The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1907-10-01

he rich or poor-shall be brought be-
| Tore the impartial justice of a court
| Perhaps 1 am most anxious to get al
| the politician who is corrupt, because
ne betrayS a great trust; but assured
| ly shall not spare his brother COR
| ruptfonist who shows himself a swim
dler in business life; and, according to
our power. crimes of fraud and cum
I as crimes of brutality and physical
violence.
Importance of Character
| We need good laws and we need
ABOVE all things the hearty aid of good
| citizens in supporting and enforcing
the laws. Nevertheless, men and
women of this great state, men and
women of the middle west, never Tor
get that law and the admins traitor,
/ of law, important though they are,
must always occupy a wholly second
airy place as compared with the char
| acter of the average citizen himself.
! On this trip shall speak to audiences
| in each of which there will be many
| men who fought in the civil war. You
| who wore the blue and your brothers
| of the south who wore the gray know
that in war no general no matter how
good, no organization no matter how
| perfect, can avail if the average man
in the ranks has not got the fighting
edge. We need the organization, the
preparation; we need the good gem
eral; but we need most the f1ghtins
edge in the individual soldier. So it is
in private life. We live in a rough,
workaday world, and we are yet u
long way from the millennium. We
can not as a nation and we can not Is
individuals afford to cultivate only the
gentler, softer qualities. There must
be gentleness and tenderness-the
strongest men are gentle and tender
but there must also be courage ano
strength. 1 have a hearty sympathy
with those who believe in doing all
that can be done for peace; but have
no sympathy at all with those who be-
lieve tha in the world as it now is we
can afford to see the average American
citizen lose the qualities that in their
sum make up a good hghting man.
You men must be workers who work
with all your heart and strength ana
mind at your several tasks in life;
and you must also be able to fight at
need. You women have even higher
and more difficult duties; for L honor
no man, not even the soldier who fights
for righteousness, quite as much as 1
honor the good woman who does her
full duty as wife and mother. But if
she shirks her duty as wife and mother
then she stands on par with the man
who refuses to work for himself ana
his family, for those dependent upon
him, and who in time of the nations
need refuses to fight. The man or
woman who shirks his or her outy oc-
cupies a contemplate position. You
here are the sons and daughters of the
pioneers I preach to you no life of
ease. 1 preach to you the life of effort,
the life that finds its highest satisfac-
ton in doing well some work that is
we'll worth doing.
So much for what concerns every
Now, word or two as to matters
which are of peculiar interest to this
region of our country.
Has Been in Every State.
Since L have been president 1 have
travelled in every state of this Union,
but my travelling has been almost en-
tirely on railroads, save now and then
by wagon or on horseback. Now l
have the chance to try travelling by
river; to go down the greatest of our
rivers, the Father of Waters. A good
many years ago when 1 lived ins the
northwest I travelled occasionally on
the Upper Missouri and its tribu-
taries; but then we travelled in a fiat
boat and did our own rowing and pad
ding and polling. Now I am to try a
our railway system; and the fact that |
am very firm in my belief as to the |
necessity of the government exercis- |
ing a proper supervision and control |
interfere with the other fact that I |
greatly admire the large majority of |
the men in all positions, from the top |
to the bottom. who build and run |
them. Yet, while of course I am |
to see these men, and there
fore the corporations they represent |
or serve, achieve the fullest measure |
of Legitimate prosperity, nevertheless |
as this country grows I feel that we |
can not have too many highroads, and |
that in addition to the iron highroads |
of our railway system we should also
utilize the great river highways which
have been given US by nature. From
a variety of causes these highways
have in many parts of the country
been almost abandoned. This is not
healthy Our people. and especially
the representatives of the people in
the national congress, should give
their most careful attention to this
subject. We should be prepared to
put the nation collectively back of the
to improve them for the
use. Our knowledge at this
time is not such as to permit me to go
into details, or to say definitely just
what the nation should do; but most
assuredly our great navigable rivers
are national assets just as much as
our great seacoast harbors. Exactly
as it is for the interest of all the coun-
try that our great harbors should be
fitted to receive in safety the largest |
vessels of the merchant fleets of the
world, so by deepening and otherwise
our rivers should be fitted to bear
their part in the movement of our
and this is especially
true of the Mississippi and it's tribu-
taries, which drain the immense and
region which makes in
very fact the heart of our nation; the
basin of the Great Lakes being al
ready united with the basin of the
and both regions being
identical in their products and inter-
ests. Waterways are peculiarly fitted
which come from the
soil or under the soil: and no other