a 58+ 
 

 CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 FROM 
 
 S . H . Burnham 
 
itie date sbows when this volume was taken. 
 HOME USE RULES 
 
 All books subject to recall 
 
 All borrowers must regis- 
 ter in the library to borrow 
 books for home use. 
 
 All books must be re- 
 turned at end of college 
 year for inspection and 
 repairs. 
 
 Limited books must be 
 returned within the four 
 week limit and not renewed. 
 
 Students must return all 
 books before leaving town. 
 Officers should arrange for 
 the return of books wanted 
 during their absence from 
 town. 
 
 Volumes of periodicals 
 and of pamphlets are held 
 in the library as much as 
 possible. For special pur- 
 poses they are given out for 
 a limited time. 
 
 Borrowers should not use 
 their library privileges for 
 the benefit of other persons. 
 
 Books of special value 
 and gift books, when the 
 giver wishes it, are not 
 allowed to circulate. 
 
 Readers are asked to re- 
 port all cases of books 
 marked or mutilated. 
 
 Do not deface books by xnarks and writing. 
 
 Cornell University Library 
 E687 .U58 
 
 Addresses on the accep{?"i^,M!;X,.,9?,!?3ISS® 
 
 ^^^ 3 1924 030 931 350 ^^^^ 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924030931350 
 
ADDRESSES 
 
 ACCEPTANCE BY CONGRESS 
 
 STATUE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD, 
 
 PRESENTED BY 
 
 THE STATE OF OHIO. 
 
 WASHINGTON ; 
 
 GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE. 
 1886. 
 
 Dv 
 
 C&I;K<|. l-L 
 LfuiUkV 
 
/{^{^■llS^i 
 
 
 
 J>2 
 
PROCEEDINGS IN THE SENATE. 
 
 In the Senate, 
 
 yanuary 5, 1886. 
 
 Mr. Sherman (Mr. Hale in the chair). 
 I desire, before submitting a resolution, to 
 have read a communication from the gov- 
 ernor of the State of Ohio. 
 
 The Presiding Officer (Mr. Hale in 
 the chair). The communication will be 
 read. 
 
 The Chief Clerk read as follows : 
 
 State of Ohio, Executive Department, 
 Office of Governor, 
 
 Columbus, December lo, iSS^. 
 Sir : I have the honor to inform you that, in acceptance of the invi- 
 tation contained in section 1814 of the Revised Statutes of the United 
 States, the State of Ohio, in pursuance of an act of its General Assembly, 
 has caused to be made by the sculptor, Carl H. Niehaus, and placed in 
 the old Hall of the House of Representatives, in the Capitol of the 
 United States, in the custody of the Architect of the Capitol, a. marble 
 statue of that illustrious and lamented citizen of Ohio, James A. Gar- 
 field, late President of the United States. 
 
 3 
 
This work is now presented to the Congress of the United States as 
 one of the statues contributed by the State of Ohio in pursuance of this 
 invitation. It is hoped that it may be found worthy of acceptance and 
 approval as a fit contribution from this State to the United States, in 
 whose service President Garfield passed so much of his life, and whose 
 chief executive officer he was at the time of his death. 
 Very respectfully, 
 
 GEO. HOADLY, 
 
 Governor of Ohio. 
 Hon. John Sherman, 
 
 President of the Senate of the United States, 
 
 Washington, D. C. 
 
 Mr. Sherman. In connection with that 
 communication I submit concurrent reso- 
 lutions. 
 
 The concurrent resolutions were read, as 
 follows : 
 
 Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives concurring). That 
 the thanks of Congress be presented to the governor, and through him to 
 the people, of Ohio, for the statue of James A. Garfield, whose name 
 is so honorably identified with the history of that State and of the United 
 States. 
 
 Resolved, That this work of art is accepted in the name of the nation, 
 and assigned a place in the old Hall of the House of Representatives, 
 already set aside by act of Congress for statues of eminent citizens ; and 
 that a copy of this resolution, signed by the President of the Senate and 
 the Speaker of the House of Representatives, be transmitted to the gov- 
 ernor of the State of Ohio. 
 
 The Senate, by unanimous consent, pro- 
 ceeded to consider the resolutions. 
 
5 
 
 Mr. Sherman. Mr. President, in seled- 
 ing from among the illustrious dead of the 
 State of Ohio the two most worthy to be 
 represented by marble statues in the old 
 hall of the House of Representatives, it 
 seemed to the General Assembly of that 
 State appropriate, first of all, to choose the 
 statesman, soldier, and President . whose 
 brilliant life and tragic death have made 
 his name "familiar as a household word," 
 not only in every part of our country, but 
 throughout the civilized world. His recent 
 presence among us, his conspicuous serv- 
 ices in the House of Representatives, the 
 impressive ceremonies in this Capitol which 
 within five brief years attended his inaugu- 
 ration as President of the United States, 
 his long and patient suffering under a 
 mortal wound by an assassin, the eloquent 
 words of his nearest friend, uttered in the 
 presence of nearly every member of this 
 body and within the Hall where both had 
 
gained their highest fame, make the duty 
 assigned me seem superfluous. Still it 
 may not be amiss to accompany the ac- 
 ceptance of the statue of James A. Gar- 
 field with a brief statement of the grounds 
 for the aff'edtion and respedt with which his 
 memory is held by the people of Ohio. 
 
 He was, in every sense, a self-made man, 
 blest, it is true, in springing from a line of 
 hardy and industrious farmers of Puritan 
 stock, who depended only upon themselves 
 and their God. Yet the early life of young 
 Garfield was a constant struggle with 
 poverty. By the death of his father when 
 an infant he, the youngest of four children, 
 was left under the care of his mother in 
 possession of a farm of thirty acres, mostly 
 covered by primeval forest, in a then new 
 and sparse settlement of Northern Ohio. 
 He had to suffer the discipline of hard daily 
 labor and enforced economy. In this re- 
 spect he was not different from the great 
 
7 
 
 majority of his neighbors, who, like him- 
 self, found the healthy and vigorous train- 
 ing by labor in early life the best prepara- 
 tion for the mental as well as the physical 
 tasks of later life. Even as a lad he never 
 forgot that it was his duty to learn as well 
 as to labor. There was in those days no 
 easy road to learning, but, availing himself 
 of the intelligent tuition of his mother and 
 occasional schools in his neighborhood, 
 and always imbued with the love of study, 
 he made rapid progress, and early in life 
 became a teacher as well as a student. 
 He was not satisfied with this, but, saving 
 his scanty pay for labor in the harvest-field 
 and in many varied manual employments, 
 he attended the seminary at Chester and 
 the college at Hiram, and finally at Will- 
 iams, Mass., where, in a broader field and 
 greater competition, he gained the honors 
 of his class. His education did not end 
 here, for he returned to the Hiram Insti- 
 
8 
 
 tute as professor of languages and soon 
 became its president. The result was that 
 before he entered upon his public life he 
 was a thoroughly educated man, not merely 
 in the lessons of the school and the col- 
 lege, not merely in literature and science, 
 but also, by extensive reading and study, 
 in all the historical and political questions 
 of the day, in the development of which 
 he was to take so adtive a part. All this 
 varied learning was ground into him and 
 fitted for use by his experience as a laborer, 
 a teacher, a preacher, a professor, and presi- 
 dent of a college. 
 
 When he entered public life in 1859, at 
 the age of twenty-eight, as a member of 
 the senate of Ohio, he was well equipped 
 for all the great duties that were to fall 
 upon him ; but, not content with this, while 
 serving as Senator he studied law and was 
 admitted to the bar. 
 
 At this period of his life came the great 
 
9 
 
 tragedy of the civil war. His heart and 
 soul and every fiber of his body was en- 
 listed in the Union cause. His speeches 
 at that time were models of the persuasive 
 eloquence that distinguished him in his 
 later years. He was chiefly instrumental 
 in raising and preparing for service a regi- 
 ment of Ohio infantry, of which he became 
 colonel. 
 
