The border vidette., 1907-07-06

 inalienahle rights and that anon! these rights are life liberty and thu pursuit of happiness.
 When the truth of that declaration was acknowledged, as it was when oul Independence was achieved, it was the first time in the history of mankind that it had ever been acknowledged that man, as man, had any rights whatever.
 And fello~ citizens, from our natal day up to the present, ever guided by those great principles, we have build ed onward and upward, until now, these great United States of America, stand the acknowledged leader of all the nations of the world. Never for an instant has that spirit then instil!ed in our fore fathers, ever Jagged in us, and we are just as ready now, as they were in '76, to defend our emblem the emblem of our great and glorious liberty, that so proudly waves and floats in Pata goni4's summer breeze, and every where else today in this beautiful land of the free -the Star spangled banner.
 What is the best proot of the asser- tion I have ust made? Let me tell you.
 For more than thirty years after the close of the civil war we had gone on Tn the pursuits of peace. We had fairly repaired the great loss which strife had drought upon the Country.
 We were such strenuous advocates of peace, and such firm believers that there would be no other wars to which we would be party, that we had ne glected to keep up our navy or even our coast defenses. We had forgotten the wise old maxim, ''in time of peace prepare for war"
 absolutely without preparation for an emergency.
 It seemed that we had lost the ma tional spirit of our fore fathers and become emasculated by long period of peace. But that was not the case. It was not real, it was only apparent. The sequel shows that the valor and virility of the great American people, had not departed from them.
 With professions of good will upon our lips; with sentiments of love in our hearts; with gifts of relief in our hands, we offered ourselves as mediat- ors of peace between Spain and down trodden Cuba.
 At the well remembered midnight hour, the waters of Havana harbor, heavsd upon their surface, a great light illumined the sky, terrible roar rent the air, darkness closed down about the scene and the good battle ship Maine was no Eaore.
 Then and there two hundred and sixty six American seamen, by the most damnable act of treachery, found watery graves. We do not know who committed he act.
 But we do know. and the Spanish nation knows, and the world knows that the American people have not lost their courage and their manhood.
 And we know and the world knows, that the American soldier and the American sailor know how to fight and conquer, and then, to forgive 2 fallen foe.
 From the day the Declaration of Independence was proclaimed, until this hour, the valor and the bravery of the American soldier and the American sailor. has been at all times conspicuous, and our hearts are fall of gratitude for them.
 We should honor them for their bravery, their suffering, their sacrifices, but above all, we should honor them for the testimony they bring of the peoples allegiance to the principle of mans inalienable right to liberty, the liberty which sustains law, upholds order, promotes peace and happine ss, and secures rights.
 And in that war with Spain among the first to shoulder arms and go to the front, were many of ArIzona's valiant and noble sons. You well know their record. Some failed to return-among them that gallant sol dier and leaGer-Bucky O'Neill.
 Today in the good city of Prescott, his former home, there will be un- yelled at the our of high noon. a colossal statue costing twenty five thousand dolllrs, recently erected to his memory, and to the memory of all the Arizona volunteers in that struggle.
 A fitting tribute to them, erected by all the people of good old patriotic Arizona. And 1 do most heartily wish, that it might have been the good fortune of all of us, to have been there today to widness those i'm posing ceremonies.
 Fellow citizens, the one hundred aud tbirf,, noo pLars If nnlrhk ep euo.