Fifty Years of Public Service Part 38

For a time Mr. Cannon was apparently very unpopular and the people seemed disposed to hold him responsible for much they did not approve of in legislation; but his feeling is pa.s.sing away, and Mr. Cannon will be regarded as an able legislator, an able Speaker, a man who has during his service in Congress saved the Government untold millions. His honesty and devotion to duty cannot be doubted, and he will go down in history as one of the foremost leaders in Congress of his day, when those who are now criticising him are forgotten.

On January 16, 1907, I was by the Forty-fifth General a.s.sembly elected for the fifth time as United States Senator from the State of Illinois. This was an entirely different contest from any previous one I had ever had, as the State had enacted a primary law which contained a proviso that the names of candidates for United States Senator could be placed on the ballot and voted for at the primaries, but that such vote was advisory merely. This is as far as the primary law can go on the question of the election of United States Senators. I had not the slightest objection to having my name go before the people, the individual voters, as a candidate for the Senate. The first primary law was declared unconst.i.tutional by the Supreme Court of the State, and as soon as I heard the decision I promptly wired the Governor, commending him for his announcement that he would call a special session of the Legislature to enact a new primary law, and I took occasion to add that I hoped by friends would work with him in the pa.s.sage of the law, and that it would provide for a vote on United States Senator.

The Legislature did enact a new law, providing that the primaries be held in August, 1906. Former Governor Richard Yates was the only candidate against me. He made a canva.s.s of the State, and a very thorough one. He had a considerable advantage in that he had almost all the politicians in the State who were holding State offices actively working for him. I made no canva.s.s and personally did very little about it at all. I was willing to leave the matter to the people, and determined, if it was a fair vote, to abide by the result of the primaries, and if defeated at the primaries to support Governor Yates. I believe that Governor Yates had the same determination,--at least his conduct after the primaries, in withdrawing from the contest, would indicate that he had. I am glad to be able to say that throughout the contest and at its close, he acted very fairly. He made a straight, fair fight, and lost, then abided by the result, just as I would have done had I lost.

My friends in different parts of the State took an active interest in my behalf, for which I want to avail myself of this opportunity to express to them my appreciation. I might add here that all during my public career it has been my good fortune to have the support and friends.h.i.+p of a very high cla.s.s of men, men whose honor and integrity were beyond question, and who were capable of filling any office. I cannot undertake to name them, but I know that they will understand the deep debt of grat.i.tude that I owe to them.

It was very flattering to me that I carried the primaries by a substantial majority, having carried the popular vote, a majority of the Senatorial districts, and a majority of the Congressional districts. It demonstrated to me that the people had confidence in me and were satisfied with my record as a Senator. It was the first time that I had been voted for directly by the people for any office since my re-election as Governor in 1880. The result could not but be gratifying.

Every one in the State accepted the result of the primaries, and the question was regarded as settled. When the Legislature convened, I was the unanimous choice of the Republican caucus and was voted for by every Republican in the Legislature on joint ballot. There seemed to be no bitterness or hard feeling on the part of any one.

After the general election in November, I returned to Was.h.i.+ngton to prepare for the session of Congress, and there was so much important work before my committee and in the Senate generally, that it seemed impossible for me to leave there in order to thank the members of the Legislature for the high honor they had conferred upon me.

I addressed a letter to the members of the Forty-fifth General a.s.sembly, which was read, and from which I will quote:

"I desire to express to the Republican members of the Forty-fifth General a.s.sembly my profound grat.i.tude for your action in unanimously declaring in favor of my re-election to again represent Illinois in the United States Senate.

"In electing me to the United States Senate for five consecutive terms, a greater distinction will be conferred by the State than has been conferred upon any other man in the history of Illinois.

"I shall appreciate this election the more, because for the first time the question of the selection of a United States Senator was submitted to the people, and without any active campaign on my part, the great majority of the voters declared me to be their preference.

"Until the recent primaries, my name had not been submitted directly to the voters of the State since I was re-elected Governor in 1880, and it was no small gratification to me, after twenty-six years had come and gone, to have this expression of continued confidence and approval of my record as a Senator.

"I wish now to return my most sincere thanks to the people of the State who have thus signally honored me.

"During the twenty-four years I have represented the State in the Senate, I have endeavored to the best of my ability to perform my whole duty to the country and the State, and the only pledge I can make is, that I shall continue in the performance of my duty in the future as in the past.

"I would prefer to have the pleasure of being present when a Senatorial election takes place, in order to express personally to the Legislature my appreciation; but there are so many important questions to settle, and so much important legislation to enact during the short session of Congress, ending as it does on March 4, that it has seemed to me to be more in accord with my duty to remain in Was.h.i.+ngton in the performance of my official business.

