Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 36, Number 99, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 August 1904 — PRESIDENT SOUNDS THE KEYNOTE [ARTICLE]

PRESIDENT SOUNDS THE KEYNOTE

In Address of Acceptance Mr. Roosevelt Recites Party Achievements and Ridicules Position Taken by Democrats on Tariff and Money.

Oyster Bay, N. July 27.—1 n his address responding to Speaker Cannon, head of the notification committee, and accepting the Republican nomination tor the presidency, Mr. Roosevelt said: “Mr. Speaker and Gentlemen of the Notification Committee: I,am deeply sensible of the high honor conferred upon me by the representatives of the Republican party assembled in convention, and I accept the nomination for the presidency with solemn realization of the obligations I assume. I heartily approve the declaration of principles which "the Republican national convention has adopted, and at some future day I shall communicate to you, Mr. Chairman, more at length and in detail a formal written acceptance of the feeanination. “Three years ago I became President because of the death of my lamented predecessor. I then stated that it was my purpose to carry out his principles and policies for the honor and the interest of the country. To the best of my ability I have kept the promise thus made. If next November my countrymen confirm at the polls the. action of the convention you represent, I shall, under Providence, continue to work with an eye single to the welfare of all our people. Co-Operatlon Is Necessary. “A party Is of worth only in so far as it promotes the national interest, and svery official, high or low, can serve his party best byj-eudering to the people the best service of which he is capable. Effective government comes only as the result of the loyal co-operation of many different persons. The members of a legislative majority, the officers in the various departments of the administration and the legislative and executive branches as toward each other, must work together with subordination of self to the common end of successful government. We who have been intrusted with power as public servants during the last seven years of administration and legislation now come before the people contoat to be judged by our record of achievement. In the years that have gone by we have made the deed squarewith the word, and if we are continued In power we shall unswervingly follow out the great lines of public policy which the Republican party has already laid down; a public policy to which we are giving, and shall give, a united and therefore an efficient support. Division Among Democrats. “In all of this we are more fortunate than our opponents, who now appeal for confidence on the ground, which some express and some seek to have confidentially understood, that if triumphant they may be trusted to prove false to every principle which in the last eight years they have laid down as vital, and to leave undisturbed those very acts of the administration because of which they ask that the administration itself be driven from power. Seemingly their present attitude as to their past record is that some of them were mistaken and others insincere. We make our appeal in a wholly different spirit. We are not constrained to keep silent on any vital question; we are divided on no, vital question; our policy is continuous and is the same for all sections and localities. There is nothing experimenetal about the government we ask the people to continue in power,

(or our performance in the past, our proved governmental efficiency, is a guaranty as to our promises for the future. “Our opponents, either openly or secretly, according to their several temperaments, now ask the people to trust their present promises in consideration of the fact that they intend to treat their past promises as null and void. We know our own minds, and we have kept of the same mind for a sufficient length of time to give to our policy coherence and sanity. In such a fundamental matter as the enforcement of the law we do not have to depend upon promises, but merely to ask that our record be taken as an earnest of what we shall continue to do. Laws on Trusts Unforced. "In dealing with the great organizations known as trusts we do not have to explain why the laws were not enforced, but to point out that they actually have been enforced and that legislation has been enacted to increase the effectiveness of their enforcement. Wo do not have to propose to ‘turn the rascals out,’ for we have Shown in very deed that whenever by diligent investigation a public official can be found who has betrayed his trust he will be punished to the full extent of the law without regard to whether he was appointed under a Republican or a Democratic administration. This is the efficient way to turn the rascals out and to keep them out, and it has the merit of sincerity. Moreover, the betrayals of trust in the last seven years have been insignificant In number when compared with the extent of the public service. Never has the administration of the government been on a cleaner and higher level; never has the public work of the nation been done more honestly and efficiently. “AasA'edly it is unwise to change the policies which have worked so well and which are now working so well. Prosperity has corns at home. The national honor and Interest have been upheld abroad. We have placed the finances of the nation upon a sound gold basis. We have done this with the aid of many who were formerly our opponents, but who would neither openly support nor silently acquiesce in the heresy of unsound finance; and we hav* done it against the convinced and violent opposition of the mass of our present opponents, who still refuse to recant the unsound opinions which for the moment they think it inexpedient to assert • Committed on Currency. “We know what we mean whan wa speak of an honest and stable currency. We mean the same thing from year to Year. We do not have to avoid a definite sad conclusive committal on the moat important issue which has recently been before the people and which may at any time in the near future be before them again. Upon tha principles which underlie this Issue the convictions of half of our number do not clash with those of the other half. So long as the BepnbUcan party is In paws* *# gsM standard

