Harriet Earhart Monroe

“ The actors here are the representatives of 85,000,000 of people. The spectators are all the peoples of the world, to be succeeded by those of all future ages.
If this experiment in self-government should fail, all other republics will surely perish; but we believe that the Republic of the United States of America has taken its place as a fixed star in the galaxy of great nations, and that the stars on its flag will not be dimmed till dimmed in the blaze of humanity’s millennium. ”

“ I have met the college women of almost every European country. I do not find American women in any way mentally superior to the women of Europe. But American women accomplish much more than their sisters east of the Atlantic simply because of our men. Now here in England your husband and brothers insist on silence, but with us if a woman sings or talks well it is the hand of her husband or father that leads her to the front, and it is the kindness of our men that starts us on our public life, helps us at hard places, and encourages us everywhere. ”

“ Dolly Madison was probably the greatest social genius that has ever occupied the White House. The papers of that day declare “Mrs. Madison is the most popular person in the United States.”
Washington social life yet abounds in pleasing legends of her graceful, courteous kindness, not only to the gentlemen and ladies of the legations, but to the ignorant and socially unskilled who were among her worshipers. ”

“ In no other place than Washington can one better see the fact illustrated that once in each generation the wheel of fortune makes a complete revolution, turning down those at the top and turning up those who are down. In the departments are now many widows and daughters of men who were prominent in Civil War times. One woman eighty-two years of age was during the war the wife of a great general. She now sits at a department desk from nine to four daily, and no one does better work. ”

“ The erection of a great National Capitol occurs but once in the life of a nation. The opportunity such an event affords is an important one for the expression of patriotic elevation, and the perpetuation, through the arts of painting and sculpture, of, that which is high and noble and held in reverence by the people; and it becomes them as patriots to see to it that no taint of falsity is suffered to be transmitted to the future upon the escutcheon of our national honor in its artistic record. ”

“ If the government would, at least twice each year, publish in each county the names of persons receiving pensions, the amount paid, and the alleged cause of disability, it would bring the blush of shame to the face of many a liar who now draws a handsome sum from his government. The money is largely paid into the United States Treasury not by the rich of our country, but by the laboring class of men and women. ”

“ Root may do many splendid things before the farmer, who only reads his weekly paper and to whose brain new things come slowly, forgives him for rudeness to a man of the people, whose merit has placed him at the head of the army. Any one who thinks he wins favor by calling General Miles “old fuss and feathers,” as some newspapers do, quite forgets that the American people like fuss and feathers. ”

“ Through it all runs a real practical teaching in morality—that good work is truth, bad work is untruth. Work in any one is the measure of character.
You remember President Roosevelt, in his New York speech concerning missions, spoke of the great underpaid army of faithful clergymen all over this land who, in obscure places, hold up the correct models of morality, who keep the ideals of the nation to honest, simple, earnest, true daily living. ”

“ The United States Naval Observatory, north of Georgetown, will interest lovers of astronomy, while every square, circle, and triangle of Washington City has some reminder of those whose heroic deeds, spiritual devotion, or literary and scientific achievement have beautified, ennobled, and glorified the world, and made it more beautiful because of their lives. ”

“ Then would follow that man whose life grows radiant in the strong search-light of history—John Quincy Adams; that Adams, who could truthfully say at the close of a long, brilliant, and useful life, in the words of an old Roman: “I have rendered to my country all the great service she was willing to receive at my hand, and I have never harbored a thought concerning her which was not divine.” With him would be his compeers, Madison, Monroe, Burr, Clay, Webster, Jackson, John Randolph, the elder Bayard, and Calhoun. ”

“ Have we put a club in the hands of some one else to beat us to death? Have we elevated one man on a pinnacle so high that he can not now see those who elevated him? Is the Speaker of this House a mere mortal man of common flesh and clay, or is he supernatural and immortal? ”

“ The most popular examination for women is that of stenographers and typewriters. “Good stenographers” is the ceaseless demand of the department official—not mediocre, but good par excellence.
Government work is well paid only when well done. Promotions are at least sometimes the reward of merit. A very striking illustration of this occurred last winter, when a young woman was made chief of one of the divisions in the Post-Office Department because she knew more about the work of that particular division than any other employee in it. ”

“ Washington is the only city in the world built exclusively to serve as a capital. Just after the Revolution, Congress, sitting in Philadelphia, was grossly insulted by the unpaid returning troops, against whom the city offered no adequate protection. Congress then adjourned to the collegiate halls of Princeton, where resolutions were offered to erect buildings for the exclusive use of Congress, either on the Delaware River or on the Potomac River. ”

“ The world is beginning to expect the United States to be the final court of appeals in behalf of the lesser nations, especially the other American republics. It is the Senate’s natural destiny, because of its treatymaking 35power, to facilitate a better understanding between nations, to prevent wrongs, to increase commerce, to secure international peace, and thus to improve the governmental powers of the world. So will our republic be the bridge over which the nations of the earth will enter on a period of universal education and modified self-government. ”

“ Besides these there are the gallery for ladies, or for gentlemen accompanied by ladies, and the public gallery for men.
The Senate is the citadel of American liberty. Its great debates have defined our constitutional rights and duties, and prevented many violations of fundamental law. Here Clay, Calhoun, Webster, Benton, Chase, Sumner, Seward, Harrison, Edmunds, Evarts, Ingalls, Logan, and Wade Hampton, with hundreds of others equally eloquent and equally patriotic, have stood for the right as they saw it, or sold their souls for the mess of pottage. ”

