Roosevelt decided to send thither Lieutenant-General John M. Schofield, who was on the retired list of the army, with a sufficient number of regular troops; he should act as receiver, put down all violence, take full charge of the mines and operate them to supply the present demand. Secretaries Root and Knox, both being excellent lawyers, would not have advised this straining of the Constitution; nevertheless they supported the President loyally.1

There was considerable violence in the coal regions but where the fault lay it was bootless to inquire. Certainly Mitchell's advice was against anything of the sort and the President who knew all of the facts in the case, stated in a private letter to Bishop on October 13, the matter fairly: "I have been told, on excellent authority, that the disorder has been very great and of very evil kind. On equally good authority I am told the exact contrary. . . . I stand against socialism, against anarchic disorder." 2 Soon after the conference of October 3, all of the national guard of Pennsylvania was sent to the coal regions to act toward the preservation of peace. It was frequently stated by the operators that, if men were properly protected, enough could be secured to man the mines, but this did not prove to be the case.3

The President saw accurately the probable course of things, writing thus to Robert Bacon: "The situation is bad, especially because it is possible it may grow in

1 On Aug. 6, 1908, Roosevelt wrote a letter to the Outlook in which he gave a large part of the Cleveland correspondence. The Outlook, Aug. 22, 1908, 881. It is also printed by Bishop, i. 204 et seq. For the Schofield incident, Bishop, i. 211. T. Roosevelt, An Autobiography, 514; Private Conversation with the President, Nov. 16, 1905.

2 Bishop, i. 208.

* See Mitchell, Organized Labor, 389.

finitely worse. If when the severe weather comes on there is a coal famine I dread to think of the suffering, in parts of our great cities especially, and I fear there will be fuel riots of as bad a type as any bread riots we have ever seen. Of course, once the rioting has begun, once there is a resort to mob violence, the only thing to do is to maintain order." 1

Before adopting the drastic plan of making General Schofield a receiver of the mining companies, the President again tried persuasion. By this time the operators, for some reason not disclosed, had become more placable. Roosevelt requested Secretary Root to go to New York to see if he could not get Morgan to agree upon some plan of arbitration. Root spent the better part of a day with J. P. Morgan on his yacht Corsair and during this interview, so Root wrote to the President, "we drafted an agreement of arbitration for a commission to be appointed by you. Mr. Morgan got the signatures of the operators to this paper with a single modification. The modification required that the arbitrators appointed by you should belong to certain specified classes — an army engineer, a business man familiar with the coal business, a judge of the locality, a sociologist, etc. When this paper was presented to the miners, they in turn wished for some modification of the proposal and it appeared they would be satisfied to enter into the agreement if Bishop Spalding [the Roman Catholic bishop of Peoria, Illinois] could be added to the list of arbitrators and Mr. Clark could be appointed to the place which called for a sociologist." 2 The President was in constant consulta

1 Oct. 5, Bishop, i. 208.

Letter of Root to the President, June 23, 1903, Bishop, i. 212.

tion with Hanna and learned from him that he had sent a telegram to Mitchell assuring him that the miners "could depend on absolute fairness" at Roosevelt's hands.1

To clinch the business so that there could be no misunderstanding, Root desired that a member of Morgan's firm should come to Washington and confer with the President. Thereupon, two of the prominent partners came. The interview, which took place on October 15, is best described in a private letter of the President to Senator Lodge: "The operators had limited me down by a full proviso to five different types of men, including an 'eminent sociologist.' . . The miners, on the other hand, wanted me to appoint at least two extra members myself, or in some fashion to get Bishop Spalding (whom I myself, wanted) and the labor union man on the commission. . . . The operators refused point blank to have another man added. . . . Finally it developed that what they meant was that no extra man should be added if he was a representative of organized labor. . . . It took me about two hours before I at last grasped the fact that the mighty brains of these captains of industry had formulated the theory that they would rather have anarchy than tweedledum, but if I would use the word tweedledee they would hail it as meaning peace. In other words, that they had not the slightest objection to my appointing a labor man as an 'eminent sociologist' and adding Bishop Spalding on my own account, but they preferred to see the Red Commune come rather than to have me make Bishop Spalding or anyone else 'the eminent sociologist,' and add the labor man. I instantly told them that

...

1 Life of Hanna, Croly, 399.

I had not the slightest objection whatever to doing an absurd thing when it was necessary to meet the objection of an absurd mind on some vital point, and that I would cheerfully appoint my labor man as the 'eminent sociologist.' It was almost impossible for me to appreciate the instant and tremendous relief this gave them. They saw nothing offensive in my language and nothing ridiculous in the proposition, and Pierpont Morgan and Baer, when called up by telephone, eagerly ratified the absurdity; and accordingly at this utterly unimportant price we bid fair to come out of as dangerous a situation as I ever dealt with." 1

Roosevelt desired to appoint Grover Cleveland on the Commission in lieu of the army engineer, but to this the operators would not agree. In 1915 Roosevelt wrote to Charles Washburn, "I think the settlement of the coal strike was much the most important thing I did about labor from every standpoint." 2 The President wrote to Senator Hanna: "Last night when it became evident that we were going to get a Commission which would be accepted by both sides, I remarked, 'Well, Uncle Mark's work has borne fruit,' and everybody said 'yes.' The solution came because so many of us have for so long hammered at the matter until at last things got into shape which made the present outcome possible." 3 In effecting such a compromise the personality of men counted for much and Roosevelt and Hanna seemed the men of all men to bring about such a result.

1 Bishop, i. 214; Private Conversation with the President, Nov. 16, 1905.

Roosevelt, Thayer, 246; Charles G. Washburn, 82.

3 Oct. 16, Life of Hanna, Croly, 400.

The Commission was: Brigadier-General John M. Wilson, retired, formerly Chief of Engineers, U. S. A.; E. W. Parker, expert mining engineer, chief statistician of the coal division of the U. S. Geological Survey and editor of the Engineering and Mining Journal; George Gray, Judge of the United States Circuit Court, Delaware; E. E. Clark, Chief of the Order of Railway Conductors, sociologist; Thomas H. Watkins, practically connected with the mining and selling of coal; Bishop John L. Spalding of Illinois; Carroll D. Wright, U. S. Commissioner of Labor, Recorder of the Commission.1 "Most of the miners were Roman Catholics" and "Mitchell and the other leaders of the miners had urged me to appoint some high Catholic ecclesiastic." Bishop Spalding was "one of the very best men to be found in the entire country." Judge Gray was chosen chairman of the Commission.

The miners at once went to work. The relief felt in the eastern part of the country was very great. The well-to-do were spared much hardship, the poor, freezing. Coal, of which there was still a small stock, had advanced to fabulous prices. Now normal conditions obtained. Many homes accustomed to genial warmth blessed Roosevelt because he had used the high office of President to give them comfort.

In five months the Commission made their report to the President, with their different awards. They adjudged that the miners should have an increase of ten per cent in their wages; that there should be no discrimination against union or non-union laborers; a slid

1 Bishop, i. 217.

* Roosevelt, Autobiography, 507, 509.