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 Principles of Healthcare Leadership
In healthcare, strong leadership is crucial, and today’s volatile and
ever-changing environment calls for a new set of leadership skills. As cost
reduction, quality improvement, and management of scarce resources become
increasingly important, healthcare leaders must know how to build a positive
culture, manage change and conflict, establish trust, promote creativity and
innovation, and empower every staff member in their organization to succeed.

Principles of Healthcare Leadership provides complete coverage of the topics Principles of

Healthcare
most vital to the success of a healthcare leader. Beginning with foundational
leadership theory, including a discussion of power and influence, the book
explores distinct leadership styles and skills, the importance of organizational
culture building, and strategies for leading people in healthcare delivery.
Additional key topics include:

Leadership
n Creativity and innovation n Team performance
n Entrepreneurship n Leadership development,
n Trust training, and trends
n Change and conflict

End-of-chapter summaries and discussion questions allow readers to review

and apply each chapter’s concepts while they learn. Five comprehensive
leadership case studies provide opportunities to integrate and practice the
skills featured in the book.

Drawing on emerging best practices in leadership, this book will guide

leaders, current and future, as they manage daily change and growth in their
redesigned healthcare organizations.

Bernard J. Healey, PhD, is a professor of healthcare administration at King’s College in

Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Dr. Healey began his career in 1971 as an epidemiologist for the
Pennsylvania Department of Health. During his tenure with the government, he earned his
master’s in public administration and his doctorate in health education from the University of
Pennsylvania. He has taught undergraduate and graduate courses in business, public health,
and healthcare administration at several colleges since 1974. He has coauthored five books
on healthcare topics and has published more than a hundred articles on public health, health
policy, leadership, marketing, and healthcare partnerships. Dr. Healey is a member of the
American Public Health Association and of the Association of University Programs in Health
Administration. He is a part-time consultant in epidemiology for the Wilkes-Barre City Health
Department and a consultant for numerous public health projects in Pennsylvania.

Bernard J. Healey
Healey

One North Franklin Street, Suite 1700

Chicago, Illinois 60606-3529
Phone: (301) 362-6905 | Fax: (240) 396-5907
ache.org/HAP

Order code: 2335 AUPHA

HAP_Principles of Healthcare Leadership_Healey_#2335_70 3 100_296-pages_Hardcover

BRIEF CONTENTS

Preface.......................................................................................................xv
Introduction.............................................................................................xix

Part I Introduction to Leadership in Healthcare

Chapter 1. The Future of Leadership in Healthcare.............................3

Bernard J. Healey

Chapter 2. The Evolution of Leadership in Healthcare......................21

Bernard J. Healey

Part II Leadership Skills

Chapter 3. Leadership Theory...........................................................39

Bernard J. Healey

Chapter 4. Creativity and Innovation in Healthcare...........................63

Bernard J. Healey

Chapter 5. Healthcare Entrepreneurship............................................83

Jeff Helton and Nancy Sayre

Chapter 6. The Development of Trust in Healthcare

Organizations.................................................................105
Tina Marie Evans

Part III Organizational Culture Building

Chapter 7. The Process of Culture Development in Healthcare

Organizations.................................................................125
Bernard J. Healey

Chapter 8. The Process of Change in Healthcare Organizations......143

Bernard J. Healey

vii
viii B rief Co n te n ts

Part IV Leading People in Healthcare Delivery

Chapter 9. Conflict Management in Healthcare Organizations........167

Tina Marie Evans

Chapter 10. Developing Leaders and Improving Team Performance in

Healthcare Organizations...............................................189
Bernard J. Healey

Chapter 11. Physician CEOs as Leaders in Healthcare

Organizations.................................................................207
Francis G. Belardi

Part V Leadership Case Studies

Case Study 1: Leadership and Never Events..................................235

Bernard J. Healey

Case Study 2: Leadership in Wellness Programs............................237

Susan Diana and Dana Abend

Case Study 3: #ThinkBeforeYouPost.............................................240

Katie P. Desiderio

Case Study 4: Leadership in a Changing Healthcare

Environment............................................................244
Bernard J. Healey

Case Study 5: Transforming Community Health..........................246

Justin Beaupre
Glossary..................................................................................................249
Index......................................................................................................255
About the Author and Contributors.........................................................273
DETAILED CONTENTS

Preface.......................................................................................................xv
About This Book.............................................................xvi
Instructor Resources.......................................................xvii
Introduction.............................................................................................xix
The Importance of Skilled Leadership.............................. xx
References........................................................................xxi

Part I Introduction to Leadership in Healthcare

Chapter 1. The Future of Leadership in Healthcare.............................3

Bernard J. Healey
Learning Objectives...........................................................3
Key Terms and Concepts....................................................3
Introduction......................................................................4
The Changing Healthcare Environment.............................5
Changing Reimbursement Methods...................................7
Measuring the Quality of Healthcare................................10
How Leaders Can Meet the Major Healthcare
Challenges ..................................................................11
Summary.........................................................................19
Discussion Questions.......................................................19
References........................................................................20

Chapter 2. The Evolution of Leadership in Healthcare.................21

Bernard J. Healey
Learning Objectives.........................................................21
Key Terms and Concepts..................................................21
Introduction....................................................................21
Movement from Bureaucracy and Scientific
Management to Leadership.........................................22
The Concept of Best Leadership Practices........................33
Summary.........................................................................34
Discussion Questions.......................................................35
References........................................................................35
ix
x Det a iled C o n te n ts

Part II Leadership Skills

Chapter 3. Leadership Theory...........................................................39

Bernard J. Healey
Learning Objectives.........................................................39
Key Terms and Concepts..................................................39
Introduction....................................................................39
A Brief History of Management and Managers.................42
The Shift to Leadership....................................................43
Leadership Theory...........................................................44
Building an Advanced Leadership Development Model....45
Leadership Skills...............................................................52
Search for the Best Leadership Theory.............................57
Summary.........................................................................59
Discussion Questions.......................................................59
References........................................................................60

Chapter 4. Creativity and Innovation in Healthcare...........................63

Bernard J. Healey
Learning Objectives.........................................................63
Key Terms and Concepts..................................................63
Introduction....................................................................64
Creativity.........................................................................65
Innovation.......................................................................68
Development and Motivation of Human Capital..............73
Creating a Climate for Creativity and Innovation.............76
Developing Creativity of Employees: The Leader’s Role....77
Summary.........................................................................79
Discussion Questions.......................................................80
References........................................................................80

Chapter 5. Healthcare Entrepreneurship............................................83

Jeff Helton and Nancy Sayre
Learning Objectives.........................................................83
Key Terms and Concepts..................................................83
Introduction....................................................................83
What Is Entrepreneurship?...............................................84
Opportunities for Entrepreneurs in Today’s Healthcare
System.........................................................................86
Innovation and Entrepreneurship.....................................89
 D etailed C ontents xi

Current Challenges to Entrepreneurship and Innovation

in Healthcare...............................................................92
Disruptive Innovation......................................................99
Summary.......................................................................102
Discussion Questions.....................................................102
References......................................................................103

Chapter 6. The Development of Trust in Healthcare

Organizations.................................................................105
Tina Marie Evans
Learning Objectives.......................................................105
Key Terms and Concepts................................................105
Introduction..................................................................105
What Is Trust, and Why Is It Important?.......................106
The Benefits of Earning Trust........................................107
Developing Trust at the Managerial Level......................109
How Not to Develop Trust............................................113
Developing Trust in the Provider–Patient Relationship....114
Integrity in Leadership...................................................115
Dangers of Losing or Not Gaining Trust.......................117
The Role of Communication in Building Trust..............118
Repairing Lost Trust......................................................119
Summary.......................................................................121
Discussion Questions.....................................................121
References......................................................................121

Part III Organizational Culture Building

Chapter 7. The Process of Culture Development in Healthcare

Organizations.................................................................125
Bernard J. Healey
Learning Objectives.......................................................125
Key Terms and Concepts................................................125
Introduction..................................................................125
Defining Organizational Culture....................................126
How Culture Develops..................................................127
Building Organizational Culture ...................................128
The Value of Culture in Healthcare................................131
Changing Culture in Healthcare....................................132
xii Det a iled C o n te n ts

