>From March 4, 1905, he was President "in his own right." Behind him stood the American people, and he was justified in regarding himself, at that time, as the most popular President since Washington. The unprecedented majority of votes he had received at the election proved that, and proved also that the country believed in "his policies." So he might go ahead to carry out and to extend the general reforms which he had embarked on against much opposition. No one could question that he had a mandate from the people, and during his second term he was still more aggressive. Now, however, came the little rift which widened and widened and at last opened a great chasm between Roosevelt and the people on one side and the Machine dominators of the Republican Party on the other. For although Roosevelt was the choice of the Republicans and of migratory voters from other parties, although he was, in fact, the idol of millions who supported him, the Republican Machine insisted on ruling. Before an election, the Machine consents to a candidate who can win, but after he has been elected the. Machine instinctively acts as his master. A strong man, like President Cleveland, may hold out against the Bosses of his party, but the penalty he has to pay is to find himself bereft of support and his party shattered. This might have happened in Roosevelt's case also, if he had not been more tactful than Cleveland was in dealing with his enemies. He now had to learn the bitter knowledge of the trials which beset a President whose vision outsoars that of the practical rulers of his party. In the House of Representatives there was a little group led by the Speaker, Joseph G. Cannon, of Illinois, who controlled that part of Congress with despotic arrogance. In the Senate there was a similar group of political oligarchs, called the Steering Committee, which decided what questions should be discussed, what bills should be killed, and what others should be passed. Aldrich, of Rhode Island, headed this. A multi-millionaire himself, he was the particular advocate of the Big Interests. Next came Allison, of Iowa, an original Republican, who entered Congress in 1863 and remained there for the rest of his life, a hide-bound party man, personally honest and sufficiently prominent to be "talked of" for Vice President on several occasions. He was rather the peacemaker of the Steering Committee, having the art of reconciling antagonists and of smoothing annoying angles. A little older, was Orville H. Platt, the Senator from Connecticut who died in 1905, and was esteemed a model of virtue among the Senators of his time. As an offset to the men of threescore and ten and over was Albert J. Beveridge, the young Senator from Indiana, vigorous, eloquent, fearless, and radical, whose mind and heart were consecrated to Roosevelt. Beveridge, at least, had no ties, secret or open, with the Trusts, or the Interests, or Wall Street; on the contrary, he