The New York herald., 1922-07-05

MARION, july tASSOCidttu ITeSo).
The text Of President Harding's pre-
pared address follows:
MY FRIENDS AND NEIoHBoxs
1t is exceedingly good to come home
and meet with you again and join you
in the centennial celebration of the
founding of Marion. Frankly. 1t would
be preferable to come simply as
Marionite. and speak as one, because
it Is easily possible for me to feel
peculiar intimacy toward such an oc-
casion.
cannot justify claim to any great
part in making the Marion of to-day,
but as a newspaper worker for more
than third of century / have done
lot of cheering, which is no less
essential to the forward movement in
a community than II Is in football or
baseball. Amid the cheering and
boosting / did my share of observing
and recording. and l could relate
things interesting to me, probably in
teresting to you. of Marion. but they
would seem rather trivial to that
larger community which is habituated
10 expect home form of broadcasting
to every Presidential utterance.
An interesting reminder of the in
escapable responsibility for Presiden-
tial utterance came TO me a year ago.
was on a brief vacation in the noun
tains of New Hampshire. and my
generous host said we must go to the
nearby village which had been his
boyhood home and meet the people
who would be assembled. We motored
down the mountain, we had a most
agreeable meeting and l spoke ex-
temporaneously for probably fifteen
minutes. Sixty days later there came
to my desk a newspaper published in
Pekin, China, with a verbatim reprint
OF the speech
or course. there was nothing in it
which i did not say sincerely. No one
fit for public service will ever be guilty
of that.
My thought is that, ordinarily,
there Is time and place for particular
speech, but in the Presidential office
all times and all places are very much
alike. There may be a Justified pride
in the manifest interest of all of our
own people and the world being inter-
ested in what the United States Gov
ernment rs thinking or saying, but l
confess being human enough to wish
to talk of the intimate things relating
to Marion, without misconstruction or
misapplieation.
There is very much Of the latter.
Maybe II will not be unseemly to re-
late an instance. Several weeks ago.
when the returning tide of industrial
activity made the time seem oppor-
tune. i invited some forty or fifty
captains of the great iron and steel in
dustry to dine with me, TO confer
about the abolition of the twelve hour
work day. / did not choose to pro-
claim the purpose in advance, because
l dislike the tendency to promise ex-
cessively and accomplish inadequately.
Imagine my surprise yea, my amuse-
ment. to read in an important metro
politan newspaper that I was dining
the steel barons to Shake them
down" FOR the deficit in campaign
funds of 1920.
1t would be good to talk about
Marion just among ourselves. | know
nothing more interesting to any man
than his own community. II he isn't
interested ne isn't n good citizen.
A century sounds like long while
as first impression, but after all, it Is
only a little while. There are COM
munities in the world. ten or twenty
centuries old, not half so important in
world activities to-day; perhaps they
have contributed to human progress
infinitely less In all their time than
Ma~on has In one century. Nay, in
shorter time than that, for the Marion
we boast has been really only half
century in the making.
mean no disparagement of the older
and earlier citizenship of sturdy quali-
ties which pioneered the way. Theirs
was a great and highly essential work
In blazing the way for the present day
civilization. 1t required strong men
and noble women to turn wilderness
into worthwhile habitation. Malaria
and ague sorely tried human bodies
even though souls cheerfully resisted
Gen. Pershing has spoken of the
fearless colonists, and we ought to re-
we're them for their SURPRISING bequest
OF liberty and nationality. but the
builders OF the West. the men and
women who marched with the west
ward star of empire" were no less
brave, no less heroic, and were more
prophetic. They sensed the greater
possibilities of which the colonists had
not dreamed.
| said a century seemed long time
In which to achieve. and Is yet only a
little while. The nation lacks four
years OF boasting n century and half,
but discovery came four centuries ago,
and century and half Of colonial de-
velopment preceded the national be-
ginning
1t was my fertuns to participate In