World’s Ⓐtextual note recent exposure of fact that Roosevelt bought his election—Remarks about Roosevelt—His proposed trip down the Mississippi—Mr. Clemens declines to join the excursion and pilot President’s boat—Copy of poem relating to this incident.
The King’s garden party at Windsor——
But never mind about that now; I will take it up when to-day’s latest and freshest and newest interest in President Roosevelt and his antics shall have had a chance to quiet down—in case he should give it one, which is not likely. Three days ago the World newspaper convicted him, beyond redemption, of having bought his election to the Presidency with money. That he committed this stupendous crime has long been suspected—ever since election day, in fact—but the proofs have never been furnished until now. Judge Parker, the opposition candidate, made the charge at the time, in courteous parliamentary terms, but Mr. Roosevelt fiercely denied it—thus adding falsehood to his burden of misconduct. However, that was not much of an addition—for him; he is accustomed to it, and has a talent for it, although he detests false speaking in other people, and cannot abide it. At one time and another, during the past three years, he has frankly charged a dozen of the cleanest men in the country with being unveracious,Ⓐtextual note and in every instance has seemed almost really and sincerely shocked at it. Mr. Roosevelt is easily the most astonishing event in American history—if we except the discovery of the country by Columbus. The details of Mr. Roosevelt’s purchase of the Presidency by bribery of voters are all exposed now, even to the names of the men who furnished the money, and the amounts which each contributedⒺexplanatory note. The men are great corporation chiefs, and three of them are Standard Oil monopolistsⒺexplanatory note. It is now known that when the canvass was over, a week before election day, and all legitimate uses for election-money at an end, Mr. Roosevelt got frightened and sent for Mr. Harriman to come to Washington and arrange measures to save the State of New York for the Republican party. The meeting took place, and Harriman was urged to raise two hundred thousand dollars for the cause. He raised two hundred and sixty thousand, and it was spent upon the election in [begin page 135] the last week of the campaign—necessarily for the purchase of votes, since the time had gone by for using money in any other way. In a printed statement, Judge Parker now says:
Obviously in the closing hours of the campaign but one practical use could be made of it, and that was to swell the fund already accumulated to secure beyond peradventure the large floating vote, builded up by years of effort to corrupt the electorate by means of moneys contributed by those who were willing to buy favors from those willing to sell themⒺexplanatory note.
Of the money subscribed, two hundred thousand dollars were spent in the City of New York, and Mr. Harriman claims that it changed the votes of fifty thousand floaters, thereby making a change in Mr. Roosevelt’s favorⒶtextual note of a hundred thousand votes.
For years the rich corporations have furnished vast sums of money to keep the Republican party in power, and have done this upon the understanding that their monopolies were to be shielded and protected in return. During all these years this protection has been faithfully furnished, in accordance with the agreement, but this time treachery intervened. Mr. Roosevelt saw that it would be popular to attack the great corporationsⒺexplanatory note, and he did not hesitate to retire from his contract and do it. Mr. Harriman and those others had bought him and paid for him, but that was nothing to a man who stands always ready to sell his honor for such a price as he can get for it in the market—for even aⒶtextual note large advertisement, for that matter.
Mr. Roosevelt is now rejoicing in the possession of a federal judge, of Chicago, who is a man after his own heart. This judge has fined the Standard Oil Company twenty-nine million two hundred and forty thousand dollars, upon a quibbleⒺexplanatory note, and the President is delighted, for it is a large and showy advertisement. It is quite unlikely that a higher court will affirm the decisionⒺexplanatory note, on appeal, but the President will care little for that; he has had his advertisement.
He has sent Secretary Taft around the worldⒺexplanatory note on an electioneering trip—another advertisement.
He is sending the United States navy to San Francisco by way of the Strait of Magellan—all for show, all for advertisementⒺexplanatory note—although he is aware that if it gets disabled on its adventurous trip it cannot be repaired in the Pacific, for lack of docks; but the excursion will make a great noise, and this will satisfy Mr. Roosevelt.
