Oscar S. Straus

Roosevelt appoints me member of the Hague Tribunal—Trouble with Philippine Mohammedans averted—Humanitarian diplomacy under Roosevelt; Hay's Roumanian note; Roosevelt's Russian cable—The Alaska boundary—Panama and the "covenant running with the land"—White House luncheons; Carnegie suggests to Roosevelt a legacy for my grandchildren—Roosevelt and organized labor—Roosevelt's definition of Americanism—Overnight at the White House; conference regarding the President's Message—Roosevelt and the Portsmouth peace negotiations; Count Witte invites a committee to discuss the Russian Jewish question; Roosevelt writes to Witte—Roosevelt's prophetic characterization of Germany—Some essential qualities of Roosevelt.

I began the year 1901 as a private citizen once more. I devoted much of my time, however, to public activities, giving close attention particularly to the international questions that arose.

The doctrine of citizenship and the rights of naturalized American citizens in foreign countries had for many years formed the major subject in our foreign relations, and it had been one for constant controversy between our own and foreign countries, especially Germany, Austria, and Turkey. In the spring I read a paper at a meeting of the American Social Science Association, of which I was the president, entitled "The United States Doctrine of Citizenship and Expatriation." Later in the year I received, in consequence, a letter from Senator S. M. Cullom of Illinois, chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, asking me to prepare material for amendments to legislation on this subject, which I did.

When Theodore Roosevelt became President of the United States through the lamentable death of William McKinley, one of my earliest relations with him was my being appointed by him as a member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague. Whether or not he acted herein in conformity with McKinley's intention, I cannot say. When McKinley was selecting the original members, he conferred with me and indicated that if agreeable to me, he would be pleased to appoint me as a member. Shortly afterward when the appointments were announced, my name was not among them. It was some time before I saw him again, and while I should never have mentioned it, he did. He said he was very sorry that through the pressure of duties he had quite forgotten his intention to name me when the time came to announce the appointments. I told him I thought perhaps I had been mistaken in understanding that he had offered me one of the appointments. He said I had not misunderstood, but that he would make amends should a vacancy occur while he was still President; he had wanted me as a member of the Court, not alone in recognition of the great services I had rendered, but because he regarded me exceptionally qualified. He added that when he became ex-President he would like to be a member of that Court himself; it appealed to him more than any other office he could think of.

The vacancy in the membership of the Court occurred sooner than any one anticipated, by the death, in March, 1901, of ex-President Harrison; but by the decree of the gods McKinley himself was no longer with us when the time came to fill President Harrison's place. In fact I think the day we talked about the Court marked my last conference with him. He was always simple in manner and of charming personality. Together we enjoyed a good smoke that afternoon; he was fond of smoking and knew I enjoyed a good cigar, and he was wont to have me take one of his brand. I begged him not to concern himself further with the omission of my appointment at The Hague, that I was satisfied to know he thought me worthy of the selection.

It is possible that Roosevelt knew the circumstance and McKinley's intention, for he was Vice-President at the time it happened. At any rate, when the successor to President Harrison was chosen, I received the following appointment, somewhat different in form from most documents of the kind:

White House

Washington, January 8, 1902

My dear Sir:

Article XX of the Convention for the Pacific Settlement of International Disputes, signed July 29, 1899, by the Plenipotentiaries to the Hague Peace Conference, provides for the organization of a permanent Court of Arbitration, and Article XXIII of the same Convention provides for the selection by each of the signatory Powers of four persons at the most, as members of the Court, who are to be appointed for a term of six years.

It will give me pleasure to designate you as one of the four United States members if you will advise me that such action is agreeable to you.

Very Truly Yours,

Theodore Roosevelt

Honorable Oscar S. Straus
New York, N.Y.

Since then I have been reappointed three times: in 1908, again by Roosevelt, in 1912 and 1920, by Wilson.

In April, 1902, there appeared in the press a dispatch to the effect that an expedition of twelve hundred men was to be sent to the southern Philippines to punish the Mohammedans there for killing one of our soldiers and wounding several others. I immediately wrote the President that I believed such a step would be unwise and would probably bring on a general uprising in that province. I called his attention to the negotiation I had had with the Sultan of Turkey regarding these people, and suggested that instead of the expedition a commission be sent to treat with them. The President asked me to come to Washington to confer with him in the matter, and after the Cabinet meeting I met him in his study. There were present also Mr. Taft, who had been appointed governor of the Philippines, Adjutant-General Corbin, and Mr. Sanger, acting Secretary of War. I presented my arguments more fully. The President had already telegraphed General Chaffee regarding the sending of a diplomatic mission, in accordance with my letter.

The result of our conference was that General Corbin was directed to advise General Chaffee to use the office of the friendly datos to obtain the desired redress. It developed later that the soldier killed was laying a telegraph line, which procedure, not being understood by the Moros, was regarded by them as a device for their destruction. The slayers were surrendered and punished and the incident was satisfactorily adjusted.

At about this time disturbances in Roumania were being reflected in our country. Eleven years before, a committee of prominent Jews had brought before President Harrison the pitiable condition of the large number of Jews arriving in New York from Russia, and it was now necessary to take similar steps with regard to the Jews from Roumania.

