Reply of Mr. Root
This cordial welcome has not been a surprise to me, as I already knew of the qualities of the Governor of Vera Cruz. By this time, I have become accustomed to the hospitable character of the Mexicans; but notwithstanding this, it has been very pleasing and gratifying to me to receive these demonstrations from the people of Vera Cruz whose frankness of disposition is well known. I appreciate your words very highly, Mr. Governor, and I thank you for them as I do the residents of Orizaba.
It is but right for you Mexicans to remember Washington, as it is for us Americans to remember Hidalgo and the other heroes of Mexican history together with our own. I firmly believe that Mexico has passed beyond the state in which civil dissensions devastated this fortunate country, and that in the future there will be no door open to internal strife, thanks to the wise administration and foresight of the great statesman Porfirio Díaz.
How true it is that the beautiful and the useful can be combined: here in Orizaba I find the proof of this truth, as in the midst of the natural beauty of the scenery offered by the exuberant vegetation and the lovely peak crowned with snow—the proud sentinel of the state of Vera Cruz—stand as signs of progress the important factories we have just visited.
Mr. Governor, I feel grateful for the frank reception of which I have been the object, and I hope that Mexico will continue to progress and develop as well as the United States, and that both nations will render mutual assistance to each other and avail themselves of the prosperous or unprosperous occurrences adopting the one or the other as lessons of experience for humanity in order to demonstrate to natives and foreigners the excellences of the republican form of government.
GUADALAJARA
Speech of Governor Ahumada
October 14, 1907
Although our president, General Porfirio Díaz, with the high international representation awarded him by our institutions, and by the personal adherence of all federal and state authorities, as well as by the love of the Mexican people in general, has already given a cordial welcome in the name of all of us, allow me, in the name of the state which I govern, to express to you the kind feelings of sympathy which exist in all hearts beating within this important section of our country. Jalisco, Mr. Secretary, has always been a land that loves all that is great and useful for the country, and as during the time when we fought for independence and liberty it did not spare its sons, in the same way we want to join our voice to the voice of the people that from the bravo to the usumacinta praise and bless you, to take our share in the work for peace which you initiated during the Third Pan American Conference in Rio de Janeiro, which you continued by your visit to the main republics of South America, and which you are carrying to an end now by tokens of friendship you are giving to Mexico and the people of the state of Jalisco. The people of this state believe that the best way to take part in this labor is to tell you through me: "Welcome be the noble emissary who, like the dove of the ark, brings the symbolic olive branch which announces that clouds have been dissipated and the sun of friendship is rising between the peoples of the new continent."
We should have been pleased to have you among us a longer time, to give you better tokens of our esteem and to show you the high appreciation we feel for the people of the United States and her great ruler, President Roosevelt. But inasmuch as this is impossible, owing to your important and urgent labors at home, allow me, Mr. Secretary, to state that if our demonstrations of friendship are short, they are made in the land of traditional frankness and true friendship.