The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1903-01-28
ROOSEVELT PAYS
TRIBUTE TO MCKINLEY
Eulosy Pronounced at the Memorial Banquet
at Canton

feelings, and yet power to lead them,
together with far-sighted sagacity and
resolute belief both in the people and
in their future-all these were needed
IN the man who headed the march OF
our people during the eventful years
from 1895 to 1901. These were the
qualities possessed by Mckinley and
developed by him throughout his whole
history previous to assuming the presi-
dency. AS a lad he had the inesti-
mable privilege of serving, first in the
ranks, and then as a commissioned
officer, in the great war for national
union, righteousness, and grandeur;
he was one of those whom a kindly
Providence permitted to take part in a
struggle which ennobled every man
who fought therein. lie who when
little more than a boy had seen the
grim steadfastness which after four
years of giant struggle restored the
Union and freed the slave was not
thereafter to be daunted by danger or
frightened out of his belief in the great
destiny of our people.
President McKinleys rise to great
ness had in it nothing of the sudden,
nothing of the unexpected or seeming
ly accidental Throughout his long
was a steady increase alike in his
power of leadership and in the rec
ignition of that power both BY his
associates in public life and by the
public itself. Session after session his
influence in the House grew greater;
his party antagonists grew to look
upon him with constantly increasing
respect; his party friends with con-
stantly increasing faith and admra-
ton.
But as so often happens in our his
tory the President was forced to face
questions other than those at issue at
the time of his election. Within a
year the situation in Cuba had be-
come literally intolerable. President
Mckinley had fought too well in his
youth, he knew tCo we'll at first hand
what war really was, lightly to enter
into a struggle. He sought by every
honorable means to preserve peace, to
avert war. He made every effort con-
sistent with the national honor to
bring about an amicable settlement Of
the Cuban difficulty. Then, when it
became evident that these efforts were
useless, that peace could not be honor
ably entertained, he devoted his
strength to making the war as short
anu do ueClSlNe as pOSSlDIe. II Is
needless to tell the result in detail
Suffice it to say that rarely indeed
in history has a contest so far-reach-
ing in the Importance of it's outcome
been achieved with such ease. There
followed a harder task. AS a result of
the war we came into possession of
Cuba, Porto Rico, and the Philippines.
In each island the conditions were
such that we had to face problems en-
tirely new to our national experience,
and, moreover, in each island or group
of islands the problems differed radi-
cally from those presented in the
others. In Porto Rico the task was
simple. The island could not be in
dependent. 1t became in all essentials
part of the Union. 1t has been given
all the benefits of our economic and
financial system. Its Inhabitants have
been given the highest individual lib
erty, while yet their government has
been under the supervision of officials
so well chosen that the island can be
appealed to as affording a model for
all such experiments in the future;
and this result was mainly owing to
the admirable choice of instruments
by President Mckinley when he Sc
lected the governing officials.
In Cuba. where we were pledged to
give the island independence the pledge
was kept not merely in letter, but in
spirit. 1t would have been a betrayal
of our duty to have given Cuba indie
pendence out of hand. President Nc
kin1ey with his usual singular sagaci-
ty in the choice of agents, selected in
Gen. Leonard Wood the man of all
others best fit to bring the island
through its uncertain period of prep
aration for independence and the re-
suit of his wisdom was shown when
last May the island became in name
and in fact a free republic, for it start
ed with a better equipment and under
more favorable conditions than had
ever previously been the case with any
Standardization commonwealth.
Finally, in the Philippines, the prob
lem was one of great complexity. There
was an insurrectionary party claiming
to represent the people of the islands
and putting forth their claim with a
certain speciousness which deceived no
small number of excellent men here at
home, and which afforded to yet 9TH
ers chance to arouse factious party
spirit against the President. OF course,
looking back, it is now easy to see that
1t would have been both absurd and
wicked to abandon the Philippine ar
chipelago and let the scores of different
II1DeS-Cnr1Stlan, MOhammedan, and
pagan, in every stage of semi-Asiatic
barbarism-turn the islands into a well
ter of bloody savagery, with the abso-
lutte certainty that some strong Power
would have to, step in and take possess
sion. But though now it is easy enough
TO see that our duty was to stay in the
islands, to put down the insurrection by
force of arms, and then to establish
freedom-g giving civil government, II
needed genuine craftsmanship to sec
this and to act accordingly at the time
of the first revolt. A weaker and less
far-sighted man than President McKin-
ley would have shrunk from a task
very difficult in itself. and certain to
furnish occasion for attack and misrep-
resentation no less than for honest mis-
understanding. But President McKin-
ley never fiinched. He refused to con-
slider the thought of abandoning our
duty in our new possessions. While
sedulously endeavoring to act with the
utmost humanity toward the insurrec-
tionists, he never faltered in the deter
mination to put them down by force OF
arms, alike for the sake of our own
interest and honor, and for the sake OF
the interest of the islanders, and par.
ticularly of the great numbers OF
friendly natives, including those most
highly civilized, for whom abandon.
ment by us would have meant ruin and
death. Again his poi ~ was most am
ply INDICATED. Peace has come to the
islands, together with a greater meas.
Ilra of fvadfxyfl,,aI l;h lie