In Chapter IV I mentioned that Roumania disregarded the provisions of the Treaty of Berlin and placed restrictions upon her Jewish subjects. Into that treaty, by which Roumania was made an independent kingdom following the Russo-Turkish War, Article XLIV was inserted specially for the protection of the Jews, of whom there were about four hundred thousand in the new state. It provided that difference of religion should not be ground for exclusion in the participation of civil, political, or economic rights. In spite of this, however, the Jews in Roumania were being oppressed and discriminated against on the specious claim that they were foreigners, though they and their ancestors had been living in the land for generations. They were compelled to serve in the army, but not permitted to become officers; they were made subject to exceptional taxes; they were excluded from the professions and from owning and cultivating land. In every direction they were being throttled, and new laws were being promulgated to shut off every avenue of self-support.

The result was what had doubtless been the intention in putting into force these drastic measures: the Jews who could emigrated, and they left Roumania en masse. The obstacles in the way of their gaining admission into the countries of Western Europe were so great that few of them could settle there. The leading Jewish organizations of Great Britain and France, namely, the Jewish Colonization Association in London and the Alliance IsraÉlite Universelle in Paris, laid the matter before their respective governments, but, on account of the disturbed conditions in the Balkans and the cross-currents of European politics, no pressure could be exerted through these governments.

The main stream of the Roumanian exodus was thus directed to America, and they arrived here in increasing numbers. The leading Jewish agencies of the country, particularly the B'nai B'rith Order under the presidency of Leo N. Levi, used their best efforts to distribute the immigrants over the country and to places where they were most likely to find employment. Later our very able commissioner of immigration at Ellis Island, Robert Watchorn, went over to Roumania for the special purpose of studying the situation and made a graphic report of what he learned. But to alleviate the situation action of a more official character was needed.

Jacob H. Schiff and I prepared a careful brief on conditions and presented it to President Roosevelt. The President said he was willing to take the matter in hand provided something could be done by our Government. Congressman Lucius N. Littauer also extended helpful coÖperation. He had recently returned from Roumania and had first-hand knowledge of the question, which he took up in conferences with the President and with Secretary Hay.

Finally, in September, 1902, the President directed Secretary Hay to prepare his now famous Roumanian Note to the Powers signatory to the Treaty of Berlin. The note was sent to our diplomatic representatives in those countries with instructions to present it to the governments to which they were accredited. The occasion for sending it was found in connection with negotiations initiated by Roumania for the concluding of a naturalization treaty with our country. The note gave the reasons why, under the circumstances, we were unwilling to conclude such a treaty. After referring to the Treaty of Berlin and the obligations assumed by Roumania under it regarding the treatment of subject nationalities, the Secretary said:

The United States offers asylum to the oppressed of all lands. But its sympathy with them in no wise impairs its just liberty and right to weigh the acts of the oppressor in the light of their effects upon this country, and to judge accordingly.

Putting together the facts, now painfully brought home to this Government, during the past few years, that many of the inhabitants of Roumania are being forced by artificially adverse discriminations to quit their native country; that the hospitable asylum offered by this country is almost the only refuge left to them; that they come hither unfitted by the conditions of their exile to take part in the new life of this land under circumstances either profitable to themselves or beneficial to the community, and that they are objects of charity from the outset and for a long time—the right of remonstrance against the acts of the Roumanian Government is clearly established in favor of this Government. Whether consciously and of purpose or not, these helpless people, burdened and spurned by their native land, are forced by the sovereign power of Roumania upon the charity of the United States. This Government can not be a tacit party to such an international wrong. It is constrained to protest against the treatment to which the Jews of Roumania are subjected, not alone because it has unimpeachable ground to remonstrate against the resultant injury to itself, but in the name of humanity. The United States may not authoritatively appeal to the stipulations of the treaty of Berlin, to which it was not and can not become a signatory, but it does earnestly appeal to the principles consigned therein, because they are the principles of international law and eternal justice, advocating the broad toleration which that solemn compact enjoins and standing ready to lend its moral support to the fulfillment thereof by its cosignatories, for the act of Roumania itself has effectively joined the United States to them as an interested party in this regard.

One of the most valuable by-products of the Congress of Berlin was to bring into closer relations the autocratic with the liberal governments of Europe and cause the former to become more amenable to the enlightened conscience of the world. Hay's dispatch, while not pleasing to the Government of Roumania, yet, because of the world-wide publicity it received, had a measure of influence in modifying Roumania's indefensible proscriptions.

Another need for humanitarian diplomacy arose the following year. The attitude and proscriptions of the Roumanian authorities had doubtless encouraged anti-Semitic activity in Russia, and the latter Government, no longer contenting itself with the application of restrictions in the book of laws which compelled Jews to live in the Pale settlements, officially encouraged mobs to massacre and loot, culminating on April 19-20, 1903, with the outbreak in Kishineff, where forty-seven Jews were killed, ninety-two severely wounded, and some five hundred more slightly injured. In addition great material losses were inflicted: seven hundred houses were destroyed, six hundred stores pillaged, and thousands of families utterly ruined.