 In the two years he remained in the 
 military service he distinguished himself 
 and was promoted for gallant services in 
 battle to the rank of brigadier and then 
 major general. I do not regard his serv- 
 ice in the Army as anything more than an 
 honorable episode of his active life, for 
 others gained greater distinction and ren- 
 dered more important services, but he did 
 demonstrate his ability to lead and com- 
 mand men, to inspire the confidence of his 
 superior officers, and to show on several 
 important battle-fields his personal courage. 
 
lO 
 
 His military services were chiefly im- 
 portant in giving him information as to 
 the wants and organization of the Army 
 that became useful to him and to the 
 Union cause when applied in Congress in 
 framing laws for the increase and govern- 
 ment of the Army. 
 
 His enduring fame will chiefly rest upon 
 what he did during the period of eighteen 
 years as a member of the House of Rep- 
 resentatives. While he was in the field, 
 and without an effort or wish on his part, 
 he was ele(5led as a Representative in Con- 
 gress from a distridl in Northeastern Ohio 
 which had been represented for nearly half 
 a century by Elisha Whittlesey and Joshua 
 Giddings. It was as their successor that, 
 during nine consecutive Congresses, from 
 1863 to 1 88 1, he made that record which 
 is the great glory of his life. 
 
 What an infinite variety of subje(5ts, 
 what magnitude of detail and results, what 
 
II 
 
 immense sums and difficult problems were 
 adted upon by him, no one can tell who 
 has not examined his share of the record 
 of the proceedings of Congress. These 
 events are too fresh in the minds of those 
 who hear me, many of whom have also 
 been adlive in these busy scenes, to make 
 it necessary for me to measure and gauge 
 the value of his services, compared to that 
 of any one of his colleagues ; but I do not 
 now recall any from among his distin- 
 guished compeers who will not frankly 
 say that in variety of duty, in labor and 
 care and earnest effort in his speeches and 
 in adlion, no one of all can be said to have 
 been his superior. 
 
 Many of his speeches may be regarded 
 as models of effective eloquence. They 
 presented frankly the arguments on the 
 topic under debate, but always were en- 
 riched by apt metaphor, by illustrations 
 drawn from other topics, by poetical or 
 
12 
 
 classical quotations. Even his impromptu 
 speeches display the rich storehouse of 
 learning from which he drew his inspira- 
 tion. Courteous in manner, and rarely, 
 if ever, trenching on the rules of order, he 
 often expressed in a single sharp sentence 
 or phrase the whole argument that silenced 
 his opponent. He was always a ready 
 speaker; ready promptly to reply to an 
 argument of an adversary without waiting 
 to cull his phrases or arrange his order of 
 battle; ready, whatever was the subje6t- 
 matter of debate, whether finance, war, 
 reconstruction, or a graceful tribute to a 
 friend; ready, even at the spur of the mo- 
 ment, to resist and check the hasty judg- 
 ment of his friends or his constituents, or 
 all combined. 
 
 In principle he was in every sense a 
 patriot. No narrow limit confined his al- 
 legiance, but the whole country was the 
 objedl of his love. He did not favor any 
 
13 
 
 sedlion, but freely extended the bounties 
 of Government to every part. He was a 
 lover of liberty, of freedom in its broadest 
 sense, not only of the person, but of 
 thought and of speech. Though a mem- 
 ber of the Disciple Church, he was cath- 
 olic in his charity for all Christian denomi- 
 nations. He was a stridl guardian of the 
 public faith, pledged either to a citizen, a 
 soldier, or a creditor. When that faith 
 seemed to be impaired by the long sus- 
 pension of specie payments, he was as ear- 
 nest as any in demanding the fulfillment 
 of a national duty, and rejoiced as much 
 as any in resumption. A striking exam- 
 ple himself of the benefits of education, he 
 favored every measure to extend and en- 
 large the scope of both State and national 
 aid to education. He was a Republican, 
 not in the narrow sense of personal ad- 
 vantage, but because he believed that 
 party could best advance the honor and 
 
14 
 
 prosperity of our whole country, and of 
 every part of it. 
 
 During his last term in Congress he was 
 elected by the General Assembly of Ohio 
 as a member of this body. No one can 
 doubt that had he entered upon this serv- 
 ice he would have greatly added to his 
 reputation as an orator and a statesman, 
 already established by eighteen years' ex- 
 perience in the House. This was his 
 cherished hope and ambition, frankly ex- 
 pressed to his personal friends, justified 
 by his physical and mental condition and 
 training, in the prime of manhood, his 
 early and later struggles behind him as 
 obstacles safely overcome, with hope and 
 health and strength all pointing in the 
 future to a long life of honor and useful- 
 ness. 
 
 Within a few months after the eledlion 
 of General Garfield as Senator, and be- 
 fore the commencement of his term, the 
 
15 
 
 Republican national convention of 1880 
 met to seledl a candidate for President 
 of the United States. Divided and dis- 
 tradted in its choice, it turned to him as its 
 standard-bearer, and he was ele(5led Presi- 
 dent by the unquestioned majority of the 
 eledloral college and of the people. He 
 entered upon the discharge of the great 
 duties of this office. He met and over- 
 came the first waves of contention and 
 disappointment which are inevitable at the 
 beginning of any administration, and hope- 
 ful and confident, at the moment when his 
 life was most full of promise, when he was 
 starting to visit his alma fnater and to en- 
 courage by his example and great success 
 the youth of that college, he was mortally 
 wounded. Here ended his hopes and his 
 life, for, though he lingered months and 
 days, it was with torture infinite. 
 
 The people of Ohio, among whom he 
 was born and bred, placed his image in 
 
i6 
 
 enduring marble in the silent senate of the 
 dead, among the worthies of every period 
 of American history, not claiming for him 
 to have been the greatest of all, but only 
 as one of their fellow-citizens, whom, when 
 living, they greatly loved and trusted, 
 whose life was spent in the service of his 
 whole country at the period of its greatest 
 peril, and who, in the highest places of 
 trust and power, did his full duty as a sol- 
 dier, a patriot, and a statesman. 
 
 I move the adoption of the resolutions. 
 
 The Presiding Officer. The ques- 
 tion is on agreeing to the concurrent reso- 
 lutions submitted by the Senator from 
 Ohio. 
 
 The resolutions were agreed to nem, 
 con. 
 
PROCEEDINGS IN THE HOUSE. 
 
 In House of Representatives, 
 
 yanuary ig, 1886. 
 
 Mr. Ezra B. Taylor. Mr. Speaker, I 
 SLsk unanimous consent to call up the 
 Senate concurrent resolutions relating to 
 the statue of the late President James A. 
 Garfield, for immediate consideration. 
 
 The Speaker. The resolutions referred 
 
 to by the gentleman from Ohio were laid 
 
 before the House on the 6th of the present 
 
 month by the Chair, and by unanimous 
 
 consent were laid on the table for the 
 
 present, with the understanding that they 
 
 would be called up at a future day for 
 
 consideration. If there be no objedtion, 
 
 they will now be taken up. 
 
 There was no objection. 
 
 S. Mis. 104 2 17 
 
i8 
 
 Mr. Ezra B. Taylor. Mr. Speaker, I 
 ask that the resolutions be read, as also 
 the letter from the governor of the State 
 of Ohio. 
 
 The Speaker. The resolutions will be 
 read. 
 
 The Clerk read as follows : 
 
 In the Senate of the United States, 
 
 January ^, 1886. 
 
 Resolved by the Senate {the House of Representatives concurring), That 
 the thanks of Congress be presented to the governor, and through him to 
 the people, of Ohio, for the statue of James A. Garfield, whose name 
 is so honorably identified with the history of that State and of the United 
 States. 
 
 Resolved, That this work of art is accepted in the name of the nation, 
 and assigned a place in the old Hall of the House of Representatives, 
 already set aside by act of Congress for statues of eminent citizens; and 
 that a copy of this resolution, signed by the President of the Senate and 
 the Speaker of the House of Representatives, be transmitted to the gov- 
 ernor of the State of Ohio. 
 
