The cable agency gave Europe the news of Roosevelt's succession in these terms, when told by the Secretary of War he should take the oath of office:

"Mr. Roosevelt, coming closer to Mr. Root, said, in a voice that at first wavered but finally came deep and strong, while he held firm the lapel of his coat with his right hand, ‘I shall take the oath at once in accordance with your request, and in this hour of deep and national bereavement, I wish to state that it shall be my aim to continue absolutely unbroken the policy of Mr. McKinley, for the peace, prosperity and honor of our beloved country.'"

The English account of the Washington funeral of McKinley, gives the following as to the presence of the new President:

"Mr. Roosevelt's demeanor was scrupulously retiring. He kept close to his car, except when paying sympathetic respects to Mrs. McKinley, and he saw few people, and these only his intimates. He seemed to be deeply reflecting. Never before did a President move up Pennsylvania avenue unacclaimed, with the throng singing in subdued strains the hymn which has marked Mr. McKinley's last progress over hundreds of miles. Mr. Roosevelt followed the hearse to the White House, and stood beside the coffin in the East room.”

There is something vastly more than the mechanical, automatic succession of Mr. Roosevelt to the Presidency. The place is his by inheritance, by the will of the people, by the suitableness that was perfectly comprehended when he was named for the place that he accepted; and to this, not only his party, but the people at large, have assented heartily.

The most powerful influence for peace that exists in the Philippines, is the knowledge that has reached the Filipinos that President Roosevelt will not tolerate insurrection, or make pets of those shown by the captured documents, that give from true inwardness the proof that they are traitors, to their own. people, the Spaniards and the Americans; and they know a regiment of Rough Riders could ride through disturbed districts, and do all that might be found necessary to restore order.

There are foreshadowings in the public press. The agitation of the people is a part of the business of publicity. When, in the same week of September last, McKinley at Buffalo, and Roosevelt at Minneapolis referred to "reciprocity" in aid of the preservation of the markets that protection provided, there was evidence of the existence of a common current of thoughtfulness moving to momentous ends. Now all the friends of protection are not agreed about the quantity and quality of reciprocity. Disagreement about ways and means is not surprising. Perhaps Roosevelt will not hesitate to proceed on a carefully considered cause, having exhausted the arts of candid diplomacy to agree with the majorities in the two Houses of Congress.

McKinley and Roosevelt seemed in their latest utterances to be in close relations on the reciprocity matter, just as Blaine and McKinley once were.

President Roosevelt is absolutely committed to the reform of the Civil Service, by the extension of the classification of the employed. That he will fight for it if opposed to the edge of resistance, all the acts of his life tell; and here he encounters the Senators who have the appointments to confirm, and the Representatives who need friends to maintain their potency; and those who care to cultivate grief, can find their cause in the revision of tariff schedules, and the refusal of the President to yield to the favoritism of patronage. There is much of interest to be speedily taken into consideration. Fortunately for us, the fashion that the defeat of a Cabinet is the fall of a government in the British sense does not prevail. A complete reorganization of the Cabinet would not cause high temperature or a low barometer, though certainly there are places hard to fill.

There was forecast of stormy weather, because we had a second treaty with England signed by Secretary Hay and the British Ambassador Pauncefote. We have a good many intelligent and excitable citizens not pleased with the colonial system of England, or the accession of King Edward VII. as a royal ruler, which does not mean actual sovereignty beyond seas, over certain great possessions. The idea of another Hay-Pauncefote treaty was abominable to these people, no matter what it was. However, there happened a pressure of public opinion obeyed by the Senate. The ratification was a mere ceremony, and mourners do not crowd the streets.

There is such transparency in the words and acts of President Roosevelt, that the men of news about Washington have not had a difficult task in understanding and imparting his proceedings. A writer who has been studying the President (not by snapping a kodak at him) pronounces him a reformer all through, who not only does not hesitate to put his reforms in practice, but has no thought or fancy of doing anything else; not even an idea that he is doing a courageous thing. He can not help acting on his convictions. That is what is to be depended on, for he fears nothing, and walks straight lines across horizons.

As to the nomination and election of the next President, that is a detail, and must take care of itself. He is not, says the gentleman with the swift pencil, "playing to the next National Republican Convention. He is not giving that a thought. No doubt he desires the nomination; no doubt he will get it; but that nomination would have no value in his eyes if secured by the manipulation of official patronage. Nobody is going to be appointed to office by Roosevelt simply because he can secure a seat in the next National Convention or control somebody who may take a seat therein. Nobody is going to be appointed to office now merely because he was defeated for a State office. Nobody is going to be appointed to office solely because he is recommended

by somebody or other and is a cog in the machine. That halcyon old time is past, and, let us hope, past forever."

And the conclusion of the correspondent is: "Roosevelt will not owe his inevitable nomination and election to office holders, but to his manliness, his arrogant integrity, his superb independence, to his industry in dispatching public business, and the admirable quality of instantaneous decision; to his keen insight of affairs present, and to his foresight as to things to be."

The Philadelphia Press says of the course the President has pursued: "In the South he has unhesitatingly taken the best man he could obtain outside of the Republican party when there was lack inside of the party of a man precisely suited to the post to be filled. In the North, where no such lack existed, he has made selections from within the party. He has consulted with all. He has heard all. He has frankly recognized the claims of party leaders to give party advice. He has refused to antagonize any one or to be controlled by any one. And when all was over he has acted as the President of the United States.

