Ohio History Journal

180       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.   dience, wherein were many of our martyred President's intimate friends, the full significance of the rendition of his loved hymn. The orator of the day was the Hon. Judson Harmon of Cincinnati, whose address is herewith given:   ADDRESS OF JUDSON HARMON. There are no States at whose celebrations Ohio is not a fitting guest. From those older than herself came the men and women who

opened her soil to the sunshine and re- placed the shifting wigwams of the sav- ages with the fixed habitations of civili- zation from which sprang the Common- wealth which sends us here. To the younger States Ohio has given her sons and daughters to do the like for them. So that, besides the bonds of race and political fellowship, she is joined for- ever to the other members of the Ameri- can Union by closer ties of kinship. Wherever she goes it is either to the abodes of her forbears or to those of her offspring, and in both she is equally at home because she has proved worthy of her descent and is proud of her de- scendants. The various peoples of the earth, as

they now exist, had their origin in migrations. These were sometimes in masses, sometimes as individuals; sometimes as conquerors expelling or absorbing existing inhabitants, sometimes as settlers of untenanted regions; to some places they came as a blessing, to others as a blight. But never in the hitory of the world, not even in that of our country, was there such a migration, or one with such a result, as that which in a little more than a century has founded and perfected the state which honors me today as one of her representatives. Secured as part of the new Republic at the close of the Revolution by sagacity and statesmanship of the highest order, the region bounded by the Ohio, the Lakes and the Mississippi lay a wilderness awaiting a des- tiny which Washington and Jay almost alone foresaw. The then three greatest nations of the earth had partly explored it and had battled and treated about it, but only as an incident to things they all thought more important. The few settlements made here and there along its chief waters were merely posts for traffic with the Indians. It was too distant for thought of general occupation by civilized men. King George had for-

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Ohio Day at the Jamestown Exposition.              181

 

bidden all attempts to settle it and, revoking all rights of the colonies

under their charters, had made it part of Canada.

After receiving control of it Congress first, by the great Ordinance

which was the forerunner of the Constitution, devoted this entire region,

whoever might become its inhabitants, to liberty, justice and equal rights

forever, and then, having nothing else to give, granted rights in it to the

soldiers of the Revolution and others who, impoverished by the war, had

to begin life anew. Some of these sold their rights but others risked the

hardships and perils which beset the long journey and awaited them at

the end of it.

The French had gone around by the lakes and the Spanish up the

Mississippi, so that not a settlement had they made in the easterly part

of this territory. But the Americans, following the routes of the great

continental pathfinders, the buffalo, reached that part first, and everybody

who ever saw Ohio knows why they went no further.

There flowed the beautiful river through the valley where the

forces of nature had for ages collected all the elements of fertility, with

the Muskingum, the Hocking, the Scioto and the Miamis flowing in from

the North, each through its broad rich valley. There was Lake Erie

smiling at the Cuyahoga, the Sandusky and the Maumee as they came to

it from the South. And between the heads of these rivers stretched the

great divide where the trails of the Indians and trappers carrying their

canoes across from one stream to another had traced the routes for

commerce.

These men did not come as conquerors to overthrow existing insti-

tutions; there were none. They sought no conflict with the savages who,

bent always on killing each other, wandered through the forests which

had overgrown the traces of two other races which had preceded them to

extinction. They did not come to impose on others religious creed or

civil authority. They merely sought homes they could call their own

where the soil would reward their husbandry and their children enjoy

the broader possibilities of a new country.

Some of them came from New England to take up lands reserved

in the grants to Congress; some from the Middle States where the war

had wrought the severest domestic injuries; some came from the Southern

States; but from nowhere came more or better settlers than from Virginia.

This was natural and fit. The pioneers whose settlement here three

hundred years ago we now celebrate and their successors had better

founded charter rights to the Western country than any of the other

colonies. Then Virginia troops under General Clarke had taken it from

the British during the Revolution and it had been formally attached to

the Old Dominion as the County of Illinois. These facts had enabled Jay,

Franklin and Adams as our peace commissioners to make and maintain

a claim to it.

And it was Virginia which closed the long and often bitter dispute

among the States over their claims to these lands. She authorized her

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delegates in Congress to convey all her rights to the United States.