 Mr. Ezra B. Taylor. I ask that the 
 letter of the governor be also read. 
 The Clerk read as follows : 
 
 State of Ohio, Executive Department, 
 Office of Governor, 
 
 Columbus, December 10, i88s- 
 Sir: I have the honor to inform you that, in acceptance of the invi- 
 tation contained in section 1814 of the Revised Statutes of the United 
 
19 
 
 States, the State of Ohio, in pursuance of an act of its General Assembly, 
 has caused to be made by the sculptor, Carl H. Niehaus, and placed in 
 the old Hall of the House of Representatives, in the Capitol of the 
 United States, in the custody of the Architect of the Capitol, u marble 
 statue of that illustrious and lamented citizen of Ohio, James A. Gar- 
 field, late President of the United States. 
 
 This work is now presented to the Congress of the United States as 
 one of the statues contributed by the State of Ohio in pursuance of this 
 invitation. It is hoped that it may be found worthy of acceptance and 
 approval as a fit contribution from this State to the United States, in 
 whose service President Garfield passed so much of his life, and whose 
 chief executive officer he was at the time of his death. 
 Very respectfully, 
 
 GEO. HOADLY, 
 
 Governor of Ohio. 
 
 Hon. John G. Carlisle, 
 
 Speaker of the House of Representatives. 
 
 Mr. Ezra B. Taylor. Mr. Speaker, as 
 others will speak upon this resolution, my 
 words will be few. 
 
 James A. Garfield was born of a 
 sturdy, self-reliant parentage. With "a 
 sound mind in a sound body," he com- 
 menced life under favorable auspices; so 
 poor as to be mainly self-dependent, but 
 untouched by distressing poverty — a con- 
 dition favorable to development and suc- 
 cess under the influence of free institu- 
 
20 
 
 tions; one not waited upon by indolence 
 or pleasure, but where hope abides. From 
 the time he first attracted attention Gar- 
 field's course was onward and upward, 
 his motto and his life " Excelsior." Labor 
 and genius placed him in and fitted him 
 for every position he ever occupied. In- 
 deed, work was his ladder, and by it he 
 reached the highest eminence. As stu- 
 dent, soldier, statesman, it was the sign by 
 which he conquered, and by it he achieved 
 all his successes, various and great as they 
 were. He was never a laggard, but, ever 
 striving to learn, he was always learning. 
 His eyes were always open, and he saw 
 the wayside flower as well as the distant 
 mountain. 
 
 In his public life he was devoted to 
 principle, resolute in the discharge of duty, 
 diligent, informed, able, and eloquent to 
 the point where he had few equals. Con- 
 ciliating to opponents, refined in speech, 
 
21 
 
 courteous in manner, with a bounteous 
 fund of loving kindness, he had the re- 
 spedl of friend and foe. 
 
 He loved his State as a son his mother, 
 and the country with undying devotion. 
 
 This occasion does not permit me to 
 dwell upon the purity or greatness of his 
 charad;er, or to speak in detail of his serv- 
 ices, known of all men; but those who 
 knew him well, and their name is legion 
 (for none was so easily known, few so dif- 
 ficult to forget), turn to his private life with 
 joy and pride. There he was seen at his 
 best. The domestic side of that life I do 
 not here touch. It. was simply so perfect 
 that concerning it language fails to convey 
 ideas. 
 
 That life is the enduring pride of his 
 people; in it he raised up such friends as 
 few can boast; they came in troops, and 
 battalions, and never in his life or since 
 have they broken their allegiance. Even 
 
22 
 
 now they mourn him with a grief that 
 finds no comfort. 
 
 The people of Ohio appreciated him 
 from the first, and they stood about him 
 Hke a wall of defense ; and now, prompted 
 by gratitude, admiration, and love, they 
 have, through their Legislature and au- 
 thorities, caused to be made a marble 
 statue, representing as well as marble may 
 the well-loved son of that State, the. citi- 
 zen, soldier, statesman, President Gar- 
 field; have placed it in the Hall of the 
 old House of Representatives, and ask 
 Congress in behalf of the American people 
 to accept it as theirs, and to allow it to 
 remain till it also turns to dust. 
 
 The statue now stands so near the way 
 through which Mr. Garfield, as member 
 of this House for almost eighteen years, 
 daily passed to reach this Hall that one 
 standing there may almost touch it with 
 his hand as it seems to gaze toward the 
 
23 
 
 Senate, which he had a commission to 
 enter, but did not, because the nation said 
 to him, "Go up higher." 
 
 He stands among the fathers of the Re- 
 pubHc, by the side of their great succes- 
 sors, and in the presence of some of his 
 contemporary patriots. The martyr Pres- 
 ident is not far away. 
 
 In this exalted company President Gar- 
 field is not out of place. He came last 
 into it, but he there greets only his peers. 
 Plis compatriots who are "standing in that 
 silent senate of the dead," if in life, would 
 recognize the fitness of the association — 
 none more readily than his old friend, the 
 matchless orator of Gettysburg, the libera- 
 tor President, the immortal Lincoln. 
 
 Accept, then, Ohio's gift, "the image in 
 enduring marble" of one she loved so 
 well, tendered as it is with her patriotic 
 aspirations for the prosperity, the happi- 
 ness, and the continuance of the great 
 
24 
 
 American Union, "one and inseparable, 
 now and forever." 
 
 I now yield so much time as he may- 
 desire to my colleague, Mr. McKinley. 
 
 Mr. McKinley. Mr. Speaker, comply- 
 ing with an act of Congress passed July, 
 1864, inviting each of the States of the 
 Union to present to National Statuary 
 Hall the statues of two of its deceased 
 citizens "illustrious for their heroic re- 
 nown, or distinguished by civic or military 
 services " worthy of national commemora- 
 tion, Ohio brings her first contribution in 
 the marble statue of James Abram Gar- 
 field. There were other citizens of Ohio 
 earlier associated with the history and 
 progress of the State and illustrious in the 
 nation's annals who might have been fitly 
 chosen for this exalted honor. Governors, 
 United States Senatoi^s, members of the 
 supreme judiciary of the nation, closely 
 
25 
 
 identified witfi the growth and greatness 
 of the State, who fill a large space in their 
 country's history; soldiers of high achieve- 
 ment in the earlier and later wars of the 
 Republic; cabinet ministers, trusted asso- 
 ciates of the martyred Lincoln, who had 
 developed matchless qualities and accom- 
 plished masterly results in the nation's 
 supreme crisis ; but from the roll of Tllus- 
 trious names the unanimous voice of Ohio 
 called the youngest and latest of her his- 
 toric dead, the scholar, the- soldier, the 
 national Representative, the United States 
 Senator-eledl, the President of the people, 
 the upright citizen, and the designation is 
 everywhere received with approval and 
 acclaim. 
 
 By the acflion of the authorities of the 
 State he loved so well and served so long, 
 and now, by the adtion of the National 
 Congress in which he was so long a con- 
 spicuous figure, he keeps company to-day 
 
26 
 
 with " the immortal circle " in the old Hall 
 of Representatives, which he was wont to 
 call the "Third House," where his strong 
 features and majestic form, represented in 
 marble, will attradl the homage of the 
 present and succeeding generations, as in 
 life his great character and commanding 
 qualities earned the admiration of the citi- 
 zens of his own State and the nation at 
 large, while the lessons of his life and the 
 teachings of his broad mind will be cher- 
 ished and remembered when marble and 
 statues have crumbled to decay. 
 
 General Garfield was born on the 19th 
 day of November, 1831, in the village of 
 Orange, in Northern Ohio, and died at 
 Elberon, in the State of New Jersey, on 
 the 19th day of September, 1881. His 
 boyhood and youth differed little from 
 others of his own time. His parents were 
 not opulent. He worked from an early 
 age, like most boys of that period. He 
 
27 
 
 was neither ashamed nor afraid of manual 
 labor, and engaged in it resolutely for the 
 means to maintain and educate himself 
 He entered Williams College, in the State 
 of Massachusetts, in 1854, and graduated 
 with honor two years later, when he as- 
 sumed charge of Hiram College, in his 
 own State. 
 
