M

Macaulay, Lord

I am rather a fanatic about Macaulay. Of course in a man with such an active life, and a man who wrote so much, there will be occasional expressions or convictions with which I do not agree; but in most cases I think these were matters as to which it was impossible that he and I should have the same understanding. In all the essentials he seems to me more and more as I grow older a very great political philosopher and statesman, no less than one of the two or three very greatest historians. Of course I am undoubtedly partly influenced by the fact that he typifies common sense mixed with high idealism, but also the same and tempered radicalism which seem to me to make for true progress. (To Sir George Otto Trevelyan, March 19, 1913.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 207; Bishop II, 177.

____________. I always take in my saddle-pocket some volume (I am too old now to be satisfied merely with a hunter’s life), and among the most worn are the volumes of Macaulay. Upon my word, the more often I read him, whether the History or the Essays, the greater my admiration becomes. I read him primarily for pleasure, as I do all books; but I get any amount of profit from him, incidentally. Of all the authors I know I believe I should first choose him as the man whose writings will most help a man of action who desires to be both efficient and decent, to keep straight and yet be of some account in the world. (To Sir George Otto Trevelyan, September 10, 1909.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 202; Bishop II, 173.

Macaulay's "History."

I . . . reread Macaulay's "History." When I had finished it I felt a higher regard for him as a great writer, and as in the truest sense of the word a great philosophical historian, than I have ever felt before. It is a pretty good test of such a history to have a President who is also a candidate for the presidency read it in the midst of a campaign. (To Sir George Otto Trevelyan, November 24, 1904.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 169; Bishop II, 144.

Machine, Political

The terms machine and machine politician are now undoubtedly used ordinarily in a reproachful sense; but it does not at all follow that this sense is always the right one. On the contrary, the machine is often a very powerful instrument for good; and a machine politician really desirous of doing honest work on behalf of the community is fifty times as useful an ally as is the average philanthropic outsider. Indeed, it is of course true, that any political organization (and absolutely no good work can be done in politics without an organization) is a machine; and any man who perfects and uses this organization is himself, to a certain extent, a machine politician. In the rough, however, the feeling against machine politics and politicians is tolerably well justified by the facts, although this statement really reflects most severely upon the educated and honest people who largely hold themselves aloof from public life, and show a curious incapacity for fulfilling their public duties. . . .

The reason why the word machine has come to be used, to a certain extent, as a term of opprobrium is to be found in the fact that these organizations are now run by the leaders very largely as business concerns to benefit themselves and their followers, with little regard to the community at large. This is natural enough. The men having control and doing all the work have gradually come to have the same feeling about politics that other men have about the business of a merchant or manufacturer; it was too much to expect that if left entirely to themselves they would continue disinterestedly to work for the benefit of others. Many a machine politician who is to-day a most unwholesome influence in our politics is in private life quite as respectable as any one else; only he has forgotten that his business affects the State at large, and, regarding it as merely his own private concern, he has carried into it the same selfish spirit that actuates in business matters the majority of the average mercantile community. (Century, November 1886.) Mem. Ed. XV, 114; Nat. Ed. XIII, 76.

____________. Such words as "boss" and "machine" now imply evil, but both the implication the words carry and the definition of the words themselves are somewhat vague. A leader is necessary; but his opponents always call him a boss. An organization is necessary; but the men in opposition always call it a machine. Nevertheless, there is a real and deep distinction between the leader and the boss, between organizations and machines. A political leader who fights openly for principles, and who keeps his position of leadership by stirring the consciences and convincing the intellects of his followers, so that they have confidence in him and will follow him because they can achieve greater results under him than under any one else, is doing work which is indispensable in a democracy. . . . The machine is simply another name for the kind of organization which is certain to grow up in a party or sec- tion of a party controlled by . . . [bosses] and by their henchmen, whereas, of course, an effective organization of decent men is essential in order to secure decent politics. (1913.) Mem. Ed. XXII, 178; Nat. Ed. XX, 152.

Machine, Political, in New York City

In New York City, as in most of our other great municipalities, the direction of political affairs has been for many years mainly in the hands of a class of men who make politics their regular business and means of livelihood. These men are able to keep their grip only by means of the singularly perfect way in which they have succeeded in organizing their respective parties and factions; and it is in consequence of the clockwork regularity and efficiency with which these several organizations play their parts, alike for good and for evil, that they have been nicknamed by outsiders “machines,” while the men who take part in and control, or, as they would themselves say, "run" them, now form a well-recognized and fairly well-defined class in the community, and are familiarly known as machine politicians. (Century, November 1886.) Mem. Ed. XV, 114; Nat. Ed. XIII, 76.

Machines, Political — Alliance Between

Our fight is a fundamental fight against both of the old corrupt party machines, for both are under the dominion of the plunder league of the professional politicians who are controlled and sustained by the great beneficiaries of privilege and reaction. How close is the alliance between the two machines is shown by the attitude of that portion of those north-eastern newspapers, including the majority of the great dailies in all the northeastern cities— Boston, Buffalo, Springfield, Hartford, Philadelphia, and, above all, New York—which are controlled by or representative of the interests which, in popular phrase, are conveniently grouped together as the Wall Street interests. The large majority of these papers supported Judge Parker for the presidency in 1904; almost unanimously they supported Mr. Taft for the Republican nomination this year; the large majority are now supporting Professor Wilson for the election. Some of them still prefer Mr. Taft to Mr. Wilson, but all make either Mr. Taft or Mr. Wilson their first choice; and one of the ludicrous features of the campaign is that those papers supporting Professor Wilson show the most jealous partisanship for Mr. Taft whenever they think his interests are jeopardized by the Progressive movement—that, for instance, any electors will obey the will of the majority of the Republican voters at the pri maries, and vote for me instead of obeying the will of the Messrs. Barnes-Penrose-Guggenheim combination by voting for Mr. Taft. (Before Progressive National Convention, Chicago, August 6, 1912.) Mem. Ed. XIX, 359; Nat. Ed. XVII, 255.

Machines, Political — Roosevelt's Relations With

When, after the Spanish War, I got to a position of such importance that a good deal of consideration had to be paid me, I was very successful; and, as President, I was able to do a great deal that I wished to do. This was done merely because I utilized the reformers without letting them grow perfectly wild- eyed; and I yet kept in some kind of relations with the machine men, so as to be on a living basis with them, although I had to thwart them at every turn. But, when I got back from Africa, I found that everything had split. Taft had thrown in his lot with the sordid machine crowd, as had most of my former efficient political supporters. (To Kermit Roosevelt, January 27, 1915.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 420; Bishop II, 357.

Machines, Political

See also Boss; Bribery; Corruption; Election Reforms; Governor Of New York; Independent; Organization; Party Allegiance; Party System; Platt, T. C.; Political Parties; Politicians; Politics; Primaries; Roosevelt's Political Career; Saloon; Tammany Hall.

McKinley, William

McKinley is a man hardly even of moderate means. He is about as well off say as a division superintendent of the New York Central railroad. He lives in a little house at Canton just as such a division superintendent who had retired would live in a little house in Auburn or some other small New York city or big country town. He comes from the typical hard-working farmer stock of our country. In every instinct and feeling he is closely in touch with, and the absolute representative of, the men who make up the immense bulk of our Nation—the small merchants, clerks, farmers and mechanics who formed the backbone of the patriotic party under Washington in the Revolution; of the Republican Party under Lincoln at the time of the Civil War. His one great anxiety while President has been to keep in touch with this body of people and to give expression to their desires and sentiments. He has been so successful that within a year he has been re-elected by an overwhelming majority, a majority including the bulk of the wage-workers and the very great bulk of the farmers. He has been to a high degree accessible to everyone. At his home anyone could see him just as easily as anyone else could be seen. All that was necessary was, if he was engaged, to wait until his engagement was over. More than almost any public man I have ever met, he has avoided exciting personal enmities. I have never heard him denounce or assail any man or any body of men. There is in the country at this time the most widespread confidence in and satisfaction with his policies. (To H. C. Lodge, September 9, 1901.) Lodge Letters I, 499.

___________. It is not too much to say that at the time of President McKinley's death he was the most widely loved man in all the United States; while we have never had any public man of his position who has been so wholly free from the bitter animosities incident to public life. His political opponents were the first to bear the heartiest and most generous tribute to the broad kindliness of nature, the sweetness and gentleness of character which so endeared him to his close associates. To a standard of lofty integrity in public life he united the tender affections and home virtues which are all- important in the make-up of national character. A gallant soldier in the great war for the Union, he also shone as an example to all our people because of his conduct in the most sacred and intimate of home relations. There could be no personal hatred of him, for he never acted with aught but consideration for the welfare of others. No one could fail to respect him who knew him in public or private life. (First Annual Message, Washington, December 3, 1901.) Mem. Ed. XVII, 93-94; Nat. Ed. XV, 81-82.

____________. It was given to President McKinley to take the foremost place in our political life at a time when our country was brought face to face with problems more momentous than any whose solution we have ever attempted, save only in the Revolution and in the Civil War; and it was under his leadership that the nation solved these mighty problems aright. Therefore he shall stand in the eyes of history not merely as the first man of his generation, but as among the greatest figures in our national life, coming second only to the men of the two great crises in which the Union was founded and preserved.

No man could carry through successfully such a task as President McKinley undertook, unless trained by long years of effort for its performance. Knowledge of his fellow citizens, ability to understand them, keen sympathy with even their innermost feelings, and yet power to lead them, together with far-sighted sagacity and resolute belief both in the people and in their future— all these were needed in the man who headed the march of our people during the eventful years from 1896 to 1901. These were the qualities possessed by McKinley and developed by him throughout his whole history previous to assuming the presidency. (At banquet in honor of birthday of William McKinley, Canton, O., January 27, 1903.) Mem. Ed. XII, 494; Nat. Ed. XI, 237.

____________. No other President in our history has seen high and honorable effort crowned with more conspicuous personal success. No other President entered upon his second term feeling such right to a profound and peaceful satisfaction. Then by a stroke of horror, so strange in its fantastic iniquity as to stand unique in the black annals of crime, he was struck down. . . . He won greatness by meeting and solving the issues as they arose—not by shirking them—meeting them with wisdom, with the exercise of the most skilful and cautious judgment, but with fearless resolution when the time of crisis came. He met each crisis on its own merits; he never sought excuse for shirking a task in the fact that it was different from the one he had expected to face. The long public career, which opened when as a boy he carried a musket in the ranks and closed when as a man in the prime of his intellectual strength he stood among the world's chief statesmen, came to what it was because he treated each triumph as opening the road to fresh effort, not as an excuse for ceasing from effort. (At banquet in honor of birthday of William McKinley, Canton, O., January 27, 1903.) Mem. Ed. XII, 500-501; Nat. Ed. XI, 242-243.

McKinley, William

See also Election of 1896; Election Of 1900; Maine.

Madison, James

In the Constitutional Convention Madison, a moderate federalist, was the man who, of all who were there, saw things most clearly as they were, and whose theories most closely corresponded with the principles finally adopted; and although even he was at first dissatisfied with the result, and both by word and by action interpreted the Constitution in widely different ways at different times, still this was Madison's time of glory; he was one of the statesmen who do extremely useful work, but only at some single given crisis. While the Constitution was being formed and adopted, he stood in the very front; but in his later career he sunk his own individuality, and became a mere pale shadow of Jefferson. (1888.) Mem. Ed. VIII, 379; Nat. Ed. VII, 327-328.

____________. Excepting Jefferson, we have never produced an Executive more helpless than Madison, when it came to grappling with real dangers and difficulties. Like his predecessor, he was only fit to be President in a time of profound peace; he was utterly out of place the instant matters grew turbulent, or difficult problems arose to be solved, and he was a ridiculously incompetent leader for a war with Great Britain. He was entirely too timid to have embarked on such a venture of his own accord, and was simply forced into it by the threat of losing his second term. (1888.) Mem. Ed. VIII, 531-532; Nat. Ed. VII, 459-460.

Madison, James

See also Federalist, The.

Mahan, A. T.

Admiral Mahan belonged in that limited class of men whose honorable ambition it is to render all the service in their power to the cause which they espouse, and who care to achieve distinction and reward for themselves only by the success with which they render this service to the cause. He emphatically belonged among those invaluable workers, the only ones whose work really adds to the sum of mankind's achievement, of whom Ruskin spoke when he said that the only work worth doing was that done by the men who labored primarily for the sake of the labor itself and not for the fee. (Outlook , January 13, 1915.) Mem. Ed. XII, 554; Nat. Ed. XI, 278.

____________. Mahan's really great success came in Europe, and especially in England, before it came here. The American public took him at his true worth only with reluctance, and after educated and far-seeing Englishmen had hailed him with relief and enthusiasm as the man of genius who was able to bring home to the minds of the people as a whole truths to which they would not listen when told by less gifted men. In dealing with our naval officers, in working for the navy from within the navy, Mahan was merely one among a number of first-class men; and many of these other first-class men were better than he was in the practical handling of the huge and complicated instruments of modern war. But in the vitally important task of convincing the masters of all of us—the people as a whole—of the importance of a true understanding of naval needs, Mahan stood alone. There was no one else in his class or anywhere near it. (Outlook, January 13, 1915.) Mem. Ed. XII, 556; Nat. Ed. XI, 279.

Mahan's Influence of Sea Power Upon History

Captain Mahan has written distinctively the best and most important, and also by far the most interesting, book on naval history which has been produced on either side of the water for many a long year. Himself an officer who has seen active service and borne himself with honor under fire, he starts with an advantage that no civilian can possess. On the other hand, he does not show the shortcomings which make the average military man an exasperatingly incompetent military historian. His work is in every respect scholarly, and has not a trace of the pedantry which invariably mars mere self-conscious striving after scholarship. He is thoroughly conversant with his subject, and has prepared himself for it by exhaustive study and research, and he approaches it in, to use an old-fashioned phrase, an entirely philosophical spirit. He subordinates detail to mass-effects, trying always to grasp and make evident the essential features of a situation; and he neither loses sight of nor exaggerates the bearing which the history of past struggles has upon our present problems. (Atlantic Monthly, October 1890.) Mem. Ed. XIV, 306; Nat. Ed. XII, 264.

Mahan's Life of Nelson

Captain Mahan has met the requirements necessary for an historian of the first class. He knows all the minute details of the subject so well that he can with an unsparing hand exercise the all-important right of rejection. Out of the immense mass of trivialities he selects the essential and the essential only. Nelson lived and died in a light as fierce and brilliant as any that ever beat upon a throne, and there is not a single fact of importance in reference to his career now left to be gathered by the most industrious gleaner in the stubble of historical literature. All the facts of importance are practically uncontested. In consequence Captain Mahan has been able almost entirely to discard footnotes, the necessary bane of the ordinary historian even of the first rank. The facts with which he deals are uncontested; but the power and vividness with which he sets them forth, and the unerring sagacity of his deductions from them, are new, and are all his own. He writes with careful self- restraint, and with careful suppression of all that is in any way redundant, or aside from his main theme. His style is concise and clear; it is simple, and yet it rises level to the needs of the feats of wonderful heroism which he describes. In short, the book has the vigor and the simplicity that mark the classic in any tongue. Biography, like portrait-painting, is perhaps the most difficult branch of the art of which it is a part; and Captain Mahan has written the best of all naval biographies, about the greatest of all sea-captains, the man who was himself the embodiment of sea power in action. (Bookman, June 1897.) Mem. Ed. XIV, 327-328; Nat. Ed. XII, 281.

Maine—Sinking of the

Being a Jingo, as I am writing confidentially, I will say, to relieve my feelings, that I would give anything if President McKinley would order the fleet to Havana to-morrow. This Cuban business ought to stop. The Maine was sunk by an act of dirty treachery on the part of the Spaniards, I believe; though we shall never find out definitely, and officially it will go down as an accident. (Letter of February 16, 1898.) Mem. Ed. XXIII, 99; Bishop I, 85.

____________. Let me again earnestly urge that you advise the President against our conducting any examination in conjunction with the Spaniards as to the Maine's disaster. I myself doubt whether it will be possible to tell definitely how the disaster occurred by an investigation, and it may be that we could do it as well in conjunction with the Spaniards as alone. But I am sure we could never convince the people at large of this fact. . . . I was informed that both Speaker Reed and Senator Hale had stated that we should cease building any more battleships, in view of the disaster to the Maine. I cannot believe that the statement is true, for of course such an attitude, if supported by the people, would mean that we had reached the last pitch of national cowardice and baseness. I earnestly wish that you could see your way clear now, without waiting a day, to send in a special message, stating that in view of the disaster to the Maine (and perhaps in view of the possible needs of this country) instead of recommending one battleship you ask for two, or better still, that four battleships be authorized immediately by Congress. (To Secretary John D. Long, February 19, 1898.) Mem. Ed. XXIII, 99; Bishop I, 85.

____________. Of course I have nothing to say as to the policy of the Government, but I hope this incident [Maine] will not be treated by itself, but as part of the whole Cuban business. There is absolutely but one possible solution of a permanent nature to that affair, and that is Cuban independence. The sooner we make up our minds to this the better. If we can attain our object peacefully, of course we should try to do so; but we should attain it one way or the other anyhow. (To Henry White, March 9, 1898.) Mem. Ed. XXIII, 101; Bishop I, 86.

Maine

See also Cuba; Spanish-American War.

Majority—Tyranny of the

The majority in a democracy has no more right to tyrannize over a minority than, under a different system, the latter would have to oppress the former; and . . . if there is a moral principle at stake, the saying that the voice of the people is the voice of God may be quite as untrue, and do quite as much mischief, as the old theory of the divine right of kings. (1887.) Mem. Ed. VIII, 91; Nat. Ed. VII, 80.

Majority

See also Minority; Popular Rule; Privilege.

"Malefactors of Great Wealth."

