Governor Calvin Coolidge Independence Day Message at Plymouth Notch

"...It is a great heritage to be born in Vermont, among men given to thrift and industry and pledged to all things pious and noble in mankind. And it seems to me the one important thing we have to do, to impart to our Nation some things of the birthright and heritage of Vermonters, doing away with ignorance by popular education, doing away with the cynicism of the present day by inspiring men to reverence through giving them a wider and deeper view of the works of nature than they see about them.

These things we must give our fellow Americans that through them they may be attached to our institutions, that they may better approach the privilege of living under law and order and the privilege of being Americans. And so, being faithful to itself, America may be faithful to all mankind."

— Governor Calvin Coolidge, speech at Plymouth Notch, Vermont,
July 15, 1920