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 ADDRESS 
 
 OF 
 
 J. J. IZVillett, 
 
 Before the Southern Society, of New York, at 
 Its Sixteenth Annual Dinner, February 22, 1902, 
 in the Waldorf-Astoria Motel, responding to 
 the toast, 
 
 "GEORGE ViTflSHIl^GTOr^." 
 

 
 r^ 
 
 PRESS 
 H. NORWOOD, 
 ANNISTON 
 
Mr. Toastmaster and Gentlemen of the Southern 
 Society: 
 
 In the early settlement of Texas while immi- 
 gration was pouring in from the other States the 
 first question which met a stranger after he had 
 crossed the Sabine River was, "What did you do at 
 home that you had to come here?" And not infre- 
 quently that stranger had left his home in the older 
 States under circumstances alike embarrassing to 
 him and his creditors, with the words G. t T. posted 
 up on the door of his late abode, which was well 
 understood to mean, Gone to Texas. I will not ask 
 any of you tonight ''What did you do that you had 
 to come to New York, or if you left G. t N. Y. on 
 the door of your home in the South?" Such ques- 
 tions might call for explanations, which are always 
 embarrassing, and particularly so upon occasions of 
 this kind. Mr. Dooley has said the reason why 
 reform is so difiicull in New York City is, that it is 
 full of men who have been chased here by the Sher- 
 iffs from the four corners of the land. This may 
 explain some of the difficulties which beset your 
 Mayor and District Attorney, but I am sure this 
 does not explain why the Southern Society is 
 increasing in such numbers or why it is in such a 
 flourishing condition as to membership and social 
 graces. 
 
 My pleasure in being with you tonight is greats 
 but the greatness of my subject rather overwhelms 
 me. There are times when even hardihood is virtue 
 and to such virtue alone do I lay claim this eve- 
 ning in venturing to address you on the subject 
 assigned me. 
 
 The story of Washington, however, will never 
 grow old, or cease to be interesting. While he was 
 
living in retirement at Mt. Vernon after his terms as 
 President had expired, Bonaparte, who was just 
 entering upon his meteoric career, upon being pre- 
 sented to our Minister in Paris, asked, "How is your 
 distinguished countryman, General Washington?" 
 Upon being informed that he was well, replied, 
 "Yes, and it will always be well with him, for 
 Washington's fame will be secure when my name 
 shall have been forgotten." The most durable 
 monument may perish but neither the forces of 
 nature nor any crime of men can ever mar or muti- 
 late a great example of public and private virtue. 
 As Bancroft has well said, "But for Washington, 
 the Country could not have achieved its Independ- 
 ence, but for him it could not have formed its 
 Union, and but for him it could not have set the 
 Federal Government in successful motion." What 
 can I say, what can any man say of him which has 
 not been already rendered as familiar as household 
 words, not only here, but throughout the civilized 
 world? How can I add anything to what has been 
 said by Guizot, John Marshall, Jared Sparks, 
 Edward Everett, Washington Irving, Bancroft and 
 Lodge? While Washington was a true type of the 
 South, his fame does not belong to her alone, nor 
 does she so claim him. His part and her part in the 
 Revolution would have been of no avail but for 
 what was so gloriously done in council and in arms 
 by brothers in the Middle and New England Colo- 
 nies. Nor does his fame belong to any nation or 
 any age. Wherever human beings throughout the 
 world have erected an altar, and set up a Govern- 
 ment dedicated to liberty, regulated by law, these 
 may claim Washington for their countryman. The 
 majestic story of that life, whether told in the pages 
 of history or in the verse of Lowell and Byron, never 
 grows old and will never cease to claim the atten- 
 tion of the sons of men. 
 
