No law that the wit of man has even devised can make or ever will make a fool wise, or a coward brave, or a weakling strong.

We do not want the absentee proprietor.

Much can be done by the aid of the government, by the aid of the State; but, after all, the fundamental thing in bringing success to any community is the quality of the average man, the average woman, in that community.

In this country we need above all things to show our power to act on one's own individual responsibility, each to care for himself, to be able to handle his own life, and yet all of us to act in co-operation with our fellows, to be able to…

I believe with all my heart in the Monroe Doctrine.

I congratulate you upon the output from the mines, next the ranches, but most of all the children.

I do not believe that Congress has for many years passed any law relating to our internal development so wise as the irrigation law of a year ago.

I congratulate you upon the chances of diversifying your industries.

All that the law can do is to try to secure a fair deal, to try to give each man a chance to show the stuff that is in him; and if the stuff is not in him you cannot get it out of him because it is not there.

I doubt if there is any State which will profit more by the increase in the application of irrigation to our needs than is the case with the State of Idaho.

You builded even better than you knew when you saved the country.

The best citizen is the man who is a good husband, a good father; the woman who is a good wife, a good mother.

Play hard while you play, and when you work don't play at all.

Railroading is one of those professions which, like following the deep sea fisheries, necessarily implies the acceptance of risk and danger.

The line that in the elemental matters we must ever draw is the line of conduct.

I think I was a pretty good American when I came, but I am going away a better American.

The law is no respecter of persons.

We are going to see great manufacturing centers here in Montana taking advantage of the power of your waters.

And Congress, the National Legislature, has not of recent years put upon the statute books any law as wise, as beneficent as the National irrigation act of a year ago.

This is not, and never shall be, a government of a plutocracy; it is not, and never shall be, a government by a mob.

You need first of all to distribute the water in space through the irrigating ditches, and then to preserve it in time by storage in reservoirs.

The most unsafe adviser to follow is the man who would advise us to do wrong in order that we may benefit by it.

We are bound in honor to try to remedy injustice; but if we are wise we will seek to remedy it in practical ways.

We have the right to ask every decent American citizen to rally to the support of the law if it is ever broken against the interest of the rich man.

Great good has come from the development of our railroad system.