Too much cannot be said against the men of wealth who sacrifice everything to getting wealth. There is not in the world a more ignoble character than the mere money-getting American, insensible to every duty, regardless of every principle, bent only on amassing a fortune, and putting his fortune only to the basest uses —whether these uses be to speculate in stocks and wreck railroads himself, or to allow his son to lead a life of foolish and expensive idleness and gross debauchery, or to purchase some scoundrel of high social position, foreign or native, for his daughter. Such a man is only the more dangerous if he occasionally does some deed like founding a college or endowing a church, which makes those good people who are also foolish forget his real iniquity. These men are equally careless of the working men, whom they oppress, and of the State, whose existence they imperil. There are not very many of them, but there is a very great number of men who approach more or less closely to the type, and, just in so far as they do so approach, they are curses to the country. (Forum, February 1895.) Mem. Ed. XV, 10; Nat. Ed. XIII, 9.

"Malefactors of Great Wealth" and the Panic of 1907

It may well be that the determination of the government (in which, gentlemen, it will not waver) to punish certain malefactors of great wealth, has been responsible for something of the trouble; at least to the extent of having caused these men to combine to bring about as much financial stress as possible, in order to discredit the policy of the government and thereby secure a reversal of that policy, so that they may enjoy unmolested the fruits of their own evil-doing. . . . I regard this contest as one to determine who shall rule this free country—the people through their governmental agents, or a few ruthless and domineering men whose wealth makes them peculiarly formidable because they hide behind the breastworks of corporate organization. (At Pilgrim Memorial Monument, Provincetown, Mass., August 20, 1907.) Mem. Ed. XVIII, 99; Nat. Ed. XVI, 84.

"Malefactors of Great Wealth."

See also Corporations; Fortunes; Monopolies; Trusts; Wall Street; Wealth.

Manhood—Qualities of

We need . . . the iron qualities that must go with true manhood. We need the positive virtues of resolution, of courage, of indomitable will, of power to do without shrinking the rough work that must always be done, and to persevere through the long days of slow progress or of seeming failure which always come before the final triumph, no matter how brilliant. But we need more than these qualities. This country cannot afford to have its sons less than men; but neither can it afford to have them other than good men. (At Colorado Springs, Col., August 2, 1901.) Mem. Ed. XV, 326; Nat. Ed. XIII, 457.

Manifest Destiny

The general feeling in the West . . . crystallized into what became known as the "Manifest Destiny" idea, which reduced to its simplest terms, was: that it was our manifest destiny to swallow up the land of all adjoining nations who were too weak to withstand us; a theory that forthwith obtained immense popularity among all statesmen of easy international morality. . . . The hearty Western support given to the movement was due to entirely different causes, the chief among them being the fact that the Westerners honestly believed themselves to be indeed created the heirs of the earth, or at least of so much of it as was known by the name of North America, and were prepared to struggle stoutly for the immediate possession of their heritage. (1887.) Mem. Ed. VIII, 31- 32; Nat. Ed. VII, 27-28.

Manifest Destiny

See also Expansion; Westward Movement. Manliness.

The ideal citizen of a free state must have in him the stuff which in time of need will enable him to show himself a first-class fighting man who scorns either to endure or to inflict wrong. American society is sound at core and this means that at the bottom we, as a people, accept as the basis of sound morality not slothful ease and soft selfishness and the loud timidity that fears every species of risk and hardship, but the virile strength of manliness which clings to the ideal of stern, unflinching performance of duty, and which follows whithersoever that ideal may lead. (New York Times, November 8, 1914.) Mem. Ed. XX, 99; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 86.

Manliness

See also Character; Fighting Virtues; Servility.

Manly Virtues the

Every citizen should be taught, both in public and in private life, that while he must avoid brawling and quarrelling, it is his duty to stand up for his rights. He must realize that the only man who is more contemptible than the blusterer and bully is the coward. No man is worth much to the commonwealth if he is not capable of feeling righteous wrath and just indignation, if he is not stirred to hot anger by misdoing, and is not impelled to see justice meted out to the wrong-doers. No man is worth much anywhere if he does not possess both moral and physical courage. (Forum, July 1894.) Mem. Ed. XV, 46; Nat. Ed. XIII, 32.

Manly Virtues

See also Courage; Cowardice; Fighting Qualities; Roman Empire ; Weakness.

Manual Training

See Education, Industrial.

Marina—Sinking of the

See Germany.

Marksmanship

The officers and enlisted men on board the ships must in their turn, by the exercise of unflagging and intelligent zeal, keep themselves fit to get the best use out of the weapons of war intrusted to their care. The instrument is always important, but the man who uses it is more important still. We must constantly endeavor to perfect our navy in all its duties in time of peace, and above all in manoeuvring in a seaway and in marksmanship with the great guns. In battle the only shots that count are those that hit, and marksmanship is a matter of long practice and of intelligent reasoning. (At Haverhill, Mass., August 26, 1902.) Presidential Addresses and State Papers I, 121.

Marksmanship

See also Navy—Efficiency of.

Marriage

[I] believe that the greatest privilege and greatest duty for any man is to be happily married; and that no other form of success or service, for either man or woman, can be wisely accepted as a substitute or alternative. (1913.) Mem. Ed. XXII, 67; Nat. Ed. XX, 58.

____________. I think the highest life, the ideal life, is the married life. But there are both unmarried men and unmarried women who perform service of the utmost consequence to the whole people; and it is equally foolish and wicked for a man to slur the unmarried woman when he would not dream of slurring the unmarried man. Bishop Brent, in the Philippines, is unmarried. He has done admirable work there, just as Jane Addams has done at Hull House. When the Times says that it dislikes to see Miss Addams "Held up in the limelight as an example for all other women to follow" it speaks offensively, and its words are true only in the sense that they would be true if it had used them about Bishop Brent or the late Phillips Brooks. Again and again I have heard Bishop Brent held up as an example, and I have held him up as an example myself; and so of the late Phillips Brooks. And in just the same way, I am heartily glad to say, I have heard Jane Addams held up as an example and have thus held her up myself. The cases of the three stand on the same plane; all three by their lives have added to, and are adding to, our heritage of good in this country; and it is an absurdity to say that in recognizing this fact as regards one of them we are in any shape or way explicitly or implicitly failing to take the position that we ought, as a matter of course, to take about marriage and the happy married life. Mr. Roosevelt's Speech on Suffrage, delivered at St. Johnsbury, Vt., August 30, 1912, p. 2.

____________. When the ordinary decent man does not understand that to marry the woman he loves, as early as he can, is the most desirable of all goals, the most successful of all forms of life entitled to be called really successful; when the ordinary woman does not understand that all other forms of life are but make-shift and starveling substitutes for the life of the happy wife, the mother of a fair-sized family of healthy children; then the state is rotten at heart. (1916.) Mem. Ed. IV, 77; Nat. Ed. III, 250.

Marriage—Federal Control of

As to there being a cessation of the movement for Federal control of marriage, including divorce and polygamy, so far as I know there never was such cessation; personally I have always favored such control. There was a strong agitation to give the national Government complete control over marriage and divorce. This was strongly opposed by a majority of the Representatives in the two Houses of Congress from the different States, and in but two or three instances is it possible that those opposing it, whether Democrats or Republicans, could have been influenced by any thought whatever concerning the Mormons. Personally I then favored the proposal, and have always favored it since, because I believed and still believe that this is one of several directions in which the power of the general government could with advantage be increased. (To Isaac Russell, February 17, 1911.) Collier's, April 15, 1911, p. 28.

Marriage—Joys of

The only full life for man or woman is led by those men and women who together, with hearts both gentle and valiant, face lives of love and duty, who see their children rise up to call them blessed and who leave behind them their seed to inherit the earth. Dealing with averages, it is the bare truth to say that no celibate life approaches such a life in point of usefulness, no matter what the motive for the celibacy—religious, philanthropic, political, or professional. The mother comes ahead of the nun—and also of the settlement or hospital worker; and if either man or woman must treat a profession as a substitute for, instead of as an addition to or basis for, marriage, then by all means the profession or other "career" should be abandoned. (1916.) Mem. Ed. IV, 78; Nat. Ed. III, 250.

Marriage and Children

In a small group there may be good and sufficient explanations why the individual men and women have remained unmarried; and the fact that those that marry have no children, or only one or two children, may be cause only for sincere and respectful sympathy. But if, in a community of a thousand men and a thousand women, a large proportion of them remain unmarried, and if of the marriages so many are sterile, or with only one or two children, that the population is decreasing, then there is something radically wrong with the people of that community as a whole. The trouble may be partly physical, partly due to the strange troubles which accompany an overstrained intensity of life. But even in this case the root trouble is probably moral; and in all probability the whole trouble is moral, and is due to a complex tissue of causation in which coldness, love of ease, striving after social position, fear of pain, dislike of hard work, and sheer inability to get life values in their proper Perspective all play a part. (Metropolitan, October 1917.) Mem. Ed. XXI, 166; Nat. Ed. XIX, 160.

Marriage as a Partnership

The one way to honor this indispensable woman, the wife and mother, is to insist that she be treated as the full equal of her husband. The birth-pangs make all men the debtors of all women; and the man is a wretched creature who does not live up to this obligation. Marriage should be a real partnership, a partnership of the soul, the spirit, and the mind, no less than of the body. An immediately practical feature of this partnership should be the full acknowledgment that the woman who keeps the home has exactly the same right to a say in the disposal of the money as the man who earns the money. Earning the money is not one whit more indispensable than keeping the home. Indeed, I am inclined to put it in the second place. The husband who does not give his wife, as a matter of right, her share in the disposal of the common funds is false to his duty. It is not a question of favor at all. Aside from the money to be spent on common account, for the household and the children, the wife has just the same right as the husband to her pin-money, her spending-money. It is not his money that he gives to her as a gift. It is hers as a matter of right. He may earn it; but he earns it because she keeps the house; and she has just as much right to it as he has. This is not a hostile right; it is a right which it is every woman's duty to ask and which it should be every man's pride and pleasure to give without asking. He is a poor creature if he grudges it; and she in her turn is a poor creature is she does not insist upon her rights, just exactly as she is worse than a poor creature if she does not do her duty. (Metropolitan, May 1916.) Mem. Ed. XXI, 147; Nat. Ed. XIX, 144.

Marriage

See also Birth Control; Children; Divorce; Family; Happiness; Home; Husbands; Love; Mormons; Mother; Sex Instinct; Women.

Marshall, John

The three men to whom throughout our national history we as a people owe most are two Presidents, Washington and Lincoln, and one chief justice, Marshall. Marshall is the one man whose services to the nation entitle him to be grouped with the two great Presidents, and he owes this to the fortunate fact that not only did he as a man deserve to rank with them as men, but that his office as an office deserved to rank, and did rank, with the great offices which they held. (Outlook, March 4, 1911.) Mem. Ed. XIX, 116; Nat. Ed XVII, 80.

____________. John Marshall is one of the six or eight foremost figures of American statesmanship. He stands among the men who actually did the constructive work of building a coherent national fabric out of the loose jumble of exhausted and squabbling little commonwealths left on the Atlantic coast by the ebb of the Revolutionary War. This was an incredibly difficult work, because it had to be forced on a suspicious, short- sighted, and reluctant people by a small number of really great leaders. (Outlook, July 18, 1917.) Mem. Ed. XII, 427; Nat. Ed. XI, 189.

____________. Marshall himself was in the best sense of the term a self-made man. As a very young man he served in the Continental army under Washington, honorably but without special distinction. He earned his living as a hard-working Virginia lawyer. . . . Marshall was an entirely democratic man in every sense of the word which makes it a word of praise. He had not a particle of arrogance in dealing with others; was simple, straightforward, and unaffected, being at ease in the courtroom or in any public gathering, with any neighbor of no matter what social standing. There was about him none of that starched self-consciousness which men who are more anxious to seem great than to be great are so apt to mistake for dignity. (Outlook, July 18, 1917.) Mem. Ed. XII, 428-429; Nat. Ed. XI, 190-191.

Marshall's Contribution

It was the appointment of Marshall and the exercise by that great man of his extraordinary personal influence which gave the Supreme Court its great power in our government, and which thereby also gave an enormous impetus to the growth among us of that spirit which made and kept us a nation, a great, free, united people, instead of permitting us to dissolve into a snarl of jangling and contemptible little independent commonwealths, with governments oscillating between the rule of a dictator, the rule of an oligarchy, and the rule of a mob. Those who on abstract grounds insist that the courts never have anything to do with the embodiment of public policy into law ought to pay heed to the simple fact that, under Marshall, the Supreme Court of the United States worked a tremendous revolution, not merely in ordinary law, but in the fundamental constitutional law of the land. . . . Marshall, in his first constitutional opinion, in an argument which, as Chancellor Kent said, approached to the precision and certainty of a mathematical demonstration, held that the Supreme Court possessed in itself the ultimate power to declare whether or not an Act of Congress was void. Nowadays the authority of the court to decide that an Act of the Legislative Department, whether of the nation or of any of the States, is repugnant to the Constitution seems self-evident. But no such power was expressly prescribed in the Constitution, and not only Jefferson but Jackson, with an emphasis amounting to violence, denounced Marshall's position and asserted that no such power existed. The reason why Marshall was so great a chief justice, the reason why he was a public servant whose services were of such incalculable value to our people, is to be found in the very fact that he thus read into the Constitution what was necessary in order to make the Constitution march. (Outlook, March 4, 1911.) Mem. Ed. XIX, 124; Nat. Ed. XVII, 85.

Marshall, John

See also Supreme Court.

Martinique—Description of

We of the North dwell in a rather drab world, and on a holiday it is well to see such sights as those of Martinique: the gay dresses and good looks of the working women, the only less picturesque quality of their mates, the quaint, many-hued houses, the beauty of the landscape outside the city, and within the city the great park or savanna with its rows of noble trees, the taverns with their tables outside under the colonnades, the little shops, and all the queer mixture of what is French with what is utterly exotic. The market was a really bewildering place, because of the color—always the color—and the strangeness, not only of the buyers and the sellers, but of many of the wares bought and sold. (1917.) Mem. Ed. IV, 291; Nat. Ed. III, 431.

Materialism, Scientific

No grotesque repulsiveness of medieval superstition, even as it survived into nineteenth-century Spain and Naples, could be much more intolerant, much more destructive of all that is fine in morality, in the spiritual sense, and indeed in civilization itself, than that hard dogmatic materialism of to-day which often not merely calls itself scientific but arrogates to itself the sole right to use the term. If these pretensions affected only scientific men themselves, it would be a matter of small moment, but unfortunately they tend gradually to affect the whole people, and to establish a very dangerous standard of private and public conduct in the public mind. (Outlook, December 2, 1911.) Mem. Ed. XIV, 418; Nat. Ed. XII, 113.

____________. At present we are in greater danger of suffering in things spiritual from a wrong-headed scientific materialism than from religious bigotry and intolerance; just as at present we are threatened rather by what is vicious among the ideas that triumphed in the Revolution than we are from what is vicious in the ideas that it overthrew. But this is merely because victorious evil necessarily contains more menace than defeated evil; and it will not do to forget the other side, nor to let our protest against the evil of the present drive us into championship of the evil of the past. (Outlook, December 2, 1911.) Mem. Ed. XIV, 421; Nat. Ed. XII, 116.

Materialist

[There are men] who measure everything by the shop-till, the people who are unable to appreciate any quality that is not a mercantile commodity, who do not understand that a poet may do far more for a country than the owner of a nail factory, who do not realize that no amount of commercial prosperity can supply the lack of the heroic virtues, or can in itself solve the terrible social problems which all the civilized world is now facing. The mere materialist is above all things, shortsighted. . . . To men of a certain kind, trade and property are far more sacred than life or honor, of far more consequence than the great thoughts and lofty emotions, which alone make a nation mighty. They believe, with a faith almost touching in its utter feebleness, that "the Angel of Peace, draped in a garment of untaxed calico," has given her final message to men when she has implored them to devote all their energies to producing oleomargarine at a quarter of a cent less a firkin, or to importing woollens for a fraction less than they can be made at home. These solemn prattlers strive after an ideal in which they shall happily unite the imagination of a green-grocer with the heart of a Bengalee baboo. They are utterly incapable of feeling one thrill of generous emotion, or the slightest throb of that pulse which gives to the world statesmen, patriots, warriors, and poets, and which makes a nation other than a cumberer of the world's surface. (Forum, February 1895.) Mem. Ed. XV, 11, 12; Nat. Ed. XIII, 10.

Materialist—Standards of the

There are not a few men of means who have made the till their fatherland, and who are always ready to balance a temporary interruption of money-making, or a temporary financial and commercial disaster, against the self-sacrifice necessary in upholding the honor of the nation and the glory of the flag. (Address as Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Naval War College, June 1897.) Mem. Ed. XV, 247; Nat. Ed. XIII, 188.

____________. [I do not wish] to be judged by . . . the standards of that particular kind of money-maker whose soul has grown hard while his body has grown soft; that is, who is morally ruthless to others and physically timid about himself. (To Sir Edward Grey, November 15, 1912.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 402; Bishop II, 342.

Materialist

See also Fortunes; Millionaires; Money; Profits; Prosperity; Wealth.

Mayor—Roosevelt's Candidacy for

See Roosevelt.

Meadow-Lark

The meadow-lark is a singer of a higher

order, deserving to rank with the best. Its song has length, variety, power and rich melody; and there is in it sometimes a cadence of wild sadness, inexpressibly touching. Yet I cannot say that either song would appeal to others as it appeals to me; for to me it comes forever laden with a hundred memories and associations; with the sight of dim hills reddening in the dawn, with the breath of cool morning winds blowing across lonely plains, with the scent of flowers on the sunlit prairie, with the motion of fiery horses, with all the strong thrill of eager and buoyant life. (1893.) Mem. Ed. II, 60; Nat. Ed. II, 52-53.