Implementing Cultural Change in Healthcare

Organizations............................................................138
Summary.......................................................................139
Discussion Questions.....................................................140
References......................................................................140

Chapter 8. The Process of Change in Healthcare Organizations .....143

Bernard J. Healey
Learning Objectives.......................................................143
Key Terms and Concepts................................................143
Introduction..................................................................143
Preparing for Change.....................................................144
Factors in Determining the Need for Change.................146
Change Management.....................................................154
The Leader’s Role in the Change Process.......................161
The Vagaries of Change Acceptance...............................162
Summary.......................................................................162
Discussion Questions.....................................................163
References......................................................................163

Part IV Leading People in Healthcare Delivery

Chapter 9. Conflict Management in Healthcare Organizations........167

Tina Marie Evans
Learning Objectives.......................................................167
Key Terms and Concepts................................................167
Introduction..................................................................167
The Nature of Conflict in the Workplace........................169
The Most Common Causes of Workplace Conflict.........169
The High Cost of Conflict in Healthcare
Organizations............................................................174
Conflict Management.....................................................176
Anticipating and Preventing Conflict in the Workplace...183
The Energizing Influence of Conflict on Teams.............185
Summary.......................................................................186
Discussion Questions.....................................................186
References......................................................................187
 D etailed C ontents xiii

Chapter 10. Developing Leaders and Improving Team Performance

in Healthcare Organizations...........................................189
Bernard J. Healey
Learning Objectives.......................................................189
Key Terms and Concepts................................................189
Introduction..................................................................189
Exemplary Leadership Development Programs:
Setting the Stage.......................................................190
What an Exemplary Leadership Development
Program Looks Like..................................................193
Evaluation of Leadership Development Programs...........201
Creating a Leadership Development Program:
How to Begin...........................................................203
Summary.......................................................................204
Discussion Questions.....................................................204
References......................................................................205

Chapter 11. Physician CEOs as Leaders of Healthcare

Organizations.................................................................207
Francis G. Belardi
Learning Objectives.......................................................207
Key Terms and Concepts................................................207
Introduction..................................................................208
History of Physician Leadership.....................................208
Physician Leader Competencies......................................210
The Cascading of Physician Leadership Education
and Training..............................................................212
Measuring Success of Physician Leaders.........................215
Debates Surrounding Physician Leaders.........................218
Future Physician Leadership Challenges.........................219
Summary.......................................................................228
Discussion Questions.....................................................229
References......................................................................229

Part V Leadership Case Studies

Case Study 1: Leadership and Never Events .................................235

Bernard J. Healey
xiv Det a iled C o n te n ts

Case Study 2: Leadership in Wellness Programs............................237

Susan Diana and Dana Abend

Case Study 3: #ThinkBeforeYouPost.............................................240

Katie P. Desiderio

Case Study 4: Leadership in a Changing Healthcare

Environment............................................................244
Bernard J. Healey

Case Study 5: Transforming Community Health..........................246

Justin Beaupre
Glossary..................................................................................................249
Index......................................................................................................255
About the Author and Contributors.........................................................273
PREFACE

The major problems found in the current healthcare delivery system are cost
escalation and diminished quality of healthcare services. Healthcare reform
efforts over the past 50 years have yielded little success in overcoming these
two enormous problems. In fact, numerous studies show that even while
spending $3 trillion on healthcare services per year, the United States still
ranks low in good health compared to other industrialized countries that
spend far less. Many tools are being developed to lower healthcare costs and
improve the quality of health services, but they will require skillful leadership
for successful implementation. Unfortunately, healthcare innovations and
reform efforts may be doomed to failure unless leaders emerge who can guide
the healthcare sector through this process of change.
Since 1900, the longevity of most Americans has increased, with the
majority of individuals now expected to live into their 80s. But because of the
current epidemic of chronic diseases and their complications, a large percent-
age of these individuals will experience a decrease in quality of life as they age.
In response, the US healthcare system must provide improved healthcare at
a lower cost. This remedy requires improved leadership in every part of the
system along with the empowerment of those who deliver these services to
their patients. It also calls for a movement to be undertaken to shift organi-
zational structures in healthcare from a bureaucratic management structure
to a decentralized organizational framework.
To meet the current and future challenges in healthcare delivery, an
immediate need is seen for leadership development for all employees. These
leaders must rely less on their position power and more on their expertise
and interpersonal skills to improve the quality of healthcare services. The old,
bureaucratic US healthcare delivery system must be replaced by an organic
form of shared power and responsibility that encourages the emergence of
creativity and innovation to meet the demands of all stakeholders in that sys-
tem. This transition is one reason this text devotes a large portion of its space
to creativity and innovation in the delivery of healthcare services.
The US system of healthcare needs to be reorganized to improve
productivity, which will eventually result in reduced costs for improved care
for many consumers. As more providers enhance their performance, oth-
ers will follow to remain competitive. The secret, then, for US healthcare

xv
xvi Prefa c e

organizations to survive, and even exploit, the changing healthcare environ-

ment is to hire and retain individuals who have the capacity to lead—rather
than manage—their employees to deliver extraordinary services to their
patients daily. This healthcare management text aims to elevate current and
future leaders to new levels of knowledge, as seen among the most successful
service delivery organizations in the world.

About This Book

Principles of Healthcare Leadership is a comprehensive discussion surrounding

the need for skillful leadership in US healthcare facilities. In addition, it cov-
ers the leadership styles found in organizations throughout the world. The
book is composed of five parts:

• Introduction to Leadership in Healthcare

• Leadership Skills
• Organizational Culture Building
• Leading People in Healthcare Delivery
• Leadership Case Studies

Parts I through IV contain 11 chapters, each covering a separate

aspect of knowledge required for healthcare leaders, all of whom are facing
a turbulent environment of constant disruption. Part V constitutes five case
studies that provide learning experiences through which students may prac-
tice the leadership skills presented in the preceding chapters. Each case begins
with an explanation of a leadership issue in healthcare delivery, then describes
a hypothetical use of the case information, and finally poses questions about
the case and its application to the students.
The book was written to convey and fulfill the need both for current
managers to develop new skills and for those planning to enter management
positions to obtain these essential skills. They include leadership training in
the empowerment of all health services employees to improve the quality of
care they provide and the health outcomes for the population.
Additional skills required for the healthcare manager include

• change management and conflict management techniques,

• culture building,
• quality improvement skills,
• communication skills, and
• an appreciation for team building and collaboration.
 Prefac e xvii

This book shares with the reader the value of developing innovation
skills in both managers and lower-level employees in healthcare facilities.
In fact, the concept of entrepreneurship is covered at great length with the
intent to move healthcare managers toward a decentralized and creative
approach to healthcare facilities management.
The authors are aware of the need to include the physician in the
discussion of change management, so a chapter on physician management—
written by a physician—is included in this text. The book concludes with
a chapter on future management challenges in health services delivery and
suggested responses to these challenges.

Instructor Resources
This book’s Instructor Resources include an instructor’s manual, a test
bank, and PowerPoint slides for each chapter in this text. The instructor’s
manual includes an overview of each chapter and the answers to all the
end-of-chapter discussion questions. The test bank is composed of true-
or-false, multiple-choice, and essay questions as well as potential answers
for these questions. Ten PowerPoint slides accompany each chapter to help
guide instructors for each lecture.
For the most up-to-date information about this book and its Instructor
Resources, visit ache.org/HAP and browse for the book’s title or author
name.
This book’s Instructor Resources are available to instructors who adopt
this book for use in their course. For access information, please e-mail
[email protected].
INTRODUCTION

The US healthcare system is experiencing massive changes in response to

numerous environmental shifts that have been growing in intensity over the
past several decades. Emanuel (2014) points out that our system of healthcare
was not designed to be the inefficient, resource-consuming industry it has
become. The inefficiencies resulted from the many poor decisions made early
in the development of the care delivery system and have led to enormous cost
increases with limited improvement in the health of most Americans.
Healthcare dollars have been spent on activities determined by the
providers of care to be necessary with little or no consideration of the value
or outcomes resulting from those activities. Emanuel (2014) argues that
approximately one third of healthcare expenditures are wasted, with some of
the activities also capable of producing real harm for the patient. These inef-
ficiencies require a newly skilled leadership base to emerge throughout the
US healthcare delivery system to save it from bankruptcy.
Kotter (2014) argues that many US organizations have failed to
develop leaders capable of moving toward a creative, innovation-based
future. Some observers attribute this leadership shortage to the fact that
numerous industries in the United States are still using a bureaucratic orga-
nizational structure to conduct business. A bureaucracy is usually operated
by managers who are concerned with the present while paying little attention
to the future.
This absence of exceptional leadership in many US healthcare organi-
zations can be attributed in part to the use of bureaucratic models, featuring
an outdated, top-down management structure. The bureaucratic structure
must be replaced with an approach driven by empowered workers in part-
nership with the leaders using a flattened organizational structure. A report
issued by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) in 2001, titled Crossing the Quality
Chasm: A New Healthcare System for the 21st Century, outlines the need for
a complete reinvention of the US healthcare system. This report is critical
of that system, claiming that it is incapable of producing the quality of care
Americans require unless major, wholesale changes are made. IOM (2001)
found that the system fails to achieve most Americans’ expectations given its
expense. Those failures stem from its overly complex nature and lack, for the

xix
xx I n t ro d u c t i o n

most part, of coordination of care. The report offers the following system
redesign imperatives (IOM 2001):

• Reengineer care processes.