Thomas Jefferson carried his authority to the delegation and was one of

the signers of the grant which became the first muniment of title to the

territory which now includes five States of the Union and part of a sixth.

It was fitting that Ohio, the first entirely new State, admitted to the

Union just twenty years later without the usual tutelage as a separate

territory, should cast her first electoral vote for Thomas Jefferson as

President of the United States.

The causes already mentioned would have assured to the lineage of

Ohio a strain of Virginia blood, but this was made broader and finer by

the reservations which Virginia made in her grant to the United States.

She retained a large area for General Clark and his soldiers. These were

only plain backwoodsmen, but they accomplished more than any equal

number ever did in the history of mankind; and they did it by a com-

bination of courage and endurance for which I know of no parallel.

Their leader has well been called the "Hannibal of the West," because,

without support from his distant government, itself struggling with the

foe on its own soil, he held his conquests to the end of the war.

The retreat of the ten thousand, the charge of the six hundred and

other examples of heroism have been immortalized, though they mostly

lacked permanent results. American literature has not yet exalted above

simple narrative the mid-winter march of our two hundred and the

capture of the entire and more numerous British garrison of Fort Vin-

cennes, including its commander. And this was no fruitless display of

military genius and heroism, for it protected the patriots from further

attack from the rear during the remaining years of the war for independ-

ence and gave to five great States a birthplace and a home.

Virginia also made reservations for her revolutionary soldiers. All

these lands were rapidly settled by families who both in public and private

life have been large factors in the growth and greatness of Ohio. They

extend from the Scioto to the Little Miami and are still known as the

Virginia Military Reservation. My selection by the Commission has at

least one element of fitness, for on that reservation I was born.

Before the great National road was projected, Virginia had estab-

lished a highway from Alexandria to Marietta; and Washington urged the

opening of communication with the Western country by portages from

stream to stream across the mountains.

So while Ohio comes, like all the world, to join in celebrating one of

the great events of history-the first permanent settlement of our race on

the continent of North America, she comes with more than a general

interest, because if any State more than another can be called the mother

of Ohio that State is Virginia.

But the Old Dominion, in making to the Union a grant of her

western rights, did more than secure homes for her soldiers. Her coun-

cils were directed by men whose profound study of government and far-

sighted purpose were making our Revolution more than a successful re-

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Ohio Day at the Jamestown Exposition.          183

 

bellion. They were designing and building a Republic on a plan until

then untried.

Our present Republic had not yet been formed, but it was apparent

that the old Confederation must be replaced by a more perfect Union of

the colonies which had become independent States, and the character of

that Union was already taking form in their minds. It would be a gov-

ernment endowed with certain powers of the States, delegated to it by

them to be used for their common protection and welfare. But, by reason

of its origin and nature it could have no existence apart from the States

which composed it, and no functions except those devolved on it by

them. The principle of local self government or home rule was too im-

portant and too deep-seated in the hearts of the people of all the States

to be yielded, or even qualified further than was necessary to create a

lasting Federal Union.

What use could the Federal government have for a region great

enough for an empire in itself? None except to open it for settlement.

And what relation were the settlers to have with the States or the new

Republic? Some of the States could not extend their boundaries, and

jealousies would be aroused if those which could should do so. More than

a century was to pass before anybody would suggest that the general

government has imperial powers and may acquire and hold territory for

its own aggrandizement without regard to present or prospective ad-

mission as new States.

Home rule means a government created and carried on at home by

home agencies which are thus never out of touch with the people. As

Virginia soon after consented to separate statehood for Kentucky, be-

cause the government beyond the mountains at Richmond was not home

rule for Kentuckians, though they had a voice in it, so she did not seek

to impose government from a distance on the people beyond the Ohio, but

secured for them the same right her own people enjoyed.

That there might be no question about the political future of the

country she gave up, Virginia made and Congress accepted her grant on

the express condition that "the territory so ceded shall be laid out and

formed into States, not less than three nor more than five, to be distinct

Republican States and admitted members of the Federal Union having

the same rights of sovereignty, freedom and independence as the other

States."

This was no doubt the precedent for the similar condition in the

later grant by France of the Louisiana region which expanded our

boundaries to the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean. And the course

so provided has been followed without exception with respect to all ter-

ritory settled by Americans. Arizona, New Mexico and Alaska alone do

not yet enjoy the rights of statehood, unless Oklahoma is to be stopped

at the door.

