[47]Report of the Commissioner of Corporations on the Steel Industry, July 1, 1911.
[47]Report of the Commissioner of Corporations on the Steel Industry, July 1, 1911.
[48]Moody,The Truth about the Trusts, p. 493.
[48]Moody,The Truth about the Trusts, p. 493.
[49]Professor W. Z. Ripley,Political Science Quarterly, March, 1911.
[49]Professor W. Z. Ripley,Political Science Quarterly, March, 1911.
[50]The Trust Problem(1900 ed.), p. 210.
[50]The Trust Problem(1900 ed.), p. 210.
[51]See the Parker episode, below, p. 268.
[51]See the Parker episode, below, p. 268.
[52]Mr. Hanna was drafted in 1864, but saw no actual service. Croly,Marcus A. Hanna, p. 44.
[52]Mr. Hanna was drafted in 1864, but saw no actual service. Croly,Marcus A. Hanna, p. 44.
[53]Croly, p. 113.
[53]Croly, p. 113.
[54]Ibid., p. 160.
[54]Ibid., p. 160.
[55]Croly, p. 183.
[55]Croly, p. 183.
[56]Ibid., p. 149.
[56]Ibid., p. 149.
[57]Croly, p. 219.
[57]Croly, p. 219.
[58]Croly, p. 81.
[58]Croly, p. 81.
[59]Ibid., p. 264.
[59]Ibid., p. 264.
[60]Croly, p. 417.
[60]Croly, p. 417.
[61]See above, Chap. II.
[61]See above, Chap. II.
The administrations of Mr. Roosevelt cannot be characterized by a general phrase, although they will doubtless be regarded by historians as marking an epoch in the political history of the United States. If we search for great and significant social and economic legislation during that period, we shall hardly find it, nor can we discover in his numerous and voluminous messages much that is concrete in spite of their immense suggestiveness. The adoption of the income tax amendment, the passage of the amendment for popular election of Senators, the establishment of parcel post and postal savings banks, and the successful prosecution of trusts and combinations,—all these achievements belong in time to the administration of Mr. Taft, although it will be claimed by some that they were but a fruition of plans laid or policies advocated by Mr. Roosevelt.
One who attempts to estimate and evaluate those eight years of multifarious activity will find it difficult to separate the transient and spectacular from the permanent and fundamental. In the foreground stand the interference in the coal strike, the acquisition of the Panama Canal strip, voluminous messages discussing every aspect of our complex social and political life, vigorous and spirited interference with state elections, asin the case of Mr. Hearst's campaign in New York, and in city politics, as in the case of Mr. Burton's contest in Cleveland, Ohio, the pressing of the idea of conserving natural resources upon the public mind, acrimonious disputes with private citizens like Mr. Harriman, and, finally, the closing days of bitter hostilities with Congress over the Tennessee Coal and Iron affair and appropriations for special detectives to be at executive disposal.
Mr. Roosevelt's Doctrines
During those years the country was much torn with the scandals arising from investigations, such as the life insurance inquest in New York, which revealed grave lapses from the paths of rectitude on the part of men high in public esteem, and gross and vulgar use of money in campaigns. No little of the discredit connected with these affairs fell upon the Republican party, not because its methods were shown to be worse in general than those of the Democrats, but because it happened to be in power. The great task of counteracting this discontent fell upon Mr. Roosevelt, who smote with many a message the money changers in the temple of his own party, and convinced a large portion of the country that he had not only driven them out but had refused all association with them.
Mr. Roosevelt was thus quick to catch the prevailing public temper. "It makes not a particle of difference," he said in 1907, "whether these crimes are committed by a capitalist or by a laborer, by a leading banker ormanufacturer or railroad man, or by a leading representative of a labor union. Swindling in stocks, corrupting legislatures, making fortunes by the inflation of securities, by wrecking railroads, by destroying competitors through rebates,—these forms of wrongdoing in the capitalist are far more infamous than any ordinary form of embezzlement or forgery.... The business man who condones such conduct stands on a level with the labor man who deliberately supports a corrupt demagogue and agitator."
Any one who takes the trouble to examine with care Mr. Roosevelt's messages and other public utterances during the period of his administration will discover the elements of many of his policies which later took more precise form.
In his first message to Congress, on December 3, 1901, Mr. Roosevelt gave considerable attention to trusts and collateral economic problems. He refused to concede the oft-repeated claim that great fortunes were the product of special legal privileges. "The creation of these great corporate fortunes," he said, "has not been due to the tariff nor to any other governmental action, but to natural causes in the business world, operating in other countries as they operate in our own. The process has aroused much antagonism, a great part of which is wholly without warrant. It is not true that as the rich have grown richer, the poor have grown poorer. On the contrary, never before has the average man, the wage worker, the farmer, the small trader, been so well off as in this country at the present time. There have beenabuses connected with the accumulation of wealth; yet it remains true that a fortune accumulated in legitimate business can be accumulated by the person specially benefitted only on condition of conferring immense incidental benefits upon others."
While thus contending that large fortunes in the main were the product of "natural economic forces," Mr. Roosevelt admitted that some grave evils had arisen in connection with combinations and trusts, and foreshadowed in his proposed remedial legislation the policy of regulation and new nationalism. "When the Constitution was adopted, at the end of the eighteenth century, no human wisdom could foretell the sweeping changes, alike in industrial and political conditions, which were to take place by the beginning of the twentieth century. At that time it was accepted as a matter of course that the several states were the proper authorities to regulate ... the comparatively insignificant and strictly localized corporate bodies of the day. The conditions are now wholly different, and a wholly different action is called for." The remedy he proposed was publicity for corporate affairs, the regulation, not the prohibition, of great combinations, the elimination of specific abuses such as overcapitalization, and government supervision. If the powers of Congress, under the Constitution, were inadequate, then a constitutional amendment should be submitted conferring the proper power. The Interstate Commerce Act should likewise be amended. "The railway is a public servant. Its rates should be just to and open to all shippers alike. The Government should see to it that within itsjurisdiction this is so." Conservation of natural resources, irrigation plans, the creation of a department of Commerce and Labor, army and navy reform, and the construction of the Panama Canal were also recommended at the same time (1901).
In this message, nearly all of Mr. Roosevelt's later policies as President are presaged, and in it also are marked the spirit and phraseology which have done so much to make him the idol of the American middle class, and particularly of the social reformer. There are, for instance, many little aphorisms which appeal to the moral sentiments. "When all is said and done," he says, "the rule of brotherhood remains as the indispensable prerequisite to success in the kind of national life for which we are to strive. Each man must work for himself, and unless he so works no outside help can avail him; but each man must remember also that he is indeed his brother's keeper, and that, while no man who refuses to walk can be carried with advantage to himself or any one else, yet each at times stumbles or halts, each at times needs to have the helping hand outstretched to him." The "reckless agitator" and anarchist are dealt with in a summary fashion, and emphasis is laid on the primitive virtues of honesty, sobriety, industry, and self-restraint. The new phrases of the social reformer also appear side by side with the exclamations of virtuous indignation: "social betterment," "sociological law," "rule of brotherhood," "high aims," "foolish visionary," "equity between man and man"—in fact the whole range of the terminology of social "uplift."
None of Mr. Roosevelt's later messages addedanything new by way of economic doctrine or moral principle. The same notions recurred again and again, often in almost identical language and frequently in the form of long quotations from previous messages. But there appeared from time to time different concrete proposals, elaborating those already suggested to Congress. The tariff he occasionally touched upon, but never at great length or with much emphasis. He frequently reiterated the doctrine that the country was committed to protection, that the tariff was not responsible for the growth of combinations and trusts, and that no economic question of moment could be solved by its revision or abandonment.
As to the trusts, Mr. Roosevelt consistently maintained the position which he had taken as governor of New York and had stated in his first message; namely, that most of the legislation against trusts was futile and that publicity and governmental supervision were the only methods of approaching the question which the logic of events admitted. In his message of December, 1907, he said: "The anti-trust law should not be repealed; but it should be made more efficient and more in harmony with actual conditions. It should be so amended as to forbid only the kind of combination which does harm to the general public, such amendment to be accompanied by, or to be an incident of, a grant of supervisory power to the Government over these big concerns engaged in interstate business. This should be accompanied by provision for the compulsory publication of accounts and the subjection of books and papers to the inspection of the Government officials.... TheCongress has the power to charter corporations to engage in interstate and foreign commerce, and a general law can be enacted under the provisions of which existing corporations could take out federal charters and new federal corporations could be created. An essential provision of such a law should be a method of predetermining by some federal board or commission whether the applicant for a federal charter was an association or combination within the restrictions of the federal law. Provision should also be made for complete publicity in all matters affecting the public, and complete protection to the investing public and the shareholders in the matter of issuing corporate securities. If an incorporation law is not deemed advisable, a license act for big interstate corporations might be enacted; or a combination of the two might be tried. The supervision established might be analogous to that now exercised over national banks. At least, the anti-trust act should be supplemented by specific prohibitions of the methods which experience has shown have been of most service in enabling monopolistic combinations to crush out competition. The real owners of a corporation should be compelled to do business in their own name. The right to hold stock in other corporations should be denied to interstate corporations, unless on approval by the proper Government officials, and a prerequisite to such approval should be the listing with the Government of all owners and stockholders, both by the corporation owning such stock and by the corporation in which such stock is owned."
With that prescience which characterized his political career from his entrance into politics, Mr. Rooseveltforesaw that it was impossible for capitalists in the United States to postpone those milder reforms, such as employers' liability, which had been accepted in the enlightened countries of Europe long before the close of the nineteenth century. In his message of December 3, 1907, he pointed out that "the number of accidents to wage-workers, including those that are preventable and those that are not, has become appalling in the mechanical, manufacturing and transportation operations of the day. It works grim hardship to the ordinary wage-worker and his family to have the effect of such an accident fall solely upon him." Mr. Roosevelt thereupon recommended the strengthening of the employers' liability law which had been recently passed by Congress, and urged upon that body "the enactment of a law which will ... bring federal legislation up to the standard already established by all European countries, and which will serve as a stimulus to the various states to perfect their legislation in this regard."
As has been pointed out above, Mr. Roosevelt, in all of his recommendations, took the ground that the prevailing system of production and distribution of wealth was essentially sound, that substantial justice was now being worked out between man and man, and that only a few painful excrescences needed to be lopped off. Only on one occasion, it seems, did he advise the adoption of any measures affecting directly the distribution of acquired wealth. In his message of December 3, 1907, he declared that when our tax laws were revised, the question of inheritance and income taxes should be carefully considered. He spoke with diffidence of thelatter because of the difficulties of evasion involved, and the decision of the Supreme Court in 1895. "Nevertheless," he said, "a graduated income tax of the proper type would be a desirable feature of federal taxation, and it is to be hoped that one may be devised which the Supreme Court will declare constitutional." The inheritance tax was, in his opinion, however, preferable; such a tax had been upheld by the Court and was "far more important for the purpose of having the fortunes of the country bear in proportion to their increase in size a corresponding increase and burden of taxation." He accordingly approved the principle of a progressive inheritance tax, increasing to perhaps 25 per cent in the case of distant relatives.
While advocating social reforms and castigating wrong-doers at home, Mr. Roosevelt was equally severe in dealing with Latin-American states which failed to discharge their obligations to other countries faithfully. In his message of December, 1905, he said: "We must make it evident that we do not intend to permit the Monroe doctrine to be used by any nation on this continent as a shield to protect it from the consequences of its own misdeeds against foreign nations. If a republic to the south of us commits a tort against a foreign nation, such as an outrage against a citizen of that nation, then the Monroe doctrine does not force us to interfere to prevent the punishment of the tort, save to see that the punishment does not assume the form of territorial occupation in any shape. The case is more difficult when it refers to a contractual obligation.... The country would certainly decline to go to war toprevent a foreign government from collecting a just debt; on the other hand it is very inadvisable to permit any foreign power to take possession, even temporarily, of the custom houses of an American republic in order to enforce the payment of its obligations; for such a temporary occupation might turn into a permanent occupation. The only escape from these alternatives may at any time be that we must ourselves undertake to bring about some arrangement by which so much as possible of a just obligation shall be paid."
Mr. Roosevelt's messages and various activities while he was serving the unexpired term of President McKinley upset all of the conservative traditions of the executive office. He intervened, without power, in the anthracite coal strike of 1902, and had the satisfaction of seeing the miners make substantial gains at the hands of a commission appointed by himself, to which the contestants had agreed to submit the issues. He began a prosecution of the Northern Securities Company at a time when such actions against great combinations of capital were unfashionable. He forced an investigation of the post-office administration in 1903, which revealed frauds of huge dimensions; and he gave the administration of public lands a turning over which led to the successful criminal prosecution of two United States Senators. Citizens acquired the habit of looking to the headlines of the morning paper for some new and startling activity on the part of the President. Politicians of the old school in both parties, who had been used to settling difficulties by quiet conferences within the"organization," stood aghast. They did not like Mr. Roosevelt's methods which they characterized as "erratic"; but the death of Mr. Hanna in February, 1904, took away the only forceful leader who might have consolidated the opposition within Republican ranks.
The Campaign of 1904
Nevertheless the rumor was vigorously circulated that Mr. Roosevelt was violently opposed by "Wall Street and the Trusts." Whatever may have been the source of this rumor it only enhanced the President's popularity. In December, 1903, Senator O. H. Platt wrote: "I do not know how much importance to attach to the current opposition to Roosevelt by what are called the 'corporate and money influences' in New York.... There is a great deal said about it, as if it were widespread and violent. I know that it does not include the whole of that class of people, because I know many bankers and capitalists, railroad and business men who are his strong, good friends, and they are not among the smaller and weaker parties, either.... Now it is a great mistake for capitalistic interests to oppose Roosevelt.... I think he will be nominated by acclamation, so what is to be gained by the Wall Street contingent and the railroad interests in this seeming opposition to him?... There is no Republican in the United States who can be elected except Roosevelt.... He is going to be the people's candidate, not the candidate of the trusts or of the hoodlums, but of the conservative elements."
The Republican convention in 1904 was uneventful beyond measure. Though Mr. Roosevelt was disliked by many members of his party, his nomination was unavoidable, and even his opponents abstained from any word or deed that might have disturbed the concord of the occasion. The management of the convention was principally in the hands of the men from whom Mr. Roosevelt afterward broke and stigmatized as "reactionary." Mr. Elihu Root was temporary chairman, Mr. Joseph G. Cannon was permanent chairman, Mr. Henry Cabot Lodge was chairman of the committee on resolutions which reported the platform, Mr. W. M. Crane and Mr. Boies Penrose were selected as members of the national committee from their respective states, and Mr. Frank S. Black, of New York, made the speech nominating Mr. Roosevelt. Throughout, the proceedings were harmonious; the platform and the nomination were accepted vociferously without a dissenting vote.
The Republican platform of 1904 gave no recognition of any of the newer social and economic problems which were soon to rend that party in twain. After the fashion of announcements made by parties already in power, it laid great emphasis upon Republican achievements since the great victory of 1896. A protective tariff under which all industries had revived and prospered had been enacted; public credit was now restored, Cuban independence established, peace, freedom, order, and prosperity given to Porto Rico, the Philippine Islands endowed with the largest civil liberty ever enjoyed there, the laws against unjust discriminations byvast aggregations of capital fearlessly enforced, and the gold standard upheld. The program of positive action included nothing new: extension of foreign markets, encouragement of American shipping, enforcement of the Fourteenth Amendment wherever the suffrage had been curtailed, and indorsement of civil service, international arbitration, and liberal pensions. The trust plank was noncommittal as to concrete policy: "Combinations of capital and of labor are the results of the economic movement of the age, but neither must be permitted to infringe the rights and interests of the people. Such combinations, when lawfully formed for lawful purposes, are alike entitled to the protection of the laws, but both are subject to the laws and neither can be permitted to break them."
In their campaign book for 1904, the Republican leaders exhibited Mr. Roosevelt as the ideal American in a superlative degree. "Theodore Roosevelt's character," runs the eulogy, "is no topic for difference of opinion or for party controversy. It is without mystery or concealment. It has the primary qualities that in all ages have been admired and respected: physical prowess, great energy and vitality, straightforwardness and moral courage, promptness in action, talent for leadership.... Theodore Roosevelt, as a typical personality, has won the hearty confidence of the American people; and he has not shrunk from recognizing and using his influence as an advocate of the best standards of personal, domestic, and civic life in the country. He has made these things relating to life and conduct a favorite theme in speech and essay and he has diligentlypracticed what he preached. Thus he has become a power for wholesomeness in every department of our life as a people."
The Democratic nominee, Mr. Alton B. Parker, failed to elicit any enthusiasm in the rank and file of the party. He had supported the Democratic candidate at a time when many of his conservative friends had repudiated Mr. Bryan altogether, and thus he could not be branded as a "bolter." But Mr. Parker's long term of service as judge of the highest court of New York, his remoteness from actual partisan controversies, his refusal to plunge into a whirlwind stumping campaign, and his dignified reserve, all combined to prevent his getting a grip upon the popular imagination. His weakness was further increased by the half-hearted support given by Mr. Bryan who openly declared the party to be under the control of the "Wall Street element," but confessed that he intended to give his vote to Mr. Parker, although the latter, in a telegram to the nominating convention at St. Louis, had announced his unflinching adherence to the gold standard.
The Democratic platform, except in its denunciation of the Republican administration, was as indefinite as the occasion demanded. Independence should be promised to the Filipinos at the proper time and under proper circumstances; there should be a revision and gradual reduction of the tariff by "the friends of the masses"; United States Senators should be elected by popular vote; combinations and trusts which restrict competition, control production, or fix prices and wagesshould be forbidden and punished by law. The administration of Mr. Roosevelt was denounced as "spasmodic, erratic, sensational, spectacular, and arbitrary," and the proposal of the Republican platform to enforce the Fourteenth Amendment was condemned as "Bourbon-like, selfish, and narrow," and designed to kindle anew the embers of racial and sectional strife. Constitutional, simple, and orderly government was promised, affording no sensations, offering no organic changes in the political or economic structure, and making no departures from the government "as framed and established by the fathers of the Republic."
The only extraordinary incident in the campaign of 1904 occurred toward the closing days, when Mr. Parker repeatedly charged that the Republican party was being financed by contributions from corporations and trust magnates. The Democratic candidate also declared that Mr. Cortelyou, as Secretary of Commerce and Labor, had acquired through the use of official inquisitorial powers inside information as to the practices of trusts, and that as chairman of the Republican national committee, he had used his special knowledge to extort contributions from corporations. These corrupt and debasing methods had, in the opinion of Mr. Parker, threatened the integrity of the republic and transformed the government of the people into "a government whose officers are practically chosen by a handful of corporate managers, who levy upon the assets of the stockholders whom they represent such sums of money as they deem requisite to place the conduct of the Government insuch hands as they consider best for their private interests."
These grave charges were made as early as October 24, and it was expected that Mr. Cortelyou would reply immediately, particularly as Mr. Parker was repeating and amplifying them. However, no formal answer came until November 5, three days before the election, when a countercharge was impossible. On that date Mr. Roosevelt issued a signed statement, analyzing the charges of his opponent, and closing with the positive declaration that "the statements made by Mr. Parker are unqualifiedly and atrociously false."
No doubt it would have been difficult for Mr. Parker to have substantiated many of the details in his charges, but the general truth of his contention that the Republican campaign was financed by railway and trust magnates was later established by the life insurance investigation in New York in 1905, by the exposures of trust methods by Mr. Hearst in the publication of Standard Oil Letters, and by the revelations made before the Clapp committee of the Senate in 1912. It is true, Mr. Roosevelt asserted that he knew nothing personally about the corporation contributions, particularly the Standard Oil gifts, and although he convinced his friends of his entire innocence in the matter, seasoned politicians could hardly understand a naïveté so far outside the range of their experience.
The Democratic candidate and his friends took open pleasure in the discomfiture produced in Republican ranks by these unpleasant revelations, but no little bitterness was added to their cup of joy by the other sideof the story. During the life insurance investigation one of the life insurance officers declared: "My life was made weary by the Democratic candidates chasing for money in that campaign. Some of the very men who to-day are being interviewed in the papers as denouncing the men who contribute to campaigns,—their shadows were crossing my path every step I took." Later, before the Clapp committee in 1912, Mr. August Belmont and Mr. T. F. Ryan, corporation magnates with wide-reaching financial interests,—the latter particularly famous for his Tobacco Trust affiliations,—testified that they had underwritten Mr. Parker's campaign to the amount of several hundred thousand dollars. Independent newspapers remarked that it seemed to be another case of the kettle and the pot.
That the conservative interests looked to the Republican party, if not to Mr. Roosevelt, for the preservation of good order in politics and the prevention of radical legislation, is shown by the campaign contributions on the part of those who had earlier financed Mr. Hanna. In 1907 a letter from the railroad magnate, Mr. E. H. Harriman, was made public, in which the writer declared that Mr. Roosevelt had invited him to Washington in the autumn of 1904, just before the election, that at the President's request he had raised $250,000 to help carry New York state, and that he had paid the money over to the Republican treasurer, Mr. Bliss. Mr. Roosevelt indignantly denied that he had requested Mr. Harriman to raise a dollar for "the Presidential campaign of 1904." It will be noted that Mr. Roosevelt here made a distinction between the state and national campaign.This distinction he again drew during the United States Senate investigation in 1912, when it became apparent that the Standard Oil Trust had made a large contribution to the Republican politicians in 1904. From his testimony, it would appear that Mr. Roosevelt was unaware of the economic forces which carried him to victory in 1904. Indeed, from the election returns, he was justified in regarding his victory as a foregone conclusion, even if the financiers of the party had not taken such extensive precautions.
The election returns in 1904 showed that the Democratic candidate had failed to engage the enthusiasm of his party, for the vote cast for him was more than a million and a quarter short of that cast for Mr. Bryan in 1900. The personal popularity of Mr. Roosevelt was fully evidenced in the electoral and popular votes. Of the former he secured 336 against 140 cast for his opponent, and of the latter he polled nearly 400,000 more than Mr. McKinley. Nevertheless the total vote throughout the country was nearly half a million under that of 1900, showing an undoubted apathy or a dissatisfaction with the two old parties. This dissatisfaction was further demonstrated in a startling way by the heavy increase in the socialist ranks, a jump from about 95,000 in 1900 to more than 400,000.
The Achievements of Mr. Roosevelt's Administrations
Doubtless the most significant of all the laws enacted during Mr. Roosevelt's administrations was the Hepburn Act passed in 1906. This law increased the number ofthe Interstate Commerce Commission[62]to seven, extended the law to cover pipe lines, express companies, and sleeping car companies, and bridges, ferries, and railway terminals. It gave the Interstate Commerce Commission the power to reduce a rate found to be unreasonable or discriminatory in cases in which complaints were filed by shippers adversely affected; it abolished "midnight tariffs" under which favored shippers had been given special rates, by requiring proper notice of all changes in schedules; and it forbade common carriers to engage in the transportation of commodities owned by themselves, except for their own proper uses.
The Hepburn bill, however, did not confer upon the Interstate Commerce Commission that power over rates which the Commission had long been urging as necessary to give shippers the relief they expected. Senator La Follette, fresh from a fight with the railways in Wisconsin, proposed several radical amendments in the Senate, and endeavored without avail to secure the open support of President Roosevelt.[63]The Senator insisted that it would be possible under the Hepburn bill "for the commission to determine whether rates wererelatively reasonable, but not that they werereasonable per se; that one rate could be compared with another, but that the Commission had no means of determining whether either rate so compared was itself a reasonable rate." No one can tell, urged the Senator, whether a rate is reasonable until the railway in question has been evaluated. This point he pressed with great insistence, and though defeated at the time, he had the consolation of having theprinciple of physical valuation enacted into law in 1913.[64]At all events, the railways found little or no fault with the Hepburn law, and shortly afterward began to raise their rates in the face of strong opposition from shippers.
Two laws relative to foodstuffs, the meat inspection act and the pure food act, were passed in 1906 in response to the popular demand for protection against diseased meats and deleterious foods and drugs—a demand created largely by the revelation of shocking conditions in the Chicago stockyards and of nefarious practices on the part of a large number of manufacturers. The first of the measures was intended to guarantee that the meat shipped in interstate commerce should be derived from animals which were sound at the time of slaughter, prepared under sanitary conditions in the packing houses, and adequately inspected by Federal employees. The second measure covered foods and drugs, and provided that such articles "must not contain any injurious or deleterious drug, chemical or preservative, and that the label on each package must state the exact facts and not be misleading or false in any particular." The effect of the last of these measures was felt in the extinction of a large number of patent medicine and other quasi-fraudulent concerns engaged in interstate trade.
The social legislation enacted during Mr. Roosevelt's administrations is not very extensive, although it was accompanied by much discussion at the time. The mostsignificant piece of labor legislation was the employers' liability law enacted in 1906, which imposed a liability upon common carriers engaged in interstate commerce for injuries sustained by employees in their service. On January 6, 1908, the Supreme Court declared the act unconstitutional on the ground that it interblended the exercise of legitimate powers over interstate commerce and interference with matters outside the scope of such commerce. The act was again taken up in Congress, and in April of that year a second law, omitting the objectionable features pointed out by the Court, was enacted.
A second piece of Federal legislation which is commonly called a labor measure was the law which went into effect on March 4, 1908, limiting the hours of railway employees engaged as trainmen or telegraph operators. As a matter of fact, however, it was not so much the long hours of trainmen which disturbed Congress as the appalling number of railway disasters from which the traveling public suffered. At least it was so stated by the Republican leaders in their campaign of 1908, for they then declared that "although the great object of the Act is to promote the safety of travellers upon railroads, by limiting the hours of service of employees within reasonable bounds, it is none the less true that in actual operation it enforces humane and considerate treatment to employees as well as greater safety to the public."[65]
That public policy with which Mr. Roosevelt's administrations will be most closely associated isunquestionably the conservation of natural resources. It is true that he did not originate it or secure the enactment of any significant legislation on the subject. The matter had been taken up in Congress and out as early as Mr. Cleveland's first administration, and the first important law on conservation was the act of March 3, 1891, which authorized the President to reserve permanently as forest lands such areas as he deemed expedient. Under this law successive Presidents withdrew from entry enormous areas of forest lands. This beginning Mr. Roosevelt enlarged, and by his messages and speeches, he brought before the country in an impressive and enduring manner the urgent necessity of abandoning the old policy of drift and of withholding from the clutches of grasping corporations the meager domain still left to the people. Without inquiring into what may be the wisest final policy in the matter of our natural resources, all citizens will doubtless agree that Mr. Roosevelt's service in this cause was valuable beyond calculation.
Among the proudest achievements of Mr. Roosevelt's administration was the beginning of the actual construction of the Panama Canal. A short route between the two oceans had long been considered by the leading commercial nations of the world. In 1850, by the Clayton-Bulwer treaty, the United States and Great Britain had agreed upon the construction of a canal by a private corporation, under the supervision of the two countries and other states, which might join the combination, on a basis of neutralization. The complete failure of the French company organized by De Lesseps,the hero of the Suez Canal, discouraged all practical attempts for a time, but the naval advantages of such a waterway was forced upon public attention in a dramatic manner during the Spanish War when the battleshipOregonmade her historical voyage around the Horn.[66]
After the Spanish War was over, Mr. John Hay, Secretary of State, began the negotiation of a new treaty with Great Britain, which, after many hitches in the process of coming to terms, was finally ratified by the Senate in December, 1901. This agreement, known as the Hay-Pauncefote treaty, set aside the old Clayton-Bulwer convention, and provided that a canal might be constructed under the supervision of the United States, either at its own cost or by private enterprise subject to the stipulated provisions. The United States agreed to adopt certain rules as the basis of the neutralization of the canal, and expressly declared that "the canal shall be free and open to the vessels of commerce and of war of all nations, observing these Rules, on terms of entire equality, so that there shall be no discrimination against any such nation, or its citizens or subjects, in respect of the conditions or charges of traffic or otherwise."[67]A proposal to forbid the fortification of the canal was omitted from the final draft, and provision was made for "policing" the district by the United States. The canal was thus neutralized under a guarantee of the United States, and certain promises were made in behalf of that country.
The exact effect of this treaty was a subject of dispute from the outset. On the one side, it was said by Mr. Latané that "a unilateral guarantee amounts to nothing; the effect of the Hay-Pauncefote treaty, therefore, is to place the canal politically as well as commercially under the absolute control of the United States."[68]On the other hand, it was contended that this treaty superseded a mutually binding convention, and that, although it was unilateral in character, the rules provided in it were solemn obligations binding upon the conscience of the American nation. Whatever may be the merits of this controversy, it is certain that the Hay-Pauncefote agreement cleared the way for speedy and positive action on the part of the United States with regard to the canal.
The great question then confronting the country was where and how should the canal be built. One party favored cutting the channel through Nicaragua, and in fact two national commissions had reported in favor of this route. Another party advocated taking over the old French concern and the construction of the waterway through Panama, a district then forming a part of Colombia. As many influential Americans had become interested in the rights of the French company, they began a campaign in the lobbies of Congress to secure the adoption of that route. At length in June, 1902, the merits of the Panama case or the persistency of the lobby, or both, carried through a law providing for the purchase of the French company's claims at a cost of not more than $40,000,000 and the acquisitionof a canal strip from the republic of Colombia—and failing this arrangement, the selection of the Nicaragua route.
On the basis of this law, which was signed June 28, 1902, negotiations were begun with Colombia, but they ended in failure because that country expected to secure better terms than those offered by the United States. The Americans who were interested in the French concern and expected to make millions out of the purchase of property that was substantially worthless, were greatly distressed by the refusal of Colombia to ratify the treaty which had been negotiated. Residents of Panama were likewise disturbed at this delay in an enterprise which meant great prosperity for them, and with the sympathy if not the support of the American administration, a revolt was instigated at the Isthmus and carried out under the protection of American arms on November 3, 1903. Three days later, President Roosevelt recognized the independence of the new revolutionary government. In his message in December, Mr. Roosevelt explained the great necessity under which he labored, and convinced his friends of the wisdom and justice of his course.
