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MR. ROOSEVELT'S ROLE.

The issue between the President and the Legislature that was raised in three different forms during the month of February is highly significant of the new phase into which American politics is entering. For the moment it might appear that the Senate triumphs at the expense of Mr. Roosevelt. But that aspect of the conflict is but a superficial one, a fact which becomes clear enough when we look more closely at the general progress of affairs in the United States.

The three grounds of dispute which have come prominently before the world cover the most important points of national policy, the trusts, relations with Europe and the Monroe doctrine. There is no doubt that on each of these matters the line taken by the President has the approval of the nation while the Senate has behind it the written law of the Constitution. Although there is no reason to apprehend acute conflict at the moment, who can say that during Mr. Roosevelt's present term incidents may not arise which will pose the two forces in the State in violent opposition? As Mr. Bryce pointed out in 1888 "Congress has succeeded in occupying nearly all of the area which the Constitution left vacant and unallotted between the several authorities it established." The critical question for the United States to consider and decide is how long the Senate (for the Senate is particularly concerned) will be permitted to retain possession of the usurped territory. The answer will depend to a certain extent on pressure extraneous to America. But apart altogether from foreign action, the conflict will begin seriously so soon as ever Mr. Roosevelt believes that the interest of the country demands it.

The President is of course singularly well equipped for such an enterprise.

Since Lincoln no one has taken the office with anything like the personal prestige he has won, and Lincoln only represented a part of the nation during a civil war. Mr. Roosevelt has impressed his character in an extraordinary way upon the imagination of all classes. In the first place he is sprung from a stock which may be termed aristocratic and has produced no Presidents since the early days of the Union. This enables him to appreciate the views of that particular class in a way no other President has been competent to do; and in the course of a varied and extraordinarily active life he has come into touch with all others and displayed a wide gift of sympathy and appreciation of their peculiar views. He is therefore, apart from the incidents of his political, military and administrative career, singularly qualified to gauge the national mind in its entirety. He is in no sense a machine-man, having come to his office originally in spite of the machine and been confirmed in it, not so much by the action of the machine as by its enforced action under popular pressure. On the other hand the Senate is in great measure the creation of the machine, its chairs are greatly in the party gift and are often the reward of dubious party services. There can be little doubt that it is the President, rather than the Senate, who enjoys the esteem of the public; therefore, as the "Times" correspondent points out, Mr. Roosevelt "never hesitates to appeal to the country when Congress falters." When such an appeal is actually formulated on a vital point involving the existing Constitution, we shall see the opening of a struggle that will entirely change the aspect of American Government.

It would be gratuitous pedantry to attempt prophecy as to the exact field of

hostilities. It may not come in an acute form this year or the next but the whole evolution of American affairs makes it inevitable. As in this country, the progress of a democratic system is destroying the power of the debating chamber. No one who watches the course of British politics attempts to deny that the Cabinet is rapidly ousting the House of Commons from its predominant position. It is quite possible that less subservient majorities than the present may from time to time appear to check the process, but the check will only be temporary and the decline of Parliament will continue. No Cabinet, whatever its complexion, will abandon the powers with which its predecessors have armed it, for an Executive wants to get things done and administration properly conducted, while the legislative body exists for talk and wants to advertise itself. The Executive again knows how all the best work of the country is performed in quiet and how fatally longwinded dilatory debate may interfere with national necessities.

The same process is at work in America and for similar reasons, though the conditions of the Constitution will render a struggle between the contending forces more conspicuous and therefore apparently more dangerous than in Great Britain, but we have no doubt as to the ultimate victory of the President. Mr. Roosevelt won his victory upon the very grounds that will tend to develop the Presidential predominance, the need for a strong foreign policy and large armaments. In home affairs he is distinctly taking a line which sooner rather than later will bring him into sharp collision with the great interests that dominate the Senate. The control of railways by the Trusts is exciting a genuine and growing resentment throughout American society. It is quite clear from his speech on 1 February that the Presi

dent is determined to deal drastically with what is rapidly becoming a public scandal. No one who knows anything of America, or who looks upon the matter from a general attitude of principle, will deny that he was right in claiming that the greatest need is "the increase in the power of the National Government to keep the great highways of commerce open alike to all on reasonable and equitable terms." As the country fills up and competition cuts more keenly, the oppression of the great corporations will be more acutely felt. The House of Representatives has already accepted the "Townsend" Bill, but nobody believes that the Senate will do so. It will not be any the more ready to do it now that Mr. Bryan has declared himself on Mr. Roosevelt's side. The influence of railways in the Senate is overwhelming, but there can be little doubt which side would win if at any time it came to a real struggle and an appeal to the people.