Mr. Roosevelt has done what he could to destroy the industries of the country, and they all stand now in a half-wreckedⒶtextual note condition and waiting in an ague to see what he will do next. One more shake-up and they will go, perhaps. He will certainly provide that shake-up, if he can get a sufficient advertisement out of it. That San Francisco earthquake which shook theⒶtextual note city down, and made such a noise in the world, was but a poor thing, and local; it confined itself to a narrow strip of the Pacific strand, and was a poor little back-settlement thing compared with Mr. Roosevelt; he is the real earthquake, and the most colossal one in history; when he quakes he convulses the entire land, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and from Canada to the Gulf; not even a village escapes. In six months he has reduced the value of every species of property in [begin page 136] the United States—in some cases 10 per centⒶtextual note, in others 20 per centⒶtextual note, in still others 50Ⓐtextual note per cent. Six months ago the country was worth a hundred and fourteen billions; it is not worth more than ninetyⒶtextual note billions nowⒺexplanatory note. The public confidence is gone; it is possible that the public credit may follow. Mr. Roosevelt is the most formidable disaster that has befallen the country since the Civil War—but the vast mass of the nation loves him, is frantically fond of him, even idolizes him. This is the simple truth. It sounds like a libel upon the intelligence of the human race, but it isn’t; there isn’t any way to libel the intelligence of the human race.
To descend to small matters: the President is about to start out on another advertising tour; two or three weeks hence he is going to review the Mississippi River—that poor old abandoned waterwayⒶtextual note which was my field of usefulness when I was a pilot in the days of its high prosperity, nearly fifty years ago. He will start at Cairo and go down the river on a steamboat, and make a noise all the way. He is ready to lend himself to any wildcat scheme that any one can invent for the bilking of the Treasury, provided he can get an advertisement out of it. This time he goes as cat’s paw for that ancient and insatiable gang, the Mississippi Improvement conspiratorsⒶtextual note, who for thirty years have been annually sucking the blood of the Treasury and spending it in fantastic attempts to ameliorate the condition of that useless river—apparently that, really to feed the Republican voteⒺexplanatory note out there. These efforts have never improved the river, for the reason that no effort of man can do that. The Mississippi will always have its own way; no engineering skill can persuade it to do otherwise; it has always torn down the petty basket-work of the engineers and poured its giant floods whithersoever it chose, and it will continue to do this. The President’s trip is in the interest of another wasted appropriation, and the project will succeed—succeed and furnish an advertisement.
Three or four weeks ago the Mayor of Cairo invited me to come out and join the conspiracy and be a guest, but I said I couldn’t make so long a land journey at my time of life, I not being well able to endure such a strain upon my strength, and would therefore excuse myself. Memphis invited me also, and I excused myself upon the same plea. The next I heard was that I had accepted, and was going to steer the President’s boat, with my venerable boss, Bixby, standing guard over me in the pilot-house to see that I didn’t butt the boat’s brains out and leave the country “shy” of a President, as the slang phrase has it. Next appeared a wandering telegram which said I had “declined”Ⓐtextual note to pilot the President’s boatⒺexplanatory note. It was a gratuitous slur; I had made no remark which could be construed into a discourtesy to the Chief Magistrate; for the sake of my own self-respectⒶtextual note I would not doⒶtextual note that. However, some poetry has resulted—therefore I have my compensation. I love poetry—at least I love it when it advertises meⒺexplanatory note.
MARK TWAIN TO THE PRESIDENT.
Note.—Mark Twain declines to pilot the steamboat which will take President Roosevelt down the Mississippi.
I’m asked to steer that boat of yours,
Theodore! O Theodore!
[begin page 137] Between the Mississippi shores,
Theodore! O Theodore!
But hear me now before you go:
I shall not do it if I know
Myself, because I’ll have no show,
Theodore! O Theodore!
When at the wheel to steer I stand,
Theodore! O Theodore!
You’ll butt in there to take a hand,
Theodore! O Theodore!
You’ll bang that wheel around like—well,
You’ll bang it as I cannot tell,
And I can only stand and yell:
Theodore! O Theodore!
If I should say to you, “Get out,
Theodore! O Theodore!
You do not know what you’re about,”
Theodore! O Theodore!
You’d gaze upon me fierce and glum;
You’d think that I was going some,
And say I was a liar, by gum,
Theodore! O Theodore!
Nay, nay! no piloting for me,
Theodore! O Theodore!
On board of any craft with thee,
Theodore! O Theodore!
I’m rather old and on the shelf;
I do not care for fame and pelf—
Say, steer the darned old boat yourself,
Theodore! O Theodore!
