THE RECORD OF CONGRESS 137 the President's hands. Its bad features are the doubling of the personal income tax (thus emphasizing the evils both of class legislation and a tax on industry, not property); a Federal inheritance tax, involving conflict with the States and double taxation; and, finally, a tax on war munitions, thus discriminating against single industries. The whole bill represents an unscientific way of raising money. The Philippines Law is commendable in spirit, but has, we think, the tendency to weaken the authority of the United States without any proportionate lessening of our responsibility. INACTION We commend certain inaction by Congress; for instance : The Colombian Treaty has not been and ought never to be ratified. The Immigration Bill has not become and ought never to become law if it contains the literacy clause which has caused President Taft and President Wilson to veto previous immigration bills. But we disapprove certain inaction at this session; for instance :: The Corrupt Practices Bill, prohibiting the buying of votes by direct or indirect means and the contribution by corporations for political purposes, and limiting individual and campaign committee contributions. The Conservation Bills, providing for the use of water power on public lands and on navigable streams anywhere; and for the exploration and disposition of coal, oil, gas, and phosphate lands. The Labor Bills, particularly the Canadian Industrial Disputes Act, recommended by the President. It is to be regretted that the session could not have legislated concerning such matters as the enlargement of the Inter-State Commerce Commission, increase of freight rates, and the lodgment in the hands of the Executive of the power, in case of military necessity, to take control of such portions and rolling stock of the railways as may be required and to operate them for military purposes. The Vocational Education Bill, giving expert advice to the States by Federal specialists in vocational, agricultural, industrial, and commercial education, and in home economics. The Waterway Commission Bill, establishing a National River and Harbor Commission to be as responsible and effective a body as is the Inter-State Commerce Commission. SEPTEMBER SIXTH' "WHOSE DAY SHALL THIS DAY BE ?" BY JOHN FINLEY "Whose day shall this day be?" I heard one cry And paint the earth against the misty skies, Fain keep its genial heat to warm the heart And hearth when snows are deep on Vosges and Alp. "Wake, men, and bid! See how its conquering glow Of argent, cities varicolored gems, And one, ere others could, Cried out: "I fling unnumbered lives of men To buy it in the planet's calendar; To crush a planet-capital and make A holiday for millions. This, my bid !" Then rose a loud confusion, as when men A name, a serum, or a victory. All day the bidding ran, on into hours, Read by Mr. Finley at the Lafayette Day celebration, in the City Hall of New York, on September 6, at the conclusion of his address. See editorial comment elsewhere. "O Author of all Days! There lived a youth, A son of France, but dear as ever son Of own could be to one whom I have heard A people call their country's father. He, He was a gallant youth, noble of birth, Of that high word. He risked his all: He could but bid his fortune and his life,- A great, lank, youth-republic, now may give So long as Thou, who didst appoint the lights In endless calendar this whirling earth." The hammer on the bell of midnight fell. Going," he said, the Ancient One of Days, Going," and, with the last sonorous stroke The youth, youth-summoning, de Lafayette !"' 139 BY ROBERT BACON FORMERLY AMERICAN AMBASSADOR TO FRANCE ON year 1757, a day honored by the peoples of two republics, and destined to be a day set apart in the history of mankind, a child was born, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the realization of political freedom. By birth a subject of France, by Act of Congress an American citizen, his name is "sweet as honey on the lips of men." Of proud and ancient lineage, reared in the lap of luxury, he discerned across an ocean the flush of liberty as of a sun strangely rising -not setting in the West, and putting aside place and position as unworthy of ambition, he associated himself with the lowly and oppressed of the New World. "When I heard your cause, my heart enlisted." But, although he came single-handed, as it were, offering his services without rank and without pay, and his life a sacrifice, if need be, yet through him and his devotion to that cause France and the United States fought shoulder to shoulder at Yorktown, and through their co-operation the independence of the struggling colonies was realized and the liberty of a whole continent assured. At this great and crowning moment Lafayette and Rochambeau stood shoulder to shoulder, and to-day they stand shoulder to shoulder in the city which bears the name of their great companion in arms, facing the White House, and reminding by their presence the successors of Washington in the Presidency of that perpetual alliance of two peoples, evidenced, indeed, by no scrap of paper, but inscribed in the hearts of every American. When the independence of the United States was formally proclaimed on the 4th of July, 1776, Lafayette was less than nineteen years of age. On the 26th day of March, 1777, he sailed from Bordeaux in a vessel of his own furnishing, but his departure was delayed by royal command. He escaped to Spain, whence, on the 20th of April, with De Kalb, later to fall in the cause they espoused, and some other chosen companions, he put to sea in his vessel, aptly called the "Victory." Still a youth of nineteen, he reached the coast of South Carolina the 13th day of June. He made his way under difficulties to Philadelphia, then the capital of the country, where he arrived on the 27th day of July. The little city swarmed with adventurers, eager for high commands in return for real or alleged experience. Commissions to foreigners meant lack of commissions to deserving Americans, and the reception of Lafayette was, as he himself said, more like a dismissal than a welcome;" but Lafayette had come in the interests of a cause, and he was not to be deprived of the opportunity of serving it. He addressed the Congress, setting forth his circumstances and the reasons which had impelled him to cross the ocean to offer his services to the young country. He felt that he had earned the right to serve, say. ing that," After the sacrifices that I have made in this cause, I have the right to ask two favors at your hands: the one is, to serve without pay, at my own expense; and the other, that I be allowed to serve at first as a volunteer." 