CHAPTER VIII

THE NEW YORK GOVERNORSHIP

In September, 1898, the First Volunteer Cavalry, in company with most

of the rest of the Fifth Army Corps, was disembarked at Montauk Point.

Shortly after it was disbanded, and a few days later, I was nominated

for Governor of New York by the Republican party. Timothy L. Woodruff

was nominated for Lieutenant-Governor. He was my stanch friend

throughout the term of our joint service.

The previous year, the machine or standpat Republicans, who were under

the domination of Senator Platt, had come to a complete break with the

anti-machine element over the New York mayoralty. This had brought

the Republican party to a smash, not only in New York City, but in the

State, where the Democratic candidate for Chief Judge of the Court

of Appeals, Alton B. Parker, was elected by sixty or eighty thousand

majority. Mr. Parker was an able man, a lieutenant of Mr. Hill's,

standing close to the conservative Democrats of the Wall Street type.

These conservative Democrats were planning how to wrest the Democratic

party from the control of Mr. Bryan. They hailed Judge Parker's victory

as a godsend. The Judge at once loomed up as a Presidential possibility,

and was carefully groomed for the position by the New York Democratic

machine, and its financial allies in the New York business world.

The Republicans realized that the chances were very much against them.

Accordingly the leaders were in a chastened mood and ready to nominate

any candidate with whom they thought there was a chance of winning. I

was the only possibility, and, accordingly, under pressure from certain

of the leaders who recognized this fact, and who responded to popular

pressure, Senator Platt picked me for the nomination. He was entirely

frank in the matter. He made no pretense that he liked me personally;

but he deferred to the judgment of those who insisted that I was the

only man who could be elected, and that therefore I had to be nominated.

Foremost among the leaders who pressed me on Mr. Platt (who "pestered"

him about me, to use his own words) were Mr. Quigg, Mr. Odell--then

State Chairman of the Republican organization, and afterwards

Governor--and Mr. Hazel, now United States Judge. Judge Hazel did not

know me personally, but felt that the sentiment in his city, Buffalo,

demanded my nomination, and that the then Republican Governor, Mr.

Black, could not be reelected. Mr. Odell, who hardly knew me personally,

felt the same way about Mr. Black's chances, and, as he had just taken

the State Chairmanship, he was very anxious to win a victory. Mr. Quigg

knew me quite well personally; he had been in touch with me for years,

while he was a reporter on the _Tribune_, and also when he edited a

paper in Montana; he had been on good terms with me while he was in

Congress and I was Civil Service Commissioner, meeting me often in

company with my especial cronies in Congress--men like Lodge, Speaker

Tom Reed, Greenhalge, Butterworth, and Dolliver--and he had urged my

appointment as Police Commissioner on Mayor Strong.

It was Mr. Quigg who called on me at Montauk Point to sound me about the

Governorship; Mr. Platt being by no means enthusiastic over Mr. Quigg's

mission, largely because he disapproved of the Spanish War and of my

part in bringing it about. Mr. Quigg saw me in my tent, in which he

spent a couple of hours with me, my brother-in-law, Douglas Robinson,

being also present. Quigg spoke very frankly to me, stating that he

earnestly desired to see me nominated and believed that the great body

of Republican voters in the State so desired, but that the organization

and the State Convention would finally do what Senator Platt desired. He

said that county leaders were already coming to Senator Platt, hinting

at a close election, expressing doubt of Governor Black's availability

for reelection, and asking why it would not be a good thing to nominate

me; that now that I had returned to the United States this would go on

more and more all the time, and that he (Quigg) did not wish that

these men should be discouraged and be sent back to their localities to

suppress a rising sentiment in my favor. For this reason he said that

he wanted from me a plain statement as to whether or not I wanted the

nomination, and as to what would be my attitude toward the organization

in the event of my nomination and election, whether or not I would "make

war" on Mr. Platt and his friends, or whether I would confer with them

and with the organization leaders generally, and give fair consideration

to their point of view as to party policy and public interest. He said

he had not come to make me any offer of the nomination, and had no

authority to do so, nor to get any pledges or promises. He simply wanted

a frank definition of my attitude towards existing party conditions.

To this I replied that I should like to be nominated, and if nominated

would promise to throw myself into the campaign with all possible

energy. I said that I should not make war on Mr. Platt or anybody else

if war could be avoided; that what I wanted was to be Governor and not a

faction leader; that I certainly would confer with the organization

men, as with everybody else who seemed to me to have knowledge of

and interest in public affairs, and that as to Mr. Platt and the

organization leaders, I would do so in the sincere hope that there might

always result harmony of opinion and purpose; but that while I would try

to get on well with the organization, the organization must with equal

sincerity strive to do what I regarded as essential for the public good;

and that in every case, after full consideration of what everybody had

to say who might possess real knowledge of the matter, I should have to

act finally as my own judgment and conscience dictated and administer

the State government as I thought it ought to be administered. Quigg

said that this was precisely what he supposed I would say, that it was

all anybody could expect, and that he would state it to Senator Platt

precisely as I had put it to him, which he accordingly did; and,

throughout my term as Governor, Quigg lived loyally up to our

understanding.[*]

[*] In a letter to me Mr. Quigg states, what I had

forgotten, that I told him to tell the Senator that I would

talk freely with him, and had no intention of becoming a

factional leader with a personal organization, yet that I

must have direct personal relations with everybody, and get

their views at first hand whenever I so desired, because I

could not have one man speaking for all.

After being nominated, I made a hard and aggressive campaign through the

State. My opponent was a respectable man, a judge, behind whom stood

Mr. Croker, the boss of Tammany Hall. My object was to make the people

understand that it was Croker, and not the nominal candidate, who was my

real opponent; that the choice lay between Crokerism and myself. Croker

was a powerful and truculent man, the autocrat of his organization, and

of a domineering nature. For his own reasons he insisted upon Tammany's

turning down an excellent Democratic judge who was a candidate for

reelection. This gave me my chance. Under my attack, Croker, who was a

stalwart fighting man and who would not take an attack tamely, himself

came to the front. I was able to fix the contest in the public mind as

one between himself and myself; and, against all probabilities, I won by

the rather narrow margin of eighteen thousand plurality.

As I have already said, there is a lunatic fringe to every reform

movement. At least nine-tenths of all the sincere reformers supported

me; but the ultra-pacifists, the so-called anti-imperialists, or

anti-militarists, or peace-at-any-price men, preferred Croker to me;

and another knot of extremists who had at first ardently insisted that

I must be "forced" on Platt, as soon as Platt supported me themselves

opposed me _because_ he supported me. After election John Hay wrote me

as follows: "While you are Governor, I believe the party can be

made solid as never before. You have already shown that a man may be

absolutely honest and yet practical; a reformer by instinct and a wise

politician; brave, bold, and uncompromising, and yet not a wild ass

of the desert. The exhibition made by the professional independents in

voting against you for no reason on earth except that somebody else was

voting for you, is a lesson that is worth its cost."

At that time boss rule was at its very zenith. Mr. Bryan's candidacy in

1896 on a free silver platform had threatened such frightful business

disaster as to make the business men, the wage-workers, and the

professional classes generally, turn eagerly to the Republican party.

East of the Mississippi the Republican vote for Mr. McKinley was larger

by far than it had been for Abraham Lincoln in the days when the life of

the Nation was at stake. Mr. Bryan championed many sorely needed reforms

in the interest of the plain people; but many of his platform proposals,

economic and otherwise, were of such a character that to have put them

into practice would have meant to plunge all our people into conditions

far worse than any of those for which he sought a remedy. The free

silver advocates included sincere and upright men who were able to make

a strong case for their position; but with them and dominating them were

all the believers in the complete or partial repudiation of National,

State, and private debts; and not only the business men but the

workingmen grew to feel that under these circumstances too heavy a price

could not be paid to avert the Democratic triumph. The fear of Mr. Bryan

threw almost all the leading men of all classes into the arms of whoever

opposed him.

The Republican bosses, who were already very powerful, and who were

already in fairly close alliance with the privileged interests, now

found everything working to their advantage. Good and high-minded men

of conservative temperament in their panic played into the hands of the

ultra-reactionaries of business and politics. The alliance between the

two kinds of privilege, political and financial, was closely cemented;

and wherever there was any attempt to break it up, the cry was at once

raised that this merely represented another phase of the assault on

National honesty and individual and mercantile integrity. As so often

happens, the excesses and threats of an unwise and extreme radicalism

had resulted in immensely strengthening the position of the

beneficiaries of reaction. This was the era when the Standard Oil

Company achieved a mastery of Pennsylvania politics so far-reaching

and so corrupt that it is difficult to describe it without seeming to

exaggerate.

In New York State, United States Senator Platt was the absolute boss of

the Republican party. "Big business" was back of him; yet at the time

this, the most important element in his strength, was only imperfectly

understood. It was not until I was elected Governor that I myself came

to understand it. We were still accustomed to talking of the "machine"

as if it were something merely political, with which business had

nothing to do. Senator Platt did not use his political position to

advance his private fortunes--therein differing absolutely from many

other political bosses. He lived in hotels and had few extravagant

tastes. Indeed, I could not find that he had any tastes at all except

for politics, and on rare occasions for a very dry theology wholly

divorced from moral implications. But big business men contributed

to him large sums of money, which enabled him to keep his grip on

the machine and secured for them the help of the machine if they were

threatened with adverse legislation. The contributions were given in the

guise of contributions for campaign purposes, of money for the good

of the party; when the money was contributed there was rarely talk of

specific favors in return.[*] It was simply put into Mr. Platt's hands

and treated by him as in the campaign chest. Then he distributed it

in the districts where it was most needed by the candidates and

organization leaders. Ordinarily no pledge was required from the latter

to the bosses, any more than it was required by the business men

from Mr. Platt or his lieutenants. No pledge was needed. It was all a

"gentlemen's understanding." As the Senator once said to me, if a man's

character was such that it was necessary to get a promise from him, it

was clear proof that his character was such that the promise would not

be worth anything after it was made.

