_My Fellow-Citizens_:
I am glad here at the capital of North Carolina to have a chance to
greet so many of the sons and daughters of your great State. North
Carolina’s part in our history has ever been high and honorable.
It was in North Carolina that the Mecklenburg Declaration of
Independence foreshadowed the course taken in a few short months by the
representatives of the thirteen colonies assembled in Philadelphia.
North Carolina can rightfully say that she pointed us the way which
led to the formation of the new Nation. In the Revolution she did
many memorable deeds; and the battle of King’s Mountain marked the
turning point of the Revolutionary War in the South. But I congratulate
you not only upon your past, but upon your present. I congratulate
you upon the great industrial activity shown in your Commonwealth—an
industrial activity which, to mention but one thing, has placed this
State second only to one other in the number of its textile factories.
You are showing in practical fashion your realization of the truth that
there must be a foundation of material well-being in order that any
community may make real and rapid progress. And I am happy to say that
you are in addition showing in practical fashion your understanding
of the great truth that this material well-being, though necessary as
a foundation, can only be the foundation, and that upon it must be
raised the superstructure of a higher life, if the Commonwealth is
to stand as it should stand. More and more you are giving care and
attention to education; and education means the promotion not only of
industry, but of that good citizenship which rests upon individual
rights and upon the recognition by each individual that he has duties
as well as rights—in other words, of that good citizenship which
rests upon moral integrity and intellectual freedom. The man must be
decent in his home life, his private life, of course; but this is
not by itself enough. The man who fails to be honest and brave both
in his political franchise and in his private business contributes
to political and social anarchy. Self-government is not an easy
thing. Only those communities are fit for it in which the average
individual practices the virtue of self-command, of self-restraint,
of wise disinterestedness combined with wise self-interest; where the
individual possesses common-sense, honesty, and courage.
And now I want to say a word to you on a special subject in which all
the country is concerned, but in which North Carolina has a special
concern. The preservation of the forests is vital to the welfare of
every country. China and the Mediterranean countries offer examples of
the terrible effect of deforestation upon the physical geography, and
therefore ultimately upon the national well-being, of the nations. One
of the most obvious duties which our generation owes to the generations
that are to come after us is to preserve the existing forests. The
prime difference between civilized and uncivilized peoples is that
in civilized peoples each generation works not only for its own
well-being, but for the well-being of the generations yet unborn, and
if we permit the natural resources of this land to be destroyed so that
we hand over to our children a heritage diminished in value we thereby
prove our unfitness to stand in the forefront of civilized peoples.
One of the greatest of these heritages is our forest wealth. It is the
upper altitudes of the forested mountains that are most valuable to the
Nation as a whole, especially because of their effects upon the water
supply. Neither State nor Nation can afford to turn these mountains
over to the unrestrained greed of those who would exploit them at the
expense of the future. We can not afford to wait longer before assuming
control, in the interest of the public, of these forests; for if we do
wait, the vested interests of private parties in them may become so
strongly intrenched that it may be a most serious as well as a most
expensive task to oust them. If the Eastern States are wise, then from
the Bay of Fundy to the Gulf we will see, within the next few years, a
policy set on foot similar to that so fortunately carried out in the
high Sierras of the West by the National Government. All the higher
Appalachians should be reserved, either by the States or by the Nation.
I much prefer that they should be put under National control, but it
is a mere truism to say that they will not be reserved either by the
States or by the Nation unless you people of the South show a strong
interest therein.
Such reserves would be a paying investment, not only in protection
to many interests, but in dollars and cents to the Government. The
importance to the Southern people of protecting the Southern mountain
forests is obvious. These forests are the best defence against the
floods which in the recent past have, during a single twelvemonth,
destroyed property officially valued at nearly twice what it would
cost to buy the Southern Appalachian Reserve. The maintenance of your
Southern water powers is not less important than the prevention of
floods, because if they are injured your manufacturing interests will
suffer with them. The perpetuation of your forests, which have done so
much for the South, should be one of the first objects of your public
men. The two Senators from North Carolina have taken an honorable part
in this movement. But I do not think that the people of North Carolina
or of any other Southern State have quite grasped the importance of
this movement to the commercial development and prosperity of the South.
