If Texas fails in any way the failure will be felt by the entire country, because its influence and its power are so great.

These are the qualities which are fundamental, which should be shown by the man who has to do with public life; and do not forget that each one of you here has to do his share in governing this commonwealth.

It is not a figure of speech, it is the literal fact that in the United States every man is a sovereign.

Remember that the fate of the sovereign who does not do his duty is to get dethroned; and if the average man who is sovereign does not do his duty he will get ousted from his sovereignty.

We will not lose our birthright of citizenship unless by our own fault.

If he is not governed that way do not let him sit down and blame the politicians, let him blame himself, for it is in his power to get any government that he seriously desires to have.

My fellow-citizens, together with expressing the exultation that we have a right to express about our country, we need to have impressed upon us a sense of our own responsibility, and of the shortcomings of which we are guilty if we do not…

But it is a better thing if we will go home and think over certain of the shortcomings that all of us have and make up our minds to remedy them in the future.

What I ask of you and what I most firmly believe you will give is a patriotic perseverance in doing each his average round of duties, in doing the duties both of private life and as a citizen in public affairs each day.

Do not wait for some special time when heroism will be called for, but do unweariedly the humdrum work that comes to every man.

There is no use sitting at home finding fault with the way in which public affairs are handled, and then every four years, in a burst of animosity against some person, voting to turn him out.

What you need to do is, month in and month out, year in and year out, to do your ordinary political duties as those political duties come up, and only under such conditions can you get really good public servants.

In public life you will sometimes encounter a man who will endeavor to lead you to do something which down at bottom you doubt being right, which he tells you will be to your advantage to do, usually something that looks like wronging some…

But the man who will wrong some one else for your advantage will, when the chance comes, be sure to wrong you for his own advantage.

One of the great and splendid features of our American life is that each American has a right to be proud of the deeds of every other American, no matter from what part of the country his fellow-American may come.

All that is necessary for our people is that they should get to know one another in order to appreciate how slight are the divergencies and how vital and fundamental is the union among them.

We had men of every grade socially; men who worked with their heads; men who worked with their hands; men of all the types that our country produces; but each of them glad to get in on his worth as a man only, and content to be judged…

This Government is emphatically a government by the people, for the people, of the people.

Now, besides applauding that sentiment, let us live up to it.

We have a right to ask that our neighbor do his duty toward God and man; but we have no business to dictate to him how he shall worship his Maker, and no business to discriminate for or against him because of the way in which he does it.

In the same way, if a man is a decent citizen, he is a decent citizen, whether rich or poor.

Remember always that you listen at your peril to any man who would seek to inflame you against your fellow-citizen because he is better off.

If the rich man does not his duty, cinch him, and I will help you just as far as I can.

But don’t cinch him because he is a rich man.

If he is a poor man and does his duty, help him, stand by him.