We know today that little Delaware is not going to be swallowed
by the greater states around her, but we rejoice that the men who
created our government gave thought to her relatively inferior condi-
tion and thus established as an irrevocable principle the right of
minorities to be protected against majorities. And then, there is the
lesson to the overzealous and the impatient that a compromise of
purposes not only is inevitable in a democracy but is sometimes — as
was certainly the case with our constitution — desirable. For, as
Franklin said, if we assemble people, as we do in a democracy, to
have the benefit of their joint wisdom and joint intelligence, we must
accept their prejudices, their errors of judgment, their selfishness and
their other shortcomings. We have nothing to fear that in our demo-
cratic society we must give a little and take a little, because we are
not infallible, we do make mistakes and in any given situation we
may be wrong.

We who have the advantage of being able to look back upon nearly
180 years of experience may wonder how the men in Philadelphia
ever could have been so skeptical about the work they produced —
how they could have been so dejected about the compromises they
had had to make. Certainly never before, and never since, has an
instrument of government of such excellence been produced. Under
it Americans have been able to live in the greatest measure of freedom,
on the highest level of prosperity, in a nation that has grown stronger
and greater with every passing year.

We are most grateful, then, that our ancestors were wise enough
to make concession, to compromise their purposes, to settle their
differences and enter into an agreement that made it possible to create
a nation, undivided and indivisible.

We are grateful that the councils in Philadelphia were not con-
founded like the builders of Babel, but instead that in the end they
spoke with one voice, loud and clear, for a system of government
under which Americans could earn a livelihood for themselves and
their families and live in harmony with their neighbors.

For the legacy they left us — a legacy of life, liberty and happiness
— we are reverently thankful.

Finally, I am delighted to have this opportunity to join you in pay-
ing respect to one of our State's greatest jurists and one of our most
devoted citizens. It seems to me that Judge Prescott has lived up to
those precepts which give the man the right to be called a great leader.
I have heard it said that a great leader is one who has achieved suc-