1909- President Taft Visits Charlotte

The Charlotte Observer 5/21/1909, p. 4

PRESIDENT TAFT IN CHARLOTTE.

  Without forfeiting any small reputation for sobriety of statement which we may possess, it is difficult to do President Taft’s Charlotte visit justice.  The President gave great and unmixed pleasure.  Carolina people, who think they know a true man from a masquerader when they look into his eyes after long acquaintance with the story of his life, have made up their minds about William Howard Taft.  They like him thoroughly, they admire him thoroughly, they are glad that this William Howard Taft is President of the United States.  What he said to them was in itself manly and attractive; backed by his presence it came with power.  

The Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence, “antedating by over twelve months the national Declaration at Philadelphia,” naturally received due honor.  In dwelling upon this memorable act of early patriotism President Taft expressed his earnest desire that all sectional lines disappear.  There is less sectionalism now, he declared, than existed “even in the decade before the civil war,” and there will soon be none at all.  He verged toward politics only twice: when he declared with manifest sincerity his previously stated belief that for the public good each State should have a strong opposition party, and when he declared with sincerity no less manifest that no political motives whatever entered into the recent judgeship appointment.  Mr. Taft, handsomely introduced by Governor Kitchin, had his hearers according him spontaneous applause from first to last.  The audience believed in the man and the man believed in the audience.  It was an hour filled with the spirit of genuineness, of good-fellowship, of uplifting patriotism.  

Mr. Taft is cheery, clear-eyed, and as transparently honest as a man who has placed conscience before ambition all his life should be.  No more wholesome individual has ever come to Charlotte.  Then, too, he is what the Scotch call “canny” and what we here in the South call “folks.”  The people of Charlotte and of North Carolina are greatly pleased to have had him as their guest.  Your health and happiness, Mr. President!