Have faith in Massachusetts Part 2

Not that I shrink from full and free consideration of the military needs of our country. Nor do I agree that it is now necessary to remain silent regarding the domestic or foreign relations of this Nation.

I agree that partisanship should stop at the boundary line, but I a.s.sert that patriotism should begin there. Others, however, have covered this field, and I leave it to them and to you.

I do, however, propose to discuss the "preparedness" of the State to care for its unfortunates. And I propose to do this without any party bias and without blame upon any particular individual, but in just criticism of a system.

In Ma.s.sachusetts, we are citizens before we are partisans. The good name of the Commonwealth is of more moment to us than party success. But unfortunately, because of existing conditions, that good name, in one particular at least, is now in jeopardy.

Ma.s.sachusetts, for twenty years, has been able honestly to boast of the care it has bestowed upon her sick, poor, and insane. Her inst.i.tutions have been regarded as models throughout the world. We are falling from that proud estate; crowded housing conditions, corridors used for sleeping purposes, are not only not unusual, but are coming to be the accepted standard. The heads of asylums complain that maintenance and the allowance for food supply and supervision are being skimped.

On August 1 of this year, the inst.i.tutions throughout the State housed more than 700 patients above what they were designed to accommodate, and I am told the crowding is steadily increasing. That is one reason I have been at pains to set forth that I do not see the way clear to make a radical reduction in the annual State budget. I now repeat that declaration, in spite of contradiction, because I know the citizens of this State have no desire for economies gained at such a sacrifice. The people have no stomach for retrenchment of that sort.

A charge of overcrowding, which must mean a lack of care, is not to be carelessly made. You are ent.i.tled to facts, as well as phrases. I gave the whole number now confined in our inst.i.tutions above the stated capacity as over 700. About August 1, Danvers had 1530 in an inst.i.tution of 1350 capacity. Northampton, my home town, had 913, in a hospital built for 819. In Boston State Hospital, there were 1572, where the capacity was 1406. Westboro had 1260 inmates, with capacity for 1161, and Medfield had 1615, where the capacity was 1542. These capacities are given from official recorded accommodations.

This was not the practice of the past, and there can be no question as to where the responsibility rests. The General Court has done its best, but there has been a halt elsewhere. A substantial appropriation was made for a new State Hospital for the Metropolitan District, and an additional appropriation for a new inst.i.tution for the feeble-minded in the western part of the State. In its desire to hasten matters, the legislature went even further and granted money for plans for a new hospital in the Metropolitan District, to relieve part of the outside congestion, but the needed relief is still in the future.

I feel the time has come when the people must a.s.sert themselves and show that they will tolerate no delay and no parsimony in the care of our unfortunates. Restore the fame of our State in the handling of these problems to its former l.u.s.tre.

I repeat that this is not partisan. I am not criticising individuals. I am denouncing a system. When you subst.i.tute patronage for patriotism, administration breaks down. We need more of the Office Desk and less of the Show Window in politics. Let men in office subst.i.tute the midnight oil for the limelight. Let Ma.s.sachusetts return to the sound business methods which were exemplified in the past by such Democrats in the East as Governor Gaston and Governor Douglas, and by such Republicans in the West as Governor Robinson and Governor Crane.

Above all, let us not, in our haste to prepare for war, forget to prepare for peace. The issue is with you. You can, by your votes, show what system you stamp with the approval of enlightened Ma.s.sachusetts Public Opinion.

VII

LAFAYETTE BANQUET, FALL RIVER

SEPTEMBER 4, 1916

Seemingly trifling events oft carry in their train great consequences.

The firing of a gun in the backwoods of Pennsylvania, Macaulay tells us, started the Seven Years' War which set the world in conflagration, causing men to fight each other on every sh.o.r.e of the seven seas and giving new masters to the most ancient of empires. We see to-day fifteen nations engaged in the most terrific war in the history of the human race and trace its origin to the bullet of a madman fired in the Balkans. It is true that the flintlock gun at Lexington was not the first, nor yet the last, to fire a "shot heard round the world." It was not the distance it travelled, but the message it carried which has marked it out above all other human events. It was the character of that message which, claimed the attention of him we this day honor, in the far-off fortress of the now famous Metz; it was because it roused in the listener a sympathetic response that it was destined to link forever the events of Concord and Lexington and Bunker Hill and Dorchester Heights, in our Commonwealth, with the name of Lafayette.