66 Congress could not resist such an appeal. It therefore resolved that "his service be accepted, and that in consideration of his zeal, illustrious family, and connections he have rank and commission of major-general in the army of the United States." The commission, however, was meant by Congress to be honorary, leaving it to Washington to avail himself of Lafayette's services or to appoint him to such command as events should justify. His zeal for the cause was sincere; his courage, shown at Brandywine, was unquestioned; his tact was even greater than either. Upon his arrival at camp Washington had said: "It is somewhat embarrassing to us to show ourselves to an officer who has just come from the army of France." To which delicate compliment Lafayette finely replied: "I am here to learn, not to teach." He not only felt his youth and inexperience, but the embarrassment that his presence in high command might create. He overcame every difficulty. "I read," he said, "I study, I examine, I listen, I reflect, and upon the result of all this I make an effort to form my opinion and to put into it as much common sense as I can. I am cautious not to talk much, lest I should say some foolish thing, and still more cautious in my actions, lest I should do some foolish thing, for I do not want to disappoint the confidence that the Americans have so kindly placed in me." His conduct at Brandywine, and the further evidence of skill as well as courage in the affair of Gloucester, coupled with his faultless devotion to the cause in which his heart was enlisted, led Washington to recommend to Congress, within less than six months after his arrival in America, that he be appointed to the command of a Division, and Congress resolved that "General Washington be informed it is highly agreeable to Congress that the Marquis de Lafayette be appointed to the command of a Division in the Continental Army." He was accordingly put in command of a Virginia Division, and he shared the hardships of defeat and the sweets of victory with his men. He went through the trying winter at Valley Forge, where, as he tells us, "the unfortunate soldiers were in want of everything; they had neither coats nor hats nor shirts nor shoes; their feet and legs froze until they grew black, and it was often necessary to amputate them. . . The army frequently passed whole days without food, and the patient endurance of both soldiers and officers was a miracle which every moment seemed to renew." ... The recognition of the independence of the United States by France, and the defensive alliance on the 6th day of February, 1778, due in no small measure to Lafayette's influence, put an end to gloom and despondency. Great Britain declared war against France for its support of the cause in which not only Lafayette but France was now enlisted, and the United Colonies found them Y HUGHES AND THE PEOPLE OF THE WEST A selves possessed of an ally as powerful as it To-day, as we celebrate the birth of Lafay- 141 free institutions from the imposition of a theory of government in the hands of a dominant sovereign will, just as, on an October day in the year 732, Charles, surnamed Martel, halted an invading army at Tours, thus preserving France and western Europe from an alien and militant civilization. The Battle of the Marne, fought and won by Lafayette's countryman Joffre, on Lafayette's birthday, makes of the 6th day of September a date memorable not only in the history of our country, but in the annals of civilization. In commemorating the services of Lafayette, the friend of liberty,.. the friend of America, and the friend of Washington, our hearts go out to France in her struggle for mankind, for ideals-for our American ideals; and, as Rochambeau said to Washington in 1781, so to-day I say to you, sir [turning to M. Jusserand], the Ambassador of the glori ous country of Lafayette and of Rochambeau : Entre vous, entre nous, à la vie, à la mort!1 HUGHES AND THE PEOPLE OF THE WEST BY FREDERICK M. DAVENPORT STAFF CORRESPONDENT OF THE OUTLOOK And Mr. Davenport's first article on Mr. Hughes's Western trip was published in The Outlook of UGHES was a political liberal before. he started West. But if he had not been, and had retained his normally open mind, he would have been a political liberal before he came back. The most significant thing about the rejuvenation of Republicanism in the real West—that is, in the Mountain and Pacific Coast States-is that the party in that section of the United States, in spite of the momentary political bewilderment which besets the whole country, is irrevocably committed to further and rapid political advance. The clouds of reaction that were clearly on the horizon after the election of 1914 are passing away. The greater part of the States through which we have passed have long been for the most part naturally Republican States, and the furnace power of the party is still here. It was the attempt of the Oid Guardsmen of the party in the East in 1910 and 1912 to slow down the machinery by throwing in a monkeywrench, by the employment of reactionary As I go on to unfold some of the popular political phenomena which the Hughes tour brought to light, I think what I have in mind will be clear. And I will just tell the story without attempting all the time to adduce 1 As for you and us, we stand united in life and in death! |