The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1918-02-06
KANSAS In THE WAR

Herbert S. Houston, in an ad-
dress before the Kansas society, at it's
annual banquet in Nel York at the
Hotel McAlpin on the evening of Kan
sas Day, spoke on kansas in the
Great War; He sad:
MY first impression is one of de-
lighted surprise. Charley Price told
me that there would only be a very
few present-therefore, 1 was asked
to speak. Now the truth of the mat
ter is.Charley Price didn't need to try
and play me to small house for 4
could have given him every assurance
that L couldn't hope to challenge his
place in the stellar armament of the
Kansas society. He is as supreme
there as Ed Howe on Potato Hill. For
orators may come to this board and
orators may go but Charley Prices
'parallelogram of plenty will go on
forever as the ne plus ultra in descrip-
ton of the state that has reached the
stars thru difficulties. So l am glad
that Charley is disappointed in the at
tendance tonight. Frankly l am de-
lighted with it,
But Kansas is far more than a
'parallelogram of plenty That has to
do with the fat acres of the state.
And sometimes they are lean acres,
too, when their black soil lifts its
thirsty face to the sky for rain. But
by and large, thru the years Prices
graphic description is true. And how
it conjures up the picture of the val
leyS of the Arkansas, the Kaw, the
Republican, all stretching out toward
the great basin of the Mississippi,
from the foothills of the Rockies.
Joining them, like the smaller limbs of
a trees branch, are the Cimarron, the
Smoky Hill, the Pawnee. the Solomon,
the Cottonwood and all the rest. And
10
lands, reaching off to the edge of the
horizon. And everywhere are farms
and ranches and grazing cattle. One
autumn afternoon. a few years ago, 1
came down the valley of the Buckner,
across the Saw Log and down the
Pawnee. 1t was drive across a great
golden plain for as far as the eye
would carry were thousands of acres
of yellow stubble and countless stacks
of grain with here and there a curl
of smoke rising from a threshing ma
chine 1t was" assuredly a picture of
plenty. There, indeed, was the par
allelogram of my friend Price and it
was fairly bullying out oe it's sides with
the rich products of the earth.
But Kansas is more than this par
allelogram of plenty. She is par
allelopipedon of ideas. She is a sing
ing sphere of hopes on their way to
be fulfilled. She is a crushing comet
streaming across the sky, leaving a
trail of variegated views and causes
But all the time, whether speech or
song or light is given forth, Kansas
is burning with inward fire If
drouth blights her crops she feels dis
appointed, but If ignorance darkens
her mind she feels disgraced. Only a
prophet could have christened her
with that aspiring motto, 'ad astra
per aSpera. And how she has striyen
to the stars thru difficulties To be
of
shooting stars. at times. But there
has always been one great fixed star
toward which the compass of the
state has pointed-the star of free
dom.
THE rays from that star lighted the
Free State men who were sent west
from Puritan New England, just as it
lighted their forefathers on their
westward way when the Mayflower
set sail Abbott Lawrence and his as
sociates in the New England Emil
grant Aid society sent~forth men. not
so much in search of fortune. but as
Crusaders for the idea of freedom On
the soil of Kansas the Free State men
and pro-slavery men c1rrieJ on bitter
warfare in the six years from 80 to
so This was the first act. the cur
tain raiser in the great drama of the
Civil war 1t was a fight with both
bayonets and ballot boxes. When
buchanan urged on congress the adj
mission of the state under the Le-
compton constitution and offered sew
eial million acres of public lands If
she would accept that constitution, the
state resisted tn" temptation by vote
OF 1900 to 1.7SS. thus standing ada
mant for her principles.
And just as Kansas stood for a |
free state in the fifties. she can be
cornted on today to stand for a free
world. After all, this war involves |
the same great issue of freedom or |
slavery or, as the terms are used to-