For there was a new tone in those Ma.s.sachusetts guns. It was not the old l.u.s.t of conquest, not the sullen roar of hatred and revenge, but a higher, clearer note of a people a.s.serting their inalienable sovereignty. It is a happy circ.u.mstance that one of our native-born, Benjamin Franklin, was instrumental in bringing Lafayette to America; but beyond that it is fitting at this time to give a thought to our Commonwealth because his ideals, his character, his life, were all in sympathy with that great Revolution which was begun within her borders and carried to a successful conclusion by the sacrifice of her treasure and her blood. It was not the able legal argument of James Otis against the British Writs of a.s.sistance, nor the pet.i.tions and remonstrances of the Colonists to the British throne, admirable though they were, that aroused the approbation and brought his support to our cause. It was not alone that he agreed with the convictions of the Continental Congress.

He saw in the example of Ma.s.sachusetts a people who would shrink from no sacrifice to defend rights which were beyond price. It was not the Tories, fleeing to Canada, that attracted him. It was the patriots, bearing arms, and he brought them not a pen but a sword.

"Resistance to tyranny is obedience to law," and "obedience to law is liberty." Those are the foundations of the Commonwealth. It was these principles in action which appealed to that young captain of dragoons and brought the sword and resources of the aristocrat to battle for democracy. I love to think of his connection with our history. I love to think of him at the dedication of the Bunker Hill Monument receiving the approbation of the Nation from the lips of Daniel Webster. I love to think of the long line of American citizens of French blood in our Commonwealth to-day, ready to defend the principles he fought for, "Liberty under the Law," citizens who, like him, look not with apology, but with respect and approval and admiration on that sentiment inscribed on the white flag of Ma.s.sachusetts, "_Ense pet.i.t placidam sub libertate quietem_" (With a sword she seeks secure peace under liberty).

VIII

NORFOLK REPUBLICAN CLUB, BOSTON

OCTOBER 9, 1916

Last night at Somerville I spoke on some of the fundamental differences between the Republican and Democratic policies, and showed how we were dependent on Republican principles as a foundation on which to erect any advance in our social and economic welfare.

This year the Republican Party has adopted a very advanced platform.

That was natural, for we have always been the party of progress, and have given our attention to that, when we were not engaged in a life-and-death struggle to overcome the fallacies put forth by our opponents, with which we are all so familiar. The result has been that here in Ma.s.sachusetts, where our party has ever been strong, and where we have framed legislation for more than fifty years, more progress has been made along the lines of humanitarian legislation than in any other State. We have felt free to call on our industries to make large outlays along these lines because we have furnished them with the advantages of a protective tariff and an honest and efficient state government. The consequences have been that in this State the hours and conditions of labor have been better than anywhere else on earth. Those provisions for safety, sanitation, compensations for accidents, and for good living conditions have now been almost entirely worked out. There remains, however, the condition of sickness, age, misfortune, lack of employment, or some other cause, that temporarily renders people unable to care for themselves. Our platform has taken up this condition.

We have long been familiar with insurance to cover losses. You will readily recall the different kinds. Formerly it was only used in commerce, by the well-to-do. Recently it has been adapted to the use of all our people by the great industrial companies which have been very successful. Our State has adopted a system of savings-bank insurance, thus reducing the expense. Now, social insurance will not be, under a Republican interpretation, any new form of outdoor relief, some new scheme of living on the town. It will be an extension of the old familiar principle to the needs at hand, and so popularized as to meet the requirements of our times.

It ought to be understood, however, that there can be no remedy for lack of industry and thrift, secured by law. It ought to be understood that no scheme of insurance and no scheme of government aid is likely to make us all prosperous. And above all, these remedies must go forward on the firm foundation of an independent, self-supporting, self-governing people. But we do honestly put forward a proposition for the relief of misfortune.

The Republican Party is proposing humanitarian legislation to build up character, to establish independence, not pauperism; it will in the future, as in the past, ever stand opposed to the establishment of one cla.s.s who shall live on the Government, and another cla.s.s who shall pay the taxes. To those who fear we are turning Socialists, and to those who think we are withholding just and desirable public aid and support, I say that government under the Republican Party will continue in the future to be so administered as to breed not mendicants, but men.

Humanitarian legislation is going to be the handmaid of character.