Mediation

See Collective Bargaining; Industrial Arbitration; Strikes.

Medicine

See Doctors; Tuberculosis.

Melting Pot

See American People; Immigration.

Memorial Day

On this day, the 30th of May, we call to mind the deaths of those who died that the nation might live, who wagered all that life holds dear for the great prize of death in battle, who poured out their blood like water in order that the mighty national structure raised by the far-seeing genius of Washington, Franklin, Marshall, Hamilton, and the other great leaders of the Revolution, great framers of the Constitution, should not crumble into meaningless ruins. (At Arlington, Va., May 30, 1902.) Presidential Addresses and State Papers I, 57.

____________. This is Memorial Day. You have to-day decorated the graves of gallant men who paid by their death for the lack of wisdom and foresight shown by their forefathers. This is the day of homage to heroism. But it is also a day of mourning. For forty years prior to the Civil War our people refused to face facts and soberly bend their energies to make war impossible. Heroes shed their blood, and women walked all their lives in the shadow, because there had been such lack of foresight, such slothful, lazy optimism. (At Kansas City, Mo., May 30, 1916.) The Progressive Party; Its Record from January to July, (Progressive National Committee, 1916), p. 69.

Memorials

See Monuments; White House.

Mental Acuteness

The kind of mental acuteness that is shown merely by a thorough study of the best methods of escaping successful criminal procedure is not the kind of mental acuteness that you value in your friend, in the man with whom you have business relations; and it should be the last type of mental ability, the last type of moral attitude, which you tolerate in a public man. (At Pacific Theological Seminary, Spring 1911.) Mem. Ed. XV, 621; Nat. Ed. XIII, 655.

Mental Acuteness

See also Character; Honesty; Intelligence; Moral Sense.

Mercantilism

See Colonial System.

Merchant Marine

It is discreditable to us as a nation that our merchant marine should be utterly insignificant in comparison to that of other nations which we overtop in other forms of business. We should not longer submit to conditions under which only a trifling portion of our great commerce is carried in our own ships. To remedy this state of things would not merely serve to build up our shipping interests, but it would also result in benefit to all who are interested in the permanent establishment of a wider market for American products, and would provide an auxiliary force for the navy. Ships work for their own countries just as railroads work for their terminal points. Shipping lines, if established to the principal countries with which we have dealings, would be of political as well as commercial benefit. From every standpoint it is unwise for the United States to continue to rely upon the ships of competing nations for the distribution of our goods. It should be made advantageous to carry American goods in American-built ships. (First Annual Message, Washington, December 3, 1901.) Mem. Ed. XVII, 114; Nat. Ed. XV, 98-99.

____________. To the spread of our trade in peace and the defense of our flag in war a great and prosperous merchant marine is indispensable. We should have ships of our own and seamen of our own to convey our goods to neutral markets, and in case of need to reinforce our battle-line. It cannot but be a source of regret and uneasiness to us that the lines of communication with our sister republics of South America should be chiefly under foreign control. It is not a good thing that American merchants and manufacturers should have to send their goods and letters to South America via Europe if they wish security and despatch. Even on the Pacific, where our ships have held their own better than on the Atlantic, our merchant flag is now threatened through the liberal aid bestowed by other governments on their own steamlines. (Fifth Annual Message, Washington, December 5, 1905.) Mem. Ed. XVII, 370; Nat. Ed. XV, 316.

Mercy

See Justice; Lynching. Merit System

I think it is mere idle chatter to talk of the merit system as being undemocratic and un- American. The spoils system is emphatically undemocratic, for the spoils system means the establishing and perpetuation of a grasping and ignorant oligarchy. The merit system is essentially democratic and essentially American, and in line with the utterances and deeds of our forefathers of the days of Washington and Madison. (Before Civil Service Reform Association, Baltimore, February 23, 1889.) Mem. Ed. XVI, 146; Nat. Ed. XIV, 89.

____________. The merit system is the system of fair play, of common sense, and of common honesty; and therefore it is essentially American and essentially democratic. (Century, February 1890.) Mem. Ed. XVI, 174; Nat. Ed. XIV, 112.

____________. The upholders of the merit system . . . maintain that offices should be held for the benefit of the whole public, and not for the benefit of that particular section of the public which enters into politics as a lucrative, though rather dirty, game; they believe that the multitude of small government positions, of which the duties are wholly unconnected with political questions, should be filled by candidates selected, not for political reasons, but solely with reference to their special fitness for the duty they seek to perform; and, furthermore, they believe that the truly American and democratic way of filling these offices is by an open and manly rivalry, into which every American citizen has a right to enter, without any more regard being paid to his political than to his religious creed, and without being required to render degrading service to any party boss, or do aught save show by common-sense practical tests that he is the man best fitted to perform the particular service needed. (Century, February 1890.) Mem. Ed. XVI, 158- 159; Nat. Ed. XIV, 99-100.

____________. The merit system of making appointments is in its essence as democratic and American as the common-school system itself. It. simply means that in clerical and other positions where the duties are entirely non-political, all applicants should have a fair field and no favor, each standing on his merits as he is able to show them by practical test. . . .

Whenever the conditions have permitted the application of the merit system in its fullest and widest sense, the gain to the government has been immense. The navy-yards and postal service illustrate, probably better than any other branches of the government, the great gain in economy, efficiency, and honesty due to the enforcement of this principle. (First Annual Message, Washington, December 3, 1901.) Mem. Ed. XVII, 148; Nat. Ed. XV, 127-128.

Merit System

See also Appointments; Civil Service; Patronage; Spoils System.

Methodist Church

Since the days of the Revolution not only has the Methodist Church increased greatly in the old communities of the thirteen original States, but it has played a peculiar and prominent part in the pioneer growth of our country, and has in consequence assumed a position of immense importance throughout the vast region west of the Alleghanies which has been added to our Nation since the days when the Continental Congress first met. . . .

In the hard and cruel life of the border, with its grim struggle against the forbidding forces of wild nature and wilder men, there was much to pull the frontiersman down. If left to himself, without moral teaching and moral guidance, without any of the influences that tend toward the uplifting of man and the subduing of the brute within him, sad would have been his, and therefore our, fate. From this fate we have been largely rescued by the fact that together with the rest of the pioneers went the pioneer preachers; and all honor be given to the Methodists for the great proportion of these pioneer preachers whom they furnished. (At bi-centennial celebration of birth of John Wesley, New York City, February 26, 1903.) Presidential Addresses and State Papers I, 243-244.

Methodist Mission In Rome

[Their] work was not only good in itself, but it was good from the standpoint of those who wish well to the Catholic Church, as I do, for it tended to introduce a spirit of rivalry in service, for rivalry in good conduct, which in the long run is as advantageous to the church as to the people, but which of course is peculiarly abhorrent to the narrow and intolerant priestly reactionaries, who, whenever and wherever they have the upper hand in the church, make it the baleful enemy of mankind. There was, however, one Methodist in town, taking charge of a congregation, who was of an utterly different type. I have no doubt that he had a certain amount of sincerity, and a great deal of energy, and there were places where I suppose he could have done good. But he was a crude, vulgar, tactless creature, cursed with the thirst of self- advertisement, and utterly unable to distinguish between notoriety and fame. He found that he could attract attention best by frantic denunciations of the Pope, and so he preached sermons in which he pleasantly alluded to the Pope as "the whore of Babylon," and even indulged in attacks on the other Protestant bodies in Rome, denouncing the Episcopalian and Presbyterian churches, and assailing the Young Men's Christian Association because it was under the Waldensian leadership. (To Sir George Otto Trevelyan, October 1, 1911.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 227; Bishop II, 195.

Mexican Factions—Support to

There was no reason whatever for any American to uphold Huerta; but to antagonize him on moral grounds, and then to endeavor to replace him by a polygamous bandit, was not compatible with any intelligent system of international ethics. Nor did any betterment follow from dropping this bandit, and putting the power of the United States Government behind another bandit. It may be entirely proper to take the view that we have no concern with the morality of any chief who is for the time being the ruler of Mexico. But to do as President Wilson has done and actively take sides against Huerta and for Villa, condemning the former for misdeeds, and ignoring the far worse misdeeds of the latter, and. then to abandon Villa and support against him Carranza, who was responsible for exactly the same kind of hideous outrages against Americans, and insults to the American flag, is an affront to all who believe in straightforward sincerity in American public life. (Metropolitan, March 1915.) Mem. Ed. XX, 422; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 362.

Mexican Hostility Toward United States

There is no government in the world for which the Mexican people now feel the profound contempt that they feel for the United States Government; and we owe this contempt to the way in which our governmental authorities have behaved during the last five years, but especially during the last three years. Well-meaning people praise President Wilson for having preserved "peace" with Mexico, and avoided the "hostility" of Mexico. As a matter of fact his action has steadily increased Mexican hostility, has not prevented the futile and infamous little "war" in which we first took and then abandoned Vera Cruz, and has been responsible for death, outrage, and suffering which have befallen hundreds of Americans and hundreds of thousands of Mexicans during the carnival of crime and bloodshed with which this "peace" has prevented interference. (Metropolitan, March 1915.) Mem. Ed. XX, 421; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 361.

Mexican Relations—Roosevelt's Stand On

To avoid the chance of anything but wilful misrepresentation, let me emphasize my position. I hold that it was not our affair to interfere one way or the other in the purely internal affairs of Mexico, so far as they affected only Mexican citizens; because if the time came when such interference was absolutely required it could only be justified if it were thoroughgoing and effective. Moreover, I hold that it was our clear duty to have interfered promptly and effectively on behalf of American citizens who were wronged, instead of behaving as President Wilson and Secretary Bryan actually did behave. To our disgrace as a nation, they forced American citizens to claim and accept from British and German officials and officers the protection which our own government failed to give. When we did interfere in Mexican internal affairs to aid one faction, we thereby made ourselves responsible for the deeds of that faction, and we have no right to try to shirk that responsibility. Messrs. Wilson and Bryan declined to interfere to protect the rights of Americans or of other foreigners in Mexico. But they interfered as between the Mexicans themselves in the interest of one faction and with the result of placing that faction in power. They therefore bound themselves to accept responsibility for the deeds and misdeeds of that faction, and of the further factions into which it then split, in so far as Mr. Wilson sided with one of these as against the other. (New York Times, December 6, 1914.) Mem. Ed. XX, 397; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 341.

Mexican War

See Texas; Wars.

Mexico—American Duty In

A prime duty, of course, is to secure livable conditions in Mexico. To permit such conditions as have obtained in Mexico for the past five years is to put a premium upon European interference; for where we shirk our duty to ourselves, to honest and law-abiding Mexicans, and to all European foreigners within Mexico, we cannot expect permanently to escape the consequences. (Metropolitan, February 1916.) Mem. Ed. XX, 280; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 241.

Mexico—Wilson's Policy In

We are told we have kept the peace in Mexico. As a matter of fact we have twice been at war in Mexico within the last two years. Our failure to prepare, our failure to take action of a proper sort on the Mexican border has not averted bloodshed; it has invited bloodshed. It has cost the loss of more lives than were lost in the Spanish War. Our Mexican failure is merely the natural fruit of the policies of pacificism and anti-preparedness. ( 1916.) Mem. Ed. XX, 225; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 193.

____________. His conduct rendered the United States an object of international derision because of the way in which its affairs were managed. President Wilson made no declaration of war. He did not in any way satisfy the requirements of common international law before acting. He invaded a neighboring state, with which he himself insisted we were entirely at peace, and occupied the most considerable seaport of the country after military operations which resulted in the loss of the lives of perhaps twenty of our men and five or ten times that number of Mexicans; and then he sat supine, and refused to allow either the United States or Mexico to reap any benefit from what had been done. It is idle to say that such an amazing action was not war. It was an utterly futile war and achieved nothing; but it was war. We had ample justification for interfering in Mexico and even for going to war with Mexico, if after careful consideration this course was deemed necessary. But the President did not even take notice of any of the atrocious wrongs Americans had suffered, or deal with any of the grave provocations we had received. His statement of justification was merely that "we are in Mexico to serve mankind, if we can find a way." Evidently he did not have in his mind any particular idea of how he was to "serve mankind," for, after staying eight months in Mexico, he decided that he could not “find a way” and brought his army home. He had not accomplished one single thing. In all our history there has been no more extraordinary example of queer infirmity of purpose in an important crisis than was shown by President Wilson in this matter. His business was either not to interfere at all or to interfere hard and effectively. This was the sole policy which should have been allowed by regard for the dignity and honor of the government of the United States and the welfare of our people. In the actual event President Wilson interfered, not enough to quell civil war, not enough to put a stop to or punish the outrages on American citizens, but enough to incur fearful responsibilities. Then, having without authority of any kind, either under the Constitution or in international law or in any other way, thus interfered, and having interfered to worse than no purpose, and having made himself and the nation partly responsible for the atrocious wrongs committed on Americans and on foreigners generally in Mexico by the bandit chiefs whom he was more or less furtively supporting, President Wilson abandoned his whole policy and drew out of Mexico to resume his "watchful waiting." (Everybody's, January 1915.) Mem. Ed. XX, 144-146; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 124-125.

Mexico

See also Villa, Pancho; Watchful Waiting; Wilson, Woodrow.

Meyer, George Von L

I trust it is not necessary for me to say what a keen satisfaction and comfort I have taken out of your being Postmaster General. You are one of the Cabinet Ministers upon whom I lean. You always spare me trouble, you never make a mistake, and you are a constant source of strength to the administration. (To Meyer, summer 1907.) M. A. De Wolfe Howe, George von Lengerke Meyer. (Dodd, Mead & Co., N. Y., 1919), p. 363.

Meyer, George Von L

See also Ambassadors.

Middle Class, the

In most countries the Bourgeoisie—the moral, respectable, commercial, middle class—are looked upon with a certain contempt which is justified by their timidity and unwarlikeness. But the minute a middle class produces men like Hawkins and Frobisher on the seas, or men such as the average Union soldier in the Civil War, it acquires the hearty respect of others which it merits. (To Edward S. Martin, November 26, 1900.) Mem. Ed. XXIII, 6; Bishop I, 4.

Middle Class In Politics

This class is composed of the great bulk of the men who range from well-to-do up to very rich; and of these the former generally and the latter almost universally neglect their political duties, for the most part rather pluming themselves upon their good conduct if they so much as vote on election day. This largely comes from the tremendous wear and tension of life in our great cities. Moreover, the men of small means with us are usually men of domestic habits; and this very devotion to home, which is one of their chief virtues, leads them to neglect their public duties. They work hard, as clerks, mechanics, small tradesmen, etc., all day long, and when they get home in the evening they dislike to go out. If they do go to a ward meeting, they find themselves isolated, and strangers both to the men whom they meet and to the matter on which they have to act; for in the city a man is quite as sure to know next to nothing about his neighbors as in the country he is to be intimately acquainted with them. In the country the people of a neighborhood, when they assemble in one of their local conventions, are already well acquainted, and therefore able to act together with effect; whereas in the city, even if the ordinary citizens do come out, they are totally unacquainted with one another, and are as helplessly unable to oppose the disciplined ranks of the professional politicians as is the case with a mob of freshmen in one of our colleges when in danger of being hazed by the sophomores. (Century, November 1886.) Mem. Ed. XV, 119; Nat. Ed. XIII, 80.

Middle Class

See also Bourgeoisie; Fortunes; Materialist; Money; Wealth.

Might

See Force; Right.

Militarism

Militarism is a real factor for good or for evil in most European countries. In America it has not the smallest effect one-way or the other; it is a negligible quantity. There are undoubtedly states of society where militarism is a grave evil, and there are plenty of circumstances in which the prime duty of man may be to strive against it. But it is not righteous war, not even war itself, which is the absolute evil, the evil which is evil always and under all circumstances. Militarism which takes the form of a police force, municipal or national, may be the prime factor for upholding peace and righteousness. Militarism is to be condemned or not purely according to the conditions. (Outlook, May 15, 1909.) Mem. Ed. XIV, 414; Nat. Ed. XII, 321.

____________. There are nations who only need to have peaceful ideals inculcated, and to whom militarism is a curse and a misfortune. There are other nations, like our own, so happily situated that the thought of war is never present to their minds.They are wholly free from any tendency improperly to exalt or to practice militarism. These nations should never forget that there must be military ideals no less than peaceful ideals. (1913.) Mem. Ed. XXII, 269; Nat. Ed. XX, 230.

Militarism, European

It is of course worth while for sociologists to discuss the effect of this European militarism on "social values," but only if they first clearly realize and formulate the fact that if the European militarism had not been able to defend itself against and to overcome the militarism of Asia and Africa, there would have been no "social values" of any kind in our world to-day, and no sociologists to discuss them. (American Sociological Society, Papers, 1915.) Mem. Ed. XX, 273; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 235.

Militarism and Preparedness

As yet, as events have most painfully shown, there is nothing to be expected by any nation in a great crisis from anything except its own strength. Under these circumstances it is criminal in the United States not to prepare. Critics have stated that in advocating universal military service on the Swiss plan in this country, I am advocating militarism. I am not concerned with mere questions of terminology. The plan I advocate would be a corrective of every evil which we associate with the name of militarism. It would tend for order and self- respect among our people. Not the smallest evil among the many evils that exist in America is due to militarism. Save in the crisis of the Civil War there has been no militarism in the United States and the only militarist President we have ever had was Abraham Lincoln. (New York Times, November 29, 1914.) Mem. Ed. XX, 203; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 174.

Militarism and the World War

We nations who are outside ought to recognize both the reality of this fear felt by each nation for others, together with the real justification for its existence. Yet we cannot sympathize with that fear-born anger which would vent itself in the annihilation of the conquered. The right attitude is to limit militarism, to destroy the menace of militarism, but to preserve the national integrity of each nation. (New York Times, October 11, 1914.) Mem. Ed. XX, 57; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 48.