[*] Each nation has its own pet sins to which it is merciful

and also sins which it treats as most abhorrent. In America

we are peculiarly sensitive about big money contributions

for which the donors expect any reward. In England, where in

some ways the standard is higher than here, such

contributions are accepted as a matter of course, nay, as

one of the methods by which wealthy men obtain peerages. It

would be well-nigh an impossibility for a man to secure a

seat in the United States Senate by mere campaign

contributions, in the way that seats in the British House of

Lords have often been secured without any scandal being

caused thereby.

It must not be forgotten that some of the worst practices of the machine

in dealings of this kind represented merely virtues in the wrong place,

virtues wrenched out of proper relation to their surroundings. A man in

a doubtful district might win only because of the help Mr. Platt gave

him; he might be a decent young fellow without money enough to finance

his own campaign, who was able to finance it only because Platt of his

own accord found out or was apprised of his need and advanced the money.

Such a man felt grateful, and, because of his good qualities, joined

with the purely sordid and corrupt heelers and crooked politicians to

become part of the Platt machine. In his turn Mr. Platt was recognized

by the business men, the big contributors, as an honorable man; not only

a man of his word, but a man who, whenever he received a favor, could be

trusted to do his best to repay it on any occasion that arose. I believe

that usually the contributors, and the recipient, sincerely felt that

the transaction was proper and subserved the cause of good politics

and good business; and, indeed, as regards the major part of the

contributions, it is probable that this was the fact, and that the only

criticism that could properly be made about the contributions was that

they were not made with publicity--and at that time neither the parties

nor the public had any realization that publicity was necessary, or any

adequate understanding of the dangers of the "invisible empire"

which throve by what was done in secrecy. Many, probably most, of the

contributors of this type never wished anything personal in exchange for

their contributions, and made them with sincere patriotism, desiring in

return only that the Government should be conducted on a proper basis.

Unfortunately, it was, in practice, exceedingly difficult to distinguish

these men from the others who contributed big sums to the various party

bosses with the expectation of gaining concrete and personal advantages

(in which the bosses shared) at the expense of the general public. It

was very hard to draw the line between these two types of contributions.

There was but one kind of money contributions as to which it seemed to

me absolutely impossible for either the contributor or the recipient to

disguise to themselves the evil meaning of the contribution. This was

where a big corporation contributed to both political parties. I knew of

one such case where in a State campaign a big corporation which had many

dealings with public officials frankly contributed in the neighborhood

of a hundred thousand dollars to one campaign fund and fifty thousand

dollars to the campaign fund of the other side--and, I believe, made

some further substantial contributions in the same ratio of two dollars

to one side for every one dollar given to the other. The contributors

were Democrats, and the big contributions went to the Democratic

managers. The Republican was elected, and after his election, when

a matter came up affecting the company, in which its interests were

hostile to those of the general public, the successful candidate, then

holding a high State office, was approached by his campaign managers

and the situation put frankly before him. He was less disturbed than

astonished, and remarked, "Why, I thought So-and-so and his associates

were Democrats and subscribed to the Democratic campaign fund." "So they

did," was the answer; "they subscribed to them twice as much as they

subscribed to us, but if they had had any idea that you intended doing

what you now say you will do, they would have subscribed it all to the

other side, and more too." The State official in his turn answered that

he was very sorry if any one had subscribed under a misapprehension,

that it was no fault of his, for he had stated definitely and clearly

his position, that he of course had no money wherewith himself to return

what without his knowledge had been contributed, and that all he could

say was that any man who had subscribed to his campaign fund under the

impression that the receipt of the subscription would be a bar to the

performance of public duty was sadly mistaken.

The control by Mr. Platt and his lieutenants over the organization was

well-nigh complete. There were splits among the bosses, and insurgent

movements now and then, but the ordinary citizens had no control over

the political machinery except in a very few districts. There were,

however, plenty of good men in politics, men who either came from

districts where there was popular control, or who represented a genuine

aspiration towards good citizenship on the part of some boss or group of

bosses, or else who had been nominated frankly for reasons of expediency

by bosses whose attitude towards good citizenship was at best one of

Gallio-like indifference. At the time when I was nominated for Governor,

as later when Mr. Hughes was nominated and renominated for Governor,

there was no possibility of securing the nomination unless the bosses

permitted it. In each case the bosses, the machine leaders, took a man

for whom they did not care, because he was the only man with whom they

could win. In the case of Mr. Hughes there was of course also the fact

of pressure from the National Administration. But the bosses were never

overcome in a fair fight, when they had made up their minds to fight,

until the Saratoga Convention in 1910, when Mr. Stimson was nominated

for Governor.

Senator Platt had the same inborn capacity for the kind of politics

which he liked that many big Wall Street men have shown for not wholly

dissimilar types of finance. It was his chief interest, and he

applied himself to it unremittingly. He handled his private business

successfully; but it was politics in which he was absorbed, and he

concerned himself therewith every day in the year. He had built up an

excellent system of organization, and the necessary funds came from

corporations and men of wealth who contributed as I have described

above. The majority of the men with a natural capacity for organization

leadership of the type which has generally been prevalent in New York

politics turned to Senator Platt as their natural chief and helped build

up the organization, until under his leadership it became more powerful

and in a position of greater control than any other Republican machine

in the country, excepting in Pennsylvania. The Democratic machines

in some of the big cities, as in New York and Boston, and the country

Democratic machine of New York under David B. Hill, were probably

even more efficient, representing an even more complete mastery by

the bosses, and an even greater degree of drilled obedience among the

henchmen. It would be an entire mistake to suppose that Mr. Platt's

lieutenants were either all bad men or all influenced by unworthy

motives. He was constantly doing favors for men. He had won the

gratitude of many good men. In the country districts especially, there

were many places where his machine included the majority of the best

citizens, the leading and substantial citizens, among the inhabitants.

Some of his strongest and most efficient lieutenants were disinterested

men of high character.

There had always been a good deal of opposition to Mr. Platt and the

machine, but the leadership of this opposition was apt to be found only

among those whom Abraham Lincoln called the "silk stockings," and much

of it excited almost as much derision among the plain people as the

machine itself excited anger or dislike. Very many of Mr. Platt's

opponents really disliked him and his methods, for aesthetic rather than

for moral reasons, and the bulk of the people half-consciously felt this

and refused to submit to their leadership. The men who opposed him in

this manner were good citizens according to their lights, prominent in

the social clubs and in philanthropic circles, men of means and often

men of business standing. They disliked coarse and vulgar politicians,

and they sincerely reprobated all the shortcomings that were recognized

by, and were offensive to, people of their own caste. They had not the

slightest understanding of the needs, interests, ways of thought, and

convictions of the average small man; and the small man felt this,

although he could not express it, and sensed that they were really not

concerned with his welfare, and that they did not offer him anything

materially better from his point of view than the machine.

When reformers of this type attempted to oppose Mr. Platt, they usually

put up either some rather inefficient, well-meaning person, who

bathed every day, and didn't steal, but whose only good point was

"respectability," and who knew nothing of the great fundamental

questions looming before us; or else they put up some big business man

or corporation lawyer who was wedded to the gross wrong and injustice

of our economic system, and who neither by personality nor by programme

gave the ordinary plain people any belief that there was promise of

vital good to them in the change. The correctness of their view was

proved by the fact that as soon as fundamental economic and social

reforms were at stake the aesthetic, as distinguished from the genuinely

moral, reformers, for the most part sided with the bosses against the

people.

When I became Governor, the conscience of the people was in no way or

shape aroused, as it has since become roused. The people accepted and

practiced in a matter-of-course way as quite proper things which they

would not now tolerate. They had no definite and clearly outlined

conception of what they wished in the way of reform. They on the whole

tolerated, and indeed approved of, the machine; and there had been no

development on any considerable scale of reformers with the vision to

see what the needs of the people were, and the high purpose sanely to

achieve what was necessary in order to meet these needs. I knew both the

machine and the silk-stocking reformers fairly well, from many years'

close association with them. The machine as such had no ideals at all,

although many of the men composing it did have. On the other hand, the

ideals of very many of the silk-stocking reformers did not relate to

the questions of real and vital interest to our people; and, singularly

enough, in international matters, these same silk-stockings were no more

to be trusted than the average ignorant demagogue or shortsighted spoils

politicians. I felt that these men would be broken reeds to which to

trust in any vital contest for betterment of social and industrial

conditions.

I had neither the training nor the capacity that would have enabled me

to match Mr. Platt and his machine people on their own ground. Nor did

I believe that the effort to build up a machine of my own under the then

existing conditions would meet the needs of the situation so far as the

people were concerned. I therefore made no effort to create a machine of

my own, and consistently adopted the plan of going over the heads of the

men holding public office and of the men in control of the organization,

and appealing directly to the people behind them. The machine, for

instance, had a more or less strong control over the great bulk of the

members of the State Legislature; but in the last resort the people

behind these legislators had a still greater control over them. I made

up my mind that the only way I could beat the bosses whenever the need

to do so arose (and unless there was such need I did not wish to try)

was, not by attempting to manipulate the machinery, and not by trusting

merely to the professional reformers, but by making my appeal as

directly and as emphatically as I knew how to the mass of voters

themselves, to the people, to the men who if waked up would be able to

impose their will on their representatives. My success depended upon

getting the people in the different districts to look at matters in my

way, and getting them to take such an active interest in affairs as to

enable them to exercise control over their representatives.

There were a few of the Senators and Assemblymen whom I could reach by

seeing them personally and putting before them my arguments; but most of

them were too much under the control of the machine for me to shake

them loose unless they knew that the people were actively behind me. In

making my appeal to the people as a whole I was dealing with an entirely

different constituency from that which, especially in the big cities,

liked to think of itself as the "better element," the particular

exponent of reform and good citizenship. I was dealing with shrewd,

hard-headed, kindly men and women, chiefly concerned with the absorbing

work of earning their own living, and impatient of fads, who had grown

to feel that the associations with the word "reformer" were not much

better than the associations with the word "politician." I had to

convince these men and women of my good faith, and, moreover, of my

common sense and efficiency. They were most of them strong partisans,

and an outrage had to be very real and very great to shake them even

partially loose from their party affiliations. Moreover, they took

little interest in any fight of mere personalities. They were not

influenced in the least by the silk-stocking reform view of Mr. Platt.

