"We are here to-day to dedicate a building which represents the interest of New York State in this great Exposition. Here, during the period when thousands shall visit these grounds, those who owe allegiance to the Empire State will find a place which will typify to them their home and impress them, let us hope, to a greater degree with the vastness of our State and of the position which it occupies in our commonwealth of nations. To those who have been intrusted with the work we owe thanks for the conception of their duty and for this magnificent edifice which, in its strength and beauty of architecture, is symbolical of the Empire State. In every phase of our nation's history, in all that has made it great and powerful and respected, New York has been both conservative and wise in the aid which it offered, powerful in the resources which it furnished in the building up of our republic. From the time when the courage and patriotism of our forefathers wrought out the nation down to the latest acquisition of our territory there is no page of history which does not tell of the devotion and statesmanship of New York's citizens. "It is always a remarkable event in the history of the world when one nation disposes of any part of its domain to another through peaceful methods. War has almost always been the means through which nations have expanded and pushed forward their boundary lines. Trade requiring an outlet has more frequently been the cause of bloodshed than almost any other national or international question. That our country, therefore, at an early period in its history, should have been able, through peaceful means, to secure the vast domain beyond the Mississippi is a tribute to the statesmanlike policies of those who conceived its purchase. True it may be that the wars of other nations aided in its consummation, but it is also equally true that the man who was most directly responsible for the purchase was a son of the Empire State. Nor did the results of this early diplomatic victory stop here. The principle thus established has frequently led to more peaceful methods of adjusting questions of territorial boundary, both in our own and other countries. It may be that much that has since been accomplished through arbitration is but the evolution of this idea, and it may lead, let us hope, to the time when such questions will no longer render necessary the arbitrament of the sword.