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CHAPTER NINE 

Of Theodore Roosevelt And his Time Volume 2

THE TAFT CAMPAIGN: 

eaRly in the fall, when the campaign for Taft's election was beginning to assume aggressive force, publication was made of letters which showed that Senator Foraker of Ohio, who had led the assault upon the President in the affair of the negro troops at Brownsville, had acted as the paid attorney of the Standard Oil Company while occupying a seat in the Senate. Senator Foraker had also opposed Taft's nomination and had not taken the stump for him after he was nominated. A public reconciliation of the two men had been arranged in accordance with which they were to appear on the same platform and shake hands. On the eve of this demonstration the disclosure of the Senator's connection with the Standard Oil Company was made. Mr. Taft was in a quandary as to what course to pursue. The President had no doubt whatever in the matter, for in a letter to Taft on September 19, 1908, he said:
"I have seen the correspondence between Archbold and Foraker, published in the morning papers. Now, it is difficult for any man to advise another as to a given act in a campaign. Personally, if I were running for President, I should in view of these disclosures decline to appear upon the platform with Foraker, and I would have it understood in detail what is the exact fact, namely, that Mr. Foraker's separation from you and from me has been due not in the least to a difference of opinion on the negro question, which was merely a pretense, but to the fact that he was the attorney of the corporations, their hired representative in public life, and that therefore he naturally and inevitably opposed us in every way; that he opposed us when it came to appointments on the bench just as he opposed legislation that we asked for in Congress. I think it essential, if the bad effect upon the canvass of those disclosures is to be obviated, that we should show unmistakably how completely loose from us Mr. Foraker is. If this is not shown affirmatively, there is danger that the people will not see it and will simply think that all Republicans are tarred with the same brush. In other words there is need for aggressive action on our part. My own feeling is that nothing is gained by temporizing in a matter like this, or by paying heed to the ridiculous little politician who thinks it is a good thing to get harmony between you and creatures of the Foraker stamp. I would like to see you in the strongest and most emphatic way do what I should do in your place—make a fight openly on the ground that you stood in the Republican party and before the people for the triumph over the forces which were typified by the purchase of a United States Senator to do the will of the Standard Oil Company, and that you had been opposed by him because of this fundamental antagonism and that for the American people to beat you was to serve notice that they were willing to see a man punished because he declined to yield on such an issue."
Two days later, September 21,1908, the President wrote to George E. Sheldon, Treasurer of the Republican National Committee, at New York:
"I have been informed that you, or some one on behalf of the National Committee, have requested contributions both from Mr. Archbold and Mr. Harriman. If this is true I wish to enter a most earnest protest, and to say that in my judgment not only should such contributions not be solicited, but if tendered they should be refused; and if they have been accepted they should immediately be returned. I am not the candidate, but I am the head of the Republican Administration, which is an issue in this campaign, and I protest most earnestly against men whom we are prosecuting being asked to contribute to elect a President who will appoint an Attorney General to continue these prosecutions. Four years ago Mr. Cortelyou returned, as I am informed, any money forwarded by any one who was being prosecuted or proceeded against by the National Government, or who had any personal interest whatever in any matter pending before the administration."
Mr. Sheldon's reply to this letter caused great surprise and distress to the President for it informed him that his directions to Mr. Cortelyou, Chairman of the Republican National Committee in 1904, quoted in an earlier chapter, to return a Standard Oil contribution to the campaign fund, had not been obeyed. He replied to Mr. Sheldon's note as follows, on September 25, 1908:

