Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1922-03-17
Balfour looked across the street anc

Barbour looked across the street ana
saw a statue.
Whose statue is that?" he asked.
That, said Ambassador Geddes, rs
John Witherspoon, one of the signers
of the Declaration of Independence"
Then Mr.. Balfour, it is yeraciously
reported smiled broadly and said, "Oh
yes, he was one of the rebels" and
then he smiled some more.
The members of the British embassy
do not seem to be the slightest bit dis
turbed because their front windows
look out on the statue of John Wither-
spoon who was one of the most earnest
of the colonists in his denunciation OF
the tyranny of the British government
in those pre-Revolutionary and early
Revolutionary days.
1t was the late Senator Stephen B.
Elkins of West Virginia whose efforts
made possible the erection of the stat
ue of the Rev. John Witherspoon in
the City of Washington. Witherspoon
was stanchly orthodox in his religion
and it is entirely in keeping with the
church proprieties that his statue
stand in front of the Presbyterian
Church of the Covenant.
Senator EllSins' utilization was with
the Presbyterian church. His widow,
who is living in Washington, is a
stanch church-woman and one of the
best known Bible students in the Unit
ed States. She teaches the Bible to a
large class of women who for the main
part are the wives of members of Con-
gress. 1t is not at all unlikely that 1t
was her inspiration that moved Senator
Elkins to work in behalf of the cree
ton of the statue of Witherspoon.
Witherspoon Deserved Honor.
John Witherspoon, according to the
generally patriotic viewpoint, ought to
have been honored in the Capital City
a long time ago, but while Congress
had money to spend for statues OF
others, some of them much less worthy
Of honor, it never had a cent to spare
to put Witherspoon in bronze where all
people might see him.
When John Dickinson of Pennsyl-
vania, during the secret debate for in
dependence, said the chances were
that the men assembled to discuss
freedom would have to atone for their
presumption on the scaffold and
wound up by saying, ''The colonies are
not ripe for independence" Wither-
spoon jumped to his feet and in voice
louder than he used in any of his SER
mons, cried out:
"Not ripe, sir We are not only ripe
but rotting. Almost every colony has
dropped from the parent stem and your
own, sir, needs no more sunshine to
mature it,"
Not Afraid to Quote Tom Paine.
While the debate prior TO the signing
of the Declaration of Independence
was secret, it is a fairly well-estab-
lished fact that one of the delegates
quoted from Tom Paine's pamphlet,
"Comnlon Sense" which some months
before had created a sensation:
'It matters very little now what the
king of England either says or does;
he hath wickedly broken through every
moral and human Obligation trampled
nature and conscience beneath his
feet, and by a steady and unconstitu-
tional spirit of insolence and cruelty,
procured for himself universal
hatred"
1t is understood that it was John
Witherspoon of Princeton stanchly
orthodox churchman, who was the man
who quoted thus literally from Tom
Paine. who generally was accounted
an atheist.
Some years afterward Witherspoon
was taken to task by a fellow clergy
man for quoting from Paine. The Rev
erend John answered him, so tradition
has it, that the devils pitchfork was
none too good weapon to use in prod
ding John Bull out of the country.
Another statue is to be erected in
the city of Washington shortly. 1t is
that of man who in the statue way
has been to a considerable extent neg
lected. 1t is the intention to put up
in the Botanical Gardens not far from
the Grant memorial statue to Gen
eraI George Gordon Meade who com
manded the federal forces at the battle
Of Gettysburg, and who kept the title
of general commanding the army of
the Potomac until the end of the war,
remaining with Grant, who of course
was the commander-in-chie in the
field.