Life — May 24, 1906 — page 6: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

“While there is Life there's Hope." VOL. XLVH. MAY 24, 1906. No. 17 West Tutety-Fiast Street, New Yori. EOPLE are still guessing what Colonel Roosevelt will do after March 4, 1909. The last guess is that he will y of Some- thing in the Cabinet of President Taft, and address himself to the work of building the Panama Canal. Colonel Watterson, whose mind works off and on on this subject, declines to accept this sug- gestion. He has reasons for thinking that there is nothing in it. He has also vetoed the idea that Colonel Roosevelt will go to the Senate, and he is not sure that his own plan of making him pre dent of Harvard Colle; will work, though he still adheres to it. ere is one course that no one has yet suggested for Colonel Roosevelt in 1909 He might go away back and sit down. Such a course would be popular with Mr. Mead, of Boston, Mr. Nelson, Mr, Fair banks (the one who is Vice-President now), Chancellor Day,some railroad men and many officers of corporations,a whole lot of scalawags, Senator Aldrich, Gov- ermor Vardaman and some others Colonel Watterson will doubtless say that it is an impossible suggestion and that though Colonel Roosevelt might possibly go away back, he could not sit down for an appreciable interval of time, but would feel almost instantly con- strained to stand on the bench and ad- dress the meeting. Of course, that sounds reasonable and may Le so. Colonel Roosevelt's sedentary propensities are in rude, uncultivated state. His ter- minal facilities are poor, as Mr. Melville Ingalls said of the Ohio minister who preached too long. But he might learn. Make it easy for him at first. Let him sit on a tack or something that would occupy his mind till he could get a little used to the posture. Then give him a -LIFE. bare bench and presently a cushion, and even springs. He has always lxed to do the thing he did, and, he might come to like sitting down, and, if so, he would excel in it, and might even come, in time and with due practice. to sit as tight as Grover Cleveland. And then he wéuld be all but perfect, wouldn't he? And if we wanted to run him again for President some time—as, like enough, we may—there he would be with a complete record; all the stunts done, active and inactive, and not a leg left for opposition to stand on. REALLY, when you think of it, there is a good deal in this plan. ‘It isn’t too easy. Sitting down would be hard, and, therefore, all the more feasible for one who prefers hard things. And even going ’way back would not be easy, be- cause of the habit we have all got into of facing around to where Colonel Roosevelt happens to be, so that we can keep an cye on him. If we should all face to rear when he g k, it would practically keep him in front again, but maybe that won't happen so much when he ceases to be President. McGregor had the same sort of a trouble when he complained that always the head of the table where t, but we presume he was cured of s ba E HAVE read with regret in the daily papers that Mr. S. S. Me- Clure and the muck rakers who have imparted so much vigor for many months past to his valuable magazine have fallen out and are going to part com- pany. The causes of disagreement have not been expounded by authority, but the impression obtains that the muck rakers want to stick somewhat closer to the muck and rake it deeper and harder than Mr. McClure considers conducive to the best interests of his periodical. It is a little in fashion now to chaff all the muck rakers. Those that have be- longed to Mr. McClure’s staff can stand some chafling, for their work has been exceedingly influential and, to our mind, exceedingly useful to the country. Miss system; Mr. Steffens and Mr. Phillips have armed hundreds of thousands of readers with fighting knowledge about municipal, legislative and corporate cor- ruption and the way to check it. What they have written in McClure’s has taken hold of people’s minds and pro- duced results, Nevertheless, if Mr. McClure’s team has got agoing so strong that he cannot hold them, he probably does well to cut the traces. Specialists who deal in political corruption or any other kind of corrup- tion are subject, like all other specialists, to the propensity to see the thing that they are doing somewhat bigger than it is. ‘They are apt to lose the sense of propor- tion, and they are lucky if, in their work, they can maintain satisfactory relations with a controlling mind whose sense of proportion is less liable to be confused. The literature of exposure is exceedingly important, but it is not the only thing that is important. It is all destructive, and destruction, indispensable as_ it sometimes is, can go too far. Some of the tares must usually be left in the wheat if there is to be any crop. Some- times, we confess, we have been scornful of the places in the prayer-book where all of us worshippers in our Sunday moming clothes and on our Sunday behavior own up to being miserable sinners and reiter- ate it. Nevertheless, most of us are middling sinful, and a decent regard for the tranquillity of ourselves and the rest of mankind constrains us to realize that the muck rake tan be run into the ground. Exposure is the kind of a job to be done to an accompaniment of prayer and fasting. When it begins to be remunerative and to excite enthusiasm it is time to go slow. REAT works are going on in the world, and they do not dwindle on better acquaintance. ‘The work of reliev ing and rebuilding San Francisco is enormous. At this writing, two hundred and fifty thousand people a day are being fed there by the relief agencies, and the fire was a month ago! ‘The canal job is big, big, big. The great work of readjusting government to Russia is by far the biggest of all—an appalling labor. But the railroad rates bill seems to be settled, and the free alcohol bill is likely to pass. comicbooks.com