W. J. Lampton.
President Roosevelt . . . the names of the men who furnished the money, and the amounts which each contributed] This scandal concerns the 1904 presidential election. In late October of that year, the Democratic candidate, Judge Alton B. Parker, made a speech in which he said that “the trusts are furnishing the money with which they [the Republicans] hope to control the election” (“Genesis of the Famous Election Fund Raised by Harriman at Roosevelt’s Request,” New York World, 9 Sept 1907, 3). Congress had recently passed legislation forbidding corporations to contribute to political campaigns. Incumbent president Theodore Roosevelt denied any impropriety. In April 1907, railroad magnate E. H. Harriman renewed the charge in a letter leaked to the New York World. Harriman said that Roosevelt, fearing he might not carry his home state of New York, had called upon Harriman to raise $250,000 in election funds, and had promised in return to appoint Republican Senator Chauncey Depew as ambassador to France, and to relax his attack on corporate interests. Once elected, Roosevelt did neither of these things. Such was Harriman’s account; Roosevelt hit back in public, calling Harriman’s story a lie, and publishing their 1904 correspondence. The World renewed the attack on 9 September, publishing the names of the corporate contributors to the election fund, with the amounts they gave (“Harriman Lies, Says President,” Washington Post, 3 Apr 1904, 1; “Heads of Corporations Came Up with the Cash to Elect Roosevelt,” New York World, 9 Sept 1907, 3; Lewis 1919, 231–34).
three of them are Standard Oil monopolists] Among the three Standard Oil chiefs reported as having contributed to Roosevelt’s 1904 election fund was Clemens’s close friend and benefactor Henry Huttleston Rogers (the other two were John D. Archbold and William Rockefeller). If true, the donation by Rogers of $30,000 is surprising, since, on the testimony of fellow tycoon Thomas W. Lawson, he had despised Roosevelt for years (Lawson 1904). This matter of campaign donations was still being fought out years after Roosevelt’s presidency and Rogers’s death in 1909 (New York Times: “Standard Oil Gave $100,000,” 9 Sept 1907, 1; “Roosevelt Says Big Gifts Didn’t Purchase Favor,” 5 Oct 1912, 1).
In a printed statement, Judge Parker now says . . . willing to sell them] Parker’s statement appeared in the New York World on 11 September 1907, and was widely reprinted.
For years the rich corporations have furnished vast sums . . . Mr. Roosevelt saw that it would be popular to attack the great corporations] The Republican party had traditionally been friendly to big business and enjoyed its support; but Roosevelt’s first term gave unmistakable signs that he aimed to restrict the power of corporations along the lines mandated by the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890. In 1902 he shocked Wall Street by filing an antitrust suit against the Northern Securities Company. The next year, he clashed with Standard Oil by sponsoring antitrust legislation; and upon reelection in 1904, he ordered an investigation of the petroleum industry, intending to break up Standard Oil. In this context, Clemens’s claim that Roosevelt had been bought by the corporations, but failed to “stay bought,” hardly seems tenable (Murphy 2011, 156–60; “President Threatens an Extra Session,” New York Times, 8 Feb 1903, 1; “Investigation of Standard Oil Ordered,” San Francisco Chronicle, 19 Nov 1904, 1).
This judge has fined the Standard Oil Company twenty-nine million . . . dollars, upon a quibble] On 13 April 1907, in the Chicago federal court of Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis, a jury found Standard Oil of Indiana guilty of multiple violations of the Elkins Act. Standard Oil had accepted illegal discounted rates, or “rebate,” on transportation of its oil by the Chicago and Alton Railway Company. Because the indictment treated each delivery of oil as a separate criminal act, the indictment contained 1,903 counts, each of them bearing a substantial fine. In August 1907, Judge Landis imposed fines totaling $29.24 million. In his notebook, Clemens recorded the quip of an unidentified person—Rogers, perhaps: “Fining the Standard Oil Co $29,240,000 reminded him of the June bride’s remark: ‘I expected it but didn’t suppose it would be so big’ ” (Notebook 48, TS p. 19, CU-MARK; New York Times: “Standard Oil Found Guilty,” 14 Apr 1907, 1; “Judge’s Decision Imposing the Fine,” 4 Aug 1907, 2).
