Department of State
Washington, December 18, 1900

Oscar S. Straus, Esquire
42 Warren Street
New York City
My dear Mr. Straus:

I have laid before the President your letter of the 12th instant, in which you express your preference not to return to Constantinople, and offer your resignation of the mission you have honorably and faithfully filled for the past few years.

Deferring to your wish, the President has accepted your resignation. In charging me to inform you of this acceptance, the President desires me to make known in fitting words his high appreciation of the valuable services you have rendered to your country, and his sense of the ability and intelligence you have brought to bear in the performance of a task of more than usual delicacy and difficulty. Called, as you were, a second time to the Ottoman mission and confronted by the problems and entanglements that seem to especially environ that post, you have shown rare aptness in dealing with its perplexities and have notably strengthened the hands of the government in leading the long pending questions toward a settlement. While deeply regretting your retirement and while averse to losing your helpful counsels, the President has felt that he could not rightfully impose fresh personal sacrifices upon you by disregarding your wish. You take with you into honored private life the esteem of those who have known and understood your conscientious worth in the paths of official duty.

I share the President's regrets and equally share his appreciation of the good services you have rendered. My sincere regards and personal friendship are with you always.

Very cordially yours

John Hay

CHAPTER VII

THEODORE ROOSEVELT

Roosevelt appoints me member of the Hague Tribunal—Trouble with Philippine Mohammedans averted—Humanitarian diplomacy under Roosevelt; Hay's Roumanian note; Roosevelt's Russian cable—The Alaska boundary—Panama and the "covenant running with the land"—White House luncheons; Carnegie suggests to Roosevelt a legacy for my grandchildren—Roosevelt and organized labor—Roosevelt's definition of Americanism—Overnight at the White House; conference regarding the President's Message—Roosevelt and the Portsmouth peace negotiations; Count Witte invites a committee to discuss the Russian Jewish question; Roosevelt writes to Witte—Roosevelt's prophetic characterization of Germany—Some essential qualities of Roosevelt.

I began the year 1901 as a private citizen once more. I devoted much of my time, however, to public activities, giving close attention particularly to the international questions that arose.

The doctrine of citizenship and the rights of naturalized American citizens in foreign countries had for many years formed the major subject in our foreign relations, and it had been one for constant controversy between our own and foreign countries, especially Germany, Austria, and Turkey. In the spring I read a paper at a meeting of the American Social Science Association, of which I was the president, entitled "The United States Doctrine of Citizenship and Expatriation." Later in the year I received, in consequence, a letter from Senator S. M. Cullom of Illinois, chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, asking me to prepare material for amendments to legislation on this subject, which I did.

When Theodore Roosevelt became President of the United States through the lamentable death of William McKinley, one of my earliest relations with him was my being appointed by him as a member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague. Whether or not he acted herein in conformity with McKinley's intention, I cannot say. When McKinley was selecting the original members, he conferred with me and indicated that if agreeable to me, he would be pleased to appoint me as a member. Shortly afterward when the appointments were announced, my name was not among them. It was some time before I saw him again, and while I should never have mentioned it, he did. He said he was very sorry that through the pressure of duties he had quite forgotten his intention to name me when the time came to announce the appointments. I told him I thought perhaps I had been mistaken in understanding that he had offered me one of the appointments. He said I had not misunderstood, but that he would make amends should a vacancy occur while he was still President; he had wanted me as a member of the Court, not alone in recognition of the great services I had rendered, but because he regarded me exceptionally qualified. He added that when he became ex-President he would like to be a member of that Court himself; it appealed to him more than any other office he could think of.

The vacancy in the membership of the Court occurred sooner than any one anticipated, by the death, in March, 1901, of ex-President Harrison; but by the decree of the gods McKinley himself was no longer with us when the time came to fill President Harrison's place. In fact I think the day we talked about the Court marked my last conference with him. He was always simple in manner and of charming personality. Together we enjoyed a good smoke that afternoon; he was fond of smoking and knew I enjoyed a good cigar, and he was wont to have me take one of his brand. I begged him not to concern himself further with the omission of my appointment at The Hague, that I was satisfied to know he thought me worthy of the selection.