I knew that if they were persuaded that I was engaged in a mere faction

fight against him, that it was a mere issue between his ambition and

mine, they would at once become indifferent, and my fight would be lost.

But I felt that I could count on their support wherever I could show

them that the fight was not made just for the sake of the row, that it

was not made merely as a factional contest against Senator Platt and the

organization, but was waged from a sense of duty for real and tangible

causes such as the promotion of governmental efficiency and honesty,

and forcing powerful moneyed men to take the proper attitude toward the

community at large. They stood by me when I insisted upon having the

canal department, the insurance department, and the various departments

of the State Government run with efficiency and honesty; they stood by

me when I insisted upon making wealthy men who owned franchises pay

the State what they properly ought to pay; they stood by me when, in

connection with the strikes on the Croton Aqueduct and in Buffalo, I

promptly used the military power of the State to put a stop to rioting

and violence.

In the latter case my chief opponents and critics were local politicians

who were truckling to the labor vote; but in all cases coming under the

first two categories I had serious trouble with the State leaders of the

machine. I always did my best, in good faith, to get Mr. Platt and the

other heads of the machine to accept my views, and to convince them,

by repeated private conversations, that I was right. I never wantonly

antagonized or humiliated them. I did not wish to humiliate them or to

seem victorious over them; what I wished was to secure the things that

I thought it essential to the men and women of the State to secure. If I

could finally persuade them to support me, well and good; in such case I

continued to work with them in the friendliest manner.

If after repeated and persistent effort I failed to get them to support

me, then I made a fair fight in the open, and in a majority of cases I

carried my point and succeeded in getting through the legislation which

I wished. In theory the Executive has nothing to do with legislation. In

practice, as things now are, the Executive is or ought to be peculiarly

representative of the people as a whole. As often as not the action

of the Executive offers the only means by which the people can get the

legislation they demand and ought to have. Therefore a good executive

under the present conditions of American political life must take a very

active interest in getting the right kind of legislation, in addition

to performing his executive duties with an eye single to the public

welfare. More than half of my work as Governor was in the direction of

getting needed and important legislation. I accomplished this only by

arousing the people, and riveting their attention on what was done.

Gradually the people began to wake up more and more to the fact that the

machine politicians were not giving them the kind of government which

they wished. As this waking up grew more general, not merely in New York

or any other one State, but throughout most of the Nation, the power

of the bosses waned. Then a curious thing happened. The professional

reformers who had most loudly criticized these bosses began to change

toward them. Newspaper editors, college presidents, corporation lawyers,

and big business men, all alike, had denounced the bosses and had taken

part in reform movements against them so long as these reforms dealt

only with things that were superficial, or with fundamental things that

did not affect themselves and their associates. But the majority

of these men turned to the support of the bosses when the great new

movement began clearly to make itself evident as one against privilege

in business no less than against privilege in politics, as one for

social and industrial no less than for political righteousness and fair

dealing. The big corporation lawyer who had antagonized the boss in

matters which he regarded as purely political stood shoulder to shoulder

with the boss when the movement for betterment took shape in direct

attack on the combination of business with politics and with the

judiciary which has done so much to enthrone privilege in the economic

world.

The reformers who denounced political corruption and fraud when shown

at the expense of their own candidates by machine ward heelers of a low

type hysterically applauded similar corrupt trickery when practiced by

these same politicians against men with whose political and industrial

programme the reformers were not in sympathy. I had always been

instinctively and by nature a democrat, but if I had needed conversion

to the democratic ideal here in America the stimulus would have been

supplied by what I saw of the attitude, not merely of the bulk of the

men of greatest wealth, but of the bulk of the men who most prided

themselves upon their education and culture, when we began in good faith

to grapple with the wrong and injustice of our social and industrial

system, and to hit at the men responsible for the wrong, no matter how

high they stood in business or in politics, at the bar or on the bench.

It was while I was Governor, and especially in connection with the

franchise tax legislation, that I first became thoroughly aware of the

real causes of this attitude among the men of great wealth and among the

men who took their tone from the men of great wealth.

Very soon after my victory in the race for Governor I had one or two

experiences with Senator Platt which showed in amusing fashion how

absolute the rule of the boss was in the politics of that day. Senator

Platt, who was always most kind and friendly in his personal relations

with me, asked me in one day to talk over what was to be done at Albany.

He had the two or three nominal heads of the organization with him. They

were his lieutenants, who counseled and influenced him, whose advice he

often followed, but who, when he had finally made up his mind, merely

registered and carried out his decrees. After a little conversation the

Senator asked if I had any member of the Assembly whom I wished to

have put on any committee, explaining that the committees were being

arranged. I answered no, and expressed my surprise at what he had said,

because I had not understood the Speaker who appointed the committees

had himself been agreed upon by the members-elect. "Oh!" responded the

Senator, with a tolerant smile, "He has not been chosen yet, but of

course whoever we choose as Speaker will agree beforehand to make the

appointments we wish." I made a mental note to the effect that if they

attempted the same process with the Governor-elect they would find

themselves mistaken.

In a few days the opportunity to prove this arrived. Under the preceding

Administration there had been grave scandals about the Erie Canal, the

trans-State Canal, and these scandals had been one of the chief issues

in the campaign for the Governorship. The construction of this work was

under the control of the Superintendent of Public Works. In the actual

state of affairs his office was by far the most important office under

me, and I intended to appoint to it some man of high character and

capacity who could be trusted to do the work not merely honestly and

efficiently, but without regard to politics. A week or so after the

Speakership incident Senator Platt asked me to come and see him (he was

an old and physically feeble man, able to move about only with extreme

difficulty).

On arrival I found the Lieutenant-Governor elect, Mr. Woodruff, who had

also been asked to come. The Senator informed me that he was glad to

say that I would have a most admirable man as Superintendent of Public

Works, as he had just received a telegram from a certain gentleman, whom

he named, saying that he would accept the position! He handed me the

telegram. The man in question was a man I liked; later I appointed him

to an important office in which he did well. But he came from a city

along the line of the canal, so that I did not think it best that he

should be appointed anyhow; and, moreover, what was far more important,

it was necessary to have it understood at the very outset that the

Administration was my Administration and was no one else's but mine. So

I told the Senator very politely that I was sorry, but that I could not

appoint his man. This produced an explosion, but I declined to lose my

temper, merely repeating that I must decline to accept any man chosen

for me, and that I must choose the man myself. Although I was very

polite, I was also very firm, and Mr. Platt and his friends finally

abandoned their position.

I appointed an engineer from Brooklyn, a veteran of the Civil War,

Colonel Partridge, who had served in Mayor Low's administration. He was

an excellent man in every way. He chose as his assistant, actively to

superintend the work, a Cornell graduate named Elon Hooker, a man with

no political backing at all, picked simply because he was the best

equipped man for the place. The office, the most important office under

me, was run in admirable fashion throughout my Administration; I

doubt if there ever was an important department of the New York State

Government run with a higher standard of efficiency and integrity.

But this was not all that had to be done about the canals. Evidently

the whole policy hitherto pursued had been foolish and inadequate. I

appointed a first-class non-partisan commission of business men and

expert engineers who went into the matter exhaustively, and their report

served as the basis upon which our entire present canal system is based.

There remained the question of determining whether the canal officials

who were in office before I became Governor, and whom I had declined to

reappoint, had been guilty of any action because of which it would be

possible to proceed against them criminally or otherwise under the law.

Such criminal action had been freely charged against them during the

campaign by the Democratic (including the so-called mugwump) press. To

determine this matter I appointed two Democratic lawyers, Messrs. Fox

and MacFarlane (the latter Federal District Attorney for New York under

President Cleveland), and put the whole investigation in their hands.

These gentlemen made an exhaustive investigation lasting several months.

They reported that there had been grave delinquency in the prosecution

of the work, delinquency which justified public condemnation of those

responsible for it (who were out of office), but that there was

no ground for criminal prosecution. I laid their report before the

Legislature with a message in which I said: "There is probably no lawyer

of high standing in the State who, after studying the report of counsel

in this case and the testimony taken by the investigating commission,

would disagree with them as to the impracticability of a successful

prosecution. Under such circumstances the one remedy was a thorough

change in the methods and management. This change has been made."

When my successor in the Governorship took office, Colonel Partridge

retired, and Elon Hooker, finding that he could no longer act with

entire disregard of politics and with an eye single to the efficiency of

the work, also left. A dozen years later--having in the meantime made

a marked success in a business career--he became the Treasurer of the

National Progressive party.

My action in regard to the canals, and the management of his office,

the most important office under me, by Colonel Partridge, established

my relations with Mr. Platt from the outset on pretty nearly the right

basis. But, besides various small difficulties, we had one or two

serious bits of trouble before my duties as Governor ceased. It must be

remembered that Mr. Platt was to all intents and purposes a large part

of, and sometimes a majority of, the Legislature. There were a few

entirely independent men such as Nathaniel Elsberg, Regis Post, and

Alford Cooley, in each of the two houses; the remainder were under the

control of the Republican and Democratic bosses, but could also be more

or less influenced by an aroused public opinion. The two machines were

apt to make common cause if their vital interests were touched. It was

my business to devise methods by which either the two machines could be

kept apart or else overthrown if they came together.

