Final Report of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission

by Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission

When the treaty signed in Paris one hundred years ago, and by which the area of the United States was to be more than doubled, stood for ratification before Congress, there were, contrary to what we might suppose, protracted discussions and objections of many sorts. Some thought that the title to the new acquisition was not a sufficient one; others were anxious on account of the very magnitude of the new territories, and expressed the fear that the federal tie would be loosened if extended to such remote and partially unknown regions. Many were the criticisms and long the speeches.

Senator Jackson, of Georgia, rose and turning toward one of the hostile parties, said: "In a century, sir, we shall be well populated * * * and instead of the description given of it by the honorable gentleman, instead of howling wilderness where no civilized foot shall ever tread, if we could return at the proper period, we should find it the seat of science and civilization."

Senator Jackson's time has come the very year he named; one century has just elapsed since he spoke. If he could return among us, he would see no howling wilderness, but one of the most brilliant gatherings which this country has ever beheld, including the Chief of the State and a former Chief of the State, representatives of all the powers of the globe, soldiers and sailors, priests, magistrates, savants, artists, tradesmen and agriculturists, workmen and citizens innumerable, all bent upon consecrating by their presence and homage the work done during the hundred years. Good work indeed; nay, stupendous.

Sanguine as he was, Senator Jackson would, I think, scarcely believe his eyes and ears if he saw the matchless sight we presently behold, and the preparation for the pending exhibition of the produce, all the discoveries, all the art of the wide earth.

He would scarcely believe his ears if he heard that we came in twenty-seven hours from the place where he had delivered his prophecy and which had become only two years before the seat of Government. No less would be his surprise, if he learned that the supposed "howling wilderness" had been turned into an immense garden, dotted with wealthy towns; that all the land called in his days Louisiana produces yearly now millions of bushels of various kinds of grain, and that the private belongings of the successors of the scattered settlers of his time are valued in ours at many millions of dollars.

But he would not be surprised if he learned that the federal tie has not been loosened; that the number of States has increased, their wealth, too, the number of their inhabitants, their importance in every respect, and that they consider as more and more sacred the bond which unites them to the older part of the community. Such are the effects of liberty and just laws.

In this triumphal day, amid the shouts of joy, the reports of the guns and ringing of the bells, considering the splendid results, it is only natural that we carry our look backward to the past and have a thought for the lonely pioneers of long ago, who came one by one to this then unknown land, and who tried among incredible difficulties to make it less unknown, to make it more productive and easier to reclaim for you, their distant inheritors. No one, I am sure, will think it amiss that I, a compatriot of theirs and a representative of their country, shall recall at this day their efforts, and express to-day's gratitude for yesterday's work. For they were hardy men, those children of distant France; they were plucky, enterprising, and courageous; they led strenuous lives indeed; all qualities for which you ever had a special regard. To say that they did not fear danger is to slander them; they loved it.

Soldiers, missionaries, governors of cities, explorers came year after year from the time of Louis XIV, attracted by the chances or the beauty of the unknown and the opportunity of increasing their country's dominions, or of becoming famous, or of instructing souls, and of dying, if death was to be met, bravely and honorably. Very French they were, with all the qualities of their race, and something else, perhaps, some of them, than the qualities.

As they went down the great rivers from the regions of the Canadian lakes to the Mexican sea they gave them French names, and the reading of a map of that epoch reminds one of the century of the Sun King. There he is with all his court, figured in lands, cities, lakes, and rivers. Louisiana bears his own name; Lake Pontchartrain the name of his minister for marine; Fort Duquesne, the name of his famous sailor. There were also the rivers Colbert and Seigneley, better known nowadays as Mississippi and Illinois. One of the Great Lakes had been named after the Duke of Orleans; another, the great Conde, the winner of Rocroy; another after his brother, Prince de Conti; but this last inland sea, as indeed most of the others, soon resumed its Indian name, the homely name of Lake Erie, the Lake of the Cat.

Very French they were, those men—this Father Marquette, who, with Joliet, first beheld the magnificent water that washes your walls, the vast existence of which was then unknown, and who explored it down to the country of the Arkansas; this Robert Cavalier Sieur de la Salle, who had, long before our days, our days' notions of the importance of great commercial routes; whose purpose was to open one to China across this continent at the very spot where your northern lines of railways have opened theirs; who called his first house on American soil La China in order that he might never forget his initial purpose. He died in the quest, but not before he had explored the Mississippi down to its mouth; not before he had ascertained that its source was to the West, and that the river therefore could be used as a guiding thread toward the Pacific; not before he had made the first French settlement in this, your country, and given it a name, which has not been replaced by another, and is its present name of Louisiana.