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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
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 I Copy 2 
 
 ADDRESS 
 
 OF 
 
 PRESIDENT WILSON 
 
 ACCEPTING THE MONUMENT IN 
 
 MEMORY OF THE CONFEDERATE 
 
 DEAD AT ARLINGTON NATIONAL 
 
 CEMETERY 
 
 JUNE 4, 1914 
 
 WASHINGTON 
 1914 
 
 
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 Co »o 4 ft 
 
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 IUN 22 
 

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 ADDRESS. 
 
 Mr. Chairman, Mrs. McLaurin Stevens, Ladies and 
 
 Gentlemen : 
 
 I assure you that I am profoundly aware of the 
 solemn significance of the thing that has now taken 
 place. The Daughters of the Confederacy have pre- 
 sented a memorial of their dead to the Government of 
 the United States. I hope that you have noted the his- 
 tory of the conception of this idea. It was proposed 
 by a President of the United States who had himself 
 been a distinguished officer in the Union Army. It 
 was authorized by an act of Congress of the United 
 States. The corner stone of the monument was laid 
 by a President of the United States elevated to his posi- 
 tion by the votes of the party which had chiefly prided 
 itself upon sustaining the war for the Union. And, 
 now, it has fallen to my lot to accept in the name of 
 the great Government which I am privileged for the 
 time to represent this emblem of a reunited people. I 
 am not so much happy as proud to participate in this 
 capacity on such an occasion, — proud that I should rep- 
 resent such a people. Am I mistaken, ladies and gentle- 
 men, in supposing that nothing of this sort could have 
 occurred in anything but a democracy? The people of 
 a democracy are not related to their rulers as subjects 
 are related to a government. They are themselves the 
 sovereign authority, and as they are neighbors of each 
 
 47751—14 (3) 
 
other, quickened by the same influences and moved by 
 the same motives, they can understand each other. 
 They are shot through with some of the deepest and 
 profoundest instincts of human sympathy. They 
 choose their governments; they select their rulers; they 
 live their own life, and they will not have that life 
 disturbed and discolored by fraternal misunderstand- 
 ings. I know that a reuniting of spirits like this can 
 take place more quickly in our time than in any other 
 because men are now united by an easier transmission 
 of those influences which make up the foundations of 
 peace and of mutual understanding, but no process 
 can work these effects unless there is a conducting me- 
 dium. The conducting medium in this instance is the 
 united heart of a great people. I am not going to 
 detain you by trying to repeat any of the eloquent 
 thoughts which have moved us this afternoon, for I 
 rejoice in the simplicity of the task which is assigned 
 to me. My privilege is this, ladies and gentlemen: To 
 declare this chapter in the history of the United States 
 closed and ended, and I bid you turn with me with your 
 faces to the future, quickened by the memories of the 
 past, but with nothing to do with the contests of the past, 
 knowing, as we have shed our blood upon opposite 
 sides, we now face and admire one another. I do not 
 know how many years ago it was that the Century 
 Dictionary was published, but I remember one day in 
 the Century Cyclopedia of Names I had occasion to 
 turn to the name of Robert E. Lee, and I found him 
 there in that book published in New York City simply 
 described as a great American general. The gener- 
 osity of our judgments did not begin to-day. The gener- 
 osity of our judgment was made up soon after this 
 great struggle was over. Men came and sat together 
 
again in the Congress and united in all the efforts of 
 peace and of government, and our solemn duty is to 
 see that each one of us is in his own consciousness and 
 in his own conduct a replica of this great reunited 
 people. It is our duty and our privilege to be like the 
 country we represent and, speaking no word of malice, 
 no word of criticism even, stand shoulder to shoulder 
 to lift the burdens of mankind in the future and show 
 the paths of freedom to all the world. 
 
\ 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
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