My own turn came last. I said: ``Mr. President: I will make no speech, but will simply state two facts.
``First: Down to a comparatively recent period every high school, college, and university in the Northern States has been a center of Republican ideas: no one will gainsay this for a moment. But recently there has come a change.
During nearly twenty years it has been my duty to nominate to the trustees of Cornell University candidates for various positions in its faculty; the fundamental charter of the institution absolutely forbids any consideration, in such cases, of the party or sect to which any candidate belongs, and I have always faithfully carried out that injunction, never, in any one of the multitude of nominations that I have made, allowing the question of politics to enter in the slightest degree. But still it has happened that, almost without exception, the candidates have proved to be Republicans, and this to such an extent that at times I have regretted it; for the university has been obliged frequently to ask for legislation from a Democratic legislature, and I have always feared that this large preponderance of Republican professors would be brought up against us as an evidence that we were not true to the principles of our charter. As a matter of fact, down to two or three years since, there were, as I casually learned, out of a faculty of about fifty members, not over eight or ten Democrats. But during these recent years all this has been changed, and at the State election, when Judge Folger was defeated for the governorship, I found to my surprise that, almost without exception, my colleagues in the faculty had voted the Democratic ticket; so far as Icould learn, but three besides myself had voted for the Republican candidate.'' President Harrison immediately said: ``Mr. White, was that not chiefly due to the free-trade tendencies of college-men?'' I answered: ``No, Mr.
President; the great majority of these men who voted with the Democrats were protectionists, and you will yourself see that they must have been so if they had continued to vote for the Republican ticket down to that election. All that I hear leads me to the conviction that the real cause is disappointment at the delay of the Republican party in making good its promises to improve the public service. In this question the faculties of our colleges and universities, especially in the Eastern, Middle, and Northern States, take a deep interest. In fact, it is with them the question of all questions; and I think this is one of the things which, at that election in New York, caused the most overwhelming defeat that a candidate for governor had ever experienced.'' To this the President listened attentively, and I then said: ``Mr.
President, my second point is this: The State of New York is, of course, of immense importance to the Republican party, and it has been carried in recent years by a majority of a few hundred votes. There are more than fourteen thousand school districts in the State, and in nearly every one of these school districts there are a certain number of earnest men--anywhere from a handful to a houseful--who believe that since the slavery question is removed from national politics, the only burning question which remains is the `spoils system' and the reform of the civil service. Now, you have only to multiply the fourteen thousand school districts by a very small figure, and you will see the importance of this question as regards the vote of the State of New York. I know whereof I speak, for I have myself addressed meetings in many of these districts in favor of a reform of the civil service, have had correspondence with other districts in all parts of the State, and am sure that there is a deep-seated feeling on the subject in great numbers of them,--a feeling akin to what used to be called in the anti-slavery days `fanaticism,'--that is, a deep-seated conviction that this is now the most important question before the American people, and that it must be settled in precedence to all others.''
The President received what I had to say courteously, and then began a reply to us all. He took at first rather a bitter tone, saying that he had a right to find fault with all of us; that the Civil Service League had denounced his administration most unjustly for its relation to the spoils system; that he was moving as rapidly in the matter as circumstances permitted; that he was anxious to redeem the promises made by the party and by himself;that he had already done something and purposed to do more; and that the glorifications of the progress made by the previous administration in this respect, at the expense of his own, had been grossly unjust.
To this we made a short rejoinder on one point, stating that his complaint against us was without foundation;that not one of us was a member of the Civil Service League; that not one of us had taken any part in its deliberations; and that we could not, therefore, be made responsible in any way for its utterances. The President now became somewhat more genial, though he did not ask us to be seated, alluding in a pungent but good-natured way to the zeal for reform shown by Mr. Roosevelt, who was standing by, and closing in considerably better humor than he had begun. Although I cannot say that Iwas greatly pleased with his treatment of the committee, I remembered that, although courtesy was not generally considered his strong point, he was known to possess many sterling qualities, and I felt bound to allow that his speech revealed a man of strength and honest purpose.
All of us, even Mr. Roosevelt and Senator Lodge, came away believing that good had been done, and that the President, before his term of office had expired, would do what he could in the right direction; and I am glad to say that this expectation was fulfilled.
CHAPTER XIV
McKINLEY AND ROOSEVELT--1891-1904
