The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1909-06-01
four BIG WORDS.
Equality, Simplicity, Economy,
and Justice Says j. j. Hill
Should Be Written on Every
Cornerstone in the Country.
A NOTABLE ADDRESS
BY the Great Railroad Builder
at Seattle
At the Opening of the Alaska.
Yukon Exposition.
A NOTABLE ADDRESS

! Seattle, Wash, June. 1-aThe great
est service to the nation, to every state
and city today would be the substitu-
| ton for a term of years of law en-
forcement for law making" declared
James J. Hill, in an address at the
opening exercises of the Alaska-Yukon-
Pacific exposition today @
There are four great words that
should be written upon the four corner
stones of every public building in this
land, with the sacredness of a religious
rite, said Mr.. Hill. These watch
words of the republic are equality.
simplicity, economy and Justice They
are interviewer with every fiber of the
national fabric. To forget or deny
them will lead to every misfortune and
every possibility of destruction that
rises now threateningly in the path of
our country'S greatness
EQUALITY before the law is an en-
bodied promise of the United States.
1t is the first principle sought to be
established by the federal constitution.
Insofar as We have been faithful to it.
we have not only grown great and
prosperous but have commanded the
respect of others because we respected
ourselves Insofar as we have denied
1t, insofar as there is anywhere spe-
c1al privilege or an unequal restriction,
any decree or legal governmental
favoritism whatever. we have changed
the government of the fathers and
turned backward toward the old. evil
traditions whose trail of blood and op-
preston runs through all history.
1t Needs Heroism.
| 1T needs heroisnl, it involves the
shaking off of ostentatious fo1lies that
nave already warped our earlier ideals,
| IL may even require considerable re-
| adjustment. ofrour whole industrial sys-
| tenn and reform in our very concep-
ton of the relation between a govern
| ment and it's citizens before the severe
standard of absolute equality before the
law can be restored. It demands
new standard of economy in both our
| public and private expenditure
TT demands the repeal of many
laws and the suppression of many of
| the bills presented to state and fed
| era1 legislatures. So many are there
| framed to give to one an undue ad-
vantage or take away from another
fair field and an equal Judgment. 1t
! demands the abolition of that most
| hateful and corroding element in a
republic that is called class conscious
ness. To steer the ship of state among
these shifting and conflicting currents,
| now full speed ahead and now full
speed astern. is task of extraordinary
difficulty. Yet, unless we can follow
the course of equal justice laid down
| on the chart, shipwreck lies some
| where ahead
| Frequent use of the phrase our
complex civilization,' creates a vague
!
| banished necessarily from the modern
world by a kind of natural evolution
Whereas it remains now, as always, the
normal rule of wholesome national
| life. Do we gain by passing from the
period where Benjamin Franklin, in
| plain dress, commanded the homage of
the most frivolous and most decorative
capital in Europe to the period when a
man cannot accept without humiliation
a foreign ambassadorship unless he has
a large income? The life of those who
do the work of the world, whether in
the high places or the low, is usually
simple thing
No Thoroughness.
eve have complicated our edu-
cationa1 system and made it super
ficia1. The just complaint every
where is that there is no thorough
ness. no wholesome mental discipline
for the young.
I'VE have complicated our social
life Until natural human intercourse
is overlaid with thick stratum of
vulgar prodigality, luxury. display
and insincerity.
I'VE have complicated our law
making until, despite the high stand
ards, the unimpaired traditions and
the continual labors of the courts,
the administration of justice is diff
cult and sometimes uncertain.
1--WE have complicated our fnan-
cial system until it encourages the
widest speculation at one moment
and at another sinks into business
collapse.
I'VE have complicated our indus
trial organization at both ends of the
scale until the great middle class.
which represents labor uncombined,
a fine energy and modest accumula-
tions of capital. finds many of it's
rights invaded or destroyed.
"And we comDlicate all these COM
plications by necessarily passing
more laws about them. Simplicity
in governing methods. in character
and in conduct must be fixed
quality of the state that survives
those changes of the centuries in
which all others have vanished.
"1nseparably connected with equal
ity and simplicity is economy. Ma
tionally considered. it has become
almost a forgotten term
Mr. Hill declared this to be the
most wasteful country on earth in
in it's treatment of natural resources,
and said that the discarded standard
of economy in its affairs must be re-
stored.
Expenses Too Great.
''The curtailment of federal ex-
penses by one-fourth would assist not
only efficiency in the departments,
task of raising and the rage of
spending great sums that should be
left in the pockets of the people.
Last and noblest conception of all
born from the associated life of
mankind is Justice. The nation must
be true to that abstract of heroes
and the final test of any state Upon
occasion the law-making power has
been invoked not to punish guilt, but
to give one man an unfair advantage
at the cost of another; to confiscate
wholly or in part property honestly
earned and fairly used: to distin-