"He has made no appointments to which any party leader could take offense; but he has insisted on taking a broad view of party relations, and he has recognized and acted on the conclusion, that in a great State like New York or a small State like Delaware party responsibility and party claims cannot be narrowed to a single man, confined to a single group, or limited to a single following. All Republicans working for and in the party, possessing its confidence and holding office through its call and choice, must be considered in selections for office; and the manifest justice of this has made it both unwise and inexpedient for any man and any leader publicly to object to this broad, catholic, and impartial policy.

“The army, the navy, and the colonial service of the country, President Roosevelt has recognized as being essentially non-partizan and non-political. The President has sought, as have few Presidents, to cut off from these selections social as well as political influence; and of the two, every man familiar with the army and navy knows that social influence has been, in the army and navy, both more deleterious and more dangerous than political, ten times over. The worst appointments in our military service have had an insidious social influence behind them. In the army, navy, and colonial service President Roosevelt purposes to recognize no claim whatever based on political influence or a social pull."

The first change in the Cabinet after the death of McKinley, was the resignation of the Postmaster General, Charles Emery Smith, to resume the Editorial Chair of the Press. The President accepted Mr. Smith's resignation reluctantly, for the administration of the vast Postoffice Department had been intelligent, prompt and clean.

Circumstances made it necessary for Mr. Smith to return to Philadelphia, as he had for sometime desired to do. The President gave the retiring Postmaster General a farewell dinner, and invited friends to call after dinner. Mr. Smith said at the dinner: "I had not intended to spring any surprise on the public in this matter. The fact is that I have for a long time desired to retire. The considerations which impel me have been all along and are now entirely personal and private. A month ago I told the President it was imperatively necessary that I should be allowed to go and that it was my wish to remain here only so long as my presence seemed an indispensable convenience."

The Baltimore Sun, at the time of Mr. Smith's retirement, prophesied a bitter war between the Senate and the President, and headed its presentation of the theory of war on Pennsylvania avenue, "The President on the Road to Jordan"-a suggestion of "Jordan is a hard road to travel."

The Sun continued:

"President Roosevelt has always been more distinguished for his courage than for his flexibility, and it is just possible that he might attain his ends more surely, or come nearer to them, by pursuing a more conciliatory course.

"The late President McKinley had the advantage to carry, with him to the Executive office long years of experience in Congress. He understood Congress as few of his predecessors in the Presidential office had; and while upon the whole he made many and great concessions of his own views and purposes, it is probable that he exerted more influence over the legislative branch of the Government than any other Executive since Andrew Jackson. Jackson accomplished his purposes in Congress more or less by determination, and McKinley by fine management and concessions. But the Congress, and especially the Senate, with which Jackson had to deal was a different and far less formidable body than that which now confronts Mr. Roosevelt."

There is in this, instructive history, but the Senate is not a consolidated fighting body. The President is a fighting man with no time for finesse; and he does not seek to put in place persons who are rapacious for him. He asks for the best men, and if they are not recommended by the Senators or Members, he appoints the best he can find. There are, in some parts of the country, politicians who have claimed places on account of "color," backed by incapability. The President has been civil to Mr. Booker Washington, the best representative man of color, and consulted him. This master stroke is not fully recognized, but the ultimate effect already perceptible, will aid the President with both races in the South. Senators will not make haste to step barefooted on hot iron in such a case, especially as they know the President will fight all his battles to a finish, and there is no possibility of intimidation.

The managing editor of the most important international paper in the world-the Times of London-was in the United States last summer, and wrote a powerful communication about the Senate of the United States in respect to treaties, plainly intimating that there were Senatorial influences relentlessly and irrationally opposed to the ratification of any treaty with England. He gave a terse statement of the constitutional power of the Senate, as follows:

"The Constitution of the United States places in the hands of the President the conduct of foreign relations, but rather by implication than by direct mandate. The President 'shall have power,' so reads the Constitution, 'by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to make treaties, provided twothirds of the Senators present concur,' and this provision has been interpreted to mean, that, while the President may initiate, the Senate alone can conclude; in other words, the President proposes and the Senate disposes."

Further, this forcible remark is made:

"The Senate has the right to amend any treaty which the, President may negotiate; that, to quote the words of the Supreme Court of the United States. in the case of 'Haver vs. Yaker,' 'The Senate is not required to adopt it or reject it (a treaty) as a whole, but may modify or amend it, as was done with the treaty under consideration;' but in the early days that was a right seldom exercised. Of recent years the Senate has become the dominant force in legislation; it has made the House of Representatives merely a cipher in the legislative equation, and has compelled the President, if he would live in peace and amity with his legislative Assembly, to recognize the power of the Senate. In order to enlarge and increase that power, it has argued that treaties negotiated by the President and sent to the Senate for ratification 'are not strictly treaties, but projects for treaties; they are still inchoate.' This was the expression used by Senator Lodge, of Massachusetts, a member of the committee on foreign relations, after the Senate had amended the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty. Mr. Lodge defended his position with great ability and ingenuity. He quoted John Quincy Adams and Secretary of State Henry Clay in support of his contention; and he drew attention to the fact that Washington, before commencing the negotiation of the Jay Treaty with England, consulted the Senate, which he cited in support of his argument that the Senate has equal treaty-making powers with the President."

Here are practical points stated: Mr. Hay simply exchanged notes with the Powers regarding the open door in China, instead of attempting to conclude treaties, as he realized the impossibility of action by the Senate on the treaties. At any time during the last few years Mr. Hay could have concluded a treaty with two of the Great Powers to maintain the integrity of China, and he was approached by the representatives of those Powers to enter into nego