What I wish to say is, that those who come from Europe to this country leave countries that are governed by kings, and come to a country that is governed by the people. In some of the countries of Europe the people might almost as well be slaves, for they have no vote and no one to speak for them, and the man who rules them is born to power. Even in England, which is the freest of them all, there is a king and queen and a House of Lords who are born to power. The people can vote, but only for members of the House of Commons. They have nothing to do with the monarch or the lords. Of course you all know that this is not the case in our country. Here every man in power is put there by the votes of the people. As President Lincoln said, we have a government "of the people, by the people, and for the people." We did not have such a government before the 4th of July, 1776. Our country was then governed by a king, and, what was worse, this king was on the other side of the ocean, and cared nothing for the people of America except as money bags to fill his purse. But after that 4th of July we governed ourselves, and had no king for lord and master; and we have got along very well without one. Now you can see what the Declaration of Independence and the Revolution meant. With the Declaration we cut loose from England. Our ship of state set out on its long voyage to liberty. The Declaration cut the chain that fastened this great ship to England's shores. The Revolution was like the stormy passage across the ocean waves. At times it looked as if our ship of state would be torn to pieces by the storms, or driven back to the shores from which it set sail; but then the clouds would break and the sun shine, and onward our good ship would speed. At length it reached the port of liberty, and came to anchor far away from the land of kings. This is a sort of parable. I think every one of you will know what it means. The people of this country had enough of kings and their ways, and of being taxed without their consent. They made up their minds to be free to tax and govern themselves. It was for this they fought in the Revolution, and they won liberty with their blood. And now, before we go on with the history of our country, it will be wise to stop and ask what kind of government the Americans gave themselves. They had thrown overboard the old government of kings. They had to make a new government of the people. I hope you do not think this was an easy task. If an architect or builder is shown a house and told to build another like that, he finds it very easy to do. But if he is shown a heap of stone and bricks and wood and told to build out of them a good strong house unlike any he has ever seen, he will find his task a very hard one, and may spoil the house in his building.