The position of honor in your parade to-day is held by the Confederate
veterans. They by their deeds reflect credit upon their descendants and
upon all Americans, both because they did their duty in war and because
they did their duty in peace. Now if the young men, their sons, will
not only prove that they possess the same power of fealty to an ideal,
but will also show the efficiency in the ranks of industrial life that
their fathers, the Confederate veterans, showed that they possessed in
the ranks of war, the industrial future of this great and typically
American Commonwealth is assured.
The extraordinary development of industrialism during the last half
century has been due to several causes, but above all to the revolution
in the methods of transportation and communication; that is, to steam
and to electricity, to the railroad and the telegraph.
When this Government was founded commerce was carried on by essentially
the same instruments that had been in use not only among civilized,
but among barbarian, nations, ever since history dawned; that is, by
wheeled vehicles drawn by animals, by pack trains, and by sailing
ships and rowboats. On land this meant that commerce went in slow,
cumbrous, and expensive fashion over highways open to all. Normally
these highways could not compete with water transportation, if such was
feasible between the connecting points.
All this has been changed by the development of the railroads. Save
on the ocean or on lakes so large as to be practically inland seas,
transport by water has wholly lost its old position of superiority
over transport by land, while instead of the old highways open to
every one on the same terms, but of a very limited usefulness, we have
new highways—railroads—which are owned by private corporations and
which are practically of unlimited, instead of limited, usefulness.
The old laws and old customs which were adequate and proper to meet
the old conditions need radical readjustment in order to meet these
new conditions. The cardinal features in these changed conditions
are, first, the fact that the new highway, the railway, is, from
the commercial standpoint, of infinitely greater importance in our
industrial life than was the old highway, the wagon road; and, second,
that this new highway, the railway, is in the hands of private owners,
whereas the old highway, the wagon road, was in the hands of the
State. The management of the new highway, the railroad, or rather of
the intricate web of railroad lines which cover the country, is a
task infinitely more difficult, more delicate, and more important than
the primitively easy task of acquiring or keeping in order the old
highway; so that there is properly no analogy whatever between the two
cases. I do not believe in government ownership of anything which can
with propriety be left in private hands, and in particular I should
most strenuously object to government ownership of railroads. But I
believe with equal firmness that it is out of the question for the
Government not to exercise a supervisory and regulatory right over the
railroads; for it is vital to the well-being of the public that they
should be managed in a spirit of fairness and justice toward all the
public. Actual experience has shown that it is not possible to leave
the railroads uncontrolled. Such a system, or rather such a lack of
system, is fertile in abuses of every kind, and puts a premium upon
unscrupulous and ruthless cunning in railroad management; for there are
some big shippers and some railroad managers who are always willing to
take unfair advantage of their weaker competitors, and they thereby
force other big shippers and big railroad men who would like to do
decently into similar acts of wrong and injustice, under penalty of
being left behind in the race for success. Government supervision is
needed quite as much in the interest of the big shipper and of the
railroad man who want to do right as in the interest of the small
shipper and the consumer.
Experience has shown that the present laws are defective and need
amendment. The effort to prohibit all restraint of competition, whether
reasonable or unreasonable, is unwise. What we need is to have some
administrative body with ample power to forbid combination that is
hurtful to the public, and to prevent favoritism to one individual
at the expense of another. In other words, we want an administrative
body with the power to secure fair and just treatment as among all
shippers who use the railroads—and all shippers have a right to use
them. We must not leave the enforcement of such a law merely to the
Department of Justice; it is out of the question for the law department
of the Government to do what should be purely administrative work.
