Harvey J. O'Higgins

“ Miller replied, embarrassed.
Warren continued pacing his carpet. "It's his future. That's what worries me. If he stays with me he'll become a machine politician a practical, professional politician. He'll have to make compromises. Unless he's an exceptionally strong character he'll become involved in things that aren't—well, pretty. You know what our sort of politics means. I don't want my daughter to marry that sort of politician."
He sat down and leaned forward on his desk to look the astonished Miller straight in the eyes. "The future is with you men. We're fighting a losing fight here. ”

“ A man is born with the ability to rule as he's born with any other ability. It happens that, during his life, some one class is governing, and he governs for them. Then another class surges up, with a new ruler. And then another. But the people never govern. They can't, any more than an army can command and direct itself. They're always killing one king to put his crown on another. ”

“ By working after school-hours, delivering newspapers, running errands, doing odd furnace jobs at night, and generally foraging like a stray cat, he had contrived to get an elementary public-school education. Then at the age of twelve he had gone to work as an office-boy for Judge Stephen Wales, and the judge in the end had practically adopted him. (Hence the "Wales" in "Thomas Wales Warren.") He sent Warren to law-school. He took him as a partner in his office. He even accepted him as a son-in-law, proud of the boy and his ability. ”

“ Politics in this state are small and corrupt. We'll escape from them into the national field and the larger issues. You'll come with me to Washington, and if you never reign like another Dolly Madison in the White House, at least you'll be the friend of the Dolly Madison who does. And you'll never be ashamed of your old dad."
"I'm not ashamed of him," she sobbed.
"No," he said, "but you might have been if I'd stayed here. Come along now. I'm as hungry as if I'd been to a funeral."
12 And that was why Warren resigned from the control of his native state and went to his career in Washington. ”

“ Pritchard flushed. "You're still too young—and unable to support a wife. But you must prepare for such things while there's time, so as not to be taken unawares. To marry such a girl as a boy of your character would naturally aspire to you'll have to be something more than a stenographer." He was reaching for his pen. "I'll be here late, but you needn't come back. I'll see you in the morning."
Pritchard folded and refolded the letter. "Well," he said at last.
"And put the catch on the door as you go out," Warren dismissed him. ”

“ Moreover, it is why his career in Washington followed the lines that it did. Warren never philosophized; he handled facts as an artisan handles his tools; but if he had philosophized, his theory of life would probably have been something like this: "There is no justice, there is no morality, in nature or in natural laws; justice and morality are laws only of human society. ”

“ And Warren said: "Robert, a healthy opposition is the life of party politics. Oppose me by all means, and I'll oppose you. I'll enjoy it, and it will be a good training for you."
Miller frowned determinedly. He felt that he was a strong character asserting his independence and compelling even Warren to bend to him with assumed jocularity. When he was nominated by the Direct Legislation League he defied the lightning in a speech in which he named Warren as the man most responsible for preventing the introduction of a direct primary law into the last Legislature. ”

“ Warren, Attorney-General of his native state, unknown to the national cartoonists, engaged obscurely in local politics, and foreseeing his conspicuous future as little as a man foresees the view from the top of a hill which he is still climbing. ”

“ At thankless work. People don't know how to govern themselves, but they revolt against any man who tries* to govern them. You have to do it without letting them know you're doing it. That's what makes our politics so hypocritical."
He may have believed that, or he may not; he was not considering the truth of what he said, but its effect on her. He asked, as if casually, the question to which he had been leading: "Did you read the attack that this man Miller is making on me? 'Wardrobe' Miller."
"Yes, father," she confessed. He never discussed politics with her. ”

“ It was characteristic of Warren so to turn alertly to any new-comer, and it was characteristic of him to regard even Pritchard with a mechanical habit of scrutiny as he regarded every one who came to interview him. He used to say that he could tell if a man was going to lie to him by the way he crossed the room. ”