When these facts became known, they called forth an expression of indignation throughout the civilized world. In New York a mass meeting was called at Carnegie Hall by hundreds of the foremost New York Christians, in protest against the outrages upon the Jews in Russia and particularly against the Kishineff affair. The meeting was presided over by Paul D. Cravath, eminent lawyer, and the speakers were ex-President Cleveland, Mayor Seth Low, Jacob G. Schurman, president of Cornell, and Edward M. Shepard, well known for his unselfish devotion to the interests of the public. I have in my possession the manuscript of Cleveland's address on this occasion, which concludes:

In the meantime, let the people of the United States, gathered together in such assemblages as this in every part of the land, fearlessly speak to the civilized world—protesting against every pretence of civilization that permits mediÆval persecution, against every bigoted creed that forbids religious toleration and freedom of conscience, against all false enlightenment that excuses hatred and cruelty towards any race of men, and against all spurious forms of government protection, that withhold from any human being the right to live in safety, and toil in peace.

I will also quote part of the resolutions adopted that evening:

Resolved, that the people of the United States should exercise such influence with the Government of Russia as the ancient and unbroken friendship between the two nations may justify to stay the spirit of persecution, to redress the injuries inflicted upon the Jews of Kishineff, and to prevent the recurrence of outbreaks such as have amazed the civilized world.

A few weeks later a committee from the B'nai B'rith Order, consisting of Simon Wolf, Adolf Moses, Julius Bien, Jacob Furth, Solomon Sulzberger, and Joseph D. Coons, and headed by their president, Leo N. Levi, called upon Secretary Hay and presented to him a statement regarding the massacres in Russia together with a proposed petition which they wished forwarded to the Government of the Czar. The Secretary expressed great sympathy and the desire to do what might be possible in the matter. His reply to the committee, taken down in shorthand at the time, was published in full in the press, and from it I quote the concluding sentence:

All we know of the state of things in Russia tends to justify the hope that even out of the present terrible situation some good results may come; that He who watches over Israel does not slumber, and that the wrath of man now, as so often in the past, shall be made to praise Him.

The Secretary then accompanied the committee to the White House, where they met the President and presented to him an outline of the oppression of their co-religionists in Russia.

Early in July I received a telegram from the President's secretary to the effect that the President would like to have me lunch with him the day following at Oyster Bay, and that Simon Wolf of Washington, and Leo N. Levi also had been invited. When I arrived at Sagamore Hill there were present besides those named Dr. Albert Shaw of the "Review of Reviews," and an English friend of his, Mr. Morris Sheldon Amos.

We discussed the Russian situation throughout lunch. The President suggested that a note be sent by the Secretary of State to John W. Riddle, our chargÉ at St. Petersburg, and that this note should embody the entire petition which Mr. Levi and his committee had drafted. Dr. Shaw observed that the embodying of the petition to the Czar and giving publicity to the note would have all the effects of a presentation even if the Czar should refuse to receive it, which was exactly what the President had in mind.

After luncheon we adjourned to the study, and Roosevelt said: "Now let's finish this thing up." Hay had been to see him the day before and had left a memorandum. Roosevelt at once drafted the note with his own pen, using part of Hay's memorandum. The note was to be sent as an open cable. It read as follows:

Riddle

St. Petersburg

You are instructed to ask an audience of the Minister of Foreign Affairs and to make to him the following communication:

Excellency: The Secretary of State instructs me to inform you that the President has received from a large number of prominent citizens of the United States of all religious affiliations, and occupying the highest positions in both public and private life, a respectful petition addressed to his Majesty the Emperor relating to the condition of the Jews in Russia and running as follows:

[Here is set out the petition.]

I am instructed to ask whether the petition will be received by your Excellency to be submitted to the gracious consideration of his Majesty. In that case the petition will be at once forwarded to St. Petersburg.

Roosevelt wanted the cable to be sent at once and was in a hurry to get it to Washington. One of his reasons was that the late Russian ambassador, Cassini, had been dismissed and was on his way back to Russia, and he wanted the note to reach the Russian Government before Cassini arrived in St. Petersburg. Mr. Wolf, who lived in Washington, was to take the drafted cable to Secretary Hay; but as he could not return that night the President asked whether I could take it so that it might be dispatched next morning. By ten o'clock the following morning I placed the draft in the Secretary's hands and it was immediately put on the wire.

In planning the cable as he did, the President was right in his anticipation. Duly the American chargÉ at St. Petersburg informed the State Department that the Russian Government, through its Minister of Foreign Affairs, had declined to receive or consider the petition. Nevertheless, its purpose was accomplished. Official Russia was made to realize the aroused indignation and the public protests of the civilized world. This in turn had a decided influence in checking, for the time being at least, similar outbreaks threatened throughout the empire, besides bringing to trial and punishment some of the leaders of the massacres.

That afternoon at Sagamore Hill, after the Russian matter had been disposed of, the President was talking to Dr. Shaw and me about the Alaskan boundary question. He pulled out a map showing the disputed boundary, and explained that three commissioners from the United States and three from Great Britain and Canada would take up the dispute for investigation. He argued that they were not arbiters and he refused to sign an arbitral agreement; if they did not agree, he would take the matter into his own hands; that the whole trouble arose from the fact that the Canadians had shoved down the boundary line after the discovery of gold. "Suppose a man pitches a tent on my grounds and claims them, and I want him to get off; and he says he won't get off, but will arbitrate the matter!" Roosevelt exclaimed. Then, turning to me, he added: "Straus, you are a member of the Hague Tribunal; don't you think I'm right?"

I calmly replied that as a member of the Hague Tribunal I should first have to hear what the other side had to say and therefore must reserve my judgment. And we all had a good laugh.

