Republic, nor in its crises since have they saved or served it.  The faith of the fathers was a mighty force in its creation, and the faith of their descendants has wrought its progress and furnished its defenders.  They are obstructionists who despair, and who would destroy confidence in the ability of our people to solve wisely and for civilization the mighty problems resting upon them.  The American people, intrenched in freedom at home, take their love for it with them wherever they go, and they reject as mistaken and unworthy the doctrine that we lose our own liberties by securing the enduring foundations of liberty to others.  Our institutions will not deteriorate by extension, and our sense of justice will not abate under tropic suns in distant seas.  As heretofore, so hereafter will the nation demonstrate its fitness to administer any new estate which events devolve upon it, and in the fear of God will “take occasion by the hand and make the bounds of freedom wider yet.”  If there are those among us who would make our way more difficult, we must not be disheartened, but the more earnestly dedicate ourselves to the task upon which we have rightly entered.  The path of progress is seldom smooth.  New things are often found hard to do.  Our fathers found them so.  We find them so.  They are inconvenient.  They cost us something.  But are we not made better for the effort and sacrifice, and are not those we serve lifted up and blessed?

We will be consoled, too, with the fact that opposition has confronted every onward movement of the Republic from its opening hour until now, but without success.  The Republic has marched on and on, and its step has exalted freedom and humanity.  We are undergoing the same ordeal as did our predecessors nearly a century ago.  We are following the course they blazed.  They triumphed.  Will their successors falter and plead organic impotency in the nation?  Surely after 125 years of achievement for mankind we will not now surrender our equality with other powers on matters fundamental and essential to nationality.  With no such purpose was the nation created.  In no such spirit has it developed its full and independent sovereignty.  We adhere to the principle of equality among ourselves, and by no act of ours will we assign to ourselves a subordinate rank in the family of nations.

My fellow-citizens, the public events of the past four years have gone into history.  They are too near to justify recital.  Some of them were unforeseen; many of them momentous and far-reaching in their consequences to ourselves and our relations with the rest of the world.  The part which the United States bore so honorably in the thrilling scenes in China, while new to American life, has been in harmony with its true spirit and best traditions, and in dealing with the results its policy will be that of moderation and fairness.