Connecticut western news., 1899-07-27

years I desire to thank you for the faith ,ul service you have rendered the country at a most exacting period and to wish you long and happy life"
 While these brief notes are friendly in :one, the conspicuous absence of any ex- pression of regret on either side is an off .ial indication of the causes which re- suited in General Alger's resignation. The president is maintaining dignifed silence in regard to General Alger's re- tirement. Nor has General Alger any hing to say for the present. He is to be heard from later. He is preparing a statement which he will make public in ihe form of an interview on Aug. ?, when he will be private citizen and able to speak freely.
 It is not to be understood from this hat he contemplates an attack upon the president: The statement is to be in the nature of defense of his conduct in con aection with the war. Possibly something may be said that will warrant inference IS to how he feels about the treatment he ,as received from the president.
 The president on Saturday offered to Elihu Root of New York the position of secretary of war. MT. Root has accepted the appointment.
 In explanation of his desire to have a lawyer secretary, President Mckinley stated that the war department would for the next two or three years be the most important legal branch of the gov ernment. Questions of policy in regard to new civil governments for the colonies will have to be considered and plans out lined for congressional legislation. There are also many important legal questions in connection with river and harbor i'm provements.
 Although born in Clinton, Oneida coun- ty, N. Y., Elihu Root is descendant of an old New England family. His father, Oren Root, was professor of mathematics at Hamilton college for a period of 36 years from 1S49 to 1885. Elihu was born Feb. 15, 1S45, and was 19 years old when he was graduated from Hamilton college. For three years he applied himself dili- gently to the study of law, part of the l time at Hamilton college, and began practice in this city in 1867. He was sue ressful from the start, fayorsbiy impress ] ing the older members of the bar by his aarnestness, his keen power of analysis and his industry.
 Mir. Root has been connected as counsel with many important and famous cases, and he was successful in a large propor- ton of them. He was the leading counsel for ex-Judge Henry Hilton in the A. T. Stewart will case, and in that capacity he defended the suit of Branagh versus Smith, disposing of the claim of the al- eged Irish heirs against the Stewart es- tate. In the Hoyt will case and also in the Fayerweather will contest MT. Root appeared as the leading counsel
 In 1879 he was Republican candidate ,n Shis city for the office of judge of the nrr,f Nf xNlA l. arge Republican vote. President Arthur lppointed him United States district at- torney for the Southern district of New York in 1883, and he served in that ca- oacity until the middle of 1885. He con iucted the prosecution which resulted in he conviction of James D. Fish, presi- lent of the Marine bank, for acts con iected with the Grant X Ward failure. With the advent of a Democratic ad- ninistration in Washington MT. Root resigned the office of United States dis :rict attorney. For a number of years he leld an influential position in the Repub- ican organization of New York county. | Mir. Root acted as one of the delegates 1t large to the constitutional convention ,f 1894, and, while Joseph H. Choate was the president of that body, Mir. Root was the chairman of the judiciary com nittee and the leader on the floor of the Republican majority. ' For a long period of years Mir. Root las been one of the foremost members of he New York Bar association, of which body he served as president. He was al- 70 at one time president of the New Eng and society. In January, 1895, he was .lected president of the Republican club ,f the city of New York, and still later le was made president of the Union League club, succeeding General Horace Porter, which office he still holds. Mir. Root is also a member of a great number ,f social political and scientific organi-