platform, and this is true. He will be nominated unanimously because of his achievements, and those achievements will constitute the platform. upon which he will stand because they are the record of the party which he has led since succeeding McKinley in the Presidency. The record is a full one partly because it fell to Roosevelt to carry to final completion questions of policy which McKinley had formulated and set in operation. In this respect Roosevelt has kept to the letter the pledge that he made on taking his oath of office at Buffalo. He has, with the support of the Republican leaders in Congress, given to his party a continuing policy of administration, thus securing for the country results which otherwise might not have been possible of attainment. He took up the problems of Cuba, the Philippines and Porto Rico at the point at which McKinley dropped them, and carried forward his policy without a break and without the slightest diminution of energy. Since he became President, Cuba has been started successfully on its career as a free republic, and the United States has entered into a treaty of reciprocity in trade with it. The Philippine policy, instituted by McKinley, has been pushed forward with such steadiness and with such ability that the islands are at peace for the first time in several centuries and are enjoying throughout nearly their entire extent a considerable measure of self-government. Porto Rico is moving along so quietly and successfully under American rule that little or no thought is given to it in this country.

In regard to the solution of the problem left by the war with Spain, therefore, the Republicans can point to a record of results which cannot be successfully assailed by their opponents. They have kept faith with Cuba in giving the island independence and in giving it, also, as a republic, special trade privileges with the United States. The new republic has started on its career with far better prospects of continuing success, has displayed a larger capacity for self-government, than many of its most sanguine friends believed to be possible when it was given full control of its own affairs. In insisting that complete faith be kept with the island, President Roosevelt was uncompromising and unwearying. He appealed to Congress at two regular sessions to grant reciprocity, as McKinley had urged and as the nation had promised, and when nothing was done he called Congress together in extra session, a month in advance of its usual time, for the specific purpose of ratifying a treaty of reciprocity, and enacting such legislation as would carry it into effect. This final effort was successful. In the Philippines, Governor Taft, who was McKinley's appointee, was so earnestly and cordially supported in his policy by Roosevelt, that he was able not only to pacify the islands and start their people surely upon the road to ultimate self-government, but to induce the Catholic Church to sell the friars' lands

and to withdraw the friars, thus removing from the islands one of the chief obstacles to their permanent peace and to advancement in prosperity. Here, again, the administration's policy has been so successful that assault upon it by the Democrats has ceased and is not likely to be renewed in the campaign. When we turn, next, to achievements which belong entirely to the Roosevelt administration, to solution of public questions that have arisen since Roosevelt became President, the record is also a notable one. The most important of these are the settlement of the anthracite coal strike and the securing of the Panama Canal. I have so recently written in detail in these pages on these two subjects that it is quite unnecessary to even recapitulate their main points now. It is only pertinent to consider here their qualities as issues in the campaign. That the Democrats will endeavor to make political capital by assailing the President's course in either matter is admittedly improbable. It is conceded that what he did in both cases commanded popular approval so overwhelmingly as to make assault upon it by an opposition party very inadvisable. In the coal strike settlement, all the opposition was from the outset concentrated in a single element of the electorate and was confined almost entirely to a single community, that known as Wall Street. As time has gone on, and as many facts hidden at the time have crept into the light, opposition and criticism have died away. In the first place, the President did settle the strike, not only for the time being, but for three years. That is a concrete fact which the people have grasped and they have paid little heed to any other aspect of the matter. They were in great anxiety, a grave peril hung over them, a peril of suffering and possible riot, and the President had both the energy and the courage to avert it in spite of all obstacles and in disregard of all criticism. It has been disclosed since the settlement that in his efforts he had from the outset the hearty sympathy and encouragement of ex-President Cleveland, who not only voluntarily assured him of both, but consented to serve, if desired, as the head of the President's Commission of Settlement. In view of that fact, and in view also of the fact that Judge Gray, who presided over the work of the commission, is himself a Democrat, second in party and public esteem only to Mr. Cleveland, the chances for the Democrats to make party capital by assailing the President's course are too slight to require serious consideration.

Much the same condition exists in regard to the administration's course in Panama. The great fact in this matter, as on the coal strike settlement, is that the President accomplished his end. He got the isthmian canal that the country had been trying in vain to get for fully three-quarters of a century. There was no objection expressed by his critics at the time to what he had accomplished; his method was the only subject of attack. Yet

after much vociferous debate and denunciation in the Senate, the Democrats were unable to unite for the rejection of the treaty which secured to the country for all time the results of the President's course, and nearly a majority of them voted for its ratification, thus giving their aid in affixing the nation's approval to his conduct. After that proceeding, it will be very difficult for the Democrats to assail the President or his administration for any step in the Panama policy.

The Republican platform, it is easy to perceive, is to be composed mainly of the subjects that I have touched upon in the foregoing passages. Combined with them will be naturally an account of the great and signal services that have been performed, both under McKinley and under Roosevelt, by Secretary Hay in the State Department; services which have written his name at the top of the list of the world's greatest diplomatists and shed enduring honor upon his country. That is not the unduly fervid language of partizanship, but an accurate expression of the tribute which intelligent and fair-minded men of all parties pay gladly whenever Mr. Hay's name is mentioned. It will not be the least valuable of the Roosevelt administration's assets that it has retained and is likely to continue to retain John Hay in its Cabinet, and has associated with him there men of the calibre of Root and Taft and Knox. The Democratic leader who should be asked where he would find in his party material for such a Cabinet as McKinley had and as Roosevelt has retained and strengthened, would have much difficulty in constructing a satisfactory response.

