begin: "America! half
brother of the world!" America, half brother of the world--and all
Americans full brothers one to the other. That is the way that line
should be concluded. The prime virtue of the Hollander here in America
and the way in which he has most done credit to his stock as a
Hollander, is that he has ceased to be a Hollander and has become an
American, absolutely. We are not Dutch-Americans. We are not "Americans"
with a hyphen before it. We are Americans pure and simple, and we have a
right to demand that the other people whose stocks go to compose our
great nation, like ourselves, shall cease to be aught else and shall
become Americans.

And further than that, we have another thing to demand, and that is that
if they do honestly and in good faith become Americans, those shall be
regarded as infamous who dare to discriminate against them because of
creed or because of birthplace. When New Amsterdam had but a few hundred
souls, among those few hundred souls no less than eighteen different
race stocks were represented, and almost as many creeds as there were
race stocks, and the great contribution that the Hollander gave to the
American people was the inestimable lesson of complete civil and
religious liberty. It would be honor enough for this stock to have been
the first to put on American soil the public school, the great engine
for grinding out American citizens, the one institution for which
Americans should stand more stiffly than for aught other.

Whenever America has demanded of her sons that they should come to her
aid, whether in time of peace or in time of war, the Americans of Dutch
stock have been among the first to spring to the aid of the country. We
earnestly hope that there will not in the future be any war with any
power, but assuredly if there should be such a war one thing may be
taken for certain, and that is that every American of Dutch descent will
be found on the side of the United States. We give the amplest credit,
that some people now, to their shame, grudge to the profession of arms,
which we have here to-night represented by a man, who, when he has the
title of a major general of the army of the United States, has a title
as honorable as any that there is on the wide earth. We also need to
teach the lesson, that the Hollander taught, of not refusing to do the
small things because the day of large things had not yet come or was in
the past; of not waiting until the chance may c