Your Excellency, Gentlemen of the two Houses of the Legislature of
Massachusetts, Ladies and Gentlemen, Fellow Countrymen: The honorable
and most gratifying duty with which I am charged is about to receive its
final act of execution, for I have the book here, as it was placed in my
hands by the Lord Bishop of London on April 29, intact then and now; and
I am about to deliver it according to the provisions of the decree of
the Chancellor of London, which has been read in your presence, and the
receipt signed by me and registered in his court that I would obey the
provisions of that decree.
I have kept my trust; I have kept the book as I received it; I shall
deliver it into the hands of the representative of the people who are
entitled to its custody.
And now, gentlemen, it would be superfluous for me to dwell upon the
historical features of this remarkable occasion, for it has been done,
as we all knew it would be done, with ability, learning, eloquence and
impressiveness, by the distinguished Senator who represents you so well
in the Congress of the United States.
For all that related to myself, and for every gracious word of
recognition and commendation that fell from his lips in relation to the
part that I have taken in the act of restoration, I am profoundly
grateful. It is an additional reward, but not the reward which induced
my action.
To have served your State, to have been instrumental in such an act as
this, was of itself a high privilege to me. The Bradford manuscript was
in the library of Fulham palace, and if, by lawful means, I could have
become possessed of the volume, and have brought it here and quietly
deposited it, I should have gone to my home with the great satisfaction
of knowing that I had performed an act of justice, an act of right
between two countries. Therefore the praise, however grateful, is
additional, and I am very thankful for it.
It may not be inappropriate or unpleasing to you should I state in a
very simple manner the history of my relation to the return of this
book, for it all has occurred within the last twelve months.
I knew of the existence of this manuscript, and had seen the
reproduction in facsimile. I knew that attempts had been made,
unsuccessfully, to obtain the original book.
At that time Senator Hoar made a short visit to England, and in passing
through London I was informed by him of the great interest that he, in
common with the people of this State, had in the restoration of this
manuscript to the custody of the State.
We discussed the methods by which it might be accomplished, and after
two or three concurrent suggestions he returned to the United States,
and presently I received, under cover from the Secretary of State,--a
distinguished citizen of your own State, Mr. Olney,--a formal note,
suggesting rather than instructing that in an informal manner I should
endeavor to have carried out the wishes of the various societies that
had addressed themselves to the Bishop of London and the Archbishop of
Canterbury, in order to obtain the return of this manuscript.
It necessarily had to be done informally. The strict regulations of the
office I then occupied forbade my correspondence with any member of the
British government except through the foreign office, unless it were
informal. An old saying describes the entire case, that "When there's a
will there's a way." There certainly was the will to get the book, and
there certainly was also a will and a way to give the book, and that way
was discovered by the legal custodians of the book itself.
At first there were suggestions of difficulty, some technical questions;
and following a very safe rule, the first thought was, What is the law?
and the case was submitted to the law officers of the Crown. Then there
arose the necessity of a formal act of permission.
There could be entertained no question as to the title to the manuscript
in the possession of the British government. There was no authority to
grant a claim, founded on adverse title, and the question arose as to
the requisite form of law of a permissive rather than of a mandatory
nature, in order to be authoritative with those who had charge of the
document.
But, as I have said, when there was a will there was found a way. By
personal correspondence and interviews with the Bishop of London, I soon
discovered that he was as anxious to find the way as I was that he
should find it. In March last it was finally agreed that I should employ
legal counsel to present a formal petition in the Episcopal Consistorial
Court of London, and there before the Chancellor to represent the strong
desire of Massachusetts and her people for the return of the record of
her early Governor.
Accordingly, the petition was prepared, and by my authority signed as
for me by an eminent member of the bar, and it was also signed by the
Bishop of London, so that there was a complete consensus. The decree was
ordered, as is published in the London "Times" on March 25 last, and
nothing after that remained but formalities, in which, as you are well
aware, the English law is not lacking, especially in the ecclesiastical
tribunals.
These formalities were carried out during my absence from London on a
short visit to the Continent, and the decree which you have just heard
read was duly entered on April 12 last, consigning the document to my
personal custody, to be delivered by me in this city to the high
official therein named, subject to those conditions which you have also
heard.
Accordingly, on the 29th of April last I was summoned to the court, and
there, having signed the receipt, this decree was read in my presence.
Then the Bishop of London arose, and, taking the book in his hands,
delivered it with a few gracious words into my custody, and here it is
to-day.
The records of those proceedings will no doubt be preserved here as
accompanying this book, as they are in the Episcopal Consistorial Court
in London, and they tell the entire story.
