The Worthington advance. [volume] (Worthington, Minn.) 1874-1908, 1908-04-17
Never Has Been a Man in Public Service Like Taft
Makes His Own Job by Cir ing Proof of
Extraordinary Abilities
Quick footed Fighting Elephant of Modern World Poll
tics-Scope Of His Knowledge Is Tremendous
Big Secretary Loves Common Sense.

'"
had so queer job as that of Secretary
OF War William Howard Taft. Fo,
that matter, there never has been q
man like him in the service Of the
country and in a way he has made
his own job by giving abundant proof
or MS extraordinary abilities. One
month he Is down at Panama, seeing
that they are not trying to run water
up hill, the next he is opening the
Philippine assembly so that it will STAY
open, and then laying aside his white
DUCK suit and Panama hat he puts or
his fur cap and fur overcoat and goes
over to st. Petersburg to talk China
and Japan with the car. At times he
runs the war department by fore
sight for month in advance. He car
ries his cabinet portfolio with it's myri-
ads Of matters in his hat on his long
trips and there never has been time
when things were quite SO up to the
mark as during his incumbency, though
he has spent half of the time away
from his desk.
AS Uncle Joe Cannon said not long
ago, 1T is really too bad that when the
Almighty was making the earth and
the fullness thereof. Bill Taft was not
around. He might have been resting
on the fifth instead of on the seventh
day, and there certainly would have
been more fullness."
There is a reason for this capacity
for work. Every human being is sort
of productive manufacturing plant
Some have small outputs and some big
outputs. Taft is one great big gigantic
plant, equipped with high grade, high
speed machinery and there is such a
demand for his goods that he runs
overtime. It looks as if his reward Is
going to be more hard work.
His Wonderful Physia1e.
Physically he is so big that the man
who sees him for the first time always
has a better opinion of the cartoon
lists. They are not such liars in lines
after ALL he says to himself H IS
tall, of huge frame and that frame is
loaded with more than three hundred
pounds of stamina. There are a few
men in different parts Of the world
who have at various times been under
the impression that the man they were
Cumming with was a big, fat, good
natured, wheezy sort of person, who
was fond of an arm chair and a strong
cigar and always made the street cars
stop when he wanted to get on. They
have tried to make things easy FOR him
in an effort to be agreeable or else just
hard enough to have a little fun at
his expense and get him out Of or cath.
One man asked him to a game Of golf
in the hot sun in the Philippines. The
secretary put him through nine miles
of following the ball and a five-mile
walk up to a plantation house on the
mountain side for tea The secretary
was strong and fresh at the finish The
other man was in bed all next day.
Some friends brfbed an old French
Canadian guide to lose him in the
upper reaches of trout stream. That
evening Taft came swinging in, calling
for a square meal in a hurry. Behind
him tottered the guide. When the
other men got the guide out back of
the house to ask him what happened,
he was in rage.
"Wot fool you mex wis me? Hey git
lose, shure Mike, hey git lose, but holly
mackarelle, she walks me 'roun dey
dam Canada"
A Master Of World Politics.
No man who has not an infinite cl-
pacity for effort should ever presume
to put himself in the position of try
ing to keep step with the big plenipo-
tertiary. The best Of them have tried
it, but before long they find that Taft
begins work before they do and is
hard at it long after they finish, and
seems to enjoy it and to thrive on it
He works harder, plays harder, sleeps
harder eats harder, and lives harder
than any man in public life to-day, and
yet there is always that good nature
about him that makes association with
him a pleasure. This is the testimony
of a man who has fought him for four
years: "He is fair and honest without
any noise about it; he, does the COM
mon sense thing always without any
pretense of being the source Of all wis
dom; he is intensely American without
carrying a red, white and blue hand
kerchief, and he is perfectly happy
when he is doing the right thing as
hard as he can do it no matter whether
it pleases any one else or not He
likes praise as ony one does, but crit
icism cannot stop him; in fact, when
he Is reused I do not believe anything
on earth can stop him. He is the
quick footed, fighting elephant of mod
ern world politics. We have grown
up and they have asked us to sit in
the eternal game of the nations and we
have bought an awful stack OF chips.
Bill Taft Is the only man in the coun-
try big enough, cool enough and honest
enough TO play our hand.
Taft LOVES Common Sense.
There IS nothing quarrelsome OF
pra9naticaI about him. but he has
never allowed any one g impose On
him. That was his record from boy
hood. Around his old home in Gin
cinnati he was the boy who never had