The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1895-08-22
ON THE TEN COMMANDMENTS.
Commissioner Roosevelt Tells Where the
Police Board Stands-No More Pulls
The s'Obselete" Excise Law.

Theodore Roosevelt, president OF the
notice board. made speech at the in
augural meeting Of tho Charles Hark
Republican club at New York Thursday
night. He said in part: We commission
ers of police feel that we are merely your
stewards, and. that you have right to
demand of us an accounting OF our stew
ardship, and all of us welcome the chance
to tell you what the board has done, and
why it has done it.
Especially those of us who are Repub'
licans feel it incumbent on lis to embrace
every opportunity for meeting our fellow
Republicans. We have a double RESPONSE
bility. We serve you as citizens, and as
such we can know no distinction of poll
tics. We deal with criminals and law
= abiding citizens without regard to politf.
cal creeds and with. equal justice to all
and for that reason we emphasize one
point on which the board feels it should
be heard. That is the relation of the de-
.partment to honest politics.
Many of you who have been active at
the polls, who are working politicians.
and who before the days of reform used
to- peddle tickets at the polls, have expert
enced the evils of corrupt and incompe-
tent election officials. You have known
what it was to find the police against
YOU. Under the present regime the
police will know neither Republican nor
Democrat, but will only know their duty
and see that the votes are honestly count
ed. IN f-oard is a unit on all questions
Of po' IA the Republican party does
not and would not profit by a
disho,.u., election
Tie Do.lrd As going to have an honest
election if we can have it. We have aske Il
the party organizations on each side to
help us by seeing that only honest and
competent men are selected for election
duty. When we are ferreting out fraud
many of those arrested are Republicans.
We shall see that that won't happen
again We must have men who will moi
only see that the votes are properly de
posted, but that they are honesty count
cd When we are told that New Yorf
does not believe in the enforcemen5 o.
law. we believe that our opponents are
mistaken, and in either event our color.
are nailed to the mast and we Intend e
fight to the end. You've heard that this
excise law was an obsolete one. Do YOU
think that law is obsolete under which
5000 arrests were made last year? why
were these people arrested? Because they
had no "pull," but under this admins
tration we go for the very men who boas
of their ''pulls'' and we get them.
We are teaching the policemen that thu
only way they can get any benefit iron
the 'tpull' is to disregard it. Who -gav'
the sinews of war to Tammany? Why
the saloon, keepers. A law-abiding maj
had saloon and closed it up on Sunday
His rivals kept open and took away hi
trade, and Tanmany representa- ant
the police came to h M and tried to per
suade him to Keep open and violate thu
law. This was not done out of friendship
but solely for the purpose OF getting {
hold On him. Think Of the corruption o.
politics in New York, when such gigan
tic weapon for wrong was in the hand
of anybody! What show was there for u
decent citizens against the banded mer
oenarles. held together by the most in
famous political influences. What chanc
had you against a man whose brother wa
an aiderman.o or kept a big saloon? Yol
will find few such have any pull nov
and our aldermen are of a different class
We stand on the Ten Commandments ant
to the injunction Thou shalt not steal, ,
we add ''And thou shalt not permit an,
one else to steal'. That's the way we in
terpret it.
In conclusion Mr. Roosevelt said that a
long they are in Office they will enforc
the law, and no threats could drive then
from their positions