Arizona republican., 1910-08-16

tion or his attitude concerning it
 This is exactly the position that tn,
 president might have been expected
 to take. Any statement that he might
 make now would be misconstrued
 at best. The people of Arizona havt
 the fate of statehood in their owr
 hands. just as MT. Taft wishes then
 to have. He will not, by any expres- | sion of his at this time, enable any
 body to say that the making of Ari-
 zona's constitution was the result of
 undue influence or intimidation from
 Washington. But that Mir Taft's own | ideas as to the constitution which we
 should adopt may not be misunder- | stood, we reproduce what he said in
 Arizona last October:
 want to &an your attention to the responsibilities that will be upon you
 as citizens of the country. You will | have to select your own state off cers, you will have to select your 1 congressman and senators, but before all that you will have to make a fun damental law called your constitution, which is to govern your legislature, your lawmaking and your executive thereafter, and that is d responsible | ity which is very heavy and to which l invite your careful attention. The
 trouble is that you are so anxious for statehood, so determined to have it, | rhat | is, if it is presented to you you will be disposed to vote for statehood and the constitution. At least that has
 been the experience of other terri tories.
 Now, we have had constitutions
 made by territories coming into the union which were voted and approved, and which did not approve themselves to those men who looked forward and understood what a constitution ought to be. It ought to be simple. It ought to be general. It ought to be comprehensive. It ought not to in clude every limitation upon the legis- lature that each member of the con- stitutional convention thinks would be wise to follow in legislation. You ought to leave something to your leg islature. Don't make your constitu- tion read like a statute. Be states men and make it read like a funda- mental law Study the constitution of the United States and see what the greatest instrument of fundamen- tai law is, and how simple; how it has been elastic and yielded to the de- mands of our increasing country. and yet is today the wonder of the world. Don't allow every fact or every principle, however sound, to be in- serted in that constitution.
 Trust something to your legislature thereafter, and don't bind them and you in such a way that you will be struggling for twenty-five years to get away from something that was made in haste and not with the sense of deliberation that you ought to ex- ercise in making a path that ought to last for fifty or one hundred years.
 I am talking sense You will find in your constitutional convention gen tlemen who have radical progressive ideas Many of the germs of truth ought to be carried out at least in statutes, but don't fasten yourselves down by the views of people who want to make laws for hundred years without knowing exactly what the conditions are under which those laws are to be made. l am not talk ing just for the sake of talking. expect that you are going to make a constitution here. I hope you will. am going to do the best l can to help fn don't load yourselves down and your future down with restrictions like those which are in the Oklahoma con- stitution, making that read like a long list of statutes instead of funda- mental instrument like some of the older states and the constitution of the United States.
 Our fathers builded even better than they knew, and we have not gotten in advance of them in the matter of laying down simple prlncl- ples of constitutional law. We don't know more than our fathers, for Tn that respect they have proven what they knew by the usefulness of the constitution of the United States.
 Mir Taft demonstrated this summer that when he addressed the people of Arizona last summer and assured them of his friendship and promised his aid to secure statehood, he Twas mot talking for just the sake of talking" When the statehood bill, in the early days of June of this year, seemed doomed to go over to the next session, William H. Taft, president of the United States, said to congress: "Gentlemen, you must pass the statehood bill. You will not adjourn with my approval until that bill is passed" The pressure he ex- erted passed the bill Taft is the first active advocate Arizona ever had in the presidential chair. He has shown himself our sincere and con sistent friend Even the most ordi- nary appreciation of this friendship ought to lead the people of Arizona to accept his advice in the making of the constitution.
 Possibly the people of this territory, accepting the advice of irresponsible agitators, will frame constitution which will subserve the ends of spec