 While I may not say anything now and inter- 
 esting on the subject of Washington, perhaps I may 
 in bringing you a message from your ancestral 
 homes say something of that portion of the Union 
 wherein the bones of your ancestors are buried and 
 
in which you first saw the light, which may not be 
 altogether without interest to you. Glorious South- 
 land! thou art still true to thy inherited valor, and 
 incomparable graces. Neither the corroding marks 
 of time, poverty or commercialism have taken away 
 from thee aught of thy sweet gentleness, thy heroic 
 and uncomplaining fortitude, or patient energy. 
 Like Washington you have passed through deep 
 waters and have had your Valley Forges, Brandy- 
 wines, Monmouths, and Germantowns, but like him 
 you have exhibited a loyalty and constancy to high 
 ideals which no reverse, no hardship, no incompe- 
 tency, no treachery, could shake or overcome. The 
 honor and courage of your sons on hundreds of bat- 
 tle fields and the virtue and gentleness of your 
 women, virtues preservative of all other virtues, 
 have won the admiration of the world, and shedan 
 imperishable lustre on thy fair name. "The past \^ 
 at least is secure." 
 
 John Milton has well said, "War has made 
 many great whom peace makes small." But we 
 can say of the South as Milton said of Cromwell, 
 while she showed herself great in war, peace hath 
 made her greater, or more correctly speaking, that 
 both war and peace alike gave opportunity for the 
 display of those incomparable innate qualities 
 which no m#re fortuitous circumstances could cre- 
 ate or destroy; and if, as Emerson has said, "We 
 are but quotations from our ancestors," does not the 
 germ of that love of home and State, and that 
 deathless devotion to conscience and principle, and 
 to the right of self determination of what is princi- 
 ple create a better citizenship, and a greater security 
 for our common country against gusts of passion 
 which may sometimes sweep over our land from the 
 homeless? The nature of everything is best seen in 
 its smallest portions, hence we must seek the nature 
 of the Republic first in the family and then in the 
 State, wherefore it may be said that each citizen is 
 an incarnate Republic, and that Republic is safe 
 whose corner stone is the love of home and kindred. 
 
 The South has played no small part in the for- 
 mation and settlement of our great country, whether 
 
in furnishing leaders or acquiring or settling terri- 
 tory. A writer in the Century has recently demon- 
 strated what was well known to many before, that 
 in the settlement of this country civilization fol- 
 lowed the water courses and that the great West is 
 the true daughter of the South, It is well known 
 that the vast domain known as the Louisiana Pur- 
 chase, and all of the other country which has been 
 added to the original thirteen states, making it 
 extend from the Atlantic to the Pacific, were 
 acquired through the influence of Southern leaders 
 who were then in control at Washington. True, 
 some territory has been recently acquired, which 
 we of the South do not claim the credit for, and 
 which time alone can tell whether or not it is a 
 credit or debit. The great majority of the people of 
 the United States in their knowledge of and atti- 
 tude to our foreign possessions are very much in the 
 position of a Confederate Soldier in the Civil War 
 who was captured by the Federals. One of the 
 Union Soldiers asked him, what he was fighting for. 
 He replied, -'Squatter Sovereignty," "What in the 
 hell is that?" asked the Union Soldier, "Damned if I 
 know," replied the Confederate, "but its ours, we 
 paid for it and intend to keep it." We have taken 
 the Philippine Bull by the horns, but the thought 
 sometimes occurs whether or not it were better if 
 we had taken him by the tail instead, since we 
 could hold on by the tail just as well and let go a 
 great deal easier. 
 
 But I hear someone say "What of the future 
 of the South?** The primal law of existence is work. 
 Like a crew capsized in water, people must either 
 struggle or sink. None appreciated these truths 
 more than the Southern people, and they had not 
 been true descendants of the brave and gay-hearted 
 cavaliers had they been appalled or discouraged at 
 their great poverty and the disasters resulting from 
 the Civil War. Nor were they so. A generous foe, 
 recognizing the fight, had been fought to a complete 
 finish and admiring the valor of his late adversary 
 has assisted with capital and encouraging friend- 
 ship to repair the ravages created by the War. and 
 
behold a transformation which reads like a fairy 
 tale. While many things were done after the Civil 
 War which were simply horrible yet all things con- 
 sidered probably the world does not contain such 
 another instance of magnanimity on the part of con- 
 queror, and ability of the conquered in such a short 
 interval, to repair not only the waste places but to 
 compete with the other in the march of industrial 
 progress. It is an object lesson which the other 
 great nations may study with profit, and never end- 
 ing interest. 
 
