ded that the Government should not accord recognition to a
Government without a navy, a capital, or fixed territory. This decision
made it particularly difficult for the President to perform his
acknowledged duty to Spain, of preventing aid being sent from the
United States to the insurgents. He issued the proper proclamations, and
American officials were reasonably diligent, it is true, but without any
of the special powers which would have resulted from a recognized state
of war they were unable to prevent a leakage of supplies. As a result
General Weyler had some ground for saying, though with characteristic
Spanish extravagance, that it was American aid which gave life to the
revolt.

President Cleveland energetically pressed all cases involving American
rights; he offered mediation; he remonstrated against the cruelty
of Weyler's methods; he pointed out that the United States could not
forever allow an island so near and so closely related to be in flames
without intervention. Spain, however, assumed a rather lofty tone,
and Cleveland was able to accomplish nothing. Senator Lodge and other
Republicans violently attacked his policy as procrastinating, and the
nation as a whole looked forward with interest to the approaching change
in administration.

William McKinley, who became President on March 4, 1897, was not
actively interested in foreign affairs. This he illustrated in a
striking way by appointing as Secretary of State John Sherman of Ohio,
a man of undoubtedly high ability but one whose whole reputation rested
upon his financial leadership, and who now, at the age of seventy-four,
was known to be incapacitated for vigorous action. To the very moment of
crisis, McKinley was opposed to a war with Spain; he was opposed to the
form of the declaration of war and he was opposed to the terms of
peace which ended the war. Emphatically not a leader, he was, however,
unsurpassed in his day as a reader of public opinion, and he believed
his function to be that of interpreting the national mind. Nor did
he yield his opinion in a grudging manner. He grasped broadly the
consequences of each new position which the public assumed, and he was a
master at securing harmonious cooperation for a desired end.

The platform of the Republican party had declared: "The Government
of Spain having lost control of Cuba, and being unable to protect the
property or lives of resident American citizens, or to comply with its
treaty oblig