Militarism

See also Armaments; Disarmament; Military Service; Pacifism; Preparedness; War.

Military Academy

See West Point.

Military Advice—Variety of

It is unnecessary for me to say that military men differ among themselves in wisdom and farsightedness, precisely as civilians do. The civilian heads of a government, when faced by a great military crisis, have to show their own wisdom primarily in sifting out the very wise military advice from the very unwise military advice which they will receive. This is especially true in a service where promotion is chiefly by seniority and where a large number of the men who rise high owe more to the possession of a sound stomach than to the possession of the highest qualities of head and heart. The military advice which you have received in this matter is strikingly unwise. I do not know whether those giving it openly advocated the principle of universal obligatory military training two and a half years ago—not within the last few months when people everywhere have been waking up to the matter—but two and a half years ago. If they did not, then they themselves are partly responsible for the condition of unpreparedness which renders it expedient from every standpoint that we should utilize every military asset in the country. (To Secretary Newton D. Baker, April 22, 1917.) Mem. Ed. XXI, 213; Nat. Ed. XIX, 201.

Military Expenditures

It is treachery to the Republic for statesmen—and for professional officers—to propose and to acquiesce in unsound half- measures which necessitate large continuing expenditures, but which do not provide for adequate national defense. (Metropolitan, February 1916.) Mem. Ed. XX, 296; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 254.

Military Expenditures — Waste of

At present the United States does not begin to get adequate return in the way of efficient preparation for defense from the amount of money appropriated every year. Both the Executive and Congress are responsible for this—and of course this means that the permanent and ultimate responsibility rests on the people. It is really less a question of spending more money than of knowing how to get the best results for the money that we do spend. Most emphatically there should be a comprehensive plan both for defense and for expenditure. The best military and naval authorities—not merely the senior officers but the best officers—should be required to produce comprehensive plans for battleships, for submarines, for air-ships, for proper artillery, for a more efficient Regular Army, and for a great popular reserve behind the army. Every useless military post should be forthwith abandoned; and this cannot be done save by getting Congress to accept or reject plans for defense and expenditure in their entirety. If each congressman or senator can put in his special plea for the erection or retention of a military post for non-military reasons, and for the promotion or favoring of some given officer or group of officers also for non-military reasons, we can rest assured that good results can never be obtained. Here, again, what is needed is not plans by outsiders but the insistence by outsiders upon the army and navy officers being required to produce the right plans, being backed up when they do produce the right plans, and being held to a strict accountability for any failure, active or passive, in their duty. (New York Times, November 29, 1914.) Mem. Ed. XX, 205; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 176.

Military Forces—Advancement in

In the Army and the Navy the chance for a man to show great ability and rise above his fellows does not occur on the average more than once in a generation. When I was down at Santiago it was melancholy for me to see how fossilized and lacking in ambition, and generally useless, were most of the men of my age and over, who had served their lives in the Army. The Navy for the last few years has been better, but for twenty years after the Civil War there was less chance in the Navy than in the Army to practise, and do, work of real consequence. (To Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., Jan. 21, 1904.) Mem. Ed. XXI, 516; Nat. Ed. XIX, 458.

Military Forces—Efficiency of

By the establishment of army and navy manœuvres I have, I think, much increased the efficiency of the army and doubled the efficiency of the navy. (To Sydney Brooks, December 28, 1908.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 153; Bishop II, 131.

Military Forces—Praise of

No American can overpay the debt of gratitude we all of us owe to the officers and enlisted men of the army and of the navy. (1913.) Mem. Ed. XXII, 299; Nat. Ed. XX, 255.

Military Forces — Support of

There is no class of our citizens, big or small, who so emphatically deserve well of the country as the officers and the enlisted men of the army and navy . . . . But they must be heartily backed up, heartily supported, and sedulously trained. They must be treated well, and, above all, they must be treated so as to encourage the best among them by sharply discriminating against the worst. The utmost possible efficiency should be demanded of them. They are emphatically and in every sense of the word men. (New York Times, November 22, 1914.) Mem. Ed, XX, 130; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 112.

Military Forces

See also Army; Desertion; Navy.

Military History

See History.

Military Leaders

See Dewey, Admiral; Frederick The Great ; Grant, U. S.; Jones, John Paul; Lee, R. E.; Napoleon; Pershing, J.; Sheridan, P. H.; Wayne, Anthony.

Military Policy, National

We should consider our national military policy as a whole. We must prepare a well-thought-out strategic scheme, planned from the standpoint of our lasting national interests, and steadily pursued by preparation and the study of experts, through a course of years. (Metropolitan, February 1916.) Mem. Ed. XX, 283; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 243.

Military Policy

See also Defense; Disarmament; National Defense; Preparedness.

Military Service

A man has no more right to escape military service in time of need than he has to escape paying his taxes. We do not beseech a man to "volunteer" to pay his taxes, or scream that it would be "an infringement of his liberty" and "contrary to our traditions" to make him pay them. We simply notify him how much he is to pay, and when, and where. We ought to deal just as summarily with him as regards the even more important matter of personal service to the commonwealth in time of war. He is not fit to live in the State unless when the State's life is at stake he is willing and able to serve it in any way that it can best use his abilities, and, as an incident, to fight for it if the State believes it can best use him in such fashion. Unless he takes this position he is not fit to be a citizen and should be deprived of the vote. Universal service is the practical, democratic method of dealing 
with this problem. (Metropolitan, February 1916.) Mem. Ed. XX, 299; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 256.

____________. In any small group of men it may happen that, for good and sufficient reasons, it is impossible for any of the members to go to war: two or three may be physically unfit, two or three may be too old or too young, and the remaining two or three may be performing civil duties of such vital consequence to the commonwealth that it would be wrong to send them to the front. In such case no blame attaches to any individual, and high praise may attach to all. But if in a group of a thousand men more than a small minority are unwilling and unfit to go to war in the hour of the nation's need, then there is something radically wrong with them, spiritually or physically, and they stand in need of drastic treatment. (Metropolitan, October 1917.) Mem. Ed. XXI, 166; Nat. Ed. XIX, 160.

Military Service—Benefits of

Universal military service, wherever tried, has on the whole been a benefit and not a harm to the people of the nation, so long as the demand upon the average man’s life has not been for too long a time. . . . The short military training given has been found to increase in marked fashion the social and industrial efficiency, the ability to do good industrial work, of the man thus trained. It would be well for the United States from every standpoint immediately to provide such strictly limited universal military training. (Everybody's, January 1915.) Mem.Ed. XX, 150; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 129.

____________. The efficiency of the average man in civil life would be thereby greatly increased. He would be trained to realize that he is a partner in this giant democracy, and has duties to the other partners. He would first learn how to obey and then how to command. He would acquire habits of order, of cleanliness, of self-control, of self-restraint, of respect for himself and for others. The whole system would be planned with especial regard to the conditions and needs of the farmer and the working man. The average citizen would become more efficient in his work and a better man in his relations to his neighbors. We would secure far greater social solidarity and mutual understanding and genuine efficiency among our citizens in time of peace. . . .

Universal service would be in every way beneficial to the State and would be quite as beneficial from the standpoint of those who consider the interest of the State in time of peace as from the standpoint of those who are interested in the welfare of the State in time of war. The normal tests of military efficiency are the very tests which would test a man's efficiency for industry and for the ordinary tasks of civil life. If a large percentage of men are unfit for military service it shows that they are also poorly fit for industrial work. (Metropolitan, February 1916.) Mem. Ed. XX, 294, 297; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 253, 255.

Military Service, Obligatory and Voluntary

I most heartily favor universal obligatory military training and service, not only as regards this war, but as a permanent policy of the government. Selective obligatory military service, as a "temporary" expedient, is better than having resort only to volunteering; but it is a mischievous error to use it in order to prevent all volunteering. Universal obligatory service, as a permanent policy, is absolutely just, fair, democratic and efficient. But it needs a period of perhaps two years in order to produce first class results; and so does the "selective" substitute for it. It is folly not to provide by volunteering for the action that ought to be taken during these two years. (Volunteering to serve in the ranks of the regular army or national guard of course in no way meets the need.)

The vice of the volunteer system lies chiefly not in the men who do volunteer, but in the men who don't. A chief, altho not the only, merit in the obligatory system lies in its securing preparedness in advance. By our folly in not adopting the obligatory system as soon as this war broke out, we have forfeited this prime benefit of preparedness. You now propose to use its belated adoption as an excuse for depriving us of the benefits of the volunteer system. This is a very grave blunder. The only right course under existing conditions is to combine the two systems. My proposal is to use the volunteer system so that we can at once avail ourselves of the services of men who would otherwise be exempt, and to use the obligatory as the permanent system so as to make all serve who ought to serve. You propose to use the belated adoption of the obligatory system as a reason for refusing the services of half the men of the nation who are most fit to serve, who are most eager to serve, and whose services can be utilized at once. (To Secretary Newton D. Baker, April 22, 1917.) Mem. Ed. XXI, 208; Nat. Ed. XIX, 197.

Military Service and Universal Suffrage

Universal suffrage can be justified only if it rests on universal service. We stand against all privilege not based on the full performance of duty; and there is no more contemptible form of privilege than the privilege of existing in smug, self-righteous, peaceful safety because other, braver, more self-sacrificing men give up safety and go to war to preserve the nation. If a man is too conscientious to fight, then the rest of us ought to be too conscientious to let him vote in a democratic land which can permanently exist only if the average man is willing in the last resort to fight for it, and die for it. (At Minneapolis, Minn., September 28, 1917.) Mem. Ed. XXI, 185; Nat. Ed. XIX, 176.

Military Service in a Democracy

A democracy should not be willing to hire somebody else to do its fighting. The man who claims the right to vote should be a man able and willing to fight at need for the country which gives him the vote. I believe in democracy in time of peace; and I believe in it in time of war. I believe in universal service. Universal service represents the true democratic ideal. No man, rich or poor, should be allowed to shirk it. In time of war every citizen of the Republic should be held absolutely to serve the Republic whenever the Republic needs him or her. The pacifist and the hyphenated American should be sternly required to fight and made to serve in the army and to share the work and danger of their braver and more patriotic countrymen; and any dereliction of duty on their part should be punished with the sharpest rigor. (Metropolitan, November 1915.) Mem. Ed. XX, 390; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 334.

Military Service

See also Conscientious Objectors; Draft; Pacifists; Preparedness; Unpreparedness.

Military Supremacy

Another thing that makes one feel irritated is the way that people insist on speaking as if what has occurred during the last three or four hundred years represented part of the immutable law of nature. The military supremacy of the whites is an instance in point. From the rise of the Empire of Genghis Khan to the days of Selim, the Mongol and Turkish tribes were unquestionably the military superiors of the peoples of the Occident, and when they came into conflict it was the former who almost always appeared as invaders and usually as victors. Yet people speak of the Japanese victories over the Russians as if they have been without precedent throughout the ages. (To A. J. Balfour, March 5, 1908.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 127; Bishop II, 109.

Military Supremacy

See also Mongol Invasions.

Military Training

Universal training in time of peace may avert war, and if war comes will certainly avert incalculable waste and extravagance and bloodshed and possible ultimate failure. (1916.) Mem. Ed. XX, 260; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 224.

____________. Now, Americans do make splendid soldiers. They shoot well naturally. But they have got to be helped by training, or their natural capacity will count for nothing. Go out and try the experiment yourself—some of you use the rifle—try to reach the target by the light of original reason, without practice, and see how far you will get in the experiment. Although the regular army men are very good men, they are only men after all. You have got to give them the right tools, and you have got to give them a chance to practise with those tools. We must have our navy exercised in fleets, our army exercised in great evolutions as an army.

We need an army, we need a navy, because we have got to work out a great destiny; and we have a right to demand that this country, when it meets its great destiny, shall be so fitted, so armed, so equipped that it can make a record which shall be a source of pride to each and every American within its borders. If we do not prepare thoroughly in advance we can never make such a record, and then shame will cover us, and we ourselves, who fail to prepare, will be responsible for the shame. (At dinner to Chauncey M. Depew, March 11, 1899.) Speeches at the Lotos Club. (Lotos Club, New York, 1901), p. 332.

____________. I am . . . heart and soul for the proposal of the Administration for universal obligatory military training and service. I would favor it for three million men. You can call it conscription if you wish, and I would say yes. (Statement to press, April 9, 1917.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 497; Bishop II, 424.

____________. Now and then the ultra-pacifists point out the fact that war is bad because the best men go to the front and the worst stay at home. There is a certain truth in this. I do not believe that we ought to permit pacifists to stay at home and escape all risk, while their braver and more patriotic fellow countrymen fight for the national well-being. It is for this reason that I wish that we would provide for universal military training for our young men, and in the event of serious war make all men do their part instead of letting the whole burden fall upon the gallant souls who volunteer. But as there is small likelihood of any such course being followed in the immediate future, I at least hope that we will so prepare ourselves in time of peace as to make our navy and army thoroughly efficient; and also to enable us in time of war to handle our volunteers in such shape that the loss among them shall be due to the enemy's bullets instead of, as is now the case, predominantly to preventable sickness which we do not prevent. (Everybody's, January 1915.) Mem. Ed. XX, 142; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 122.

Military Training—Dependence on

Devotion to country or to religion adds immensely to the efficiency of a soldier, but is a broken reed by itself. Officers whose only qualifications are religious or patriotic zeal are better than officers who seek service to gratify their vanity, or who are appointed through political favor; but until they have really learned their business, and unless they are eager and able to learn it, this is all that can be said of them. (1900.) Mem. Ed. XIII, 407; Nat. Ed. X, 290.

Military Training—industrial and

The adoption at once of the policy of obligatory universal military training will be the performance of a great public duty.

For three years the foremost advocates of this policy have pointed out that it can advantageously be combined with a certain amount of industrial training. It is earnestly to be hoped that this element of industrial training will be incorporated in the law. Of course, in such case the length of service with the colors in the field, aside from preliminary training in the higher school grades, ought to be a year, so as to avoid superficiality. Credit should be given the graduates of certain scholastic institutions or to individuals who speedily attain a high degree of proficiency, and for them the time of service could be shortened. All officers or other candidates for officers' training schools would be chosen from among the best of the men who had gone through the training, without regard to anything except their fitness. This would represent the embodiment in our army of the democratic principle which insists upon an equal chance for all, equal justice for all, and the need for leadership, and therefore for special rewards for leadership. (July 3, 1918.) Roosevelt in the Kansas City Star, 173.

Military Training—Need for

The average citizen of a civilized community requires months of training before he can be turned into a good soldier, and . . . raw levies—no matter how patriotic—are, under normal conditions, helpless before smaller armies of trained and veteran troops, and cannot strike a finishing-blow even when pitted against troops of their own stamp. (1900.) Mem. Ed. XIII, 332; Nat. Ed. X, 226.

____________. Good ships and good guns are simply good weapons, and the best weapons are useless save in the hands of men who know how to fight with them. (First Annual Message, Washington, December 3, 1901.) Mem. Ed. XVII, 140; Nat. Ed. XV, 121.

____________. Steadily remember that ample material is useless unless we prepare in advance the highly trained personnel to handle it. This applies all the way through from battle-cruisers and submarines to coast guns and field-artillery and aeroplanes. (Metropolitan, February 1916.) Mem. Ed. XX, 292; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 251.

Military Training—Value of

Training of our young men in field maneuvers and in marksmanship, as is done in Switzerland, and to a slightly less extent in Australia, would be of immense advantage to the physique and morale of our whole population. It would not represent any withdrawal of our population from civil pursuits, such as occurs among the great military states of the European Continent. In Switzerland, for instance, the ground training is given in the schools, and the young man after graduating serves only some four months with the branch of the army to which he is attached, and after that only about eight days a year, not counting his rifle practice. All serve alike, rich and poor, without any exceptions; and all whom I have ever met, the poor even more than the rich, are enthusiastic over the beneficial effects of the service and the increase in self- reliance, self-respect, and efficiency which it has brought. (New York Times, November 8, 1914.) Mem. Ed. XX, 98; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 85.

____________. Universal training would give our young men the discipline, the sense of orderly liberty and of loyalty to the interests of the whole people which would tell in striking manner for national cohesion and efficiency. It would tend to enable us in time of need to mobilize not only troops but workers and financial resources and industry itself and to co-ordinate all the factors in national life. There can be no such mobilization and co-ordination until we appreciate the necessity and value of national organization; and universal service would be a most powerful factor in bringing about such general appreciation. As a result of it, every man, whether he carried a rifle or labored on public works or managed a business or worked on a railway, would have a clearer conception of his obligations to the State. (Metropolitan, February 1916.) Mem. Ed. XX, 298; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 256.

Military Training, American

If ever we have a great war, the bulk of our soldiers will not be men who have had any opportunity to train soul and mind and body so as to meet the iron needs of an actual campaign. Long continued and faithful drill will alone put these men in shape to begin to do their duty, and failure to recognize this on the part of the average man will mean laziness and folly and not the possession of efficiency. Moreover, if men have been trained to believe, for instance, that they can "arbitrate questions of vital interest and national honor," if they have been brought up with flabbiness of moral fibre as well as flabbiness of physique, then there will be need of long and laborious and faithful work to give the needed tone to mind and body. But if the men have in them the right stuff, it is not so very difficult. (1913.) Mem. Ed. XXII, 278; Nat. Ed. XX, 238.

Military Training, Swiss

It is absolutely our duty to prepare for our own defense. This country needs something like the Swiss system of war training for its young men. Switzerland is one of the most democratic governments in the world, and it has given its young men such an efficient training as to insure entire preparedness for war, without suffering from the least touch of militarism. Switzerland is at peace now primarily because all the great military nations that surround it know that its people have no intention of making aggression on anybody and yet that they are thoroughly prepared to hold their own and are resolute to fight to the last against any invader who attempts either to subjugate their territory or by violating its neutrality to make it a battle-ground. (New York Times, November 15, 1914.) Mem. Ed. XX, 104; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 90.

