Remarks at the Ground-Breaking Ceremonies of the Queens Midtown Tunnel, New York City.

This card is a very essential part of this ceremony. Without it, they would not start that shovel working.

I think the Mayor is right, and I hope he is right, about the capacity in which I am to come back here in 1939. But even if I am then a private citizen, I do want somebody to ask me to ride through the tunnel in the first procession that goes through.

I go back a long way—I go back four years more than half a century—and that is why I am qualified to talk about the epic of Queens. It is one of the most amazing stories in all of modern civilization, the story not only of Queens, but of all these Boroughs of the City of New York. Half a century ago they were separate cities; and out here they were villages. Within our own lifetime, we have seen a great Borough in the greatest city in the world grow until it has more than a million human beings living within its borders. Those human beings deserve good transportation.

When I was a small boy there were only the old Brooklyn Bridge and a lot of ferries. Sometimes in the winter time, the ferries did not run because of the ice. If you wanted to get out into the country and see green fields and cows and chickens, all you had to do was to take a ferry across to Queens. I believe there are still half a dozen farms in this Borough, but their days, too, are numbered. So, in this half century of one generation, we have seen one of the greatest transitions that have ever occurred in our history.

I go back a few years to when I came back from Washington, after the World War, to practice law in New York. At that time I attended a conference, I think in 1921 or 1922, to talk about a tunnel from Manhattan to Queens. It is true that it has taken fifteen years to get action; but, on the other hand, as the Mayor said, it has taken only six or seven months since we put our shoulders to the wheel and got the bill through the Legislature at Albany, Now, here is the steam shovel.

I am very proud of what has been done. I am proud of the privilege that we have had in Washington in helping the City of New York to start and complete a large number of very important public works, public works that will be useful, public works that are giving employment to thousands of men and women. I also want to say that these public works which have been initiated would not have been possible had it not been for an intelligent and aggressive Administration in the City of New York.

Every once in a while your Mayor would slip down to Washington; and when I heard he was coming in I would say to myself, "There go another five or ten millions." But we have not minded. We have been proud to help because the things that have been initiated have been useful projects, things that have been badly needed. As you know, there were four or five years when interest rates were so high and the lack of teamwork so glaring, that we fell behind in this great city and in all the other communities, in carrying forward public works that were of the utmost importance. In these last three years, we have been trying to catch up; and I believe we are catching up.

I congratulate the people of Queens, the people of Manhattan, and the people of the whole city, on what is going to happen in about a minute and a half when, as a member of the Union, I press the button which will put the shovel in operation.

Are you ready? Let her go!