GOVERNOR, 1905
willing to undertake the task. That suggestion suited me exactly. Dixon consented and I made the appointment. Under his direction it has come to be accepted as the most important and efficient organization for this line of work in the United States. There is good ground for hope that many of the inflammatory diseases due to specific poisons, such as typhoid fever, smallpox, diphtheria and tuberculosis, may be in time stamped out of existence.
The legislature also, upon my urgency, provided for a state police or constabulary, and here the same kind of question arose. Such a body, if organized upon political lines, would have tremendous power over the state and would be correspondingly dangerous. After talking over a number of persons, some of them connected with the Guard, and consulting with several persons, I tendered the position to John C. Groome, captain of the City Troop, who accepted. He proved to be just the man needed, of the right age, slim, erect, quick to see and to act, possessing a rare combination of decision of character and sound judgment. I told him I wanted a police force and absolutely nothing else. Not a man on the force was selected upon the recommendation of anybody. The men were all chosen upon the results of physical and mental examination and what political or religious creed any one of them professes is officially unknown. Groome has made the constabulary famous all over the United States. Two hundred and forty in number, they have maintained the peace within the state as was never done before. Not once since has it been necessary to call out the National Guard, and that vast expense has been saved. While organized labor has unwisely assailed them as “Pennypacker's Cossacks,” one of the greatest of their merits has been that they have saved labor from the oppression of force and have done away with that kind of police intervention which came from men employed by the corporations.
There were certain principles which underlay the dis-