 The Director of the last census has just issued 
 a statement showing that for the past decade the 
 South kept pace with the West and North in 
 increase of population, and the significant feature 
 of it is, that while the increase in the West and 
 North was almost wholly in the cities, in the South 
 the increase was overwhelmingly in the country 
 and small towns. This is a healthful, hopeful sign. 
 It shows that "there is life in the old land yet," and 
 that the love of homes and landed estates is still an 
 instinct of the descendants of the cavaliers as it was 
 in Washington's time. No country can be near to 
 decaying which shows that the forests are being 
 felled and fertile farms being cleared to make way 
 for homes and profitable agriculture. Nor has man- 
 ufacturing been neglected; on the contrary the 
 development now going on in the cotton and iron 
 industries of the South is a revelation to the world, 
 and it bids fair to surpass the industrial develop- 
 ment of the West in the years succeeding our Civil 
 War, Industries are springing up on all sides, and 
 are paying dividends which would surprise the busi- 
 ness world if they were made public. For years it 
 was said the Southerner had a genius for politics 
 but no aptitude for business. What an egregious 
 mistake! The brtiins of the South which was once 
 through self defense In politics trying to preserve its 
 vested interests and the status quo are now engaged 
 in business. They are building railroads, cotton 
 factories, iron industries, and all other kinds of 
 manufacturing establishments. The South, in com- 
 plete control of its own affairs at home, is not much 
 disturbed as to who is in control of affairs at Wash- 
 
ington, although as the wife of Louis XV once 
 remarked, "An old coachman does like to hear his 
 whip crack occasionally." Genius is but faculty 
 intensified, or as Dr. Johnson said, great general 
 powers of mind capable of being turned any way. 
 Can it be doubted that the same intellectual forces 
 in the South which controlled the policies and des- 
 tinies of this whole nation for the sixty years pre- 
 ceding the Civil War when now devoted to 
 commerce and manufacturing will not be able to 
 meet competitors when nature has given them the 
 advantage of soil, climate, and cheaper labor and 
 cheaper raw material? He must needs be very rich 
 or very reckless who invests his money solely upon 
 the idea they cannot, and regardless of all natural 
 advantages. 
 
 I would not have you think however, that these 
 great strides in manufacturing in the South have 
 been without effort, or that hers has been a "prim- 
 rose path of dalliance,"— on the contrary she has 
 been making a fight for the last thirty-five years 
 which required more courage, fortitude and patience 
 than it did to carry on the four years Civil War, 
 She, without experience or adequate capital and 
 beset with race troubles on every side, wherein the 
 greatest kindness was noninterference, almost over- 
 whelmed with an ignorant electorate, and no pro- 
 vision made for its education by the power which 
 forced it upon her, has met the fiercest competition 
 which brains and money could supply, and like all 
 great and lasting achievements in the business 
 world they have been accomplished by strenuous 
 and unremitting efforts and by fighting over every 
 inch of the ground. Hie labor, hoc opus est. A less 
 brave or less cheerful people would have given up 
 in sheer despair, and the fact that they did not, has 
 justified the faith and kindness of their friends, and 
 has shown that they are well worthy to be called by 
 that name of which we are all so proud, — that of 
 Americans. 
 