During the Venezuela controversy in 1902, Venezuela on the one side and Great Britain and Germany on the other, Roosevelt was very much incensed that Germany, with the feeble backing of England, should undertake a blockade against Venezuela to make the latter carry out certain agreements, and he promptly took steps to prevent it. Thereupon there was a disposition on the part of Germany to ask Roosevelt to arbitrate. Secretary Hay, it seems, favored such a course, but I strongly advised against it.

At a luncheon to which I was invited by the President early in November, 1903, the conditions in Panama came up as the principal topic of conversation. There were present on this occasion, besides Mr. and Mrs. Roosevelt, Cornelius N. Bliss, former Secretary of the Interior; John Clark Davis, of the "Philadelphia Ledger"; H. H. Kohlsaat, of Chicago; Lawrence F. Abbott, of "The Outlook"; and the President's brother-in-law, Lieutenant-Commander Cowles, of the Navy. News had been received that Panama had separated from Colombia and we were about to recognize Panama. In his informal way, as was his custom at luncheons, the President began to discuss the situation, referring to the fact that our treaty of 1846 was with New Granada, which afterwards became the United States of Colombia and then the Republic of Colombia, and that in that treaty we had guaranteed to protect the transit route. One of the questions raised was whether the treaty still held us to that obligation, notwithstanding these several changes of sovereignty.

The President was directing his remarks toward me, which was his way of signifying the particular person from whom he wanted to draw comment. I answered that it seemed to me, as I recollected the terms of the treaty, which I had recently read, that the change of sovereignty did not affect either our obligations or our rights; that I regarded them in the nature of a "covenant running with the land."

"That's fine! Just the idea!" Roosevelt replied, and as soon as luncheon was over, he requested me to express that idea to Hay. He scratched a few lines on a correspondence card asking Secretary Hay to go over with me the suggestion I had made and to work into the treaty the "covenant running with the land" idea.

That evening I called on the Secretary. He seized the idea at once and said he would make use of it in a statement he was just preparing for the press detailing the whole situation. The following day there was reported in the papers of the country the fact that the President, following a meeting of the Cabinet, had decided to recognize the de facto government of Panama; and then the detailed statement by Secretary Hay regarding the terms of the treaty, the history of the negotiations, and the subsequent development, covered several newspaper columns. It contained this paragraph:

It must not be lost sight of that this treaty is not dependent for its efficacy on the personnel of the signers or the name of the territory it affects. It is a covenant, as lawyers say, that runs with the land. The name of New Granada has passed away; its territory has been divided. But as long as the isthmus endures, the great geographical fact keeps alive the solemn compact which binds the holders of the territory to grant us freedom of transit, and binds us in return to safeguard for the isthmus and the world the exercise of that inestimable privilege.

A few days thereafter I received a short note from the President reading: "Your 'covenant running with the land' idea worked admirably. I congratulate you on it." And from my friend John Bassett Moore I received an amusing letter:

So you had a finger in the pie! I find a good deal of amusement in reflecting on the end reached from the premise of my memorandum; and almost as much on the conclusion reached from your suggestion. Perhaps, however, it is only a question of words—that is to say, it is, indifferently, a question of the "covenant running with the land" or a question of the "covenant running (away!) with the land"!!

Those luncheons at the White House were always pleasant and interesting occasions. One met there all kinds of people, of every station in life, but always people who stood for something and who interested the President. At the table Roosevelt would speak without apparent reserve and free from all official restraint, and I doubt whether these confidences were ever abused. By this means, too, he received the frank, unreserved statements and criticisms of his guests.

As an illustration of the range of personalities one would meet at the Roosevelt luncheons, I remember one day when Seth Bullock, a former sheriff of the Black Hills district and an intimate friend of Roosevelt during his cowboy days, sat next to Seth Low at the table. And in his "Autobiography" Roosevelt himself says:

No guests were ever more welcome at the White House than these old friends of the cattle ranches and the cow camps—the men with whom I had ridden the long circle and eaten at the tail-board of a chuck-wagon—whenever they turned up at Washington during my Presidency. I remember one of them who appeared at Washington one day just before lunch, a huge, powerful man who, when I knew him, had been distinctly a fighting character. It happened that on that day another old friend, the British Ambassador, Mr. Bryce, was among those coming to lunch. Just before we went in I turned to my cow-puncher friend and said to him with great solemnity, "Remember, Jim, that if you shot at the feet of the British Ambassador to make him dance, it would be likely to cause international complications"; to which Jim responded, with unaffected horror, "Why, Colonel, I shouldn't think of it, I shouldn't think of it!"

Mrs. Roosevelt is a most charming and cultured woman, typically the wife and mother. Literary and intellectual matters appeal to her, though her dominant note is the domestic one. I am sure she would have been just as happy as the mistress of a private household as the leading lady of the land in the White House, despite her great tact, sweetness, and simple dignity in filling the latter position.

