THE MANTLE OF ROOSEVELT.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9055, 14 February 1908, Page 4

THE MANTLE OF ROOSEVELT.

If Mr Taft, United Stages Secretary for War, and a probable Republican candidate for the United States Presidency, is elected to fill the Presidential chair he will, it seems probable, assume the mantle of his present chief, Mr Roosevelt, in the matter of social reform. The President's speeches on this subject are pleasant reading to all who desire to see the social abuses of the time put down; and his acts, being in conformity with his words, meet with approval far beyond his own dominions. In a recent speech at Jamestown, Mr Roosevelt made the following notable utterance:—"We base our regard for each man on the essentials; we judge him not by his profession, but by his deeds. Other Republics have fallen because the citizens gradually grew to consider the interests of a class before the interests of the whole. This great Republic of ours shall never become the government of a plutocracy, and it shall never become the government of a mob. God willing, it shall remain a government in which each man stands on his worth as a man." A cablegram from New York, which we published yesterday, indicates that Mr Rooseveltss Secretary of State and possible successor sees eye to eye with him in this respect. Speaking at Kansas City, he declared that vigorous action was necessary to eradicate existing business abuses, and pointed out that effective moral and social abuses must be remedied if society as at present constituted was not to yield to a new order of things on a Socialist basis. It is men of this stamp who are required at the head of State affairs at a period when there is a proneness on . the part of huge trusts to exploit the community, and on the part of certain sections of the people to establish class rule.