Have Faith in Massachusetts; 2d ed. | Page 9

"What were our lives without thee? What all our lives to save thee? We
reck not what we gave thee; We will not dare to doubt thee, But ask
whatever else and we will dare."

V
RIVERSIDE
AUGUST 28, 1916
It may be that there would be votes for the Republican Party in the
promise of low taxes and vanishing expenditures. I can see an
opportunity for its candidates to pose as the apostles of retrenchment
and reform. I am not one of those who believe votes are to be won by
misrepresentations, skilful presentations of half truths, and plausible
deductions from false premises. Good government cannot be found on
the bargain-counter. We have seen samples of bargain-counter
government in the past when low tax rates were secured by increasing
the bonded debt for current expenses or refusing to keep our
institutions up to the standard in repairs, extensions, equipment, and

accommodations. I refuse, and the Republican Party refuses, to endorse
that method of sham and shoddy economy. New projects can wait, but
the commitments of the Commonwealth must be maintained. We
cannot curtail the usual appropriations or the care of mothers with
dependent children or the support of the poor, the insane, and the infirm.
The Democratic programme of cutting the State tax, by vetoing
appropriations of the utmost urgency for improvements and
maintenance costs of institutions and asylums of the unfortunates of the
State, cannot be the example for a Republican administration. The
result has been that our institutions are deficient in resources--even in
sleeping accommodations--and it will take years to restore them to the
old-time Republican efficiency. Our party will have no part in a scheme
of economy which adds to the misery of the wards of the
Commonwealth--the sick, the insane, and the unfortunate; those who
are too weak even to protest.
Because I know these conditions I know a Republican administration
would face an increasing State tax rather than not see them remedied.
The Republican Party lit the fire of progress in Massachusetts. It has
tended it faithfully. It will not flicker now. It has provided here
conditions of employment, and safeguards for health, that are surpassed
nowhere on earth. There will be no backward step. The reuniting of the
Republican Party means no reaction in the protection of women and
children in our industrial life. These laws are settled. These principles
are established. Minor modifications are possible, but the foundations
are not to be disturbed. The advance may have been too rapid in some
cases, but there can be no retreat. That is the position of the great
majority of those who constitute our party.
We recognize there is need of relief--need to our industries, need to our
population in manufacturing centres; but it must come from
construction, not from destruction. Put an administration on Beacon
Hill that can conserve our resources, that can protect us from further
injuries, until a national Republican policy can restore those conditions
of confidence and prosperity under which our advance began and under
which it can be resumed.
This makes the coming State election take on a most important
aspect--not that it can furnish all the needed relief, but that it will
increase the probability of a complete relief in the near future if it be

crowned with Republican victory.

VI
AT THE HOME OF AUGUSTUS P. GARDNER, HAMILTON
SEPTEMBER, 1916
Standing here in the presence of our host, our thoughts naturally turn to
a discussion of "Preparedness." I do not propose to overlook that issue;
but I shall offer suggestions of another kind of "preparedness." Not that
I shrink from full and free consideration of the military needs of our
country. Nor do I agree that it is now necessary to remain silent
regarding the domestic or foreign relations of this Nation.
I agree that partisanship should stop at the boundary line, but I assert
that patriotism should begin there. Others, however, have covered this
field, and I leave it to them and to you.
I do, however, propose to discuss the "preparedness" of the State to
care for its unfortunates. And I propose to do this without any party
bias and without blame upon any particular individual, but in just
criticism of a system.
In Massachusetts, we are citizens before we are partisans. The good
name of the Commonwealth is of more moment to us than party
success. But unfortunately, because of existing conditions, that good
name, in one particular at least, is now in jeopardy.
Massachusetts, for twenty years, has been able honestly to boast of the
care it has bestowed upon her sick, poor, and insane. Her institutions
have been regarded as models throughout the world. We are falling
from that proud estate; crowded housing conditions, corridors used for
sleeping purposes, are not only