_Governor, Mr. Speaker, Mr. President pro tem., Senators, and Members
of the House of Representatives, and all of you, men and women of
Texas, those whom I am so proud to call my Fellow-Americans_:
No President of the United States, no good American proud of his
country, could enter this Capitol and stand in this hall without
feeling a certain thrill of pride in his citizenship, and in the
history of the country’s past. This building in which we are now is
not only one of the largest but one of the most beautiful of its kind
throughout the world. It is eminently fitting that so great a State
should have so fine a capitol building.
There are one or two things that I would like particularly to say in
this chamber, and to the members of the Texas Legislature. I received a
copy of the resolution passed by your body, introduced, I understand,
by ex-Minister Terrell, in reference to the passage of the Interstate
Commerce Act. I wish to thank you most heartily for what you did.
I think, Governor, Mr. Speaker, and gentlemen, that the longer our
experience in public office is, the more we realize that at least
ninety-five per cent, if not more, in importance, of the work done by
any public officer who is worth his salt has nothing whatever to do
with partisan politics. The things that concern us all as good citizens
are infinitely larger than the matters concerning which we are divided
one from the other along party lines. Fundamentally our attitude in
our foreign affairs and in reference to foreign nations must in the
long run, if we are to be successful as a people, be based upon certain
common-sense rules of conduct, the identical rules upon which every
self-respecting citizen must base his private actions.
This is equally true as regards all questions dealing with capital and
labor; and especially with those dealings with the great aggregates of
capital usually to be found in corporate form through which so much
of our business at the present day is conducted. It is essential, in
dealing thus by legislative action with corporate wealth, or indeed
with wealth in any form, that we remember and act upon certain rules
simple enough and commonplace enough to state, but not always easy to
act upon. Most emphatically we can not as good Americans bear hostility
to any rich man as such any more than to any poor man as such. My
experience has been that the man who talks over-loudly of his hostility
to corporate wealth can not be trusted even to antagonize corporate
wealth when it is wrong. Let us be moderate in our statements; but let
us make our deeds bear out absolutely our words.
With this preliminary I would like to say in brief just what my
position is as regards the particular question with which I had to deal
and as regards which the Texas Legislature took the action I so much
appreciate.
On the whole there have been few instruments in the economic
development of the country which have done more for the country than
the railroads. I do not wish in any shape or way to interfere with
the legitimate gain of any of the big men whose special industrial
capacity enables them to handle the railroads so as to be of profit to
themselves and of advantage to all of us. I should be most reluctant—I
will put it stronger than that—I should absolutely refuse to be a party
to any measure, to any proposition, that interfered with the proper
and legitimate prosperity of those men; and I should feel that such a
measure was aimed not only at them, but at all of us, for any attack
upon the legitimate prosperity of any of us is in the long run sure
to turn into an attack upon all. With that proviso (as to which I ask
you to remember that I mean literally every word) let me further add
that the public has the right (not a privilege, but in my view a duty)
to see that there is on its behalf exercised such supervisory and
regulatory power over the railroads as will ensure that while they get
fair treatment themselves, they give it in return. The proper exercise
of that power is conditioned upon the securing of proper legislation,
which will enable the representatives of the public to see to it that
any unjust or oppressive or discriminating rate is altered, so as to be
a just and fair rate, and is altered immediately.
I know well that when you give that power there is a chance of its
being occasionally abused. There is no power that can be given to the
representatives of the people which it is not possible to abuse. As
every one knows, the power of taxation, which must of course be given
to the representatives of the people, is the power of death, for it is
possible to kill any industry by excessive taxation. There must be a
certain trust placed in the common-sense and common honesty of those
who are to enforce the law. If it ever falls, and I think it will, to
my lot to nominate a board to carry out such a law, I shall nominate
men, as far as I am able, on whose ability, courage, and integrity
I can count, men who will not be swayed by any influence whatever,
direct or indirect, social, political, or any other, to show improper
favoritism to any railroad, and who, on the other hand, if a railroad
is unjustly attacked, no matter if that attack has behind it the
feeling of prejudice of ninety-nine per cent of the people, will stand
up against that attack. That is my interpretation of the doctrine of
the square deal.
I want to say just one word more on an entirely different subject. I
have always taken a very great interest in the National Guard in this
country. It is our pride that we have the smallest possible regular
army. There is not another first-class power, there is not a second
or third class power in the world that has not got relatively to its
population and wealth a very much larger regular army than we have.
We do not need anything but a small regular army. We need and must
and shall have the very best regular army of its size that is to
be found anywhere. We do not need a large regular army, because of
the possibilities of our people in raising volunteer troops. Those
possibilities are largely conditioned upon the excellence of the
National Guard. Since I have been in Texas, at almost every stopping
place there have been members of the National Guard, companies of the
National Guard out to do duty in connection with keeping the crowds
in order, in preventing any trouble of any kind, keeping the whole
proceedings orderly and proper. I have been immensely struck with their
soldier-like efficiency. It is only what I ought to expect. When I was
last in Texas I was engaged with certain others in raising a volunteer
regiment, and as I think I know a good thing when I see it, I got just
as many Texans as possible in that regiment.
Your whole history, from the days of Austin and Houston and Davy
Crockett, right to the present time, shows what fighting material
the average Texan makes. But I do not care how good the material, it
is not going to amount to much if it is not given a chance. It is a
most important thing for all of us, if we desire to keep the regular
army small, that we shall have the militia, the National Guard of the
several States, kept up to a proper point. Last year, I am happy to be
able to say, that, at the manœuvres of the regulars, your Texan troops
did admirably. I have been told again and again how well they did. I
want to congratulate you upon the excellent law for the administration
of the National Guard that has recently been passed by the Texas
Legislature. With that law backed up by a sufficient appropriation to
make it available, you can count upon having the Texas National Guard a
model for the National Guard of the country.
I feel very much at home here: I have been Governor, and I have served
in the Legislature, so I have a good deal of fellow-feeling with all of
you. I have had for a good many years to grapple with just about the
problems you are grappling with from time to time here; and I know, as
any man who has taken part in active work must know, how easy it is for
the outsider to say that everything should be managed perfectly, and
how difficult it is in practice to get even fairly good results. There
is a heap of difference between the critic, the onlooker on one side,
and on the other the doer, the man who does the job.