"There has been an undercurrent all through this Convention. Somebody has been afraid that we are going to do something or pop some lid off that will bust the thing and I have been, as I said last night, sometimes scared almost to death. I think I could personally say that I wanted to make about seventy-four speeches in the two days that I have been here. I didn't do it but I was waiting and praying for the psychological hour to arrive and I believe that that hour came last night when this Executive Committee really got together and got something concrete before them, and I think that the whole Convention comes together this morning ready to take up matters of importance and leave off matters that should not be taken up, and to solidify this body in a great spirit of Americanism that shall last for fifty years as the greatest organization that the world has ever known." (Applause.) "Now the keyword that I want to say in the beginning is, at all costs we want to save this organization. We do not want anything to arise to-day that will in any way mar the spirit of this great assembly and the work that it is going to do in the future. While you were deliberating here these past two days some of you thought only of this hour and this moment, but, gentlemen, I had an eye cast into the future and I was dreaming dreams and seeing visions of the years that are to come and the wonderful work, the wonderful influence, and the mighty power that this organization is going to have and exert upon this nation and upon the whole world, and I want you to think of it in these terms. This convention is a baby and we must not choke this baby. You can't give a young baby a gallon of castor oil the first week. It only requires castoria, that is all the first week. It can stand with a little mother's milk, and I want you to feel that way about it to-day." (Laughter and Applause.)
"Our first duty is beyond the shadow of a doubt to get this infant on its legs, and once we get it on its legs, it will be like the mighty Niagara Falls, there isn't anything in the world can dam it up. It will be a power that shall be known, and with influence all over America and for good all over the world. Let's be quiet and let's be sensible to-day until we get this infant on his legs. He's just a recruit, a raw recruit, and he has to be trained and we are going to do that now.
"Gentlemen, I want to say just here, if you can only think about this Legion—the chairman spoke of it last night to me—as the jewel of the ages. I believe that is the best interpretation I know. I cannot say anything greater than this: I believe God raised up America for this great hour; I can say that the strong young man of the time is to be the American Legion in this country and in the world.
"What the great seers of the past ages have dreamed and what they have planned and longed for, the opportunity that they sought, have suddenly been placed and in our hands. Are we going to be great men and big men? Will we arise to the dignity and be worthy of the occasion?
"I believe that we will. Oh, men, if I might make it plain to you that it seems to me I stand on the very rim of creation and I am speaking there to an angel who has never yet been able to see light. I said: 'Angel, what are you doing here?' and he said: 'I was placed here when God created this world'; and he said: 'God sent me to look down upon this world and report to him at one special time, and that one time only,' and I said: 'What was to be the nature of that report?' He said: 'God made man in His own image and God Himself is a being of knowledge, love, truth, democracy, and peace,' and He said to that angel, 'Don't you ever leave that world until you see dawn, until you see that man has come up to the place where he will begin to measure up to what I expected of him,' and that angel said to me, 'I have sat here through all the ages and I have seen times when I thought that the sunlight of God's great knowledge and love and truth was going to come over the hills and then some being like the Kaiser or Alexander or Napoleon or some one that was of a Bolsheviki type would rise up and retard it and the sun could never rise,' but he said: 'Thank God on April 6, 1917, I reported back to God when America entered this war that I had seen the dawn.' (Applause.)
"As little as you dream, maybe when you came here and as little as you thought about it in the commitment of time, I believe to-day that we stand on the dawn of the realization of the republic of man which is nothing short of the Kingdom of God on earth when men shall be men." (Applause.)
"So the first thing we are to do to-day is to get a great spirit, men, a great spirit that we can carry back. All the other questions will be ironed out in due time. Everything will be straightened out when we realize that five million men are going to be organized with the same spirit of love and loyalty and devotion and sacrifice and democracy that characterized their lives on the battlefield. They will never rest until they make this whole world bloom in love, democracy, peace and prosperity and equality and brotherhood for all mankind. That is what we are going to do and that is what this assembly means to-day. It is the world's great opportunity and your privilege to share with it.
"Now, then, I want to say that the soldier spirit is going to be my spirit and I believe it is going to be your spirit. When Wilson and the other men called us to the war, I was glad and ready immediately to offer my life because of the great principle. I said to those men last night in that Executive Committee and I mean it to-day, I'd gladly lay down my life to-day if laying down my life meant that this Legion should live and fulfill my dreams of its service to the country for these next fifty years. (Applause.) So do you think I want anything to come up here that would disrupt this body? Never! Do you think I want to make a fiery speech about something because it is my personal conviction? No, I have a hundred personal convictions that I would like to see operating in the United States and this convention, but it isn't the time and I am not going to bring them up here. I don't want to say anything that will keep all of us from pulling together like a military army for the great things that this convention in the future is going to stand for. So my final word is this: That this day, we get right down to business and that we omit everything that we can omit pertaining to the permanent policy of this organization that we cannot all immediately agree upon.
"If there is going to be anything discussed here to-day that everybody in this convention won't immediately agree upon and would hinder us from sending out to the nation word that we stand together and that we are going to pull together, that we caught a mighty vision and that we have gained the great spirit, then, brethren, let's carry that thing over until November when all the boys come home and then we will discuss it there. There are many things to-day that we can discuss that are important and fundamental and that are urgently needed in our nation this hour. Let's take those things up and get down to business on it to-day. Every Executive Member from each State pledged the chairman last night that he was going to act as a sergeant-at-arms in his delegation and hold the convention in order to-day. We are going to do the right thing and we won't be 'busted' by anything or by anybody, and when anything comes up that isn't the right thing for us to do to make a great impression on America, and the world, we will say hold that thing over until the baby is strong enough to do it right.
"I beg you to do those things. Somebody said: 'What are the things we can do to-day?' We mentioned them last night.