uct of our Government. I shall
seek, as I have always sought, to justify the extraordinary confidence
thus reposed in me by striving to purge my heart and purpose of every
personal and of every misleading party motive and devoting every energy
I have to the service of the nation as a whole, praying that I may
continue to have the counsel and support of all forward-looking men at
every turn of the difficult business.

For I do not doubt that the people of the United States will wish the
Democratic Party to continue in control of the Government. They are not
in the habit of rejecting those who have actually served them for those
who are making doubtful and conjectural promises of service. Least of
all are they likely to substitute those who promised to render them
particular services and proved false to that promise for those who have
actually rendered those very services.

Boasting is always an empty business, which pleases nobody but the
boaster, and I have no disposition to boast of what the Democratic Party
has accomplished. It has merely done its duty. It has merely fulfilled
its explicit promises. But there can be no violation of good taste in
calling attention to the manner in which those promises have been
carried out or in adverting to the interesting fact that many of the
things accomplished were what the opposition party had again and again
promised to do but had left undone. Indeed that is manifestly part of
the business of this year of reckoning and assessment. There is no means
of judging the future except by assessing the past. Constructive action
must be weighed against destructive comment and reaction. The Democrats
either have or have not understood the varied interests of the country.
The test is contained in the record.

What is that record? What were the Democrats called into power to do?
What things had long waited to be done, and how did the Democrats do
them? It is a record of extraordinary length and variety, rich in
elements of many kinds, but consistent in principle throughout and
susceptible of brief recital.

The Republican Party was put out of power because of failure, practical
failure and moral failure; because it had served special interests and
not the country at large; because, under the leadership of its preferred
and established guides, of those who still make its choices, it had lost
touch with the thoughts and the needs of the nation and was living in a
past age and under a fixed