Somewhat
later, as one of the Federal Commissioners, Mr. Roosevelt made a most
useful contribution to the more effective enforcement of the Civil
Service Law. Still later, as Police Commissioner of New York City, he
had his experience of reform by means of unregenerate instruments and
administrative lies. Then, as Governor of the State of New York, he was
instrumental in securing the passage of a law taxing franchises as real
property and thus faced for the first time and in a preliminary way the
many-headed problem of the trusts. Finally, when an accident placed him
in the Presidential chair, he consistently used the power of the Federal
government and his own influence and popularity for the purpose of
regulating the corporations in what he believed to be the public
interest. No other American has had anything like so varied and so
intimate an acquaintance with the practical work of reform as has Mr.
Roosevelt; and when, after more than twenty years of such experience, he
adds to the work of administrative reform the additional task of
political and economic reconstruction, his originality cannot be
considered the result of innocence.
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