But that is but part. The thing that I wish to impress upon you, and
upon my fellow countrymen throughout the United States, is that this is
an act of courtesy and friendship by another government--the government
of what we once called our "mother country"--to the entire people of the
United States.
You cannot limit it to the Governor of this Commonwealth; nor to the
Legislature; nor even to the citizens of this Commonwealth. It extends
in its courtesy, its kindness and comity to the entire people of the
United States. From first to last there was the ready response of
courtesy and kindness to the request for the restoration of this
manuscript record.
I may say to you that there has been nothing that I have sought more
earnestly than to place the affairs of these two great nations in the
atmosphere of mutual confidence and respect and good-will. If it be a
sin to long for the honor of one's country, for the safety and strength
of one's country, then I have been a great sinner, for I have striven to
advance the honor and the safety and the welfare of my country, and
believed it was best accomplished by treating all with justice and
courtesy, and doing those things to others which we would ask to have
done to ourselves.
When the Chancellor pronounced his decree in March last, he cited
certain precedents to justify him in restoring this volume to
Massachusetts. One precedent which powerfully controlled his decision,
and which in the closing portion of his judgment he emphasizes, was an
act of generous liberality upon the part of the American Library Society
in Philadelphia in voluntarily returning to the British government some
volumes of original manuscript of the period of James the First, which
by some means not very clearly explained had found their way among the
books of that institution.
Those books were received by a distinguished man, Lord Romilly, Master
of the Rolls, who took occasion to speak of the liberality and kindness
which dictated the action of the Philadelphia library. Gentlemen, I am
one of those who believe that a generous and kindly act is never unwise
between individuals or nations.
The return of this book to you is an echo of the kindly act of your
countrymen in the city of Philadelphia in 1866.
It is that, not, as Mr. Hoar has said, any influence or special effort
of mine; but it is international good feeling and comity which brought
about to you the pleasure and the joy of having this manuscript
returned, and so it will ever be. A generous act will beget a generous
act; trust and confidence will beget trust and confidence; and so it
will be while the world shall last, and well will it be for the man or
for the people who shall recognize this truth and act upon it.
Now, gentlemen, there is another coincidence that I may venture to point
out. It is history repeating itself. More than three hundred years ago
the ancestors from whom my father drew his name and blood were French
Protestants, who had been compelled to flee from the religious
persecutions of that day, and for the sake of conscience to find an
asylum in Holland. Fifty years after they had fled and found safety in
Holland, the little congregation of Independents from the English
village of Scrooby, under the pastorate of John Robinson, was forced to
fly, and with difficulty found its way into the same country of the
Netherlands, seeking an asylum for consciences' sake.
Time passed on. The little English colony removed, as this manuscript of
William Bradford will tell you, across the Atlantic, and soon after the
Huguenot family from whom I drew my name found their first settlement in
what was then the New Netherlands, now New York. Both came from the same
cause; both came with the same object, the same purpose,--"soul
freedom," as Roger Williams well called it. Both came to found homes
where they could worship God according to their own conscience and live
as free men. They came to these shores, and they have found the asylum,
and they have strengthened it, and it is what we see to-day,--a country
of absolute religious and civil freedom,--of equal rights and
toleration.
And is it not fitting that I, who have in my veins the blood of the
Huguenots, should present to you and your Governor the log of the
English emigrants, who left their country for the sake of religious
freedom?
They are blended here,--their names, their interests. No man asks and no
man has a right to ask or have ascertained by any method authorized by
law what is the conscientious religious tenet or opinion of any man, of
any citizen, as a prerequisite for holding an office of trust or power
in the United States.
I think it well on this occasion to make, as I am sure you are making,
acknowledgment to that heroic little country, the Lowlands as they call
it, the Netherlands,--the country without one single feature of military
defence except the brave hearts of the men who live in it and defend it.
Holland was the anvil upon which religious and civil liberty was beaten
out in Europe at a time when the clang was scarcely heard anywhere else.
We can never forget our historical debt to that country and to those
people. Puritan, Independent, Huguenot, whoever he may be, forced to
flee for conscience's sake, will not forget that in the Netherlands
there was found in his time of need the asylum where conscience,
property and person might be secure.
And now my task is done. I am deeply grateful for the part that I have
been enabled to take in this act of just and natural restitution. In
Massachusetts or out of Massachusetts there is no one more willing than
I to assist this work; and here, sir [addressing Governor Wolcott], I
fulfil my trust in placing in your hands the manuscript.
To you, as the honored representative of the people of this
Commonwealth, I commit this book, in pursuance of my obligations, gladly
undertaken under the decree of the Episcopal Consistorial Court of
London.