The Department of Justice is to stand behind and co-operate with the
administrative body, but the administrative body itself must be given
the power to do the work and then held to a strict accountability for
the exercise of that power. The delays of the law are proverbial, and
what we need in this matter is reasonable quickness of action.
The abuses of which we have a genuine right to complain take many
shapes. Rebates are not now often given openly. But they can be given
just as effectively in covert form; and private cars, terminal tracks,
and the like must be brought under the control of the commission or
administrative body which is to exercise supervision by the Government.
But in my judgment the most important thing to do is to give to this
administrative body power to make its findings effective, and this can
be done only by giving it power, when complaint is made of a given rate
as being unjust or unreasonable, if it finds the complaint proper, then
itself to fix a maximum rate which it regards as just and reasonable,
this rate to go into effect practically at once, that is within a
reasonable time, and to stay in effect unless reversed by the courts.
I earnestly hope that we shall see a law giving this power passed by
Congress. Moreover, I hope that by law power will be conferred upon
representatives of the Government capable of performing the duty of
public accountants carefully to examine into the books of railroads
when so ordered by the Interstate Commerce Commission, which should
itself have power to prescribe what books, and what books only, should
be kept by railroads. If there is in the minds of the Commission any
suspicion that a certain railroad is in any shape or way giving rebates
or behaving improperly, I wish the Commission to have power as a matter
of right, not as a matter of favor, to make a full and exhaustive
investigation of the receipts and expenditures of the railroad, so
that any violation or evasion of the law may be detected. This is not
a revolutionary proposal on my part, for I only wish the same power
given in reference to railroads that is now exercised as a matter
of course by the national bank examiners as regards national banks.
My object in giving these additional powers to the administrative
body representing the Government—the Interstate Commerce Commission
or whatever it may be—is primarily to secure a real and not a sham
control to the Government representatives. The American people abhor a
sham, and with this abhorrence I cordially sympathize. Nothing is more
injurious from every standpoint than a law which is merely sound and
fury, merely pretence, and not capable of working out tangible results.
I hope to see all the power that I think it ought to have granted to
the Government; but I would far rather see only some of it granted, but
really granted, than see a pretence of granting all in some shape that
really amounts to nothing.
It must be understood, as a matter of course, that if this power
is granted it is to be exercised with wisdom and caution and
self-restraint. The Interstate Commerce Commissioner or other
Government official who failed to protect a railroad that was in the
right against any clamor, no matter how violent, on the part of the
public, would be guilty of as gross a wrong as if he corruptly rendered
an improper service to the railroad at the expense of the public. When
I say a square deal I mean a square deal; exactly as much a square deal
for the rich man as for the poor man; but no more. Let each stand on
his merits, receive what is due him, and be judged according to his
deserts. To more he is not entitled, and less he shall not have.
REMARKS IN PRESENTING THE PATTERSON MEMORIAL CUP TO MR. JOHN CHARLES
McNEILL, IN THE SENATE CHAMBER, RALEIGH, N. C., OCTOBER 19, 1905
_Mr. McNeill_:
I feel, and I am sure all good Americans must feel, that it is far
from enough for us to develop merely a great material prosperity. I
appreciate, and all of us must, that it is indispensable to have the
material prosperity as a foundation, but if we think the foundation
is the entire building, we never shall rank as among the nations of
the world; and therefore, it is with peculiar pleasure that I find
myself playing a small part in a movement, such as this, by which one
of the thirteen original States, one of our great States, marks its
sense of proper proportion in estimating the achievements of life,
the achievements of which the Commonwealth has a right to be proud.
It is a good thing to have the sense of historic continuity with the
past, which we largely get through the efforts of just such historic
societies as this, through which this cup is awarded to you. It is an
even better thing to try to do what we can to show our pleasure in and
approval of productive literary work in the present. Mr. McNeill, I
congratulate you and North Carolina.