Part 21

We have happily maintained a policy of avoiding all interference with European affairs. We have been only interested spectators of their contentions in diplomacy and in war, ready to use our friendly offices to promote peace, but never obtruding our advice and never attempting unfairly to coin the distresses of other powers into commercial advantage to ourselves. We have a just right to expect that our European policy will be the American policy of European courts.

It is so manifestly incompatible with those precautions for our peace and safety, which all the great powers habitually observe and enforce in matters affecting them, that a shorter water-way between our eastern and western seaboards should be dominated by any European Government, that we may confidently expect that such a purpose will not be entertained by any friendly power. We shall in the future, as in the past, use every endeavor to maintain and enlarge our friendly relations with all the great powers, but they will not expect us to look kindly upon any project that would leave us subject to the dangers of a hostile observation or environment.

We have not sought to dominate or to absorb any of our weaker neighbors, but rather to aid and encourage them to establish free and stable governments, resting upon the consent of their own people. We have a clear right to expect, therefore, that no European Government will seek to establish colonial dependencies upon the territory of these independent American States. That which a sense of justice restrains us from seeking they may be reasonably expected willingly to forego.

It must not be assumed, however, that our interests are so exclusively American that our entire inattention to any events that may transpire elsewhere can be taken for granted. Our citizens domiciled for purposes of trade in all countries and in many of the islands of the sea demand and will have our adequate care in their personal and commercial rights. The necessities of our navy require convenient coaling stations and dock and harbor privileges. These and other trading privileges we will feel free to obtain only by means that do not in any degree partake of coercion, however feeble the Government from which we ask such concessions. But having fairly obtained them by methods and for purposes entirely consistent with the most friendly disposition toward all other powers, our consent will be necessary to any modification or impairment of the concession.

We shall neither fail to respect the flag of any friendly nation or the just rights of its citizens, nor to exact the like treatment for our own. Calmness, justice, and consideration should characterize our diplomacy. The offices of an intelligent diplomacy or of friendly arbitration, in proper cases, should be adequate to the peaceful adjustment of all international difficulties. By such methods we will make our contribution to the world's peace, which no nation values more highly, and avoid the opprobrium which must fall upon the nation that ruthlessly breaks it.

The duty devolved by law upon the President to nominate and, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to appoint all public officers whose appointment is not otherwise provided for in the Constitution or by act of Congress has become very burdensome, and its wise and efficient discharge full of difficulty. The civil list is so large that a personal knowledge of any large number of the applicants is impossible. The President must rely upon the representations of others, and these are often made inconsiderately and without any just sense of responsibility.

I have a right, I think, to insist that those who volunteer or are invited to give advice as to appointments shall exercise consideration and fidelity. A high sense of duty and an ambition to improve the service should characterize all public officers. There are many ways in which the convenience and comfort of those who have business with our public officers may be promoted by a thoughtful and obliging officer, and I shall expect those whom I may appoint to justify their selection by a conspicuous efficiency in the discharge of their duties. Honorable party service will certainly not be esteemed by me a disqualification for public office; but it will in no case be allowed to serve as a shield for official negligence, incompetency, or delinquency. It is entirely creditable to seek public office by proper methods and with proper motives, and all applications will be treated with consideration; but I shall need, and the heads of departments will need, time for inquiry and deliberation. Persistent importunity will not, therefore, be the best support of an application for office.

Heads of departments, bureaus, and all other public officers having any duty connected therewith, will be expected to enforce the Civil Service law fully and without evasion. Beyond this obvious duty I hope to do something more to advance the reform of the civil service. The ideal, or even my own ideal, I shall probably not attain. Retrospect will be a safer basis of judgment than promises. We shall not, however, I am sure, be able to put our civil service upon a non-partisan basis until we have secured an incumbency that fair minded men of the opposition will approve for impartiality and integrity. As the number of such in the civil list is increased removals from office will diminish.

While a treasury surplus is not the greatest evil, it is a serious evil. Our revenue should be ample to meet the ordinary annual demands upon our treasury, with a sufficient margin for those extraordinary but scarcely less imperative demands which arise now and then. Expenditure should always be made with economy, and only upon public necessity. Wastefulness, profligacy, or favoritism in public expenditures is criminal; but there is nothing in the condition of our country or of our people to suggest that anything presently necessary to the public prosperity, security, or honor should be unduly postponed. It will be the duty of Congress wisely to forecast and estimate these extraordinary demands, and, having added them to our ordinary expenditures, to so adjust our revenue laws that no considerable annual surplus will remain. We will fortunately be able to apply to the redemption of the public debt any small and unforeseen excess of revenue. This is better than to reduce our income below our necessary expenditures with the resulting choice between another change of our revenue laws and an increase of the public debt. It is quite possible, I am sure, to effect the necessary reduction in our revenues without breaking down our protective tariff or seriously injuring any domestic industry.

