Theodore Rex - Edmund Morris [464]
71 “If I am” James Wilson, “On the Law of Nature,” in The Works of James Wilson, ed. Robert G. McCloskey (Cambridge, Mass., 1967), 132–33. The author is indebted to David H. Burton for relating TR’s speech to this essay. Burton argues that TR, in the fall of 1906, feared that his recent sheaf of progressive legislation might be challenged by the judiciary, which was traditionally biased in favor of property rights. Be that as it may, historians may detect in the Harrisburg speech the first signs of what was to become one of the most controversial demands of Progressivism: popular recall of judicial decisions.
72 Propelled by Summary Discharge, 178. TR’s order, transmitted by the War Department, was dated 4 Oct. 1906, the day of his visit to Harrisburg. As the quoted paragraph makes clear (see the complete order for repetitive emphasis), he had already decided that the men of the Twenty-fifth were guilty.
73 His old friend arrived The following account is taken from Lee, Good Innings, vol. 1, 323–27.
74 Lee remembered Alan Clark, ed., “A Good Innings”: The Private Papers of Viscount Lee of Fareham, P.C., G.C.B., G.C.S.I., G.B.E. (London, 1974), 69–71. See 1–7 for a biographical sketch of Lee.
75 Lee left Lee, in A Good Innings, glosses over the redundancy of his visit, and is at pains to represent himself as having had to perform a painful duty in getting rid of Sir Mortimer. If he had come when TR had first summoned him, on 27 July, he might indeed have administered the coup de grâce, but illness delayed his departure until 3 October. Grey’s letter recalling Durand was dispatched the following day (Durand diary, 21 Oct. 1906) (HMD). Durand subsequently heard that “the President has been complaining of me through Henry White” (ibid., 12 Nov. 1906). See also Nevins, Henry White, 224–25, and, for TR’s “appointment” letter, TR, Letters, vol. 5, 458. When Lee reprinted this letter, he omitted the names of two alternative ambassadors suggested by TR: Cecil Spring Rice and Munro Ferguson.
76 Sir Mortimer was Durand to Lord Lansdowne, 6 Dec. 1906, and to Madge Durand, 15 Dec. 1906 (HMD).
77 Edith Roosevelt had Durand to “Nell,” 9 Aug. 1904, and to Coutts Bank, 16 Dec. 1904 (HMD).
78 “I must try” Durand diary, 21 Oct. 1906 (HMD). For a full account of Durand’s recall, see Tilchin, Theodore Roosevelt, 111–13.
79 BY NOW, TAFT Magoon, former Governor of the Panama Canal Zone, was sworn in on 13 Oct. 1906. Although TR had told Taft to announce that elections would be held immediately, the corruption of Cuba’s political process was found to be so extreme that representative government was not restored until 1908. Magoon was a popular and gentle executive who issued no death sentences and was even criticized for his leniency. The United States withdrew from Cuba by TR’s outside deadline of 28 Jan. 1909. David A. Lockmiller, Magoon in Cuba: A History of the Second Intervention (Chapel Hill, 1938). See also Perkins, Constraint of Empire, 18–19; Marks, Velvet on Iron, 141.
80 “It is important” Weaver, Senator, 113.
81 Ignoring him The extraordinary care with which TR prepared for Moody’s appointment belies his reputation for hasty decision making. See Heffron, “Mr. Justice Moody,” and, for a parallel example at the lower federal level, Elting E. Morison, “Theodore Roosevelt Appoints a Judge,” Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historial Society 72 (1963). Moody proved to be a distinguished but sadly short-tenured Justice, of mostly conservative opinions, whose lucid powers of expression earned the praise of both Oliver Wendell Holmes and Felix Frankfurter. A collapse of the central nervous system forced his retirement from the Supreme Court in 1910. He died, after years of torment, in 1917.
82 General Garlington’s Brownsville See Summary Discharge, 178–83.
83 He stated Ibid., 179.
84 Garlington had then Ibid., 180–82.
85 On 30 October Harlan, Booker T. Washington, 309; Gould, Presidency of Theodore Roosevelt, 232–35; Review of Reviews, Dec. 1906.
86 Charles Evans Hughes Hughes, forty-four