 In 1859 he was eledled to the Senate of 
 Ohio, being its youngest member. Strong 
 men were his associates in that body, and 
 have since held high stations in the public 
 service. Some of them were his col- 
 leagues here. In tliis, his first political 
 office, he displayed a high order of ability, 
 and developed some of the great qualities 
 which afterward distinguished his illus- 
 trious career. 
 
 In August, 1861, he entered the Union 
 Army, and in September following was 
 commissioned colonel of the Forty-second 
 Ohio Infantry Volunteers. He was pro- 
 
28 
 
 moted successively brigadier and major 
 general of the United States Volunteers, 
 and while yet in the Army was eledled to 
 Congress, remaining in the field more 
 than a year after his eledlion, and resign- 
 ing only in time to take his seat in the 
 House December 7, 1863. His military 
 service secured him his first national 
 prominence. He showed himself compe- 
 tent to command in the field, although 
 without previous training. He could plan 
 battles and fight them successfully. As 
 an officer he was exceptionally popular, 
 beloved by his men, many of whom were 
 his former students, respected and hon- 
 ored by his superiors in rank, and his 
 martial qualities and gallant behavior were 
 more than once commended in general 
 orders and rewarded by the Government 
 with well-merited promotion. 
 
 He was brave and sagacious. He filled 
 every post with intelligence and fidelity, 
 
29 
 
 and diredted the movement of troops with 
 judgment and skill. Distinguished as was 
 his military career, which in itself would 
 have given him a proud place in history, 
 his most enduring fame, his highest re- 
 nown, was earned in this House as a rep- 
 resentative of the people. Here his mar- 
 velous qualities were brought into full ac- 
 tivity, here he grew with gradual but ever- 
 increasing strength, here he won his richest 
 laurels, here was the scene and center of 
 his greatest glory. Here he was leader 
 and master, not by combination or schem- 
 ing, not by chicane or caucus, but by the 
 force of his cultivated mind, his keen and 
 far-seeing judgment, his unanswerable 
 logic, his strength and power of speech, 
 his thorough comprehension of the sub- 
 jedls of legislation. Always strong, he 
 was strongest on his feet, addressing the 
 House, or, from the rostrum, the assem- 
 bled people. Who of us having heard 
 
30 
 
 him here or elsewhere, speaking upon a 
 question of great national concern, can 
 forget the might and majesty, the force 
 and diredlness, the grace and beauty of 
 his utterances. He was always just to his 
 adversary, an open and manly opponent, 
 and free from invedtive. He convinced 
 the judgment with his searching logic, 
 while he swayed his listeners with brilliant 
 periods and glowing eloquence. He was 
 always an educator of the people. His 
 thoughts were fresh, vigorous, and in- 
 strudlive. 
 
 In running over his public service here, 
 covering a period of nearly eighteen years, 
 crowding page after page of the Congres- 
 sional Record, I have sought to settle in 
 my own mind the question or questions in 
 which he was greatest, and with which his 
 name will be best remembered. I confess 
 it is no easy task. He was not a specialist 
 in statesmanship. The subjedls which he 
 
31 
 
 debated covered all the leading issues of 
 the parties and the political policies of his 
 time. He limited himself to no one topic 
 and was confined to no single range of 
 national legislation. His thoroughness 
 upon every question he touched was 
 marked and habitual. The Congressional 
 debates show him prominent in discussion 
 of the military affairs of the Government 
 in time of war, when mighty armies were 
 to be mustered and the means provided 
 for their maintenance; the emancipation 
 of the slave, and the problem of his future ; 
 reconstrudtion of the seceding States; the 
 amendments to the Constitution giving 
 suffrage to the newly enfranchised race; 
 the tariff; refunding of the national debt; 
 general education ; the resumption of 
 specie payment; silver coinage; the civil 
 service; the independence of the several 
 branches of the Federal Government. 
 He brought to this wide range of sub- 
 
32 
 
 jedls vast learning and comprehensive 
 judgment. He enlightened and strength- 
 ened every cause he advocated. Great in 
 dealing with them all, dull and common- 
 place in none, but to me he was the 
 strongest, broadest, and bravest when he 
 spoke for honest money, the fulfillment 
 of the nation's promises, the resumption 
 of specie payments, and the maintenance 
 of the public faith. He contributed his 
 share, in full measure, to secure national 
 honesty and preserve inviolate our na- 
 tional honor. None did more, few, if any, 
 so much, to bring the Government back to 
 a sound, stable, and constitutional money. 
 He was a very giant in those memorable 
 struggles, and it required upon his part 
 the exercise of the highest courage. A 
 considerable element of his party was 
 against him, notably in his own State and 
 some parts of his Congressional distridl. 
 The mad passion of inflation and irre- 
 
33 
 
 deemable currency was sweeping through 
 the West, with the greatest fury in his 
 own State. He was assailed for his con- 
 vidlions, and was threatened with defeat. 
 He was the special target for the hate and 
 prejudice of those Avho stood against the 
 honest fulfillment of national obligations. 
 In a letter to a friend on New Year's eve, 
 1867-68, he wrote: 
 
 I have just returned from a tedious trip to Ashtabula, where 1 made a 
 two-hour speech upon finance, and when I came home, came through a 
 storm of paper-money denunciation in Cleveland, only to find on my 
 arrival here a sixteen-page letter, full of alarm and prophecy of my 
 political ruin for my opinions on the^ currency. 
 
 To the same friend he wrote in 1878: 
 
 On the whole it is probable I will stand again for the House. I am 
 not sure, however, but the nineteenth district will go back upon me 
 upon the silver question.' If they do, I shall count it an honorable dis- 
 charge. 
 
 These and more of the same tenor, 
 which I might produce from his corre- 
 spondence, show the extreme peril attend- 
 ing his position upon the currency and 
 
 silver questions, but he never flinched, he 
 S. Mis. 104 — 3 
 
34 
 
 never wavered; he faced all the dangers, 
 assumed all the risks, voting and speaking 
 for what he believed would secure the 
 highest good. He stood at the forefront, 
 with the waves of an adverse popular sen- 
 timent beating against him, threatening 
 his political ruin, fearlessly contending for 
 sound principles of finance against public 
 clamor and a tiihe-serving policy. To me 
 his greatest effort was made on this floor 
 in the Forty-fifth Congress, from his old 
 seat yonder near the center aisle. He was 
 at his best. He rose to the highest re- 
 quirements of the subjedt and the occa- 
 sion. His mind and soul were absorbed 
 with his topic. He felt the full responsi- 
 bility of his position and the necessity 
 of averting a policy (the abandonment 
 of specie resumption) which he believed 
 would be disastrous to the highest inter- 
 ests of the country. Unfriendly criticism 
 seemed only to give him breadth of con- 
 
35 
 
 templation and boldness and force of ut- 
 terance. 
 
 Those of us who were so fortunate as 
 to hear him can not efface the recollec- 
 tion of his matchless effort. Both sides of 
 this Chamber were eager listeners, and 
 crowded galleries bent to catch every 
 word, and all were sensibly moved by his 
 forceful logic and impassioned eloquence. 
 He at onge stepped to the front without 
 rival or contestant, secure in the place he 
 had fairly earned. The press and the 
 people received the address with warm 
 approval, and his rank before the country 
 was fixed as a strong, faithful, and fearless 
 leader. No one thing he had ever done 
 contributed so much to his subsequent ele- 
 vation; no act of his life required higher 
 courage; none displayed greater power; 
 none realized to him larger honors; none 
 brought him higher praise. 
 
 Something of his real character and 
 
36 
 
 high aims as a legislator and public serv- 
 ant is disclosed in his private correspond- 
 ence, from which I quote a single sen- 
 tence: 
 
 You know that I have always said that my whole public life was an 
 experiment to determine whether an intelligent people would sustain a 
 man in acting sensibly on each proposition that arose, and in doing 
 nothing for mere show or demagogical effect. I do not now remember 
 that I ever cast a vote of that latter sort. 
 
