men in the history of the Republic have ever
fought for the weak, for a just cause against organized power and
oppression in the high places of the Government. Senator Foraker was one
man, but Senator Foraker was a host in himself. We know this, but the
enemies of the Black Battalion know it better than we do, for wherever
they appeared on the field of action during those two years, whether
with their sappers and miners or assaulting columns, there they found
him alert, dauntless, invincible--their sappers and miners hoisted with
their own petard, their assaulting columns routed and driven to cover
before the withering, the deadly fire from the flashing cannon of his
facts, his logic, his law, and his eloquence. Sir, God knows that I
would rather have fought the fight which you fought so gloriously than
be a Senator of the United States, day, than be President of the
Republic itself. For it is better to be a brave and just and true man
than to be either Senator or President, or both.

"Greater love hath no man than this that a man lay down his life for his
friends." This is what Senator Foraker has done for the Black Battalion
and for the principles of law and liberty which underlie their case. He
has given his political life, his seat in the Senate, all the honor and
power which were his had he chosen to defend the order of the
President, discharging those one hundred and sixty-seven men without
trial of any kind from the Army which their valor had helped to make
glorious--instead of the soldiers whom he did not know but whose pitiful
case, whose unjust and cruel punishment, enlisted the sympathy of his
great heart and the masterly labors of his tireless brain. Yes, I
repeat, and do not let it ever be forgotten by us as a race, that
Senator Foraker might to-day be his own successor in the United States
Senate had he chosen to play in the "Brownsville" affair the part of
defender of President Roosevelt's wanton abuse and usurpation of
executive power, instead of taking the side of the Black Battalion and
the fundamental principle of our law and Constitution that each man
accused of crime is entitled to trial before he is condemned and
punished. He chose the side of the weak, of justice, and the
Constitution in this great struggle, and not that of power and the
Administration. This was the sin which brought upon him all the wrath of
that power and of that Administration, but of which all good men and
true absolve and for