184 State Papers and Addresses

giving thought to the problems presented, have made great advances in de-
veloping systems of education that would utilize to the fullest the capacities
of all our citizens in some field or another.

As graduates of this fine institution you enjoy educational advantages
that have not been granted to everyone, but at the same time a corresponding
duty devolves upon you because of the special advantages which are yours by
reason of the education you have received.

You are being graduated from an institution that is indelibily stamped with
the tradition of a great State. It is no reflection upon the schools of some
other states when we say that in a particular manner the schools of Maryland
leave upon their students the imprint of an unforgettable tradition. It is a
tradition of the Maryland colonists, a tradition of tolerance and independence
that has been handed down and become an integral part of the State's life
during the three hundred years of its existence.

To evaluate properly the spirit which is Maryland's we must go back not
only to the first days of the Colony but even beyond that. The motivating
spirit even before the first colonists set foot upon these shores was to live
their lives free of unnecessary restrictions, where they could aid others to make
this land a better place in which to live than that from which they had come.

So, too, has it been during the one hundred and sixty odd years of our
Country's existence. Maryland has been loyal, supremely so, but her loyalty
has not closed her eyes to the fact that her citizens were guaranteed certain
fundamental rights by the Constitution, and she has not hesitated to insist
upon these rights, even in the face of the most hostile adverse sentiment.

All of this has come down to us as so much a part and parcel of the
tradition of Maryland, that subconsciously it seems to have had its leavening
influence upon the life of the State, down even to the present day.

This it is to which I refer in expressing the hope that, above and beyond
all the more tangible results of your years spent under the supevision of this
splendid school, you may have absorbed some of this independence of thought,
this will to live your own life, and to help those about you to live their own
lives, free from any unnecessary restraints, always striving for a better day.

It is no accident, no special gift of fate, that Maryland ever has been free
from real conflict of thought on any fundamental question. Three hundred or
more years ago the settlers invited all the world to their domain. In every
phase of our civil and political life, there has been that leavening influence of
the first settlers' Will—that Good Will that should be forever emblazoned on
our Great Seal for all the world to see—and emulate. Why is it, that with all
the disturbing factors that have come into the industrial life of our Country,
to array capital against labor, and class against class, Maryland has been
singularly free from upheavals? Again, I say, it is the influence of the Mary-
land spirit of tolerance; a spirit that demands, and obtains, for the worker the
right to work, or not to work, as he may see fit, but that places upon him
the obligation, in whatever he may do, to respect the rights of both capital and
those workers who may not see eye to eye with him.

That such a spirit of sane, independent thinking can be one of the most
potent forces for good in your whole life, is particularly true in this day and
age, when old standards of life and thought have suffered rude upsets, and the
whole world knows not what to expect from the future.