The construction of a sufficient number of modern war ships and of their necessary armament should progress as rapidly as is consistent with care and perfection in plans and workmanship. The spirit, courage, and skill of our naval officers and seamen have many times in our history given to weak ships and inefficient guns a rating greatly beyond that of the naval list. That they will again do so upon occasion I do not doubt; but they ought not, by premeditation or neglect, to be left to the risks and exigencies of an unequal combat.

We should encourage the establishment of American steamship lines. The exchanges of commerce demand stated, reliable, and rapid means of communication, and until these are provided the development of our trade with the States lying south of us is impossible.

Our pension law should give more adequate and discriminating relief to the Union soldiers and sailors and to their widows and orphans. Such occasions as this should remind us that we owe everything to their valor and sacrifice.

It is a subject of congratulation that there is a near prospect of the admission into the Union of the Dakotas and Montana and Washington Territories. This act of justice has been unreasonably delayed in the case of some of them. The people who have settled those Territories are intelligent, enterprising, and patriotic, and the accession of these new States will add strength to the Nation. It is due to the settlers in the Territories who have availed themselves of the invitations of our land laws to make homes upon the public domain that their titles should be speedily adjusted and their honest entries confirmed by patent.

It is very gratifying to observe the general interest now being manifested in the reform of our election laws. Those who have been for years calling attention to the pressing necessity of throwing about the ballot-box and about the elector further safeguards, in order that our elections might not only be free and pure, but might clearly appear to be so, will welcome the accession of any who did not so soon discover the need of reform. The national Congress has not as yet taken control of elections in that case over which the Constitution gives it jurisdiction, but has accepted and adopted the election laws of the several States, provided penalties for their violation and a method of supervision. Only the inefficiency of the State laws or an unfair partisan administration of them could suggest a departure from this policy. It was clearly, however, in the contemplation of the framers of the Constitution that such an exigency might arise, and provision was wisely made for it. No power vested in Congress or in the Executive to secure or perpetuate it should remain unused upon occasion.

The people of all the Congressional districts have an equal interest that the election in each shall truly express the views and wishes of a majority of the qualified electors residing within it. The results of such elections are not local, and the insistence of electors residing in other districts that they shall be pure and free does not savor at all of impertinence. If in any of the States the public security is thought to be threatened by ignorance among the electors, the obvious remedy is education. The sympathy and help of our people will not be withheld from any community struggling with special embarrassments or difficulties connected with the suffrage, if the remedies proposed proceed upon lawful lines and are promoted by just and honorable methods. How shall those who practise election frauds recover that respect for the sanctity of the ballot which is the first condition and obligation of good citizenship? The man who has come to regard the ballot-box as a juggler's hat has renounced his allegiance.

Let us exalt patriotism and moderate our party contentions. Let those who would die for the flag on the field of battle give a better proof of their patriotism and a higher glory to their country by promoting fraternity and justice. A party success that is achieved by unfair methods or by practices that partake of revolution is hurtful and evanescent, even from a party standpoint. We should hold our differing opinions in mutual respect, and, having submitted them to the arbitrament of the ballot, should accept an adverse judgment with the same respect that we would have demanded of our opponents if the decision had been in our favor.

No other people have a government more worthy of their respect and love, or a land so magnificent in extent, so pleasant to look upon, and so full of generous suggestion to enterprise and labor. God has placed upon our head a diadem, and has laid at our feet power and wealth beyond definition or calculation. But we must not forget that we take these gifts upon the condition that justice and mercy shall hold the reins of power, and that the upward avenues of hope shall be free to all the people.

I do not mistrust the future. Dangers have been in frequent ambush along our path, but we have uncovered and vanquished them all. Passion has swept some of our communities, but only to give us a new demonstration that the great body of our people are stable, patriotic, and law-abiding. No political party can long pursue advantage at the expense of public honor or by rude and indecent methods, without protest and fatal disaffection in its own body. The peaceful agencies of commerce are more fully revealing the necessary unity of all our communities, and the increasing intercourse of our people is promoting mutual respect. We shall find unalloyed pleasure in the revelation which our next census will make of the swift development of the great resources of some of the States. Each State will bring its generous contribution to the great aggregate of the Nation's increase. And when the harvest from the fields, the cattle from the hills, and the ores of the earth shall have been weighed, counted, and valued, we will turn from them all to crown with the highest honor the State that has most promoted education, virtue, justice, and patriotism among the people.

NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1889.