My desire was to achieve results, and not merely to issue manifestoes

of virtue. It is very easy to be efficient if the efficiency is based

on unscrupulousness, and it is still easier to be virtuous if one is

content with the purely negative virtue which consists in not doing

anything wrong, but being wholly unable to accomplish anything positive

for good. My favorite quotation from Josh Billings again applies: It is

so much easier to be a harmless dove than a wise serpent. My duty was to

combine both idealism and efficiency. At that time the public conscience

was still dormant as regards many species of political and business

misconduct, as to which during the next decade it became sensitive. I

had to work with the tools at hand and to take into account the feeling

of the people, which I have already described. My aim was persistently

to refuse to be put in a position where what I did would seem to be a

mere faction struggle against Senator Platt. My aim was to make a fight

only when I could so manage it that there could be no question in the

minds of honest men that my prime purpose was not to attack Mr. Platt

or any one else except as a necessary incident to securing clean and

efficient government.

In each case I did my best to persuade Mr. Platt not to oppose me. I

endeavored to make it clear to him that I was not trying to wrest the

organization from him; and I always gave him in detail the reasons why I

felt I had to take the position I intended to adopt. It was only after I

had exhausted all the resources of my patience that I would finally, if

he still proved obstinate, tell him that I intended to make the fight

anyhow. As I have said, the Senator was an old and feeble man in

physique, and it was possible for him to go about very little. Until

Friday evening he would be kept at his duties at Washington, while I was

in Albany. If I wished to see him it generally had to be at his hotel

in New York on Saturday, and usually I would go there to breakfast with

him. The one thing I would not permit was anything in the nature of a

secret or clandestine meeting. I always insisted on going openly. Solemn

reformers of the tom-fool variety, who, according to their custom, paid

attention to the name and not the thing, were much exercised over my

"breakfasting with Platt." Whenever I breakfasted with him they became

sure that the fact carried with it some sinister significance. The

worthy creatures never took the trouble to follow the sequence of facts

and events for themselves. If they had done so they would have seen that

any series of breakfasts with Platt always meant that I was going to

do something he did not like, and that I was trying, courteously and

frankly, to reconcile him to it. My object was to make it as easy as

possible for him to come with me. As long as there was no clash between

us there was no object in my seeing him; it was only when the clash came

or was imminent that I had to see him. A series of breakfasts was always

the prelude to some active warfare.[*] In every instance I substantially

carried my point, although in some cases not in exactly the way in which

I had originally hoped.

[*] To illustrate my meaning I quote from a letter of mine

to Senator Platt of December 13, 1899. He had been trying to

get me to promote a certain Judge X over the head of another

Judge Y. I wrote: "There is a strong feeling among the

judges and the leading members of the bar that Judge Y ought

not to have Judge X jumped over his head, and I do not see

my way clear to doing it. I am inclined to think that the

solution I mentioned to you is the solution I shall have to

adopt. Remember the breakfast at Douglas Robinson's at

8:30."

There were various measures to which he gave a grudging and querulous

assent without any break being threatened. I secured the reenactment

of the Civil Service Law, which under my predecessor had very foolishly

been repealed. I secured a mass of labor legislation, including the

enactment of laws to increase the number of factory inspectors, to

create a Tenement House Commission (whose findings resulted in further

and excellent legislation to improve housing conditions), to regulate

and improve sweatshop labor, to make the eight-hour and prevailing rate

of wages law effective, to secure the genuine enforcement of the act

relating to the hours of railway workers, to compel railways to equip

freight trains with air-brakes, to regulate the working hours of women

and protect both women and children from dangerous machinery, to enforce

good scaffolding provisions for workmen on buildings, to provide seats

for the use of waitresses in hotels and restaurants, to reduce the

hours of labor for drug-store clerks, to provide for the registration of

laborers for municipal employment. I tried hard but failed to secure an

employers' liability law and the state control of employment offices.

There was hard fighting over some of these bills, and, what was much

more serious, there was effort to get round the law by trickery and by

securing its inefficient enforcement. I was continually helped by men

with whom I had gotten in touch while in the Police Department; men such

as James Bronson Reynolds, through whom I first became interested in

settlement work on the East Side. Once or twice I went suddenly down to

New York City without warning any one and traversed the tenement-house

quarters, visiting various sweat-shops picked at random. Jake Riis

accompanied me; and as a result of our inspection we got not only

an improvement in the law but a still more marked improvement in its

administration. Thanks chiefly to the activity and good sense of Dr.

John H. Pryor, of Buffalo, and by the use of every pound of pressure

which as Governor I could bring to bear in legitimate fashion--including

a special emergency message--we succeeded in getting through a bill

providing for the first State hospital for incipient tuberculosis. We

got valuable laws for the farmer; laws preventing the adulteration of

food products (which laws were equally valuable to the consumer), and

laws helping the dairyman. In addition to labor legislation I was able

to do a good deal for forest preservation and the protection of our

wild life. All that later I strove for in the Nation in connection with

Conservation was foreshadowed by what I strove to obtain for New York

State when I was Governor; and I was already working in connection with

Gifford Pinchot and Newell. I secured better administration, and some

improvement in the laws themselves. The improvement in administration,

and in the character of the game and forest wardens, was secured partly

as the result of a conference in the executive chamber which I held with

forty of the best guides and woodsmen of the Adirondacks.

As regards most legislation, even that affecting labor and the forests,

I got on fairly well with the machine. But on the two issues in which

"big business" and the kind of politics which is allied to big business

were most involved we clashed hard--and clashing with Senator Platt

meant clashing with the entire Republican organization, and with the

organized majority in each house of the Legislature. One clash was in

connection with the Superintendent of Insurance, a man whose office made

him a factor of immense importance in the big business circles of New

York. The then incumbent of the office was an efficient man, the boss

of an up-State county, a veteran politician and one of Mr. Platt's

right-hand men. Certain investigations which I made--in the course of

the fight--showed that this Superintendent of Insurance had been engaged

in large business operations in New York City. These operations had

thrown him into a peculiarly intimate business contact of one sort and

another with various financiers with whom I did not deem it expedient

that the Superintendent of Insurance, while such, should have any

intimate and secret money-making relations. Moreover, the gentleman

in question represented the straitest sect of the old-time spoils

politicians. I therefore determined not to reappoint him. Unless I could

get his successor confirmed, however, he would stay in under the law,

and the Republican machine, with the assistance of Tammany, expected to

control far more than a majority of all the Senators.

Mr. Platt issued an ultimatum to me that the incumbent must be

reappointed or else that he would fight, and that if he chose to fight

the man would stay in anyhow because I could not oust him--for under the

New York Constitution the assent of the Senate was necessary not only

to appoint a man to office but to remove him from office. As always with

Mr. Platt, I persistently refused to lose my temper, no matter what

he said--he was much too old and physically feeble for there to be any

point of honor in taking up any of his remarks--and I merely explained

good-humoredly that I had made up my mind and that the gentleman

in question would not be retained. As for not being able to get his

successor confirmed, I pointed out that as soon as the Legislature

adjourned I could and would appoint another man temporarily. Mr.

Platt then said that the incumbent would be put back as soon as the

Legislature reconvened; I admitted that this was possible, but

added cheerfully that I would remove him again just as soon as that

Legislature adjourned, and that even though I had an uncomfortable time

myself, I would guarantee to make my opponents more uncomfortable still.

We parted without any sign of reaching an agreement.

There remained some weeks before final action could be taken, and the

Senator was confident that I would have to yield. His most efficient

allies were the pretended reformers, most of them my open or covert

enemies, who loudly insisted that I must make an open fight on the

Senator himself and on the Republican organization. This was what he

wished, for at that time there was no way of upsetting him within the

Republican party; and, as I have said, if I had permitted the contest

to assume the shape of a mere faction fight between the Governor and the

United States Senator, I would have insured the victory of the

machine. So I blandly refused to let the thing become a personal fight,

explaining again and again that I was perfectly willing to appoint an

organization man, and naming two or three whom I was willing to appoint,

but also explaining that I would not retain the incumbent, and would not

appoint any man of his type. Meanwhile pressure on behalf of the said

incumbent began to come from the business men of New York.

The Superintendent of Insurance was not a man whose ill will the big

life insurance companies cared to incur, and company after company

passed resolutions asking me to reappoint him, although in private some

of the men who signed these resolutions nervously explained that they

did not mean what they had written, and hoped I would remove the man. A

citizen prominent in reform circles, marked by the Cato-like austerity

of his reform professions, had a son who was a counsel for one of the

insurance companies. The father was engaged in writing letters to the

papers demanding in the name of uncompromising virtue that I should not

only get rid of the Superintendent of Insurance, but in his place should

appoint somebody or other personally offensive to Senator Platt--which

last proposition, if adopted, would have meant that the Superintendent

of Insurance would have stayed in, for the reasons I have already given.

Meanwhile the son came to see me on behalf of the insurance company he

represented and told me that the company was anxious that there should

be a change in the superintendency; that if I really meant to fight,

they thought they had influence with four of the State Senators,

Democrats and Republicans, whom they could get to vote to confirm

the man I nominated, but that they wished to be sure that I would not

abandon the fight, because it would be a very bad thing for them if I

started the fight and then backed down. I told my visitor that he need

be under no apprehensions, that I would certainly see the fight through.

A man who has much to do with that kind of politics which concerns both

New York politicians and New York business men and lawyers is not easily

surprised, and therefore I felt no other emotion than a rather sardonic

amusement when thirty-six hours later I read in the morning paper

an open letter from the officials of the very company who had been

communicating with me in which they enthusiastically advocated the

renomination of the Superintendent. Shortly afterwards my visitor,

the young lawyer, called me up on the telephone and explained that the

officials did not mean what they had said in this letter, that they had

been obliged to write it for fear of the Superintendent, but that if

they got the chance they intended to help me get rid of him. I thanked

him and said I thought I could manage the fight by myself. I did not

hear from him again, though his father continued to write public demands

that I should practice pure virtue, undefiled and offensive.