"There is one feature of your letter of the 22d which causes me much surprise. You say that in 1904 the contribution of the Standard Oil Company I spoke of was made under the authority of its executive committee. This is the first time I was aware that such a contribution was made. In response to my letters Mr. Cortelyou told me that no Standard Oil money was received or would be received. Later, after the campaign closed, I was informed from a different source that certain individuals who had contributed had Standard Oil as well as other interests. Mr. Cortelyou informed' me that he made his statement on Mr. Bliss's authority, which he and I were of course warranted in accepting as final." (See Chapter twenty seven, Volume. I.)
The campaign was not proceeding with the aggressive vigor which the President considered desirable, and toward the end of September he yielded to the appeals of the campaign managers and decided to take a hand in it himself. He wrote a long letter, addressed to the Democratic candidate, William Jennings Bryan, which was published in the newspapers and called forth a vigorous reply from Mr. Bryan. Roosevelt responded in a second and no less vigorous letter, and the desired aggressiveness was imparted to the canvass, remaining with it till the end. Writing to Lawrence Abbott, of the Outlook, at New York, on September 22, 1908, the President said:
". . . In this Foraker affair I made up my mind that I would hit from the shoulder, inasmuch as Taft did not. Taft is quite right in saying that he does not wish to hit a man when he is down; but this is not a case of that. This is a case of a fight to a finish, and in such a fight (if you will pardon the simile by an old-time boxer) if a man wishes to win it is absolutely necessary that he shall knock out his opponent when he has the latter groggy."
Writing to William Kent, Esq., California, on September 28, 1908, he said:
"Of course I do not dare in public to express my real opinion of Bryan. He is a kindly man and well-meaning in a weak way; always provided that to mean well must not be translated by him into doing well if it would interfere with his personal prospects. But he is the cheapest fakir we have ever had proposed for President."
Twice during his Presidency, Roosevelt offered a position on the Supreme Court bench to William H. Taft, and twice the latter declined to accept it. The first offer was made while Taft was Governor of the Philippines and was declined on the ground that he did not feel that he ought to abandon his work in the Islands at that time. The second offer was made in March, 1906, when Taft was Secretary of War. The correspondence between the two men at the time was first published during the campaign of 1908 and the revelation which it made of the affectionate relations existing between them caused something very like a sensation. When the appointment was offered, the President thought that Mr. Taft would be glad to accept it and was surprised when in a personal interview the latter expressed himself otherwise. Shortly after this interview the President, on March 15, 1906, wrote a long letter to him in which he said:
"I think I have been in error as to your feeling. You say that it is your decided preference to continue your present work. This I had not understood. On the contrary, I gathered that what you really wanted to do was to go on the hench, and that my urging was in the line of your inclination, but in a matter in which you were in doubt as to your duty.
"My dear Will, it is preeminently a matter in which no other man can take the responsibility of deciding for you what is best for you to do. Nobody could decide for me whether I should go to the war or stay as Assistant Secretary of the Navy. Nobody could decide for me whether I should accept the Vice Presidency or try to continue as governor. In each case it is the man himself who is to lead his life after having decided one way or the other. No one can lead that life for him, and neither he nor any one else can afford to have any one else make the decision for him, because the vital factor in the decision must be an equation of the man himself.
"So far as I am personally concerned, I could not put myself in your place, because I am not a lawyer, and would under no circumstances, even if I had been trained for a lawyer, have any leaning toward the bench; so in your case I should, as a matter of course, accept the three years of service in the War Department, dealing with the Panama and Philippine questions, and then abide the event as to whether I became President or continued in public life in some less conspicuous position or went back to the practice of law.
"But I appreciate, as every thoughtful man must, the importance of the part to be played by the Supreme Court in the next 25 years. I don't at all like the social conditions at present. The dull, purblind folly of very rich men, their greed and arrogance, and the way in which they have unduly prospered by the help of the ablest lawyers, and, too often through the weakness and short-sightedness of the judges, or by their unfortunate possession of meticulous minds; these facts, and the corruption in business and politics, have tended to produce a very unhealthy condition of excitement and irritation in the popular mind, which shows itself in part in the enormous increase in the Socialistic propaganda.

"Nothing effective, because nothing at once honest and
intelligent is being done to combat the great amount of
evil which, mixed with a little good, a little truth, is contained in the outpourings of Blank, Blank, Blank, Blank, Blank,	.

