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Theodore Roosevelt 

And his Time

Shown in his own letters

BY
Joseph Bucklin Bishop

Volume Two

Charles Scribner’s sons

CHAPTER ONE

RAILWAY   RATE   LAW: 

MAN   WITH   A   MUCKRAKE: 

VIEWS ON MANY SUBJECTS: 

the year 1906, like its immediate predecessor, was a very busy and, at times, an exciting one for the President, though there was no one matter of such dominating proportions as the Portsmouth Peace Conference.

The year opened with the contest in the Senate on the railway rate bill at its highest point of bitterness. The most powerful men in that body led the opposition to the measure which gave the Interstate Commerce Commission power to fix rates. Among them were men like Lodge and Knox, who were the President's warm personal friends. The Republican leader of the Senate, and the strongest man in it, Senator Aldrich of Rhode Island, was bitterly opposed to the measure. Virtually all the most influential newspapers of the country were also opposed to it. The prevailing opinion in press and public was that the measure would never pass the Senate. The Committee to which the bill was referred and whose chairman was Senator Aldrich, acted adversely upon it, and then, as a "good joke on the President," turned it over to Senator Tillman, Democratic Senator from South Carolina, thereby making him its sponsor. The joke lay in the fact that the President and Tillman were not on friendly terms, the President having not long before canceled an invitation to him to dine at the White House because he had made a personal assault in the Senate Chamber on his colleague from South Carolina. To the surprise of the authors of the joke, the President did not hesitate a moment about opening communication with Tillman. He did not '' care a rap,'' he said, who had charge of the bill; what he was after was its passage and he would work with Tillman or anybody else who was in favor of it. His alliance with Tillman aroused great interest and excited hostile comment from the newspapers that took the side of the railway and financial interests which were opposed to the bill, but the President paid no heed to criticism from any quarter, but steadily pursued his course, never for a moment relaxing his pressure on the Senate. Writing to Whitelaw Reid, in London, on March 1, 1906, he said: "I have had some mild troubles in connection with the rate bill. Aldrich did what I have rarely seen him do: he completely lost both his head and his temper. But it won't have any effect in the long run and I shall get just about the bill I have been fighting for."

His faith was justified, for after debating the bill for 70 days, the Senate passed it by a vote of 71 to 3, after it had been amended in a way that did not materially affect its character. Loud assertions were made in the so-called capitalistic press that the President had backed down in order to save himself from defeat, but the truth was that the amendments which were cited as proof of this claim were drawn by the Attorney General and were in accordance with the President's views. The proof of the pudding was in the eating. In his annual message to Congress, December 3, 1906, the President gave this account of the immediate effects of the law:

"The Interstate Commerce law has rather amusingly falsified the predictions, both of those who asserted that it would ruin the railroads and of those who asserted that it did not go far enough and would accomplish nothing. During the last five months the railroads have shown increased earnings and some of them unusual dividends; while during the same period the mere taking effect of the law has produced an unprecedented, a hitherto unheard-of, number of voluntary reductions in freights and fares by the railroads. Since the founding of the Commission there has never been a time of equal length in which anything like so many reduced tariffs have been put into effect. On August 27, for instance, two days before the new law went into effect, the Commission received notices of over five thousand separate tariffs which represented reductions from previous rates."
Roosevelt's correspondence during the year shows the usual wide range of his interests both inside and outside the public service. On February 1, 1906, he wrote a long letter, which he addressed to each of the chairmen of the naval committees of the Senate and the House, urging a modification of the law against hazing in the Naval Academy. As it stood, the law required that a cadet convicted by court martial on a charge of hazing should be dismissed and be ineligible for appointment as a commissioned officer in the Army, Navy, or Marine Corps during a specified time. "These provisions," wrote the President, "seem to me neither just nor judicious, and I am seriously concerned at the injury which I fear may be done to the discipline of the Academy and even to the future efficiency of the Navy if they are permitted to remain in force without amendment. I heartily disapprove of the practice of hazing, and, in common with all those interested in the welfare of the Academy, wish to see this practise thoroughly eradicated there. But the punishment of dismissal is altogether disproportionate to the culpability involved in some forms of hazing. In many cases, these amount to nothing more than exhibitions of boyish mischief attended with no consequence of any moment to those hazed, and indicating on the part of the hazers only some exuberance of animal spirits. Unquestionably they ought to be punished, for under any circumstances hazing constitutes a breach of the rules, and the future officers of our Navy must be taught, first of all and as a foundation for all other merits, strict and unquestioning obedience. But to punish those faults of youth by depriving the young man concerned of his career in life is to commit a glaring injustice.''
In a letter to the Secretary of War, Mr. Taft, on February 3, 1906, he made this earnest demand for respect for the uniform of enlisted men:
"The more civilized a nation is, the more honestly desirous it is of securing peace, the greater should be the care with which it fosters and encourages the preservation of the military virtues among its citizens, and in no way can this be better achieved than by resolute effort to secure proper recognition for the enlisted men of the Army and Navy. The uniform of the enlisted man is a badge of honor. It entitles him to peculiar consideration. It shows that in the great majority of cases he has learned those habits of self-command, of self-restraint, of obedience, and of fearlessness in the face of danger which put him above most of his fellows who have not possessed similar privileges. To strive to discriminate against him in any way is literally an infamy; for it is in reality one of the most serious offenses which can be committed against the stability and greatness of our nation. If a hotel-keeper or the owner of a theater or any other public resort attempts such discrimination, everything possible should be done by all good citizens to make the man attempting it feel the full weight of a just popular resentment, and if possible, legal proceedings should be taken against him. As for the commissioned officers, it both is and must be their pride alike to train the enlisted man how to do his duty and to see that the enlisted man who does his duty is held in honor and respect."
"Writing to Mr. Strachey, editor of the London Spectator, on February 12, 1906, he says of his own career: "Although I have been pretty steadily in politics since I left college, I have always steadfastly refused to regard politics as a career, for save under exceptional circumstances I do not believe that any American can afford to try to make this his definite career in life. With us politics are of a distinctly kaleidoscopic nature. Nobody can tell when he will be upset; and if a man is to be of real use he ought to be able at times philosophically to accept defeat and to go on about some other kind of useful work, either permanently or at least temporarily until the chances again permit him to turn to political affairs. Every office I have held I have quite sincerely believed would be the last I should hold, the only exception being that during my first term as President I gradually grew to think it probable that I should be reelected."

    In the same letter, he writes of the Senate: 

"It is a very powerful body with an illustrious history, and life is easy in it, the Senators not being harassed as are members of the lower House, who go through one campaign for their seats only to begin another. The esprit de corps in the Senate is strong, and the traditions they inherit come from the day when, in the first place, men dueled and were more considerate of one another's feeling, even in doing business; and when, in the second place, the theories of all doctrinaire statesmen were that the one thing that was needed in government was a system of checks, and that the whole danger to government came not from inefficiency but from tyranny. In consequence, the Senate has an immense capacity for resistance. There is no closure, and if a small body of men are sufficiently resolute they can prevent the passage of any measure until they are physically wearied out by debate. The Senators get to know one another intimately and tend all to stand together if they think any one of them is treated with discourtesy by the Executive.
"I do not see that the Senate is any stronger relatively to the rest of the government than it was sixty or seventy years ago. Nor do I think that the Senate and the lower House taken together are any stronger with reference to the President than they were a century ago. Some of the things the Senate does really work to increase the power of the Executive. They are able so effectually to hold up action when they are consulted, and are so slow about it, that they force a President who has any strength to such individual action as I took in both Panama and Santo Domingo. In neither case would a President a hundred years ago have ventured to act without previous assent by the Senate. ... In this nation, as in any nation which amounts to anything, those in the end must govern who are willing actually to do the work of governing; and in so far as the Senate becomes a merely obstructionist body it will run the risk of seeing its power pass into other hands."
To an editor who had commented unfavorably on Senator Lodge, he wrote on February 23, 1906:
"Lodge has violent enemies. But he is a boss or the head of a machine only in the sense that Henry Clay and Webster were bosses and heads of political machines; that is, it is a very great injustice to couple his name with the names of those commonly called bosses. I know Massachusetts politics well. I know Lodge's share in them, and I know what he has done in the Senate. He and I differ radically on certain propositions, as for instance, on the pending rate bill and on the arbitration treaties of a couple of years ago; but I say deliberately that during the twenty years he has been in Washington he has been on the whole the best and most useful servant of the public to be found in either house of Congress.
"I say also that he has during that period led politics in Massachusetts in the very way which, if it could only be adopted in all our States, would mean the elimination of graft, of bossism, and of every other of the evils which are most serious in our politics. Lodge is a man of very strong convictions, and this means that when his convictions differ from mine I am apt to substitute the words 'narrow' and 'obstinate' for 'strong'; and he has a certain aloofness and coldness of manner that irritate people who don't live in New England. But he is an eminently fit successor of Webster and Sumner in the Senator-ship of Massachusetts. He is a bigger man than Sumner, but of course he has not dealt with any such crisis as Sumner dealt with. He is not as big a man intellectually as Webster, but he is a far better man morally; and the type of citizenship which he represents is from the standpoint of the United States better than either of theirs."
On the question of his own popularity, Roosevelt wrote as follows, on March 1, to Sereno S. Pratt in New York:

"I have felt a slightly contemptuous amusement over the discussion that has been going on for several months about my popularity or waning popularity or absence of popularity. I am not a college freshman nor that would-be popular fox-hunting hero in 'Soapy Sponge,' and therefore I am not concerned about my popularity save in exactly so far as it is an instrument which will help me to achieve my purposes. That is, in so far as my good repute among the people helps me to secure the passage of the rate bill, I value it. In so far as it fails to help me secure the adoption of the Santo Domingo treaty, I do not value it. A couple of years ago or thereabouts, a good many timid souls told me that by my action in Panama I had ruined my popularity and was no longer available as a candidate; to which I answered that while I much wished to be a candidate and hoped that I had not ruined my popularity, yet if it was necessary to ruin it in order to secure to the United States the chance to build the Panama Canal, I should not hesitate a half second, and did not understand how any man could hesitate.
"It is surprising to me that Blank should not see the real meaning of what he says about Washington when he speaks of his having become an object of dislike to the bulk of his fellow citizens at the end of his second term by refusing to side with France. Washington sacrificed a temporary popularity for the purpose of securing the permanent welfare of his country. I do not believe he was capable of being swayed in the matter by the consideration of his own permanent repute as compared with the nation's permanent good. But in any event his permanent repute stood higher and not lower because of his willingness to sacrifice a temporary popularity.

