Mr. Chairman, and you, my Fellow-Americans:
I am glad indeed to have the honor of coming to-day to your beautiful city in your beautiful State to greet, on behalf of the whole country, a Tennesseean who has rendered high and honorable service to the whole country—a Tennesseean of whom it can be said, as it has been said of the Greek hero:
“Much has he seen and known, cities of men,
And manners, climates, councils, governments,
Himself not least, but honored of them all;
Has drunk delight of battle with his peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.”
We are one people absolutely. The memories of the Civil War are now heritages of honor alike for those whose fathers wore the blue and for those whose fathers wore the gray. There is one curious and not inappropriate coincidence to-day—my mother’s brother served under Mrs. Wright’s father in the Confederate Navy. I am proud of his valor; and I can say this freely, for if I had been old enough I would myself have surely worn the blue uniform.
I come here to-day to greet General Wright because it has been given to him to render a peculiar service to the whole country. A man can render service of the very highest character at home, but owing to the very nature of our system of government, he must, in his election at least, represent particularly a given party. I say in his election at least, for after election, if he is worth anything, he must be a representative of the whole country. But there are certain branches of the public service in which if we are wise and far-seeing we will never allow partisan politics to enter. There must be no partisan politics in the army or the navy of the United States. All that concerns us to know about any general or admiral, about a mighty captain by sea or by land, is whether he is a thoroughly fit commander of men and loyal to the country as a whole. In the same way if we are wise, if we care for our reputation abroad, if we are sensitive of our honor at home, we will allow no question of partisan politics ever to enter into the administration of the great islands which came under our flag as a result of the war with Spain.
Hence I say that General Wright, like Governor Taft and his associates, has rendered a peculiar service to every man jealous of the honor of the American name in what he has done in administering the Philippine Islands. For fourteen months it has been part of my business to see how the work there was done. I am not speaking exaggeratedly, I am speaking literally, telling the naked truth, when I say that never during that time has a question of party politics entered into even the smallest action of those in control of the Philippine Islands.