AN APOSTOLIC PRESIDENT.

Evening Post, Volume LXXV, Issue 29, 4 February 1908, Page 6

AN APOSTOLIC PRESIDENT.

4> President Roosevelt's vocal capacity, and his habit of delive-ring sermons full of moral commonplaces from the stops of the White House, have usually affected his critics to amusement not unmixed with irritation. The official thunder with which he accompanies ! statements of the obvious seems always a triflo theatrical. "What I most admiro about you, Theodore," said one of his political friends, "is your original discovery of the Ten CommandmentsBut there is ground for thinking that in Roosevelt's caso the pose is the man, and that when he stints, he struts sincerely, because it is his nature. That does not alte r the ridiculous ar.poct of some of his past fulmjoa lions, buiv at least {

it frees him from the original suspicion of hypocrisy. Ho honestly believos himself a man sent from God to illuminate the darkness of America, to right tho wrong and to purge iniquity. And he has succeeded in .naking a majority of American electors agree with Ins own conception of himself. So that, if he had only been acting, tne calculated merit of his acting would have been proved sound by his success. But we have absolved him from that suspicion, as the mass of Americans has absolved him. His speeches are taken at his own valuation, and influence the country profoundly. This shows that he knows better or feels better than, his critics what tho country needs. And it must be owned that his utterances go always m the right direction. He is foe to dishonesty, foe to tyrannic monopoly, and such an advocate of tho rights of tho common people that a prominent Democrat describes his last message as the best Democratic document ever issued by a Republican President. For once President Roosevelt seems to have beon eloquent as well as moral. The special message to Congress, reported by cable, is described as "the most impassionad and stirring document ever ' issued from th« White House." It is a new movement jin the war against Trusts, a denunciation of business corruption. Standard Oil and the Atchison Railroad are apparently taken as types of the organised crimes of giant monopoly and industrial gambling. The President asks for now restrictive legislation, and suggests that Exchange speculation in future values b© prevented. He asks for the Government regulation of railroad stocks, and tho exercise of control over inter-State traffic for the Federal benefit. Employers must recognise that they have obligations as well as rights, and Government should ascertain and enforce those obligations. The message recommends the re-enact-ment of employers' liability legislation, in order to meet the Supreme Court's decision that its Federal province is constitutionally confined to inter-State affairs. Altogether a rousing election placard. For it is in regard ta its effect on the coming election of a President that tho document will receive particular American consideration. President Roosevelt evidently has made up his mind tlmt the trumps of reform are still good in - the game, and he flings them out superbly. Ho deals in big issues, and "trusts the people." The result of his message will be still further to emphasise the division between tho moneyed section of the Republican party and the bulk of its supporters. It looks as if a clean breach had been made in the traditional defences of the "machine." And the reception of tho message indicates that, unless new circumstances arise, the vbte for Roosevelt or Roosevelt's nominee is likely to be overwhelming.