It is quite unlikely that a higher court will affirm the decision] On appeal, Judge Landis’s August 1907 decision was reversed, and a new trial was ordered. Judge Anderson, of the district of Indiana, disallowed the counting of each shipment as an individual act, reducing the number of counts and the size of any possible fines. At the close of proceedings in March 1909, Judge Anderson instructed the jury to acquit. The government abandoned the case. Standard Oil was broken up under antitrust law in 1911 (“Government Abandons $29,240,000 Case against the Standard Oil Co.,” Wall Street Journal, 11 Mar 1909, 2).
He has sent Secretary Taft around the world] From September to December 1907 William Howard Taft, then Roosevelt’s secretary of war, made a 123-day tour around the world, sailing from Seattle and visiting heads of state in Japan, the Philippines, and Russia before returning via the Atlantic (“Taft Home Again, Mum on Politics,” New York Times, 21 Dec 1907, 1).
He is sending the United States navy to San Francisco . . . all for advertisement] See the Autobiographical Dictation of 18 October 1907, note at 173.10.
In six months he has reduced the value of every species of property . . . it is not worth more than ninety billions now] Clemens blames Roosevelt’s antitrust policy for the slump of 1907 (which would soon be eclipsed by the panic of the same year; see AD, 1 Nov 1907). The total wealth of the United States was reported in early 1907 as slightly more than $107 billion, not the $114 billion that Clemens asserts. An article in the New York Times of 15 August 1907 estimated that stock values had declined $3 billion over the last three weeks. Clemens could have applied this conjectural rate of loss to the last six months to arrive at his figure of $24 billion lost, giving a new value of “ninety billions” (New York Times: “U.S. Wealth in 1904 Was $107,104,192,410,” 24 Mar 1907, 10; “Roosevelt Blamed for Wall St. Slump,” 15 Aug 1907, 1, 2).
he is going to review the Mississippi . . . to ameliorate the condition of that useless river—apparently that, really to feed the Republican vote] In May 1907 Roosevelt announced that he planned to make an October journey down the Mississippi by steamboat. The excursion was sponsored by the Lakes-to-the-Gulf Deep Waterways Association, a group of businessmen who lobbied for the improvement of the Mississippi and its tributaries. If artificially deepened to accommodate freight ships, the river system, which was public property, could offer competition to the railroads, which were owned and controlled by wealthy men. The project had Roosevelt’s approval, but Clemens’s contrary view of “the Mississippi Improvement conspirators” was not purely reactive: improvements of this kind had been discussed for decades, and Clemens derided them in chapter 28 of Life on the Mississippi (1883). His claim that the river-improvements lobby fed “the Republican vote” has not been substantiated; at this period, both Democrats and Republicans favored the improvements (“Jaunt for President,” Washington Post, 19 May 1907, 12; “World’s Greatest Waterway Indorsed by President,” New York Times, 6 Oct 1907, SM1; Democratic National Committee 1908, 15).
Three or four weeks ago the Mayor of Cairo invited me . . . which said I had “declined” to pilot the President’s boat] Clemens, staying in Tuxedo Park in July 1907, declined an invitation from the mayor of Cairo, Illinois, where the presidential tour was going to be launched, on 29 July. A few days later he received and declined an invitation from the city of Memphis, where the tour would end with a convention of the Lakes-to-the-Gulf Association (29 July 1907 to Parsons, InU-Li; Lakes-to-the-Gulf Association to SLC, 31 Aug 1907, CU-MARK; 26 and 27 Sept 1907 to Edmonds, Baton Rouge State Times–New Advocate, 20 Feb 1911, 2).
some poetry has resulted . . . it advertises me] The poem that follows is by Clemens’s second cousin William James Lampton, the grandson of one of Jane Clemens’s paternal uncles. He became a journalist in the 1870s, and was best known as a contributor of satirical verses to the New York papers ( AutoMT1 , 642 n. 450.13–19; “Colonel W. J. Lampton, Newspaper Poet, Dead,” Editor and Publisher 49 [2 June 1917]: 29).
Source document.
TS1 Typescript, leaves numbered 2251–59, made from Hobby’s notes and revised.The paragraph which quotes ‘a printed statement’ by Alton B. Parker (135.3–7) is copied from an unidentified newspaper; the item first appeared in the New York World for 11 September 1907 and was widely reprinted. Likewise, the clipping “Mark Twain to the President” was first printed in the New York World, and was much reprinted. Not knowing the exact sources from which Hobby typed, our text is based on TS1.
An authorial instruction is recorded by Lyon on the first leaf: ‘Not to be used for fifty years from 1907’.