• Use information technologies effectively.
• Adopt knowledge and skills management expertise.
• Develop effective teams.
• Coordinate care across patient conditions, services, and sites of care
over time.

Schimpff (2012) further argues that to reduce the cost and improve
the quality of care requires a comprehensive effort to coordinate care for
those with chronic diseases. These diseases, along with their complications,
are the main cause of cost escalation in healthcare and of poor-quality out-
comes for the patients who have one or more chronic diseases. In addition
to enhanced coordination of care for chronic diseases, he calls for the elimi-
nation of wasteful tests that do little to improve health outcomes. To effect
these recommended changes, healthcare organizations must develop leader-
ship skills in not only their executives and managers but also their employees,
including physicians.
Many large organizations struggle with the need to give up past busi-
ness practices for new ways of doing business to succeed in the disruptive
business world. Govindarajan (2016) presents a solution that allows most
businesses today to move forward in this process by segmenting the concerns
they face into three separate boxes: managing the present, escaping the past
ways of doing things, and preparing for the future. To operationalize this pro-
cess, organizations must seek and develop leaders who can guide an empow-
ered followership in understanding and responding to the three-box solution.
In particular, Govindarajan (2016) recommends that leaders gain an
improved understanding of “planned opportunism,” the ability to exploit
opportunities that allow an organization to prepare for future disruptions in the
present. The exploitation of opportunities is discussed at length in chapter 4.
This and numerous other strategies are presented throughout the
book to point out options for US healthcare delivery organizations that face
crises, such as cost escalation and diminished quality, failed past practices,
and environmental disruption. More about the contents of this book follows.

The Importance of Skilled Leadership

In this book, the authors suggest that the only way to meet the most serious
challenges facing the US healthcare delivery system, in both the short term
 Introduc tion xxi

and the long term, is through skilled leadership that is developed specifically
to address these challenges using emerging best practices and tapping the
existing relevant theories of leadership in healthcare. Part I begins by explain-
ing the theories of leadership, attending in particular to the concept of power
and influence necessary for strong leadership. It then moves to a discussion
of leadership skills, including best practices and the applicability of entrepre-
neurship and creativity.
Part II delves into the various leadership styles, including transforma-
tional leadership and servant leadership.
In Part III, the authors present the entire process of culture building
in an organization, explaining how culture develops, the role of trust and
culture development, and the need to build a thick positive culture.
Part IV addresses the specific issues related to leading people in health-
care delivery. Special emphasis is placed on the leadership process, develop-
ment of strategy, and management of conflict.
By way of case studies, part V offers a multifaceted discussion of lead-
ership development and the future of leadership in healthcare delivery. It
considers up-to-date examples concerning the external environment leaders
face as they attempt to deal with what seems like daily change in their rede-
signed organizations.

References

Emanuel, E. J. 2014. Reinventing American Health Care. New York: Public Affairs.
Govindarajan, V. 2016. The Three Box Solution: A Strategy for Leading Innovation.
Boston: Harvard Business Review Press.
Institute of Medicine (IOM). 2001. Crossing the Quality Chasm: A New Health Sys-
tem for the 21st Century. Washington, DC: National Academies Press.
Kotter, J. P. 2014. Accelerate: Building Strategic Agility for a Faster-Moving World.
Boston: Harvard Business Review Press.
Schimpff, S. C. 2012. The Future of Health Care Delivery: Why It Must Change and
How It Will Affect You. Washington, DC: Potomac.
 PART