By a treaty proclaimed on February 26, 1904, between Panama and the United States, provision was made for the construction of the canal. The independence of the former country was guaranteed, and the latter obtained "in perpetuity the use, occupation, and control" of a canal zone, and the right to construct, maintain, and operate the canal and other means of transportation through the strip. Panama was paid $10,000,000 for her concession and promised $250,000 ayear after the lapse of nine years. The full $40,000,000 was paid over to the French concern and its American underwriters; the lock type instead of the sea-level canal was agreed upon in 1906; construction by private contractors was rejected in favor of public direct employment under official engineers; and the work was pushed forward with great rapidity in the hope that it might be completed before 1915.
The country had not settled down after the Panama affair before popular interest was again engaged in a diplomatic tangle with Santo Domingo. That petty republic, on account of its many revolutions, had become deeply involved in debt, and European creditors, through their diplomatic agents, had practically threatened the use of armed force in collecting arrears, unless the United States would undertake the supervision of the Dominican customs and divide the revenues in a suitable manner. In an agreement signed in February, 1905, between the United States and Santo Domingo, provisions were made for carrying such an arrangement into effect. The Senate, having failed to sanction the treaty, Mr. Roosevelt practically carried out the program unofficially and gave it substantial support in the form of American battleships.
Against this independent executive action there was a strong protest in the Senate. The spirit of this opposition was fully expressed by Mr. Rayner in a speech in that chamber, in which he said: "This policy may be all right—perhaps the American people are in favor of this new doctrine; it may be a wonderfulaccomplishment—Central America may profit by it; it may be a great benefit to us commercially and it may be in the interest of civilization, but as a student and follower of the Constitution, I deprecate the methods that have been adopted, and I appeal to you to know whether we propose to sit silently by, and by our indifference or tacit acquiescence submit to a scheme that ignores the privileges of this body; that is not authorized by statute; that does not array itself within any of the functions of the Executive; that vests the treaty-making power exclusively in the President, to whom it does not belong; that overrides the organic law of the land, and that virtually proclaims to the country that, while the other branches of the Government are controlled by the Constitution, the Executive is above and beyond it, and whenever his own views or policies conflict with it, he will find some way to effectuate his purposes uncontrolled by its limitations."
Notwithstanding such attacks on his authority, the President had not in fact exceeded his constitutional rights, and the boldness and directness of his policy found plenty of popular support. The Senate was forced to accept the situation with as good grace as possible, and a compromise was arranged in a revised treaty in February, 1907, in which Mr. Roosevelt's action on material points received official sanction from that authority. The wisdom of the policy of using the American navy to assist European and other creditors in collecting their debts in Latin-American countries was thoroughly thrashed out, as well as the constitutional points; and a new stage in the development of the Monroe Doctrinewas thus reached. Those who opposed the policy pointed to another solution of the perennial difficulties arising in the countries to the southward; that is, the submission of pecuniary claims to the Hague Court or special tribunals for arbitration.[69]
Another very dramatic feature of Mr. Roosevelt's administration was his action in bringing Russia and Japan together in 1905 and thus helping to terminate the terrible war between these two powers. Among the achievements of the Hague conference, called by the Tsar in 1899, was the adoption of "A Convention for the Peaceful Adjustment of International Differences" which provided for a permanent Court of Arbitration, for international commissions of inquiry in disputes arising from differences of opinion on facts, and for the tendering of good offices and mediation. "The right to offer good offices or mediation," runs the convention, "belongs to Powers who are strangers to the dispute, even during the course of hostilities. The exercise of this right shall never be considered by one or the other parties to the contest as an unfriendly act."
It was under this last provision that President Roosevelt dispatched on June 8, 1905, after making proper inquiries, identical notes to Russia and Japan, urging them to open direct negotiations for peace with each other. The fact that the great European financiers had already substantially agreed that the war must end and that both combatants were in sore straits for money, clearly facilitated the rapidity with which thePresident's invitation was accepted. In his identical note, Mr. Roosevelt tendered his services "in arranging the preliminaries as to the time and place of meeting," and after some delay Portsmouth, New Hampshire, was determined upon. The President's part in the opening civilities of the conference between the representatives of the two powers, and the successful outcome of the negotiations, combined to make the affair, in the popular mind, one of the most brilliant achievements of his administration.