4 S 
FIGHTING THE SPOILS HUNTERS AND RASCALS 
good records with Spaniards—in fact, every nationality is represented 
almost but the Chinese, and I find the men as a class willing to give 
faithful service. When men find the official in charge of them consis¬ 
tent, always keeping his word to the letter, they will soon begin follow¬ 
ing the example set before them. Treat a man squarely and you will 
get square treatment in return. That is human nature and sound 
doctrine, whether in the police or in any other department.” 
Being an honest man and determined to do his duty fearlessly 
and without favor, Mr. Roosevelt was not caught in the many traps 
set for him. All attempts to ensnare him were failures and soon 
appeared so ridiculous that he became the best “let alone” official in 
the city government. 
Jacob Riis says that “Jobs innumerable were put up to discredit 
the President of the Board and inveigle him into awkward positions. 
Probably he never knew of one-tenth of them. Mr. Roosevelt walked 
through them with perfect unconcern, kicking aside the snares that 
were set so elaborately to catch him. The politicians who saw him 
walk apparently blindly into a trap and beheld him emerge with dam¬ 
age to the trap only, could not understand it. They concluded it was 
his luck. It was not. It was his sense. He told me once after such 
a time that it was a matter of conviction with him that no frank and 
honest man could be in the long run entangled by the snares of 
plotters, whatever appearances might for the moment indicate. So 
he walked unharmed in it all.” 
But the new Police President had no path of roses to walk in. 
Corruption was deeply planted and it was not easy to uproot it. The 
system of blackmail by police and officials was hard to overcome. It 
was the enforcement of the Sunday liquor law, in particular, that gave 
trouble to the Commission. There were plenty of arrests, indeed, for 
its violation, but these were of people who had no political pull or 
refused to pay the police for shut eyes. This system of blackmail 
existed in the case of all illegal pursuits, which could be carried on 
unseen by the police if the necessary money were forthcoming, but to 
which refusal to pay brought sudden retribution. 
Dishonesty at elections was another of the prevailing forms of 
vice. Honesty at the ballot box had almost ceased to exist, and it 