The President was an omnivorous reader. He could read faster and remember better than any one I have ever known. On one occasion he recommended to me Ferrero's "Greatness and Decline of Rome," which he had just finished in the original Italian, and which had been brought out in English by the Putnam house. Subsequently, too, I met this author at the White House, where he and his wife were the guests of the President for several days.In January, 1904, a large conference was held in Washington of representatives of the various peace societies and other persons prominently interested in the calling of an international peace congress. George F. Seward, of New York, was chairman, and others connected with it were the Reverend Edward Everett Hale and Robert Treat Paine, of Boston; Henry St. George Tucker, of Virginia, Andrew Carnegie, and myself. Resolutions were adopted recommending the negotiation of a treaty with Great Britain whereby all differences between us which might fail of adjustment through diplomatic channels were to be submitted for arbitration to the Permanent Court at The Hague. It was further recommended that we enter into like treaties with other powers as soon as practicable. We called on the President and the resolutions were presented by Mr. Tucker; Mr. Carnegie and I each made a few remarks, which the President in turn answered with a brief address. When he had finished and we were all standing around him, Mr. Carnegie said to him, "I have just been congratulating Mr. Straus on the compliments you paid him, and suggested that he get a copy of that portion of your remarks to preserve for his children and grandchildren." Roosevelt immediately turned to Mr. Loeb, his secretary, and instructed him to send to me that portion of his remarks, adding: "And I meant every word I said." I trust I may be pardoned for the egotism which prompts me to incorporate it in these memoirs:

I have had from Mr. Straus aid that I can not over-estimate, for which I can not too much express my gratitude, in so much of the diplomatic work that has arisen in this administration—aid by suggestion, aid by actual work in helping me to carry out the suggestions; and Mr. Straus was one of the two or three men who first set my mind, after I came in as President, in the direction of doing everything that could be done for the Hague Tribunal, as that seemed to be the best way to turn for arbitration.

At another pleasant luncheon there was present Alice, now the wife of Congressman Longworth, of Ohio, Roosevelt's daughter by his first wife. In the course of our discussion about the reciprocity treaty with Cuba and the making of more favorable tariff arrangements, I said: "We went to war with Spain for the liberation of Cuba, and now if we treat her step-motherly and starve her to death, what would the world say?" There was hearty laughter all round the table, and Miss Alice turned to me and said, in her naÏve way and with a mischievous sparkle in her eyes: "Do I look starved?" The President had fairly exploded with laughter, and when I remarked that I had "put my foot into it," he added, amid another outburst, "Yes, both of them!"

The President did not smoke, but always served cigars and cigarettes to his guests. When I did not take one, he said, "Straus, you smoke."

"Yes," I answered, "but I certainly want to pay as much respect to you as I always did to the Sultan of Turkey. He did not drink, and I never took any when it was served."

"You go right ahead and smoke. If Root were here he would smoke and always does," replied Roosevelt.

After lunch that day, when the other guests had gone, he and I went into an adjoining room and had a general discussion—labor matters, the National Civic Federation, the Republican Party, etc., etc. He said he had received a number of requests to put into the Republican platform a plank protesting against the discrimination made by Russia against Americans of the Jewish faith. "You know," he said, "I am prepared to do anything that I can for all of our citizens regardless of race or creed, but unless we mean to do something further than simply protest it would look like an effort to catch votes, for such statements in the platform could not be regarded for any other purpose." He added he had in mind a different and more effective way of handling the subject when the time came. He said he remembered that I had never asked him to take action in this or any other question that was not justified on broad American principles, but that if anything arose which specially reflected upon the Jews he looked to me to bring it to his attention, and I was to regard that just as much my duty as the protection of American Christian interests in Turkey.

We spoke about the Russo-Japanese War, and I told him that some one had said that the Japs were yellow-skinned, but the Russians were yellow all the way through. This called forth a hearty laugh. Humor of any kind, provided it was clean, he always appreciated, and his own sense of it continually served, as it did for Lincoln, to lighten the seriousness of his duties.

Like Lincoln, too, Roosevelt combined with that balancing sense of humor an innate and always active sense of justice. Time and again in my relationship with him I have observed and admired it. I recall in this regard the case of an employee named Miller in the Government Printing Office, who was discharged because he did not belong to the union, and Roosevelt reinstated him. Mr. Gompers and several members of the Executive Committee of the American Federation of Labor thereupon called upon the President to protest against this reinstatement. They said his discharge was based on two points: that he was a non-union man, and also that he was an incapable worker. Roosevelt's answer was: "The question of his personal fitness is one to be settled in the routine of administrative detail, and cannot be allowed to conflict with or to complicate the larger question of governmental discrimination for or against him or any other man because he is or is not a member of a union. This is the only question now before me for decision; and as to this my decision is final."

As I was in constant touch with the President by correspondence and conferences, I wrote him telling of my gratification to find in his decision anent the Miller case such consonance in principle with his position regarding the anthracite coal strike, to which I received the following reply that brings out the point I have just made about his sense of justice:

White House, Washington
October 1, 1903

My dear Mr. Straus:

I thank you heartily for your letter. When you can get on here I should like to tell you for your own information some of my experiences in connection with this Miller case. I feel exactly as you do—that my action was a complement to my action, for instance, in the anthracite coal strike, and that I could no more hesitate in the teeth of opposition from the labor unions in one case, than I could when the opposition came from the big monied men in the other case.

Sincerely yours

Theodore Roosevelt

Perhaps no President has had a policy, with regard to labor, so wise and far-seeing as that of Roosevelt. Invariably he sought the counsel of labor leaders in matters affecting their interests, and always they were made to feel that redress for their just grievances, and their rights generally, were as much a concern of his and of his administration as any rights of the rich. In this connection I recall a remark of P. H. Morrissey, then head of the railroad train-men. We were seated in the Red Room of the White House for conference after dinner. There were present some thirty or more men prominently identified with labor, whom the President had invited to discuss labor legislation. Morrissey recalled one time several years before when he sat in front of the great fireplace in the Red Room waiting for the President; and he said he could not help reflecting what a long way it was from the cab of the locomotive engine to this stately room in the official residence of the President of the United States, an honor and a privilege that Roosevelt was the first President to give to men of labor.

