The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1908-07-09
, WASHINGTON
From our Regular Correspondent.

|
home and the scattering of the Cab
met and the Supreme Court, move
ments emanating from or centering
III Washington are of more than
usual interest this summer. The
Secretary of War or he who was
until recently the Secretary of War
and is now the Republican pres-
dental candidate, is in the CITY
winding up matters for his final de-
parture. He is today, for the first
time for years. private citizen and
the most conspicuous private citi-
zen i'll the western hemisphere. He
left for the Hot Springs of Virgin
ia on the Fourth cf July, with Mrs.
TAFT and their youngest son, Charles
Taft, a youth of ten years. Mr..
Taft has been in the habit of spend
ing his summers in Canada, but it
will not be convenient for the pres
idential candidate to be out of the
country and he has selected place
in Monroe county, Virginia, among
the mountains, for his summer
home. The Hot Springs of Virginia
have been resort for fifty years
or more and, even before the War,
rivalled the Green Briar White
Springs as fashionable resort for
the slave-holdine aristocracy of the
South. Within the last few years
1t has been a resort of the wealthy
and ultra fashionable people of the
North and Northeast. While the
presidential candidate and part of
his family will be there for the hot
test of the summer months, his
daughter will visit a school friend
i'll Georgia. There is, of course,
no political significance in the Sc
lection of resort south OF the Ma
son and Dixon line, but the fact,
insignificant as it is. marks the
amelioration of long standing polit-
ical asperities. There are political
wiseacres who predict that the re-
publican candidate will carry two
or three southern states in the COM
ing election ..and the fact that he
and his family are at home in the
south will not be without its signif-
icance.
*a*
1t is reported that President
Roosevelt has bought a lot for
residence, in the City of New York,
at cost of a million of dollars.
Two or three weeks ago only, it
was supposed that the President
would be without occupation after
March the fourth, and it was pub
lished that he was comfortably we'll
off, having an income of at least
ten thousand dollars /! The ques-
ton naturally arises: How is the
President able to buy a lot for build
ing purposes worth million dol
lars? Many eX-Senators and ex-
cabinet officers have been known to |
buy homes or build homes in Wash
ington, but no ex-presicent has ever
remained in the city longer than
his term. Ex-presidents have al
ways returned to their homes in the
states. There may be a reason for
this. No king or emperor, after
having enjoyed or endured the |
splendors of state, was ever known
to settle down as quiet citizen
amid the scenes of his vanished |
glories. The President of the |
United States, is, as far as honors
and pageantry are concerned,
king or an emperor; and the anti
climax of private life would doubt
less be too severe. as felt by him
self and all who came in contact |
with him, for merely mortal man.
*.*
At the State and War Depart
ment in this city, the situation in
Mexico is watched with intensest |
interest. The Mexican Govern
ment, of course. treats the insur-
gents as banditti for precisely the
same reason that the British Gov
ernment hundred and thirty years
ago, treated the revolutionary fa-
theirs as rebels. An important diff
ference in practice is that the Mex
lean Government takes no prison
ers but kills those it captures. Por-
frio Diaz, president of the So called |
republic for the last twenty five |
years, has been very much praised. |
The Government has at least one
recommendation. 1t is very strong
government. 1t is despotic and in |
its despotism, Mexico has enjoyed
such internal peace as she had nev-
er previously known for so long a
period, but it is absurd to call the
government republic. The elec-
tiouc are absurd There has never