Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1914-12-08
DEFENSES OF NATION NOT NEGLECTED,
SAYS PRESIDENT IN MESSAGE

defense. We are not unmindful of the
great responsibility resting upon us.
We shall learn and profit by the lesson
of every experience and every new cir
cumstance; and what is needed will
be adequately done"
Has Hopes For Peace
To peace in Europe the President
referred briefly:
I'VE are the champions of peace
and of concord" he said. And we
should be very jealous of this distinc-
ton which we have sought to earn.
Just now we should be particularly
jealous of it because it is our dearest
present hope that this character and
reputation may presently, in Gods
providence, bring us an opportunity
such as has seldom been vouchsafed
any nation. the opportunity to coun-
sci and obtain peace in the world and
reconciliation and healing settlement
of many matter that has cooled and
interrupted the friendship of nations.
This is the time above all others when
we should wish and resolve to keep
our strength by self-possession, our in
fiuence by preserving our ancient prin-
ciples of action
The President spoke in full as fol-
lows:
Gentlemen of the Congress:
THE session upon which you are
now entering will be the closing ses-
sion of the SiXty-third Congress, a
Congress, l venture to say, which will
long be remembered for the great
body of thoughtful and constructive
work which ii has done, in loyal re-
sponse to the thought and needs of
the country. l should like in this ad-
dress to review the notable record and
try to make adequate assessment of IT;
but no doubt we stand too near the
work that has been done and are our
selves too much part of it to play the
part of historians toward it.
Moreover, our thoughts are now
more of the future than of the past.
While we have worked at our tasks of
peace the circumstances of the whole
age have been altered by war. What
we have done for our own land and
our own people we did with the best
that was in us, whether of character
or of intelligence, with sober enthu-
siasm and a confidence in the princi-
pies upon which we were acting which
sustained us at every step of the diff
cult undertaking; but it Is done. 1t
has passed from our hands. 1t is now
an established part of the legislation
OF the country. It's usefulness, its
effects will disclose themselves in eX-
perience. What chiefly strikes us now,
as we look about us during these clos
ing days of year which will be for
ever memorable in the history of the
world, is that we face new tasks, have
been facing them these six months,
must face them in the months to come
face them without partisan feeling,
like men who have forgotten every
thing but a common duty and the fact
that we are Representatives of a great
people whose thought is not of us but
of what America owes to herself and
to all mankind in such circumstances
as these upon which we look amazed
and anxious.
War Interrupts Trade
'War has not only interrupted the
means of trade, but also the processes
of production. In Europe it is destroy
ing men and resources wholesale and
upon scale unprecedented and ap-
palling. There is reason to fear that
the time is near, if it be not already at
hand, when several of the countries of
Europe will find it difficult to do for
their people what they have hitherto
been always easily able to do-many
essential and fundamental things. At
any rate, they will need our help and
our manifold services as they have
never needed them before; and we
should be ready, more fit and ready
than we have ever been.
Needs In Europe
nations whom Europe has usually sup
piled with innumerable articles of
manufacture and commerce of which
they are in constant need and with
out which their economic development
halts and stands still can now get only
a small part or what they formerly
imported and eagerly look to us to
supply their all but empty markets.
This is particularly true of our own
neighbo the States, great and small,
of Central and South America. Their
lines of trade have hitherto run chiefly
athwart the seas, not to our ports but
to the ports of Great Britain and of
the older continent of Europe. L do
not stop to inquire why, or to make
any comment on probable causes.
What interests us just now Is not the
explanation but the fact and our duty
and opportunity in the presence of it.
Here are markets which we must sup
ply, and we must find the means of
action. The United States this great
people for which we speak and act,
should be ready, as never before, to
serve itself and to serve mankind;