IX

PUBLIC MEETING ON THE HIGH COST OF LIVING, FANEUIL HALL

DECEMBER 9, 1916

The great aim of American inst.i.tutions is the protection of the individual. That is the principle which lies at the foundation of Anglo-Saxon liberty. It matters not with what power the individual is a.s.sailed, nor whether that power is represented by wealth or place or numbers; against it the humblest American citizen has the right to the protection of his Government by every force that Government can command.

This right would be but half expressed if it ran only to a remedy after a wrong is inflicted; it should and does run to the prevention of a wrong which is threatened. We find our citizens, to-day, not so much suffering from the high cost of living, though that is grievous enough, as threatened with an increasing cost which will bring suffering and misery to a large body of our inhabitants. So we come here not only to discuss providing a remedy for what is now existing, but some protection to ward off what is threatening to be a worse calamity. We shall utterly fail of our purpose to provide relief unless we look at things as they are. It is useless to indulge in indiscriminate abuse. We must not confuse the innocent with the guilty; it must be our object to allay suspicion, not to create it. The great body of our tradespeople are honest and conscientious, anxious to serve their customers for a fair return for their service. We want their cooperation in our pursuit of facts; we want to cooperate with them in proposing and securing a remedy. We do not deny the existence of economic laws, nor the right to profit by a change of conditions.

But we do claim the right and duty of the Government to investigate and punish any artificial creation of high prices by means of illegal monopolies or restraints of trade. And above all, we claim the right of publicity. That is a remedy with an arm longer and stronger than that of the law. Let us know what is going on and the remedy will provide itself. In working along this line we shall have great help from the newspapers. The American people are prepared to meet any reasonable burden; they are not asking for charity or favor; fair prices and fair profits they will gladly pay; but they demand information that they are fair, and an immediate reduction if they are not.

The Commonwealth has just provided money for an investigation by a competent commission. Its Police Department, its Law Department, are also at the service of our citizens. Let us refrain from suspicion; let us refrain from all indiscriminate blame; but let us present at once to the proper authorities all facts and all evidence of unfair practices.

Let all our merchants, of whatever degree, a.s.sist in this work for the public good and let the individual see and feel that all his rights are protected by his Government.

X

ONE HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY DINNER OF THE PROVIDENT INSt.i.tUTION FOR SAVINGS

DECEMBER 13, 1916

The history of the inst.i.tution we here celebrate reaches back more than one third of the way to the landing of the Mayflower--back to the day of the men who signed the Declaration of Independence, who saw Prescott, Pomeroy, Stark, and Warren at Bunker Hill, who followed Washington and his generals from Dochester Heights to Yorktown, and saw the old Bay Colony become the Commonwealth of Ma.s.sachusetts. They had seen a nation in the making. They founded their government on the rights of the individual. They had no hesitation in defending those rights against the invasion of a British King and Parliament, by a Revolutionary War, nor in criticising their own Government at Washington when they thought an invasion of those rights was again threatened by the preliminaries and the prosecution of the War of 1812. They had made the Commonwealth. They understood its Government. They knew it was a part of themselves, their own organization. They had not acquired the state of mind that enabled them to stand aloof and regard government as something apart and separate from the people. It would never have occurred to them that they could not transact for themselves any other business just as well as they could transact for themselves the business of government. They were the men who had fought a war to limit the power of government and enlarge the privileges of the individual.

It was the same spirit that made Ma.s.sachusetts that made the Provident Inst.i.tution for Savings. What the men of that day wanted they made for themselves. They would never have thought of asking Congress to keep their money in the post-office. They did not want their commercial privileges interfered with by having the Government buy and sell for them. They had the self-reliance and the independence to prefer to do those things for themselves. This is the spirit that founded Ma.s.sachusetts, the spirit that has seen your bank grow until it could now probably purchase all there was of property in the Commonwealth when it began its existence. I want to see that spirit still preeminent here.

I want to see a deeper realization on the part of the people that this is their Commonwealth, their Government; that they control it, that they pay its expenses, that it is, after all, only a part of themselves; that any attempt to shift upon it their duties, their responsibilities, or their support will in the end only delude, degrade, impoverish, and enslave. Your inst.i.tution points the only way, through self-control, self-denial, and self-support, to self-government, to independence, to a more generous liberty, and to a firmer establishment of individual rights.

XI