is settled, not as a matter of temporary political expediency, not because of shifting conditions in the production of gold in certain mining centers, but in accordance with wfhat we regard as the fundamental principles of national morality and wisdom. “Under the financial legislation which we have enacted there is now ample circulation for every business need, and every dollar of this circulation is worth a dollar in gold. We have reduced the in-terest-bearing debt and in still larger measure the interest on that debt. All of the war taxes imposed during the Spanish war have been removed with a view to relieve the people and to prevent the accumulation of an unnecessary surplus. The result is that hardly ever before have the expenditures and income of the government so closely corresponded. In the fiscal year that haa just closed the excess of income over the ordinary expenditures was nine millions of dollars. This does not take account of the $50,000,000 expended out of the accumulated surplus for the purchase of the isthmian canal. It is an extraordinary proof of the sound financial condition of the nation that instead of following the usual course in such matters and throwing the burden upon posterity by an issue of bonds, we were able to make the payment outright and yet after it to have in the treasury, a surplus of $160,000,000. Moreover, we were able to pay this $50,000,000 out of hand without causing the slightest disturbance to business conditions. Tariff and Wages. “We have enacted a tariff law under which during the last few years the country has attained a height of material well-being never before reached. Wages are higher than ever before. That whenever the need arises there should be a readjustment of the tariff schedules is undoubted, but such changes can with safety be made only by those whose devotion to the principle of a protective tariff is beyond question, for otherwise the changes would amount not to readjustment, but to repeal. The readjustment -whenmade must maintain and not destroylhe protective principle. To the farmer, the merchant, the manufacturer, this is vital; but perhaps no other man is so much interested as the wage worker in the maintenance of our present economic system, both as regards the finances and the tariff. The standard of living of our wage workers is higher than that of any other country, and it cannot so remain unless we have a protective tariff which shall always keep at a minimum a rate of duty sufficient to cover the difference between the labor cost here and abroad.

“Those who, like our opponents, ‘denounce protection as a robbery,’ thereby explicitly commit themselves to the proposition that if they were to revise the tariff no heed would be paid to the necessity of meeting this difference between the standards of living for wage workers here and in other countries; and therefore on this point their antagonism to our position is fundamental. Here again we ask that their promises and ours be judged by what has been done in the immediate past. We ask that sober and sensible men compare the workings of the present tariff law, and the conditions which obtain under it, with the workings of the preceding tariff law of 1894 and the conditions which that tariff of 1894 helped to bring about. Believe in Reciprocity. “We believe in reciprocity with foreign nations on the terms outlined in President McKinley’s last speech, which urged the extension of our foreign markets by reciprocal agreements whenever they could be made without injury to American industry and labor. It is a singular fact that the only great reciprocity treaty recently adopted—that with Cuba —was finally opposed almost alone by the represehtatlves of the very party which now states that it favors reciprocity. “And here again we ask that the worth of our words be judged by comparing their deeds with ours. On this Cuban reciprocity treaty there were at the outset grave differences of opinion among ourselves, and the notable thing in the negotiation and ratification of the treaty, and in the legislation which carried it into effect, was the highly practical manner in which without sacrifice of principle these differences of opinion were reconciled. There was no rupture of a great party, but an excellent practical outcome, the result of the harmonious co-operation of two successive Presidents and two successive Congresses. This is an illustration of the governing capacity which entitles us to the confidenco of tin people not only in our purposes but is our practical ability to achieve thos* purposes. Judging by the history of th% last twelve years, down to this very month, is there justification for believing that under similar circumstances au< with similar lultial differences of our opponents would have achieved auj practical result? “We have already shown in actual fact (h*t our policy la to do fair an«l equal justice to all men. paying no heed to whether a man is pcli or poor; paying no heed to hia race, his creed or his birthplace. Labor and Capital Unions. “We recognize the organization of capital and the organization of labor aa natural outcomes of our Industrial system. Each kind of organization ia to be favored so long ns it acts in a spirit ot justice and of regard for the rights of others. Each ia to be granted the full protection of the law and each in turn is to be held to a strict obedience to tba law; for no man la above it and no man below it. The humblest individual ia to have hi* rights safeguarded aa scrupulously as those of tha strongest organisation, for each is to receive justice, no more and no less. Tha problems with which we have to deal in oar modern industrial and social Ilfs are manifold, bat tho spirit in which it is necessary to approach (hair solution Is simply tha spirit of honesty, of courage and of common sense. “In inaugurating tha great work of Irrigation in the West the administration has been enabled by Congress to take own