“ He knew where to reach a man as the wasp knows where to sting a beetle so as to paralyze a nerve center that nothing but careful dissection under a microscope would seem sufficient to locate. He had never dissected Pritchard, and it is scarcely worth while to do it here; but to that well-dressed and good-looking young "secretarial valet" the offer of a place with the rich and "classy" "Wardrobe" Miller would be a flattery and a temptation hard to withstand.
9 As soon as Miller's letter arrived Warren telephoned to Pritchard, put the letter in the outer office, and returned to his work. ”

“ He could manage her if he could manage Pritchard.
He shut his door noiselessly. He sat down to his desk 'phone and called a private number. "Is that you, Robert?" he asked, in a low voice. "Know who's speaking? It's Tom Warren. Can you come at once to my office in the State-house? The side entrance will be open. And my private door. I'll be alone. ... Yes, right away, if you can. I'm going right down. ... I have a personal favor to ask. ... Yes. Thanks." ”

“ But society, national life, and all civilization are subject in their larger aspects to natural laws—which contradict morality——and outrage justice—and the statesman has to move with those laws and direct his people in accordance with them, despite the lesser by-laws of morality and justice. ”

“ They don't realize that some one has to pay for the full stocking, and that they're that some one."
Consequently, in his first participation in national affairs, he kept behind the scenes. He was the stage director of the convention that nominated his Governor for the Presidency, but Warren's name was not even on the program. After he had accepted his place as Attorney-General in Washington he remained unknown, except to the inner higher circle of politics. It was not until he became Secretary of State—in the third year of his President's administration—that he grew conspicuous. ”

“ I want you to offer him a place as stenographer, either for the League or for you personally. I'd prefer the latter. I know I could trust him with you. I haven't so much faith in your executive committee; I know some of those men of old. But try him. If he's not what I think he is, discharge him. ”

“ He had to conceal it from the public. "The American people," he once said in confidence, "still believe in Santa Claus. They believe that if they're good, and wash their faces every morning, and do as teacher tells them, prosperity and well-being will come down the chimney to them. ”

“ And if he was practising some duplicity, he had the excuse that Pritchard had begun that game.
He went back to his work on the direct primary bills. Every now and then he was interrupted by messages from Teague, the detective, who 'phoned to report progress. The roughs of Middleburg had enlisted under the sheriff eagerly. "Say, Ben," Warren asked, "how about that river-front gang that you've been after? You know them when you see them, don't you? ... ”

“ Well, Teague"—he cleared his throat again—"just go down to those joints, get together all the roughs and gunmen you can find, and tell them that a lot of Rubes are coming in to Middleburg to rough-house the town. Understand? Work up their natural antagonism to the hayseeds. And tell them if this lynching is pulled off in Middleburg we'll have to start a campaign of law enforcement that 'll end in a strict closing law and a dry Sunday. ”

“ He insinuated machine men into the Direct Legislation League; they got control unostentatiously of the executive committee, and the League nominated for the governorship Mr. Robert Wardrup Miller, whom Warren had privately chosen for that empty honor.
Miller had accepted his nomination in good faith.
He was a wealthy young idealist who had become an ardent follower of a national leader in reform, and he knew as much about practical politics as a nun. He was a member of the City Club to which Warren belonged, and it was Warren who had encouraged him to enter public life. "Mr. ”

“ Virginia Wales, June 10, 1881; member firm of Wales & Warren, 1880-92. Active in politics; twice deleg. Rep. Nat. convs; mem. Rep. Nat. Exec. Com., 1890-1902; state Attorney- General; Attorney-General of U. S.; Secretary of State; justice Supreme Court of U. S., etc.—Who's Who.
I FOR the purposes of this portrait-study let us take Warren before he was Justice Thomas Wales Warren of the Supreme Court of the United States. Let us take him before he was even Thomas W. Warren, United States Attorney-General and "Warwick the Kingmaker" at Washington. ”