Evening star., 1928-10-19
PRESIDENT PRAISES
SOUTH'S INDUSTRY
Civil War Scars Eliminated,
Coolidge Says in Vir-
ginia Address.

FREDERICKSBURG. Va. October
19.-Dedicating the Fredericksburg and
Spotsylvania County Battle Fields Me-
mortal, President Coolidge spoke as fol-
lows:
NV fellow Americans:
No one who loves cur country and is
sufficiently interested to make even a
Sligh: examination of our history could
visit this locality without feeling that
he is close to great characters and great
events. From early colonial times down
to the present hour men who have lived
and wrought in this section of Virginia
have cast mighty influence over the
course of the affairs of this Nation.
They have been race who led in carv-
Ing out this Republic and establishing
It's institutions, who believed in local
self-government and loved liberty.
The famous sons of this Common
wealth furnished the leadership for ac-
ouiring the territory which makes up
the continental domain of the United
States Washington gave us the thir-
teen Colonies, George Rogers Clark
added the Northwest, Lewis and Clarke
carried our jurisdiction to the Pacific,
Jefferson made the Louisiana Purchase.
Monroe secured Florida, Sam Houston
brought in the State of Texas. Win
California region. Your soldiers led the
forces in the field. and your statesmen
directed the negotiations at the council
table in bringing together that vast area.
stretching from the Atlantic to the Pa
ciflc. which comprises our Federal
Union. Their wisdom endowed our
country with an empire
LaudS Early Pioneers.
But however important those achieve
ments may be. this Nation is some
thing vastly more than an expanse of
territory. 1t has reached the high place
which it holds in the world largely be-
cause of its institutions of Government.
Your devotion to their principles dates
from your pioneer days. AS early as
1876 Nathaniel Bacon was asserting
with armed force the spirit of those
rights which were to be established by
the Revolution. That spirit never fall
tered in Virginia. 1t inspired the elo-
quent voice of Patrick Henry 1t led
to the decisive action of the Williams
burg Convention in May, 1776, when
1t unanimously resolved to instruct its
delegates to the Continental Congress
to declare the United Colonies free and
independent States. Accordingly. it
was Richard Henry Lee who moved
resolution to that effect, and Thomas
Jefferson who embodied that action in
the Declaration of independence.
1t was your great soldier, George
Washington, who made that declaration
effective. In his other capacity, as a
statesman aided by able leaders in
other Colonies but especially by Madi-
son, he was the main influence in Sc
curing the adoption of the Federal Con-
stitution. To make that Constitution
a living, vital system of national gov
ernment. Virginia contributed John
Marshall, Chief Justice of the Supreme
Court of the United States, who ranks
as our greatest magistrate. When our
Government had been established and
given strength and direction under
Washington the great instrument which
insured that it should forever remain
dedicated to the voice of the people
was again Thomas Jefferson. During
the first so years of our Republic the
presidential Office was held for SO years
by Virginians. Among them was Mon
roe, who added to our own Declaration
of independence the doctrine against
any further interference with the inde-
pendence Of the other countries of our
Western Hemisphere.
After remembering all the contribu-
tions that were made by Adams and
Hamilton and Franklin, and their colo
nial associates, after giving due credit
to all the inspiration and all the armed
forces which came from outside the
Old Dominion, it will forever remain to
your glory that our territory was won,
our republican institutions were put into
form and a government resting on the
sovereignty of the people was per-
manently established under the leader
ship of the sons of Virginia. No other
colony put more of itself into the Fed
eral Union or had greater influence
in the early direction of its government.
Recalls Civil War Battles.
But the historic interest of this To-
cality is by no means confined to the
creation and the formative years of our
Republic. When the Nation became in
volved in the great tragedy which over
took it in 1861, the contending armies
of the North and the South for long
periods had opposing camps in this re-
gion. where occurred some of the hard
est-fought battles of the war Near here
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