of Governor Herbert R. O'Conor 501

Along with our State's appreciation, therefore, I bring you this plea: That
you not only continue to the fullest your patriotic efforts in the interest of a
better America, but that you devote yourselves, with renewed spirit, to the
sublime task of uprooting in our State, and in all your contacts, here and else-
where, the spirit of dissension and disunity.

Consider, if you will, the millions of unfortunate aged and children through-
out the length and breadth of Europe and among China's millions, and contrast
that situation with the security enjoyed by your own families and relatives.
With this picture before you, is it conceivable that any red-blooded American
would ever be willing to preserve his own case by yielding any of those rights
and privileges he enjoys ? The one who would do that is not worthy to be called
an American, for he is not worthy of the ancestors who toiled and suffered and
fought to win and preserve for him the advantages he now enjoys.

The path of duty, of honor, of decency, lies clear before us, for every real
American to tread. Our legacy of freedom and of opportunity, is too well
treasured ever to be yielded to any aggressor while there is life with which to
defend and preserve it.

We, of this generation, will keep faith with our gallant forefathers. We
will preserve the Nation they founded, its institutions safeguarded, its high
prestige untarnished. We will pass on to our descendants the same God-given
form of government, and the same individual liberty and freedom which always
have been, and God willing, always will be the heritage of the American people.