More than a century of experience under this dual form of govern-

ment has proved its fitness and sufficiency for the needs of our people. In

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each state they have built up and carry on for themselves institutions under

which protection, justice, education and public convenience are provided,

and civil rights defined and secured. Those whom they entrust with the

making and enforcement of laws are chosen by themselves from their

own number and act under their own hand and eye. And they have at

the same time a voice in the conduct by the general government of the

foreign and general affairs committed to it.

The people of Ohio cherish still as they always have done the

"rights of sovereignty, freedom and independence," as well as the mem-

bership in the Union, thus secured to them. They might have gained

these otherwise, but are none the less grateful for the precaution taken

by Virginia which assured them. And they have justified her by the use

they have made of these rights.

They realize that for a people who have set out to govern them-

selves to look to some one else, no matter who to help govern them is

a confession of unfitness. They are proud of the governor who when

pleaded with to call for Federal troops said Ohio could take care of her-

self, as she did.

And the people of Ohio have no excuse for lapsing from the virtue

of self reliance. They have shown that they know how to deal with trusts

and combinations organized and conducted in defiance of the laws of

trade and the rules of fair dealing. They are sure they better than others

can control without crippling the corporations they create and fix the con-

ditions on which those created by other sovereignties may do business

within their borders. And they are not willing to yield the right to do this

to any other power, or to have it qualified save by the condition, to which

they have given irrevocable consent, that they must act justly with re-

spect to rights lawfully acquired.

It is a matter of no personal interest to me, because my aim in life

has never been to amass wealth, but I am not taken with the idea of

seeking to limit by law the acquisition of fortunes. The smallest fortune

is too great if it be dishonestly or unfairly gained. With laws so

framed as not to impose unnecessary charges on the people which operate

to give some advantages over others, and with laws impartially enforced

to prevent unfair methods and corrupt practices, no fortunes will be

"swollen," which implies unnatural and perverted growth.

Nor with our well tested systems of inheritance and restriction of

entailments will fortunes long remain in unworthy hands; while fair got-

ten wealth has neither temptation nor occasion to seek illicit favors from

officials who make and enforce the laws. And in our free country every

man who thinks happiness lies in wealth has the right to get as rich

as he honestly can. All we should demand is that he shall not increase

his gains by withholding from the laborer his just reward or adding

hardships to his lot, nor by depriving others of their gains by unfair

competition. And he must bear his due share of the expenses of the gov-

ernments which protect him in pursuit and possession.

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Ohio Day at the Jamestown Exposition.              185   But if for the first time in the history of the race somebody is to draw a line around thrift and enterprise, I am sure Ohio will insist on trying the experiment for herself. For all economic measures are neces- sarily experiments, especially those which deal with new conditions. And when the atmosphere is charged with discontent and resentment, no mat- ter how just, the eye is not always sure nor the hand always steady, so that results not intended or desired may follow. The people of each State can best decide for themselves, from time to time, what measures to adopt and judge their operation and effect. They can better and more promptly correct or change them to suit their case, as trial may suggest.  And each State will have benefit of the experience of the other States as well as its own. If a measure prove wise it will be promptly adopted wherever conditions require it. If it prove unwise the less scope it has the better. What higher hope can I express, in conclusion, than that when Virginia and Ohio meet from century to century, as no doubt they will, to celebrate their origin on this spot, they may greet each other, as they do today, as "free, independent and sovereign" States whose dignity is magnified and glorified, not reduced or obscured, by the Union to whose greatness they contribute and in whose glory they share.

The poet of the occasion was Miss Anna Piatt Worthington, great- granddaughter of Governor Thomas Worthington, resident of Chillicothe, builder and owner of the famous mansion known as Adena, which at the time of its erection was the most magnificent mansion west of the Alleghenies. It was this residence which was reproduced as the Ohio Building on the Jamestown Expo- sition grounds.  Miss Anna Piatt Worthington being unable to be pres- ent, the poem was read by her sister, Miss Martha Worthington.

ADENA. There is a quiet lake, its silver deeps Cool-fringed with grasses, lovely "Ellensmere." The high, bright heavens seem within its heart A mystic world, far-shining, softly clear.

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