____________. I am certain that the only permanently safe attitude for this country as regards national preparedness for self-defense is along the lines of obligatory universal service on the Swiss model. Switzerland is the most democratic of nations. Its army is the most democratic army in the world. There isn't a touch of militarism or aggressiveness about Switzerland. It has been found as a matter of actual practical experience in Switzerland that the universal military training has made a very marked increase in social efficiency and in the ability of the man thus trained to do well for himself in industry. The man who has received the training is a better citizen, is more self-respecting, more orderly, better able to hold his own, and more willing to respect the rights of others, and at the same time he is a more valuable and better-paid man in his business. (Before Knights of Columbus, New York City, October 12, 1915.) Mem. Ed. XX, 466; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 400.

Military Training and National Defense

Until an efficient world league for peace is in more than mere process of formation the United States must depend upon itself for protection where its vital interests are concerned. All the youth of the nation should be trained in warlike exercises and in the use of arms—as well as in the indispensable virtues of courage, self-restraint, and endurance—so as to be fit for national defense. (New York Times, November 22, 1914.) Mem. Ed. XX, 124; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 107.

____________. Think what Grmany did to her foes in the first ninety days, in the first thirty days of this war, and you will have an idea of the appalling disaster that will some day befall us unless we turn seriously to the solution of the problem of self-defense.

There is but one such solution. It is the adoption of the principle of universal military training of our young men in advance, in time of peace, with as a corollary the acceptance of the obligation of universal service in time of war. This is the only democratic system. This is the only efficient system. (Metropolitan, September 1917.) Mem. Ed. XXI, 26; Nat. Ed. XIX, 22.

Military Training and Preparedness

It is . . . evident that this preparedness for the tasks of peace forms the only sound basis for that indispensable military preparedness which rests on universal military training and which finds expression in universal obligatory service in time of war. Such universal obligatory training and service are the necessary complements of universal suffrage and represent the realization of the true American, the democratic, ideal in both peace and war. (To Progressive National Committee, dated June 22, 1916.) Mem. Ed. XIX, 565; Nat. Ed. XVII, 415.

____________. You seem to think, if I understand your letter aright, that "preparedness" is in some way designed to make your boys food for cannon. Now, as a matter of fact, the surest way to prevent your boys from being food for cannon is to have them, and all the other young men of the country—my boys, for instance, and the boys of all other fathers and mothers throughout the country,—so trained, so prepared, that it will not be safe for any foreign foe to attack us. Preparedness no more invites war than fire insurance invites a fire. (Letter of February 9, 1916.) Mem. Ed. XXI, 152; Nat. Ed. XIX, 149.

Military Training

See also Defense; Draft; Fighting Edge; Marksmanship; National Defense; Naval Personnel; Pacifism; Peace; Preparedness; Soldiers; Training Camps; Volunteer System.

Militia

This proposal [for universal military training] does not represent anything more than carrying out the purpose of the second amendment to the Federal Constitution, which declares that a well- regulated militia is necessary to the security of a free nation. The Swiss army is a well-regulated militia; and, therefore, it is utterly different from any militia we have ever had. (Everybody's, January 1915.) Mem. Ed. XX, 164; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 140.

Militia—Ineffectiveness of

[We must remember] the old lesson that, whether by sea or land, a small, well-officered, and well-trained force, cannot, except very rarely, be resisted by a greater number of mere militia; and that in the end it is true economy to have the regular force prepared beforehand, without waiting until we have been forced to prepare it by the disasters happening to the irregulars. (1882.) Mem. Ed. VII, 145; Nat. Ed. VI, 128.

Militia, Frontier

The frontier virtue of independence and of impatience of outside direction found a particularly vicious expression in the frontier abhorrence of regular troops, and advocacy of a hopelessly feeble militia system. The people were foolishly convinced of the efficacy of their militia system, which they loudly proclaimed to be the only proper mode of national defense. While in the actual presence of the Indians the stern necessities of border warfare forced the frontiersmen into a certain semblance of discipline. As soon as the immediate pressure was relieved, however, the whole militia system sank into a mere farce. At certain stated occasions there were musters for company or regimental drill. These training days were treated as occasions for frolic and merrymaking. (1896.) Mem. Ed. XII, 302-303; Nat. Ed. IX, 455.

Militia and Regular Army

—Under modern conditions, in a great civilized state, the regular army is composed of officers who have as a rule been carefully trained to their work; who possess remarkably fine physique, and who are accustomed to the command of men and to taking the lead in emergencies; and the enlisted men have likewise been picked out with great care as to their bodily development; have been drilled until they handle themselves, their horses, and their weapons admirably, can cook for themselves, and are trained to the endurance of hardship and exposure under the conditions of march and battle. An ordinary volunteer or militia regiment from an ordinary civilized community, on the other hand, no matter how enthusiastic or patriotic, or how intelligent, is officered by lawyers, merchants, business men, or their sons, and contains in its ranks clerks, mechanics, or farmers' lads of varying physique, who have to be laboriously taught how to shoot and how to ride, and above all, how to cook and to take care of themselves and make themselves comfortable in the open, especially when tired out by long marches, and when the weather is bad. At the outset such a regiment is, of course, utterly inferior to a veteran regular regiment, but after it has been in active service in the field for a year or two, so that its weak men have been weeded out, and its strong men have learned their duties—which can be learned far more rapidly in time of war than in time of peace— it becomes equal to any regiment. (1900.) Mem. Ed. XIII, 333-334; Nat. Ed. X, 227.

Militia

See also National Guard; Rough Riders; Soldiers; War of 1812.

Millionaires

I do not think the average American multimillionaire a very high type, and I do not much admire him. But in his place he is well enough. (To Sir George Otto Trevelyan, March 9, 1905.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 171; Bishop II, 147.

____________. I wish it distinctly to be understood that I have not the smallest prejudice against multimillionaires. I like them. But I always feel this way when I meet one of them: You have made millions—good; that shows you must have something in you; I wish you would show it.

I do regard it as a realizable ideal for our people as a whole to demand, not of the millionaire—not at all—but of their own children and of themselves, that they shall get the millionaire in his proper perspective, and, when they once do that, ninety-five per cent of what is undesirable in the power of the millionaire will disappear. (At Pacific Theological Seminary, Spring 1911.) Mem. Ed. XV, 584; Nat. Ed. XIII, 622.

____________. I decline to recognize the mere multimillionaire, the man of mere wealth, as an asset of value to any country; and especially as not an asset to my own country. If he has earned or uses his wealth in a way that makes him of real benefit, of real use—and such is often the case—why, then he does become an asset of worth. But it is the way in which it has been earned or used, and not the mere fact of wealth, that entitles him to the credit. (At the Sorbonne, Paris, April 23, 1910s.) Mem. Ed. XV, 359; Nat. Ed. XIII, 514.

____________. The very luxurious, grossly material life of the average multimillionaire whom I know does not appeal to me in the least, and nothing could hire me to lead it. It is an exceedingly nice thing to have money enough to be able to take a hunting trip in Africa after big game (if you are not able to make it pay for itself in some other way). It is an exceedingly nice thing, if you are young, to have one or two good jumping horses and to be able to occasionally hunt—although Heaven forfend that any one for whom I care should treat riding to hounds as the serious business of life! It is an exceedingly nice thing to have a good house and to be able to purchase good books and good pictures, and especially to have that house isolated from others. But I wholly fail to see where any real enjoyment comes from a dozen automobiles, a couple of hundred horses, and a good many different houses luxuriously upholstered. From the standpoint of real pleasure I should selfishly prefer my old-time ranch on the Little Missouri to anything in Newport. (To Sir Cecil Arthur Spring-Rice, April 11, 1908.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 129; Bishop II, 111.

____________. Now, a word to my fellow reformers. If they permit themselves to adopt an attitude of hate and envy toward the millionaire they are just about as badly off as if they adopt an attitude of mean subservience to him. It is just as much a confession of inferiority to feel mean hatred and defiance of a man as it is to feel a mean desire to please him overmuch. In each case it means that the man having the emotion is not confident in himself, that he lacks self-confidence, self-reliance, that he does not stand on his own feet; and, therefore, in each case it is an admission that the man is not as good as the man whom he hates and envies, or before whom he truckles.

So that I shall preach as an ideal neither to truckle to nor to hate the man of mere wealth, because if you do either you admit your inferiority in reference to him; and if you admit that you are inferior as compared to him you are no good American, you have no place in this Republic. (At Pacific Theological Seminary, Spring 1911.) Mem. Ed. XV, 584; Nat. Ed. XIII, 623.

Millionaires

See also Capitalist; Fame; Fortunes; "Malefactors Of Great Wealth"; Materialist; Wealth.

Milton, John

I have had a good deal of time for reading, naturally, and among other things have gone over Milton's prose works. What a radical republican, and what a stanch partisan, and what an intense Protestant the fine old fellow was; subject to the inevitable limitations of his time and place, he was curiously modern too. He advocated liberty of conscience to a degree that few were then able to advocate, or at least few of those who were not only philosophers like Milton, but also like Milton in active public life, and his plea for liberty of the press is good reading now. His essay on divorce is curious rather than convincing, and while it is extremely modern in some ways it is not modern at all in the contemptuous arrogance of its attitude toward women. (To Sir George Otto Trevelyan, November 23, 1906.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 187; Bishop II, 160.

Mineral Fuels — Conservation of

The mineral fuels of the eastern United States have already passed into the hands of large private owners, and those of the West are rapidly following. This should not be, for such mineral resources belong in a peculiar degree to the whole people. Under private control there is much waste from shortsighted methods of working, and the complete utilization is often sacrificed for a greater immediate profit. The mineral fuels under our present conditions are as essential to our prosperity as the forests will always be. The difference is that the supply is definitely limited, for coal does not grow and trees do. It is obvious that the mineral fuels should be conserved, not wasted, and that enough of them should remain in the hands of the Government to protect the people against unjust or extortionate prices so far as that can still be done. Wh at has been accomplished in the regulation of the great oil fields of the Indian Territory offers a striking example of the good results of such a policy. Last summer, accordingly, I withdrew most of the coal-bearing public lands temporarily from disposal, and asked for the legislation necessary to protect the public interest by the conservation of the mineral fuels; that is, for the power to keep the fee in the Government and to lease the coal, oil, and gas rights under proper regulation. No such legislation was passed, but I still hope that we shall ultimately get it. (Before National Editorial Association, Jamestown, Va., June 10, 1907.) Presidential Addresses and State Papers VI, 1314-1315.

Mineral Fuels

See also Oil.

Miners

See Coal Strike.

Mines

See Conservation; Forest Problem.

Mining Conditions in West Virginia

The government should not content itself merely with restoring law and order; although this is the essential first step, it is only the first step; and when law and order have been obtained a system of fair play must be established or the evil will return with increasing violence. What is needed is the thorough rooting out of the conditions which brought about the dreadful state of affairs in the West Virginia bituminous fields. . . .

They say that the laborer has the freedom, or as they phrase it the "right" to sell his labor as he thinks best, and that any law controlling this right is unconstitutional. Literally and exactly this decision stands on a par with one which in the name of freedom should guarantee the laborer the right to sell himself into slavery. It represents nothing whatever but the effort, the successful effort, to suppress the workers' end of an economic controversy by denying him just law; and in actual practice this has been supplemented in West Virginia by the issuance of oppressive injunctions against the laborer. (Before National Conference of Progressive Service, Portsmouth, R. I., July 2, 1913.) Mem. Ed. XIX, 520, 524; Nat. Ed. XVII, 381, 384.

Minorities

See Liberty.

Minority—Tyranny of a

I have scant patience with this talk of the tyranny of the majority. Wherever there is tyranny of the majority, I shall protest against it with all my heart and soul. But we are to-day suffering from the tyranny of minorities. It is a small minority that is grabbing our coal-deposits, our water-powers, and our harbor fronts. A small minority is battening on the sale of adulterated foods and drugs. It is a small minority that lies behind monopolies and trusts. It is a small minority that stands behind the present law of master and servant, the sweat- shops, and the whole calendar of social and industrial injustice. It is a small minority that is to-day using our convention system to defeat the will of a majority of the people in the choice of delegates to the Chicago Convention.

The only tyrannies from which men, women, and children are suffering in real life are the tyrannies of minorities.

If the majority of the American people were in fact tyrannous over the minority, if democracy had no greater self-control than empire, then indeed no written words which our forefathers put into the Constitution could stay that tyranny. (At Carnegie Hall, New York City, March 20, 1912.) Mem. Ed. XIX, 200; Nat. Ed. XVII, 151.

____________. For twenty-five years here in New York State, in our efforts to get social and industrial justice, we have suffered from the tyranny of a small minority. We have been denied, now by one court, now by another, as in the Bakeshop Case, where the courts set aside the law limiting the hours of labor in bakeries- the "due process" clause again-as in the Workmen's Compensation Act, as in the Tenement-House Cigar- Factory Case-in all these and many other cases we have been denied by small minorities, by a few worthy men of wrong political philosophy on the bench, the right to protect our people in their lives, their liberty, and their pursuit of happiness. As for "consistency"-why, the record of the courts, in such a case as the income tax, for instance, is so full of inconsistencies as to make the fear expressed of "inconsistency" on the part of the people seem childish. (At Carnegie Hall, New York City, March 20, 1912.) Mem. Ed. XIX, 214; Nat. Ed. XVII, 162.

____________. I shall protest against the tyranny of the majority whenever it arises, just as I shall protest against every other form of tyranny. But at present we are not suffering in any way from the tyranny of the majority. We suffer from the tyranny of the bosses and of the special interests, that is, from the tyranny of minorities. Mr. Choate, Mr. Milburn, and their allies are acting as the servants and spokes men of the special interests and are standing cheek by jowl with the worst representatives of politics when they seek to keep the courts in the grasp of privilege and of the politicians; for this is all they accomplish when they prevent them from being responsible in proper fashion to the people. (At Philadelphia, April 10, 1912.) Mem. Ed. XIX, 270; Nat. Ed. XVII, 202.

Minority

See also Courts; Filibustering; Government; Legislative Minority; Popular Rule; Privilege; Referendum; Representative Government; Special Interests.

Missionaries

America has for over a century done its share of missionary work. We who stay at home should as a matter of duty give cordial support to those who in a spirit of devotion to all that is highest in human nature, spend the best part of their lives in trying to carry civilization and Christianity into lands which have hitherto known little or nothing of either. The work is vast, and it is done under many and widely varied conditions....

I hope there will be the most hearty support of these men, who in far-off regions are fighting for progress in things of the spirit no less than in things of the body. Let us help them to make the missions centres of industrial no less than of ethical teaching; for unless we raise the savage in industrial efficiency we cannot permanently keep him on a high plane of moral efficiency, nor yet can we render him able to hold his own in the world. (At celebration of Methodist Episcopal Church, Washington, January 18, 1909.) Mem Ed. XVIII, 349-350; Nat. Ed. XVI, 264-266.

____________. Mission work among savages offers many difficulties, and often the wisest and most earnest effort meets with dishearteningly little reward; while lack of common sense, and of course, above all, lack of a firm and resolute disinterestedness, insures the worst kind of failure. There are missionaries who do not do well, just as there are men in every conceivable walk of life who do not do well; and excellent men who are not missionaries, including both government officials and settlers, are only too apt to jump at the chance of criticising a missionary for every alleged sin of either omission or commission. Finally, zealous missionaries, fervent in the faith, do not always find it easy to remember that savages can only be raised by slow steps, that an empty adherence to forms and ceremonies amounts to nothing, that industrial training is an essential in any permanent upward movement, and that the gradual elevation of mind and character is a prerequisite to the achievement of any kind of Christianity which is worth calling such. Nevertheless, after all this has been said, it remains true that the good done by missionary effort in Africa has been incalculable. . . . Over most of Africa the problem for the white man is to govern, with wisdom and firmness, and when necessary with severity, but always with an eye single to their own interests and development, the black and brown races. To do this needs sympathy and devotion no less than strength and wisdom, and in the task the part to be played by the missionary and the part to be played by the official are alike great, and the two should work hand in hand. (1910.) Mem. Ed. V, 102-103; Nat. Ed. IV, 88.

Missionaries

See also Africa; Jesuits.

Mississippi River-Development of

We should undertake the complete development and control of the Mississippi as a national work, just as we have undertaken the work of building the Panama Canal. We can use the plant, and we can use the human experience, left free by the completion of the Panama Canal in so developing the Mississippi as to make it a mighty highroad of commerce, and a source of fructification and not of death to the rich and fertile lands lying along its lower length. (Before Progressive National Convention, Chicago, August 6, 1912.) Mem. Ed. XIX, 405; Nat. Ed. XVII, 294.

Mitchell, John

See Coal Strike.

Mob Rule

See Popular Rule.

Mob Violence

See Violence.

Mocking-Bird

The mocking-bird is a singer that has suffered much in reputation from its powers of mimicry. On ordinary occasions, and especially in. the daytime, it insists on playing the harlequin. But when free in its own favorite haunts at night in the love season it has a song, or rather songs, which are not only purely original but are also more beautiful than any other bird music whatsoever. Once I listened to a mocking-bird singing the livelong spring night, under the full moon, in the magnolia tree; and I do not think I shall ever forget its song. (1893) Mem. Ed. II, 61; Nat. Ed. II, 54.

____________. The mocking-bird is as conspicuous as it is attractive, and when at its best it is the sweetest singer of all birds; though its talent for mimicry and a certain odd perversity in its nature often combine to mar its performances. The way it flutters and dances in the air when settling in a tree-top, its alert intelligence, its good looks, and the comparative ease with which it can be made friendly and familiar, all add to its charm. (1905.) Mem. Ed. III, 318; Nat. Ed. III, 128.

