The Nevada County picayune., 1908-11-12
WILLIAM HOWARD TAFT VI family of Jurists-tiis Mothers InfluenCeT The Call to Public OffiCe-On the Federal Bench--
 Blazing the Philippine TraiI--Secretary
 ot War; Building Panama Canal.

llcans of the United States have elected to the presidency man ex- ceptionally equipped, not only by nature and training, but by experience and achievement, to perform the deli cate and arduous duties of the greatest once in the gift of any people. For nearly thirty years he has given him. self to the public service. In all the years of it's history the Republican party has never selected as it's leader man so tried beforehand.
 A Family of Jurists.
 MT. Taft comes of family dis tinguished in the law and the public service. The first American Tafts came of the English yeomanry. In this country they turned to the study and practice of the law Peter Taft was both a maker and an interpreter of laws, having served as a member of the Vermont legislature, and after ward as judge. Alphonso Taft, son of Peter, was graduated from Yale college, and then went out to the Western Reserve to practice law. He settled in Cincinnati, and it was at Mt. Auburn, a suburb of that city, on September 15, 1857, that his son, Will liam Howard Taft, first became a presidential possibility
 His father earned distinction in the service of the city and state and na- tion going from the superior bench, to which he had been elected unani- mously, to the place in Grants cabinet | now held by the son, then, as attorney general, to the Department of Justice, and finally into the diplomatic ser vice. as minister first to Austria and then to Russia. His mother, who was Miss Louise M Torrey, also came of New England stock.
 His Mothers Influence.
 It was her express command that sent him away from her last fall when both knew that she was entering upon the last stage of her life. He had promised the Filipinos that he would go to Manila and in person formally open their assembly, It was to be their first concrete experience in self government, and he, more than any other man, had made it possible. If he should not keep his promise there was danger that the suspicious Fill pinos would impute his failure to sin ister motives, to indifference or altered purpose. with result vastly unfortune to them and to us. Mir Taft saw all that very clearly, yet in view of his mothers health he would have re- mained at home But she forbade. He went, and before he could re- turn his mother had passed away.
 Much was 10 be expected of a boy of such parentage, and young Tart fulfilled the expectation. He began by growing big physically. He has tremendous frame. The cartoonlsts have made a false presentment of him familiar to the country by drawing him always as a mountain of hesh' But if they had gone to the same ex- treme of leanness, and still honestly portrayed his frame they would nave represented a man above the average weight.
 At College.
 Of course he went to Yale. Ills father had been the first alumnus elected to the corporation, and when young Taft had completed his prepara- tory course at Andover he went to New Haven for his college training. He was a big, rollicking. good natured hoy who liked play but still got run out of work. He did enough in athlet- ics to keep his 225 pounds of muscle in good condition, but gave most or his time to his studies. When the class of 7S was graduated Taft was It's salutatorian, having finished second among 12O. He was then not quite Fl.
 He went back to Cincinnati and began the study of law in his father office. at the same time doing court reporting for the newspaper owned py his half lf-brother, Charles P. Taft. Ills salary at first was $6 week He did his work so well, however, that Murat Halstead, editor of the Clncin- nati Commercial Gazette, employed him to work for that paper. at the Tn creased salary of $25 week.
 While he was doing this he was keeping up his studies, taking the course at the Cincinnati Law School, from which he was graduated. in 1880 dividing first honors with another student. and being admitted to the bar soon afterward
 His Respects to BIackmailer. That fall there occurred one of the most celebrated and characteristic in cidents in his life. A man named Rose was then running a blackmail- ing paper in Cincinnati. He had the reputation of being a dangerous man. He had been a prize fighter, and was usually accompanied by a gang of roughs ready to assault any whom he wanted punished. Alphonso Taft had been the unsuccessful candidate for