"So, my dear sir, I should be quite unable to tell you whether I was or was not now 'popular.' If I am, I am also entirely prepared to believe that I shall be extremely unpopular before I go out. But this is not what I am concerning myself about. I am not paying heed to public opinion; I am paying heed to the public interest; and if I can accomplish, not all that I desire, but a reasonable proportion of what I desire, by the end of my term (and in the four and a half years that have gone by I have succeeded in accomplishing such reasonable proportion) why, I am more than satisfied."
At intervals during his seven years in the Presidency there was one United States Senator who appealed to the President either to promote some officer in the army over the heads of other officers, or to intercede in behalf of an officer in disgrace for some cause or other, always basing the appeal on personal grounds. Some of the President's replies to these appeals have been published in previous chapters. The following, written on March 2, 1906, is of especial interest as showing the President's devotion to absolute and impartial justice:
"I am very sorry to say that I cannot see Mrs. 	
concerning the court-martial case of her brother. I have been obliged in cases of this kind to make a definite rule that I will not see the delinquent's mother, sister, daughter, or other kinsfolk. They are the very people who under no circumstances should ever be seen. They are of course entirely unable to express any opinion of the slightest value as to the guilt, innocence, or general worthiness of the accused; and an appeal for the accused on the ground of sympathy for his kinsfolk is one which it is simply impossible to entertain if justice is to be done or the service not to be ruined. So that to see them means nothing-whatever but an entirely useless harrowing of feelings.
    I have been carefully over this case, going through the brief of the counsel for the accused, going through the extracts of the testimony and the brief of the Judge Advocate General. The utmost leniency that I could show would be to allow him to resign. He is obviously entirely incompetent to remain any longer in the service. I need not say, my dear Senator, how I regret my inability to do what you request; but it would not be fair to do for one man who had influential friends anything I would not do for the man who had not a friend in the world. I try to handle the Army and the Navy on the basis of doing absolute justice and showing no favoritism for any reason, a course which I know has your hearty approval."
In the spring of 1906, there was much talk about what Roosevelt would do when he retired from the Presidency, and among various suggestions there was one that he might be chosen President of Harvard University. To a Massachusetts friend, who had written to him about it asking him if he would accept, he replied on March 7, 1906:
"It is simply impossible for me to give you a definite answer three years in advance. People have spoken to me about it, of course. I had never thought of myself as president of a college. I have not the slightest idea how I would do as such, and I haven't an idea whether when I get out of here I will feel that I could immediately go into such work; nor do I know whether any work will be offered to me of any kind, or rather, whether the chance of any work will come up, and if so, what kind of work. I would hate to commit myself definitely so far in advance. Any President on retiring ought to be proud and grateful to serve as President of Harvard. But to say that I would serve is impossible for me now, simply because I do not know what the circumstances will be. It is very unlikely that other work in which I should feel that with my peculiar abilities and non-abilities I could do better, would ar.ise, but it is always possible." 
A phrase which the President used in an informal speech at a dinner given by Speaker Cannon to the Gridiron Club in Washington, on March 17, attracted wide attention at the time and led to its elaboration into a formal address later. He spoke in terms of strong denunciation of "the man with the muckrake" who in newspapers and magazines made slanderous and mendacious attacks upon men in public life and upon men engaged in public work and at the same time defended labor leaders who were guilty, directly or indirectly, of murderous assaults upon officials who opposed their schemes. To an eminent jurist who wrote to him expressing warm approval of what he had said, the President replied on March 20, 1906:
"I am glad you liked what I said. I had not prepared the speech at all, but I had been reading with great indignation a certain magazine and the news of the way certain labor unions were subscribing for the defense of those Western Federation of Miners people whose organization certainly, if not they themselves personally, were accessories to murder before the fact in the case of Governor Steunenberg. As you know, my dear Judge, I will go to the limit in enforcing the law against the wealthiest man or the wealthiest corporation if I think he or it has done wrong; but my whole soul revolts at a campaign of foul slander waged against men, down at bottom and primarily, because they have succeeded in business; and above all, at the sinister tendency to condone crimes of brutality, including murder, if those committing them can obtain the support of some powerful labor organization. I shall 'try and see if I can not write out that speech, recasting and elaborating it so as to make it more definite, as soon as I get the chance.''
He decided to make the subject a part of his address on the laying of the corner-stone of the office building of the House of Representatives, on April 14. Writing to Bay Stannard Baker, on April 9, 1906, he said:

 "One reason I want to make that address is because people so persistently misunderstand what I said that I want to have it reported in full. For instance, you understand it. I want to let in light and air, but I do not want to let in sewer gas. If a room is fetid and the windows are bolted I am perfectly contented to knock out the windows, but I would not knock a hole into the drain pipe. In other words, I feel that the man who in a yellow newspaper or in a yellow magazine makes a ferocious attack on good men or even attacks bad men with exaggeration or for things they have not done, is a potent enemy of those of us who are really striving in good faith to expose bad men and drive them from power. I disapprove of the whitewash brush quite as much as of mud slinging, and it seems to me that the disapproval of one in no shape or way implies approval of the other. This I shall try to make clear."
The address, when delivered on April 14, was published in full in the newspapers and excited wide attention and a great variety of comment, the larger part being favorable. In the same address he spoke with characteristic plainness and force of his efforts to secure the passage of the railway rate bill, saying he was sure it would be so framed as to secure tangible results and would be a first step "in the direction of a policy of superintendence and control over corporate wealth engaged in interstate commerce, this superintendence and control not to be exercised in a spirit of malevolence toward the men who have created the wealth, but with the firm purpose both to do justice to them and to see that they in their turn do justice to the public at large.''
He foreshadowed, also in the same address, a recommendation which he was to make in his next annual message to Congress for a graduated inheritance tax on large fortunes. "We shall discriminate," he said, "in the sharpest way between fortunes well-won and fortunes ill-won; between those gained as an incident to performing great services to the community as a whole, and those gained in evil fashion by keeping just within the limits of mere law honesty. Of course no amount of charity in spending such fortunes in any way compensates for misconduct in making them."
Maxim Gorky, Russian author, poet and revolutionist, paid a visit to the United States in the spring of 1906. Soon after his arrival it was discovered that the woman with whom he was living at the time and who accompanied him was not his wife and that he had a wife and children in Russia. There was a widespread outcry against him after this revelation was made. In the midst of it Gorky appeared in Washington and a proposal was made to the President that he consent to receive a call from him. The refusal was prompt and sharp. In a letter to the hearer of the proposal, April 23, 1906, the President gave his reasons as follows:
"The Gorky class of realistic writer of poems and short stories is a class of beings for whom I have no very great regard per se; but I would not have the slightest objection to receiving him, and indeed would be rather glad to receive him, if he was merely a member of it. But in addition he represents the very type of fool academic revolutionist which tends to bring to confusion and failure the great needed measures of social, political and industrial reform. I have scant sympathy for that maudlin sentimentality which encourages these creatures abroad, when at home, as Gorky instantly showed by his action when he came here, they would be the special sympathizers with, for instance, the peculiarly foul assassins who are now rallying to the support of the men indicted for the murder of the ex-Governor of Idaho. In addition to this, Gorky in his domestic relations seems to represent with nice exactness the general continental European revolutionary attitude, which in governmental matters is a revolt against order as well as against tyranny, and in domestic matters is a revolt against the ordinary decencies and moralities even more than against conventional hypocrisies and cruelties." 
A letter to George H. Lorimer, editor of the Philadelphia Saturday Evening Post, May 12, 1906, contains, in addition to interesting autobiographical information, some no less interesting views upon the power of political bosses to control the action of parties:
"I have been in active politics almost from the moment I left Harvard twenty-five years ago. I possessed a very moderate income. I could not have gone into politics at all if the expenses of election had at any time come anywhere near the salaries I have received in the different positions I have held; and except from these salaries, I of course never made a cent out of politics—I could no more do it than I could cheat at cards. I have always occupied working positions. I have seen New York State politics from the inside as a member of the legislature, and New York City politics from the inside as Police Commissioner. I have carried my ward and lost it; have been delegate to county and state and national conventions; have stumped year in and year out, and served on committees, before and after elections, which determined much of what the inside policy was to be. I have had on occasions to fight bosses and rings and machines; and have had to get along as best I could with bosses and rings and machines when the conditions were different. I have seen reform movements that failed and reform movements that succeeded and have taken part in both, and have also taken part in opposing fool reform movements which it would be a misfortune to have succeed. In particular, I have been so placed as to see very much of the inside of the administration of three Presidents in addition to my own—that is, of Harrison, Cleveland and McKinley. ...
"I do not for a moment believe that there is or has been any powerful senatorial boss who in our time has been influential in handling at the same moment the nominations of the two parties. In fact, I do not for a moment believe that in our time any boss in one party has had any effect upon the Presidential nomination of the other. I know that there are many wealthy men who have changed parties at different elections, and supported, for instance, Cleveland first and then McKinley. To my somewhat grim amusement, the chief representatives of this class, or at least a majority, went into a futile conspiracy against me of which they sought to make Mr. Hanna the head; and at that time they expected that if they could not nominate Mr. Hanna or some one who would be agreeable to Mr. Hanna, they would nominate Mr. Parker on the Democratic ticket and turn in and elect him. But their plan miscarried at every point, and it was merely a purely rich man's conspiracy, not a politician's conspiracy at all."
Periodically the President was called upon to reason like a veritable "Dutch Uncle" with Senator T. C. Platt of New York on the subject of the proper use of public office. An excellent example of his method in these emergencies is furnished in this letter to the Senator on June 17, 1906:
"I am not yet prepared to announce my decision about Mr. H., but I must emphatically dissent from your statement that 'it ought to suffice for me to simply say that I prefer Y. to H.'; and furthermore, that the appointment would 'be recognized as an affront to the Senior Senator from the State of New York'; and furthermore from your statement running as follows: 'You and I disagreed some years ago upon a previous judicial appointment in this district. Any fair-minded lawyer, or observer, if he were honest, would tell you to-day that the appointment which was made was a mistake from the standpoint of superior administration.' As to this last statement I take issue absolutely with you. I have taken particular pains to inquire from all the members of the bar whose opinion I regard as most worthy of attention, and it is practically unanimous that he is an exceptionally fine judge and head and shoulders above every other man who at that time it was possible to obtain for the position.

