Contemporary American History, 1877-1913 Part 14

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 a.s.sets of the stockholders whom they represent such sums of money as they deem requisite to place the conduct of the Government in such 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, a.n.a.lyzing 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 a.s.serted 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 navete 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 side of 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 pa.s.sed in 1906. This law increased the number of the 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 were _relatively reasonable_, but not that they were _reasonable 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 the principle 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 pa.s.sed 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 most significant 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 unconst.i.tutional 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 a.s.sociated is unquestionably 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 Ca.n.a.l. 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 ca.n.a.l 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 Ca.n.a.l, 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 battleship _Oregon_ made 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 ca.n.a.l 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 ca.n.a.l, and expressly declared that "the ca.n.a.l 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 ca.n.a.l was omitted from the final draft, and provision was made for "policing"

the district by the United States. The ca.n.a.l 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. Latane that "a unilateral guarantee amounts to nothing; the effect of the Hay-Pauncefote treaty, therefore, is to place the ca.n.a.l 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 ca.n.a.l.

The great question then confronting the country was where and how should the ca.n.a.l 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 acquisition of a ca.n.a.l 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 ca.n.a.l. The independence of the former country was guaranteed, and the latter obtained "in perpetuity the use, occupation, and control" of a ca.n.a.l zone, and the right to construct, maintain, and operate the ca.n.a.l and other means of transportation through the strip. Panama was paid $10,000,000 for her concession and promised $250,000 a year 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 ca.n.a.l 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 wonderful accomplishment--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 Const.i.tution, 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 Const.i.tution, 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 const.i.tutional 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 a.s.sist European and other creditors in collecting their debts in Latin-American countries was thoroughly thrashed out, as well as the const.i.tutional points; and a new stage in the development of the Monroe Doctrine was 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 j.a.pan 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 j.a.pan, 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 the President'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.

FOOTNOTES:

[62] See above, p. 133.

[63] La Follette, _Autobiography_, 399 ff.

[64] The law ordered the Interstate Commerce Commission to ascertain the cost of the construction of all interstate railways, the cost of their reconstruction at the present time, and also the amount of land and money contributed to railways by national, state, and local governments.

[65] _Campaign Textbook, 1908_, p. 45.

[66] See above, p. 209.

[67] Notwithstanding this arrangement, Congress in 1912 enacted a law exempting American coastwise vessels from ca.n.a.l tolls.

[68] _America as a World Power_, p. 207.

[69] Latane, _America as a World Power_, pp. 282 ff.

CHAPTER XI

THE REVIVAL OF DISSENT

On the morning of March 4, 1901, when Mr. McKinley took the oath of office to succeed himself as President, it appeared to the superficial observer that the Populist movement had spent its strength and disappeared. Such was the common remark of the time. To discredit a new proposition it was only necessary to observe that it was as dead as Populism. Twice had the country repudiated Mr. Bryan and his works, the second time even more emphatically than the first; and the radical ideas which had been a.s.sociated with his name, often quite erroneously, seemed to be permanently laid to rest. The country was prosperous; it congratulated itself on the successful outcome of the war with Spain and accepted the imperialist policies which followed with evident satisfaction. Industries under the protection of the Dingley Act and undisturbed by threats of legislative interference went forward with renewed vigor. Capital began to reach out for foreign markets and investments as never before. Statesmen of Mr. Hanna's school looked upon their work and p.r.o.nounced it good.

But Populism was not dead. Defeated in the field of national politics, it began to work from the ground upward, attacking one piece of political machinery after another and pressing upon unwilling state legislatures new forms of agrarian legislation. The People's party, at its convention in 1896, had declared in favor of "a system of direct legislation through the initiative and referendum, under proper const.i.tutional safeguards"; and Mr. Bryan two years later announced his belief in the system, saying: "The principle of the initiative and referendum is democratic. It will not be opposed by any Democrat who indorses the declaration of Jefferson that the people are capable of self-government; nor will it be opposed by any Republican who holds to Lincoln's idea that this should be a government of the people, by the people, and for the people."[70]

The first victory of "direct democracy" came in the very year of Mr.

Bryan's memorable defeat. In 1896, the legislature of South Dakota was captured by a Democratic-Populist majority, and at the session beginning in the following January, it pa.s.sed an amendment to the state const.i.tution, establishing a system of initiative and referendum. Some leaders of the old Knights of Labor and the president of the Farmers'

Alliance were prominently identified with the campaign for this innovation. The resolution was "pa.s.sed by a strict party vote, and to the Populists is due the credit of pa.s.sing it," reported "The Direct Legislation Record" in June, 1897. In the contest over ratification at the polls a party division ensued. The Democratic state convention in 1898 adopted a plank favoring direct legislation, on "the principle that the people should rule"; and the Republicans contented themselves with urging party members "to study the legislative initiative and referendum." At the ensuing election the amendment was carried by a vote of 23,876 to 16,483; but ten years elapsed before any use was made of the new device.[71]

A cloud no bigger than a man's hand had appeared on the horizon of representative government. East, West, North, and South, advocates of direct government were busy with their propaganda, Populists and Democrats taking the lead, with Republican politicians not far in the rear. The year following the adoption of the South Dakota amendment a combination of Democrats and Populists carried a similar provision through the state legislature of Utah and obtained its ratification in 1900. This victory was a short-lived triumph, for the Republicans soon regained their ascendancy and stopped the progress of direct legislation by refusing to enact the enabling law putting the amendment into force.