 His experiment, although a perilous one 
 and fraught with extreme danger, was yet 
 successful, and that it was so is a high 
 tribute not to him alone but to the justice 
 and intelligence of the old Western Re- 
 serve distrid; and the whole American 
 people. He was sustained, triumphantly 
 sustained, over and over again by his im- 
 mediate constituency. His State sus- 
 tained him and at last a nation of fifty 
 millions of people rewarded his courage 
 and consistency with the highest honors 
 it could bestow. 
 
 Although eledted. General Garfield 
 
37 
 
 never took his seat in the Senate of the 
 United States. His legislative career 
 ended here, where it had practically begun 
 eighteen years before. His nomination 
 for the Presidency occurred soon after the 
 Legislature of Ohio had chosen him Sena- 
 tor, and came to him, as did all of his 
 honors, because deserved. Although un- 
 sought, no mere chance brought him this 
 rare distind;ion. His solid reputation ren- 
 dered it not improbable at any time. He 
 had the qualities which attached his great 
 party to him and the equipment which 
 filled the fullest measure of public and 
 party requirement. From the stirring 
 scenes at Chicago to the succeeding elec- 
 tion he bore himself like a statesman and 
 patriot fit for the highest trust. He ad- 
 vanced in public confidence, and whenever 
 he met with or addressed the people he 
 enlarged the circle of his admiring fol- 
 lowers and friends. His brief term in 
 
38 
 
 the Presidency, so tragically ended, gave 
 promise of large usefulness to the country 
 in the realization of the true American 
 policy at home and abroad. His death 
 filled the nation with profound and uni- 
 versal sorrow, and all lands and all peo- 
 ples sympathized in our overshadowing 
 bereavement. 
 
 In General Garfield, as in Lincoln and 
 Grant, we find the best representation of 
 the possibilities of American life. Boy 
 and man, he typifies American youth and 
 manhood, and illustrates the beneficence 
 and glory of our free institutions. His 
 early struggles for an education, his self- 
 support, his "lack of means," his youthful 
 yearnings, find a prototype in every vil- 
 lage, city, and hamlet of the. land. They 
 did not retard his progress, but spurred 
 him on to higher and nobler endeavor. 
 His push and perseverance, his dired; and 
 un deviating life purpose, his sturdy integ- 
 
39 
 
 rity, his Christian charadler, were rewarded 
 with large results and exceptional honors ; 
 honors not attainable anywhere else, and 
 only to be acquired under the generous 
 and helpful influences of a free govern- 
 ment. 
 
 He was twenty- three years of age when 
 he confronted the more pra(5lical duties 
 and the wider problems of life. All before 
 had been training and preparation, the 
 best of both, and his marvelous career 
 ended before he was fifty. Few have 
 crowded such great results and acquired 
 such lasting fame in so short a life. Few 
 have done so much for country and for 
 civilization as he whom we honor to-day, 
 stricken down as he was when scarce at 
 the meridian of his powers. He did not 
 flash forth as a meteor; he rose with meas- 
 ured and stately step over rough paths 
 and through years of rugged work. He 
 earned his passage to every preferment. 
 
40 
 
 He was tried and tested at every step in 
 his pathway of progress. He produced 
 his passport at every gateway to oppor- 
 tunity and glory. 
 
 His broad and benevolent nature made 
 him the friend of all mankind. He loved 
 the young men of the country and drew 
 them to him by the thoughtful concern 
 with which he regarded them. He was 
 generous in his helpfulness to all, and to 
 his encouragement and words of cheer 
 many are indebted for much of their suc- 
 cess in life. In personal charad;er he 
 was clean and without reproach. As a 
 citizen, he loved his country and her insti- 
 tutions, and was proud of her progress 
 and prosperity. As a scholar and a man 
 of letters, he took high rank. As an ora- 
 tor, he was exceptionally strong and gifted. 
 As a soldier, he stood abreast with the 
 bravest and best of the citizen soldiery of 
 the Republic. As a legislator, his most 
 
41 
 
 enduring testimonial will be found in the 
 records of Congress and the statutes of 
 his country. As President, he displayed 
 moderation and wisdom, with executive 
 ability, which gave the highest assurances 
 of a most honored and successful adminis- 
 tration. 
 
 On the 19th day of December, 1876, 
 the State of Massachusetts presented the 
 statues of John Winthrop and Samuel 
 Adams as her offerings to Memorial Hall. 
 On that interesting occasion General Gar- 
 field said: 
 
 As from time to time our venerable and beautiful hall has been peo- 
 pled with the statues of the elect of the States, it has seemed to me that 
 ■L third House was being organized within the walls of the Capitol, u 
 H ouse whose members have received their high credentials at the hands 
 of history and whose term of office will outlast the ages. Year by year 
 we see the elect of their country in eloquent silence taking their places 
 in the American Pantheon, bringing within its sacred circle the wealth 
 of those immortal memories which made their lives illustrious. And 
 year by year that august assembly is teaching a deeper and grander 
 lesson to all who serve their brief hour in these more ephemeral Houses 
 of Congress. And now two places of great honor have just been most 
 nobly filled. 
 
 Mr. Speaker, another place of great honor 
 
42 
 
 we fill to-day. Nobly and worthily is it 
 filled. Garfield, whose eloquent words 
 I have just pronounced, has joined Win- 
 throp and Adams and the other illustrious 
 ones, as one of "the eled; of the States," 
 peopling yonder venerable and beautiful 
 hall. He receives his high credentials 
 from the hands of the State which has 
 withheld from him none of her honors, 
 and history will ratify the choice. We 
 add another to the immortal membership. 
 Another enters "the sacred circle." In 
 silent eloquence from the "American Pan- 
 theon" another speaks, whose life-work, 
 with its treasures of wisdom, its wealth of 
 achievement, its great work wrought, and 
 its priceless memories, will remain to u:-^ 
 and our descendants a legacy, forever and 
 forever. 
 
 Mr. Ezra B. Taylor. I now yield to 
 my colleague, Judge Geddes. 
 
43 
 
 Mr. Geddes. Mr. Speaker, it was in 
 1864 that Congress invited each State oi 
 the Union to eredl statues in the Old 
 Hall of the House of Representatives 
 of two of its most eminent citizens. 
 In pursuance of this, many of the 
 States have accepted the privilege, and 
 now, by the action of the General As- 
 sembly of Ohio, a marble statue of 
 James A. Garfield has been presented 
 to Congress as the first contribution 
 by that State. This selection will, I am 
 certain, meet with universal, heartfelt ap- 
 proval. 
 
 In the few moments allowed me in ac- 
 cepting this token of the sentiment of my 
 State it is not my purpose to give a bio- 
 graphical sketch or even to outline the 
 life-work of him whose memory so richly 
 deserves this recognition. 
 
 As a work of art I find it highly com- 
 mended, and most forcibly by that close 
 
44 
 
 observer and well-known writer, "Gath," 
 .as follows: 
 
 I had not seen the new statue of Garfield, sent by the State of Ohio 
 to the Hall of Representatives, until to-day. I thought it was one of the 
 best statues that has been presented to the Capitol. ' I could realize the 
 man with whom I have often walked and tallied in life as well as white 
 marble can embody man. There are no accessories of this statue which 
 take the eye away from the head and face and expression. He has 
 at his left hand a little bracket, on which is the paper of his notes or 
 manuscript, and, holding this, he speaks, and all who want to see him as 
 he lived in life, hearty and high and broad, can look at him there as he 
 was until the assassin, with the spitefulness of a backbiter, fired into the 
 citadel of his life. 
 
 Although we often met, my political 
 views contributed in part to deprive me of 
 the privilege and honor of a more intimate 
 personal acquaintance with him, but could 
 not and did not prevent an appreciation of 
 his virtues and admiration of his typical 
 American charadler. 
 