I
INTRODUCTION TO LEADERSHIP
IN HEALTHCARE
Discovering Diverse Content Through
Random Scribd Documents
the individual’s own faculties must form the chief factor in working
out his own salvation. In the last analysis it is the thrift, energy, self-
mastery, and business intelligence of each man which have most to
do with deciding whether he rises or falls. It is easy enough to
devise a scheme of government which shall absolutely nullify all
these qualities and ensure failure to everybody, whether he deserves
success or not. But the best scheme of government can do little
more than provide against injustice, and then let the individual rise
or fall on his own merits. Of course something can be done by the
State acting in its collective capacity, and in certain instances such
action may be necessary to remedy real wrong. Gross misconduct of
individuals or corporations may make it necessary for the State or
some of its subdivisions to assume the charge of what are called
public utilities. But when all that can be done in this way has been
done, when every individual has been saved so far as the State can
save him from the tyranny of any other man or body of men, the
individual’s own qualities of body and mind, his own strength of
heart and hand, will remain the determining conditions in his career.
The people who trust to or exact promises that, if a certain political
leader is followed or a certain public policy adopted, this great truth
will cease to operate, are not merely leaning on a broken reed, but
are working for their own undoing.
So much for the men who by their demands for the impossible
encourage the promise of the impossible, whether in the domain of
economic legislation or of legislation which has for its object the
promotion of morality. The other side is that no man should be held
excusable if he does not perform what he promises, unless for the
best and most sufficient reason. This should be especially true of
every politician. It shows a thoroughly unhealthy state of mind when
the public pardons with a laugh failure to keep a distinct pledge, on
the ground that a politician can not be expected to confine himself
to the truth when on the stump or the platform. A man should no
more be excused for lying on the stump than for lying off the stump.
Of course matters may so change that it may be impossible for him,
or highly inadvisable for the country, that he should try to do what
he in good faith said he was going to do. But the necessity for the
change should be made very evident, and it should be well
understood that such a case is the exception and not the rule. As a
rule, and speaking with due regard to the exceptions, it should be
taken as axiomatic that when a man in public life pledges himself to
a certain course of action he shall as a matter of course do what he
said he would do, and shall not be held to have acted honorably if
he does otherwise.
All great fundamental truths are apt to sound rather trite, and yet in
spite of their triteness they need to be reiterated over and over
again. The visionary or the self-seeking knave who promises the
golden impossible, and the credulous dupe who is taken in by such a
promise, and who in clutching at the impossible loses the chance of
securing the real though lesser good, are as old as the political
organizations of mankind. Throughout the history of the world the
nations who have done best in self-government are those who have
demanded from their public men only the promise of what can
actually be done for righteousness and honesty, and who have
sternly insisted that such promise must be kept in letter and in spirit.
So it is with the general question of obtaining good government. We
can not trust the mere doctrinaire; we can not trust the mere closet
reformer, nor yet his acrid brother who himself does nothing, but
who rails at those who endure the heat and burden of the day. Yet
we can trust still less those base beings who treat politics only as a
game out of which to wrong a soiled livelihood, and in whose
vocabulary the word “practical” has come to be a synonym for
whatever is mean and corrupt. A man is worthless unless he has in
him a lofty devotion to an ideal, and he is worthless also unless he
strives to realize this ideal by practical methods. He must promise,
both to himself and to others, only what he can perform; but what
really can be performed he must promise, and such promise he must
at all hazards make good.
The problems that confront us in this age are, after all, in their
essence the same as those that have always confronted free peoples
striving to secure and to keep free government. No political
philosopher of the present day can put the case more clearly than it
was put by the wonderful old Greeks. Says Aristotle: “Two principles
have to be kept in view: what is possible, what is becoming; at these
every man ought to aim.” Plato expresses precisely the same idea:
“Those who are not schooled and practiced in truth [who are not
honest and upright men] can never manage aright the government,
nor yet can those who spend their lives as closet philosophers;
because the former have no high purpose to guide their actions,
while the latter keep aloof from public life, having the idea that even
while yet living they have been translated to the Islands of the
Blest.... [Men must] both contemplate the good and try actually to
achieve it. Thus the state will be settled as a reality, and not as a
dream, like most of those inhabited by persons fighting about
shadows.”[1]
[1] Translated freely and condensed.
 THE AMERICAN BOY
PUBLISHED IN “ST. NICHOLAS,” MAY, 1900
Of course what we have a right to expect of the American boy is
that he shall turn out to be a good American man. Now, the chances
are strong that he won’t be much of a man unless he is a good deal
of a boy. He must not be a coward or a weakling, a bully, a shirk, or
a prig. He must work hard and play hard. He must be clean-minded
and clean-lived, and able to hold his own under all circumstances
and against all comers. It is only on these conditions that he will
grow into the kind of American man of whom America can be really
proud.
There are always in life countless tendencies for good and for evil,
and each succeeding generation sees some of these tendencies
strengthened and some weakened; nor is it by any means always,
alas! that the tendencies for evil are weakened and those for good
strengthened. But during the last few decades there certainly have
been some notable changes for good in boy life. The great growth in
the love of athletic sports, for instance, while fraught with danger if
it becomes one-sided and unhealthy, has beyond all question had an
excellent effect in increased manliness. Forty or fifty years ago the
writer on American morals was sure to deplore the effeminacy and
luxury of young Americans who were born of rich parents. The boy
who was well off then, especially in the big Eastern cities, lived too
luxuriously, took to billiards as his chief innocent recreation, and felt
small shame in his inability to take part in rough pastimes and field-
sports. Nowadays, whatever other faults the son of rich parents may
tend to develop, he is at least forced by the opinion of all his
associates of his own age to bear himself well in manly exercises
and to develop his body—and therefore, to a certain extent, his
character—in the rough sports which call for pluck, endurance, and
physical address.
Of course boys who live under such fortunate conditions that they
have to do either a good deal of outdoor work or a good deal of
what might be called natural outdoor play do not need this athletic
development. In the Civil War the soldiers who came from the prairie
and the backwoods and the rugged farms where stumps still dotted
the clearings, and who had learned to ride in their infancy, to shoot
as soon as they could handle a rifle, and to camp out whenever they
got the chance, were better fitted for military work than any set of
mere school or college athletes could possibly be. Moreover, to mis-
estimate athletics is equally bad whether their importance is
magnified or minimized. The Greeks were famous athletes, and as
long as their athletic training had a normal place in their lives, it was
a good thing. But it was a very bad thing when they kept up their
athletic games while letting the stern qualities of soldiership and
statesmanship sink into disuse. Some of the younger readers of this
book will certainly sometime read the famous letters of the younger
Pliny, a Roman who wrote, with what seems to us a curiously
modern touch, in the first century of the present era. His
correspondence with the Emperor Trajan is particularly interesting;
and not the least noteworthy thing in it is the tone of contempt with
which he speaks of the Greek athletic sports, treating them as the
diversions of an unwarlike people which it was safe to encourage in
order to keep the Greeks from turning into anything formidable. So
at one time the Persian kings had to forbid polo, because soldiers
neglected their proper duties for the fascinations of the game. We
can not expect the best work from soldiers who have carried to an
unhealthy extreme the sports and pastimes which would be healthy
if indulged in with moderation, and have neglected to learn as they
should the business of their profession. A soldier needs to know how
to shoot and take cover and shift for himself—not to box or play
foot-ball. There is, of course, always the risk of thus mistaking
means for ends. Fox-hunting is a first-class sport; but one of the
most absurd things in real life is to note the bated breath with which
certain excellent fox-hunters, otherwise of quite healthy minds,
speak of this admirable but not over-important pastime. They tend
to make it almost as much of a fetich as, in the last century, the
French and German nobles made the chase of the stag, when they
carried hunting and game-preserving to a point which was ruinous to
the national life. Fox-hunting is very good as a pastime, but it is
about as poor a business as can be followed by any man of
intelligence. Certain writers about it are fond of quoting the
anecdote of a fox-hunter who, in the days of the English civil war,
was discovered pursuing his favorite sport just before a great battle
between the Cavaliers and the Puritans, and right between their
lines as they came together. These writers apparently consider it a
merit in this man that when his country was in a death-grapple,
instead of taking arms and hurrying to the defence of the cause he
believed right, he should placidly have gone about his usual sports.
Of course, in reality the chief serious use of fox-hunting is to
encourage manliness and vigor, and to keep men hardy, so that at
need they can show themselves fit to take part in work or strife for
their native land. When a man so far confuses ends and means as to
think that fox-hunting, or polo, or foot-ball, or whatever else the
sport may be, is to be itself taken as the end, instead of as the mere
means of preparation to do work that counts when the time arises,
when the occasion calls—why, that man had better abandon sport
altogether.
No boy can afford to neglect his work, and with a boy work, as a
rule, means study. Of course there are occasionally brilliant
successes in life where the man has been worthless as a student
when a boy. To take these exceptions as examples would be as
unsafe as it would be to advocate blindness because some blind men
