Roosevelt and the republic

Chapter I

"Joe" Murray falls out with "Barney" Hess— "Joe" discovers a budding statesman — A name — Ancestry — Harvard — Prowess, Associates, Characteristics — New Assemblyman 1

Chapter II

Roosevelt, the Solon — Political stress — Spoils — Corruption — Large programme — Position of novice — Committees — "Finds" himself — Murphy, Bogan et al. — Civil service reform — Traction — Investigator — Reformer — Qaims — Facts — Accomplishment — An incident 8

Chapter III

Roosevelt, investigator — Practical situation — Grover Cleveland — Union League Club takes initiative — Scope of inquiry — Roosevelt's light not to be hidden — "Rippering" — Up- State machine and Tammany — Municipal home rule — Prohibition — Elevated Railway legislation — Accomplishment 21 ii CONTENtS

CHAPTER IV. PAGE Roosevelt makes crucial decision — Blaine — Edmunds —Stalwarts, half breeds, Independents — Roosevelt avows his partisanship 33

Chapter V

Answers call to the wilds — Longings of hunter- Adding cubits to stature horizontally — Ranchman — Answers partisan call — Candidate for Mayor of New York 38*

Chapter VI

Civil Service Commissioner — Changes flavor of body — Dramatic as against quiet effort — Pugnacity — In controversy with prominent men — Real work — Harrison — Cleveland — "Midnight" order of 1893 41

Chapter VII

Enters storm center in New York — Police commissioner — Genesis — Strong — Union League Club — Committee of Seventy — Tammany — Police reform — Civil service — Roosevelt in his element — Efficiency — Troubles — Quits 48

CHAPTER Vin.

"Head" of Navy Department — Conditions — Trials — Naval personnel — Difficulties — Quits 59

Chapter IX

Leader of Rough Riders — Organization — Equipment — Regular officers — To Cuba — Las Guasimas— Race for "first blood" — Wheeler— Young —Wood— Roosevelt— Lawton's wrath— Losses. 69

Chapter X

San Juan and days that followed — Wheeler makes proposition — Plan of advance — Spanish valor — Queer order to bivouac — Desperate position — A trap— The assault— Up to the trenches — Roosevelt's place— The part he played — After the battle— War horrors _. 81

Contents ill

CHAPTER XL page

Santiago falls — Game of bluff — American luck —

Roosevelt's round robin- — Going home 98

CHAPTER XH.

Roosevelt gets the nomination — Skillful political manipulation — Piatt and the Independents — Roosevelt again chooses partisanship — Good or bad faith? — Rough Rider campaign — Governor — Starts out bravely — War message — Piatt and Odell as advisers — Canals — Payn — Trust Company investigation — Messages — Work unfinished — Dangers and difficulties — Piatt's magic ring — Estimates of Roosevelt's work — Accomplishment — Quits 102

CHAPTER XHL Menaced by vice-presidency — Piatt, Quay and Roosevelt — Woe for Senator Hanna — Roosevelt yields — The campaign — Roosevelt as spokesman — Denounces opponents, Filipinos and others — Wins 132

CHAPTER XIV.

Tragedy make^ Roosevelt president — Flight to Adirondacks — Dramatic entrance — Pledges — Civil Service — Tariff — Philippines — Conditions — Exploitation — Legislation against assassins — Roosevelt's message 139

CHAPTER XV.

Race problems confront administration — Booker Washington — Crum — Indianola — Brownsville — Lynch law 151

CHAPTER XVL President takes up reform — Northern Securities — Beef — Postal scandal 156

CHAPTER XVH.

President captures canal site — Mr. Hay's politeness

IV Contents

PAGE

—Treaty with Great Britain— Colombia— Treaty with latter rejected— Panama "revolts"-- Strange prevision — Panama Company gets millions — Constructing the canal — Problems — Changes — Blunders 159

CHAPTER XVIII.

Roosevelt revises the Monroe doctrine— Venezuela and Santo Domingo — Bischoffscheim and Goldschmidt— State Department shields asphalt trust — Loomis, thrifty diplomat — Bowen humiliated — United States as receiver — Roosevelt's "agreement" vi^ith Morales — Senate overridden — President has his way — Uncle Sam as protector general 179

CHAPTER XIX.

Pious mastication and "benevolent assimilation" — Roosevelt as historian finds colonies utterly hopeless — Bryan's sinister influence — Filipinos as Apaches and Boxers — Government by presidential ukase 195

CHAPTER XX.

Cuba becomes free, almost — America's pledge — Government by military satrap — Cuba libre — Palma's "yellow streak" — America "preserves Cuban independence" 214

CHAPTER XXL Battling with railway octopus — President adopts a Democratic party issue rejected at polls — Makes it his cardinal doctrine — Public mandate by newspaper clamor and iteration — Roosevelt- Chandler-Tillman-Bailey-Moody episode — New recruits for the Ananias Club — Aldrich acts — Roosevelt again demonstrates partisanship — Very hard labor, very small mouse 219

CHAPTER XXII.

Civil service reform by the president — Regaining

Contents v

PAGE

lost ground — Taking care of friends — Patronage as bribery — "Joe" Murray — Rough Riders — Harvard men — College men — Cabinet officers and clerks in politics 236

CHAPTER XXHI.

Alexander Hamilton, Roosevelt's political ideal — Hamilton in the Constitutional Convention — Praises monarchy — Outlines constitution establishing monarchial government — Hamilton's errors — His influence on the Republic — Burr and Hamilton — Hamilton's strangely false prophecies 250

CHAPTER XXIV.

Thomas Jefferson and his sinister democracy — How the "weaklings" won from the mighty Napoleon — Roosevelt's contempt for democracy's leader — Things Jefferson did — Apostle of democracy — Lincoln's tribute 271

CHAPTER XXV.

Our "ignorant" president, Andrew Jackson — Change to him change for the worse — Despicable followers of Jackson — Jackson as "tool and figurehead" — Jackson's political methods compared with those of Roosevelt — Jackson and Van Buren's "expensive" government as compared with that of Roosevelt 289

CHAPTER XXVI.

Roosevelt distrusts democracy — Rights of kings as logical as rights of majorities — Sanctions of government — Right of suffrage — Voice of people voice of God? 298

CHAPTER XXVH.

Rich and poor in politics as Roosevelt sees them — No abuses to correct — Poor stirred by jealousy

VI Contents

PAGE

and envy — Lightning change of front following "muckrake" speech — Now steering "reform" movements 313

CHAPTER XXVIII.

Roosevelt in literature — Atavistic in theme — War and chase his favorite topics — First book best — Autobiography in books — Sublime subjectiveness — Mania for executive messages — Annual cyclopedia of universal knowledge 324

CHAPTER XXIX.

Roosevelt, war and peace — Glorification of war spirit — Conquest and commercialism — Non-resistant creed — Sermon on Mount — Rome and Christianity — The "true man's part" — Carl Schurz and Gen. Sherman comment on war — As a poet sees it 329

CHAPTER XXX.

What Roosevelt has done for Washington society — Greater "individuality" — More exclusiveness — Public receptions curtailed — The "Social Secretary"— Roosevelts refuse to meet the "mob" — Traveling contingent fund — White House expenditures 344

CHAPTER XXXI.

A bit of autobiography — Biographers differ 353

CHAPTER XXXII.

Sidelights on Roosevelt's character — Tariff — Friends— Ananias Club— Reformer, etc., etc... 357

CHAPTER XXXIII.

Some recent history — "My policies" — Progress by states— Politicians clamor — Railway lobbyists as "reformers" — Roosevelt fortunate in his enemies— He "helps" in Chicago— Railroads fail ^-Loeb discovers "conspiracy"— Roosevelt's tol-

Contents vii

„rT -I PAGE

erance— Undesirable citizens'—Suspends pilot — ^port —A successor — Fleet to Pacific — Roosevelt "helps" Cleveland— Oklahoma constitiition— Financial panic— "Honest money"— Roosevelt's responsibility— What his platforms asserted— Different ox gored 377

CHAPTER XXXIV.

Critical view of Roosevelt— His character, his ideals, his aims, his achievements— Place in history 400

Preface

This is not a biography of President Roosevelt. We are interested in Roosevelt the man only in so far as his peculiarities throw light upon Roosevelt the office-holder.

It is our aim to journey freely along the public pathway followed by Roosevelt in his march from obscurity to eminence. We shall pick up on the way, and examine evidences of his influence upon this Republic.

In taking this excursion, we shall try to hamper ourselves as little as possible with the baggage of preconceived opinion. Our own opinion, we shall give for what it is worth, indicating where possible its foundation. Those who prefer to take their opinions of men, their political philosophy, or even their politics, blindfolded, would do well not to travel with us.

Americans, as a rule, have improved upon the old maxim, "noblesse oblige." To persons in high place we prefer to apply the more comfortable fiction, "The king can do no wrong." Having no king, many of us try to make kings of every popular person. Being without heroes, we are not discriminating as to whom we shall give this distinction. We might have made it treason to criticize those in high place, as it is infamous presumption to suggest that they ever speak unwisely. But our sense of self-restraint has held us back.

n Preface

Extraordinary authority is not hampered witH extraordinary responsibiUty in high places. We assume a divine sanction for every act of a person v^hom we have honored. Each word from the Hps of a high official contains prophet wisdom. Each peccadillo we find a virtue in disguise, each offense a scintillation of genius.

Peans of hero worship are not especially easy for us, but we shall try to fulfill expectations. If at any time we should seem to treat the subject of our inquiry as just an American citizen, with rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness merely equal to those of other American citizens, it will not be because we forget the more popular viewpoint. As for standards of truth and righteousness to which we shall subject the acts of our characters indiscriminately, we shall make due allowance for high place and the trials and temptations surrounding it. The sequel will show whether our standards will be more strict or more liberal for one in authority.

An administration which has attracted much attention is about to close. It has been different in some respects from other administrations. This is an excellent time to take stock and to inquire what influence that administration has had upon this Republic. Pleas are being made for a continuation of certain governmental policies. We could not take better time to inquire whether we wish them continued.

Your indulgence we bespeak. Walk with us with open mind. Let us try to get perspective in which near as well as distant objects appear in their just proportions.

Preface iii

Give tolerant ear, we beseech you, to our introduction. Ponder it carefully. Prejudices must be cleared away or sterilized. In no better way than by studying the opinions there expressed can we get the viewpoint of the man we are about to study. Giving us a more instructive insight into the motives, abilities and characters of the nation's past great, it will aid us in judging more correctly the great of the present and of the future.

Introduction

President Roosevelt has made many and lengthy literary excursions into various fields. There has he met many of the great, the good, the highly honored of this nation. Freely has he expressed his opinion of their characters, their services and their worth. It is interesting to hear him speak of them : —

Thomas Jefferson. — *'The father of nullification and therefore of secession. . . . Constitutionally unable to put a proper value upon truthfulness." (Roosevelt's Life of Benton, page 95-)

"Characteristically enough, he only showed his annoyance by indirect methods." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, page 293.)

^'Jefferson was using them (the alien and sedition laws) as handles to guide seditious agitation." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, page 323.)

"He (Morris) despised Jefferson for a tricky and incapable theorist." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, page 331.)

"Jefferson . . . was perhaps the most incapable executive that ever filled the presidential chair. . . . He was utterly unable to grapple with the slightest actual danger, and even excepting his successor, Madison, it would be difficult to find a man less fit to guide the i^tate with honor and safety."

Roosevelt says that the burning of the Capitol

[{ Introduction

at Washington was as nothing compared with the "cowardly infamy" of Jefferson and Madison, who failed to take means adequate to protect it.

James Madison.— "Excepting Jefferson we have never produced an executive more helpless than Madison when it comes to grappling with real dangers and difficulties." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, page 348.)

"The indignation naturally excited by the utter weakness and folly of Jefferson's second term and the pitiable incompetence shown both by him and his successor," etc. (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, page 344.)

Madison's followers in the South and West. — *They themselves, for all their bluster, were but a shade less incompetent than their nominal chief when it came to actual work, and were shamefully unable to make their words good by deeds." (Witness Jackson at New Orleans.)

'The administration thus drifted into a war which it had neither the wisdom to avoid nor the foresight to prepare for." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, page 348-9.)

Congress at Madison's time. — "With almost incredible folly the Congress that declared war, voted down the bill to increase the navy by twenty battleships." (American Ideals, page 260. )

James Monroe. — "I think he was as much of a failure as his predecessors (Washington, Adams, Jefferson and Madison), and a harsher criticism could not be passed upon him. Like other statesmen of his school, he was mighty of word, but weak in action ; bold to plan, but weak to per-

Introduction iii

form." (Roosevelt's Naval War of 1812, page

"A very amiable gentleman, but one who comes distinctly in the class of one whose greatness was thrust upon them." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, page 293.)

President Martin Van Buren. — "Van Buren faithfully served the mammon of unrighteousness, both in his own state and later on at Washington; and he had his reward, for he was advanced to the highest office in the gift of the nation. He had no reason to blame his own conduct for his final downfall; he got just as far along as he could possibly get, he succeeded because of, not in spite of his moral shortcomings; if he had always governed his actions by a high moral standard, he would probably never have been heard of." (Roosevelt's Life of Benton, page 187.)

President Tyler. — "He was a mediocre man; but that is unwarranted flattery — he was a politician of monumental littleness. . . . His chief mental and moral attributes were peevishness, fretful obstinacy, inconsistency, incapacity to make up his own mind . . . together with inordinate vanity . . . ."

"His mind which was not robust at best, was completely dazzled by his sudden elevation, and his wild hopes that he could continue to keep the place that he had reached." (Roosevelt's Life of Benton, pages 239 and 257.)

Andrew Jackson. — "Few men were ever more unlike than the scholarly, timid, shifty, doctrinaire (Jefferson) who supplanted the elder Adams, and

IV Introduction

the ignorant, headstrong and straightforward soldier who was victor over the younger. The change was the dehberate choice of the great mass of the people, and that it was for the worse, was then and has been even since, the opinion of most thinking men." (A sly way of paying the author a handsome compliment). (Roosevelt's Life of Benton, page 73.)

"The public service then took its first step in the downward career of progressive debasement, and deterioration which has onlv been checked in our own days." (Roosevelt's Life of Benton, page 74.)

Washington. — "Washington's administration was in error in not acting with greater decision about the Spanish posts." (Winning of the West, vol. 4, page 203.)

"His (Monroe's) appointment (by Washington) was an excellent example of the folly of trying to carry on a government on a non-partisan basis." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, pages 301, 302.)

President Pierce. — "Seeing him (President Pierce) exactly as he was — a small politician of low capacity and mean surroundings, proud to act as the servile tool of men worse than himself, but also stronger and abler" . . . arguing in favor of slavery with "undaunted mendacity, moral callousity and mental obhquity; exemplifying in his last message all the modes of conveying untruths, direct assertion, fallacious inference and false innuendo." (Roosevelt's Life of Benton, page 345.)

Introduction v

A portion of the above is quoted from Benton with evident approval.

George CHnton, Samuel Adams and Patrick Henry. — "They (opponents of centralized government) "were followed by a lot of designing politicians who feared that their importance would be lost if their sphere of action should be enlarged. Among these leaders the three most conspicuous were, in New York, George Clinton, and in Massachusetts and Virginia, Samuel Adams and Patrick Henry." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, page 128.)

Gouverneur Morris. — "In fact throughout the war of 181 2 he appeared as the open champion of treason to the nation, dishonesty to the nation's creditors and subserviency to a foreign power." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, pages 352 to 355.)

Harrison Gray Otis. — "Harrison Gray Otis was almost as bad as Morris himself." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, page 353.)

Captain Perry. — "He certainly stands on a lower grade than either Hull or MacDonough, and not a bit higher than a dozen others." (Naval War of 1812, page 271.)

Gen. Winfield Scott. — "A good general but otherwise a wholly absurd and flatulent person." (Roosevelt's Life of Benton, page 344.)

"Timothy Pickering showed eager desire to stand by another country to the hurt of his own country's honor." (Forum, January, 1897.)

"Oliver Ellsworth (Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States) of Connecticut, whose name should be branded with infamy

VI Introduction

because of the words he uttered." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, page i6o.)

Thomas Paine. — "So the filthy little atheist had to remain in prison." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, page 289.) The occasion for rejoicing on the part of Mr. Roosevelt, was Gouverneur Morris' strange indifference to the imprisonment of the great pamphleteer of the Revolution, in a French prison. There are historians who hold that the pen of Thomas Paine did more for the Revolution than was done by any other one man except Jefferson and Washington. Gouverneur Morris showed as much feeling and patriotism in this matter as he did in the burial of Mr. Roosevelt's "corsair" (John Paul Jones).

"Judge Taney of unhappy fame." (Life of Benton, page 358.)

Wendell Phillips. — "After the war and until the day of his death his position upon almost every public question was either mischievous or ridiculous, and usually both." (Roosevelt's Life of Benton, page 160.)

Jefferson Davis and Aaron Burr. — "The moral difference between Benedict Arnold on the one hand and Aaron Burr and Jefferson Davis on the other, is precisely the difference which obtains between a politician who sells his vote for money and one who supports a bad measure in consideration of being given high place." _ President Polk and the Abolitionists. — "Abolitionists joined hands with Northern roughs and Southern slavocrats to elect the man who was, excepting Tyler, the very smallest of the small presidents who came between Jackson and Lin-

Introduction' vif

coin." (Observe the compliment to Harrison, Taylor, Filmore and the others.)

''Owing to a variety of circumstances the Abolitionists have received an immense amount of hysterical praise which they do not deserve and have been credited with deeds done by other men whom they in reality hampered and opposed rather than aided." (Roosevelt's Life of Benton, page 292.)

Whole classes of Americans, too, came in for Mr. Roosevelt's emphatic disapproval.

Jefferson's followers. — "Four fifths of the talent, ability and good sense of the country was to be found in the Federalist ranks." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, page 321.)

Cowboys, small farmers and mechanics. — • "When drunk on villainous whiskey of the frontier towns, they (the cowboys) cut mad antics, firing their pistols right and left . . . and indulging too often in deadly shooting aftrays, brought on by the incidental conduct of the moment or some long standing grudge, or perhaps because of bad blood between certain ranches or localities. . . . They are much better fellows and pleasanter companions than small farmers or agricultural laborers; nor are mechanics or workmen of the big cities to be mentioned in the same breath." (Roosevelt's Ranch Life and Hunting Trail, page 10.)

Catholics (who believe in miracles). — "Those persons of arrested mental development who now make pilgrimages to our Lady of Lourdes, had plenty of prototypes in the atheistic France of vlli Introduction

the French Revolution." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, page 291.)

Merchants and traders. — "He (Morris) had no patience with those despicable beings, the merchants and traders." (Life of Morris, page 297.)

Napoleon. — "He (Morris) fully appreciated Napoleon's utter unscrupulousness and marvelous mendacity." (Life of Morris, page 303.)

Quakers (As seen by Roosevelt, historian). — "It is a bitter and unanswerable commentary on the non-resistant creed that such outrages and massacres as those committed on the helpless Indians, were more numerous in the colony that the Quakers governed than in any other; their vaunted policy of peace . . . caused the utmost possible evil . . . their system was a direct incentive to crime and wrong-doing. No other colony made such futile contemptible efforts to deal with the Indians ; no other colony showed such supine selfisn helplessness. (Winning West I.-98.) "A class of professing non-combatants is as hurtful to the real healthy growth of the nation as a class of fire-eaters, for a weakness or a folly is as bad for a nation as a vice, or worse, and in the long run a Quaker may be quite as undesirable a citizen as a duelist. No man not willing to bear arms and fight for his rights can give a good reason why he should be entitled to the privilege of living in a free community." (Life of Benton, page 37.)

Taken to task later for the statement, President Roosevelt in a campaign said : "Were I now to rewrite the sentence I should so phrase it that

Introduction Ix

it could not be construed as offensive to the Society of Friends." In a speech at Plainfield, N. J., in 1900, he praised the Quakers. That was in a campaign. He also made some modification of his views on farmers and mechanics.

Germans and Irish. — "The habit of importing indentured Irish servants as well as German laborers under contract, prevailed throughout the colonies, and the number of men thus imported was quite sufficient to form a considerable element in the population, and to add a new, although, perhaps, not a very valuable strain to the already mixed blood." (Roosevelt's Life of Morris, page 34.)

Bryan, Sewall, Watson, Populists, Democrats and other Americans who disagreed with Roosevelt in politics in 1896. — ''McKinley believes in sound finance. That is a currency based on gold and as good as gold. McKinley believes in a protective tariff. McKinley believes in the only way of enforcing orderly liberty, that is, in seeing that the laws are enforced at any cost."

"Mr. Watson would be a more startling, more attractive and more dangerous figure (than Sewall) for if he got the chance, he could lash the nation with a whip of scorpions, while Bryan would be contented with the torture of ordinary thongs."

"Mr. Bryan, the nominee for the presidency, and Messrs. Sewall and Watson, the nominees for the vice-presidency, are almost equally devoted adherents to the light-weight dollar and of a currency (not clearing house certificates) which shall not force a man to repay what he

X Introduction

borrowed, and shall punish the wrong-headed laborer who expects to be paid his wages in money worth something, as heavily as the business man or the farmer who is so unmoral as to wish to pay his debts."

"Loud-mouthed predecessors of Mr. Bryan and his kind then thought good enough for them . . . Neither Mr. Bryan nor Mr. Sewall nor Mr. Watson has advocated a two-cent copper dollar. Still they are striving toward that ideal."

"Mr. Sewall distinctly lags behind the leader of the spike team, Mr. Bryan, and still more dis- 'tinctly behind his rival or running mate, or whatever you may choose to call him, the Hon. Thomas Watson."

"He (Mr. Sewall) is a well-to-do man. Indeed in many commimities he would be called a rich man. He is a banker, a railroad man, a ship-builder, and has been successful in business. Now if Mr. Bryan and Mr. Watson really stand for any principle, it is hostility to this kind of success. Thrift, industry and business energy, are qualities which are quite incompatible with true populistic feeling. Paying of debts, like the suppression of riots, is abhorrent to the j)opulistic mind. Such conduct strikes the populist as immoral."

"Populism never prospers save where men are unprosperous, and your true populist is especially intolerant of business success. If a man is a successful business man, he at once calls him a plutocrat. He makes only one exception. A miner or speculator in mines may be

Introduction xI

many times a millionaire, and yet remain in good standing in the populist party."