Meanwhile Senator Platt declined to yield. I had picked out a man,

a friend of his, who I believed would make an honest and competent

official, and whose position in the organization was such that I did not

believe the Senate would venture to reject him. However, up to the

day before the appointment was to go to the Senate, Mr. Platt remained

unyielding. I saw him that afternoon and tried to get him to yield, but

he said No, that if I insisted, it would be war to the knife, and my

destruction, and perhaps the destruction of the party. I said I was

very sorry, that I could not yield, and if the war came it would have

to come, and that next morning I should send in the name of the

Superintendent's successor. We parted, and soon afterwards I received

from the man who was at the moment Mr. Platt's right-hand lieutenant

a request to know where he could see me that evening. I appointed the

Union League Club. My visitor went over the old ground, explained that

the Senator would under no circumstances yield, that he was certain to

win in the fight, that my reputation would be destroyed, and that he

wished to save me from such a lamentable smash-up as an ending to my

career. I could only repeat what I had already said, and after half an

hour of futile argument I rose and said that nothing was to be gained by

further talk and that I might as well go. My visitor repeated that I

had this last chance, and that ruin was ahead of me if I refused it;

whereas, if I accepted, everything would be made easy. I shook my head

and answered, "There is nothing to add to what I have already said." He

responded, "You have made up your mind?" and I said, "I have." He then

said, "You know it means your ruin?" and I answered, "Well, we will see

about that," and walked toward the door. He said, "You understand, the

fight will begin to-morrow and will be carried on to the bitter end."

I said, "Yes," and added, as I reached the door, "Good night." Then, as

the door opened, my opponent, or visitor, whichever one chooses to call

him, whose face was as impassive and as inscrutable as that of Mr. John

Hamlin in a poker game, said: "Hold on! We accept. Send in So-and-so

[the man I had named]. The Senator is very sorry, but he will make no

further opposition!" I never saw a bluff carried more resolutely

through to the final limit. My success in the affair, coupled with the

appointment of Messrs. Partridge and Hooker, secured me against further

effort to interfere with my handling of the executive departments.

It was in connection with the insurance business that I first met Mr.

George W. Perkins. He came to me with a letter of introduction from the

then Speaker of the National House of Representatives, Tom Reed,

which ran: "Mr. Perkins is a personal friend of mine, whose

straightforwardness and intelligence will commend to you whatever he has

to say. If you will give him proper opportunity to explain his business,

I have no doubt that what he will say will be worthy of your attention."

Mr. Perkins wished to see me with reference to a bill that had just been

introduced in the Legislature, which aimed to limit the aggregate volume

of insurance that any New York State company could assume. There

were then three big insurance companies in New York--the Mutual Life,

Equitable, and New York Life. Mr. Perkins was a Vice-President of

the New York Life Insurance Company and Mr. John A. McCall was its

President. I had just finished my fight against the Superintendent of

Insurance, whom I refused to continue in office. Mr. McCall had written

me a very strong letter urging that he be retained, and had done

everything he could to aid Senator Platt in securing his retention. The

Mutual Life and Equitable people had openly followed the same course,

but in private had hedged. They were both backing the proposed bill. Mr.

McCall was opposed to it; he was in California, and just before starting

thither he had been told by the Mutual Life and Equitable that the

Limitation Bill was favored by me and would be put through if such a

thing were possible. Mr. McCall did not know me, and on leaving for

California told Mr. Perkins that from all he could learn he was sure I

was bent on putting this bill through, and that nothing he could say

to me would change my view; in fact, because he had fought so hard

to retain the old Insurance Superintendent, he felt that I would be

particularly opposed to anything he might wish done.

As a matter of fact, I had no such feeling. I had been carefully

studying the question. I had talked with the Mutual Life and Equitable

people about it, but was not committed to any particular course, and had

grave doubts as to whether it was well to draw the line on size instead

of on conduct. I was therefore very glad to see Perkins and get a new

point of view. I went over the matter with a great deal of care and at

considerable length, and after we had thrashed the matter out pretty

fully and Perkins had laid before me in detail the methods employed by

Austria, Germany, Switzerland, and other European countries to handle

their large insurance companies, I took the position that there

undoubtedly were evils in the insurance business, but that they did not

consist in insuring people's lives, for that certainly was not an evil;

and I did not see how the real evils could be eradicated by limiting or

suppressing a company's ability to protect an additional number of lives

with insurance. I therefore announced that I would not favor a bill that

limited volume of business, and would not sign it if it were passed;

but that I favored legislation that would make it impossible to place,

through agents, policies that were ambiguous and misleading, or to pay

exorbitant prices to agents for business, or to invest policy-holders'

money in improper securities, or to give power to officers to use

the company's funds for their own personal profit. In reaching this

determination I was helped by Mr. Loeb, then merely a stenographer in

my office, but who had already attracted my attention both by his

efficiency and by his loyalty to his former employers, who were for

the most part my political opponents. Mr. Loeb gave me much information

about various improper practices in the insurance business. I began

to gather data on the subject, with the intention of bringing about

corrective legislation, for at that time I expected to continue

in office as Governor. But in a few weeks I was nominated as

Vice-President, and my successor did nothing about the matter.

So far as I remember, this was the first time the question of correcting

evils in a business by limiting the volume of business to be done was

ever presented to me, and my decision in the matter was on all fours

with the position I have always since taken when any similar principle

was involved. At the time when I made my decision about the Limitation

Bill, I was on friendly terms with the Mutual and Equitable people

who were back of it, whereas I did not know Mr. McCall at all, and Mr.

Perkins only from hearing him discuss the bill.

An interesting feature of the matter developed subsequently. Five years

later, after the insurance investigations took place, the Mutual Life

strongly urged the passage of a Limitation Bill, and, because of the

popular feeling developed by the exposure of the improper practices of

the companies, this bill was generally approved. Governor Hughes adopted

the suggestion, such a bill was passed by the Legislature, and Governor

Hughes signed it. This bill caused the three great New York companies to

reduce markedly the volume of business they were doing; it threw a great

many agents out of employment, and materially curtailed the foreign

business of the companies--which business was bringing annually a

considerable sum of money to this country for investment. In short,

the experiment worked so badly that before Governor Hughes went out of

office one of the very last bills he signed was one that permitted the

life insurance companies to increase their business each year by an

amount representing a certain percentage of the business they had

previously done. This in practice, within a few years, practically

annulled the Limitation Bill that had been previously passed. The

experiment of limiting the size of business, of legislating against it

merely because it was big, had been tried, and had failed so completely

that the authors of the bill had themselves in effect repealed it. My

action in refusing to try the experiment had been completely justified.

As a sequel to this incident I got Mr. Perkins to serve on the Palisade

Park Commission. At the time I was taking active part in the effort to

save the Palisades from vandalism and destruction by getting the States

of New York and New Jersey jointly to include them in a public park.

It is not easy to get a responsible and capable man of business to

undertake such a task, which is unpaid, which calls on his part for an

immense expenditure of time, money, and energy, which offers no

reward of any kind, and which entails the certainty of abuse and

misrepresentation. Mr. Perkins accepted the position, and has filled

it for the last thirteen years, doing as disinterested, efficient,

and useful a bit of public service as any man in the State has done

throughout these thirteen years.

The case of most importance in which I clashed with Senator Platt

related to a matter of fundamental governmental policy, and was the

first step I ever took toward bringing big corporations under effective

governmental control. In this case I had to fight the Democratic machine

as well as the Republican machine, for Senator Hill and Senator Platt

were equally opposed to my action, and the big corporation men, the big

business men back of both of them, took precisely the same view of these

matters without regard to their party feelings on other points. What

I did convulsed people at that time, and marked the beginning of the

effort, at least in the Eastern states, to make the great corporations

really responsible to popular wish and governmental command. But we

have gone so far past the stage in which we then were that now it seems

well-nigh incredible that there should have been any opposition at all

to what I at that time proposed.

The substitution of electric power for horse power in the street car

lines of New York offered a fruitful chance for the most noxious type of

dealing between business men and politicians. The franchises granted by

New York were granted without any attempt to secure from the grantees

returns, in the way of taxation or otherwise, for the value received.

The fact that they were thus granted by improper favoritism, a

favoritism which in many cases was unquestionably secured by downright

bribery, led to all kinds of trouble. In return for the continuance

of these improper favors to the corporations the politicians expected

improper favors in the way of excessive campaign contributions, often

contributed by the same corporation at the same time to two opposing

parties. Before I became Governor a bill had been introduced into the

New York Legislature to tax the franchises of these street railways. It

affected a large number of corporations, but particularly those in New

York and Buffalo. It had been suffered to slumber undisturbed, as none

of the people in power dreamed of taking it seriously, and both the

Republican and Democratic machines were hostile to it. Under the rules

of the New York Legislature a bill could always be taken up out of its

turn and passed if the Governor sent in a special emergency message on

its behalf.

After I was elected Governor I had my attention directed to the

franchise tax matter, looked into the subject, and came to the

conclusion that it was a matter of plain decency and honesty that these

companies should pay a tax on their franchises, inasmuch as they did

nothing that could be considered as service rendered the public in lieu

of a tax. This seemed to me so evidently the common-sense and decent

thing to do that I was hardly prepared for the storm of protest and

anger which my proposal aroused. Senator Platt and the other machine

leaders did everything to get me to abandon my intention. As usual,

I saw them, talked the matter all over with them, and did my best to

convert them to my way of thinking. Senator Platt, I believe, was quite

sincere in his opposition. He did not believe in popular rule, and he

did believe that the big business men were entitled to have things their

way. He profoundly distrusted the people--naturally enough, for the kind

of human nature with which a boss comes in contact is not of an exalted

type. He felt that anarchy would come if there was any interference

with a system by which the people in mass were, under various necessary

cloaks, controlled by the leaders in the political and business worlds.

