TOPEKA, KANSAS, OCTOBER 10.
The President's reception at Topeka on Friday, October 10, was a remarkable ovation; over 50,000 people from every county in the State greeted him. The famous Seventh U. S. Cavalry, Gen. J. W. Forsythe commanding, acted as the guard of honor. The President was welcomed by Gov. Lyman U. Humphrey, Senator John J. Ingalls, Chief-Justice Albert H. Horton, Mayor Robert L. Cofran, and the following distinguished committee: Ex-Gov. Thomas A. Osborn, ex-Gov. Geo. T. Anthony, Capt. Geo. R. Peck, Col. James Burgess, Hon. S. B. Bradford, Judge N. C. McFarland, Judge John Martin, A. J. Arnold, John Guthrie, Wm. P. Douthitt, John Mileham, William Sims, Cyrus K. Holliday, Perry G. Noel, S. T. Howe, Bernard Kelly, J. Lee Knight, N. D. McGinley, Wm. H. Rossington, Rev. Dr. F. S. McCabe, Geo. W. Reed, Elihu Holcomb, Lark Odin, L. J. Webb, Milo B. Ward, J. K. Hudson, F. P. McLennan, H. O. Garvey, Frank Root, John M. Bloss, John F. Gwinn, A. M. Fuller, J. W. F. Hughes, John R. Peckham, James L. King, Henry Bennett, Geo. H. Evans, M. C. Holman, John C. Gordon, H. P. Throop, Joseph R. Hankland, T. W. Durham, Judge C. G. Foster, A. K. Rodgers, A. B. Jetmore, and Thomas F. Oenes.
The parade was an imposing affair. Thirty thousand veterans were in line. The Indiana contingent numbered over 1,000, and as they passed the reviewing carriage, led by Major George Noble, cheer after cheer was given in honor of the distinguished Hoosier. Nearly 6,000 school children participated in the parade. In the afternoon the President visited the reunion grounds with Commander Ira F. Collins and other officers of the Kansas Department, G. A. R. Governor Humphrey delivered the welcoming address.
The President responded as follows:
My Fellow-citizens—I am strongly tempted to omit even an attempt to speak to you to-day; I think it would be better that I should go home and write you an open letter. [Great laughter and cheering.] I have been most profoundly impressed with the incidents which have attended this tremendous and, I am told, unprecedented gathering of the soldiers and citizens of the great State of Kansas. No one can interpret in speech the lessons of this occasion. No power of description is adequate to convey to those who have not looked upon it or into the spirit and power of this meeting. This assembly is altogether too large to be greeted individually—one cannot get his arms around it. [Laughter and cheers.] And yet so kindly have you received me that I would be glad if to each of you I could convey the sense of gratitude and appreciation which is in my heart. There is nothing for any of us to do but to open wide our hearts and let these elevating suggestions take possession of them. I am sure there has been nothing here to-day that does not point in the direction of a higher individual, social, State and national life. Who can look upon this vast array of soldiers who fought to a victorious consummation the war for the Union without bowing his head and his heart in grateful reverence? [Great applause.] Who can look upon these sons of veterans, springing from a patriotic ancestry, full of the spirit of '61, and coming into the vigor and strength of manhood to take up the burdens that we must soon lay down, and who, turning from these to the sweet-faced children whose hands are filled with flowers and flags, can fail to feel those institutions of liberty are secure for two generations at least? [Great cheering.] I never knew until to-day the extent of the injury which the State of Kansas had inflicted upon the State of Indiana [laughter and cheers]—never until I had looked upon that long line of Indiana soldiers that you plucked from us when the war was over by the superior inducement which your fields and cities offered to their ambitious toil. Indiana grieves for their loss, but rejoices in the homes and prosperity they have found here. [Cheers.] They are our proud contribution to the great development which this State has made. They are our proud contribution to that great national reputation which your State has established as the friend as well as one of the bulwarks of liberty and law. [Cheers.] It was not unnatural that they, coming back from scenes where comrades had shed their blood for liberty, should choose to find homes in a State that had the baptism of martyrs' blood upon its infant brow. [Prolonged cheering.] The future is safe if we are but true to ourselves, true to these children whose instruction is committed to us. There is no other foe that can at all obstruct or hinder our onward progress except treason in our own midst—treachery to the great fundamental principle of our Government, which is obedience to the law. The law, the will of the majority expressed in orderly, constitutional methods, is the only king to which we bow. But to him all must bow. Let it be understood in all your communities that no selfish interest of the individual, no class interests, however entrenched, shall be permitted to assert their convenience against the law. This is good American doctrine, and if it can be made to prevail in all the States of the Union until every man, secure under the law in his own right, is compelled by the law to yield to every other man his rights, nothing can shake our repose. [Cheers.]
Now, fellow-citizens, you will excuse me from the attempt at further speech. I beg you again to believe that I am grateful, so far as your presence here has any personal reference to myself—grateful as a public officer for this evidence of your love and affection for the Constitution and the country which we all love. [Great applause.]
There is some grumbling in Kansas, and I think it is because your advantages are too great. [Laughter.] A single year of disappointment in agricultural returns should not make you despair of the future or tempt you to unsafe expedients. Life is made up of averages, and I think yours will show a good average. Let us look forward with hope, with courage, fidelity, thrift, patience, good neighborly hearts, and a patriotic love for the flag. Kansas and her people have an assured and happy future. [Prolonged cheers.]