 When the South first commenced to manufac- 
 ture iron, it was confidently asserted by her com- 
 petitors that while Southern iron might be made 
 
cheaply, it was of an inferior quality and fit only for 
 cheap castings, but when the Southerner commenced 
 to ship and sell his iron in Pittsburg, Cincinnati and 
 Philadelphia, and when the English and German 
 manufacturer began to actually prefer the Southern 
 over the Pennsylvania and Ohio iron, that misrepre- 
 sentation died and was gathered unto its fathers. 
 Then it was said the future of iron was steel, and 
 steel could not be successfully made out of the 
 Southern iron for the reason that the cost of elimi- 
 nating the objectionable properties in the ores, and 
 reducing the same to steel, would be more than the 
 steel would bring in the market. The enormous 
 steel industries now in successful operation in the 
 South disproved this assertion, and so it died and was 
 gathered unto its fathers. Then it was asserted that 
 the Southern iron man paid so much higher rate for 
 money than his Northern competitor that the ad- 
 vantages of his location and cheapness of his raw 
 materials were neutralized by his lack of capital 
 and the high rate he had to pay for money. The 
 successful reorganization of Southern Iron Com- 
 panies, giving them an abundance of working capi- 
 tal at a low rate of interest, demonstrated that 
 capital, with its keen instinct for profit, had un- 
 bounded confidence in the future of iron in the 
 South and was desirous of developing and utilizing 
 its great natural resources to the mutual advantage 
 of both lender and borrower, and so this last mis- 
 representation died and was gathered unto its 
 fathers. 
 
 The development in the mining of coal has kept 
 steady pace with the manufacture of iron, and, if 
 anything, has exceeded it, while as to the lumber 
 business it is generally admitted there are no timber 
 forests of any consequence now standing available 
 for manufacturers this side of the Pacific slope ex- 
 cept in the South. As to the oil business, I guess 
 you know something about that up here. 
 
 The development of cotton manufacturing in 
 the South is even more remarkable than that of the 
 iron and coal business. It is simply inconceivable, 
 even to those among whom this development is tak- 
 ing place, and those who do not visit the South have 
 
no idea of the wonderful transformation going on 
 there. But a few years ago the South had but few 
 cotton factories and their output was a negligible 
 quantity. Today there is hardly a village but what 
 has its one or more cotton factories, sometimes as 
 many as ten or twelve. Today the South spins as 
 many bales of cotton as New England, although it 
 started in this business but yesterday. Who can 
 doubt that the iron logic of events has decreed that 
 in a few years practically the whole cotton crop will 
 be spun into cloth in the South, thus increasing the 
 value of that crop many fold, besides giving steady 
 employment to hundreds of thousands of people? At 
 the beginning of our cotton manufacturing it was 
 said by our competitors that the South could never 
 make a success of it for several reasons, one of 
 which in chief was the lack of skilled or capable 
 labor, but here again reasoning from false or mis- 
 takenly assumed premises produced false conclu- 
 sions as in the iron business, for the wife and 
 daughter of the so-called "Southern Cracker," who 
 have afforded our New England Magazine writers 
 such amusement, have proved to be the very best 
 cotton mill laborers in the world— patient, careful, 
 loyal and industrious, and without desire to organize 
 labor Unions and demand unjust exactions from 
 their employers. It is a poetic and refined justice 
 that puts it in the power of the so-called "(Jrackers" 
 to be chiefly instrumental, through their capability 
 as cotton mill laborers, in transferring New Eng- 
 land's great cotton industries to the South. 
 
 Then it was said that the South could never 
 make the finer grades but must confine itself to the 
 coarser cloths. Again we see a theory exploded 
 and find the Dwight, Merrimac and other Northern 
 mills duplicating their fine plants in the South, with 
 new and improved machinery and manufacturing 
 the finer grades of cloth; to all which we give a cor- 
 dial welcome, and in several of the Southern States 
 ten years exemption from all taxation. 
 
 You ask me the cause which produced these 
 results? It is the old story of the struggle for ex- 
 istence and survival of the fittest. Did you ever see 
 
a bee hive when the hive was full of honey? How 
 lazily and slowly the bees go in and out. Did you 
 ever see the same hive when it had been stripped of 
 its honey? How unceasingly and industriously the 
 bees work until it is full again. So it was with the 
 South. Until the Civil War, slavery and agriculture 
 were so profitable that nearly all the South's earn- 
 ings were invested in slaves and land, while our 
 minerals and other great natural resources remained 
 undeveloped, but when by the fortunes of war our 
 hive was stripped of its honey, and slavery was no 
 longer possible or even desirable, it became neces- 
 sary for us to develop what we had hitherto neg- 
 lected, and we are merely applying the lessons we 
 have learned from the bees. 
 
