When the Government attempted to take the editors of the Indianapolis News to Washington to be tried under a statute which Elihu Root described in the Dana case as "the same arbitrary and odious law against which Erskine fought in the days of George III," Joseph B. Kealing, United States Attorney for Indiana, resigned his office rather than participate in the proceeding, on the ground that

I believe the principle involved is dangerous, striking at the very foundation of our form of government.

When the case came before Judge Anderson he dismissed the defendants and said in his decision:

To my mind that man has read the history of our institutions to little purpose who does not look with grave apprehension upon the possibility of the success of a proceeding such as this. If the history of liberty means anything, if constitutional guarantees mean anything, this proceeding must fail.

If the prosecuting authorities have the authority to select the tribunal, if there be more than one tribunal to select from; if the Government has that power and can drag citizens from distant States to the capital of the nation, there to be tried, then, as Judge Cooley says, this is a strange result of a Revolution where one of the grievances complained of was the assertion of the right to send parties abroad for trial.

And because Judge Anderson said this, because Judge Anderson refused to prostitute the judicial power in order to help Mr. Roosevelt gratify a desire for personal and political revenge, Mr. Roosevelt brands him as "a crook and a jackass." But Henry L. Stimson, who was Mr. Roosevelt's willing tool in the New York proceed ings against The World, which Judge Hough likewise 'dismissed, is nominated for Governor by Mr. Roosevelt as evidence of Mr. Roosevelt's "gratitude."

The independent and courageous Judge is "a crook and a jackass,” but the servile prosecutor is "Our Harry." Mr. Roosevelt's slanderous assault upon Judge An'derson is in the same spirit as his recent attacks upon the United States Supreme Court. It is in the same spirit as his attacks upon other Judges who dared to decide according to law and not according to his personal will. Years before Mr. Roosevelt left the White House the fact was generally understood that any Federal Judge who decided against the Government in a case in which Mr. Roosevelt was interested had forfeited his chance of promotion. The appointing power was held as a club over every Judge of the Circuit and District Courts.

What would be the situation if Mr. Roosevelt ever returned to the White House, with power to appoint Judges, with power to coerce Congress into enacting new laws relating to the interior Federal courts and with power to coerce Congress into granting him legislation. under which he could pack the Supreme Court? Is it possible to conceive of a greater threat to American liberty and republican institutions? All the nations of Europe and all the hostile fleets of the world could offer no such

menace.

The shadow of Rooseveltism is like the shadow of a great war. While it hangs over the country all other political issues are secondary and there is no place for party lines.

A QUESTION OF HONOR

[January 6, 1913]

UNLESS the Nation intends to make waste paper of its treaties it cannot refuse to submit to arbitration the Panama Canal dispute with Great Britain. One alter

native is left; that is, that Congress shall repeal the provisions exempting from the payment of canal tolls American shipping engaged in coastwise trade.

When Mr. Taft signed the Panama Canal act he defended the right of the United States to exempt coastwise shipping. But through Secretary Stimson the Administration has condemned this policy, which “in effect will amount to the payment of national funds to a special industry which does not need such assistance"-in other words, the granting of a subsidy to a law-made monopoly.

Still, Mr. Taft realized that under the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty Great Britain has grounds for protesting that her rights are violated by the act. It is to his credit that he has the courage and the honesty to declare that the construction of the treaty should be submitted to arbitration, and that if the opportunity comes before he leaves office the dispute will be submitted to an impartial tribunal. Neither the cant of false patriots nor the bluster of jingoes shakes his faith in the wisdom and urgency of meeting Great Britain on equal terms before a court of arbitration.

The United States has two treaties with Great Britain which are vital in this discussion. The Hay-Pauncefote Treaty of 1901 provides that

The Canal shall be free and open to the vessels of commerce and war of all nations observing these rules, on terms of entire equality, so there shall be no discrimination against any such nation, or its citizens or subjects, in respect of the conditions or charges of traffic or otherwise.

The other treaty declares that we will submit to arbitration any questions growing out of the interpretation of treaties, provided they do not "affect the vital interests, the independence or the honor of the two contracting parties, and do not concern the interests of third parties."

If the United States proposes to repudiate both these pledges at one stroke, it may as well tear up all its treaties. It will have given notice to every nation that its plighted word is of no value. If for the sole benefit of a shipping monopoly it persists in its policy of bad faith at Panama, it will expose itself to the merited scorn of the world. It cannot make treaties and break treaties at convenience and hold its head high among the nations. It cannot 'dishonor its pledged word and retain its selfrespect. No sham patriotism can make of the repudiation of solemn obligations "an American policy" unless "American" is to mean something less and something lower than it has meant in an honorable past.

THE NATION'S PLEDGE

[March 18, 1914]

THE Clayton-Bulwer Treaty was a convention to 'define the joint policy of the United States and Great Britain "with reference to any means of communication by shipcanal which may be constructed between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans by way of the River San Juan de Nicaragua and either or both the Lake of Nicaragua or Managua to any port or place on the Pacific Ocean."

This Treaty, which was ratified by the Senate May 22, 1850, provided that—

The Governments of the United States and Great Britain hereby declare that neither the one nor the other will ever obtain or maintain for itself any exclusive control over said ship-canal; agreeing that neither will ever erect nor maintain any fortifications commanding the same or in the vicinity thereof, or occupy, or fortify, or colonize or assume or exercise any dominion over Nicaragua, Costa Rica, the Mosquito coast, or any part of Central America.

If the Treaty had stopped there, the United States would have been spared much controversy and vexation; but it did not stop there. In their anxiety to extend the general principles of this Treaty to every possible Isthmian route between the Atlantic and Pacific, and thereby prevent interference on the part of other Governments, the American and British diplomatists included in the convention a further provision that

The Governments of the United States and Great Britain, having not only desired, in entering into this convention, to accomplish a particular object, but also to establish a general principle, they hereby agree to extend their protection, by treaty stipulations, to any further practicable communications, whether by canal or railway, across the Isthmus which connects North and South America, and especially to the interoceanic communications, should the same prove to be practicable, whether by canal or railway, which are now proposed to be established by the way of Tehuantepec or Panama.

This Treaty was hailed at the time as a notable victory for American diplomacy. It ended all American misgivings as to the objects of the British policy on the Mosquito Coast, and it was regarded as more favorable to American than to British interest.

The United States was not prepared to build a canal, and it was well satisfied to have any canal that might be built subject to the joint protection of the two Englishspeaking nations.

After ratification the Treaty went to sleep, and for many years neither the United States nor Great Britain manifested further interest in the subject of a transIsthmian canal, except in an academic way.

Finally, de Lesseps appeared upon the scene and the question became acute again. Hayes, who was then President, declared that any canal ought to be under American control and the line of that canal should be considered "a