In the question of S. Domingo again the Senate appears to have made good its claim to decide whether or no the arrangement come to between that ef fete and troubled State and the encroaching Government of the United States shall be ratified. Mr. Roosevelt will submit with a good grace, and there is not much probability that the protocol will be seriously impaired, but the capacity for mischief latent in a body like the Senate under its existing privileges can hardly be exaggerated. The rejection of the Arbitration Treaties matters little in itself. Those instruments would have effected little either for good or evil, but the whole incident is only an instructive skirmish on the ground where far heavier engagements may be fought at any moment. Mr. Roosevelt is the embodiment of the national demand for an active foreign policy and he has the constitutional right of command of the army and navy. As it is only since the

Spanish war that the United States can be correctly said to have definitely taken a conspicuous place in the politics of the world, the extraordinary developments in the Presidential power which that step brings with it have hardly yet been realized, but it will help every day to exalt him at the expense of the Legislature. The declarations regarding the Monroe Doctrine which Mr. Roosevelt himself and leading supporters have made of late involve similar results.

No man in his position can help contemplating with envy the free hand allowed a British Minister in the manipulation of foreign affairs, but, if not Mr. Roosevelt, then some early successor will find himself no less generously entrusted with the national interests of the United States. The dangers and difficulties inherent in any attempt to conduct complicated negotiations through representative bodies may any day appear aggressively insistent even to the average American. A business people will quickly appreciate the most The Saturday Review.

businesslike way of conducting public affairs. Hitherto the existing framework has sufficiently served public requirements. The new developments make it quite impossible that they can do so much longer. In spite of all the precautions of the founders of the Constitution the time is rapidly approaching when in electing the President the people will recognize that they endow him for a season with prerogatives more than regal because he embodies their own absolutism.

The American public will in the end welcome this solution as the British have done who have slid by almost imperceptible gradations into accepting the rule of a practically despotic ministry for a terminable period. The Legislature in both cases becomes a hortatory and minatory, not a governing, body. The people take supreme interest in the character and capacity of their rulers whom they may accept or reject but less every day in the inconclusive discussions of elective assemblies.

BOOKS AND AUTHORS.

Randall Parrish's new novel, "My Lady of the North," as the experienced reader guesses from the title, is a story of the Civil war. Told in the first person by one of Lee's cavalry officers, it presents a rapid succession of incidents, interwoven with a mysterious romance whose secret is not disclosed till the final chapter. Guerilla raids play a striking part in the plot. A. C. McClurg & Co.

The novel of international intrigue is forging to the front, nowadays, and E. Phillips Oppenheim makes a striking contribution to the list with his "Mysterious Mr. Sabin." The plot

centres in the attempts of two rival Continental Powers to gain possession of a set of papers known to contain secret information regarding the coast defences and naval strength of England, but to the mysterious Mr. Sabin their schemes are only preliminary to a daring and romantic enterprise of his own, in which are involved the fortunes of the charming heroine. With so congenial a theme, Mr. Oppenheim's remarkable ingenuity and command of detail are seen at their best, and his readers will follow the narrative with keen interest to the last of his four hundred closely printed pages. Little, Brown & Co.

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PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LENOX
TILDEN FOUNDATIONS.

THE LIVING AGE:

3 Weekly Magazine of Contemporary Literature and Chought.

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Tokens of the coming storm are now many and unmistakable, and cries are heard that the Russian ship of State is in danger. But they are the fears of men of little faith. It is not the ship of State that is in peril. That stout vessel will weather worse storms than any as yet experienced in Europe, not excepting the tempest of 1789. Manned by a hardy, buoyant, resourceful crew, it has nought to fear. Nothing is now at issue beyond the present trip and the rights and duties of the skipper. And on those questions a decision must soon be taken. For compass and chart have been put aside and we are drifting towards rocks and sandbanks. Of the crew-with no goal to attract, no commander to inspirit them-some are indifferent and many sluggish while the most active are preparing to mutiny. They all merge their welfare in the safety of the ship, and as a consequence would persuade or if necessary compel the captain to take a pilot on board. It is in that temper-for which history may perhaps

find a less harsh term than criminalthat the real and only danger lies.

To point out that danger and help to ward it off were the legitimate objects of my former article1; and the means I used were honestly adjusted to those ends. If I pitched my voice in too high a key, it was for fear I should fail to strike ears that had long been deaf to loud warnings; if I touched my imperial master with ungentle hand, it was because I believed he was on the point of drowning. Honi soit qui mal y pense. I may have been mistaken. Coming events will perhaps soon enable my critics to measure the distance that separated my judgment from political wisdom and my intentions from enlightened loyalty. Meanwhile I am solaced by the thought that history knows of fellow countrymen of mine, honored by rulers and ruled, who caused far greater pain than I have done to individual Tsars and Tsarivitches, in

1 See "The Tsar" in The Living Age, August 27, 1904.

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