Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 19.pdf/97

 76

THE GREEN BAG

Throughout his entire active life, and espe cially since so much of it has been given to public service, he has been conspicuous in the national and state campaigns. His rep utation as an orator, the universal esteem of the people, made him one of the foremost and most effective advocates of the policies of his party. The enthusiasm of his own neighbors in the towns of Essex was no greater than that which attended his ap pearance before vast meetings of his fellow citizens of the West or of the Pacific coast. Four times elected to the lower House of Congress, tireless in his devotion to those duties, he gained wide knowledge of the varied administrations of national affairs. It was not surprising that one who had so long looked out past the capes of the Merrimac to the ocean, should have been called to direct the courses of our ships at sea. He knew the brave men who sailed out of Glou cester to the stormiest waters of the world. He had heard from their lips the tales of heroism that Connolly has made immortal. He had the most profound and real interest in the welfare of the seamen, and in the maintenance of our navy at the highest de gree of efficiency in ships and men, and in the extension and -protection of our commer cial interests the world over. With charac teristic energy, diligent study, investigation, and observation, he fitted himself to conduct with admirable success the administration of the Navy Department. He sought only the counsel of those best qualified to aid himHe adopted only that which should respond to the most rigid requirements of efficient service. The coming years shall testify to the wis dom of his foresight in the strategic estab lishment of naval stations in Caribbean and Pacific seas. With the universal approval of his countrymen, he discharged the duties of Secretary of the Navy, and then was called to assume even weightier cares and responsibilities. Coming to his own best loved field of effort, he assumed the duties of chief law

officer of the nation, for throughout all the diversities of experience in public office, his dominant impulse, instinct, and ambition, has been to give his life service to the admin istration of the law. The Attorney General sits constantly by the side of the President. With no cabinet officer has he more close or necessarily con fidential official relations. Though upon a word or message of the Secretary of State, incident to foreign diplomatic relations, peace or war may be the issue, yet the utter ance of that portentious word awaits the advice of the Attorney General. The ultimate exercise of the authoritative functions of the Secretary of the Interior, affecting industrial questions of highest im portance to millions of citizens, the adoption of a measure relating to the national funds or currency by the Secretary of the Treasury, touching the very life currents of national finance, again depends upon the final sanc tion of the Attorney General. Such are the ordinary cares, such the normal duties of the office, requiring both learning in the law and incessant attention to the executive con trol of the national affairs. When Mr. Knox, in June, 1904, after a brilliant administration, gave place to his successor, one of less energy, courage, and self-reliance than Mr. Moody might well have been appalled by the forecast of duties that lay before him. No complacent enjoy ment of the prestige of a powerful and hon orable office, no superficial approval of the individual work of a multitude of subordi nates, was either possible from the condition of public affairs, and the aroused sentiment of the people, or tolerable to the man who had so undertaken a task of signal impor tance at a truly critical period in the history of our country. In the days of Hamilton, the Treasury Department was doubtless the field of most momentous executive action, and so we believe during the past few years the Department of the Attorney General has been the scene of executive responsibilities of the very first importance.