On the same evening I saw in clear relief Roosevelt's wonderful tact, judgment, and understanding of men as I had never seen it displayed before. One or two of the labor leaders showed some bitterness in their criticism of certain legislation. Roosevelt showed frank approval of just complaints and allayed irritation in a most tactful way where the demand was unjust or unreasonable.

In the election of 1904 I took an active part and kept in close touch with Roosevelt. An unusual amount of bitterness characterized this campaign, though it was foreseen that Roosevelt would win by a large majority. In this connection I received a characteristic letter from him, dated at the White House October 15th:

I notice that various Democratic papers, including the Evening Post, have endeavored to show that I have appealed to the Jew vote, the Catholic vote, etc. Now the fact is that I have not appealed to any man as Jew, as Protestant, or as Catholic, but that I have as strongly as in me lies endeavored to make it evident that each is to have a square deal, no more and no less, without regard to his creed. I hope that this country will continue in substantially its present form of government for many centuries. If this is so it is reasonable to suppose that during that time there will be Presidents of Jewish faith, Presidents of Catholic faith. Now, my aim as President is to behave toward the Jew and the Catholic just as I should wish a Jewish or Catholic President to behave towards Protestants—in other words, to behave as a good American should behave toward all his fellow Americans, without regard to the several creeds they profess or the several lands from which their ancestors have sprung. Moreover, I am pleased at what Lebowich says at my not having a spirit of condescension or patronizing. I have enough of the old Adam in me to object almost as strongly to being patronized as to being wronged; and I do not intend knowingly to behave toward others in a manner which I should resent if it were adopted toward me.

These sentences bring to mind another and public statement of Roosevelt's in which he characterized Americanism; the occasion was an address at the unveiling of the Sheridan equestrian statue in Washington:

We should keep steadily before our minds the fact that Americanism is a question of principle, of purpose, of idealism, of character; that it is not a matter of birthplace, or creed, or line of descent.

Here in this country the representatives of many old-world races are being fused together into a new type, a type the main features of which are already determined, and were determined at the time of the Revolutionary War; for the crucible in which all the new types are melted into one was shaped from 1776 to 1789, and our nationality was definitely fixed in all its essentials by the men of Washington's day.

Soon after the election he invited me to come to the White House for dinner one evening and to spend the night; there were a number of things he wanted to talk over with me. When I arrived I found Dr. Lyman Abbott and his son Ernest had been similarly invited, and there were additional guests for dinner: Attorney-General Moody, Senator Knox, Secretary of War Taft, and James R. Garfield, chief of the Bureau of Corporations in the Department of Commerce and Labor.

At dinner the President announced that we had come together to do some business, and he produced from his pocket a slip of paper on which were noted the several subjects he wished to consider with us, mainly things to be incorporated in his forthcoming Message to Congress. First there was the negro question. The South had vilified him because he entertained Booker Washington and appointed Crum Collector of the Port at Charleston. When Congress assembled, one of the things he intended doing was to send in again the name of Crum for confirmation. "The Southerners either do not or do not wish to understand it," he said; adding that his position plainly was that he would do everything in his power for the white man South without, however, doing a wrong or an injustice to the colored man. He was sympathetic with the South, for he was half Southerner himself, his mother having come from Roswell, Georgia. His remarks on this topic were directed mainly to Dr. Abbott.

The conversation then turned to the recent election and became very general, every one joining and relating instances or experiences in connection with it. Mr. Taft, who had waged a vigorous campaign for the Administration, told a joke on himself: he had received a letter from Wayne MacVeagh saying that so far as he (MacVeagh) could see, Taft's speeches did not do any harm.

When the talk had gone along these general lines for a while, Roosevelt interjected with "Now we must get back to business," and proceeded to discuss the diplomatic service in relation to his Message. He thought civil service too strictly applied would be detrimental, as we had a great deal of old timber there that should be gotten rid of.Next he took up a discussion of Panama. Mr. Taft with several others was to leave next day on a mission there to look into the difficulties between the native army and the President of Panama, and some one humorously suggested that he had better go down and take away the weapons from the army and let them muster as much as they wanted to without weapons.

After dinner we adjourned to the President's study on the floor above. He sat down at his desk and pulled open a drawer as he said: "I want to read to you incomplete drafts of portions of my Message which I should like to have you criticize, as on some of the subjects I have not yet fully made up my mind." The Message was in separate parts, each dealing with an important subject. He took up the part dealing with our foreign relations, in regard to Russia and Roumania, and addressed me, saying he would like me to pay special attention to that as he had consulted me all along concerning the action to be taken. He said our Government had been criticized as interfering with the internal affairs of other nations, and the statement had been repeatedly made that we should not like it if other nations took us to task for our negro lynchings in the South; but he argued that the lynchings were comparatively few, and, though bad enough, were nothing compared to the wholesale murder in cold blood under official sanction and perhaps instigation, as in Kishineff. "My answer to all these criticisms is this," he said; "only a short time ago I received a remonstrance or petition from a society in Great Britain regarding the lynchings in this country. I did not reject it; on the contrary, I answered it most politely and expressed my great regret for these unlawful, unjustifiable acts, with which neither I nor the Government had any sympathy. On the contrary the Government does everything in its power to prevent these outrages and unlawful acts. And I authorize any one to make use of this information whenever the occasion presents itself."

