The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-01-13
rREsrpENrrAL ASSURANCE.

The letter of the President to Con- gross. transmitting the report of Sec retary Taft, is distinctly humiliating to every citizen of the United States. Of the report of Taft 1t is hardly neces- sary to speak, for 1t is mass of de- nials and assertions from beginning to end, and is given to tho public in the evident hope or belief that everything he says will be accepted as gospel truth without question. We hardly think it necessary to assure him that he very seriously mistakes the Amer ican people, if he believes that. They are better informed than he gives them credit for. and arc doing some think ing for themselves.
 The letter of Roosevelt is not only an endorsement of all that is said by his Secretary but is something more. It is putting 1t mildly to say that a number of his statements are wholly unsupported by. facts, a perversion of facts. For example, one of his first ! assertions is that "the work on the Isthnfus Is being admirably done" All intelligent men who are not hope lessly blinded by prejudice or partis- anship know that this is not fact. Evidence has been piled on evidence to show that the work has not been admirably done" the asser- | tion of Roosevelt to the contrary not withstanding. From the very begin ming the whole business has been a series of blunders of ignorance or de- sign, of misapplication of funds. of graft on both large and small scales, of deceit ana of shameless waste. There Is hardly bright page in the entire history of the canal work so far and the blame of it reaches from the high est to the lowest officials. If Roosevelt does>not know this his ignorance is to be deplored.
 And he has the gall--for no other word will fit--to assert in prac- ticaIiy so many words that all the un- favorable criticisms of the canal work and those who have mismanaged it is to be attributed to prejudice or paid enemies. Is it possible that he expects the country to believe this? Some of the harshest condemnation of 1t has come from friends of the canal and sup porters of the administration. The
 most galIing truths that have been published were writton by disinterest- ed visitors and observers who had no reason for making misstatements, and have not done so. Not all of the truth has been told but enough has gotten out to discredit the management and to breed distrust, if not disgust. in the minds of all friends of the canal and of the country's good name.
 In one thing the President is likely to be taken strictly at his word, and that is when he declares that he courts 'the fullest most exhaustive and most searching investigation" That may be taken as & specimen or Rooseveltian bravado, but if he thinks he can bluff | the Senate and the country he will find himself badly mistaken. There 1 promises to be complete investigation of the whole canal business. and it will not be made by enemies of the project or of the administration. but we are hopeful that it will be such as | to throw needed light on the rotten- ness which exists there and which has existed all along. When that investi- l gation is concluded and the results made public the President may have something else to say 6r he may not.
 He may not feel like saying anything when all the truth comes out.