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1904.] OF THE SENATE. 9
I am not an advocate of the useless of extravagant
expenditure of the public money, but in my opinion
the work should be done in accordance with the re-
quirements of the age and to meet the wants of our
increated and rapidly increasing population, and a
liberal appropriation should be made to carry into
effect the plans which have been agreed upon by the
commission.
For more than a century and a quarter the old State
House has been the home of the executive, legislative
and judicial departments of the government, and
within its walls linger the memories of famous men
who have left their impress on the. State, and have
elevated it to the high position it occupies among its
sister States of the Union. May their successors who
will occupy larger and more imposing quarters, sur-
rounded by all the conveniences which the ingenuity
of man can devise, emulate the lives and character of
those who have made the State what it is, and may
they be men of high ideals, of pure and lofty patri-
otism, having but one aim in their official relations—
the common good of all our people.
The simple ceremonies in the organization of the
two branches of the General Assembly this day are
the dedication of this new building to the serious and
holy purposes or elevating the character, preserving
the rights and protecting the liberty of the people.
Standing upon the threshold of a new era and looking
back to the time when this structure was first erected,
one can not but exclaim with the Prophet of old,
"What hath God wrought!"
A hundred and thirty years ago a comparatively
small body of sturdy pioneers, with arms in their
hands to guard against savage foes, faint with the toil
of subduing the virgin wilderness, oppressed by the
stifling atmosphere of the fast approach ing conflict for
the preservation of their liberties against the foremost
power of the world, reared the beautiful old structure
not only as a meeting place for their deliberations,
but as an altar to the Goddess of Liberty and an ex-
pression of their longing for the beautiful. So it has
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