have won undying honor by triumphing over their physical infirmity
and accomplishing great results in the world. I am no advocate of
senseless and excessive cramming in studies, but a boy should work,
and should work hard, at his lessons—in the first place, for the sake
of what he will learn, and in the next place, for the sake of the effect
upon his own character of resolutely settling down to learn it.
Shiftlessness, slackness, indifference in studying, are almost certain
to mean inability to get on in other walks of life. Of course, as a boy
grows older it is a good thing if he can shape his studies in the
direction toward which he has a natural bent; but whether he can do
this or not, he must put his whole heart into them. I do not believe
in mischief-doing in school hours, or in the kind of animal spirits that
results in making bad scholars; and I believe that those boys who
take part in rough, hard play outside of school will not find any need
for horse-play in school. While they study they should study just as
hard as they play foot-ball in a match game. It is wise to obey the
homely old adage, “Work while you work; play while you play.”
A boy needs both physical and moral courage. Neither can take the
place of the other. When boys become men they will find out that
there are some soldiers very brave in the field who have proved
timid and worthless as politicians, and some politicians who show an
entire readiness to take chances and assume responsibilities in civil
affairs, but who lack the fighting edge when opposed to physical
danger. In each case, with the soldiers and politicians alike, there is
but half a virtue. The possession of the courage of the soldier does
not excuse the lack of courage in the statesman and even less does
the possession of the courage of the statesman excuse shrinking on
the field of battle. Now, this is all just as true of boys. A coward who
will take a blow without returning it is a contemptible creature; but,
after all, he is hardly as contemptible as the boy who dares not
stand up for what he deems right against the sneers of his
companions who are themselves wrong. Ridicule is one of the
favorite weapons of wickedness, and it is sometimes
incomprehensible how good and brave boys will be influenced for
evil by the jeers of associates who have no one quality that calls for
respect, but who affect to laugh at the very traits which ought to be
peculiarly the cause for pride.
There is no need to be a prig. There is no need for a boy to preach
about his own good conduct and virtue. If he does he will make
himself offensive and ridiculous. But there is urgent need that he
should practice decency; that he should be clean and straight,
honest and truthful, gentle and tender, as well as brave. If he can
once get to a proper understanding of things, he will have a far
more hearty contempt for the boy who has begun a course of feeble
dissipation, or who is untruthful, or mean, or dishonest, or cruel,
than this boy and his fellows can possibly, in return, feel for him. The
very fact that the boy should be manly and able to hold his own,
that he should be ashamed to submit to bullying without instant
retaliation, should, in return, make him abhor any form of bullying,
cruelty, or brutality.
There are two delightful books, Thomas Hughes’s “Tom Brown at
Rugby,” and Aldrich’s “Story of a Bad Boy,” which I hope every boy
still reads; and I think American boys will always feel more in
sympathy with Aldrich’s story, because there is in it none of the
fagging, and the bullying which goes with fagging, the account of
which, and the acceptance of which, always puzzle an American
admirer of Tom Brown.
There is the same contrast between two stories of Kipling’s. One,
called “Captains Courageous,” describes in the liveliest way just what
a boy should be and do. The hero is painted in the beginning as the
spoiled, over-indulged child of wealthy parents, of a type which we
do sometimes unfortunately see, and than which there exist few
things more objectionable on the face of the broad earth. This boy is
afterward thrown on his own resources, amid wholesome
surroundings, and is forced to work hard among boys and men who
are real boys and real men doing real work. The effect is invaluable.
On the other hand, if one wishes to find types of boys to be avoided
with utter dislike, one will find them in another story by Kipling,
called “Stalky & Co.,” a story which ought never to have been
written, for there is hardly a single form of meanness which it does
not seem to extol, or of school mismanagement which it does not
seem to applaud. Bullies do not make brave men; and boys or men
of foul life can not become good citizens, good Americans, until they
change; and even after the change scars will be left on their souls.
The boy can best become a good man by being a good boy—not a
goody-goody boy, but just a plain good boy. I do not mean that he
must love only the negative virtues; I mean he must love the
positive virtues also. “Good,” in the largest sense, should include
whatever is fine, straightforward, clean, brave, and manly. The best
boys I know —the best men I know—are good at their studies or
their business, fearless and stalwart, hated and feared by all that is
wicked and depraved, incapable of submitting to wrong-doing, and
equally incapable of being aught but tender to the weak and
helpless. A healthy-minded boy should feel hearty contempt for the
coward, and even more hearty indignation for the boy who bullies
girls or small boys, or tortures animals. One prime reason for
abhorring cowards is because every good boy should have it in him
to thrash the objectionable boy as the need arises.
Of course the effect that a thoroughly manly, thoroughly straight and
upright boy can have upon the companions of his own age, and
upon those who are younger, is incalculable. If he is not thoroughly
manly, then they will not respect him, and his good qualities will
count for but little; while, of course, if he is mean, cruel, or wicked,
then his physical strength and force of mind merely make him so
much the more objectionable a member of society. He can not do
good work if he is not strong and does not try with his whole heart
and soul to count in any contest; and his strength will be a curse to
himself and to every one else if he does not have thorough
command over himself and over his own evil passions, and if he
does not use his strength on the side of decency, justice, and fair
dealing.
In short, in life, as in a foot-ball game, the principle to follow is:
Hit the line hard; don’t foul and don’t shirk, but hit the line hard!
 MILITARY PREPAREDNESS AND
UNPREPAREDNESS
PUBLISHED IN THE “CENTURY,” NOVEMBER,
1899
At the outbreak of the Spanish-American War, M. Pierre Loti,
member of the French Academy and cultivated exponent of the
hopes and beliefs of the average citizen of Continental Europe in
regard to the contest, was at Madrid. Dewey’s victory caused him
grief; but he consoled himself, after watching a parade of the
Spanish troops, by remarking: “They are indeed still the solid and
splendid Spanish troops, heroic in every epoch—it needs only to look
at them to divine the woe that awaits the American shopkeepers
when brought face to face with such soldiers.” The excellent M. Loti
had already explained Manila by vague references to American
bombs loaded with petroleum, and to a devilish mechanical
ingenuity wholly unaccompanied by either humanity or courage, and
he still allowed himself to dwell on the hope that there were
reserved for America des surprises sanglantes.
M. Loti’s views on military matters need not detain us, for his
attitude toward the war was merely the attitude of Continental
Europe generally, in striking contrast to that of England. But it is a
curious fact that his view reflects not unfairly two different opinions,
which two different classes of our people would have expressed
before the event—opinions singularly falsified by the fact. Our
pessimists feared that we had lost courage and fighting capacity;
some of our optimists asserted that we needed neither, in view of
our marvelous wealth and extraordinary inventiveness and
mechanical skill. The national trait of “smartness,” used in the
Yankee sense of the word, has very good and very bad sides. Among
the latter is its tendency to create the belief that we need not
prepare for war, because somehow we shall be able to win by some
novel patent device, some new trick or new invention developed on
the spur of the moment by the ingenuity of our people. In this way it
is hoped to provide a substitute for preparedness —that is, for years
of patient and faithful attention to detail in advance. It is even
sometimes said that these mechanical devices will be of so terrible a
character as to nullify the courage which has always in the past been
the prime factor in winning battles.
Now, as all sound military judges knew in advance must inevitably
be the case, the experience of the Spanish War completely falsified
every prediction of this kind. We did not win through any special
ingenuity. Not a device of any kind was improvised during or
immediately before the war which was of any practical service. The
“bombs enveloped in petroleum” had no existence save in the brains
of the Spaniards and their more credulous sympathizers. Our navy
won because of its preparedness and because of the splendid
seamanship and gunnery which had been handed down as
traditional in the service, and had been perfected by the most
careful work. The army, at the only point where it was seriously
opposed, did its work by sheer dogged courage and hard fighting, in
spite of an unpreparedness which almost brought disaster upon it,
and would without doubt actually have done so had not the defects
and shortcomings of the Spanish administration been even greater
than our own.
We won the war in a very short time, and without having to expend
more than the merest fraction of our strength. The navy was shown
to be in good shape; and Secretary Root, to whom the wisdom of
President McKinley has intrusted the War Department, has already
shown himself as good a man as ever held the portfolio—a man
whose administration is certain to be of inestimable service to the
army and to the country. In consequence, too many of our people
show signs of thinking that, after all, everything was all right, and is
all right now; that we need not bother ourselves to learn any lessons
that are not agreeable to us, and that if in the future we get into a
war with a more formidable power than Spain, we shall pull through
somehow. Such a view is unjust to the nation, and particularly
unjust to the splendid men of the army and of the navy, who would
be sacrificed to it, should we ever engage in a serious war without
having learned the lessons that the year 1898 ought to have taught.
If we wish to get an explanation of the efficiency of our navy in
1898, and of the astonishing ease with which its victories were won,
we must go a long way back of that year, and study not only its
history, but the history of the Spanish navy for many decades. Of
course any such study must begin with a prompt admission of the
splendid natural quality of our officers and men. On the bridge, in
the gun-turrets, in the engine-room, and behind the quick-firers,
every one alike, from the highest to the lowest, was eager for the
war, and was in heart, mind, and body, of the very type which makes
