H McADOO CHAPTER I THE SECRETARYSHIP OF THE TREASURY IGH, white and gleaming, Washington rises above the marshes of the Potomac less a city than a symbol, a capital of immortalized political ideals rather than a metropolis of surging human aspirations. Strangely isolated from the struggling evolution which has been, is and always will be the dominant power of the United States, the city of L'Enfant's plan and conception bears out the wisdom of its founders, who set it apart that it might not be swayed by merely local considerations, and who builded better than they knew by removing it from the emotional upheavals of more populous capitals. With its long vistas of immaculate masonry and its classic memorials of spotless alabaster, it gives to the beholder an impression of detachment, of coldness, of association with a past and the vision of a future rather than absorption in the drama of the present; but if it has the chill and aloofness of marble, it has also something of its permanence. Only by understanding of what its monuments symbolize can the nearer past be measured. Only by comparison with the achievements of their predecessors may the work of men still living be related to the history of the nation they served. Without the standard of Washington and Lincoln the place of Woodrow Wilson in the progress of his country can not be fixed; and without remembrance of the traditions of the Treasury of the United States the labors of William Gibbs McAdoo, Secretary of that portfolio through the six of the most portentous years in the world's drama, may not be estimated. Of all the buildings of Washington the Treasury stands most impressively adamantine. Squat, almost stolid in its architecture, seeming to guard with defiant solemnity the chaste elegance of the White House from the wide sweep of the avenue it deflects, the structure has somehow assumed in the course of its years an aspect significant of its solid foundations. Grayish, flat-faced, except for the classic stateliness of those entrances which are now mere decorations on its facades, it fronts the world of Washington with the severity of Alexander Hamilton, its spiritual founder, rather than with the bluff democracy of Andrew Jackson, the mason of its material cornerstone. It is, all things considered, the last place for the staging of revolution, but revolution and counter-revolution have held sway in its lofty rooms. High purposes have triumphed there, and low intrigues smirched the pages. Nobility has held its stage in flashes of splendid courage. Privilege has entrenched itself to be flung out, and to return, and to be flung out again. In no other department of American National Government has the conflict between aristocracy-sometimes masquerading as plutocracy-and democracy been so clearly defined, so bitterly fought. The log of any Secretary of the Treasury comes to be, in the long run, only a statement of how he steered his course through the ever-troubled waters of the relation of the money power of his generation to the popular welfare. From the days of Alexander Hamilton the Treasury portfolio has been a touchstone of greatness-or of littleness. In the fastnesses of that stronghold a man could do as much or as little as he had inclination, courage or ability to accomplish. A few men of high stature made the post during their tenure a fortress to the nation. Others went to sleep in it, leaving as testimony of their passing only exceedingly flatulent portraits to gaze down from the walls. It is, by virtue of its constitutional authority, the most vital point in the executive system of the United States, for upon its administration for the people depends the weal or woe of that people. In it a man may render the worst of evil or the greatest of good to more than a hundred million of his countrymen. Most men who have been its incumbents have followed the line of least resistance, and done neither. A long succession of them, relieved only by a few instances of real capacity and genuine patriotism, has sometimes brought the institution to a situation where it not only failed to guard but actually imperiled the welfare of the masses. The establishment of the Treasury Department was accomplished only after long and solemn debate in the Continental Congress. The Constitution provided that the Secretary of the Treasury should digest and prepare plans for the improvement and management of the revenue and the support of public credit, to decide on forms of keeping accounts, to report budget estimates, to superintend the collection of revenue, and to execute the laws relating to the sale of public lands. On the face of the statement the post seemed to offer no excess of power to its incumbent. In reality, however, it established an intimate relationship between the Secretary of the Treasury and the Congress, independent of the President, by specifically providing that a call for financial information by the legislative body be |