Again, I remark that Henry W. Grady stood for Christian patriotism
irrespective of political spoils. He declined all official reward. He
could have been Governor of Georgia, but refused it. He could have been
Senator of the United States, but declined it. He remained plain Henry
Grady. Nearly all the other orators of the political arena, as soon as
the elections are over, go to Washington, or Albany, or Harrisburg, or
Atlanta, to get in city or state or national office, reward for their
services, and not getting what they want spend the rest of the time of
that administration in pouting about the management of public affairs or
cursing Harrison or Cleveland. When the great political campaigns were
over Mr. Grady went home to his newspaper. He demonstrated that it is
possible to toil for principles which he thought to be right, simply
because they were right. Christian patriotism is too rare a commodity in
this country. Surely the joy of living under such free institutions as
those established here ought to be enough reward for political fidelity.
Among all the great writers that stood at the last Presidential election
on Democratic and Republican platforms, you cannot recall in your mind
ten who were not themselves looking for remunerative appointments. Aye,
you can count them all on the fingers of one hand. The most illustrious
specimen of that style of man for the last ten years was Henry W. Grady.
Again, Mr. Grady stood for the New South, and was just what we want to
meet three other men, one to speak for the New North, another for the
New East, and another for the New West. The bravest speech made for the
last quarter of a century was that made by Mr. Grady at the New England
dinner in New York about two or three years ago. I sat with him that
evening and know something of his anxieties, for he was to tread on
dangerous ground, and might by one misspoken word have antagonized both
sections. His speech was a victory that thrilled all of us who heard him
and all who read him. That speech, great for wisdom, great for kindness,
great for pacification, great for bravery, will go down to the
generations with Webster’s speech at Bunker Hill, William Wirt’s speech
at the arraignment of Aaron Burr, Edmund Burke’s speech on Warren
Hastings, Robert Emmett’s speech for his own vindication.
Who will in conspicuous action represent the New North as he did the New
South? Who will come forth for the New East and who for the New West?
Let old political issues be buried, let old grudges die. Let new
theories be launched. With the coming in of a new nation at the gates of
Castle Garden every year, and the wheat bin and corn crib of our land
enlarged with every harvest, and a vast multitude of our population
still plunged in illiteracy to be educated, and moral questions abroad
involving the very existence of our Republic, let the old political
platforms that are worm-eaten be dropped, and platforms that shall be
made of two planks, the one the Ten Commandments, and the other the
Sermon on the Mount, lifted for all of us to stand on. But there is a
lot of old politicians grumbling all around the sky who don’t want a New
South, a New North, a New East, or a New West. They have some old war
speeches that they prepared in 1861, that in all our autumnal elections
they feel called upon to inflict upon the country. They growl louder and
louder in proportion as they are pushed back further and further and the
Henry W. Gradys come to the front. But the mandate, I think, has gone
forth from the throne of God that a new American Nation shall take the
place of the old, and the new has been baptized for God and liberty, and
justice and peace and morality and religion.