Pullman herald. [volume] (Pullman, W.T. [Wash.]) 1888-1989, 1909-04-09


the late Governor Cosgrove, at the
Methodist Church last week. The
address follows:
Twice have stood before the people
to say word when death had claimed
a President of the United States.
Twice now has it been my duty and
privilege to speak few words to my
fellow citizens on the occasion of the
death of the chief executive of the
state. Garfield and Mckinley fell by
the hand of the assassin. Rogers and
Cosgrove, in the midst of peace and
supported by an affectionate people,
each wrapped the drapery of his couch
about him and lay down in peaceful
sleep that final sleep that knows no
waking. 1t is tribute to the
strength and stability of our govern
ment that such crises are, after all,
no crises. AS Garfield himself put it
in a still darker hour, "God reigns.
yet the fact that the Ship of State
sails forward without shiver from
such shock does not mean that the
lives of such men are wholly insignifi-
cant, that the state is all in all and
the officer nothing and the individual
citizens nothing. Such an hour should
be an hour of thoughtfullness, and re-
Election. and thanksgiving in the
midst of sorrow and sadness which
dominate our feelings. 1t is the
triumph of democracy not only that
other good men step forward ready
for the emergency. but that the self
control of our citizenship can with
stand any shock. There are those who
refuse to see the evidence of strength
and beauty in our constitutional democ-
racy and who persist in looking down
ward and backward, who would curse
and destroy what we have achieved
after so many long century of effort
and suffering. The career of Cogrove
is typical A farmer boy in Ohio.
with meager home opportunities, and
yet in the midst of a social state
which whispered to him. "All things
are possible to him who hath hope and
faith. And he answered and said,
Even to be the Governor of a great
state?' And the voice answered
"Yea, even to be the governor of the
people" And he asid, ''Then | will
be governor. for l have hope and
faith and l can work and wait"
Though little child when the great
civil war burst forth. l can remember
we'll the tremor which ran through all
the people, an | can imagine the long
ing which consumed the heart of the
lad of fourteen and fifteen to lay that
heart on his country's altar, if so be
that the Union might be preserved.
And then when he felt the sturdy
strength of youth of sixteen and he
had heard that far resounding cry for
the liberty of the slave in Lincoln's
emancipation proclamation on June
lst.. 1868, flesh and blood could endure
it no longer and his spirit hurried him
away against the will of parents and
friends, and till the close of the war
he was in the army. That is how he
became one of the old guard and was
able to wear that badge of honor, now
becoming SO rare, the Grand Army
button.
His struggle to get college educa-
tion, meaning as it did, self denial,
and endurance, as we'll as effort. is
likewise characteristic of that choice
band of American youth who, almost
from the first landing on the New
England coast have sought through the
discipline of learning. to gain the
knowledge and power which would
make them leaders in all that is best
in the civic and social life of our
people. And then came his career as
struggling young lawyer without
money, without social prestige, with
out "a pull" as they call it patiently
laying the foundation and waiting the
day when the dream of his youth
might be a reality. Mr.. Cosgrove's
career has been typical of the nation
and of the frontier. 1t is a very strik.
ing example of the truth that it is
rot the man alone who holds public
Office who determines the social anc
political development of the state
When the book is written "The Build
ers of tho Commonwealth, ION one OF
the brightest pages will be written tn,
name Samuel G. Cosgrove. +" for h,
has been emphatically one of the build
ers of the great state of Washington
] do not know, with the exception O
the exalted Office to which the voice O
the people lately called him, that h,
has ever held any important office. H,
was. for four years. a director in tn
public schools, position in whicl
the public spirited man often contrib
utes to the welfare of his fellow eiti
1apa in urNaatow dn~,oz II