"Mollycoddle."

In the long run the "sissy" and the "mollycoddle" are as undesirable members of society as the crook and the bully. I don't like the crook and the bully. Don't misunderstand me; I will abate both of them when I get the chance at them. But, after all, there is the possibility that you can reform the crook or the bully, but you cannot reform the "sissy" or the "mollycoddle," because there is not anything there to reform. With a nation, as with an individual, weakness, cowardice, and flabby failure to insist upon what is right, even if a certain risk comes in insisting, may be as detrimental, not only from the standpoint of the individual or the nation, but from the standpoint of humanity at large, as wickedness itself. (Before Panama-Pacific Historical Congress, Palo Alto, Cal., July 23, 1915.) The Pacific Ocean in History. Papers and Addresses. (Macmillan Co., N. Y., 1917), p. 149.

Monarchs

See Kings; Royalty.

Monetary Standard

See Currency; Gold Standard; Silver·

Money

Money is a good thing. It is a foolish affectation to deny it. But it is not the only good thing, and after a certain amount has been amassed it ceases to be the chief even of material good things. It is far better, for instance, to do well a bit of work which is well worth doing, than to have a large fortune. (Before Young Men's Christian Association, New York City, December 30, 1900.) Mem. Ed. XV, 532; Nat. Ed. XIII, 496.

____________. It is a false statement, and therefore it is a disservice to the cause of morality, to tell any man that money does not count. If he has not got it he will find that it does count tremendously. If he is worth his salt and is desirous of caring for mother and sisters, wife and children, he will not only find that it counts but he will realize that he has acted with infamy and with baseness if he has not appreciated the fact that it does count. Of course, when I speak of money I mean what money stands for. It counts tremendously. No man has any right to the respect of his fellows if through any fault of his own he has failed to keep those dependent upon him in reasonable comfort. It is his duty not to despise money. It is his duty to regard money, up to the point where his wife and children and any other people dependent upon him have food, clothing, shelter, decent surroundings, the chance for the children to get a decent education, the chance for the children to train themselves to do their life-work aright, a chance for wife and children to get reasonable relaxation. (At Pacific Theological Seminary, Spring 1911.) Mem. Ed. XV, 578; Nat. Ed. XIII, 617.

____________. The very fact that I grant in the fullest degree the need of having enough money, which means the need of sufficient material achievement to enable you and those dependent upon you to lead your lives healthily and under decent conditions . . . entitles me to have you accept what I say at its face value when I add that this represents only the beginning, and that after you have reached this point your worth as a unit in the commonwealth, your worth to others and your worth to yourself, depends infinitely less upon having additional money than it depends upon your possessing certain other things, things of the soul and the spirit. . . . After the man and the woman have reached the point where they have a home in which the elemental needs are met and where in addition they have accumulated the comparatively small amount of money necessary to meet the primal needs of the spirit and of the intellect— after this point is reached it is my deliberate judgment that money, instead of being the prime factor, is one of the minor factors, both in usefulness and in happiness. (At Pacific Theological Seminary, Spring 1911.) Mem. Ed. XV, 580; Nat. Ed. XIII, 619-620.

____________. I feel very strongly that one great lesson to be taught here in America is that while the first duty of every man is to earn enough for his wife and children, that when once this has been accomplished no man should treat money as the primary consideration. He is very foolish unless he makes it the first consideration, up to the point of supporting his family; but normally, thereafter it should come secondary. (To John St. Loe Strachey, November 28, 1908.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 147; Bishop II, 126.

Money

See also Fortunes; Materialist; Success; Wealth.

Moneyed Men

The moneyed classes, especially those of large fortune, whose ideal tends to the mere money, are not fitted for any predominant guidance in a really great nation. I do not dislike but I certainly have no especial respect or admiration for and no trust in, the typical big moneyed man of my country. I do not regard them as furnishing sound opinion as regards either foreign or domestic policies. (To Frederick Scott Oliver, August 9, 1906.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 28; Bishop II 24.

Moneyed Men — Roosevelt's Independence of

Unfortunately, the strength of my public position before the country is also its weakness. I am genuinely independent of the big monied men in all matters where I think the interests of the public are concerned, and probably I am the first President of recent times of whom this could be truthfully said. I think it right and desirable that this should be true of the President. But where I do not grant any favors to these big monied men which I do not think the country requires that they should have, it is out of the question for me to expect them to grant favors to me in return. I treat them precisely as I treat other citizens; that is, I consider their interests so far as my duty requires and so far as I think the needs of the country warrant. In return, they will support me, in so far as they are actuated purely by public spirit, simply accordingly as they think I am or am not doing well; and so far as they are actuated soley by their private interests they will support me only on points where they think it is to their interest to do so. (To H. C. Lodge, September 27, 1902.) Lodge Letters I, 534.

Moneyed Men

See also Business, Big; Capitalists; Corporations; Millionaires; Wall Street.

Mongol Invasions

It is extraordinary to see how ignorant even the best scholars of America and England are of the tremendous importance in world history of the nation-shattering Mongol invasions. A noted Englishman of letters not many years ago wrote a charming essay on the thirteenth century—an essay showing his wide learning, his grasp of historical events, and the length of time that he had devoted to the study of the century. Yet the essayist not only never mentioned but was evidently ignorant of the most stupendous fact of the century—-the rise of Genghis Khan and the spread of the Mongol power from the Yellow Sea to the Adriatic and the Persian Gulf. Ignorance like this is partly due to the natural tendency among men whose culture is that of western Europe to think of history as only European history and of European history as only the history of Latin and Teutonic Europe. . . . It is this ignorance, of course accentuated among those who are not scholars, which accounts for the possibility of such comically absurd remarks as the one not infrequently made at the time of the Japanese-Russian War, that for the first time since Salamis Asia had conquered Europe. As a matter of fact the recent military supremacy of the white or European races is a matter of only some three centuries. For the four preceding centuries, that is, from the beginning of the thirteenth to the seventeenth, the Mongol and Turkish armies generally had the upper hand in any contest with European foes, appearing in Europe always as invaders and often as conquerors; while no ruler of Europe of their days had to his credit such mighty feats of arms, such wide conquests, as Genghis Khan, as Timour the Limper, as Bajazet, Selim, and Amurath, as Baber and Akbar. (Foreword to J. Curtin's The Mongol; dated September 1907.) Mem. Ed. XIV, 58; Nat. Ed. XII, 178.

Mongol Invasions

See also Military Supremacy.

Monopolies —- Objection to

The very reason why we object to State ownership, that it puts a stop to individual initiative and to the healthy development of personal responsibility, is the reason why we object to an unsupervised, unchecked monopolistic control in private hands. Outlook, June 19, 1909, p. 394.

Monopolies —- Prosecution of

Monopolies can, although in rather cumbrous fashion, be broken up by lawsuits. Great business combinations, however, cannot possibly be made useful instead of noxious industrial agencies merely by lawsuits, and especially by lawsuits supposed to be carried on for their destruction and not for their control and regulation. (1913.) Mem. Ed. XXII, 490; Nat. Ed. XX, 422.

Monopolies In New York

There is an issue in this State of great importance, and they who defend it have to some extent brought it into disrepute, that is anti-monopoly. But nevertheless there is no question that there is a vital spirit underlying it; that we as a people are suffering from new dangers; that as our fathers fought with slavery and crushed it, in order that it would not seize and crush them, so we are called on to fight new forces, and we cannot do it unless our hands are held up, and those who act outside of legislative halls give us the support through which alone we can act. (At Republican mass-meeting, 21st Assembly Dist., New York, October 28, 1882.) Mem. Ed. XVI, 16; Nat. Ed. XIV, 14.

Monopoly

All business into which the element of monopoly in any way or degree enters, and where it proves in practice impossible totally to eliminate this element of monopoly, should be carefully supervised, regulated, and controlled by governmental authority; and such control should be exercised by administrative, rather than by judicial, officers. . . . Where regulation by competition (which is, of course, preferable) proves insufficient, we should not shrink from bringing governmental regulation to the point of control of monopoly prices if it should ever become necessary to do so, just as in exceptional cases railway rates are now regulated.

In emphasizing the part of the administrative department in regulating combinations and checking absolute monopoly, I do not, of course, overlook the obvious fact that the legislature and the judiciary must do their part. The legislature should make it clear exactly what methods are illegal, and then the judiciary will be in a better position to punish adequately and relentlessly those who insist on defying the clear legislative decrees.

I do not believe any absolute private monopoly is justified, but if our great combinations are properly supervised, so that immoral practices are prevented, absolute monopoly will not come to pass, as the laws of competition and efficiency are against it. (Before Ohio Constitutional Convention, Columbus, February 21, 1912.) Mem. Ed. XIX, 174; Nat. Ed. XVII, 129.

____________. The true way of dealing with monopoly is to prevent it by administrative action before it grows so powerful that even when courts condemn it they shrink from destroying it. (1913.) Mem. Ed. XXII, 492; Nat. Ed. XX, 423.

Monopoly—-Legalization of

Our opponents have said that we intend to legalize monopoly. Nonsense. They have legalized monopoly. At this moment the Standard Oil and Tobacco Trust monopolies are legalized; they are being carried on under the decree of the Supreme Court. Our proposal is really to break up monopoly. Our proposal is to lay down certain requirements, and then require the commerce commission—-the industrial commission ¾to see that the trusts live up to those requirements. Our opponents have spoken as if we were going to let the commission declare what the requirements should be. Not at all. We are going to put the requirements in the law and then see that the commission requires them to obey that law. (At Milwaukee, Wis., October 14, 1912.) Mem. Ed. XIX, 449; Nat. Ed. XVII, 326.

Monopoly

See also Business; Combinations; Competition; Corporations; Government Control; Government Regulation; Industrial Commission; Northern Securities Case; Trusts.

Monroe Doctrine

The Monroe Doctrine may be briefly defined as forbidding European encroachment on American soil. It is not desirable to define it so rigidly as to prevent our taking into account the varying degrees of national interest in varying cases. The United States has not the slightest wish to establish a universal protectorate over other American States, or to become responsible for their misdeeds. If one of them becomes involved in an ordinary quarrel with a European power, such quarrel must be settled between them in any one of the usual methods. But no European State is to be allowed to aggrandize itself on American soil at the expense of any American State. Furthermore, no transfer of an American colony from one European State to another is to be permitted, if, in the judgment of the United States, such transfer would be hostile to its own interests. (The Bachelor of Arts, March 1896.) Mem. Ed. XV, 226; Nat. Ed. XIII, 169.

____________. The Monroe Doctrine should be the cardinal feature of the foreign policy of all the nations of the two Americas, as it is of the United States. . . . The Monroe Doctrine is a declaration that there must be no territorial aggrandizement by any non-American power at the expense of any American power on American soil. It is in nowise intended as hostile to any nation in the Old World. Still less is it intended to give cover to any aggression by one New World power at the expense of any other. It is simply a step, and a long step, toward assuring the universal peace of the world by securing the possibility of permanent peace on this hemisphere. (First Annual Message, Washington, December 3, 1901.) Mem. Ed. XVII, 134; Nat. Ed. XV, 116.

____________. There are certain essential points which must never be forgotten as regards the Monroe Doctrine. In the first place we must as a nation make it evident that we do not intend to treat it in any shape or way as an excuse for aggrandizement on our part at the expense of the republics to the south. We must recognize the fact that in some South American countries there has been much suspicion lest we should interpret the Monroe Doctrine as in some way inimical to their interests, and we must try to convince all the other nations of this continent once and for all that no just and orderly government has anything to fear from us. There are certain republics to the south of us which have already reached such a point of stability, order, and prosperity that they themselves, though as yet hardly consciously, are among the guarantors of this doctrine. These republics we now meet not only on a basis of entire equality, but in a spirit of frank and respectful friendship, which we hope is mutual. If all of the republics to the south of us will only grow as those to which I allude have already grown, all need for us to be especial champion of the doctrine will disappear, for no stable and growing American republic wishes to see some great non-American military power acquire territory in its neigborhood. All that this country desires is that the other republics on this continent shall be happy and prosperous; and they cannot be happy and prosperous unless they maintain order within their boundaries and behave with a just regard for their obligations toward outsiders. (Fifth Annual Message, Washington, December 5, 1905.) Mem. Ed. XVII, 352- 353; Nat. Ed. XV, 301-302.

____________. It is in no sense a doctrine of one-sided advantage; it is to be invoked only in the interest of all our commonwealths in the Western Hemisphere. It should be invoked by our nations in a spirit of mutual respct, and on a footing of complete equality of both right and obligation. Therefore, as soon as any country of the New World stands on a sufficiently high footing of orderly liberty and achieved success, of self- respecting strength, it becomes a guarantor of the doctrine on a footing of complete equality. I congratulate the countries of South America that I have visited and am about to visit that their progress is such, in justice, political stability and material prosperity, as to make them also the sponsors of the Monroe Doctrine, so that, as regards them, all that the United States has to do is to stand ready, as one of the great brotherhood of American nations, to join with them in upholding the doctrine should they at any time desire, in the interest of the Western Hemisphere, that we should do so. (At Monte-video, November 1913.) J. H. Zahm, Through South America's Southland. (D. Appleton & Co., N. Y., 1916), pp. 143-144.

____________. Ninety years ago, when the doctrine was first proclaimed, the only American nation that had sufficient strength to gain a scanty and discourteous hearing from the Old World was the United States of America. At that time the only hearing even the United States received was both scanty and discourteous; nevertheless, it could at times make itself heard and heeded; and therefore the guardianship of the doctrine had to rest with the United States. But times have changed. Certain of the Latin American nations have grown with astonishing speed to a position of assured and orderly political development, material prosperity, readiness to do justice to others and potential strength to enforce justice from the others. These nations are able to enforce order at home and respect abroad. These nations have so developed their institutions that they themselves do not wrong others, and that they are able to repel wrong from others. Every such nation, when once it has achieved such a position, should become itself a sponsor and guarantor of the doctrine; and its relations with the other sponsors and guarantors should be those of equality. (At Buenos Aires, Argentina, November 12, 1913.) American Ideals. Speeches. . . of Dr. Emilio Frers and of Col. Theodore Roosevelt. (Buenos Aires, 1914), p. 23.

____________. This doctrine was perfectly simple. It declared that the soil of the Western Hemisphere was no longer to be treated as a subject for territorial conquest or acquisitions by old-world powers. I wish you to remember just what the Monroe Doctrine is. If any man tells you that it is dead, ask him if he really means that Old-World powers are to be permitted to acquire territory by conquest or colonization in the Western Hemisphere. Unless he so believes, he cannot assert that the doctrine is dead. So far from its being dead, I think it is a great deal more alive than ever before. I believe that there is a less chance than ever before of the American nations permitting any species of conquest or colonization on this Continent by Old-World powers. Moreover, I believe that the time has now come when the doctrine in reality has the guarantee not only of the United States, my own country, but of your country, Chile, and of every other American nation which has risen to a sufficient point of economic well-being, of stable and orderly government, of power to do justice to others and to exact justice from others; and therefore of potential armed strength to enable it thus to act as a guarantor of the doctrine.

In other words, keep these two facts distinctly in your minds: 1) the doctrine itself; 2) the question as to who the guarantor or guarantors of that doctrine shall be. I am wholly unable to understand how any farsighted patriot of the two Americas could fail to recognize the vital importance of the doctrine to the liberty and well-being of the nations of the Western Hemisphere. The only differences that can arise are as to the methods of its enforcement, and as to who shall be its guarantors. On these points there must of necessity be change as conditions change. (At Santiago, November 24, 1913.) Souvenir of the visit of Colonel Mr. Theodore Roosevelt, ex-President of the United States of America, to Chile. (Santiago de Chile, 1914), PP, 44-45.

Monroe Doctrine — Application of

The great nations of southernmost South America, Brazil, the Argentine, and Chile, are now so far advanced in stability and power that there is no longer any need of applying the Monroe Doctrine as far as they are concerned; and this also relieves us as regards Uruguay and Paraguay, the former of which is well advanced and neither of which has any interests with which we need particularly concern ourselves. As regards all these powers, therefore, we now have no duty save that doubtless if they got into difficulties and desired our aid we would gladly extend it, just as, for instance, we would to Australia and Canada. But we can now proceed on the assumption that they are able to help themselves and that any help we should be required to give would be given by us as an auxiliary rather than as a principal. (New York Times, November 22, 1914.) Mem. Ed. XX, 127; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 109.

____________. We need bother with the Monroe Doctrine only so far as the approaches to the Panama Canal are concerned, that is, so far as concerns the territories between our Southern border and, roughly speaking, the Equator. (Metropolitan, November 1915.) Mem. Ed. XX, 389; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 333.

Monroe Doctrine — Implications of

We have not the slightest desire to secure any territory at the expense of any of our neighbors. We wish to work with them hand in hand, so that all of us may be uplifted together, and we rejoice over the good fortune of any of them, we gladly hail their material prosperity and political stability, and are concerned and alarmed if any of them fall into industrial or political chaos. We do not wish to see any Old World military power grow up on this continent, or to be compelled to become a military power ourselves. The peoples of the Americas can prosper best if left to work out their own salvation in their own way. (First Annual Message, Washington, December 3, 1901.) Mem. Ed. XVII, 135; Nat. Ed. XV, 117.

____________. We can not permanently adhere to the Monroe Doctrine unless we succeed in making it evident in the first place that we do not intend to treat it in any shape or way as an excuse for aggrandizement on our part at the expense of the republics to the south of us; second, that we do not intend to permit it to be used by any of these republics as a shield to protect that republic from the consequences of its own misdeeds against foreign nations; third, that inasmuch as by this doctrine we prevent other nations from interfering on this side of the water, we shall ourselves in good faith try to help those of our sister republics, which need such help, upward toward peace and order. (At Chautauqua, N. Y., August II, 1905.) Presidential Addresses and State Papers IV, 440.

