The Days of a Man 



II1909 



A strange 

 change 



National 



Peace 



Congress 



New York, however, he received orders to go by way 

 of the Pacific Coast and Japan, not through Europe. 

 He accordingly changed his route and arrived duly — 

 with his family — in San Francisco. He then ran 

 down to see me at Stanford, and there got a telegram 

 from the State Department ordering him to delay 

 sailing and return to Washington for other instruc- 

 tions. As it happened, we were both invited to a 

 dinner given that evening in San Francisco to Mr. 

 Taft, and we promptly sought him out to ask what 

 the order meant; the President said he knew nothing 

 about it and had no idea of its significance. Arrived 

 again in Washington, Crane found himself practically 

 dismissed without ever having gone to China, the 

 cause alleged being that he had talked too freely 

 and unwisely. So far as I know, there was no founda- 

 tion for this statement. 



Taft, I feel sure, had set his heart on the realization 

 of Hay's vision of the "Open Door" in China, hoping 

 to make it the special feature of his administration. 

 But in this and every other positive plan of his own 

 he was thwarted by certain forces, although able to 

 prevent mischievous policies in regard to Mexico and 

 Japan. ^ 



On May 3, 1909, at the annual National Peace Con- 

 gress held in Chicago, I spoke along the line of the 

 argument in my book entitled "The Human Har- 

 vest" published the year before. My address made a 

 favorable impression upon Mr. Edwin Ginn, the well- 

 known Boston publisher, then preparing to give a 

 million dollars — about half his fortune — for an 

 extension of his modest International School of Peace, 

 already functioning. He therefore appointed me chief 



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