government of the United States and the treatment of the inhabitants thereof, he became an ardent opponent to the administrative policy of expansion and of waging war against the Filipinos, interpreting the power of the government to be that of a police to prevent internal contention and the interference of foreign nations, and claiming that the Filipinos were capable of self-government and should be allowed the opportunity to exercise that right. He continued to maintain these views in debate before the senate and in addresses before various assemblies of the people; but when the question came to vote, he respected the wishes and judgment of the majority of his own party, and voted with them. In 1898 President McKinley offered him the ambassadorship to Great Britain as successor to John Hay; but he declined it. In aid of measures to the advantage of persons connected with the Slaveholders' Rebellion he obtained the approval of President Harrison to the bill for the relief of the widow of Jefferson Davis; secured the passage of the bill for the restoration of the College of William and Mary burned by the Union troops during the Civil war, and the appointment of Howell E. Jackson of Tennessee, a Confederate general, as associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Senator Hoar was married March 30, 1853, to Mary Louisa, daughter of Samuel D. Spurr of Worcester. She died a few years after, leaving a son, Rockwood, and a daughter, Mary. He was married again, October 13, 1862, to Ruth Anne, daughter of Henry W. Miller of Worcester, who died in Washington, District of Columbia, December 24, 1903. He served as a regent of the Smithsonian Institution in 1880; as president of the American Historical Association; as vice-president and president of the American Antiquarian Society; as president of the Board of Trustees of Clark university, 1900; as a trustee of the Peabody Museum of Archeology; he was founder and first president of the Board of Trustees of the Worcester Free Library; trustee of Leicester academy; a founder of the Worcester Polytechnic institute, and in 1904 he was the only surviving member of the first board. He was one of the one hundred members of the Massachusetts Historical Society; a member of the famous Saturday Club of Boston; of the New England Historic Genealogical Society; of the Worcester Fire Society Club and of the American Historical Society. He was a trustee of the Peabody Education fund; an overseer of Harvard university; a member of the Virginia Histori-