_The Nation's Centenary._

The celebration, at the city of New York, of the one hundredth anniversary of the inauguration of George Washington as first President of the United States was more than national in its scope and influence. The people of the entire continent manifested a gratifying interest in it, and no event in our history has been commemorated with greater success. The occasion called together more than two million people within the gateways of the great metropolis, many of them our most distinguished and representative citizens. The celebration was conducted under the auspices of one hundred prominent citizens, organized as a general committee, of which the Hon. Hamilton Fish was President; Mayor Hugh J. Grant, Chairman; Hon. Elbridge T. Gerry, Chairman Executive Committee; and Clarence W. Bowen, Secretary.

Early on the morning of April 29 the President, accompanied by Mrs. Harrison, Mrs. J. R. McKee, Mr. and Mrs. Russell B. Harrison, the members of the Cabinet, Chief Justice and Mrs. Fuller, Justice and Mrs. Field, Justice Blatchford, Justice Strong, Major-General Schofield, Mr. Walker Blaine and Miss Blaine, Col. Thos. F. Barr, Lieut. T. B. M. Mason and Mrs. Mason, left Washington by special train tendered by President Geo. R. Roberts and Vice-President Frank Thomson, of the Pennsylvania Company. The distinguished guests were escorted by the following members of the Centennial Committee designated for this honorable duty: John A. King, Chairman; John Jay, Edward Cooper, Wm. H. Wickham, Wm. R. Grace, Frederick J. DePeyster, Wm. H. Robertson, Cornelius Vanderbilt, Wm. M. Evarts, Frank Hiscock, Seth Low, Orlando B. Potter, Clifford S. Sims, Jas. Duane Livingston, and Frank S. Witherbee.

At Trenton the party was met by the New Jersey Centennial Committee, consisting of Governor Green, General Sewell, Rev. Dr. Hamill, Colonel Stockton, General Grubb, Colonel Donnelly, Captain Skirm, Senator Cramner, Senator Cattell, Colonel Chambers, and others.

Arrived at Elizabeth the President breakfasted with Governor Green and then held a reception, conducted by Col. Rob't S. Green, assisted by Col. Suydam, Chas. G. Parkhurst, and John L. Boggs. Following the route taken by Washington, President Harrison and his party embarked at Elizabethport on board the U. S. S. _Despatch_, and, escorted by a magnificent fleet of war ships, merchant marine, and craft of all kinds, proceeded up the Kills to the bay amid the roar of cannon from the several forts and the men-of-war.

At the gangway of the _Despatch_ the President was received by Jackson S. Schultz and the following gentlemen, comprising the Committee on Navy: John S. Barnes, George G. Haven, D. Willis James, Frederick R. Coudert, Capt. Henry Erben, Ogden Goelet, John Jay Pierrepont, Loyall Farragut, Alfred C. Cheney, Buchanan Winthrop, and S. Nicholson Kane. Other distinguished guests on the _Despatch_ were Gov. David B. Hill, Gen. William T. Sherman, Admiral David D. Porter, Commodore Ramsey, and Jas. M. Varnum. Several hundred thousand patriotic people greeted the _Despatch_ as she proudly entered the harbor. The scene was a most memorable one.

Following the example of Washington, President Harrison was rowed ashore in a barge, landing at Pier 16, where he was met by the venerable Hamilton Fish, who welcomed him to New York. Proceeding to the Equitable Building, the President was tendered a reception in the rooms of the Lawyers' Club, followed by a banquet under the auspices of the Committee on States, consisting of the following distinguished citizens: William G. Hamilton, Chairman; James C. Carter, John Schuyler, J. T. Van Rensselaer, James W. Husted, Theo. Roosevelt, Jacob A. Cantor, E. Ellery Anderson, Floyd Clarkson, Henry W. LeRoy, John B. Pine, Samuel Borrowe, and Jas. M. Montgomery. Among the guests--other than the members of the Cabinet and the other prominent gentlemen who accompanied the President on the _Despatch_--were ex-President R. B. Hayes and the Governors of thirty-five States.

At night the President and his Cabinet attended the grand centennial ball at the Metropolitan Opera House, at which 6,000 guests were present. This brilliant entertainment, rendered memorable by the presence of so many distinguished people, was given under the auspices of a committee composed of the following society leaders: Stuyvesant Fish, Chairman; William Waldorf Astor, William K. Vanderbilt, William Jay, Egerton L. Winthrop, Robert Goelet, Wm. B. Beekman, Stephen H. Olin, Wm. E. D. Stokes, and Gouverneur Morris.