What, then, are the Democrats to do for issues? Whither are they to turn for a candidate? These are questions which grow more difficult to answer as the date for the assembling of the conventions draws near. The party is suffering from a family quarrel of eight years' standing. Experienced observers of such quarrels say that ten or twelve years is the usual period for them to run, that it is idle to hope for peace and the restoration of good-will in less time than that. It should be borne in mind that this Democratic quarrel has in it extraordinary elements of bitterness. It has resulted in two national elections in the overwhelming defeat of the majority faction. Whatever else may be said of Mr. Bryan, he was the regular and undisputed nominee of his party, receiving not only the required two-thirds vote in one convention, but the unanimous vote in the second convention. He and his supporters believe that he was defeated in both campaigns by Democrats who either refused to vote at all or voted directly for his opponent. They regard these Democrats as having committed the unpardonable political crime of bolting. It should be remembered that while the bulk of these bolters were in the Eastern States, there were many thousands of them in the West. It was in the latter section that the Bry

anites and the bolting Democrats came face to face. They were old party associates, and the quarrel became, consequently, as bitter as family quarrels always are. The bolters not only defeated Mr. Bryan, but they caused the defeat of State and local Democratic candidates everywhere. They did this in two national elections, and they so weakened the party in all sections that it deprived hundreds of Democrats of office and means of support. Is it strange, in view of all this, that the Bryanites are bitter in their hatred, that they refuse to tolerate a suggestion that members of the party who were traitors" to it eight years and four years ago shall be permitted to come back now and dictate its principles and name its candidate?

It cannot be said that the course pursued by the Eastern Democrats has been placatory. Mr. Cleveland, as their most eminent representative, has repeatedly spoken of the Bryan followers as neither sane nor honest, yet the Eastern Democrats, a few months ago, pressed him to the front as their chosen candidate for the nomination this year, in spite of the third-term tradition. It was scarcely in human reason to suppose that men spoken of in this way, who had suffered the humiliation of two great defeats because of the refusal of Mr. Cleveland and his associates to stand by the party's nominee, would be equal to the task of bowing under Mr. Cleveland's lash, confessing that they had been insane and dishonest and accepting him as their candidate. As a matter of fact, bringing him forward as a candidate served to rekindle the fires of party animosity to a fiercer heat than had been in them for some time. When Mr. Cleveland's candidacy was abandoned, because of his refusal to consent to it, the Eastern Democrats brought forward Judge Parker in such a manner as to enrage the Bryanites rather than to conciliate them. Scarcely had they put him in the field when Mr. Cleveland published a formal and earnest approval of his candidacy in which he took occasion to repeat all the irritating views that he had previously expressed as to the insane and dishonest qualities of the Bryan contingent. This made Judge Parker, who had himself voted for Mr. Bryan in both elections, the chosen candidate of the bolters and as such most objectionable to the Bryanites.

But this was not the real source of the opposition to Judge Parker within his own party. I am writing far in advance of the meeting of the convention and am expressing no opinion as to his chances for securing the nomination. What I wish to point out is the radical difficulty in bringing the Democratic party into harmony upon any New York candidate. The only excuse the Democrats have for coming to New York for a candidate is that Roosevelt is believed to be weak in his own State. Why is he weak there? Because Wall Street does not like him. Then, in order to gain strength with a New York candidate in New York, the Democrats must find one

acceptable to Wall Street, that is, one more friendly to the Trusts than Roosevelt is. It is manifestly absurd to say that such a candidate would be supported by the Bryan followers in the West. Yet Judge Parker was put forward as such a candidate, was advocated openly by one Wall Street magnate, was placed by the convention of his own State on a platform which said nothing about Trusts that was not friendly, and was in general heartily supported by the friends of Mr. Cleveland in and out of the press. What would be the condition of the Democrats with such a candidate on a platform friendly to the Trusts? What would be his condition on a platform of the old Bryan type? In the first instance, the Bryanites would refuse to support him and he would stand no chance of carrying a single large Western State. In the second instance, New York and the East would repudiate him and he would lose all States in that section.

This reveals the fundamental weakness in the Democratic situation. The party is more intent upon fighting within itself than it is upon fighting its opponent. It is so irreconcilably divided in opinion that no common ground of meeting can be discerned. It cannot be induced to make tariff reform its chief issue because its members have at heart no interest in the question and they know also that the people are content with present conditions and will not tolerate a proposal to disturb them. The silver question is dead and cannot be revived. There remains only the Trusts, and on that they are greatly embarrassed by the record of President Roosevelt. He has enforced the law fearlessly and thoroughly. He has won the confidence of the people in his sincerity in the matter. He has refused, as the phrase of Attorney-General Knox puts it, to "run amuck" among all the corporations of the land on the assumption that not only are Trusts and corporations bad, illegal and full of evil, but all aggregations of wealth, as well, and all deserving of prosecution and destruction through the courts. Under these conditions, the only way open to the Democrats is to out-Roosevelt Roosevelt, to go farther than he has gone, that is, "run amuck." Mr. Bryan and his followers wish to do this; the rest of the party are opposed to it, and if a candidate and platform are put forward embodying that doctrine, they will bolt a third time.

Is there any other platform that the Democrats can formulate? They can and probably will assail President Roosevelt as an unsafe" man, but a campaign on a personal issue against a man of deeds has never succeeded in this country and never can. They will not take the tariff as an issue, and they have no desire to declare direct antagonism to the great issues of the Republican platform which I have enumerated above. Their situation is much like what the late William C. Whitney said it was four years ago -"They have neither men nor principles." They have a man in Judge Parker, but the difficulty lies in fitting him with suitable principles.