 My first substantial knowledge of him 
 was when he was engaged in raising vol- 
 unteers for the regiment which he subse- 
 quently commanded as colonel. Many of 
 the men were raised from the families and 
 
45 
 
 firesides of those with whom I was well 
 acquainted. 
 
 On an occasion of a reunion of that 
 regiment held at Ashland, Ohio, in 1880, 
 we met. He was before the people at that 
 time as the Republican candidate for the 
 Presidency, and I was invited to speak 
 from the same stand, although I was then 
 the Democratic candidate for Congress. 
 The occasion was intended to be non- 
 partisan. An incident occurred at that 
 time that might lead a superstitious per- 
 son to regard as a premonition of the sad 
 and tragic death he subsequently suffered. 
 During the time he was speaking the plat- 
 form on which he stood fell several feet to 
 the ground, but, unmoved by the accident, 
 he continued his address to the multitude 
 assembled to hear him. 
 
 I now distinctly recall the heartfelt ear- 
 nestness with which I congratulated the 
 people on the honor conferred upon us all 
 
46 
 
 by the presence of our illustrious citizen 
 who had addressed 4hem, and then con- 
 gratulated him on the honor paid him by 
 the presence of so many thousands of our 
 people. 
 
 Early in my Congressional experience I 
 was deeply impressed with the wonderful 
 intellectual storehouse he had at his com- 
 mand for every emergency. Let me give 
 you an illustration: 
 
 On the 13th of January, 1815, Congress 
 bought 6,700 volumes of Thomas Jeffer- 
 son's library, a well-preserved colledlion of 
 books, constituting the basis of the present 
 Government Library, and will be found to 
 be among the richest intelledlual treasures 
 of the world. This colled:ion of books, so 
 indispensable to every American states- 
 man, I found was familiar to him. 
 
 I had the honor to present to this 
 House from the Library Committee a 
 proposition in the interest of our national 
 
• 47 
 
 Library, which I urged in a lew words in 
 my humble way, and, meeting with oppo- 
 sition that alarmed me, our lamented late 
 President unexped;edly came to my rescue 
 in words so pertinent, as matter of argu- 
 ment and so precious as his personal sen- 
 timents, that I now quote them from the 
 Congressional Record of May 9, 1879. 
 He said: 
 
 We are here under circumstances where, without the slightest regard 
 for party, we ought all to vie with each other in being proud of that great 
 Library and doing anything in the world that is reasonable to maintain it 
 and render it more effective. 
 
 Let us remember that the foundation of that Library was laid in the small 
 library of Thomas Jefferson, and the spirit of scholarhip and thoroughness 
 that he showed in the care of his own books, which are still preserved in 
 the Library as a monument of his learning and wisdom, seems to have been 
 secured in the management of the Congressional Library itself. Perhaps 
 gentlemen may not know that every one of the large body of books obtained 
 from Thomas Jefferson, to form the foundation of this Library, has his own 
 mark at some distinct page away over in the book indicating his ownership. 
 
 I recollect to have seen a little thing which is worthy of mention here. 
 In one of these books, when it came here, there happened to be left a 
 little piece of paper not more than five inches square, in Mr. Jefferson's 
 handwriting. He had kept during the eight years of his presidency this 
 curious memorandum. He had drawn it off in the form of a table, with 
 the year at the head, a column for each year, and the date of appear- 
 ance of vegetables in the Washington market — in 1801, on such a date, 
 asparagus, and so on through, showing that in the midst of great affairs, 
 when President of the United States, he took care of little things. These 
 little observations marked him as a philosopher. 
 
48 - 
 
 Mr. Speaker, this gift from the State of 
 Ohio is to be deposited in the old Cham- 
 ber occupied by the members of the lower 
 House of Congress prior to the i6th of 
 December, 1857, ^^t now dedicated as a 
 depository of the statues of American citi- 
 zens most distinguished in civil or mili- 
 tary life. 
 
 riow appropriate the place. As the 
 citizens from all portions of our beloved 
 country enter this Capitol building they 
 find, it in keeping with the genius and 
 spirit of our form of government. They 
 find its chief beauty and most imposing- 
 qualities consisting in its exhibition of 
 strength, plainness, and durability. It at 
 once demands and receives the closest 
 attention and earnest admiration of every 
 lover of our Republican simplicity. 
 
 As you pass from either branch of Con- 
 gress to the other this room is on the line, 
 and in passing through it you never fail 
 
49 
 
 to observe the large number of visitors 
 charmed by the scene. Not only the 
 statues that attrad;, charm, and force the 
 admiration of all who pause and think, 
 but the memories that cluster around 
 every objedl and bring fresh to mind the 
 memorable scenes in the history of that 
 hall all unite to constrain you to, feel that 
 you are in the presence of objects ren- 
 dered sacred by their history. These ob- 
 jedts — statues of our great and good men 
 from the colonial period down to the pres- 
 ent — will, I trust, unite to prove that — • 
 
 No sound is breathed so potent to coerce 
 And to conciliate as their names wlio dare 
 For that sweet mother-land which ^ave them birth 
 Nobly to do, nobly to die. Their names, 
 Graven on memorial columns, are a song 
 Heard in the future ; few, but more than wall 
 And rampart, their examples reach a hand 
 Far thro' all years, and everywhere they meet 
 And kindle generous purpose, and the strength 
 To mold it into action pure as theirs. 
 
 But these statues are not to all the most 
 impressive and inspiriting associations to 
 
 S. Mis. 104 4 
 
50 
 
 be found in this old hall. The heart 
 and mind are soon filled with thoughts of 
 the glowing, thrilling eloquence, undying 
 patriotism, and stern, immovable integrity 
 that charadlerized the lives of many con- 
 nedled with that old hall whose statues 
 are not here. They too have enduring 
 monuments. Their life-work forms the 
 grandest, most magnificent, and enduring 
 of all monuments. Such lives speak in 
 trumpet tones to all nations, for all na- 
 tions, and for all time to come. "Though 
 dead they yet speak." 
 
 And is he dead whose glorious mind 
 
 Lifts thine on high? 
 To live in hearts we leave behind 
 
 Is not to die. 
 
 Although the gift and reception of this 
 statue of our noble dead, the lamented 
 late President, is the performance of a 
 holy work of love, a patriotic and sacred 
 duty, yet we should be led to look beyond 
 the work of art and take fresh inspiration 
 
51 
 
 from the heroic deeds performed in civil 
 or military life. 
 
 The highest, noblest, and best quality 
 in a nation is gratitude, without which it 
 would soon fall an easy prey to either 
 violence or corruption. Our nation has 
 always manifested in the most conspicu- 
 ous ways its unstinted gratitude to the 
 men who founded the Government, who 
 conceived and formulated the great prin- 
 ciples upon which our institutions rest, or 
 who have done most in civil or military 
 life to maintain and preserve them. 
 
 No nation can forget or negledt its 
 benefactors and illustrious public servants 
 and be itself worthy of admiration. It 
 must itself liberally shower just rewards 
 on all who serve with fidelity its truest 
 and highest interests in war or peace. 
 
 In accepting and enjoying the priceless 
 and glorious results which the distin- 
 guished dead of our country achieved on 
 
52 
 
 land and sea, we must accord to their 
 niemories the most hearty and generous 
 recognition. 
 
 One favorite form of expression of the 
 patriotic gratitude of this generation is to 
 ere(5t monuments. Constitutional liberty, 
 vindicated by the pen or sword on the 
 judicial bench or battlefield, or in the halls 
 of legislation, we find honored in monu- 
 ments and statuary in all parts of the 
 nation's capital. 
 
 These exhibitions of -our appreciation of 
 the heroic virtues, glorious deeds, incor- 
 ruptible purity, exalted patriotism, and 
 self-sacrificing devotion to duty will se- 
 cure to the present and coming genera- 
 tions the same qualities to guide, mold, 
 and govern the destiny of this mighty 
 Republic. 
 
