The Chanute times. [volume] (Chanute, Kan.) 1897-1913, 1901-10-11
26h pRESIDENT4of U. S. J

United States Civil Service Commits
sion. His ability and rugged honesty
in the administration Of the affairs of
that office greatly helped to strengthen
his hold on popular regard.
Police CommiSSioner in Metz
York.
Roosevelt continued in that office I'M
til May /, 1895, when he resigned to
accept the Office Of Police Commits
sioner from Mayor Strong. He found
the administration of affairs in a de-
moralized condition, but he soon
brought order out of chaos. Says James
A. Riis, who is an intimate friend OF
President Roosevelt:
We had been trying for forty years to
achieve system of dealing decently with
our homeless poor. Two score years be-
fore, the surgeons of the police depart
ment had pointed out that herding them
in the cellars or over the prisons of police
stations in fostering heaps, and turning
them out hungry at daybreak to beg their
way from door to door, was indecent and
inhuman. Since then grand juries, acad-
emieS of medicine, committees on phil
anthropic citizens, had attacked the toul
disgrace, but to no purpose. Pestllence
ravaged the prison lodgings, but still they
STAYED. l know what that fight meant,
for / was one of a committee that Waged
it wear after year, and suffered defeat
every time until Theodore Roosevelt
came and destroyed the nuisance IN
night l remember the caricatures Oh
tramps shivering in the cold with whlcn
the yellow newspapers pursued MIN d.
the time, labelling him the poor man
foe" And l remember being just iiltie
uneasy lest they wound him. and perhaps
make him think he had been nasty. But
not he 1t was only those who did not
know him who charged him with being
hasty. He thought thing out quickly
YES. that is his way; but he thought II
out, and, having thought 1t out, suited ac-
ton to his Judgment. OF the consequences
he didn't think at all. He made sure he
was right. and then went ahead with per-
feet confidence that things would come
out right.
His a dolce TO Organized LABOR.
Mr.. Riis says he never saw Roose-
welt to better advantage than when ne
once confronted the labor men at their
meeting-place, Clarendon Hail:
The police we're all the time having
trouble with strikers and their "plckets.
Roosevelt saw that 1t was because nelth-
err party understood fully the position OF
the other, and, with his usual dlrectness,
sent word to the labor organizations tnat
he would like to talk it over with theih'
At his request 1 went with MIN 10 the
meeting. 1t developed almost immedi-
ately that the labor men mad taken a
wrong measure of the man. They met him
al xyno nOintS.
| limited at trouble unless their demands
were met. Mr.. Roosevelt broke them OIL
short:
Gentlemen" he said-with that snap
| of the laws that always made people MS
! tent asked to meet you, hoping tha'
we might come to understand one anoth-
err. Remember, please, before we go fur
ther that the worst injury anyone OF you
can do to the cause of labor is to counsel
violence. 1t will also be worse tor MN.
self. Understand distinctly that order
will be kept. The police will keep 1t. NOW
we can proceed
I was never so proud and pleased as
when they applauded him to the echo. Ht
| redeemed with pleasure, for he saw tna'
the best in them had come out on top
as he expected it would.
Attracted by "yeIotO NetOS
papers.
It was of this incident that handle
was first made by Mr.. Roosevelts enc
mics in and out of the police board
and he had many-to attack MIN:
1t happened that there was a music
hall in the building in which the laoo
men met. The yellow newspapers circu
lated the lie that he went there on pur
pose to see the show, and the ridlculou
story was repeated until actually I'M
liars persuaded themselves that 1t was SO
They would not have been able to under
stand the kind of man they had to d.
with had they tired. Accordingly the!
fell into their own trap. 1t is tradition
of Mulberry Street that the notorlou
seeley dinner raid was planned by his en-
emies in the department OF whieh ne wa
the head. in the belief that they woul'
catch Mr. Roosevelt there. Inc ui1her
were supposed to be his set
Some time after that, Mr.. Kills wa
in Roosevelt's Office when a police OF
ficial of superior rank came in, and re
ouested a private audience with him
They stepped aside and the policema
| s,oLe in an undertone. urging somethin
| strongly. Mr.. Roosevelt listened. SUD
dsnlv i saw him straighten up as ma
rscoiis from something unclean. and dis
miss the other with sharp: mo. sir!
don't fight that way" The policema
vent out crestfaIlen. Roosevelt took tw
or three turns about the floor. strugglin
evidently with strong disgust He toll