He wrote me a very strong letter of protest against my attitude,

expressed in dignified, friendly, and temperate language, but using one

word in a curious way. This was the word "altruistic." He stated in his

letter that he had not objected to my being independent in politics,

because he had been sure that I had the good of the party at heart, and

meant to act fairly and honorably; but that he had been warned, before

I became a candidate, by a number of his business friends that I was a

dangerous man because I was "altruistic," and that he now feared that

my conduct would justify the alarm thus expressed. I was interested in

this, not only because Senator Platt was obviously sincere, but because

of the way in which he used "altruistic" as a term of reproach, as if it

was Communistic or Socialistic--the last being a word he did use to me

when, as now and then happened, he thought that my proposals warranted

fairly reckless vituperation.

Senator Platt's letter ran in part as follows:

"When the subject of your nomination was under consideration, there was

one matter that gave me real anxiety. I think you will have no

trouble in appreciating the fact that it was _not_ the matter of your

independence. I think we have got far enough along in our political

acquaintance for you to see that my support in a convention does

not imply subsequent 'demands,' nor any other relation that may not

reasonably exist for the welfare of the party. . . . The thing that did

bother me was this: I had heard from a good many sources that you were

a little loose on the relations of capital and labor, on trusts and

combinations, and, indeed, on those numerous questions which have

recently arisen in politics affecting the security of earnings and the

right of a man to run his own business in his own way, with due respect

of course to the Ten Commandments and the Penal Code. Or, to get at it

even more clearly, I understood from a number of business men, and among

them many of your own personal friends, that you entertained various

altruistic ideas, all very well in their way, but which before they

could safely be put into law needed very profound consideration. . . .

You have just adjourned a Legislature which created a good opinion

throughout the State. I congratulate you heartily upon this fact because

I sincerely believe, as everybody else does, that this good impression

exists very largely as a result of your personal influence in the

Legislative chambers. But at the last moment, and to my very great

surprise, you did a thing which has caused the business community of New

York to wonder how far the notions of Populism, as laid down in Kansas

and Nebraska, have taken hold upon the Republican party of the State of

New York."

In my answer I pointed out to the Senator that I had as Governor

unhesitatingly acted, at Buffalo and elsewhere, to put down mobs,

without regard to the fact that the professed leaders of labor furiously

denounced me for so doing; but that I could no more tolerate wrong

committed in the name of property than wrong committed against property.

My letter ran in part as follows:

"I knew that you had just the feelings that you describe; that is, apart

from my 'impulsiveness,' you felt that there was a justifiable anxiety

among men of means, and especially men representing large corporate

interests, lest I might feel too strongly on what you term the

'altruistic' side in matters of labor and capital and as regards the

relations of the State to great corporations. . . . I know that when

parties divide on such issues [as Bryanism] the tendency is to force

everybody into one of two camps, and to throw out entirely men like

myself, who are as strongly opposed to Populism in every stage as the

greatest representative of corporate wealth, but who also feel strongly

that many of these representatives of enormous corporate wealth have

themselves been responsible for a portion of the conditions against

which Bryanism is in ignorant revolt. I do not believe that it is wise

or safe for us as a party to take refuge in mere negation and to

say that there are no evils to be corrected. It seems to me that our

attitude should be one of correcting the evils and thereby showing that,

whereas the Populists, Socialists, and others really do not correct the

evils at all, or else only do so at the expense of producing others in

aggravated form; on the contrary we Republicans hold the just balance

and set ourselves as resolutely against improper corporate influence on

the one hand as against demagogy and mob rule on the other. I understand

perfectly that such an attitude of moderation is apt to be misunderstood

when passions are greatly excited and when victory is apt to rest with

the extremists on one side or the other; yet I think it is in the long

run the only wise attitude. . . . I appreciate absolutely [what Mr.

Platt had said] that any applause I get will be too evanescent for a

moment's consideration. I appreciate absolutely that the people who now

loudly approve of my action in the franchise tax bill will forget all

about it in a fortnight, and that, on the other hand, the very powerful

interests adversely affected will always remember it. . . . [The

leaders] urged upon me that I personally could not afford to take this

action, for under no circumstances could I ever again be nominated for

any public office, as no corporation would subscribe to a campaign fund

if I was on the ticket, and that they would subscribe most heavily to

beat me; and when I asked if this were true of Republican corporations,

the cynical answer was made that the corporations that subscribed most

heavily to the campaign funds subscribed impartially to both party

organizations. Under all these circumstances, it seemed to me there

was no alternative but to do what I could to secure the passage of the

bill."

These two letters, written in the spring of 1899, express clearly the

views of the two elements of the Republican party, whose hostility

gradually grew until it culminated, thirteen years later. In 1912 the

political and financial forces of which Mr. Platt had once been the

spokesman, usurped the control of the party machinery and drove out of

the party the men who were loyally endeavoring to apply the principles

of the founders of the party to the needs and issues of their own day.

I had made up my mind that if I could get a show in the Legislature

the bill would pass, because the people had become interested and the

representatives would scarcely dare to vote the wrong way. Accordingly,

on April 27, 1899, I sent a special message to the Assembly, certifying

that the emergency demanded the immediate passage of the bill. The

machine leaders were bitterly angry, and the Speaker actually tore up

the message without reading it to the Assembly. That night they were

busy trying to arrange some device for the defeat of the bill--which

was not difficult, as the session was about to close. At seven the

next morning I was informed of what had occurred. At eight I was in the

Capitol at the Executive chamber, and sent in another special message,

which opened as follows: "I learn that the emergency message which I

sent last evening to the Assembly on behalf of the Franchise Tax Bill

has not been read. I therefore send hereby another message on the

subject. I need not impress upon the Assembly the need of passing this

bill at once." I sent this message to the Assembly, by my secretary,

William J. Youngs, afterwards United States District Attorney of Kings,

with an intimation that if this were not promptly read I should come

up in person and read it. Then, as so often happens, the opposition

collapsed and the bill went through both houses with a rush. I had in

the House stanch friends, such as Regis Post and Alford Cooley, men of

character and courage, who would have fought to a finish had the need

arisen.

My troubles were not at an end, however. The bill put the taxation in

the hands of the local county boards, and as the railways sometimes

passed through several different counties, this was inadvisable. It was

the end of the session, and the Legislature adjourned. The corporations

affected, through various counsel, and the different party leaders

of both organizations, urged me not to sign the bill, laying especial

stress on this feature, and asking that I wait until the following year,

when a good measure could be put through with this obnoxious feature

struck out. I had thirty days under the law in which to sign the bill.

If I did not sign it by the end of that time it would not become a law.

I answered my political and corporation friends by telling them that I

agreed with them that this feature was wrong, but that I would rather

have the bill with this feature than not have it at all; and that I was

not willing to trust to what might be done a year later. Therefore, I

explained, I would reconvene the Legislature in special session, and if

the legislators chose to amend the bill by placing the power of taxation

in the State instead of in the county or municipality, I would be glad;

but that if they failed to amend it, or amended it improperly, I would

sign the original bill and let it become law as it was.

When the representatives of Mr. Platt and of the corporations affected

found they could do no better, they assented to this proposition.

Efforts were tentatively made to outwit me, by inserting amendments that

would nullify the effect of the law, or by withdrawing the law when the

Legislature convened; which would at once have deprived me of the

whip hand. On May 12 I wrote Senator Platt, outlining the amendments I

desired, and said: "Of course it must be understood that I will sign the

present bill if the proposed bill containing the changes outlined above

fails to pass." On May 18 I notified the Senate leader, John Raines,

by telegram: "Legislature has no power to withdraw the Ford bill. If

attempt is made to do so, I will sign the bill at once." On the same

day, by telegram, I wired Mr. Odell concerning the bill the leaders were

preparing: "Some provisions of bill very objectionable. I am at work on

bill to show you to-morrow. The bill must not contain greater changes

than those outlined in my message." My wishes were heeded, and when I

had reconvened the Legislature it amended the bill as I outlined in my

message; and in its amended form the bill became law.

There promptly followed something which afforded an index of the good

faith of the corporations that had been protesting to me. As soon as the

change for which they had begged was inserted in the law, and the law

was signed, they turned round and refused to pay the taxes; and in the

lawsuit that followed, they claimed that the law was unconstitutional,

because it contained the very clause which they had so clamorously

demanded. Senator David B. Hill had appeared before me on behalf of the

corporations to argue for the change; and he then appeared before the

courts to make the argument on the other side. The suit was carried

through to the Supreme Court of the United States, which declared the

law constitutional during the time that I was President.

One of the painful duties of the chief executive in States like New

York, as well as in the Nation, is the refusing of pardons. Yet I can

imagine nothing more necessary from the standpoint of good citizenship

than the ability to steel one's heart in this matter of granting

pardons. The pressure is always greatest in two classes of cases: first,

that where capital punishment is inflicted; second, that where the

man is prominent socially and in the business world, and where in

consequence his crime is apt to have been one concerned in some way with

finance.

As regards capital cases, the trouble is that emotional men and women

always see only the individual whose fate is up at the moment, and

neither his victim nor the many millions of unknown individuals who

would in the long run be harmed by what they ask. Moreover, almost any

criminal, however brutal, has usually some person, often a person whom

he has greatly wronged, who will plead for him. If the mother is alive

she will always come, and she cannot help feeling that the case in which

she is so concerned is peculiar, that in this case a pardon should be

granted. It was really heartrending to have to see the kinsfolk and

friends of murderers who were condemned to death, and among the very

rare occasions when anything governmental or official caused me to lose

sleep were the times when I had to listen to some poor mother making a

plea for a criminal so wicked, so utterly brutal and depraved, that it

would have been a crime on my part to remit his punishment.

On the other hand, there were certain crimes where requests for leniency

merely made me angry. Such crimes were, for instance, rape, or the

circulation of indecent literature, or anything connected with what

would now be called the "white slave" traffic, or wife murder, or gross

cruelty to women and children, or seduction and abandonment, or the

action of some man in getting a girl whom he had seduced to commit

abortion. I am speaking in each instance of cases that actually came

before me, either while I was Governor or while I was President. In an

astonishing number of these cases men of high standing signed petitions

or wrote letters asking me to show leniency to the criminal. In two or

three of the cases--one where some young roughs had committed rape on a

helpless immigrant girl, and another in which a physician of wealth

and high standing had seduced a girl and then induced her to commit

abortion--I rather lost my temper, and wrote to the individuals who had

asked for the pardon, saying that I extremely regretted that it was

not in my power to increase the sentence. I then let the facts be made

public, for I thought that my petitioners deserved public censure.