The morning of the 30th--Centennial Day--the President, members of his Cabinet, with ex-Presidents Cleveland and Hayes, Governor Hill, and many other noted guests, attended thanksgiving services at St. Paul's Church. The President and his family occupied the Washington pew. The exercises were conducted by the Rt. Rev. Henry C. Potter, Bishop of New York. The literary exercises were held on the steps of the sub-Treasury, where General Washington took his oath of office a hundred years before. Countless thousands surrounded the speaker's stand and congregated in the vicinity. Elbridge T. Gerry presided and introduced Rev. Richard S. Storrs, who delivered the invocation. Secretary Bowen read a poem entitled "The Vow of Washington," composed for the occasion by the venerable John Greenleaf Whittier. Hon. Chauncey M. Depew then delivered the Centennial oration. On conclusion, Chairman Gerry introduced President Harrison, who was greeted with a grand outburst as he advanced to the front. Amid repeated interruptions with cheers he spoke as follows:

_Mr. Chairman, my Countrymen_--Official duty of a very exacting character has made it quite impossible that I should deliver an address on this occasion. Foreseeing this, I early notified your committee that the programme must not contain any address by me. The selection of Mr. Depew as the orator of this occasion makes further speech not only difficult, but superfluous. He has met the demand of this great occasion on its own high level. He has brought before us the incidents and the lessons of the first inauguration of Washington. We seem to have been a part of that admiring and almost adoring throng that filled these streets one hundred years ago.

We have come into the serious, but always inspiring, presence of Washington. He was the incarnation of duty, and he teaches us to-day this great lesson: That those who would associate their names with events that shall outlive a century can only do so by high consecration to duty. Self-seeking has no public observance or anniversary. The captain who gives to the sea his cargo of goods, that he may give safety and deliverance to his imperilled fellow-men, has fame; he who lands the cargo has only wages. Washington seemed to come to the discharge of the duties of his high office impressed with a great sense of his unfamiliarity with these new calls thrust upon him, modestly doubtful of his own ability, but trusting implicitly in the sustaining helpfulness and grace of that God who rules the world, presides in the councils of nations, and is able to supply every human defect. We have made marvellous progress in material things since then, but the stately and enduring shaft that we have erected at the national capital at Washington symbolizes the fact that he is still the First American Citizen. [Cheers.]

_The Great Military Parade and Banquet._

On conclusion of the ceremonies at the sub-Treasury the President and other honored guests of the day reviewed the grand military parade from a stand in Madison Square. Along the line of march, especially on Broadway and Fifth Avenue, for several miles the gorgeous pageant moved between two living walls. Never were so many people congregated on this continent. The glittering column, commanded by General Schofield, moved with continuous precision, and was five hours and twenty-five minutes in passing the reviewing stand. The President remained at his post, saluting the last company. The troops of the various States were led by their Governors.

This monster military demonstration and the great industrial parade of the day following were conducted under the management of a committee comprising the following well-known gentlemen: S. Van Rensselaer Cruger, Chairman; John Cochrane, Locke W. Winchester, J. Hampden Robb, Frederick Gallatin, Frederick D. Tappen, and John C. Tomlinson.

The President's visit concluded with his participation in the greatest banquet known to modern times, held at the Metropolitan Opera House. The lavish decorations, the magnitude and occasion of the entertainment have rendered it historical. Eight hundred guests were seated at the tables, while the surrounding boxes and stalls were overflowing with distinguished ladies eagerly partaking of the feast of reason. Mayor Grant presided, and introduced Governor Hill, who welcomed the guests. Ex-President Cleveland responded to the toast "Our People;" Gov. Fitzhugh Lee, of Virginia, spoke to "The States;" Chief-Justice Fuller responded to "The Federal Constitution;" Hon. John W. Daniel spoke to "The Senate;" ex-President Hayes to "The Presidency." Among other prominent guests were Vice-President Morton, General Sherman, Lieutenant-Governor Jones, of New York, Judge Charles Andrews, Hon. Hannibal Hamlin, Mayor Chapin, of Brooklyn, Governor Foraker, of Ohio, Abram S. Hewitt, Cornelius N. Bliss, Fred'k S. Tallmadge, Samuel D. Babcock, Chauncey M. Depew, Erastus Wiman, Charles W. Dayton, Josiah M. Fisk, William Henry Smith, Thomas S. Moore, Henry Clews, Austin Corbin, Philip L. Livingston, Brayton Ives, Darius O. Mills, Richard T. Wilson, William L. Strong, Henry B. Hyde, James M. Brown, Louis Fitzgerald, Allan Campbell, John Sloane, James D. Smith, Edward V. Loew, Eugene Kelly, Walter Stanton, John F. Plummer, J. Edward Simmons, John Jay Knox, De Lancey Nicoll, Henry G. Marquand, Gordon L. Ford, Daniel Huntington, F. Hopkinson Smith, William E. Dodge, Chas. Parsons, A. W. Drake, Oliver H. Perry, Frank D. Millet, H. H. Boyesen, Charles Henry Hart, Rutherford Stuyvesant, John L. Cadwalader, Lispenard Stewart, Chas. H. Russell, Jr., and Richard W. Gilder.

After the Chief-Justice's address President Harrison was introduced and received with a storm of applause. He spoke to the toast "The United States of America" as follows: