n the breaking out of the Spanish-American War
in 1898, he resigned on May 6, and, entering the army, organized the
First United States Volunteer ("Rough Rider") Regiment of Cavalry,
recommending Col. L.G. Wood to the command, and taking for himself the
second-in-command as lieutenant-colonel. He had gained his military
experience as a member of the Eighth Regiment of N.Y.N.G. from
1884-1888, during which time he rose to the rank of captain. The Rough
Riders were embarked at Tampa, Fla., with the advance of Shafter's
invading army, and sailed for Cuba on June 15, 1898. They participated
in every engagement preceding the fall of Santiago. Theodore Roosevelt
led the desperate charge of the Ninth Cavalry and the Rough Riders at
the Battle of San Juan Hill on July 1. He was made a colonel on July 11.
He received the nomination on September 27, 1898, for Governor of the
State of New York, obtaining 753 votes, against 218 for Gov. Frank S.
Black. At the election Theodore Roosevelt was supported by a majority
of the Independent Republicans and many Democrats, and defeated the
Democratic candidate, Judge Augustus Van Wyck, by a plurality of 18,079.
At the Republican Convention, held at Philadelphia in June, 1900, he was
nominated for Vice-President, upon which he resigned the governorship
of New York. Was elected Vice-President in November, 1900, and took the
oath of office March 4, 1901. President McKinley was shot September 6,
1901, and died September 14. His Cabinet announced his death to the
Vice-President, who took the oath of President at the residence of
Mr. Ansley Wilcox in Buffalo, before Judge John R. Hazel, of the United
States District Court, on September 14.

VICE-PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT'S INAUGURAL ADDRESS AS VICE-PRESIDENT.

The history of free government is in large part the history of those
representative legislative bodies in which, from the earliest times,
free government has found its loftiest expression. They must ever hold
a peculiar and exalted position in the record which tells how the great
nations of the world have endeavored to achieve and preserve orderly
freedom. No man can render to his fellows greater service than is
rendered by him who, with fearlessness and honesty, with sanity and
disinterestedness, does his life work as a member of such a body.
Especially is this the case when the legislature in which the service is
rendered is a vital part in the governmental machinery of one of those
worl