CHAPTER XI. ROOSEVELT'S FOREIGN POLICY
In taking the oath of office at Buffalo, Roosevelt promised to
continue President McKinley's policies. And this he set about
doing loyally. He retained McKinley's Cabinet,* who were working
out the adjustments already agreed upon. McKinley was probably
the best-natured President who ever occupied the White House. He
instinctively shrank from hurting anybody's feelings. Persons who
went to see him in dudgeon, to complain against some act which
displeased them, found him "a bower of roses," too sweet and soft
to be treated harshly. He could say "no" to applicants for office
so gently that they felt no resentment. For twenty years he had
advocated a protective tariff so mellifluously, and he believed
so sincerely in its efficacy, that he could at any time hypnotize
himself by repeating his own phrases. If he had ever studied the
economic subject, it was long ago, and having adopted the tenets
which an Ohio Republican could hardly escape from adopting, he
never revised them or even questioned their validity.
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