the best kind of fighting man. Many of the officers of our ships have
mentioned to me that during the war punishments almost ceased,
because the men who got into scrapes in times of peace were so
aroused and excited by the chance of battle that their behavior was
perfect. We read now and then of foreign services where men hate
their officers, have no community of interest with them, and no
desire to fight for the flag. Most emphatically such is not the case in
our service. The discipline is just but not severe, unless severity is
imperatively called for. As a whole, the officers have the welfare of
the men very much at heart, and take care of their bodies with the
same forethought that they show in training them for battle. The
physique of the men is excellent, and to it are joined eagerness to
learn, and readiness to take risks and to stand danger unmoved.
Nevertheless, all this, though indispensable as a base, would mean
nothing whatever for the efficiency of the navy without years of
careful preparation and training. A warship is such a complicated
machine, and such highly specialized training is self-evidently
needed to command it, that our naval commanders, unlike our
military commanders, are freed from having to combat the
exasperating belief that the average civilian could at short notice do
their work. Of course, in reality a special order of ability and special
training are needed to enable a man to command troops
successfully; but the need is not so obvious as on shipboard. No
civilian could be five minutes on a battleship without realizing his
unfitness to command it; but there are any number of civilians who
firmly believe they can command regiments, when they have not a
single trait, natural or acquired, that really fits them for the task. A
blunder in the one case meets with instant, open, and terrible
punishment; in the other, it is at the moment only a source of
laughter or exasperation to the few, ominous though it may be for
the future. A colonel who issued the wrong order would cause
confusion. A ship-captain by such an order might wreck his ship. It
follows that the navy is comparatively free in time of war from the
presence in the higher ranks of men utterly unfit to perform their
duties. The nation realizes that it can not improvise naval officers
even out of first-rate skippers of merchantmen and passenger-
steamers. Such men could be used to a certain extent as under-
officers to meet a sudden and great emergency; but at best they
would met it imperfectly, and this the public at large understands.
There is, however, some failure to understand that much the same
condition prevails among ordinary seamen. The public speakers and
newspaper writers who may be loudest in clamoring for war are
often precisely the men who clamor against preparations for war.
Whether from sheer ignorance or from demagogy, they frequently
assert that, as this is the day of mechanics, even on the sea, and as
we have a large mechanical population, we could at once fit out any
number of vessels with men who would from the first do their duty
thoroughly and well.
As a matter of fact, though the sea-mechanic has replaced the
sailorman, yet it is almost as necessary as ever that a man should
have the sea habit in order to be of use aboard ship; and it is
infinitely more necessary than in former times that a man-of-war’s-
man should have especial training with his guns before he can use
them aright. In the old days cannon were very simple; sighting was
done roughly; and the ordinary merchant seaman speedily grew fit
to do his share of work on a frigate. Nowadays men must be
carefully trained for a considerable space of time before they can be
of any assistance whatever in handling and getting good results from
the formidable engines of destruction on battleship, cruiser, and
torpedo-boat. Crews can not be improvised. To get the very best
work out of them, they should all be composed of trained and
seasoned men; and in any event they should not be sent against a
formidable adversary unless each crew has for a nucleus a large
body of such men filling all the important positions. From time
immemorial it has proved impossible to improvise so much as a
makeshift navy for use against a formidable naval opponent. Any
such effort must meet with disaster.
Most fortunately, the United States had grown to realize this some
time before the Spanish War broke out. After the gigantic Civil War
the reaction from the strain of the contest was such that our navy
was permitted to go to pieces. Fifteen years after the close of the
contest in which Farragut took rank as one of the great admirals of
all time, the splendid navy of which he was the chief ornament had
become an object of derision, to every third-rate power in Europe
and South America. The elderly monitors and wooden steamers,
with their old-fashioned smooth-bore guns, would have been as
incompetent to face the modern ships of the period as the Congress
and the Cumberland were to face the Merrimac. Our men were as
brave as ever, but in war their courage would have been of no more
avail than the splendid valor of the men who sank with their guns
firing and flags flying when the great Confederate ironclad came out
to Hampton Roads.
At last the nation awoke from its lethargy. In 1883, under the
Administration of President Arthur, when Secretary Chandler was in
the Navy Department, the work was begun. The first step taken was
the refusal to repair the more antiquated wooden ships, and the
building of new steel ships to replace them. One of the ships thus
laid down was the Boston, which was in Dewey’s fleet. It is therefore
merely the literal truth to say that the preparations which made
Dewey’s victory possible began just fifteen years before the famous
day when he steamed into Manila Bay. Every Senator and
Congressman who voted an appropriation which enabled Secretary
Chandler to begin the upbuilding of the new navy, the President who
advised the course, the Secretary who had the direct management
of it, the shipbuilder in whose yard the ship was constructed, the
skilled experts who planned her hull, engine, and guns, and the
skilled workmen who worked out these plans, all alike are entitled to
their share in the credit of the great Manila victory.
The majority of the men can never be known by name, but the fact
that they did well their part in the deed is of vastly more importance
than the obtaining of any reward for it, whether by way of
recognition or otherwise; and this fact will always remain.
Nevertheless, it is important for our own future that, so far as
possible, we should recognize the men who did well. This is
peculiarly important in the case of Congress, whose action has been
the indispensable prerequisite for every effort to build up the navy,
as Congress provided the means for each step.
As there was always a division in Congress, while in the popular
mind the whole body is apt to be held accountable for any deed,
good or ill, done by the majority, it is much to be wished, in the
interest of justice, that some special historian of the navy would take
out from the records the votes, and here and there the speeches, for
and against the successive measures by which the navy was built
up. Every man who by vote and voice from time to time took part in
adding to our fleet, in buying the armor, in preparing the gun-
factories, in increasing the personnel and enabling it to practice,
deserves well of the whole nation, and a record of his action should
be kept, that his children may feel proud of him. No less clearly
should we understand that throughout these fifteen years the men
who, whether from honest but misguided motives, from short-
sightedness, from lack of patriotism, or from demagogy, opposed the
building up of the navy, have deserved ill of the nation, exactly as
did those men who recently prevented the purchase of armor for the
battleships, or, under the lead of Senator Gorman, prevented the
establishment of our army on the footing necessary for our national
needs. If disaster comes through lack of preparedness, the fault
necessarily lies far less with the men under whom the disaster
actually occurs than with those to whose wrong-headedness or
short-sighted indifference in time past the lack of preparedness is
due.
The mistakes, the blunders, and the shortcomings in the army
management during the summer of 1898 should be credited mainly,
not to any one in office in 1898, but to the public servants of the
people, and therefore to the people themselves, who permitted the
army to rust since the Civil War with a wholly faulty administration,
and with no chance whatever to perfect itself by practice, as the
navy was perfected. In like manner, any trouble that may come upon
the army, and therefore upon the nation, in the next few years, will
be due to the failure to provide for a thoroughly reorganized regular
army of adequate size in 1898; and for this failure the members in
the Senate and the House who took the lead against increasing the
regular army, and reorganizing it, will be primarily responsible. On
them will rest the blame of any check to the national arms, and the
honor that will undoubtedly be won for the flag by our army will
have been won in spite of their sinister opposition.
In May, 1898, when our battleships were lying off Havana and the
Spanish torpedo-boat destroyers were crossing the ocean, our best
commanders felt justifiable anxiety because we had no destroyers to
guard our fleet against the Spanish destroyers. Thanks to the
blunders and lack of initiative of the Spaniards, they made no good
use whatever of their formidable boats, sending them against our
ships in daylight, when it was hopeless to expect anything from
them.
But in war it is unsafe to trust to the blunders of the adversary to
offset our own blunders. Many a naval officer, when with improvised
craft of small real worth he was trying to guard our battleships
against the terrible possibilities of an attack by torpedo-boat
destroyers in the darkness, must have thought with bitterness how a
year before, when Senator Lodge and those who thought like him
were striving to secure an adequate support of large, high-class
torpedo-boats, the majority of the Senate followed the lead of
Senator Gorman in opposition. So in the future, if what we all most
earnestly hope will not happen does happen, and we are engaged in
war with some formidable sea power, any failure of our arms
resulting from an inadequate number of battleships, or imperfectly
prepared battleships, will have to be credited to those members of
Congress who opposed increasing the number of ships, or opposed
giving them proper armament, for no matter what reason. On the
other hand, the national consciousness of capacity to vindicate
national honor must be due mainly to the action of those
Congressmen who have in fact built up our fleet.
Secretary Chandler was succeeded by a line of men, each of whom,
however he might differ from the others politically and personally,
sincerely desired and strove hard for the upbuilding of the navy.
Under Messrs. Whitney, Tracy, Herbert, and Long the work has gone
steadily forward, thanks, of course, to the fact that successive
Congresses, Democratic and Republican alike, have permitted it to
go forward.
But the appropriation of money and the building of ships were not
enough. We must keep steadily in mind that not only was it
necessary to build the navy, but it was equally necessary to train our
