will do his duty, he will
give the people the benefit of the doubt, and act in any way which
their interests demand and which is not affirmatively prohibited by law,
unheeding the likelihood that he himself, when the crisis is over and
the danger past, will be assailed for what he has done.

Every step I took in this matter was open as the day, and was known in
detail at the moment to all people. The press contained full accounts of
the visit to me of Messrs. Frick and Gary, and heralded widely and
with acclamation the results of that visit. At the time the relief and
rejoicing over what had been done were well-nigh universal. The danger
was too imminent and too appalling for me to be willing to condemn those
who were successful in saving them from it. But I fully understood and
expected that when there was no longer danger, when the fear had been
forgotten, attack would be made upon me; and as a matter of fact after
a year had elapsed the attack was begun, and has continued at intervals
ever since; my ordinary assailant being some politician of rather cheap
type.

If I were on a sail-boat, I should not ordinarily meddle with any of the
gear; but if a sudden squall struck us, and the main sheet jammed, so
that the boat threatened to capsize, I would unhesitatingly cut the main
sheet, even though I were sure that the owner, no matter how grateful
to me at the moment for having saved his life, would a few weeks later,
when he had forgotten his danger and his fear, decide to sue me for the
value of the cut rope. But I would feel a hearty contempt for the owner
who so acted.

There were many other things that we did in connection with
corporations. One of the most important was the passage of the meat
inspection law because of scandalous abuses shown to exist in the great
packing-houses in Chicago and elsewhere. There was a curious result of
this law, similar to what occurred in connection with the law providing
for effective railway regulation. The big beef men bitterly opposed the
law; just as the big railway men opposed the Hepburn Act. Yet three
or four years after these laws had been put on the statute books every
honest man both in the beef business and the railway business came to
the conclusion that they worked good and not harm to the decent business
concerns. They hurt only those who were not acting as they should have
acted. The law providing for the inspection of packing-houses, and the
Pure Food and Drugs A