____________. Foolish people say that the Monroe Doctrine is outworn, without taking the trouble to understand what the Monroe Doctrine is. As a matter of fact, to abandon the Monroe Doctrine would be to invite overwhelming disaster. In its essence the Monroe Doctrine amounts to saying that we shall not permit the American lands around us to be made footholds for foreign military powers who would in all probability create out of them points of armed aggression against us. We must therefore make up our mind that we will police and defend the Panama Canal and its approaches, preserve order and safeguard civilization in the territories adjacent to the Caribbean Sea, and see that none of these territories great or small, are seized by any military empire of the Old World which can use them to our disadvantage. (Metropolitan, February 1916.) Mem. Ed. XX, 280; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 240.

Monroe Doctrine-Justification of

The Monroe Doctrine should not be considered from any purely academic standpoint, but as a broad, general principle of living policy. It is to be justified not by precedent merely, but by the needs of the nation and the true interests of Western civilization. (The Bachelor of Arts, March 1896.) Mem. Ed. XV, 224; Nat. Ed. XIII, 168.

Monroe Doctrine – Opposition to

There are many upright and honorable men who take the wrong side, that is, the anti-American side, of the Monroe Doctrine because they are too short-sighted or too unimaginative to realize the hurt to the nation that would be caused by the adoption of their views. There are other men who take the wrong view simply because they have not thought much of the matter, or are in unfortunate surroundings, by which they have been influenced to their own moral hurt. There are yet other men in whom the mainspring of the opposition to that branch of American policy known as the Monroe Doctrine is sheer timidity. This is sometimes the ordinary timidity of wealth. Sometimes, however, it is peculiarly developed among educated men whose education has tended to make them overcultivated and oversensitive to foreign opinion. They are generally men who undervalue the great fighting qualities, without which no nation can ever rise to the first rank. . . . Those wealthy men who wish the abandonment of the Monroe Doctrine because its assertion may damage their business, bring discredit to themselves, and, so far as they are able, discredit to the nation of which they are a part. (The Bachelor of Arts, March 1896.) Mem. Ed. XV, 235; Nat. Ed. XIII, 177.

Monroe Doctrine - Roosevelt’s View of

I regard the Monroe Doctrine as being equivalent to open door in South America. That is, I do not want the United States or any European power to get territorial possessions in South America but to let South America gradually develop on its own lines, with an open door to all outside nations, save as the individual countries enter into individual treaties with one another. (To Baron H. S. von Sternberg, October II, 1901.) Mem. Ed. XXIII, 184; Bishop I, 158.

____________. I am having my hands full . . . in endeavoring to make our people act on a rational interpretation of the Monroe Doctrine. No such policy as that of the Monroe Doctrine can remain fossilized while the nation grows. Either it must be abandoned or it must be modified to meet the changing needs of national life. I believe with all my heart in the Monroe Doctrine and have, for instance, formally notified Germany to that effect. But I also believe that we must make it evident on the one hand that we do not intend to use the Monroe Doctrine as a pretence for self- aggrandizement at the expense of the Latin-American republics, and on the other hand that we do not intend it to be used as a warrant for letting any of these republics remain as small bandit- nests of a wicked and inefficient type. (To Spring Rice, July 24, 1905.) The Letters and Friendships of Sir Cecil Spring Rice. (Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston, (1929), 1, 480.

Monroe Doctrine and England

As far as England is concerned I do not care a rap whether she subscribes to the Monroe Doctrine or not, because she is the one power with which any quarrel on that doctrine would be absolutely certain to result to our immediate advantage. She could take the Philippines and Porto Rico, but they would be a very poor offset for the loss of Canada. I should regard a war with England as a calamity because of its future results to both powers and especially to England ; but its immediate effect would be beneficial to the United States. (To H. C. Lodge, June 19, 1901. ) Lodge Letters I, 494.

Monroe Doctrine and International Law

The Monroe Doctrine is not international law; but there is no necessity that it should be. All that is needful is that it should continue to be a cardinal feature of American policy on this continent; and the Spanish- American states should, in their own interests, champion it as strongly as we do. We do not by this doctrine intend to sanction any policy of aggression by one American commonwealth at the expense of any other, nor any policy of commercial discrimination against any foreign power whatsoever. Commercially, as far as this doctrine is concerned, all we wish is a fair field and no favor; but if we are wise we shall strenuously insist that under no pretext whatsoever shall there be any territorial aggrandizement on American soil by any European power, and this, no matter what form the territorial aggrandizement may take. (At Minnesota State Fair, September 2, 1901.) Mem. Ed. XV, 335 ; Nat. Ed. XIII, 475.

____________. The Monroe Doctrine is not international law, and though I think one day it may become such, this is not necessary as long as it remains a cardinal feature of our foreign policy and as long as we possess both the will and the strength to make it effective. This last point, my fellow-citizens, is all important, and is one which as a people we can never afford to forget. I believe in the Monroe Doctrine with all my heart and soul ; I am convinced that the immense majority of our fellow-countrymen so believe in it; but I would infinitely prefer to see us abandon it than to see us put it forward and bluster about it, and yet fail to build up the efficient fighting strength which in the last resort can alone make it respected by any strong foreign power whose interest it may ever happen to be to violate it. (At Chicago, Ill., April 2, 1903.) Presidential Addresses and State Papers I, 265.

____________. The Monroe Doctrine lays down the rule that the western hemisphere is not hereafter to be treated as subject to settlement and occupation by Old World powers. It is not international law; but it is a cardinal principle of our foreign policy. (1913.) Mem. Ed. XXII, 575; Nat. Ed. XX, 495.

Monroe Doctrine and the Canal

As to the Monroe Doctrine. If we invite foreign to a joint ownership, a joint guaranty of a canal], of what so vitally concerns us a little way from our borders, how can we possibly object to similar joint action say Southern Brazil or Argentina, where our interests are so much less evident? If Germany has the same right that we have in the canal across Central America, why not in the partition of any part of Southern America? To my mind, we should consistently refuse to all European powers the right to control, in any shape, any territory in the the Western Hemisphere which they do not already hold. (To Secretary John Hay, February 18, 1900.) Mem. Ed. XXIII, 168 ; Bishop I, 145.

Monroe Doctrine and the Navy

The Monroe Doctrine is as strong as the United States navy, and no stronger. (1916.) Mem. Ed. XX, 261; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 225.

____________. The Monroe Doctrine won’t be observed by foreign nations with sufficient strength to disregard it when once it becomes their interest to disregard it, unless we have a navy sufficient to make our assertion of the Doctrine good.

The Monroe Doctrine, unbacked by a navy, is an empty boast; and there exist but few more contemptible characters, individual or national, than the man or the nation who boasts and when the boast is challenged, fails to make good. (At Naval War College, Newport, R. I., July 22, 1908.) Mem. Ed., XVIII, 333; Nat. Ed. XVI, 252.

Monroe Doctrine

See also Big Stick; Latin America; Navy; Santo Domingo ; Venezuela.

Monuments

We have not too many monuments of the past; let us keep every bit of association with that which is highest and best of the past as a reminder to us, equally of what we owe to those who have gone before and of how we should show our appreciation. (At N. Y. Avenue Presbyterian Church, Washington, D. C., November 16, 1903.) Mem. Ed. XII, 456; Nat. Ed. XI, 215.

Monuments

See also Obelisks; White House.

Moody, William H.

It is the universal testimony of all who knew him that as justice he grew and developed with extraordinary rapidity. As district attorney of Massachusetts, as congressman, as secretary of the navy, and as attorney-general he had rendered signal service to his country; indeed, his record as attorney-general can be compared without fear with the record of any other man who ever held that office. Much was rightly expected of him when he was made justice of the Supreme Court; but what he did and the attitude he took during his lamentably short term of office showed that these expectations would be far more than realized. He was not a man who was misled by a formula. His clear eye always saw into the heart of things. No devotion to the theory of national power prevented his deciding in favor of the rights of any State wherever it was obvious that through the exercise of its rights by the State lay the only chance of securing the rights of the people. On the other hand, no theory as to the rights of the States caused him to refrain from giving effect to a just expression of the popular will when that popular will could find effective expression only by the exercise of the powers of the Federal Government. It is not a difficult thing to find an upright man who as judge will do justice between individuals; but it is a very difficult thing to find the far-seeing statesman who on the bench will with wisdom and firmness shape the course of governmental action so that the national and State governments shall completely cover the whole field of governmental action in order that there shall be left no neutral ground wherein astute men, protected by contradictory judicial decisions, may work wickedness uncontrolled by either State or nation. Mr. Justice Moody was one of these men. He rendered noteworthy service to the country even during his short term on the bench, and had he been able to continue on the bench he would have rendered such service as hardly any other man now in public life can hope to render. (Outlook, November 5, 1910.) Mem. Ed. XII, 535-536; Nat. Ed. XI, 262-263.

Moose

The true way to kill the noble beast, however, is by fair still-hunting. There is no grander sport than still-hunting the moose, whether in the vast pine and birch forests of the Northeast, or among the stupendous mountain masses of the Rockies. The moose has wonderfully keen nose and ears, though its eyesight is not remarkable. Most hunters assert that it is the wariest of all game, and the most difficult to kill. I have never been quite satisfied that this was so; it seems to me that the nature of the ground wherein it dwells helps it even more than do its own sharp senses. (1893.) Mem. Ed. II, 200; Nat. Ed. II, 173.

Moral Influence of Great Men

Every great nation owes to the men whose lives have formed part of its greatness not merely the material effect of what they did, not merely the laws they placed upon the statute-books or the victories they won over armed foes, but also the immense but indefinable moral influence produced by their deeds and words themselves upon the national character. (Forum, February 1895.) Mem. Ed. XV, 3; Nat. Ed. XIII, 3.

Moral Influence

See also Heroes; Leaders; Leadership.

Moral Sense

If courage and strength and intellect are unaccompanied by the moral purpose, the moral sense, they become merely forms of expression for unscrupulous force and unscrupulous cunning. If the strong man has not in him the lift toward lofty things his strength makes him only a curse to himself and to his neighbor. All this is true in private life, and it is no less true in public life. (At Colorado Springs, Col., August 2, 1901.) Mem. Ed. XV, 326; Nat. Ed. XIII, 457.

____________. If a man's efficiency is not guided by a moral sense, then the more efficient he is the worse he is, the more dangerous to the body politic. Courage, intellect, all the masterful qualities, serve but to make a man more evil if they are used merely for that man s own advancement, with brutal indifference to the rights of others. It speaks ill for the community if the community worships these qualities and treats their possessors as heroes regardless of whether the qualities are used rightly or wrongly. It makes no difference as to the precise way in which this sinister efficiency is shown. It makes no difference whether such a man's force and ability betray themselves in the career of money-maker or politician, soldier or orator, journalist or popular leader. If the man works for evil, then the more successful he is the more he should be despised and condemned by all upright and far-seeing men. (At the Sorbonne, Paris, April 23, 1910.) Mem. Ed. XV, 363; Nat. Ed. XIII, 518.

Moral Sense

See also Character; Conscience; Courage; Intelligence; Mental Acuteness.

Morality

Morality, to count, must include the two elements of uprightness and efficiency. You need the zeal, and the knowledge without which zeal amounts to so little; and I need not say, gentlemen, that to be efficient without also being upright is merely to be additionally dangerous to the community. The abler a man is, the worse he is from the public standpoint if his ability is not guided by conscience. (At Harvard University, Cambridge, December 14, 1910.) Mem. Ed. XV, 555; Nat. Ed. XIII, 601.

Morality, National

No prosperity and no glory can save a nation that is rotten at heart. We must ever keep the core of our national being sound, and see to it that not only our citizens in private life, but, above all, our statesmen in public life, practice the old commonplace virtues which from time immemorial have lain at the root of all true national well-being. (At Minnesota State Fair, September 2, 1901.) Mem. Ed. XV, 334; Nat. Ed. XIII, 474.

____________. The most perfect machinery of government will not keep us as a nation from destruction if there is not within us a soul. No abounding material prosperity shall avail us if our spiritual senses atrophy. The foes of our own household shall surely prevail against us unless there be in our people an inner life which finds its outward expression in a morality not very widely different from that preached by the seers and prophets of Judea when the grandeur that was Greece and the glory that was Rome still lay in the future. (1917.) Mem. Ed. XXI, 132; Nat. Ed. XIX, 132.

Morality, Political and Private

I do not for one moment admit that political morality is different from private morality, that a promise made on the stump differs from a promise made in private life.

I do not for one moment admit that a man should act deceitfully as a public servant in his dealings with other nations, any more than that he should act deceitfully in his dealings as a private citizen with other private citizens. I do not for one moment admit that a nation should treat other nations in a different spirit from that in which an honorable man would treat other men. (At the Sorbonne, Paris, April 23, 1910.) Mem. Ed. XV, 374; Nat. Ed. XIII, 527.

Morality and Economics

It is a mistake of the gravest kind to believe that any moral question can be completely solved along purely economic lines; but it is an equally grave mistake not to recognize that no movement of moral reform can permanently avail unless it has the proper economic foundation. Outlook, July 15, 1911, p. 570.

Morality

See also Corruption; Efficiency; Idealism; Ideals; Intellectual Acuteness; International Morality; Religion; Spiritual Development; Success; Virtues; Weakness.

Mormons

Any effort, openly or covertly, to reintroduce polygamy in the Mormon Church would merely mean that that Church had set its face toward destruction. The people of the United States will not tolerate polygamy; and if it were found that, with the sanction and approval or connivance of the Mormon Church people, polygamous marriages are now being entered into among Mormons, or if entered into are treated on any other footing than bigamous marriages are treated everywhere in the country, then the United States Government would unquestionably itself in the end take control of the whole question of polygamy, and there could be but one outcome to the struggle. In such event, the Mormon Church would be doomed, and if there be any Mormons who advocate in any shape or way disobedience to, or canceling of, or the evading of, the manifesto forbidding all further plural marriages, that Mormon is doing his best to secure the destruction of the Church. . . . The Mormon has the same right to his form of religious belief that the Jew and the Christian have to theirs; but, like the Jew and the Christian, he must not practise conduct which is in contravention of the law of the land. I have known monogamous Mormons whose standard of domestic life and morality and whose attitude toward the relations of men and women was as high as that of the best citizens of any other creed; indeed, among these Mormons the standard of sexual morality was
unusually high. Their children were numerous, healthy and well brought up; their young men were less apt than their neighbors to indulge in that course of vicious sexual dissipation so degrading to manhood and so brutal in the degradation it inflicts on women; and they were free from that vice, more destructive to civilization than any other can possibly be, the artificial restriction of families, the practice of sterile marriage; and which ultimately means destruction of the nation. (To Isaac Russell, February 17, 1911.) Collier's, April 15, 1911, p. 28.

Morocco

See Algeciras Conference ; Jusserand, J.J.

Morris, Gouverneur

Morris was a true republican, and an American to the core. He was alike free from truckling subserviency to European opinion, —-a degrading remnant of colonialism that unfortunately still lingers in certain limited social and literary circles, —-and from the uneasy self-assertion that springs partly from sensitive vanity, and partly from a smothered doubt as to one's real position. Like most men of strong character, he had no taste for the "cosmopolitanism" that so generally indicates a weak moral and mental makeup. He enjoyed his stay in Europe to the utmost, and was intimate with the most influential men and charming women of the time; but he was heartily glad to get back to America, refused to leave it again, and always insisted that it was the most pleasant of all places in which to live. While abroad he was simply a gentleman among gentlemen. He never intruded his political views or national prejudices upon his European friends; but he was not inclined to suffer any imputation on his country. (1888.) Mem. Ed. VIII, 418; Nat. Ed. VII, 360.

____________. There has never been an American statesman of keener intellect or more brilliant genius. Had he possessed but a little more steadiness and self- control he would have stood among the two or three very foremost. He was gallant and fearless. He was absolutely upright and truthful; the least suggestion of falsehood was abhorrent to him. His extreme, aggressive frankness, joined to a certain imperiousness of disposition, made it difficult for him to get along well with many of the men with whom he was thrown in contact. In politics he was too much of a free lance ever to stand very high as a leader. He was very generous and hospitable; he was witty and humor- ous, a charming companion, and extremely fond of good living. He had a proud, almost hasty temper, and was quick to resent an insult. He was strictly just; and he made open war on all traits that displeased him, especially meanness and hypocrisy. He was essentially a strong man, and he was an American through and through. (1888.) Mem. Ed. VIII, 543; Nat. Ed. VII, 469.

Morris, Gouverneur, and the Convention

Morris played a very prominent part in the convention. He was a ready speaker, and among all the able men present there was probably no such really brilliant thinker. In the debates he spoke more often than any one else, although Madison was not far behind him; and his speeches betrayed, but with marked and exaggerated emphasis, both the virtues and the shortcomings of the Federalist school of thought. They show us, too, why he never rose to the first rank of statesmen. His keen, masterful mind, his far- sightedness, and the force and subtlety of his reasoning were all marred by his incurable cynicism and deep- rooted distrust of mankind. He throughout appears as advocatus diaboli; he puts the lowest interpretation upon every act, and frankly avows his disbelief in all generous and unselfish motives. His continual allusions to the overpowering influence of the baser passions, and to their mastery of the human race at all times, drew from Madison, although the two men generally acted together, a protest against his "forever inculcating the utter political depravity of men, and the necessity for opposing one vice and interest as the only possible check to another vice and interest." (1888.) Mem. Ed. VIII, 379; Nat. Ed. VII, 328.

