Albuquerque morning journal. [volume] (Albuquerque, N.M.) 1903-1926, 1909-07-04
To.
GRAND ARMY
FOUNDER
DEDICATED WITH
IMPOSING CEREMONIES
President Taft Pays Warm Tri-
butte TO ORGANIZATION Whose
Rapidly Thinning Ranks
Causes National Sorrow.


|
Washington. July S-Declaring
! that unlike che pretorian guard of
| Rome, the men vino made up the
! Union forces in the Ciivi war. We're
| in favor of free institutions, that they
/ fought for them anH did not intenn
| to sacrifice rhem 80 anything else,
| President TAFT today was the princi-
pal speaker at the unveilng of II
memorial to Or BENJAMIN Franklin
stephenson. founder Of the Grand
! Army OF the Republic. paid glowing
| tribute to that organization Con
| gress having contributed to the east
of the memorial President Taft said
| he was present in his official capac-
| ity
The president spoke as follows:
I'VE are met to dedicate MEM
orial to Union soldier who SCI ced
| four years as a surgeon in the civil
| war. and who also huilded an insti-
tuition by which there should be unit
| ed the bonds of fellowship, all the
sweet association. all the deep lessons
of loyalty and all the pride OF pa
| triotism that such Civil war as that
| could arouse in millions OF hearts.
When men at the formative period In
! life from is to Glare associated
| In any work whether II he IN college.
| in society. in church or otherwise,
! they carry with them afterwards the
| fondest memories and associations for
each other because they have passed
| through common mould. But how
much greater most be the sweet as
| sociation and the bond of union be-
TWEEN men who for four years passed
! through dangers OF the Civil war;
those who survived, thinking OF the
| tender memories of those who gave
up their lives for their countries;
! those surviving, carrying with them
| the sweet association. the stories of
| courage aud tales fun of humor and
pathos. / can conceive no bond or
union stronger than that which unit
ed the men who fought from '6l to
| 65 in the Grand Army. and 1t WAS to
! the crediE OF the fcundcr q, tho
! Grand Army Of the Republic that he
saw the solid basis upon which such
| q structure as that great society
could be erected.
You win recollect that there were
prophets OF evil with respect to the
fate OF the United states after the
war should cease. after the end
should he accomplished. for which
the north was fighting, and II was
said that the aggregation of mil
lion men in arms threatened our free
institutions. They recalled that the
pretorian guard of Rome was an in
strument in furthering the ambition
of those who would suppress free in
stitutions and who We're to assume
despotic power But all those proph-
estes faded into nothingness. The
men who composed that million We're
men In favor of free institutions, who
had fought for them and did not in
tend TO sacrifice them to anything
else. There was no man with the am
bition to use that army as an iustru-
ment Of despOtism, oven II II had been
willing To furnish itself as such, and
50 II was the marvel Of other coun-
tries that his great body of organized
force, than which there never was
stronger or better disciplined army,
faded out and disappeared into the
paths of peace, preserving nothing but
the free memory and association they
had formed in the war and the con-
scousness they had in their own
hearts of having rendered the great
est service 90 il.
stephenson organized this Grand
Army of the Republic to preserve
the essence of that army in its finest
characteristics, in its democracy and
i'm its patriotism Far be it from me
to criticlse IN the slightest such or
ganizat tions as the society of Cincin-
natl and the Loyal Legion. They are
great organizations and those who
belong To them may well have pride
in them. But the Grand Army of the
Republic knows no Initiation, hut ser
vice to the government in the civil
war. and therefore II is that congress,
recognizing the usefulness OF such an
organization in preserving patriotism.
in maintaining Il i'm intensity in those
years when commercial greed Seemed
to make many people forget II, prop
crIv contributed $1,000 to this MEM
ortal and recognized the Grand Army
Of the Republic as an institution
which may well have national graft
tude and national recognition. More
than that, the Grand Army of the Re
public is most useful in this: 1t rep
rescnts the cone centrated opinion OF
the men who fought in the war to
preserve the Union. and 1t therefore
may give authoritative expression
which no other body and no other
part OF the people can give, to-wit.
of the strife which eN-
listed during the four years of the war
and | am glad to say that while that
bitterness may in few instances oh
tain. YOU will never find ii 10 exist
between the men who actually cN-
posed their lives on one side ar the
other.
The Union of the two sections has
been moulded strongly ana more
strongly by those meetings which
ought To he encouraged. between the
blue and the gray to occur as often
as possible Even within my recol-
lection on occasions like this and on
Memorial Dav and on Fourths or
July. I have seen the ranks OF the
Grand Army thinncd know there
are many who. with iauutv step and
keeping their hats on. rather tend Ia
deceive the people a. To their age,
hut the fact is that those ranks are
thinning from day To day; perhaps a
hundred dav are going to their long
home. 1t is fitting that such an as
ISOLATION which IN the course Of the
next generation -,ill bass away. should
have such an enduring monument as
this to testify not only to the patri-