officers and men aboard it by actual practice. If in 1883 we had
been able suddenly to purchase our present battleships, cruisers,
and torpedo-boats, they could not have been handled with any
degree of efficiency by our officers and crews as they then were.
Still less would it be possible to handle them by improvised crews. In
an emergency bodies of men like our naval militia can do special bits
of work excellently, and, thanks to their high average of character
and intellect, they are remarkably good makeshifts, but it would be
folly to expect from them all that is expected from a veteran crew of
trained man-of-war’s-men. And if we are ever pitted ship for ship on
equal terms against the first-class navy of a first-class power, we
shall need our best captains and our best crews if we are to win.
As fast as the new navy was built we had to break in the men to
handle it. The young officers who first took hold and developed the
possibilities of our torpedo-boats, for instance, really deserve as
much credit as their successors have rightly received for handling
them with dash and skill during the war. The admirals who first
exercised the new ships in squadrons were giving the training
without which Dewey and Sampson would have found their tasks
incomparably more difficult. As for the ordinary officers and seamen,
of course it was their incessant practice in handling the ships and
the guns at sea, in all kinds of weather, both alone and in company,
year in and year out, that made them able to keep up the never-
relaxing night blockade at Santiago, to steam into Manila Bay in the
darkness, to prevent breakdowns and make repairs of the
machinery, and finally to hit what they aimed at when the battle was
on. In the naval bureaus the great bulk of what in the army would
be called staff places are held by line officers. The men who made
ready the guns were the same men who afterward used them. In
the Engineering Bureau were the men who had handled or were to
handle the engines in action. The Bureau of Navigation, the Bureau
of Equipment, the Bureau of Information, were held by men who
had commanded ships in actual service, or who were thus to
command them against the Spaniards. The head of the Bureau of
Navigation is the chief of staff, and he has always been an officer of
distinction, detailed, like all of the other bureau chiefs, for special
service. From the highest to the lowest officer, every naval man had
seen and taken part, during time of peace, in the work which he
would have to do in time of war. The commodores and captains who
took active part in the war had commanded fleets in sea service, or
at the least had been in command of single ships in these fleets.
There was not one thing they were to do in war which they had not
done in peace, save actually receive the enemy’s fire.
Contrast this with the army. The material in the army is exactly as
good as that in the navy, and in the lower ranks the excellence is as
great. In no service, ashore or afloat, in the world could better men
of their grade be found than the lieutenants, and indeed the
captains, of the infantry and dismounted cavalry at Santiago. But in
the army the staff bureaus are permanent positions, instead of being
held, as of course they should be, by officers detailed from the line,
with the needs of the line and experiences of actual service fresh in
their minds.
The artillery had for thirty-five years had no field-practice that was in
the slightest degree adequate to its needs, or that compared in any
way with the practice received by the different companies and troops
of the infantry and cavalry. The bureaus in Washington were
absolutely enmeshed in red tape, and were held for the most part by
elderly men, of fine records in the past, who were no longer fit to
break through routine and to show the extraordinary energy,
business capacity, initiative, and willingness to accept responsibility
which were needed. Finally, the higher officers had been absolutely
denied that chance to practice their profession to which the higher
officers of the navy had long been accustomed. Every time a warship
goes to sea and cruises around the world, its captain has just such
an experience as the colonel of a regiment would have if sent off for
a six or eight months’ march, and if during those six or eight months
he incessantly practiced his regiment in every item of duty which it
would have to perform in battle. Every warship in the American navy,
and not a single regiment in the American army, had had this
experience.
Every naval captain had exercised command for long periods, under
conditions which made up nine tenths of what he would have to
encounter in war. Hardly a colonel had such an experience to his
credit. The regiments were not even assembled, but were scattered
by companies here and there. After a man ceased being a junior
captain he usually had hardly any chance for field-service; it was the
lieutenants and junior captains who did most of the field work in the
West of recent years. Of course there were exceptions; even at
Santiago there were generals and colonels who showed themselves
not only good fighters, but masters of their profession; and in the
Philippines the war has developed admirable leaders, so that now we
have ready the right man; but the general rule remains true. The
best man alive, if allowed to rust at a three-company post, or in a
garrison near some big city, for ten or fifteen years, will find himself
in straits if suddenly called to command a division, or mayhap even
an army-corps, on a foreign expedition, especially when not one of
his important subordinates has ever so much as seen five thousand
troops gathered, fed, sheltered, manœuvred, and shipped. The
marvel is, not that there was blundering, but that there was so little,
in the late war with Spain.
Captain (now Colonel) John Bigelow, Jr., in his account of his
personal experiences in command of a troop of cavalry during the
Santiago campaign, has pictured the welter of confusion during that
campaign, and the utter lack of organization, and of that skilled
leadership which can come only through practice. His book should
be studied by every man who wishes to see our army made what it
should be. In the Santiago campaign the army was more than once
uncomfortably near grave disaster, from which it was saved by the
remarkable fighting qualities of its individual fractions, and, above
all, by the incompetency of its foes. To go against a well-organized,
well-handled, well-led foreign foe under such conditions would
inevitably have meant failure and humiliation. Of course party
demagogues and the thoughtless generally are sure to credit these
disasters to the people under whom they occur, to the Secretary, or
to the commander of the army.
As a matter of fact, the blame must rest in all such cases far less
with them than with those responsible for the existence of the
system. Even if we had the best Secretary of War the country could
supply and the best general the army could furnish, it would be
impossible for them offhand to get good results if the nation,
through its representatives, had failed to make adequate provision
for a proper army, and to provide for the reorganization of the army
and for its practice in time of peace. The whole staff system, and
much else, should be remodeled. Above all, the army should be
practiced in mass in the actual work of marching and camping. Only
thus will it be possible to train the commanders, the quartermasters,
the commissaries, the doctors, so that they may by actual
experience learn to do their duties, as naval officers by actual
experience have learned to do theirs. Only thus can we do full
justice to as splendid and gallant a body of men as any nation ever
had the good luck to include among its armed defenders.
 ADMIRAL DEWEY
PUBLISHED IN “McCLURE’S MAGAZINE,”
OCTOBER, 1899
Admiral Dewey has done more than add a glorious page to our
history; more even than do a deed the memory of which will always
be an inspiration to his countrymen, and especially his countrymen
of his own profession. He has also taught us a lesson which should
have profound practical effects, if only we are willing to learn it
aright.
In the first place, he partly grasped and partly made his opportunity.
Of course, in a certain sense, no man can absolutely make an
opportunity. There were a number of admirals who, during the
dozen years preceding the Spanish War, were retired without the
opportunity of ever coming where it was possible to distinguish
themselves; and it may be that some of these lacked nothing but the
chance. Nevertheless, when the chance does come, only the great
man can see it instantly and use it aright. In the second place, it
must always be remembered that the power of using the chance
aright comes only to the man who has faithfully and for long years
made ready himself and his weapons for the possible need. Finally,
and most important of all, it should ever be kept in mind that the
man who does a great work must almost invariably owe the
possibility of doing it to the faithful work of other men, either at the
time or long before. Without his brilliancy their labor might be
wasted, but without their labor his brilliancy would be of no avail.
It has been said that it was a mere accident that Dewey happened
to be in command of the Asiatic Squadron when the war with Spain
broke out. This is not the fact. He was sent to command it in the fall
of 1897, because, to use the very language employed at the time, it
was deemed wise to have there a man “who could go into Manila if
necessary.” He owed the appointment to the high professional
reputation he enjoyed, and to the character he had established for
willingness to accept responsibility, for sound judgment, and for
entire fearlessness.
Probably the best way (although no way is infallible) to tell the worth
of a naval commander as yet untried in war is to get at the estimate
in which he is held by the best fighting men who would have to
serve under him. In the summer of 1897 there were in Washington
captains and commanders who later won honor for themselves and
their country in the war with Spain, and who were already known for
the dash and skill with which they handled their ships, the excellence
of their gun practice, the good discipline of their crews, and their
eager desire to win honorable renown. All these men were a unit in
their faith in the then Commodore Dewey, in their desire to serve
under him, should the chance arise, and in their unquestioning belief
that he was the man to meet an emergency in a way that would do
credit to the flag.
An excellent test is afforded by the readiness which the man has
shown to take responsibility in any emergency in the past. One
factor in Admiral Dewey’s appointment—of which he is very possibly
ignorant—was the way in which he had taken responsibility in
purchasing coal for the squadron that was to have been used
against Chile, if war with Chile had broken out, at the time General
Harrison was President. A service will do well or ill at the outbreak of
war very much in proportion to the way it has been prepared to
meet the outbreak during the preceding months. Now, it is often
impossible to say whether the symptoms that seem to forbode war
will or will not be followed by war. At one time, under President
Harrison, we seemed as near war with Chile as ever we seemed to
war with Spain under President McKinley. Therefore, when war
threatens, preparations must be made in any event; for the evil of