"Some of these Socialists; some of them merely lurid sensationalists; but they are all building up a revolutionary feeling, which will, most probably, take the form of a political campaign. Then we may have to do, too late, or almost too late, what had to be done in the silver campaign, when in one summer we had to convince a great many good people that what they had been laboriously taught for several years was untrue.

"Under such circumstances you would be the best possible leader, and with your leadership we could rest assured that only good methods would prevail. In such a contest you could do very much if you were on the bench; you could do very much if you were in active political life outside. I think you could do most as President, but you could do very much as Chief Justice, and you could do less, but still very much, as Associate Justice. Where you can fight best I cannot say, for you know what your soul turns to better than I can.

"As I see the situation, it is this: There are strong arguments against your taking this justice ship. In the first place, my belief is that of all the men who have appeared so far you are the man who is most likely to receive the Republican nomination, and who is, I think, the best man to receive it. It is not a light thing to cast aside the chance of the Presidency, even though, of course, it is a chance, however, a good one.

"It would be a very foolish thing for you to get it into your thoughts, so that your sweet and fine nature would be warped and you would become bitter and sour, as Henry Clay became; and, thank heaven, this is impossible. But it is well to remember that the shadow of the Presidency falls on no man twice, save in most exceptional circumstances.

'' Now, my dear Will, there is the situation as I see it. It is a hard choice to make, and you yourself have to make it. You have two alternatives before you, each with uncertain possibilities, and you cannot feel sure that which ever you take you will not afterward feel that it would have been better if you had taken the other. But which ever you take I know that you will render great and durable service to the nation for many years to come, and I feel sure that you should decide in accordance with the promptings of your own liking, of your own belief as to where you can render the service which most appeals to you, as well as that which you. feel is most beneficial to the nation. No one can with wisdom advise you."
Mr. Taft had the offer under consideration for three and a half months before deciding, and on July 30, 1906, declined it in a letter written from Murray Bay, Canada, where he was on vacation. In it he repeated the Philippine reason that he had given when the first offer was made, and said:
"I know that few, if any, even among my friends, will credit me with anything but a desire, unconscious, perhaps, to run for the Presidency, and that I must face and bear this misconstruction of what I do. But I am confident you credit my reasons as I give them to you, and will believe me when I say that I would much prefer to go on the Supreme Bench for life than to run for the Presidency, and that in twenty years of judicial service I could make myself more useful to the country than as President, even if my election should come about.
"Please do not misunderstand me to think that I am indispensable or that the world could not run on much the same if I were to disappear in the St. Lawrence river. But circumstances seem to me to have imposed something in the nature of a trust to me personally that I should not discharge by now succeeding Justice Brown. In the nature of things the trust must end with this Administration, and one or two years is short to do much. Yet the next session of Congress may result in much for the benefit of the Filipino, and it seems to me it is my duty to be in the fight.''
The election took place on November 2, 1908, and Taft was elected triumphantly, receiving 321 electoral votes against 162 for Bryan, and a plurality of 1,269,800 in the popular vote. This was the largest electoral and popular vote ever received by any candidate except that recorded for Roosevelt in 1904, when he had 336 electoral votes and a plurality of 2,545,500 in the popular vote.
Five days after his election, November 7, 1908, Mr. Taft wrote from Hot Springs, Va., to the President a long letter, mainly composed of a review of the results in various States, and saying in recognition of the President's services on his behalf:
"I have just reached Hot Springs, and have only now taken up my correspondence. The first letter I wish to write is to you, because you have always been the chief agent in working out the present status of affairs, and my selection and election are chiefly your work. You and my brother Charley made that possible which in all probability would not have occurred otherwise. I don't wish to be falsely modest in this. I know, as you have said to me when we have talked the matter over, that neither you nor he could probably have done the same thing with any other candidate, under the circumstances as they were, but that doesn 't affect the fact as I have stated it, or my reason for feeling the deep gratitude which I do to you both for what has happened and the successful efforts which you have made, costing time and energy and subjecting you to severe criticism and, in some cases, the loss of personal friendships that you might have avoided."