"Silver is connected in his mind (the populist's) with scaling down debts, the partial repudiation of obligations, and other measures aimed at those odious moneyed tryants who lend money to those who insist upon borrowing, or who have put their ill-gotten gains in savings banks and kindred wicked institutions for the encouragement of the vice of thrift. . . . Not even the fact that the rich silver mine owners may have earned their money honestly, can outweigh the other fact that they champion a species of currency which will make most thrifty and honest men poorer, in the mind of the truly logical populist."

There are rich scoundrels, Mr. Roosevelt says, who make their money dishonestly, and other men who make their money honestly. "But the populist draws no line of division between the classes."

"In the minds of most thrifty, hard-working men who are given to thinking at all about public questions, the free-silver plank is very far from being the most rotten of the many rotten planks put together with such perverted skill by the Chicago architects. A platform which declared for free and unlimited rioting, and which has the same strenuous objection to the exercise of the police power by the Federal government that is felt in the circles presided over by Herr Most, Eugene V. Debs, and all the persons whose pictures appear in the detective bureaus of our great cities, cannot appeal to perxli Introductiott

sons who have gone beyond the unpolished stone period of civiHzation. The men who object to government by injunction, are as regards essential principles of our government, in hearty sympathy with their remote skin-clad ancestors, who lived in caves, fought one-another with stone-headed axes and ate the mammoth and the woolly rhinoceros. They are interesting as representing a geological survival. . . . They are not in sympathy with men of good minds and of sound civic morality."

*'Mushy sentimentalists and wrong-doers," Roosevelt says, made the Chicago platform. Their attack upon the Supreme Court represents ''recurrence to the ways of thought of their remote barbarian ancestors." . . . "Populists realize that the judiciary stands betvv^een them and plunder."

"He (Sewall) has a vein of the erratic in his character, otherwise he would not be in such company at all. But on the whole, his sympathies must be with the man who saves money, rather than with the man who proposes to take away the money that has been saved; with the police who arrest a violent criminal, rather than with the criminal. Such sympathy puts him at a disadvantage in the populist camp."

In other words, Mr. Sewall, Mr. Roosevelt said, must have been uncomfortable.

"Mr. Watson, whose enemies now call him a Georgia cracker, is in reality a far more suitable companion for Mr. Bryan. With Mr. Bryan, denunciation of the gold bug and banker is largely a mere form of intellectual entertainment,

Introduction xui

but with Mr. Watson it represents a ferocious conviction. ... In Watson and Tillman is embodied retribution on the South for having failed to educate the cracker, the poor white, which gives them strength. Mr. Watson is certainly an awkward man for a community to develop."

"They (the Southern populists) distrust anything they cannot understand ; and as they understand but little, this opens a wide field for distrust. Refinement and comfort they are apt to consider quite as objectionable as immorality. That a man should change his clothes in the evening, that he should dine at any other hour than noon, impresses these people as symptoms of depravity, instead of merely trivial. A taste for learning and cultivated friends and a tendency to bathe frequently cause them the deepest suspicion."

Mr. Roosevelt tells how out of place Mr. Watson is in Georgia, where modern ideas have obtained some hold, and regrets that Mr. Watson could not have the more suitable South Carolina constituency which had been developed by Tillman.

"Moreover, Mr. Tillman's brother has been frequently elected to Congress on the issue that he never wore an overcoat nor an undershirt, an issue which any populist statesman finds readily comprehensible, and which he would recognize at a glance as being strong before the people."

"Altogether, Mr. Watson with his sincerity, his frankness, his extreme suspicion and distrust xfv Introduction

of anything he cannot understand, and the feeling he encourages against all the elegancies and decencies of civilized life, is an exceedingly interesting personage. . . . Bryan, after all, is more or less of a sham and a compromise."

"Now in the event of Mr. Bryan having more votes than Mr. McKinley, that is, in the event of the country showing strong bedlamite tendencies next November" . . . 'Tarrago of sinister nonsense making up the Democratic platform."