 Herein lies our greatest security against 
 every form of danger. The ancient Ro- 
 man gloried in the security afforded him 
 
53 
 
 by the declaration: "I am a Roman citi- 
 zen." It secured him personal safety 
 throughout the known world. But it was 
 an insecure privilege. Fear of physical 
 power — mere brutal force — was his only 
 guarantee of safety. 
 
 Not so with an American. To be able 
 to say "I am an American citizen" com- 
 mands the respedt and love of all classes 
 throughout the civilized world. It is 
 therefore a great privilege to -belong to a 
 country that can present to the world so 
 many striking and illustrious examples of 
 the ennobling and elevating power of free 
 institutions. 
 
 Mr. Ezra B. Taylor. I now yield to 
 my colleague, Mr. Butterworth. 
 
 Mr. Butterworth. Ohio has placed in 
 this Capitol a statue of James A. Gar- 
 field. It is a gift by the people of that 
 
54 
 
 State to the nation. A resolution accept- 
 ing the gift has passed the Senate and 
 now waits the action of this House. Be- 
 fore the final vote is taken I desire to 
 speak for a few moments of the dead after 
 whose living likeness the marble statue is 
 fashioned. 
 
 It seems but yesterday that Garfield 
 stood in our midst, a leader of his party 
 and a teacher of the people. He was 
 a leader on this floor — not by virtue of 
 those qualities that made Clay and Ste- 
 vens great and successful parliamentary 
 leaders. They sought the right as Gar- 
 field did, but their imperious wills 
 brooked no opposition and tolerated no 
 hesitation in the ranks of the column at 
 the head of which they marched. They 
 led, if might be, and forced, if necessary, 
 the column forward as the exigency of the 
 hour demanded or seemed to them to de- 
 mand. 
 
55 
 
 In this Garfield differed from those 
 two great leaders. In forensic eloquence 
 he was the equal of Clay and superior to 
 Stevens. He was more than the peer of 
 either in ripe scholarship, was a more pro- 
 found thinker, and had a wider range of 
 experience in the midst of those great 
 events which test the metal of statesmen 
 and soldiers and try the strength of gov- 
 ernmental institutions and shape the 
 course and fix the destiny of nations. 
 
 Few men were better equipped in mat- 
 ter of mental furnishings for parliamentary 
 debate and party leadership. He always 
 led the column, he never forced it forward. 
 No one questioned the accuracy of his 
 learning or doubted the integrity of his 
 purpose. 
 
 His strength as a leader was due to his 
 unswerving love of right, and his un- 
 matched ability in satisfying candid minds 
 that he sought with singleness of purpose 
 
56 
 
 ways which wisdom commended and truth 
 and justice approved. In the great con- 
 flidl of principles mere expedients to dodge 
 or delay an issue found no favor with him. 
 
 Truth is eternal, and her time is now. 
 He recognized that in all life's labors 
 duty is ours, results are God's. He de- 
 spised demagogy, and had little patience 
 with those who seek exaltation by that 
 ladder of corrupt ambition. He loved his 
 fellow-men. He never learned to hate 
 even the meanest of mankind. 
 
 The one weakness in his leadership was 
 that howsoever he condemned the ajct, his 
 great unguarded kindness, unasked, for- 
 gave the actor. His head won vantage 
 ground, his heart not unfrequently sur- 
 rendered. 
 
 In his judgments of men mercy so tem- 
 pered justice as often to destroy that need- 
 ful quality. This controlling love of his 
 fellow-men would tend to make him bet- 
 
57 
 
 ter fit in times of public peril to write the 
 law than to be the agent of its execution. 
 He would have hailed with delight a dis- 
 pensation that would from punishment 
 have divorced all pain and left to just 
 judgment no quality but mercy. 
 
 Of the great attributes of his kindly 
 heart, nothing manifested itself more 
 grandly than the tender and constant love 
 he bore his mother. 
 
 I saw and heard him first more than 
 twenty years ago. In the speech he made 
 all hearts were moved by the splendid 
 tribute that he paid to her. 
 
 When unsought the people of his State 
 chose him for United States Senator, his 
 friends in this city were pleased to tender 
 him a serenade. On that occasion one 
 of the speakers pronounced some words 
 of well-deserved praise of Garfield's 
 mother. A moment afterward Garfield 
 approached the speaker and, unobserved 
 
58 
 
 of others, placed his arm about his neck, 
 and with voice choked by emotion, and 
 eyes wet with tears, he said: "God bless 
 you for the good things you said about 
 my mother." 
 
 On his inauguration, when the oath that 
 made him Chief Magistrate of this great 
 nation had been taken, he turned amidst 
 that vast waiting multitude and bending 
 down to her he kissed his aged mother. 
 Malicious envy called this acting. How 
 little such " critics " knew the heart of that 
 great man. 
 
 By that adl of reverent filial piety he 
 touched the hearts of this nation. They 
 knew what great emotions' wrought him in 
 that hour and in that presence to bear 
 witness to what a mother's love and care 
 had done, could do, for a home and for a 
 people. 
 
 He was credulous and confiding as a 
 child, and gave his confidence almost 
 
59 
 
 without reserve, and seemed to deem 
 a betrayal of that confidence impossi- 
 ble. 
 
 Lincoln and Garfield were essentially 
 of the people, in the widest and best 
 sense. Both were born in low estate. 
 Both were freedom's apostles and hu- 
 manity's friends. 
 
 Inscrutible Providence that so ordained 
 that these two, of all men most near the 
 people, most a(5lively in sympathy with 
 them, at once their friend and champion, 
 should in all the line of rulers have been 
 singled out by the assassins as victims of 
 their bloody work, and be by these minis- 
 ters of crime cut down in the very flower 
 of their usefulness ! 
 
 While the life and character of Gar- 
 field may challenge closest scrutiny, it is 
 not urged that he was free from human 
 faults and frailties. He stood conspicu- 
 ously prominent among his fellow-men. 
 
6o 
 
 while his adversaries were hidden by their 
 own obscurity. 
 
 The moon being clouded presently is missed, 
 But little stars can hide them when they list ; 
 Gnats are not noted wheresoe'er they fly, 
 But eagles gazed upon by every eye. 
 
 So his whole course of life was noted. 
 
 To find a fault in him was justly to 
 accuse the party led by him. To baffle 
 him was to halt the column at the head of 
 which he marched. To- hide his promi- 
 nence was impossible. To curb or de- 
 stroy his influence was the aim of those 
 who felt and feared his power. His coun- 
 trymen had learned to love his precepts 
 and to walk in the light of his example. 
 
 The record of his life was to his fellow- 
 countrymen at once a benedidlion and an 
 inspiration. While they loved and hon- 
 ored him, they were in the last degree ex- 
 adting. With unwonted eagerness they 
 searched his life to find, if such there was, 
 a single stain or touch of taint, and were 
 
6i 
 
 the while indifferent to gross lapses on the 
 part of those who had attained to emi- 
 nence, good or bad, by means that would 
 have hurled Garfield from the pedestal of 
 popular favor into well-deserved contempt. 
 But it is always so. 
 
 The greatest scandal waits on greatest state. 
 
 The crow may bathe her coal-black wing in mire, 
 
 And unperceived fly with the filth away; 
 But should the like the snow-white swan desire, 
 
 The stain upon his silver down would stay. 
 
 Garfield could not be pushed into nor 
 find obscurity, nor his life-service in the 
 interest of his countrymen be forgotten. 
 
 His nomination for the Presidency was 
 not the accident of the distempered time 
 nor the result of mere manipulation of 
 rival fadlions. There is abundant witness, 
 that in the wildest tumult of that stormy 
 contest the master's voice was heard, and, 
 yielding to its stern command, the con- 
 vention recognized and confirmed the 
 people's choice. 
 
62 
 
 His eledlion was assured unless his ad- 
 versaries could devise some means to 
 wrest from him the people's confidence 
 and love, the prop and stay by which he 
 was upheld and which the struggling 
 millions of our land gave willingly. Un- 
 worthy as was the end thus sought, the 
 means were worse — forgery, the fruit and 
 coinage of one base mind. 
 