To the labor question also he wanted me to pay special attention because of my experience with such matters and in the arbitration of labor disputes. He began with the statement that he was in favor of organized capital and organized labor. I asked him whether right at that point I might make a suggestion, which was that he begin with the general subject of capital and labor, because organized labor did not comprise more than fifteen per cent of the wage-earners of the country. This suggestion he accepted.

Roosevelt then expressed himself in favor of the eight-hour law. Messrs. Moody, Knox, Taft, and myself did not agree with his statement in the form he had it. We explained that there were several bills before Congress on the subject, some of which had passed the lower house, but were defeated in the Senate; that it was all right for the Government in its own yards to adopt an eight-hour day, but when it gave out contracts to other shops, while it had a right to say that the work upon that contract should be done by eight-hour days, it had no right to require work on other contracts to be done in eight-hour days. When we had discussed the subject quite thoroughly, it was agreed to omit it from the Message.

Next he took up the trust question. He said Mr. Garfield had several suggestions to offer for making the interstate commerce law effective. It was generally agreed that the law as originally passed fully provided the remedy that was intended, but it had been emasculated by the decisions of the Supreme Court. Messrs. Knox, Taft, and Moody referred to several of these decisions and pointed out that the railroads, under subterfuge of switches and free cars—cars that were furnished by such shippers as the beef trust—got completely around the law. They allowed a mileage charge for the supply of these cars in excess of what should be allowed, and under such cover it amounted to a rebate to those shippers and was a complete circumvention of the law. Garfield's suggestion was that the interstate commerce corporations be compelled to obtain a license or charter from the National Government to do business. We thoroughly discussed this, but it was disapproved as being an interference with the legal rights of States, and that therefore no such law could be passed by Congress. The President then turned to the legal members of our group and said, "Now here is a great wrong and you lawyers have always got a way of preventing us from reaching a remedy."

Knox created a laugh by replying, "The President wants us as usual to jump over the Supreme Court."

The work on the Message done, Roosevelt said it was his intention to go South and make a few speeches. He would begin at San Antonio and would visit Tuskegee and Sewanee Colleges, for he wanted his views in regard to the South and the negro question fully understood. He read us a draft along the lines of thought he wanted to present, quoting much from Lincoln, which seemed highly to the point. When some one mentioned the curtailing of suffrage so as to have it based upon educational qualifications and property ownership, the President said it would not be wise to agitate that subject, and that herein Booker Washington agreed with him; but, he added, "There is something inherently wrong about a Southern member representing in some instances only a quarter of the number of votes that an Eastern member represents, and having an equal vote with him in Congress."

It was half after midnight when our little company separated. The President then suggested to Dr. Abbott and me that we meet at 8.15 breakfast, if we did not object to having this meal with him and the children. In the absence of Mrs. Roosevelt, who had gone to New York, the President next morning took the head of the table, and with the coffee urn before him served us each with our coffee, cream, and sugar. There were Teddy, Ethel, Kermit, Archie, and Quentin, the governess, the tutor, besides Dr. Abbott, his son, and myself. After the meal we strolled in the park back of the White House until 9.30, when the President left for his work-room in the new office building west of the White House.

I did not see Roosevelt again for several months. One day in May I took lunch with him upon his return from Chicago where he had had a conference with the representatives of the labor unions who were carrying on the teamster's strike that paralyzed the commerce of the city. He said he had received through his secretary my memorandum regarding an adjustment of the trouble, and that it was of great assistance to him in discussing the situation and coming to some equitable arrangement. He was preparing a Message for an extra session of Congress in October, and said he would send me parts of it, especially those referring to immigration and the Far East, for my advice and suggestion.

In 1905, when Roosevelt was busy with negotiations to bring peace between Russia and Japan, I received a letter from him stating that he had endeavored to get these two nations to go to The Hague, but Russia was most reluctant and Japan positively refused; nor would they go to either Paris or Chefoo, but they were both willing to come to Washington. In his own "Autobiography," which I never tire of reading, Roosevelt gives an interesting sketch of his mediation between these two countries which finally brought about the conference and treaty at Portsmouth, New Hampshire.

Count Sergius Witte, head of the Russian mission to Portsmouth, was desirous of meeting some of the representative Jews of our country with a view to seeking what might practicably be done to improve the condition of the Jews in the Russian Empire. While it was said that his wife was a Jewess, his interest in the Jewish question was perhaps primarily to improve the relations between Russia and the United States. The Russian massacres, with the resultant enforced emigration, the public meetings of protest in this country and the press comments, had seriously prejudiced public opinion here against Russia.

The Count therefore invited a committee to confer with him and Baron Rosen at Portsmouth. There were Jacob H. Schiff, Isaac N. Seligman, Adolph Kraus, Adolf Lewisohn, and myself. The Count admitted with much frankness the condition of the Jewish population of Russia, and that it was an injustice. He expressed his purpose to exert his best influence to remedy the just grievances of the oppressed Jews. We assured him that we asked for no special privileges for our co-religionists, but the same, and no greater, rights for them than were accorded other Russian subjects; that the granting of such rights would relieve Russia of the Jewish question and of the international ill-will to which this question naturally and rightly gave rise. Both the Count and Baron Rosen agreed with us, but argued that it was not practicable to grant such complete emancipation, but that it should come about gradually. We told them, of course, that with that premise we could not and would not agree.