"In the next place, as to the 'affront* to you; I do not understand how you can make such a statement. It is my business to nominate or refuse to nominate, and yours, together with your colleagues, to confirm or refuse to confirm. Of course the common sense way is to confer together and try to come to an agreement. It is just exactly what I have been doing in this matter. If we both do our duty then each will endeavor to obtain a man for the position who is the best man under the circumstances that can be obtained, and neither of us will insist upon any man for merely personal reasons if there is good ground against him—upon any man who is not the best man for the position. I never saw H. until the other day. I have not the slightest interest in his appointment, save from the standpoint of the bench and of the public. As you do not indicate any possible objection to him, save that you insist upon having some one else, I must decline to consider that there will be any affront to you involved in appointing him.

"Finally, I am sorry to say I must emphatically disagree with you and disagree with your statement that it ought to suffice me to have you simply say that you prefer Y. to H. You add that 'both men are admittedly qualified for the position.' Here you say that H. is qualified for the position, but insist that your preference for Y. should be enough to settle the matter. I cannot consider such a proposition. I have not considered my own individual preference and I cannot consider yours. Neither of us is entitled to have his personal preference considered, and it is the duty of both of us to disregard our individual preferences and take the man who will be most acceptable to the public and the bar, who will be most likely to do his work well and faithfully, showing exact justice to corporation and labor union, rich man and poor man, and the man who is neither a member of the corporation nor the labor union, and is neither rich nor poor."
A strong movement had been started by the labor unions in 1905 for the passage of a law by Congress depriving the courts of their power to issue injunctions in labor disputes. In his annual message of that year the President had expressed his opposition to such action and had suggested that the procedure in injunction cases might be regulated by requiring the judge to give due notice to the adverse parties before granting the writ, such due notice to depend upon the facts in the case. A bill somewhat along those lines was introduced but failed of enactment. It was reintroduced in 1906, and the labor unions opposed it, demanding the complete removal of the power to grant injunctions. The members of the Executive Council of the American Federation of Labor sought an interview with the President on March 21, 1906, and stated their views on the subject. In his reply the President told them that if they thought that the pending bill did not go far enough they would have no earthly difficulty in killing it for the capitalists were against it. '' Personally,'' he said,'' I think the proposed law a most admirable one, and I very sincerely wish it could be put through. As for the right of injunction, it is absolutely necessary to have this power lodged in the courts; though of course any abuse of the power is strongly to be reprobated. During the four and a half years that I have been President I do not remember an instance where the Government has invoked the right of injunction against a combination of laborers. We have invoked it certainly a score of times against combinations of capital; I think possibly oftener. But understand me, gentlemen, if ever I thought it necessary, if I thought a combination of laborers were doing wrong, I would apply an injunction against them just as quick as against so many capitalists.''
In the spring of 1906 the President's attention was called to conditions in the stock yards and meat packing-houses of Chicago, which were reported to be very bad. He appointed a special commission to investigate the matter and on June 4 he sent its report to Congress with a message in which he said the conditions disclosed were "revolting" and "in the interest of health and decency should be radically changed." The report fairly startled the whole country, for the revelations made were fitly characterized by the President. Following his recommendations, a law was passed giving the Government power to enforce inspection of prepared meat products, and, what was of far-reaching importance, a Pure Food and Drugs Act, which was the first thoroughgoing law of the kind and which has proved in practise an incalculable boon to the country. The great beef dealers fought these measures bitterly and sought in many ways to deprive them of their effectiveness by ingenious amendments of one kind or another, but in vain. The whole country was aroused by the revelations and Congress acted in obedience to an overwhelming popular demand.