what proves to be the needless expenditure of money in one
instance is not to be weighed for a moment against the failure to
prepare in the other. But only a limited number of men have the
moral courage to make these preparations, because there is always
risk to the individual making them. Laws and regulations must be
stretched when an emergency arises, and yet there is always some
danger to the person who stretches them; and, moreover, in time of
sudden need, some indispensable article can very possibly only be
obtained at an altogether exorbitant price. If war comes, and the
article, whether it be a cargo of coal, or a collier, or an auxiliary
naval vessel, proves its usefulness, no complaint is ever made. But if
the war does not come, then some small demagogue, some cheap
economist, or some undersized superior who is afraid of taking the
responsibility himself, may blame the man who bought the article
and say that he exceeded his authority; that he showed more zeal
than discretion in not waiting for a few days, etc. These are the risks
which must be taken, and the men who take them should be singled
out for reward and for duty. Admiral Dewey’s whole action in
connection with the question of coal-supply for our fleet during the
Chilean scare marked him as one of these men.
No one who has not some knowledge of the army and navy will
appreciate how much this means. It is necessary to have a complete
system of checks upon the actions, and especially upon the
expenditures, of the army and navy; but the present system is at
times altogether too complete, especially in war. The efficiency of
the quartermasters and commissary officers of the army in the war
with Spain was very seriously marred by their perfectly justifiable
fear that the slightest departure from the requirements of the red-
tape regulations of peace would result in the docking of their own
pay by men more concerned in enforcing the letter of the law than
in seeing the army clothed and fed. In the navy, before the passage
of the Personnel Bill, a positive premium was put on a man’s doing
nothing but keep out of trouble; for if only he could avoid a court-
martial, his promotions would take care of themselves, so that from
the selfish standpoint no possible good could come to him from
taking risks, while they might cause him very great harm. The best
officers in the service recognized the menace that this state of affairs
meant to the service, and strove to counterbalance it in every way.
No small part of the good done by the admirable War College, under
Captains Mahan, Taylor, and Goodrich, lay in their insistence upon
the need of the naval officer’s instantly accepting responsibility in
any crisis, and doing what was best for the flag, even though it was
probable the action might be disavowed by his immediate superiors,
and though it might result in his own personal inconvenience and
detriment. This was taught not merely as an abstract theory, but
with direct reference to concrete cases; for instance, with reference
to taking possession of Hawaii, if a revolution should by chance
break out there during the presence of an American warship, or if
the warship of a foreign power attempted to interfere with the
affairs of the island.
For the work which Dewey had to do willingness to accept
responsibility was a prime requisite. A man afraid to vary in times of
emergency from the regulations laid down in time of peace would
never even have got the coal with which to steam to Manila from
Hong Kong the instant the crisis came. We were peculiarly fortunate
in our Secretary of the Navy, Mr. Long; but the best Secretary that
ever held the navy portfolio could not successfully direct operations
on the other side of the world. All that he could do was to choose a
good man, give him the largest possible liberty of action, and back
him up in every way; and this Secretary Long did. But if the man
chosen had been timid about taking risks, nothing that could be
done for him would have availed. Such a man would not have
disobeyed orders. The danger would have been of precisely the
contrary character. He would scrupulously have done just whatever
he was told to do, and then would have sat down and waited for
further instructions, so as to protect himself if something happened
to go wrong. An infinity of excuses can always be found for non-
action.
Admiral Dewey was sent to command the fleet on the Asiatic station
primarily because he had such a record in the past that the best
officers in the navy believed him to be peculiarly a man of the
fighting temperament and fit to meet emergencies, and because he
had shown his willingness to assume heavy responsibilities. How
amply he justified his choice it is not necessary to say. On our roll of
naval heroes his name will stand second to that of Farragut alone,
and no man since the Civil War, whether soldier or civilian, has
added so much to the honorable renown of the nation or has
deserved so well of it. For our own sakes, and in particular for the
sake of any naval officer who in the future may be called upon to do
such a piece of work as Dewey did, let us keep in mind the further
fact that he could not have accomplished his feat if he had not had
first-class vessels and excellently trained men; if his warships had
not been so good, and his captains and crews such thorough
masters of their art. A man of less daring courage than Dewey would
never have done what he did; but the courage itself was not
enough. The Spaniards, too, had courage. What they lacked was
energy, training, forethought. They fought their vessels until they
burned or sank; but their gunnery was so poor that they did not kill
a man in the American fleet. Even Dewey’s splendid capacity would
not have enabled him to win the battle of Manila Bay had it not been
for the traditional energy and seamanship of our naval service, so
well illustrated in his captains, and the excellent gun-practice of the
crews, the result of years of steady training. Furthermore, even this
excellence in the personnel would not have availed if under a
succession of Secretaries of the Navy, and through the wisdom of a
succession of Congresses, the material of the navy had not been
built up as it actually was.
If war with Spain had broken out fifteen years before it did,—that is,
in the year 1883, before our new navy was built,—it would have
been physically impossible to get the results we actually did get. At
that time our navy consisted of a collection of rusty monitors and
antiquated wooden ships left over from the Civil War, which could
not possibly have been matched against even the navy of Spain.
Every proposal to increase the navy was then violently opposed with
exactly the same arguments used nowadays by the men who oppose
building up our army. The Congressmen who rallied to the support of
Senator Gorman in his refusal to furnish an adequate army to take
care of the Philippines and meet the new national needs, or who
defeated the proposition to buy armor-plate for the new ships,
assumed precisely the ground that was taken by the men who, prior
to 1883, had succeeded in preventing the rebuilding of the navy.
Both alike did all they could to prevent the upholding of the national
honor in times of emergency. There were the usual arguments: that
we were a great peaceful people, and would never have to go to
war; that if we had a navy or army we should be tempted to use it
and therefore embark in a career of military conquest; that there
was no need of regulars anyhow, because we could always raise
volunteers to do anything; that war was a barbarous method of
settling disputes, and too expensive to undertake even to avoid
national disgrace, and so on.
But fortunately the men of sturdy common sense and sound
patriotism proved victors, and the new navy was begun. Its
upbuilding was not a party matter. The first ships were laid down
under Secretary Chandler; Secretary Whitney continued the work;
Secretary Tracy carried it still further; so did Secretary Herbert, and
then Secretary Long. Congress after Congress voted the necessary
money. We have never had as many ships as a nation of such size
and such vast interests really needs; but still by degrees we have
acquired a small fleet of battleships, cruisers, gunboats, and
torpedo-boats, all excellent of their class. The squadron with which
Dewey entered Manila Bay included ships laid down or launched
under Secretaries Chandler, Whitney, Tracy, and Herbert; and all four
of these Secretaries, their naval architects, the chiefs of bureaus, the
young engineers and constructors, the outside contractors, the
shipyard men like Roach, Cramp, and Scott, and, finally and
emphatically, the Congressmen who during these fifteen years voted
the supplies, are entitled to take a just pride in their share of the
glory of the achievement. Every man in Congress whose vote made
possible the building of the Olympia, the Baltimore, the Raleigh, or
the putting aboard them and their sister ships the modern eight-inch
or rapid-fire five-inch guns, or the giving them the best engines and
the means where with to practice their crews at the targets—every
such man has the right to tell his children that he did his part in
securing Dewey’s victory, and that, save for the action of him and his
fellows, it could not have been won. This is no less true of the man
who planned the ships and of the other men, whether in the
government service or in private employment, who built them, from
the head of the great business concern which put up an armor-plate
factory down to the iron-worker who conscientiously and skilfully did
his part on gun-shield or gun.
So much for the men who furnished the material and the means for
assembling and practicing the personnel. The same praise must be
given the men who actually drilled the personnel, part of which
Dewey used. If our ships had merely been built and then laid up, if
officers and crews had not been exercised season after season in all
weathers on the high seas in handling their ships both separately
and in squadron, and in practicing with the guns, all the excellent
material would have availed us little. Exactly as it is of no use to give
an army the best arms and equipment if it is not also given the
chance to practice with its arms and equipment, so the finest ships
and the best natural sailors and fighters are useless to a navy if the
most ample opportunity for training is not allowed. Only incessant
practice will make a good gunner; though, inasmuch as there are
natural marksmen as well as men who never can become good
marksmen, there should always be the widest intelligence displayed
in the choice of gunners. Not only is it impossible for a man to learn
how to handle a ship or do his duty aboard her save by long cruises
at sea, but it is also impossible for a good single-ship captain to be
an efficient unit in a fleet unless he is accustomed to manœuvre as
part of a fleet.
It is particularly true of the naval service that the excellence of any
portion of it in a given crisis will depend mainly upon the excellence
of the whole body, and so the triumph of any part is legitimately felt
to reflect honor upon the whole and to have been participated in by
every one. Dewey’s captains could not have followed him with the
precision they displayed, could not have shown the excellent gun
practice they did show—in short, the victory would not have been
possible had it not been for the unwearied training and practice