The rise of Theodore Roosevelt - Edmund Morris [209]
DAILY THE SUN GREW hotter, softening the asphalt in the streets and glaring on marble and whitewash. Slum dwellers began to sweep out their shanties, filling the air with acrid dust. Pleasure-boats on the Potomac hoarsely encouraged office-workers to play hooky. Every evening millions of mosquitoes left the marshes south of the White House and fanned out in search of human blood. As August approached, the city’s population decreased by almost one-third, and the tempo of government business slowed almost to a standstill.62
Roosevelt was unable to prevent the Civil Service Commission from lapsing into what he called “innocuous desuetude.” The evidence is he did not try very hard, for his own duties were light. “It is pretty dreary to sizzle here, day after day, doing routine work that the good Lyman is quite competent to attend to himself.” He tried to begin his history of New York, but found he could not write. He spent $1.50 on a new volume of Swinburne, read a few voluptuous lines, then threw it away in disgust. “My life,” he mourned, “seems to grow more and more sedentary, and I am rapidly sinking into fat and lazy middle age.”63
Clearly he was in need of his annual vacation in the West. If President Harrison would only hurry up and announce the dismissal of Postmaster Paul, he could take the next train out of town “with a light heart and a clear conscience.”64 But the White House preserved an enigmatic silence. Then, as Roosevelt chafed at his desk, a thunderbolt struck him.
FRANK HATTON, editor of the Washington Post, was an ex–Postmaster General and an enemy of Civil Service Reform.65 He was also a shrewd promoter who knew the value of a running fight in boosting circulation. On 28 July he suddenly decided to launch an attack on Roosevelt. His lead editorial derided the Commissioner as “this young ‘banged’ (and still to be banged more) disciple of counterfeit reform.” He accused Roosevelt of personally condoning many violations of the Civil Service Law, and of misappropriating—or misspending—large sums of federal money. Without being specific as to any recent crimes, Hatton said that “the Fifth Avenue sport” had bribed his way into the New York mayoralty campaign, and made “disreputable” deals with machine politicians.66
Nostrils dilated, Roosevelt rushed to the podium to deny these “falsehoods.” He was tempted, he said, to use “a still stronger and shorter word.”67 Hatton’s reply, published the following day, shrewdly played upon that temptation.
THE POST regrets that this spangled and glittering reformer, if he is bound to get mad, should not do so in more classic style. You are not a ranchman now, Mr. Theodore Roosevelt … Banish your cowboy manners until the end of your trip, which the evening papers announce you are to take in a few days. And, by the way … have you made the proper application for a leave of absence, or have you ordered yourself West, that you may have the Government pay your ‘legitimate’ travelling expenses?
THE POST had an idea that it would bring to the raw the surface of the callow Roosevelt … For you to say that the [Civil Service] law has not been violated is to advertise yourself as a classical ignoramus, and the sooner you hie yourself West to your reservation, where you can rest your overworked brain, the more considerate you will be to yourself.
Now, Mr. Commissioner Roosevelt, you can mount your broncho and be off. Personally, THE POST wishes you well. It enjoys you.
On the same day this editorial appeared, Roosevelt bumped into President Harrison, who had doubtless read it with amusement over breakfast. Psychologically the moment was unsuitable for a speech in Western dialect, but Roosevelt, hoping he could persuade Harrison not to take Wanamaker’s side in the Paul case, made one anyhow. He quoted the prayer of