Another beneficient law passed at this session of Congress was an Employers' Liability Act which first established on the statute books recognition of the principle involved. A consular reform measure was also passed, classifying the service, and, most important of all, the act decreeing the construction of a lock canal at Panama.
The President was justly proud of the work of the session, and issued a frankly jubilant statement to that effect. High praise came to him from many quarters, and, most surprising of all, from a persistent and often virulent critic, the New York World. The editorial article which that journal published on July 2, 1906, after the adjournment of Congress, is worth reproducing to show what even his political opponents felt moved to say of him at this time:
Mr. Roosevelt's best work,.
"Mr. Roosevelt would be more than human if he could conceal his elation over the achievements of a Congress that has evidenced almost phonographic fidelity to the wishes of the President. The sentiment of the country is undoubtedly in accord with him in praising Congress for what it has done—concerning which Mr. Roosevelt might say, 'All of which I saw and a great part of which I was.'
"But the President in his exultant proclamation was restrained by modesty perhaps from calling attention to what historians are likely to regard as the best work of his Administration—not legislation, but the progress made in enforcing laws already on the statute-books.
"Congress has for twenty years been making laws to restrain organized wealth and will be passing new laws along the same lines for decades to come, but Mr. Roosevelt is the first President to make a considerable progress in the matter of enforcing this legislation.
"In replying to a Senate resolution Attorney General Moody has issued a statement showing that under the Elkins Anti-Rebate law the Department of Justice has already obtained thirty-six indictments and nine convictions, with only two acquittals and three cases nolle-prossed. In view of the fact that it has been hardly more than a year since the Administration began to make serious efforts to enforce this law, a really great work has been accomplished. If the President continues this vigor it will be a matter of only a few months before he will have destroyed the iniquitous rebate system, root and branch.
"The rebate cases represented but one set of activities Only a few days ago Mr. Moody began more than thirty suits against railroad companies for violating the Safety Appliance law, an act which has been virtually a dead letter. The cases are not perhaps of the first importance, but they reveal a healthy determination to execute laws regardless of the wealth of the defendants. The same thing must be said of the Administration's campaign against the Paper Trust, the Drug Trust and the Fertilizer Trust.
"By relentless prosecution of rich offenders Secretary Hitchcock has all but destroyed the business of stealing Government land. The Post-Office Department has pursued Burton until he has been at last driven out of the United States Senate and is in a fair way to go to prison. In the railroad-rate matter, in the investigation of the coal roads by the Interstate Commerce Commission, in the investigation of the packing-houses, in the preparations for prosecuting the Standard Oil Company, the Administration has shown a spirit that is not dismayed by the power of organized capital.   The President is actualizing the ' square deal' which makes every man equal before the law.
"Even Mr. Roosevelt's bitterest opponents could not minimize the healthful influence upon public sentiment of these activities. At a time when a horde of demagogues are trying to convince the American people that there is one law for the rich and another law for the poor, the President is proving that there is only one law for everybody and that the National Government knows not distinction in offenders. Such an object-lesson could not be more opportune. It is doubly so at a time when District-Attorneys like William Travers Jerome are making class distinctions in crime and shirking the prosecution of rich offenders. Whatever his faults, Mr. Roosevelt has proved that he is not dazzled by dollars."
A few days earlier the President had written, June 26, 1906, a letter to his devoted and much-loved friend, Jacob Riis, in reply to one asking for hints as to how best to answer the President's critics:
"I would not have the least idea how to give you light upon the criticisms made, chiefly because I really do not know about the latter in detail. For instance, I am criticized for interference with Congress. There really is not any answer I can make to this except to say that if I had not interfered we would not have had any rate bill, or any beef-packers' bill, or any pure food bill, or any consular reform bill, or the Panama Canal, or the Employers' Liability Bill, or in short, any of the legislation which we have obtained during the last year. . . .
"I have enumerated the measures we have succeeded in passing. If I stand for anything it is for this kind of substantive achievement, and above all, for treating public affairs with courage, honesty and sanity; for keeping our Army and Navy up; for making it evident that as a nation we do not intend to inflict wrong or submit to wrong, and that we do intend to try to do justice within our own borders, and so far as it can be done by legislation, to favor the growth of intelligence and the diffusion of wealth in such a manner as will measurably avoid the extremes of swollen fortunes and grinding poverty. This represents the ideal toward which I am striving. I hope we can fairly realize it."