Let me instance one case. The Oregon and California Railroad begins at Portland and runs south toward California. The California and Oregon Railroad begins at Sacramento and runs north toward Oregon. They meet somewhere north of the Oregon line. They are both adjuncts of the Southern Pacific. When those roads were contemplated, the Government, by an act of Congress, donated to them 6,000,000 acres of land, much of it covered with as fine timber as grows out of doors—I bar none. In the act of Congress donating that land it was specified that the land should be sold in 160-acre tracts for $2.50 per acre to all actual settlers who might apply therefor. Was any of it sold to actual settlers? A very few acres of it. Half of the 6,000,000 acres was sold, however, in large tracts to land speculators, to timber corporations, and to people of that kind and class, for $5.00, $10.00, $15.00, $20.00, $30.00, $50.00 an acre. And when the Southern Pacific was brought to bar and asked why it hadn't lived up to the letter and spirit of the law, it said it had. And then we asked, "How do you make that out?" And it said, "Why, only a few actual settlers have applied for the land." And we asked, "Haven't people gone there and attempted to buy that land of you in order that they might settle upon it?" "Oh, yes, but they are not actual settlers." "Why not?" "Because we construe the words 'actual settlers' to mean those persons who had actually settled in that country before the act of Congress was passed." (Laughter and applause.) And when, at the Sacramento session of the National Irrigation Congress, Mr E. H. Harriman was asked why his company was holding 3,000,000 acres of that land grant, he said, "For future generations." And everybody laughed.
Now, let that sink into you. The absolute arrogance, the indecent indecency of that kind of a proposition ought to make the blood boil in the veins of every American citizen who is face to face, or who was seven or eight years ago face to face with the proposition whether or not the American people were to rule themselves or whether they were to continue to be ruled by the "big interests," as Jimmie Garfield puts it. (Applause)
The sun rises every morning, three hundred and sixty-five days in the year, in California; it reddens the cheeks of our girls; it makes our boys strong and healthy; it brings the gold to the oranges that hang upon our trees. And for all these years we have been thanking God for the rising of the sun in California. "The gentle rain from heaven" has fallen alike upon the just and the unjust out there in California—upon those who deserve to be rained on and those who do not deserve to be rained on (laughter). And all these years we have been thanking God for the gentle rain that falls from heaven. But yesterday as I sat here in this great Auditorium and listened to the Governor of Montana tell what Montana had been doing for this Nation, I began to think (I do not wish to be irreverent in saying it) that we were under no obligations in California to God for the rising of the sun or the falling of the rain; but that we were under great obligations to Montana (laughter and applause) for all the good things that belong to California and Californians. And as my good friend, Governor Norris (to put a name to him) was telling his lurid history of Montana's great doings, I couldn't help but think that as an American citizen some of the things that lie in the State of Montana belong to me, belong to you, belong even to those who live on the hook of Cape Cod or away up in the northeastern corner of Maine or down on the tip of Florida; that those things which belong to the people of the United States even in Montana belong to us all, and that Montana has no exclusive right to them until our representatives in Congress give them to that State, and I am one of those who pray God that it will be a long time before the State of Montana gets from us the exclusive right to, and ownership of, those things that are ours. (Great applause)
Some time ago a good friend of mine, who has never denied when I have charged him with receiving $20,000 per annum (and by the way, he is a delegate from California to this Congress) as the chief counsel of one of the power trusts of California, said to me, "Oh, how the President is usurping the powers of the Government! Isn't it awful?" But I never could see anything very awful about it when Roosevelt and Garfield and Pinchot and the rest of them were hustling around trying to keep my friend's corporation from stealing from us of California the few things we have left (laughter and applause); nor have I forgotten that, before the time of Roosevelt, Garfield and Pinchot, the corporations represented by my friend did not believe in State rights. But since the time of Roosevelt, Pinchot and Garfield they have begun to sing a different song. That song is State rights. Nor have I forgotten that my friend used to be and still claims to be one of the most hide-bound republicans that mortal man ever looked upon (laughter and applause). Now he says that the rights of the people of the States are being pillaged and plundered and robbed away from them. I speak again for my State of California when I say that if there is anything in the State of California that the National Government has not nailed down that has not been stolen, I would like to know what it is. (Great laughter and applause)
There are, as you heard Mr Herbert Knox Smith say here on this platform an hour ago, four great power corporations in the State of California. That is so; but there are practically only two power trusts in the State of California. When the Government declared its intention to hold on to the few power sites that are left in the State of California in the National forests, all of a sudden these power trusts wanted all the water-power of California developed in the interests of the people; and they can't say it fast enough or often enough (laughter and applause). But, as you heard Mr Smith say, they have developed and are using only half of the power that they already have in their possession. So when they get gay around where I am, I generally say, "Well, that's all right, but go on and develop all the power you have got now; and after you have got that developed, then we'll talk about giving you some more; because I know just as sure as you fellows get an opportunity to lay your hands on any of those power sites in the National forests you'll steal them and put them in cold storage, and you'll make my children and their children, so long as there are any children in the State of California, dig up the last dollar that they have to pay you for the necessary electric current to do their business during the next century and the century after that until the end of time in California" (applause). And I, for one, as I say to them, while I am somewhat hardened and calloused by being robbed myself, don't want my children or their children to be robbed into the poor-house and the penitentiary by anybody's power corporation (applause). Therefore I hope and pray that those gentlemen who are so apprehensive that the people of the country will not get, unless they get it through the States, the right to use the things that belong to all the people of the country, will pause until the State of Montana, the State of California, the State of Washington, and all the Pacific-coast States, at least, if not the rest of the Nation, are governed by the people of those States and not by the public-service corporations. (Great and prolonged applause)
Christopher G. Horr—Mr Chairman: The State of Washington having been mentioned, I wish one minute to speak in behalf of that State.
President Baker—Is the Gentleman a Delegate from the State of Washington?
Mr Horr—Yes. It has been stated from the platform that the State of Washington believed in State rights. I want to contradict that. As one of the Delegates of the State of Washington, I want to declare my belief that not only the Granges of the State of Washington, as Brother Pardee has stated, but the majority of the citizens of that State, will repudiate any such sentiment coming from anyone in this Congress (great applause and cheers). I want to say that the State of Washington is peopled in part by 25,000 former residents of the State of Minnesota, and that they have full confidence in the National Government—they have full confidence in President Taft, they have full confidence in your Senators Nelson and Clapp, and in Congressman Stevens and the other congressmen of the United States; and I consider it an insult to the Congress and the President of the United States to say that they will not treat the people of the State of Washington as they should be treated. I want to say to you, Ladies and Gentlemen, that the State of Washington will keep step to the music of the Union. (Great applause)