Whether they received this public censure or not I did not know, but

that my action made them very angry I do know, and their anger gave me

real satisfaction. The list of these petitioners was a fairly long one,

and included two United States Senators, a Governor of a State, two

judges, an editor, and some eminent lawyers and business men.

In the class of cases where the offense was one involving the misuse of

large sums of money the reason for the pressure was different. Cases of

this kind more frequently came before me when I was President, but they

also came before me when I was Governor, chiefly in the cases of county

treasurers who had embezzled funds. A big bank president, a railway

magnate, an official connected with some big corporation, or a

Government official in a responsible fiduciary position, necessarily

belongs among the men who have succeeded in life. This means that his

family are living in comfort, and perhaps luxury and refinement, and

that his sons and daughters have been well educated. In such a case

the misdeed of the father comes as a crushing disaster to the wife and

children, and the people of the community, however bitter originally

against the man, grow to feel the most intense sympathy for the

bowed-down women and children who suffer for the man's fault. It is

a dreadful thing in life that so much of atonement for wrong-doing

is vicarious. If it were possible in such a case to think only of the

banker's or county treasurer's wife and children, any man would pardon

the offender at once. Unfortunately, it is not right to think only of

the women and children. The very fact that in cases of this class there

is certain to be pressure from high sources, pressure sometimes by men

who have been beneficially, even though remotely, interested in the

man's criminality, no less than pressure because of honest sympathy with

the wife and children, makes it necessary that the good public servant

shall, no matter how deep his sympathy and regret, steel his heart and

do his duty by refusing to let the wrong-doer out. My experience of the

way in which pardons are often granted is one of the reasons why I

do not believe that life imprisonment for murder and rape is a proper

substitute for the death penalty. The average term of so-called life

imprisonment in this country is only about fourteen years.

Of course there were cases where I either commuted sentences or pardoned

offenders with very real pleasure. For instance, when President, I

frequently commuted sentences for horse stealing in the Indian Territory

because the penalty for stealing a horse was disproportionate to the

penalty for many other crimes, and the offense was usually committed by

some ignorant young fellow who found a half-wild horse, and really did

not commit anything like as serious an offense as the penalty indicated.

The judges would be obliged to give the minimum penalty, but would

forward me memoranda stating that if there had been a less penalty they

would have inflicted it, and I would then commute the sentence to the

penalty thus indicated.

In one case in New York I pardoned outright a man convicted of murder

in the second degree, and I did this on the recommendation of a friend,

Father Doyle of the Paulist Fathers. I had become intimate with the

Paulist Fathers while I was Police Commissioner, and I had grown to feel

confidence in their judgment, for I had found that they always told me

exactly what the facts were about any man, whether he belonged to their

church or not. In this case the convicted man was a strongly built,

respectable old Irishman employed as a watchman around some big

cattle-killing establishments. The young roughs of the neighborhood,

which was then of a rather lawless type, used to try to destroy the

property of the companies. In a conflict with a watchman a member of one

of the gangs was slain. The watchman was acquitted, but the neighborhood

was much wrought up over the acquittal. Shortly afterwards, a gang of

the same roughs attacked another watchman, the old Irishman in question,

and finally, to save his own life, he was obliged in self-defense to

kill one of his assailants. The feeling in the community, however, was

strongly against him, and some of the men high up in the corporation

became frightened and thought that it would be better to throw over the

watchman. He was convicted. Father Doyle came to me, told me that he

knew the man well, that he was one of the best members of his church,

admirable in every way, that he had simply been forced to fight for his

life while loyally doing his duty, and that the conviction represented

the triumph of the tough element of the district and the abandonment of

this man, by those who should have stood by him, under the influence of

an unworthy fear. I looked into the case, came to the conclusion that

Father Doyle was right, and gave the man a full pardon before he had

served thirty days.

The various clashes between myself and the machine, my triumph in them,

and the fact that the people were getting more and more interested

and aroused, brought on a curious situation in the Republican National

Convention at Philadelphia in June, 1900. Senator Platt and the New

York machine leaders had become very anxious to get me out of the

Governorship, chiefly because of the hostility of the big corporation

men towards me; but they had also become convinced that there was such

popular feeling on my behalf that it would be difficult to refuse me a

renomination if I demanded it. They accordingly decided to push me for

Vice-President, taking advantage of the fact that there was at that time

a good deal of feeling for me in the country at large. [See Appendix B

to this chapter.] I myself did not appreciate that there was any such

feeling, and as I greatly disliked the office of Vice-President and was

much interested in the Governorship, I announced that I would not accept

the Vice-Presidency. I was one of the delegates to Philadelphia. On

reaching there I found that the situation was complicated. Senator

Hanna appeared on the surface to have control of the Convention. He was

anxious that I should not be nominated as Vice-President. Senator Platt

was anxious that I should be nominated as Vice-President, in order to

get me out of the New York Governorship. Each took a position opposite

to that of the other, but each at that time cordially sympathized with

the other's feelings about me--it was the manifestations and not the

feelings that differed. My supporters in New York State did not wish

me nominated for Vice-President because they wished me to continue as

Governor; but in every other State all the people who admired me were

bound that I should be nominated as Vice-President. These people were

almost all desirous of seeing Mr. McKinley renominated as President, but

they became angry at Senator Hanna's opposition to me as Vice-President.

He in his turn suddenly became aware that if he persisted he might find

that in their anger these men would oppose Mr. McKinley's renomination,

and although they could not have prevented the nomination, such

opposition would have been a serious blow in the campaign which was to

follow. Senator Hanna, therefore, began to waver.

Meanwhile a meeting of the New York delegation was called. Most of the

delegates were under the control of Senator Platt. The Senator notified

me that if I refused to accept the nomination for Vice-President I

would be beaten for the nomination for Governor. I answered that I would

accept the challenge, that we would have a straight-out fight on the

proposition, and that I would begin it at once by telling the assembled

delegates of the threat, and giving fair warning that I intended to

fight for the Governorship nomination, and, moreover, that I intended to

get it. This brought Senator Platt to terms. The effort to instruct

the New York delegation for me was abandoned, and Lieutenant-Governor

Woodruff was presented for nomination in my place.

I supposed that this closed the incident, and that no further effort

would be made to nominate me for the Vice-Presidency. On the contrary,

the effect was directly the reverse. The upset of the New York machine

increased the feeling of the delegates from other States that it was

necessary to draft me for the nomination. By next day Senator Hanna

himself concluded that this was a necessity, and acquiesced in the

movement. As New York was already committed against me, and as I was

not willing that there should be any chance of supposing that the New

Yorkers had nominated me to get rid of me, the result was that I was

nominated and seconded from outside States. No other candidate was

placed in the field.

By this time the Legislature had adjourned, and most of my work as

Governor of New York was over. One unexpected bit of business arose,

however. It was the year of the Presidential campaign. Tammany, which

had been lukewarm about Bryan in 1896, cordially supported him in

1900; and when Tammany heartily supports a candidate it is well for the

opposing candidate to keep a sharp lookout for election frauds. The city

government was in the hands of Tammany; but I had power to remove

the Mayor, the Sheriff, and the District Attorney for malfeasance or

misfeasance in office. Such power had not been exercised by any previous

Governor, as far as I knew; but it existed, and if the misfeasance or

malfeasance warranted it, and if the Governor possessed the requisite

determination, the power could be, and ought to be, exercised.

By an Act of the Legislature, a State Bureau of Elections had been

created in New York City, and a Superintendent of Elections appointed

by the Governor. The Chief of the State Bureau of Elections was

John McCullagh, formerly in the Police Department when I was Police

Commissioner. The Chief of Police for the city was William F. Devery,

one of the Tammany leaders, who represented in the Police Department

all that I had warred against while Commissioner. On November 4 Devery

directed his subordinates in the Police Department to disregard the

orders which McCullagh had given to his deputies, orders which were

essential if we were to secure an honest election in the city. I had

just returned from a Western campaign trip, and was at Sagamore Hill. I

had no direct power over Devery; but the Mayor had; and I had power over

the Mayor. Accordingly, I at once wrote to the Mayor of New York, to the

Sheriff of New York, and to the District Attorney of New York County the

following letters:

STATE OF NEW YORK OYSTER BAY, November 5, 1900.

To the Mayor of the City of New York.

Sir: My attention has been called to the official order issued by Chief

of Police Devery, in which he directs his subordinates to disregard the

Chief of the State Election Bureau, John McCullagh, and his deputies.

Unless you have already taken steps to secure the recall of this order,

it is necessary for me to point out that I shall be obliged to hold you

responsible as the head of the city government for the action of the

Chief of Police, if it should result in any breach of the peace and

intimidation or any crime whatever against the election laws. The State

and city authorities should work together. I will not fail to call to

summary account either State or city authority in the event of either

being guilty of intimidation or connivance at fraud or of failure to

protect every legal voter in his rights. I therefore hereby notify

you that in the event of any wrong-doing following upon the failure

immediately to recall Chief Devery's order, or upon any action or

inaction on the part of Chief Devery, I must necessarily call you to

account.

Yours, etc., THEODORE ROOSEVELT.

STATE OF NEW YORK OYSTER BAY, November 5, 1900.

To the Sheriff of the County of New York.

Sir: My attention has been called to the official order issued by Chief

of Police Devery in which he directs his subordinates to disregard the

Chief of the State Election Bureau, John McCullagh, and his deputies.

It is your duty to assist in the orderly enforcement of the law, and I

shall hold you strictly responsible for any breach of the public peace

within your county, or for any failure on your part to do your full duty

in connection with the election to-morrow.

Yours truly, THEODORE ROOSEVELT.

STATE OF NEW YORK OYSTER BAY, November 5, 1900.