f - f of the longest strides ever taken under our government toward utilising oar vast national domain for the settler, the actual homemaker. J “Ever since this continent was discovered the need of an isthmian canal to connect the Pacific and the Atlantic has been recognized, and ever since the birth of our nation such a canal has been planned. At last the dream has become a reality. The isthmian canal is now being built by the government of the United States. We conducted the negotiation for its construction with the nicest and most scrupulous honor, and in a spirit of the largest generosity toward those through whose territory it was to run. Every sinister effort which could be devised by the spirit of faction or the spirit of self-interest was made in order to defeat the treaty with Panama and thereby prevent the consummation of this work. The construction of the canal is now an assured fact; but most certainly it is unwise to intrust the carrying out of so momentous a policy to those who have endeavored to defeat the whole undertaking. Foreign Relations Peaceful. “Our foreign policy has been so conducted that, while not one of our just claims has been sacrificed, our relations with all foreign nations are now of the most peaceful kind; there is not a cloud on the horizon. The last cause of irritation between us and any other nation was removed by the settlement of the Alaskan boundary. “In the Caribbean Sea we have made good our promises of independence to Cuba and have proved our assertion that our mission in the island was one of justice and not of self-aggrandizement; and thereby, no less than by our action in Venezuela and Panama, we have shown that the Monroe doctrine is a living reality, designed for the hurt of no nation, but for the protection of civilization on the western continent and for the peace of the world. Our steady growth in power has gone hand in hand with a strengthening disposition to nse this power with strict regard for the rights of others and for the cause of international justice and good will. “We earnestly desire friendship with all the nations of the new and old worlds, and we endeavor to place our relations with them upon a basis of reciprocal advantage instead of hostility. We hold that the prosperity of each nation is an aid and not a hindrance to the prosperity of other nations. We seek international amity for the same reasons that make, us believe in peace within our own borders, and we seek this peace not because we are afraid or unready, but because we think that peace is right as well as advantageous. “American interests in the Pacific have grown rapidly. American enterprise lias laid a cable across this, the greatest of oceans. We have proved in effective fashion that we wish the Chinese Empire well and desire its integrity and independence. In Interest of Filipinos. “Our foothold in the Philippines greatIr strengthens our position in the competition for the trade of the East, but we are governiug the Philippines in the interest of the Philippine people themssjves. We have already given them a la.’ge share in their government, and purpose is to increase this share at rapidly as they give evidence of Increasing fitness for the task. The great majority of the officials of the islands, whether elective or appointive, are already native Filipinos. We are now providing for a legislative assembly. This is the first step to be taken in the future, aqd it would be eminently unwise to declare what our next step will be until this first step has been taken and. the results are manifest. To have gone faster than we have already gone in giving the islanders a constantly increasing measure of self-government would have been disastrous. At the present moment to give political Independence to the islands would result in the immediate loss of civil rights, personal liberty and public order, as regards the mass of the Filipinos, for the majority of the Islanders have been given these great boons by us, and keep them only because we vigilantly safeguard and guarantee them. To withdraw our government from the Islands at tliis time would mean to the average native the loss of his barely won civil freedom. We have established In Jhe islands a government by Americans, assisted by Filipinos. We are steadily striving to transform this into self-gov-ernment by the Filipinos, assisted by Americans. “The principles which we uphold should appeal to all our countrymen, in all parts of our country. Above all, they Should give us strength with the men ,and women who are the spiritual heirs of those who upheld the hands of Abraham Lincoln, for we are striving to do our work in the spirit with which Lincoln approached Ills. During the seven years that have just passed there is no duty, domestic or foreign, which we. have , shirked, and no necessary task which we have feared to undertake or which we have not performed with reasonable efficiency. We have never pleaded impotence. We have never sought refuge in criticism and complaint instead of action. We face the future with our past and our present as guarantors of our promises, and we are content to stand or to fall by the record which we have made and are muking.”