s of the law in high places come
to realize that they would receive the same punishment as the lowest
offenders. He did more than any of his predecessors to prevent
this country from drifting into socialism.

I have known Colonel Roosevelt for many years. I knew him as Civil
Service Commissioner under President Harrison. In that position,
as in every other public office he held, he saw to it that the law
was strictly enforced. I once wrote him a note, when he was Civil
Service Commissioner, requesting him to act favorably on some
matter, which he considered was contrary to his duty. He promptly
returned this characteristic reply: "You have no right to ask me
to do this, and I have no right to do it."

As Assistant Secretary of the Navy under President McKinley, he
was able, aggressive, and pushing in preparing the Navy for the
Spanish-American War. He seemed so interested in what he was doing
that he would appear to an outsider to be nervous and excitable.
My old friend, the Hon. W. I. Guffin, than whom there was no better
man, was visiting the Department with me one day, and I took occasion
to introduce him to Colonel Roosevelt, who was then Assistant
Secretary. Guffin was astonished at Roosevelt's manners and his
way of speaking, and I recall Guffin's remark when we left the
office. I was very much amused at it. He said: "Well, that is
Roosevelt, is it! He is one hell of a Secretary." Doubtless that
was the impression that Colonel Roosevelt left on many people whom
he met in the Navy Department, who did not know him and who had
not yet come to know the degree of promptness and ability with
which he despatched public business.

I was at the Philadelphia Convention which nominated Colonel
Roosevelt for Vice-President. I know that he did not desire the
nomination, but it was thrust on him through the manipulation of
Senator T. C. Platt, of New York, then the acknowledged "easy boss"
of that State. Platt himself said afterwards that he did it to
get rid of him as Governor of New York, and that he regretted it
every day of his life after Roosevelt became President. The
politicians of New York did not want Roosevelt in control at Albany,
and they thought it would be an admirable plan to remove him from
the State, and eventually relegate him to private life--to nominate
him for Vice-President. But the fates willed differently, and the
nomination for Vice-President opened the way for him to become Mr.
McK