The times., 1898-10-04
TUESDAY. OCTOBER 4. 1898.
whnt the President Loses.

When the peace protocol was signed
there was no man outside the navy and
the army who was rival of President
Mckinley in the admiration Of the peo-
pie He had gone to war reluct-
antly, but once the war began he
stood 10 his work like man
and a hero. In spite of an in
competent, lightweight, presumptuous
and doddering head of the War Depart
ment, he carried the righteous conflict
to a quick and glorious ending.
How everybody roared and raved
with joy when the matchless Dewey
smashed the great Spanish fleet in
Manila Bay, and how they were GRAZ
ed over Schley's magnificent pound
ing of Cervera's squadron that had
terrorized our coast-reducing il to the
semblance Of the twisted steel bridges
Of the Johnstown flood. Never in the
worlds history had there been such an
amazing triumph Never had il enter
ed into the dreams of the imaginative
Mahan. People Rugged one another in
their pride, and Old Glory waved, newly
glorified, from every house. Mr.
Mckinley's name was cheered and
all were raging McKinleyites. and
politics be hanged. They were
sorry there was no higher office
70 Ii
as the spontaneous choice of the whole
people. When, during the wearisome
and wearing days of delay at Santi-
ago the President prodded General
Shafter, telling him to stop talking
and go to fghting-after our splendid
boys had opened the worlds eyes to the
fighting qualities of Young America
everybody wore Mckinley badges and
swore there was nothing good enough
for the heroes in the trenches. Those
were days to be remembered
1t is because they are remembered
that nobody speaks quite what he feels
about the Presidents retention of Sec
retary Alger; that people are silent or
reserved Il = hurt and disappointed.
IT hrr Ei "a oivw from a club to have
TO iulg what the circumstances seem
t-snpose on the impartial mind. That
President should not always keep
heights he reached in the war was
to be expected, since he is human. The
people cannot hold the note they sound
ed then. But that he should disappoint
their confidence in the particular direc-
tion he does is grievous. If Secretary
Alger had been guilty of mere robbery;
If he had betrayed us to Spain, sold
sutlerships and commissions, or ap-
pointed all Michigan as army officers,
or committed any offense of that kind.
the popular admiration and esteem for
the President might have kept the ma
tion silent if he were held in office.
More than they admire the President,
the people love and venerate their sons
who were sanctified by heroism in
holy war They cried like grief-stricken
women when they saw these sons re-
turned to them mere wrecks of the
young athletes who went so cheerfully
to the front. and when they thought of
those who died ingloriously, the victims
Of neglect and appalling incompetence
That this should happen at the close of
the nineteenth century in nation re-
nowned for its inventive genius, its
transportation achievements. its incom-
parable skill in overcoming the natural
obstacles in the way of its daring en-
terprises is proof enough OF crime. The
pitiable plea that such things as starva-
tion and epidemic disease are the un-
avoidable accompaniments of war
might serve in China, but in this land,
where sanitary science has its well-es-
tablished principles, it is an insult to
reason. The particular form of defec-