy with each; and his con-
sstent effort was to try to judge all by
the same standard and to treat all with
the same Justice Arrogance toward the
weak, and envious hatred of those well
IL. l, md
gentle soul.
Surely this attitude of his should be
the attitude of all our people to-day. 1t
would be cruel disaster to this country
to permit ourselves to adopt an attitude
of hatred and envy toward success Wor-
thily won, toward wealth honestly ac-
quired. Let US in this respect profit by
the example of the republics of this west
ern hemisphere to the south Of us. Some
of these republics have prospered great
": but there are certain ones that have
Jagged far behind, that still continue in
a condition of material poverty, Of social
and political unrest and confusion.
Without exception the republics of the
former class are those in which honest
industry has been assured of reward and
protection those where a cordial welcome
has been extended to the kind of enter
prise which benefits the whole country,
while incidentally, as is right and proper,
giving substantial rewards to those who
manifest it. On the other hand, the poor
and backward republics, the republics in
which the lot of the average citizen is
least desirable, and the lot of the faNoring
man worst of all are precisely those in
which industry has been killed because
wealth exposed it's owner to spOliation.
To these communities foreign capital
now rarely comes because it has been
found that as soon as capital is employed
so as 20 give substantial remuneration to
thos2 supplying it, it excites ignorant
envy and hostility, which results in such
oppressive action, within or without the
law, as sooner or later to work a virtual
confscation. Every manifestation of feel
ing of this kind in our civilization should
be crushed at the outset by the weight of
a sensible public opinion.
From the standpoint of our material
prosperity there is only one other thing
as important as the Encouragement of a
spirit of envy and hostility toward honest
business men, toward honest men of
means; this is the discourage of dis
honest business men, the war upon the
chicanery and wrongdoing which are pc
culiarly repulsive, peculiarly noxious,
when exhibited by men who have no ex-
cuse of want, of poverty, of ignorance,
for their crimes.
Men of means, and above all, men of
great wealth. can exist in safety under the
peaceful protection of the State only in
orderly societies, where liberty manifests
itself through and under the law. 1t is
these men who, more than any others,
should, in the interests of the class to
which they belong, in the interests of their
children and their children's children, seek
in every way, but especially in the con-
duct of their lives, to insist upon and to
build up respect for the law. 1t may not
be true from the standpoint of some par
ticular individual of this class, but in the
long run it is pre-eminently true from
the standpoint of the class as a whole,
no less than of the country as a whole,
that it is a veritable calamity to achieve
a temporary triumph by violation or eva
sion of the law; and we are the best
friends of the man of property, we show
ourselves the stanchest uphOlders Of the
rights Of property, when we set our faces
like flint against those offenders who do
wrong in order to acquire great wealth
or who use this wealth as a help to
wrongdoing.
All Cannot Equal Him.
Wrongdoing is confined to no class.
Good and evil are to be found among both
rich and poor and in drawing the line
among our fellows we must draw it on
conduct and not on worldly possessions.
In the abstract most of US will admit
this. In the concrete we can act upon
such doctrine only if we really have
knowledge of and sympathy with one an
other.
If both the wage-worker and the capt.
talist are able to enter each into the
others life, to meet him so as to get into
genuine sympat thy with him, most Of the
misunderstanding between them will dis
appear and its place will be taken by