But he who takes the oath to-day to preserve, protect, and defend the
Constitution of the United States only assumes the solemn obligation
which every patriotic citizen--on the farm, in the workshop, in the busy
marts of trade, and everywhere--should share with him. The Constitution
which prescribes his oath, my countrymen, is yours; the Government you
have chosen him to administer for a time is yours; the suffrage which
executes the will of freemen is yours; the laws and the entire scheme
of our civil rule, from the town meeting to the State capitals and the
national capital, is yours. Your every voter, as surely as your Chief
Magistrate, under the same high sanction, though in a different sphere,
exercises a public trust. Nor is this all. Every citizen owes to the
country a vigilant watch and close scrutiny of its public servants and
a fair and reasonable estimate of their fidelity and usefulness. Thus
is the people's will impressed upon the whole framework of our civil
polity--municipal, State, and Federal; and this is the price of our
liberty and the inspiration of our faith in the Republic.
It is the duty of those serving the people in public place to closely
limit public expenditures to the actual needs of the Government
economically administered, because this bounds the right of the
Government to exact tribute from the earnings of labor or the property
of the citizen, and because public extravagance begets extravagance
among the people.
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