The Count was very much impressed with our presentation of the subject, and our statements were corroborated by his own observations later when he made a visit to the lower East Side of New York where he spoke with a number of the Russian-Jewish immigrants. He said that upon his return to Russia he would at once take up the problem with a view ultimately to secure equal rights for the Jewish subjects, that he realized the necessity for this not only from a humanitarian standpoint, but from the standpoint of Russia's best interests and of her relations with the leading nations of the world, particularly with the United States.

Before going to Portsmouth on Count Witte's invitation, I conferred with Roosevelt. He wanted me in an unofficial capacity to observe carefully the progress of the negotiations and keep him advised. Just at that time it looked as if the conference might break up, and before that stage was actually reached he wanted to be notified, for he would probably have a communication to make to the commissioners. On arriving at Portsmouth I had a confidential talk with Fedor Fedorovich Martens, the great Russian international jurist, who was one of my fellow members at the Hague Tribunal, and with whom I had been in personal touch on several previous occasions. He was legal adviser to the Russian delegation. I apprised him of what I knew to be the desire of the President, and he agreed that if a break became imminent, a communication such as the President would send would be likely to have the right influence, and he would see to it that, should the necessity arise for such a message, Roosevelt should be promptly informed. I advised the President of my understanding with Martens, but fortunately no rupture occurred and the terms of peace were agreed upon.

In his "Autobiography" Roosevelt says, with regard to these Portsmouth negotiations: "I had certainly tried my best to be the friend not only of the Japanese people but of the Russian people, and I believe that what I did was for the best interests of both and of the world at large." He refers with characteristic generosity to the help given him at St. Petersburg by our ambassador, George von Lengerke Meyer, who "rendered literally invaluable aid by insisting upon himself seeing the Czar at critical periods of the transaction, when it was no longer possible for me to act successfully through the representatives of the Czar, who were often at cross-purposes with one another."

And when the Portsmouth Conference was over, the President further took a deep interest in bringing about amelioration of the condition of the Jews in Russia. When Count Witte came to New York, Roosevelt wrote him the following letter, of which he sent me a copy:

Oyster Bay, N.Y.
September 10, 1905

My dear Mr. Witte:

... In furtherance of our conversation of last evening I beg you to consider the question of granting passports to reputable American citizens of Jewish faith. I feel that if this could be done it would remove the last cause of irritation between the two nations whose historic friendship for one another I wish to do my best to maintain. You could always refuse to give a passport to any American citizen, Jew or Gentile, unless you were thoroughly satisfied that no detriment would come to Russia in granting it. But if your Government could only see its way clear to allowing reputable American citizens of Jewish faith, as to whose intentions they are satisfied, to come to Russia, just as you do reputable American Christians, I feel it would be from every standpoint most fortunate.

Again assuring you of my high regard, and renewing my congratulations to you and to your country upon the peace that has been obtained, believe me,

Sincerely yours

Theodore Roosevelt

Early in 1906, when the Algeciras Conference regarding Morocco was in session, and the press reported that it was likely to break up without an agreement on account of Germany's attitude, Carl Schurz, knowing of my close relationship with Roosevelt, wrote to me that the President could probably prevail upon the Powers concerned to refer the question to the Hague Tribunal. This letter I forwarded to Roosevelt; but although he was ever ready to vitalize the machinery of the Hague Tribunal, advice coming from Mr. Schurz at this time was not regarded with favor, possibly because of their previous differences. In his reply to me, however, the President showed what a clear and prophetic insight he had into Germany's attitude and purposes:

Modern Germany is alert, aggressive, military and industrial. It thinks it is a match for England and France combined in war, and would probably be less reluctant to fight both those powers together than they would be together to fight it. It despises the Hague Conference and the whole Hague idea. It respects the United States only in so far as it believes that our navy is efficient and that if sufficiently wronged or insulted we would fight. Now I like and respect Germany, but I am not blind to the fact that Germany does not reciprocate the feeling. I want us to do everything we can to stay on good terms with Germany, but I would be a fool if I were blind to the fact that Germany will not stay in with us if we betray weakness. As for this particular case, when I see you next I shall tell you all that I have done and you will see that I have been using my very best efforts for peace.

In all my relations with Roosevelt, even before I became a member of his Cabinet, I was more and more convinced that no consideration of political self-interest or partisan advantage ever entered his mind in determining his attitude or action in upholding the right or dethroning a wrong. He resented nothing more than when some politician or inconsiderate person made an appeal to him for action on the plea that it would be good politics. He was visioned, but not visionary; and withal highly practical, in that he understood the workings and tendencies of human forces. Just as he would read a book by absorbing a page at a glance, so he would instinctively appraise his fellow men; their qualities would impress him just as a brilliant paragraph in a book would arrest his instant attention.

Roosevelt would not make an idle gesture or even imply a threat which he did not purpose to carry into action. He was more abused by those whom he designated as "the interests," and better understood and trusted by the masses, than any President in our history with the exception of Lincoln. So it is always with real leaders, who seek to guide rather than pander to public opinion. The latter course appeals to weak though well-intentioned public men; the former requires not only clear vision but high courage, and these qualities Roosevelt possessed to an extraordinary degree.