Sly fellows they were and sneaks.
Against their "strike" legislation Roosevelt had also to fight.
His chief friend at Albany was Billy O'Neil, who kept a little
crossroads grocery up in the Adirondacks; had thought for himself
on American politics; had secured his election to the Assembly
without the favor of the Machine; and now acted there with as
much independence as his young colleague of the Twenty first
District. Roosevelt remarks that the fact that two persons,
sprung from such totally different surroundings, should come
together in the Legislature was an example of the fine result
which American democracy could achieve.
The session came to a close, and although Roosevelt had protested
the year before that he was not going into politics as a career,
he allowed himself to be renominated. Naturally, his desire to
continue in and complete the task in which he had already
accomplished much was whetted. He would have been a fool if he
had not known, what every one else knew, that he had made a very
brilliant record during his first year.
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