_Members and guests of the American-Irish Historical Society_:
To-day we commemorate the deeds of those heroic men who on April 19,
1775, on the green at Lexington, won a fame as imperishable as the
men who fought at Marathon or Thermopylæ. Well might Sam Adams
exclaim, “What a glorious morning for America is this.” As a
distinguished foreigner has well said, “It is their sacrificed blood
in which is written the preface of the nation’s history.”
At Lexington was the opening scene of a revolution destined to
change the character of human governments and the condition of the
human race. Yet I sometimes incline to the opinion, as I read the
utterances of men who in our day are called statesmen, and some of
the newspapers, that the age of patriotism has gone; that an age of
selfish materialists, economists, and calculators has succeeded. Let
us hope there is still a saving remnant in this republic which will
rekindle the love and patriotism which actuated the men who
established our government.
Do some of the people really understand the meaning of patriotism?
Many seem to imagine it means blind obedience to any administration
which may be insidiously laboring to destroy our institutions. But I
have an abiding faith in the people of this country when they fully
appreciate a threatened danger. I believe with Burke “that the
people never give up their liberties but under some delusion.”
Are some of us laboring under the delusion that we are called upon
to govern the world, that we are to set forth with a few small
Bibles and a large supply of arms to force what we call our
civilization on an unwilling people in another hemisphere, while
thoughtful men are staggered at the problems of government
confronting us on the North American continent?
Shall we not profit by the lessons of history and recall what this
day means? It was the beginning of a movement against an empire
which aspired to govern the world. Yet those men on Lexington common
initiated a revolution which wrested from the diadem of Great
Britain the fairest jewel in her crown. May we not indulge to-day
somewhat in retrospection and examine the causes which led to our
revolt?
The British parliament had passed the stamp act, the tea tax and the
Boston port bill, yet those did not cause war; the real cause of the
battle of Lexington was the reconstruction act of 1774. Prior to
this act the councilors had been chosen by the people through their
representatives. By the new law the king was to appoint them, to
hold office during his pleasure. The superior judges were to hold at
the will of the king and to be dependent on his will for the amount
and payment of their salaries; the inferior judges were to be
removable by the royal governor at his discretion, he himself
holding at the king’s will.
The deepest reaching provision of the acts was aimed at the
town-meetings. They were prohibited, except the annual meeting to
elect officers, but no other meetings could be held without the
written permission of the royal governor. These acts of parliament
sought to change self-government into government by the king, and to
substitute for home rule, absolute rule at Westminster and St.
James’s palace.
Then came the military act, and in February, 1775, parliament
declared Massachusetts in rebellion. The instructions of Lord
Dartmouth, the secretary of state for the colonies, to General Gage,
the royal governor, ran like this: “Sovereignty of the king over the
colonies requires a full and absolute submission.” What a striking
similarity that has to some recent dispatches we have heard since we
acquired distant possessions.
General Gage’s call for 20,000 men, the assembling of 5,000 troops
at Boston, and the authority given to General Gage to fire on the
people, made war inevitable. We see again how history repeats
itself.
The people in spite of royal mandates continued to hold their own
town-meetings, organized county meetings, and made a provincial
congress. The convention at Middlesex “Resolved, if in support of
our rights we are called to encounter death we are yet undaunted,
sensible that he can never die too soon who lays down his life in
support of the laws and liberties of his country.” Lexington wrote
to Boston, “We trust in God that should the state of affairs require
it, we shall be ready to sacrifice our estates and everything dear
in life, yea, and life itself, in support of the common cause.”
Nobly did the men of Lexington fulfil that pledge. Shall we in our
day forget what these men did and dared? Are we so saturated with
the spirit of commercialism, are we so wedded to the worship of the
golden calf, that justice and humanity have no place in our modern
code?
Let us remember we shall be tried at the bar of history as have been
other nations; as our opportunities have been greater, so are our
responsibilities. We cannot escape our liabilities; it is for us to
so act in the present that this experiment of a free government,
founded upon manhood suffrage, shall not fail.