Note 13 — Chapter XIII · MacArthur and the War

All through the official correspondence of 1899 and 1900 between the Adjutant-General of the Army, General Corbin, and General Otis at Manila, one sees Mr. McKinley’s sensitiveness to public opinion. “In view of the impatience of the people” you will do thus and so, is a typical sample of this feature of that correspondence.13 Troubled, possibly, with misgivings, as to whether, after all, in view of the vigorous and undeniably obstinate struggle for independence the Filipinos were putting up, it would not have been wiser to have done with them as we had done in the case of Cuba, and troubled, beyond the peradventure of a doubt, about the effect of the possible Philippine situation on the fortunes of his party and himself in the approaching campaign for the presidency, Mr. McKinley sent Mr. Taft out, in the spring preceding the election of 1900, to help General MacArthur run the war. We must now, therefore, turn our attention to Mr. Taft, not forgetting General MacArthur in so doing.