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 w