To the District Attorney of the County of New York.

Sir: My attention has been called to the official order issued by Chief

of Police Devery, in which he directs his subordinates to disregard the

Chief of the State Election Bureau, John McCullagh, and his deputies.

In view of this order I call your attention to the fact that it is your

duty to assist in the orderly enforcement of the law, and there must be

no failure on your part to do your full duty in the matter.

Yours truly, THEODORE ROOSEVELT.

These letters had the desired effect. The Mayor promptly required Chief

Devery to rescind the obnoxious order, which was as promptly done. The

Sheriff also took prompt action. The District Attorney refused to heed

my letter, and assumed an attitude of defiance, and I removed him from

office. On election day there was no clash between the city and State

authorities; the election was orderly and honest.

APPENDIX A

CONSERVATION

As foreshadowing the course I later, as President, followed in this

matter, I give extracts from one of my letters to the Commission, and

from my second (and last) Annual Message. I spent the first months of my

term in investigations to find out just what the situation was.

On November 28, 1899, I wrote to the Commission as follows:

". . . I have had very many complaints before this as to the

inefficiency of the game wardens and game protectors, the complaints

usually taking the form that the men have been appointed and are

retained without due regard to the duties to be performed. I do not wish

a man to be retained or appointed who is not thoroughly fit to perform

the duties of game protector. The Adirondacks are entitled to a peculiar

share of the Commission's attention, both from the standpoint of

forestry, and from the less important, but still very important,

standpoint of game and fish protection. The men who do duty as game

protectors in the Adirondacks should, by preference, be appointed from

the locality itself, and should in all cases be thorough woodsmen. The

mere fact that a game protector has to hire a guide to pilot him through

the woods is enough to show his unfitness for the position. I want

as game protectors men of courage, resolution, and hardihood, who can

handle the rifle, ax, and paddle; who can camp out in summer or winter;

who can go on snow-shoes, if necessary; who can go through the woods by

day or by night without regard to trails.

"I should like full information about all your employees, as to their

capacities, as to the labor they perform, as to their distribution from

and where they do their work."

Many of the men hitherto appointed owed their positions principally to

political preference. The changes I recommended were promptly made,

and much to the good of the public service. In my Annual Message, in

January, 1900, I said:

"Great progress has been made through the fish hatcheries in the

propagation of valuable food and sporting fish. The laws for the

protection of deer have resulted in their increase. Nevertheless, as

railroads tend to encroach on the wilderness, the temptation to illegal

hunting becomes greater, and the danger from forest fires increases.

There is need of great improvement both in our laws and in their

administration. The game wardens have been too few in number. More

should be provided. None save fit men must be appointed; and their

retention in office must depend purely upon the zeal, ability, and

efficiency with which they perform their duties. The game wardens in the

forests must be woodsmen; and they should have no outside business.

In short, there should be a thorough reorganization of the work of

the Commission. A careful study of the resources and condition of the

forests on State land must be made. It is certainly not too much to

expect that the State forests should be managed as efficiently as the

forests on private lands in the same neighborhoods. And the measure

of difference in efficiency of management must be the measure of

condemnation or praise of the way the public forests have been managed.

"The subject of forest preservation is of the utmost importance to

the State. The Adirondacks and Catskills should be great parks kept in

perpetuity for the benefit and enjoyment of our people. Much has been

done of late years towards their preservation, but very much remains to

be done. The provisions of law in reference to sawmills and wood-pulp

mills are defective and should be changed so as to prohibit dumping

dye-stuff, sawdust, or tan-bark, in any amount whatsoever, into the

streams. Reservoirs should be made, but not where they will tend to

destroy large sections of the forest, and only after a careful and

scientific study of the water resources of the region. The people of

the forest regions are themselves growing more and more to realize the

necessity of preserving both the trees and the game. A live deer in the

woods will attract to the neighborhood ten times the money that could

be obtained for the deer's dead carcass. Timber theft on the State lands

is, of course, a grave offense against the whole public.

"Hardy outdoor sports, like hunting, are in themselves of no small value

to the National character and should be encouraged in every way. Men who

go into the wilderness, indeed, men who take part in any field sports

with horse or rifle, receive a benefit which can hardly be given by even

the most vigorous athletic games.

"There is a further and more immediate and practical end in view. A

primeval forest is a great sponge which absorbs and distills the rain

water. And when it is destroyed the result is apt to be an alternation

of flood and drought. Forest fires ultimately make the land a desert,

and are a detriment to all that portion of the State tributary to the

streams through the woods where they occur. Every effort should be made

to minimize their destructive influence. We need to have our system of

forestry gradually developed and conducted along scientific principles.

When this has been done it will be possible to allow marketable lumber

to be cut everywhere without damage to the forests--indeed, with

positive advantage to them. But until lumbering is thus conducted,

on strictly scientific principles no less than upon principles of the

strictest honesty toward the State, we cannot afford to suffer it at

all in the State forests. Unrestrained greed means the ruin of the great

woods and the drying up of the sources of the rivers.

"Ultimately the administration of the State lands must be so centralized

as to enable us definitely to place responsibility in respect to

everything concerning them, and to demand the highest degree of trained

intelligence in their use.

"The State should not permit within its limits factories to make bird

skins or bird feathers into articles of ornament or wearing apparel.

Ordinary birds, and especially song birds, should be rigidly protected.

Game birds should never be shot to a greater extent than will offset the

natural rate of increase. . . . Care should be taken not to encourage

the use of cold storage or other market systems which are a benefit to

no one but the wealthy epicure who can afford to pay a heavy price for

luxuries. These systems tend to the destruction of the game, which would

bear most severely upon the very men whose rapacity has been appealed to

in order to secure its extermination. . . ."

I reorganized the Commission, putting Austin Wadsworth at its head.

APPENDIX B

THE POLITICAL SITUATION IN 1900

My general scheme of action as Governor was given in a letter I wrote

one of my supporters among the independent district organization

leaders, Norton Goddard, on April 16, 1900. It runs in part as follows:

"Nobody can tell, and least of all the machine itself, whether the

machine intends to renominate me next fall or not. If for some reason I

should be weak, whether on account of faults or virtues, doubtless the

machine will throw me over, and I think I am not uncharitable when I say

they would feel no acute grief at so doing. It would be very strange if

they did feel such grief. If, for instance, we had strikes which led

to riots, I would of course be obliged to preserve order and stop the

riots. Decent citizens would demand that I should do it, and in any

event I should do it wholly without regard to their demands. But, once

it was done, they would forget all about it, while a great many laboring

men, honest but ignorant and prejudiced, would bear a grudge against

me for doing it. This might put me out of the running as a candidate.

Again, the big corporations undoubtedly want to beat me. They prefer

the chance of being blackmailed to the certainty that they will not be

allowed any more than their due. Of course they will try to beat me

on some entirely different issue, and, as they are very able and very

unscrupulous, nobody can tell that they won't succeed. . . . I have been

trying to stay in with the organization. I did not do it with the idea

that they would renominate me. I did it with the idea of getting things

done, and in that I have been absolutely successful. Whether Senator

Platt and Mr. Odell endeavor to beat me, or do beat me, for the

renomination next fall, is of very small importance compared to the fact

that for my two years I have been able to make a Republican majority

in the Legislature do good and decent work and have prevented any split

within the party. The task was one of great difficulty, because, on the

one hand, I had to keep clearly before me the fact that it was better to

have a split than to permit bad work to be done, and, on the other hand,

the fact that to have that split would absolutely prevent all _good_

work. The result has been that I have avoided a split and that as a net

result of my two years and the two sessions of the Legislature,

there has been an enormous improvement in the administration of the

Government, and there has also been a great advance in legislation."

To show my reading of the situation at the time I quote from a letter

of mine to Joseph B. Bishop, then editor of the _Commercial Advertiser_,

with whom towards the end of my term I had grown into very close

relations, and who, together with two other old friends, Albert Shaw,

of the _Review of Reviews_, and Silas McBee, now editor of the

_Constructive Quarterly_, knew the inside of every movement, so far as I

knew it myself. The letter, which is dated April 11, 1900, runs in part

as follows: "The dangerous element as far as I am concerned comes from

the corporations. The [naming certain men] crowd and those like them

have been greatly exasperated by the franchise tax. They would like to

get me out of politics for good, but at the moment they think the best

thing to do is to put me into the Vice-Presidency. Naturally I will

not be opposed openly on the ground of the corporations' grievance; but

every kind of false statement will continually be made, and men like

[naming the editors of certain newspapers] will attack me, not as the

enemy of corporations, but as their tool! There is no question whatever

that if the leaders can they will upset me."

One position which as Governor (and as President) I consistently took,

seems to me to represent what ought to be a fundamental principle in

American legislative work. I steadfastly refused to advocate any law, no

matter how admirable in theory, if there was good reason to believe that

in practice it would not be executed. I have always sympathized with the

view set forth by Pelatiah Webster in 1783--quoted by Hannis Taylor

in his _Genesis of the Supreme Court_--"Laws or ordinances of any kind

(especially of august bodies of high dignity and consequence) which

fail of execution, are much worse than none. They weaken the government,

expose it to contempt, destroy the confidence of all men, native and

foreigners, in it, and expose both aggregate bodies and individuals who

have placed confidence in it to many ruinous disappointments which

they would have escaped had no such law or ordinance been made." This

principle, by the way, not only applies to an internal law which cannot

be executed; it applies even more to international action, such as a

universal arbitration treaty which cannot and will not be kept; and

most of all it applies to proposals to make such universal arbitration

treaties at the very time that we are not keeping our solemn promise

to execute limited arbitration treaties which we have already made. A

general arbitration treaty is merely a promise; it represents merely a

debt of honorable obligation; and nothing is more discreditable, for

a nation or an individual, than to cover up the repudiation of a debt

which can be and ought to be paid, by recklessly promising to incur a

new and insecure debt which no wise man for one moment supposes ever

will be paid.