Every person has two selves, the shell and the real self beneath. Acts
are the evidence of the real self. Let us hope what is best in the real
self is eternal, for thus only does the world progress.
Lafayette symbolized two great principles of government. First, the
right of a people to govern themselves, as opposed to government of the
many by a self-appointed few--in other words, democracy as opposed to
autocracy. Second, a union of the democracies to insure mutual
protection and peace.
When only a boy at school, he was told in class one day to describe a
perfect courser, and he sacrificed his hope of obtaining a premium by
describing a horse which on perceiving the whip threw down his master.
He adopted on his arms the device, "_Cur non?_"--"Why not?" Before
landing in America in 1777 he wrote to his wife: "I but offer my
services to that interesting republic from motives of the purest kind,
unmixed with ambition or private views: her happiness and my glory are
my only incentives to the task. I hope that, for my sake, you will be a
good American, for that feeling is worthy of every noble heart. The
happiness of America is intimately connected with the happiness of all
mankind; she will become the safe and respected asylum of virtue,
integrity, toleration, equality, and tranquil happiness."
In camp at Valley Forge, January, 1778, he writes to his wife, who was
then seeking his return: "The desire ... to promote ... the happiness
of humanity which is strongly interested in the existence of one
perfectly free nation ... forbids my departure."
Upon a return visit to America in 1784, speaking to a deputation from
the Pennsylvania Legislature, he said: "Now that the great work is
accomplished let us mutually congratulate ourselves on the federal union
which this peace has cemented, and upon which the importance, the power,
and the riches of this beautiful country rest; that union is the bond
which will continue to preserve brotherly love and reciprocal friendship
among the citizens of the states. I shall be happy to receive the
command of this Republic at every period of my existence and in whatever
part of the world I may be; my zeal for its prosperity is only equalled
by my gratitude and respect." A statement from his reply to a special
committee appointed by Congress to wait upon him shows the same feeling:
"May this immense temple of freedom ever stand a lesson to oppressors,
an example to the oppressed, and a sanctuary for the rights of mankind."
The confederation in 1776 of the thirteen separate colonies of the
western world was a union of all the then existing democracies of a
hemisphere, to insure mutual protection and peace. Since then, democracy
has been born in the Old World. In its common cause it knows no
nationality. Lafayette is the symbol of its internationalism. In the
time of our greatest stress he crossed the ocean to us, saying: "Now is
precisely the moment to serve your cause." To-day democracy in France is
bleeding to death. Throughout Europe, assailed in front by the giant of
Prussian militarism and stabbed in the back by assassins conducting an
insidious and treacherous peace propaganda, it is staggering under the
combined attack. The spirit of Lafayette, the democrat, calls to us
across that same ocean. The bugles of the heavens ring out. The days of
'76 are born again. Once more is heard the battle-cry of the Republic.
Where his spirit calls, our armies go. And when the great work is
accomplished, we shall cement the union which he began.
X
But is democracy worth preserving? How fares that intangible something
which was the inspiration of this man's living? Democracy, the right of
people to govern themselves, as opposed to their control by a
self-appointed few--is it a failure or a success? Has it proved itself
worth the dedication of this soldier spirit?
The French, for themselves, have answered the question at the Battle of
the Marne and at Verdun. But how about America? Has the great American
democracy proved a success, as compared with government by
autocracy--for example, as compared with the government of Germany by
the Prussian military autocracy, headed by the House of Hohenzollern?
More than a century has passed since the surrender of Cornwallis. Since
then in physical growth and material success the democracy of the United
States has more than fulfilled the highest hopes. At that time these
United States were only a strip along the eastern seaboard, bounded on
the east by the Atlantic Ocean and on the west by an unexplored
wilderness; thirteen sparsely settled states, the settlements widely
separated from each other, with a population of less than four million
persons. Now the wilderness is overcome. By the Louisiana Purchase we
acquired the Great Southwest. For a pittance we bought the wastes of
Alaska and then found them to be the gold fields of the world. The
Philippines, with an area of one hundred and fifteen thousand square
miles, and the Hawaiian Islands mark the extension of our western
boundaries. Cuba is under our immediate protection. Porto Rico is part
of us, and likewise the Danish West Indies. In Central America we have
built the Panama Canal. By the Monroe Doctrine we are the protectors
from foreign interference of all of Central and South America. Our
population has grown to more than one hundred million souls. Our
material wealth is the greatest of any single nation in the world.
Does this constitute success? Look on the other side of the picture. Our
form of national government has been notoriously inefficient--taking
Germany as the standard. Our state governments at their best are
mediocre, while at their worst they stand pitifully paralyzed before mob
law. Our unpunished lynchings of coloured people, innocent as well as
guilty, make us contemptible in the eyes of the civilized world. No
other government on earth remains silent and helpless while its citizens
assemble as for a holiday and burn a criminal at the stake. Our
municipalities are largely rotten with graft, and the graft is
accompanied by its inevitable handmaids, extravagance and inefficiency.
Enormous wealth, in the hands of a few, dwells side by side with extreme
poverty. Our cities are overcrowded, and the country of Whittier, where
"Shut in from all the world without
We sat the clean-winged hearth about,"
is handed over to the huts and shanties of immigrants. Capital fights
labour and labour fights capital. Politics are such that most men avoid
them. The standard of work is not how well you can do your job, but how
much you can make out of it. Is this democracy a success?
In answer to this, however, does not an inner consciousness in each of
us, perhaps the spirit of Lafayette and perhaps our own, perhaps the
whispering of an unseen, great, and infinite power, tell us that the
really relevant question is not whether we have yet achieved success,
but whether a successful democracy is worth striving for? If, however, I
should be obliged to answer the question by "Yes" or "No" I would say,
"Yes, it is a success!"
The best route for the development of any man lies along the hard and
thorny road of self-development. In the end, self-development, by dint
of hard work and mistakes, produces the best man, provided he has the
courage to "see it through." Nations are merely big collections of
individuals. In the end this self-development produces the best nation.
The road is filled with difficulties, but so are most roads to goals
that are worth reaching.
Our national government may have been inefficient in its details, but
taken as a whole it has created a country which for generations has been
a haven for the oppressed of the world. How many hundred thousand
Germans have immigrated to America? How many Americans have ever
emigrated to Germany? We have lynchings in the South, but no other
country was ever left a more hideous problem of slavery, and in 1861
when the supreme test came the government rose to it; no one but a
visionary can expect an immediate Utopian readjustment. Our
municipalities abound in graft, but what country before ours ever faced
the problem of absorbing annually the enormous flood of unlettered
immigrants that is unceasingly poured upon us by the Old World. The
wonder is not that we have graft, but that we have not more graft. We
have great wealth and extreme poverty, but they are due to unusual
economic causes, namely: great national resources on the one hand, and
ceaseless immigration on the other. Our cities are overcrowded and our
standards of work are superficial, but would this be cured by a
despotism?
And always we have the hope that goes with liberty, the undying strength
that accompanies the knowledge that you are master of your own soul. A
good despot at the head of a military autocracy may for the time being
make the most efficient government in the world; certainly a bad despot
at the head of a military autocracy makes the worst government. But I
will never believe that the total surrender of the individual to the
guiding hand of a despotic autocracy makes in the end for the progress
of the whole. History shows it to be untrue; the never-ceasing efforts
of democracy, as endless as the waves of the sea, show that despotic
autocracy cannot last; and the hell let loose upon earth by Prussian
autocracy, its modern exponent, clinches the falsity of its creed for
all but the intoxicated or maniacs.