"Your Legislature a.s.sembles this year in the midst of the greatest era of prosperity that has ever prevailed in this country. There has never been a time in our history that we have had so long an uninterrupted period of prosperity. This prosperous and happy condition has come as the result, in a large part, of Republican rule and Republican policy.

"For nearly forty-five years the history of the United States has been the history of the Republican party, because, with the exception of two short periods, Republican administration has guided the destinies of the Nation; and the achievements of Republican administrations during those forty-five years const.i.tute the greatest record in our history, and that record is a complete defence of the party against a.s.saults from whatever quarter.

"We stand to-day at the head of all the Nations in the value of imports and exports, and these maintain the prosperity our country has enjoyed since the American people declared in favor of a protective tariff and a sound-money standard.

"The people do not prosper under vicious government. Good government is essential to real prosperity, to properly develop and to advance it. The Republican party has always secured for the Nation stability, confidence and prosperity at home, and respect and prestige abroad.

"We are to-day at peace with all the Nations of the world. Perhaps never before in our history have we had such intimate and friendly relations with all the great Nations as we have to-day. Our country has the respect of all the Governments of the world, great and small. We are gradually a.s.suming the first place among the naval powers; but, unlike the older Nations, we are acquiring a great navy in the interest of peace. Under the policy of this Government, such a navy is one of the surest a.s.surances against war. The Nations know that the United States stands for peace, and under Roosevelt's Republican administration, greater progress has been made in the direction of international arbitration as a means of settling disputes among nations than under any other previous administration in our history.

"While the nations know that we stand for peace, they also know that we will not tamely submit to the imposition of wrong, or to offenses against our own honor and dignity, or to the oppression of our sister republics in this Western world. We have no desire to rob these republics of their independence, or a single foot of their territory. Our recent action in Cuba has been an object lesson to these republics, and to the world at large, of our disinterested friends.h.i.+p. As we have repeatedly a.s.sured them, our only desire is that they shall follow us in peace and prosperity.

"The construction of the great ca.n.a.l across the isthmus of Panama will bind them closer to us, and at the same time will almost double our strength as a naval power.

"Too much credit cannot be given to President Roosevelt for the great and wonderful results which he has accomplished in the interest of the country, but the legislative branch of the Government has done its full share.

"The record made during the last session of Congress in the enactment of wise laws for the direct benefit of the people has not been equalled since the Civil War--if at all, since the adoption of the Const.i.tution.

"I will not detain the caucus longer than to repeat my sincere obligations to you and to express through you my thanks to the people of the State, whose representatives you are, for the signal honor that has been conferred upon me."

CHAPTER x.x.xIV CONCLUSION

Generally I might say that I am quite content; but as I sit down now in the evening time of my life, it is a source of sadness and wonder to me that I have survived both my wives and all of my children. One by one I have laid them away in beautiful Oak Ridge Cemetery, in Springfield, where I myself will one day be laid beside them. I have had a delightful home life; no man could have had a more happy and peaceful one. As I look back now, I cannot remember that either wife or children ever caused me one moment's pain. I was twice married. My first wife, Hannah M. Fisher, to whom I was married in 1855, and who died in 1861, was of a very amiable spirit, a woman of more than ordinary culture, and was the mother of my first two children, Mrs. Ridgely and Mrs. Hardie, who lived to womanhood, but both of whom have pa.s.sed away. My second wife, Julia Fisher, was the sister of my first wife. No better or truer woman ever lived. She was a devoted helpmate to me during all the years that I have occupied high public office and needed the support and help of a woman. She did her full part and filled her place on every occasion with dignity and propriety. It seems that her death is the last great sorrow I shall have to bear.

The memory of the children whom I lost in their infancy is naturally dimmed by the pa.s.sage of time, but it is hard for me to understand the justice of things when I remember the death of my two daughters, Ella, wife of William Barret Ridgely, and Carrie, wife of Robert Gordon Hardie, who were taken just in the very prime of womanhood, just in the most beautiful period of a woman's life, and just at a time when they had the most to live for.

As I think of it now, I do not know where I obtained the strength to survive all these sorrows. I have no great fear of death, except the natural dread of the physical pain which usually accompanies it. I certainly wish beyond any words I have power to express that I could have greater a.s.surance that there will be a reuniting with those we love and those who have loved us in some future world; but from my reading of Scripture, and even admitting that there is a hereafter, I cannot find any satisfactory evidence to warrant such a belief. Could I believe that I should meet the loved ones who have gone before, I do not know but that I should look forward with pleasure to the "pa.s.sing across." Not having this belief, I am quite content to stay where I am as long as I can; and finally, when old Charon appears to row me over the river Styx, I shall be ready to go.