LOGIC OF THE TODD CASE

more in the summer of 1903, when PostmasterGeneral Payne removed Miss Todd, the postmaster at Greenwood, Del., because she was distasteful to Senator Allee. Mr. Allee was one of two Senators elected early in that year through a truce between the Republican factions in the Legislature, each faction choosing a Senator and Allee being the choice of the Addicksites. The male members of Miss Todd's family were rather conspicuously identified with the anti-Addicks element.

Mr. Payne, in the same blundering way as before, began to issue "statements." He announced first that Miss Todd was a perfectly satisfactory postmaster, but that the two Senators from Delaware had arranged to divide the patronage between them on territorial lines, that this office fell within Mr. Allee's area, and that Mr. Allee had called for a new postmaster. When this brought down upon his head a storm of popular criticism he fell back upon another excuse, saying that Miss Todd had allowed her office to be used as a political headquarters for the anti-Addicks factionists, to the damage of good discipline., She stoutly denied the charge, and the public at large sided with her, naturally assuming that the Postmaster

General would not have made two dissonant apologies for the same act if his conscience had been clear.

Thus the matter stood when the attention of the President was called to it. He made some inquiries on his own account, and found two or three reputable witnesses who insisted that Miss Todd had shown disrespect to the Senator, while others of equal credibility stood ready to make oath that she had always behaved with perfect decorum. Such an absolute conflict of testimony as this placed him in a most uncomfortable position. Had he been consulted before the Postmaster-General acted he would not have considered the case against Miss Todd strong enough to warrant her dismissal; as she was already out, however, and her place filled, he did not consider the evidence in her favor strong enough to demand her reinstatement. The whole effect of Mr. Payne's tactless performance was to bring unnecessary public censure upon the President. Cabinet officers have relieved the situation by resigning on less ground than this; Mr. Payne is not one of the resigning kind, and he still sticks to his place. But one result of the incident has been that he has had his authority

THE NET RESULT

questioned and will have to keep his fingers out of Delaware factional politics for the future.

The President's patience is not limitless, and he hates fruitless quarrels. To Byrne's place he appointed John P. Nields, who had once served acceptably as district attorney ad interim and understood the duties of the office. Nields was a pronounced anti-Addicks man. There was a brisk set-to between the Senators as to the successorship before the President settled it, and he was disgusted to the point of vigorous protest at the substitution of two quarrelsome bosses for one who did not quarrel but was universally quarreled with. He read the two men a lecture on scandalizing his administration before the country and keeping him continually in hot water. The upshot of the Byrne and Todd cases is that he will take the patronage of Delaware wholly into his own hands till the two factions can make up their differences, or till Addicks shall quit active politics and remove the most serious obstacle to the permanent supremacy of his party in the little State.

The President's desire for reelection-Republican rivals who dropped out-The Hanna "boom"-Real loyalty appreciated-Cleveland, Gray, and the coal-strike arbitration.

"I Do not believe in playing the hypocrite," Mr. Roosevelt wrote to a friend a few months ago. "Any strong man fit to be President would desire a renomination and reelection after his first term. Lincoln was President in so great a crisis that perhaps he neither could nor did feel any personal interest in his own reelection. I trust and believe that if the crisis were a serious one I should be incapable of considering my own well-being for a moment in such a contingency. But at present I should like to be elected President just precisely as John Quincy Adams, or McKinley, or Cleveland, or John Adams, or Washington himself desired to be elected. It is pleasant to think that one's countrymen believe well of one. But I shall not do anything whatever to secure

THE ONE CONSIDERATION

my nomination save to try to carry on the public business in such shape that decent citizens will believe I have shown wisdom, integrity and courage. If they believe this with sufficient emphasis to secure my nomination and election-and on no other terms can I, or would I, be willing to secure either-why, I shall be glad. If they do not I shall be sorry, but I shall not be very much cast down, because I shall feel that I have done the best that was in me, and that there is nothing I have yet done of which I have cause to be ashamed or which I have cause to regret; and that I can go out of office with the profound satisfaction of having accomplished a certain amount of work that was both beneficial and honorable for the country."

Substantially the same idea he had expressed to others from the day he succeeded to the presidency. Yet the newspapers have never ceased figuring upon his relations with this and that party magnate; and every time he has stirred or opened his mouth they have speculated in all seriousness on the way his secondterm aspirations would be affected thereby. Of course, his competitors would be from both the great parties: the Republicans would con