 The young men in the South today are not seek- 
 ing to know what are the rights of the States as did 
 their fathers or even what are their individual 
 rights for they have been long since defined, but 
 they are seeking to know what are their opportuni- 
 ties and how they can best improve them. To them 
 it is of more consequence to know how to locate and 
 mine iron and coal or how to construct and profita- 
 bly operate a manufacturing establishment than to 
 know the history or terms of the Wilmot Proviso or 
 the Missouri Compromise. To them the building of 
 the Nicarauga Canal, which would connect the two 
 Oceans at our doors and make a Mediterranean of 
 the Gulf of Mexico in its shipping and commerce, 
 with its resultant advantages to our Gulf Ports and 
 inland manufactories, is of vastly more importance 
 than the Hampton Roads Conference or even than 
 as to who was in command at Santiago. There is 
 no part of this country which is living more in the 
 future than the South and there is no part for which 
 the future holds out greater promise of usefulness 
 and development. We are looking confidently into 
 the future, and it smilingly beckons us on. 
 
 But, gentlemen, the future, while full of promise, 
 also holds great questions to be solved. The new 
 century we have just entered upon contains within 
 itself the problems of the future. What has been 
 settled in the past century is scarcely now of more 
 
than academic interest, and it is burning.—living 
 issues which engage the greatest thoughts of man- 
 kind. As Americans we are no longer deeply inter- 
 ested in the rights of man in his individual capacity 
 as a vital question. They have been so firmly estab- 
 lished by our Federal and State Constitutions and 
 by the hundreds of decisions of our highest Courts 
 that no one now doubts or disputes them, nor have 
 we the slightest idea of relinquishing anyone of 
 theiri. It is natural however, that when a question 
 is settled finally and conclusively it ceases to be 
 absorbing. One of the great questions of living 
 interest just now is the rights of property, and its 
 right to contract — and over against this is the 
 equally if not more important question of the rights 
 of society or man in his collective capacity. To the 
 solution of this great question, the South with its 
 homogeneous and conservative yet progressive peo- 
 ple can, must and will contribute its full share. 
 Other questions will crowd upon us. How shall we 
 without sacrificing our own race, discharge the full 
 measure of our duty towards that unfortunate race 
 who are in our midst without fault on their part, to 
 whom this country has so long been a home, and 
 who were falsely taught for so many years that 
 they were wards of the Government? How shall 
 the individual be preserved in the mass and be 
 made to feel his responsibility for government and 
 the duty of discharging public obligations? How 
 shall corruption in private and public life be eradi- 
 cated? These arid similar questions must be ans- 
 wered and they will be by the countrymen of 
 Washington, who whether in success or defeat have 
 ever held to high ideals. And so as a nation we 
 enter the new century in that spirit of optimism 
 which is essential to progress and the natural result 
 of trials and dangers successfully encountered and 
 with self confidence arising from experience. Proud 
 of the past and the achievements of our ancestors, 
 yet looking not into the past but into the more glo- 
 rious future, chanting not the Miserere, but the Te 
 Deum, we proceed to take our place among the 
 peoples of the earth and to fulfill a destiny vouch- 
 safed to us by rrierit and by inheritance. 
 
/ 
 
 ? X- J>' 
 
 i» 
 
 *■ 
 
ADDRESS 
 
 . . OP 
 
 J. J. Willett, 
 
 Before the Southern Society, of New York, at 
 it8 Sixteenth Annual Dinner, February 22, 1902, 
 in the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, responding to 
 the toast, 
 
 "GEORGE VS/^flSHINGTON." 
 
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