Morris, Gouverneur, and the Federalist Party

Gouverneur Morris, like his far greater friend and political associate, Alexander Hamilton, had about him that "touch of the purple" which is always so strongly attractive. He was too unstable and erratic to leave a profound mark upon our political developments, but he performed two or three conspicuous feats, he rendered several marked services to the country, and he embodied to a peculiar degree both the qualities which made the Federalist party so brilliant and so useful, and those other qualities which finally brought about its downfall. Hamilton and even Jay represented better what was highest in the Federalist party. Gouverneur Morris stood for its weakness as well as for its strength. Able, fearless, and cultivated, deeply devoted to his people, and of much too tough fibre ever to be misled into losing his affection for things American because of American faults and shortcomings, as was and is the case with weaker natures, he was able to render distinguished service to his country. (Preface, April 1898.) Mem. Ed. VIII, 273; Nat. Ed. VII, 237.

Morris, Gouverneur, and the French Revolution

In his whole attitude towards the revolution, Morris represents better than any other man the clear-headed, practical statesman, who is genuinely devoted to the cause of constitutional freedom. He was utterly opposed to the old system of privilege on the one hand, and to the wild excesses of the fanatics on the other. The few liberals of the revolution were the only men in it who deserve our true respect. The republicans who champion the deeds of the Jacobins are traitors to their own principles; for the spirit of Jacobinism, instead of being identical with, is diametrically opposed to the spirit of true liberty. Jacobinism, socialism, communism, nihilism, and anarchism,—these are the real foes of a democratic republic, for each one, if it obtains control, obtains it only as the sure forerunner of a despotic tyranny and of some form of the one-man power.

Morris, an American, took a clearer and truer view of the French Revolution than did any of the contemporary European observers. Yet while with them it was the all-absorbing event of the age, with him, as is evident by his writings, it was merely an important episode; for to him it was dwarfed by the American Revolution of a decade or two back. (1888.) Mem. Ed. VIII, 495; Nat. Ed. VII, 427.

Morris, Gouverneur, and the War of 1812

In fact, throughout the War of 1812 he appeared as the open champion of treason to the nation, of dishonesty to the nation's creditors, and of cringing subserviency to a foreign power. It is as impossible to reconcile his course with his previous career and teachings as it is to try to make it square with the rules of statesmanship and morality. His own conduct affords a conclusive condemnation of his theories as to the great inferiority of a government conducted by the multitude, to a government conducted by the few who should have riches and education. Undoubtedly he was one of these few; he was an exceptionally able man, and a wealthy one; but he went farther wrong at this period than the majority of our people—the "mob" as he would have contemptuously called them—have ever gone at any time; for though every State in turn, and almost every statesman, has been wrong upon some issue or another, yet in the long run the bulk of the people have always hitherto shown themselves true to the cause of right. Morris strenuously insisted upon the need of property being defended from the masses; yet he advocated repudiation of the national debt, which he should have known to be quite as dishonest as the repudiation of his individual liabilities, and he was certainly aware that the step is a short one between refusing to pay a man what ought to be his and taking away from him what actually is his. (1888.) Mem. Ed. VIII, 536; Nat. Ed. VII, 464.

Morris, William—Poems of

Last night I was reading the poems of William Morris. Of course they are rather absurd and one gets tired of them very soon; but there are some of them which have a kind of pre- Raphaelite attraction of their own. (To Sir George Otto Trevelyan, September 1905.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 178; Bishop II, 152.

Mother, the

The welfare of the woman is even more important than the welfare of the man; for the mother is the real Atlas, who bears aloft in her strong and tender arms the destiny of the world. She deserves honor and consideration such as no man should receive. She forfeits all claim to this honor and consideration if she shirks her duties. But the average American woman does not shirk them; and it is a matter of the highest obligation for us to see that they are performed under conditions which make for her welfare and happiness and for the welfare and happiness of the children she brings into the world. Outlook , August 27, 1910, p. 922.

____________. No man, not even the soldier who does his duty, stands quite on the level with the wife and mother who has done her duty. (Outlook , April 8, 1911.) Mem. Ed. XIV, 162; Nat. Ed. XII, 193.

Mother, the

See also Birth Control; Children; Family; Home; Marriage; Women.

Mountain Climbing

Mountaineering is among the manliest sports; and it is to be hoped that some of our young men with a taste for hard work and adventure among the high hills will attempt the conquest of these great untrodden mountains of their own continent. As with all pioneer work, there would be far more discomfort and danger, far more need to display resolution, hardihood, and wisdom in such an attempt than in any expedition on well-known and historic ground like the Swiss Alps; but the victory would be a hundred-fold better worth winning. (1893.) Mem. Ed. II, 415; Nat. Ed. II, 356.

Muck-Rakers

In Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress" you may recall the description of the Man with the Muck-rake, the man who could look no way but downward, with the muck-rake in his hand; who was offered a celestial crown for his muck-rake, but who would neither look up nor regard the crown he was offered, but continued to rake to himself the filth of the floor.

In "Pilgrim's Progress" the Man with the Muck- rake is set forth as the example of him whose vision is fixed on carnal instead of on spiritual things. Yet he also typifies the man who in this life consistently refuses to see aught that is lofty, and fixes his eyes with solemn intentness only on that which is vile and debasing. Now, it is very necessary that we should not flinch from seeing what is vile and debasing. There is filth on the floor, and it must be scraped up with the muck-rake; and there are times and places where this service is the most needed of all the services than can be performed. But the man who never does anything else, who never thinks or speaks or writes, save of his feats with the muck-rake, speedily becomes, not a help to society, not an incitement to good, but one of the most potent forces for evil. (At Washington, April 14, 1906.) Mem. Ed. XVIII, 571; Nat. Ed. XVI, 415.

____________. Muck-rakers who rake up much that ought to be raked up deserve well of the community, and the magazines and newspapers who publish their writings do a public service. But they must write the truth and the service they do must be real. The type of magazine which I condemn is what may be called the Ananias muck-raker type. No paper bought and owned by the special interests can be viler, or can play a more contemptible part in American politics, than the Ananias muck-raker type of magazine, the type of magazine of which the proprietor, editor, and writer seek to earn their livelihood by telling that what they know to be scandalous falsehoods about honest men. No boodling alderman, no convicted private or public thief serving his term in stripes in the penitentiary, is a baser and more degraded being than the writers of whom I speak. And they render this ill service, this worst of bad services to the public; they confuse the mind of the public as between honest and dishonest men. (At Pacific Theological Seminary, Spring 1911.) Mem. Ed. XV, 637; Nat. Ed. XIII, 668-669.

Muck-Raking

I want to let in light and air, but I do not want to let in sewer-gas. If a room is fetid and the windows are bolted I am perfectly contented to knock out the windows, but I would not knock a hole into the drain-pipe. In other words, I feel that the man who in a yellow newspaper or in a yellow magazine makes a ferocious attack on good men or even attacks bad men with exaggeration or for things they have not done, is a potent enemy of those of us who are really striving in good faith to expose bad men and drive them from power. I disapprove of the whitewash-brush quite as much as of mud-slinging, and it seems to me that the disapproval of one in no shape or way implies approval of the other. (To Ray Stannard Baker, April 9, 1906.) Mem. Ed. XXIV, 14; Bishop II, 11.

____________. Some persons are sincerely incapable of understanding that to denounce mud-slinging does not mean the indorsement of whitewashing; and both the interested individuals who need whitewashing, and those others who practise mud-slinging, like to encourage such confusion of ideas. One of the chief counts against those who make indiscriminate assault upon men in business or men in public life, is that they invite a reaction which is sure to tell powerfully in favor of the unscrupulous scoundrel who really ought to be attacked, who ought to be exposed, who ought, if possible, to be put in the penitentiary. (At Washington, April 14, 1906.) Mem. Ed. XVIII, 573; Nat. Ed. XVI, 416.

Muck-Raking

See also Journalism, Yellow.

Mugwumps

There is nothing that I have more regretted in the present campaign than the fact that many of those with whom we were proud to act in time past, have now felt obliged to go over to the camp of those who are, as we firmly believe, the most bitter foes of the very principles which Independent Republicanism has so stoutly upheld. Beyond question, many of our brother Independents have done what they conscientiously believe to be right; most certainly. We cannot question the honesty of purpose and the sincerity of motive that actuate men like Carl Schurz, George William Curtis, and Horace White; but I think these gentlemen have been drawn into a course of action which, in the end, they must most bitterly regret, and into contact and companionship with men whom they must heartily despise, and I think they themselves would be among the first to see the evil results to the whole community that would inevitably follow in the fortunately exceedingly improbable event of their being able to accomplish the defeat of the Republican nominee. (Before Young Republican Club of Brooklyn, N. Y., October 18, 1884.) Mem. Ed. XVI, 73-74; Nat. Ed. XIV, 41.

____________. I regard this dishonest jealousy of decent men on the part of people who claim to be good, and this wholesale abuse, as two of the most potent forces for evil now existent in our nation. The foul and coarse abuse of an avowed partisan, willing to hurt the nation for the sake of personal or party gain, is bad enough; but it receives the final touch when steeped in the mendacious hypocrisy of the mugwump, the mis-called Independent. (To H. C. Lodge, July 11, 1889.) Lodge Letters I, 83.

Mugwumps

See also Election of 1884; Independent.

Muir, John

Our greatest nature-lover and nature- writer, the man who has done most in securing for the American people the incalculable benefit of appreciation of wild nature in his own land, is John Burroughs. Second only to John Burroughs, and in some respects ahead even of John Burroughs, was John Muir Ordinarily, the man who loves the woods and the mountains, the trees, the flowers, and the wild things, has in him some indefinable quality of charm which appeals even to those sons of civilization who care for little outside of paved streets and brick walls. John Muir was a fine illustration of this rule. . . . His was a dauntless soul, and also one brimming over with friendliness and kindliness. (Outlook, January 6, 1915.) Mem. Ed. XII, 566; Nat. Ed. XI, 288.

Mule-Deer

See Deer.

Municipal Administration

In spite of the fact that the urban growth is as yet small in the South, the time seems not very far distant when the average American, instead of living in the country, will live in a city or town, and when a very large number of Americans will live in cities of such size as show all the effects, for good and for evil, which accompany the crowding together of masses of people in limited Under such circumstances, it behooves every American interested in public life and public affairs to study as carefully as he can the phenomena of the life in these cities, and the administration of them. In this study of our own cities, nothing will help us more than an intelligent comparison with foreign cities. We desire to know whether certain phenomena appearing with us are constant and inevitable accompaniments of urban growth, or whether they are merely special to our peculiar conditions. An unintelligent comparison is of little use, and there is still less use in reasoning upon conclusions drawn from conditions wholly different from those which exist with us, and recklessly applied to our own circumstances; but if the conclusions are drawn carefully, and with ample allowance for different conditions, and if the comparison is really accurate the American civic student is put in possession of invaluable data. (Atlantic Monthly, April 1895.) Mem. Ed. XIV, 206; Nat. Ed. XII, 224-225.

Municipal Elections

A non-partisan ticket usually (although not always) [is] the right kind of ticket in municipal affairs, provided it represents not a bargain among factions, but genuine non-partisanship with the genuine purpose to get the right men in control of the city government on a platform which deals with the needs of the average men and women, the men and women who work hard and who too often live hard. (1913.) Mem. Ed. XXII, 202; Nat. Ed. XX, 173.

Municipal Government—Participation in

Above all, every young man should realize that it is a disgrace to him not to take active part in some way in the work of governing the city. Whoever fails to do this, fails notably in his duty to the Commonwealth. (1891.) Mem. Ed. IX, 420; Nat. Ed. X, 534.

Municipal Government

See also Civic Duty; Law; Police Commissioner; Tammany Hall.

Municipal Officers—Qualifications of

What you want in your municipal authorities is, first and foremost, absolute honesty. Their views upon any conceivable question of public policy come second to that. You must have in an executive officer willingness to be faithful to his oath of office; willingness, again, to show the common virtues; willingness to behave with that measure of probity which you exact from every successful business man, from every reputable lawyer. (Before Liberal Club of Buffalo, N. Y., September 10, 1895.) Mem. Ed. XVI, 274; Nat. Ed. XIV, 195.

Municipal Ownership

I would point out to the advocates of municipal ownership that it is doubly incumbent upon them to take the most efficient means of rebuking municipal corruption and of insisting upon a high standard of continuous fidelity to duty among municipal employees. Only if the government . . . of a municipality is honest will it be possible ever to justify fully the workings of municipal ownership. (Message to Legislature, April 21, 1899.) Murat Halstead, The Life of Theodore Roosevelt. (Akron, O., 1902), p. 131.

Municipal Program

This was nineteen years ago, but it makes a pretty good platform in municipal politics even to-day—smash corruption, take the municipal service out of the domain of politics, insist upon having a mayor who shall be a working man's mayor even more than a business man's mayor, and devote all attention possible to the welfare of the children. (1903.) Mem. Ed. XXII, 204; Nat. Ed. XX,

Municipal Self-Government

We believe that municipalities should have complete self- government as regards all the affairs that are exclusively their own, including the important matter of taxation, and that the burden of municipal taxation should be so shifted as to put the weight of land taxation upon the unearned rise in value of the land itself rather than upon the improvements, the buildings; the effort being to prevent the undue rise of rent. We regard it as peculiarly the province of the government to supervise tenement-houses, to secure proper living conditions, and to erect parks and playgrounds in the congested districts, and to use the schools as social centres. (Century, October 1913.) Mem. Ed. XIX, 549; Nat. Ed. XVII, 405.

Municipal Waste

Waste is the largest single element in municipal finance. It persists largely because taxpayers cannot properly analyze public outlays. It could be greatly lessened by a system of public accounts and reports which would separate the wasteful from the useful outlays and subject them frequently and in a concise form to the scrutiny of taxpayers. (At Merchants' Association dinner, New York City, May 25, 1900.) Mem. Ed. XVI, 505.

Munition Plants

We should at once begin governmental encouragement and control of our munition plants. To make war on them is to make war on the United States; and those doing so should be treated accordingly and all who encourage them should be treated accordingly. The existi ng plants should be encouraged in every legitimate way, and provision made to encourage their continuance after the war. But it is most unfortunate that they are situated so near the seacoast. The establishment of munition plants farther inland should be provided for, without delay. Pittsburgh is as far east as any plant should by rights be placed. This whole matter of providing and regulating the output of munitions is one in which Germany should especially stand as our model. Let us study carefully what she has done, and then develop and adapt to our own needs the schemes which she has found successful, supplementing them with whatever additional measures our own experience may indicate as advisable. (Metropolitan, February 1916.) Mem. Ed. XX, 291; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 250.

Munitions—Sale of

It has been the settled policy of Germany to drive all other countries out of the business of manufacturing arms and supplies because, of course, if this were once substantially accomplished, the rest of the world would be completely helpless before Germany. . . .

It was Germany which for decades supplied Turkey with the means of keeping the Christians of her European and Asiatic provinces in a state of dreadful subjection. . . . Essen has been the centre of military supplies to belligerents and has exported on an enormous scale to belligerents in all the modern wars, making vast profits from this traffic even in the late Balkan wars. Germany has consistently followed this course, even when one of the belligerents alone had access to her markets and the other, with which she was nominally in sympathy, had no such access. . . . In short, Germany has thriven enormously on the sale of arms to belligerents when she was a neutral; she insisted that such sale be sanctioned by The Hague conventions; she, so far as possible, desires to prevent other nations from manufacturing arms; and if she is successful in this effort she will have taken another stride to world dominion. The professional pacifists, hyphenated Americans, and beef and cotton Americans; in short, all the representatives of American mollycoddleism, American greed, and downright treachery to America, in seeking to prevent shipments of munitions to the Allies, are playing the game of a brutal militarism against Belgium and against their own country. (Metropolitan, October 1915.) Mem. Ed. XX, 338-339; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 290-291.

Munitions—Shipment of

The manufacture and shipment of arms and ammunition to any belligerent is moral or immoral, according to the use to which the arms and munitions are to be put. If they are to be used to prevent the redress of hideous wrongs inflicted on Belgium then it is immoral to ship them. If they are to be used for the redress of those wrongs and the restoration of Belgium to her deeply wronged and unoffending people, then it is eminently moral to send them. (Statement to press, May 1915.) Mem. Ed. XX, 444; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 380.

____________. The professional pacifists, the cotton Americans, the beef barons, and the German- Americans—in other words, the hyphenated Americans, the greedy materialists, and all the mollycoddles of both sexes—advocate the prohibition, of the shipment of munitions to the Allies who are engaged in fighting Belgium's battles. They thereby take a stand which, not merely in the concrete case of the moment but in all future cases, would immensely benefit powerful and aggressive nations which cynically disregard the rules of international morality at the expense of the peaceful and industrial nations which have no thought of aggression and which act toward their neighbors with honorable good faith. From the standpoint of international law, . . . we have the absolute right to make such shipments. Washington and Lincoln, in fact all our Presidents and secretaries have peremptorily refused to allow this right to be questioned. The right has been insisted upon by Germany in her own interest, more strongly than by any other nation, up to the beginning of the present war. (Metropolitan, October 1915.) Mem. Ed. XX, 342; Nat. Ed. XVIII, 293.

Munitions

See also Contraband; Neutral Rights; Neutrality; World War.

Murray, Joseph

He was by nature as straight a man, as fearless and as stanchly loyal, as any one whom I have ever met, a man to be trusted in any position demanding courage, integrity, and good faith. He did his duty in the public service, and became devotedly attached to the organization which he felt had given him his chance in life. . . . It was to him that I owe my entry into politics. I had at that time neither the reputation nor the ability to have won the nomination for myself, and indeed never would have thought of trying for it. (1913.) Mem. Ed. XXII, 72, 73; Nat. Ed. XX, 62, 63.

Music

See Pleasure.