Truth. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1901-1908, 1905-12-23
HOW THE PRESIDENTS
MESSAGE is REGARDED.
Literary Digest.


Roosevelt is. according to those whc
took the pains to count the words, the
longest ever written by president
of the United States. It's huge bulk
was due, as the Charleston News and
Courier (Dem.) explains, ito essay
writing of an altruistic sort" The
Louisville Courier-Journal Dem.)
thinks it is contrary to good taste for
the president to insert so much extra
neous matter, and observes: "His SER
mons are largely elementary and
platitudinous, and If congress chose
to take them very seriously, would
necessarily be construed by members
of that body as a reflection on their
intelligence, If not an imputation up
on their years of maturity" and with
equal severity the stanchly Republi-
can New York Press comments upon
the style and size of the message, and
declares that it Is a pity that the
president is so addicted to immoderate
volume of speech that he can not re-
strain himself when such confluence
is not only a virtue but a necessity"
But barring these structures on Mr.
Roosevelt's habit of delivering hon.
lilies in a communication to congress
all seem to agree that the message
is one of the best written and most
important documents of it's kind.
AS for the general tone and spirit
of the message, many papers read be-
tween it's lines a wish to centralize
more power at Washington. "Mr.
Roosevelt" exclaims the New York
World (Dem.), "has submitted to con-
gress the most amazing program of
Capitalization that any president of
the United States has ever recon-
mended." The New York Journal Of
Commerce (Fin.) also finds that "the
burden of President Roosevelt's mes
sage to congress is that whatever is
wrong in this country in matters Of
national scope should be rectified by
the government, and matters liable to
such wrong should be put under ma
tional regulation" The Boston Her.
aid Qnd.) likewise dwells upon this
alleged tendency of the president
and, after asserting that he is trying
to subvert the whole system of our
government, says that at is precisely
this Capitalization of power D..
that is at the bottom of the trouble
in Russia" The New York Tribune
(Rep.), however, while noting in the
message the same tone which these
papers complain of, observes that
times have changed, and laws must
be changed accordingly. Says The
Tribune:
"The president wisely lays stress on
the fact that at the present day much
work which was formerly done by
state authorities can no longer eff
GENTLY be performed by them. The
consolidation and extension of bust
ness operations have made restraints
on corporations which extend only to
a state line quite ineffective for the
protection not only of the country in
general, but of the citizens of the
state supposed to be in control. Con-
sequently, he proposes policy of lib
eral use of federal powers to regulate
what has long been legal no mans
land of refuge for corporate abuses
with which no authority has seemed
competent to deal"
| The salient features of the message
may be summarized as follows:
After reiterating in familiar phrases
some of his well-known sentiments
about the Square Deal" which re-
appear time and again in the body of
the message, the president starts out
with the general proposition that the
wealth amassed by corporations deal
|