Rutherford B. Hayes: Doing

“I have a talent for silence and brevity. I can keep silent when it seems best to do so, and when I speak I can, and do usually, quit when I am done.”

Rutherford B. Hayes

Diary (20 November 1872)
Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1922 - 1926)
Context: I have a talent for silence and brevity. I can keep silent when it seems best to do so, and when I speak I can, and do usually, quit when I am done. This talent, or these two talents, I have cultivated. Silence and concise, brief speaking have got me some laurels, and, I suspect, lost me some. No odds. Do what is natural to you, and you are sure to get all the recognition you are entitled to.

Silence

“Do what is natural to you, and you are sure to get all the recognition you are entitled to.”

Rutherford B. Hayes

Diary (20 November 1872)
Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1922 - 1926)
Context: I have a talent for silence and brevity. I can keep silent when it seems best to do so, and when I speak I can, and do usually, quit when I am done. This talent, or these two talents, I have cultivated. Silence and concise, brief speaking have got me some laurels, and, I suspect, lost me some. No odds. Do what is natural to you, and you are sure to get all the recognition you are entitled to.

Nature

“My speaking is irregular. Sometimes quite good, sometimes not, but generally will do”

Rutherford B. Hayes

Letter to Lucy Webb Hayes (14 August 1875)
Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1922 - 1926)
Context: My speaking is irregular. Sometimes quite good, sometimes not, but generally will do... I am too far along in experience and years both for this business. I do not go into [it] with the zest of old times. Races, baseball, and politics are for the youngsters.

“The sacred obligation to the Union soldiers must not — will not be forgotten nor neglected…. But those who fought against the Nation cannot and do not look to it for relief…. Confederate soldiers and their descendants are to share with us and our descendants the destiny of America. Whatever, therefore, we their fellow citizens can do to remove burdens from their shoulders and to brighten their lives is surely in the pathway of humanity and patriotism.”

Rutherford B. Hayes

Letter to Oliver Downing (15 March 1889)
Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1922 - 1926)

“My only objection to the arrangements there is the two-in-a-bed system. It is bad…. But let your words and conduct be perfectly pure — such as your mother might know without bringing a blush to your cheek…. If not already mentioned, do not tell your mother of the doubling in bed.”

Rutherford B. Hayes

Letter to his son, Rutherford P. Hayes (26 February 1875)
Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1922 - 1926)

“Unjust attacks on public men do them more good than unmerited praise. They are hurt less by undeserved censure than by undeserved commendation. Abuse helps; often praise hurts.”

Rutherford B. Hayes

Diary (14 July 1889)
Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1922 - 1926)

Men , Help , Hurt

“Do not let your bachelor ways crystallize so that you can’t soften them when you come to have a wife and a family of your own.”

Rutherford B. Hayes

Letter to his son, Webb Hayes (20 March 1890)
Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1922 - 1926)

Family , Way

“Personally I do not resort to force — not even the force of law — to advance moral reforms. I prefer education, argument, persuasion, and above all the influence of example — of fashion. Until these resources are exhausted I would not think of force.”

Rutherford B. Hayes

On attempts at an alcohol prohibition amendment, in his Diary (9 October 1883)
Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1922 - 1926)

Education , Law , Fashion , Thinking

“Every good cause gained a victory when the Union troops were triumphant. Our final victory was the triumph of religion, of virtue, of knowledge…. During those four years, whatever our motives, whatever our lives, we were fighting on God’s side. We were doing His work. What would this country have been if we had failed?”

Rutherford B. Hayes

Diary (27 October 1883)
Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1922 - 1926)

God , Religion , Motivation , Knowledge

“The debt was the most sacred obligation incurred during the war. It was by no means the largest in amount. We do not haggle with those who lent us money. We should not with those who gave health and blood and life. If doors are opened to fraud, contrive to close them. But don’t deny the obligation, or scold at its performance.”

Rutherford B. Hayes

About the Arrears of Pensions Act (1879) for disabled Union veterans, which Hayes cheerfully signed, which was roundly criticized as too expensive and too open to fraud by unscrupulous veterans fabricating service-related injuries.
Letter to William Henry Smith (19 December 1881)
Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1922 - 1926)

Life , Money , War , Health

“Nobody ever left the presidency with less regret, less disappointment, fewer heart burnings, or any general content with the result of his term (in his own heart, I mean) than I do. Full of difficulty and trouble at first, I now find myself on smooth waters and under bright skies.”

Rutherford B. Hayes

Letter to Guy M. Bryan (1 January 1881)
Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1922 - 1926)

Disappointment , Water , Heart