The Donaldsonville chief. [volume] (Donaldsonville, La.) 1871-current, 1907-01-19
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"Why?,' asked the president.
1--WE were taken by surprise and the
action OF the national administration
suddenly knocked the prices of our
stocks to pieces in the market. You
should have given notice for the sake
of the innocent widows and orphans
whose money was invested in stock. "
81 would like to ask you, : said
Attorney General Knox, heartlessly,
'wbether you gave advance informa-
ton to the widows and orphans when
you cornered Northern Pacific stock!''
Again the president showed his teeth.
1.-THE government doesn't give no.
tice, y he said. 'sWhen it believes that
man has committed crime, it arrests
him, and then notifies him OF what he
is accused. Why should the govern
ment give notice to one man and not
to another?"
tsBut you might at least have noti-
fed Eve or six of the biggest men in
Wall street,
The president smiled ard rubbed his
hands together softly.
"I'm afraid that the little men would
not have appreciated it, he answered
with cruel gentleness.
"I'll say this for the president, = ex-
claimed the attorney general, leaning
back in his chair. "There is no stock
ticker in the White House. That might
as well be understood right now"
Whereat the president had to strug-
gle to suppress his laughter, SO strick-
en- were his visitors by the unfeeling
rem ark.
Nor could any of the sullen protest
ants produce evidence to justify a be-
lief that Mr.. Roosevelt would have
for moment considered the idea that
Mr.. Morgan and Mr.. Hill, with their
| friends, were entitled to secret advance
information in order that they might
| unload their stocks on the general
public before the blow aimed at the
railroad monopoly was delivered.
That strange scene in the White
House must have been in Mr.. Roose-
velt's mind when he wrote to congress:
tNo man is above the law and no man
is below it; nor do we ask any mans
permission when we require him to
obey it. Obedience to the Law is de-
| manded as a right, not as a favor. +"
No, there is no new Roosevelt. He
is now what he has always been, ex-
cept that he is working with more pow
erful instrumentalities on larger prob
lens. Experience and the weight of
great responsibilities have deepened,
broadened and steadied him; but his
standpoint is the same-that is the tes-
timony of all who have known him in
timately from the beginning.
The extraordinary hold which Mr..
Roosevelt has on the minds and hearts
of the American people, the boldness
and intelligence with which he has
fought the evils of his time-defant
alike of allied corporations on the one
side and OF mob clamor on the other
and the sureness with which he has
swung his cause over the line of sue
cess, trampling roughly on pale pro-
prieties, ignoring corroded presidents,
looking over the heads of arrogant
political bosses and Wall street plot
tiers to the great, sane, honest multi
tude, wwose red-b1ood energies and
sober, moderate judgments beat in one
central American heart and inspire
one continental brain, make the pres
ent character and outlook of President
Roosevelt an impressive subject for
calm and candid explanation.
The theory which has been SO insid-
iously spread that Mr.. Roosevelt is
rash and reckless, and that he rushes
into things without looking to see
where he is going, is absolutely false.
1t is true that he has proved the pow
erlessness of rich men or rich corpor-
atoms to control the government of
the United States. But he set out in
cold blood to do that very thing.
Hearing cry from one end of the
country to the other that there had
come into being power greater than
the government, power transcending
the power of presidents, congresses,
governors and legislatures, he set to
himself the task of exposing the lie.
If the corporations and Wall street
money captains believed that they had
power superior to that of the organ
ICED nation, hard experience must un-
deceive them.
If the people, upon whose confidence
and loyalty the strength of the repub-
lie depended, really believed that the
will of Wall street had become more
powerful than the will of the nation,
it was aIl-important that such de-
structive and demoralizing idea should
be disproved by actual and open de-
monstration-and all other business
might wait until the supremacy of the
government, and its ability to enact
or enforce law against the opposition
of any combina alton of wealth or cum
ming VIII atever, was proven, not by
secret, still processes, but by govern
mental deeds done in the sight OF the
whole people.
That is the deepest cause of hatred
in the breasts of the Harrimans, Rookie
fellers, Rogerses, Archbolds, Nor
gans, Hills and all of their kind-that
Mr.. Roosevelt has refused to recog-
nize their supreme Importance, and
IL. Il =