 To taint Garfield's claim to popular 
 support, the "Morey letter" was contrived. 
 
 The destrudlion of a hecatomb of men 
 the nation might and would survive, and 
 possibly forgive, but willfully to misdiredl 
 and trample down the people's will and 
 by chicane defeat them in their choice has 
 no fellow in the annals of dangerous ex- 
 ample, and can only well up from a de- 
 pravity that is indifferent alike to every 
 sense of patriotic duty. 
 
 Against the assault that comes in open 
 day and seeks by means heroic, however 
 
63 
 
 wicked, prudent foresight may provide. 
 But what human agency can proted; this 
 nation against the all-destroying poison 
 injedted into the healthful current of pub- 
 lic thought and private judgment by some 
 living, breathing source of foul contagion 
 which infedts the very life-blood of our 
 governmental system. 
 
 The desperate purpose of a desperate 
 man was too soon conceived, and, though 
 well planned, miscarried in its execution. 
 And though to the humble homes through- 
 out the land, on wings of lightning that 
 corrupting agent flew, yet, thank Heaven, 
 in that wild race of right with wrong God's 
 truth o'ertook the speeding falsehood and 
 bore it to the earth, and at once restored 
 to Garfield's fame the shield and armor 
 of his spotless life. 
 
 The offerings from the people of well- 
 earned confidence were but for a moment 
 interrupted. The heart that beat for all 
 
64 
 
 his race had not been false to the burden- 
 bearers from whose ranks he came. The 
 arm that had struck and only struck for 
 their disenthrallment had not been raised 
 against them. The voice that had spoken, 
 the pen that had written for their en- 
 nobling had not been suborned to base 
 betrayal of a single trust. 
 
 Loved by his countrymen as only Lin- 
 coln was; trusted by his countrymen as 
 only Lincoln was, by means only less in- 
 famous and by a man only less depraved 
 than he who struck down Lincoln, Gar- 
 field fell ; but he is not lost to this people. 
 
 Garfield is in his shroud and tomb, 
 but in this nation he is mighty yet. His 
 utterances and his example will outlast 
 the earthly monuments fashioned to make 
 his name immortal. His grave will be 
 the patriot's shrine; his life and charad;er 
 be an inspiration to the lovers of freedom 
 throughout the world. The fathers of this 
 
65 
 
 land will seek his footsteps and our chil- 
 dren- learn of him. He has taught our 
 youth to rise to exalted station by wise 
 and virtuous adlion. He has taught them 
 that the highway to eminence and worthy 
 renown leads not alone from palaces, nor 
 yet along the paths of luxury, but that it 
 finds its way alike from the abode of pov- 
 erty and the home of wealth. 
 
 It will go ill with this Republic when 
 such lives are forgotten and the influence 
 of such examples are unheeded. [Ap- 
 plause.] 
 
 Mr. Ezra B. Taylor. I now move that 
 the House concur in the Senate resolu- 
 tions. 
 
 Mr. Symes. Before the question is put 
 I ask unanimous consent of the House 
 that the gentleman from Tennessee [Mr. 
 Pettibone] be allowed to address it on 
 
 S. Mis. 104 — 5 
 
66 
 
 these resolutions. To my knowledge Mr. 
 Pettibone was a pupil of the distinguished 
 statesman whose memory we are now 
 honoring when he taught school in the 
 State of Ohio and has always been one of 
 his great admirers. I know the House 
 will be glad to listen to his remarks. 
 
 The Speaker. The gentleman from 
 Colorado asks unanimous consent that the 
 gentleman from Tennessee be allowed to 
 address the House on the pending resolu- 
 tions. 
 
 There was no objeftion. 
 
 Mr. Pettibone. In addition to what 
 has been said by the eloquent sons of 
 Ohio in admiration and commendation of 
 the charadler of our late President, whose 
 marble image is to-day received by the 
 House of Representatives, I shall have 
 but little to present. And, Mr. Speaker, I 
 
67 
 
 only desire to say that why I speak at all 
 is because it so happens that one of the 
 earliest teachers with whom I had the 
 privilege of studying the classics and pre- 
 paring for college was the late President 
 Garfield. I knew in early life his com- 
 plete and utter devotion as a teacher. He 
 taught not merely at Hiram, but he taught 
 always in the whole course of his life ; not 
 only in Ohio, but in this forum; and all 
 who heard him knew that he was a model 
 teacher. 
 
 He loved to teach. His wide-minded 
 character and his yearning for his fellow- 
 men expanded itself in every variety of way. 
 
 If, Mr. Speaker, there was any one trait 
 in the charadler of General Garfield 
 more predominant than another it was his 
 great kindliness, his universal charity, his 
 love for humanity. I recoiled; receiving 
 long ago, some twenty-six years ago, a 
 letter from him in which he used this ex- 
 
68 
 
 pression: Being invited to come and par- 
 take on one occasion the hospitalities of 
 a literary society, he said: "I know the 
 portals of your heart will fly open at a 
 friend's approach like the gates of Peter's 
 prison at the angel's touch." 
 
 This sentiment in Garfield's heart 
 touched all his students at Hiram, and 
 among the hundreds who have gone out 
 from that institution not one will forget it; 
 and by the hundreds of splendid women, 
 then young maidens and then in the first 
 blush of their glorious womanhood, who 
 received his instru(5lions and who are to- 
 day wearing the golden crown of mater- 
 nity — by them will be handed down to 
 their children, and by them to generations 
 yet unborn, reminiscences of the kindli- 
 ness, the sweet yet stern truthfulness, and 
 the magnanimity of this man who was so 
 great among the children of Ohio thirty 
 years ago! 
 
69 
 
 Never will we who used to hear him 
 forget that element in his character which 
 so closely akinned him with the spiritually 
 minded, and led him to admire the brilliant 
 and beautiful touches in "In Memoriam" 
 when he used to quote the lines so fre- 
 quently repeated by him. 
 
 When Lazarus left his chamel cave, 
 
 And home to Mary's house retum'd. 
 
 Was this demanded — if he yeam'd 
 To hear her weeping by his grave ? 
 
 " Where wert thou, brother, those four days ? " 
 
 There lives no record of reply. 
 
 Which telling what it is to die 
 Had surely added praise to praise. 
 
 From every house the neighbors met. 
 
 The streets were filled with joyful sound ; 
 A solemn gladness even crown'd 
 
 The purple brows of Olivet. 
 
 Behold ! a man raised up by Christ ! 
 
 The rest remaineth unreveal'd; 
 
 He told it not; or something seal'd 
 The lips of that Evangelist. 
 
 But, Mr. Speaker, the hour draws on, 
 and this fitting ceremony must close. 
 This statue of purest Parian marble will 
 yet crumble into dust, but the memory of 
 
70 
 
 the martyr President will live; and I 
 could not speak if I desired a more just 
 eulogium than he used to quote with ad- 
 miration from Tacitus, a classic which 
 once it was his fortune to teach to us at 
 Hiram, and a truer, and better, and more 
 characteristic statement of the real char- 
 acter of the man than that which was 
 made by Tacitus, speaking of the merit 
 of Agricola, a passage I know President 
 Garfield used to admire, does not exist. 
 Said Tacitus in the old language of 
 Rome: 
 
 Quidquid ex eo amavimus, quidquid mirati sumus, manet, mansurum- 
 que est in etemitate temporum, fama rerum. 
 
 Whatsoever of him we have loved, 
 whatsoever of him we have admired, re- 
 mains, and will remain in the eternity of 
 time, and in the fame of great events. 
 [Applause.] 
 
 Mr. Ezra B. Taylor. I now repeat 
 
71 
 
 my motion that the House concur in the 
 Senate resolutions. 
 
 The resolutions were concurred in. 
 
 Mr. Ezra B. Taylor moved to recon- 
 sider the vote by which the resolutions 
 were concurred in; and also moved that 
 the motion to reconsider be laid on the 
 table. 
 
 The latter motion was agreed to.