“ Congress is an aggregate of selfish units, each fighting for his district. No doubt good influences prevail, but no one class of men, either the extremely good or the extremely bad, has the entire say, for law is the formulated average public opinion of the age and country in which it is made. ”

“ Men of the United States army have always been noted for their high standard of honor. The country believes in the integrity of the officers of the regular army. When any of them fail themselves and betray the trust imposed in them, it causes a shock to public feeling such as malfeasance in no other official position ever produces. To an unusually large extent they have been worthy of the trust reposed in them by a great nation. ”

“ The old charge of immorality among the women of departments is now seldom heard in Washington. Among the thousands there must be a few black sheep, but women have ways of making life so uncomfortable for a derelict that she prefers to resign and occupy a less public position. ”

“ The Committee on Rules, or its majority, constitutes a stone wall against which men break their hearts and ruin their reputations. Let us have less done, but let what is done be an average result of public opinion.
The President can do but little to influence legislation. His clubs are personality and patronage. If as persistent as Mr. Roosevelt, he may eventually get an “Administration” measure (like Cuban reciprocity) through, despite opposition. Present Congressional methods make politicians out of men capable, under broader training, of becoming statesmen. ”

“ If one desires to make a living only, and not lay up for a rainy day, or if one has clerical talent only, then a Washington position might be desirable; but when one sees great, able-bodied men opening and shutting doors for a salary, or a man capable of running a foundry operating an elevator in a government building, it disgusts him with the strife for place. Government 78clerkships may be desirable for women, but few of them should claim the ability of first-class men. It is commercial death to become once established in a department at Washington. ”

“ It is not all “skittles and beer” to be a Senator or a Representative at Washington. The continued pressure from a man’s constituents that he shall accomplish certain legislation for his district, and the iron-clad rules which prohibit his every movement, if in the House of Representatives, are enough to break an ordinary man’s health.
A new member goes to the House full of enthusiasm, hoping to accomplish great things for those who have trusted him; he finds that he is scarcely permitted to open his mouth the first term. But he does his best in committee, which is little enough ”

“ Seven hours, frequently spent in close, confined rooms, doing work which brings no mental improvement, often with a fretful, over-critical chief, anxious to get an incumbent out in order to put in his own friend, does not look to me like a desirable position.
It is evidently intended to give places more and more to men who can go home and help manage elections. It will not be until woman suffrage prevails in the States that women will have an equal opportunity 76with men, even in the work world. Then department people are ever anxious about their places. ”

“ The government has many first-class scientists in its employ, people with technical knowledge. These are the rare souls who, while they know more than their fellow men, care less for money, and have neither time nor ability to make it. For such men a good position in the Agricultural, Geological, Smithsonian, Educational, Indian, or other scientific departments is desirable, but for no other class. ”

“ Of all the noble matrons who have graced the White House, Abigail Adams was the wisest and greatest. Her letters make her the Madam de Sévigné of our 168land. Her letter (written February, 1797) to her husband, who had just succeeded Washington, sounds like the voice of an oracle. We quote a portion: “You have this day to declare yourself head of a nation. ‘And now, O Lord, my God, thou hast made Thy servant ruler over the people; give unto him an understanding heart, that he may know how to go out and come in before this great people; that he may discern between good and bad. ”

“ No one can get into the classified service without it; but in most places, when one has passed the highest examination, it takes Congressional influence to get a position. Whatever may be the conditions in the future, there never has been a time when influence was more used than in the session of Congress ending July 1, 1902. In making up the Bureau of Permanent Census, it was not merit but influence which secured a place. Merit, of course, helps everywhere, but in the session referred to three-fourths influence to one-fourth merit were necessary to secure any position. ”

“ So an American father who desires his children to assume their proper place among the great force of American youth who are to perpetuate American institutions, might well bring them to the Capitol of the nation, and there in glowing words, and amid reminders of every decade of the nineteenth century and the latter part of the eighteenth, tell the story of liberty as shown in republican institutions. ”

“ A statue should represent a man in the costume of his time. Washington should have been shown either in the knee-breeches or in the full military costume of his period. We want no foreign effects in our statues. Washington had no aspiration to be either Jupiter or Mars, but he earnestly desired to be a good and useful man. As such he should be represented.
In this connection a few words in relation to the character of future paintings that shall be selected for the adornment of the nation’s great Capitol building may not be amiss. ”

“ One of the peculiar features of department life is 82that it seems to dry up the milk of human kindness. A man will move heaven and earth to get a high situation under the government, then when others ask from him less than he has asked of his friends, the applicant is made to feel like a beggar. He is advised to go home and tend to his own affairs—which may be very good advice, but comes with bad grace from a government official. ”

“ Probably the most characteristic feature of both political and social life in Washington is afforded by the presence of these legations. The members are more conspicuous here than at any other national capital in the world, except, possibly, Peking. Not to speak of Asiatic costumes and customs, European manners and morals, if we except those of England and Germany, which are much the same as our own, contrast most decidedly with their American correspondents. Most of the men are pure pagans—cynics and materialists. ”

“ Arlington Cemetery should be visited by the pilgrim to Washington. There sleep many of the sacred dead of the nation, and there is the home of Robert E. Lee, where he was called to decide between his country as a whole or his native state.
Around Lafayette Square, which faces the White House, history, poetry, romance, and chivalry have twined an immortal wreath. Every monument commemorates a hero. Here, too, is the old private residence of Dolly Madison, the old home of the British Embassy, where Owen Meredith wrote “Lucile”; also the Webster home, where once lived the French Embassy ”