THEODORE ROOSEVELT
Biography
Theodore Roosevelt was one of the most popular American presidents as well as one of the most important. With his zest for life and his love of controversy, he captured the public's imagination as no President since Andrew Jackson had done. His willingness to shoulder the burdens of world power and to struggle with the problems caused by the growth of industry made his administration one of the most significant in U.S. history.
Roosevelt was sworn in as president on September 14, 1901, following the assassination of President William Mckinley. At 42 years of age he was the youngest person ever to become president of the United States. Fortunately, 15 years of public service, particularly as governor of New York, had also made him one of the best prepared presidents.
First Marriage, Assemblyman, Rancher
In 1880, a few months after graduation from Harvard College, Roosevelt married a charming young lady, Alice Hathaway Lee of Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts. After a short honeymoon he started to study law at Columbia University. He had little interest in legal details, however. In 1881, he gave up the study of law upon his election to the first of three terms in the New York State Assembly.
Roosevelt was only 23 years old when he took his seat in January 1882. But his courageous support of good government soon earned him a statewide reputation, and he rose rapidly in influence. He became the leader of a group of reform-minded Republicans and pushed through several bills strengthening the government of New York City. At the same time, he overcame a belief that government should not interfere in the economy and fought successfully for the regulation of tenement workshops.
Early in his third term, in 1884, Roosevelt's mother died. A few hours later his wife, who had given birth to a baby girl a short while before, also died. Though grief-stricken, Roosevelt carried on his duties until the end of the session. As he wrote to a close friend, “It was a grim and evil fate, but I have never believed it did any good to flinch or yield for any blow, nor does it lighten the blow to cease from working.” That summer he retired temporarily from politics and went out to the Dakota Territory to raise cattle on his ranch on the Little Missouri River.
When Roosevelt first appeared in the West, veteran cowboys and hunters were amused by his thick glasses, eastern accent, and gentlemanly manners. But after he had knocked out a drunken stranger who threatened him with two pistols and had proved himself in a half dozen other incidents, he was accepted. Within a year he was regarded as one of the region's ablest young leaders.
Public Service
Roosevelt returned from the West in the fall of 1886 to suffer defeat in a race for mayor of New York. That same year he married a childhood sweetheart, Edith Carow, and settled in a great rambling house on Sagamore Hill, overlooking Oyster Bay, Long Island. Four sons and a daughter were born to them.
In 1889 he accepted an appointment to the United States Civil Service Commission. Roosevelt at once gave the commission new life, and for 6 years he enforced the laws honestly and fearlessly. When he resigned in 1895 to accept the presidency of the New York City Police Board, the civil service system had become an important part of American government.
As New York police commissioner, Roosevelt prowled the streets after midnight, overhauled the promotion system, and modernized the force. In 1897 he resigned from the Police Board to become assistant secretary of the Navy.
Rough Rider and Governor
Roosevelt's service in the Navy Department and in the war against Spain brought out his aggressive qualities. He believed at the time that power was necessary for a country to achieve greatness, and that war was a test of manliness. He also believed that civilized nations had a right to interfere in the affairs of less advanced nations in order to forward the march of civilization. He demanded that the United States build up its fleet, drive Spain from the Western Hemisphere, and acquire colonies of its own.
Soon after the Spanish-American War broke out in 1898, Roosevelt helped organize the First United States Volunteer Cavalry Regiment (the “Rough Riders”). He took command of the regiment in Cuba, and on July 1 he led an assault on a hill outside Santiago (Kettle Hill, not San Juan Hill as many believe). For hours he braved withering gunfire from the heights as he rode up and down the line urging his men, who were on foot, to press the attack. His elbow was nicked, a soldier was killed at his feet, and he had several other narrow escapes. But he rallied his own and other troops, and the hill was captured.
As soon as Roosevelt returned to New York in the fall of 1898, Republican bosses nominated him for governor. They hoped that his war record and reputation as a reformer would cause the voters to overlook a series of recent scandals within the party. After being elected by a narrow margin, Roosevelt compelled the bosses to accept a number of reform measures. These included a tax on corporation franchises, regulation of sweatshops, a raise in schoolteachers’ salaries, and a conservation program. This angered the businessmen who supported the bosses. So Republican leaders practically forced Roosevelt to accept the Vice-Presidential nomination in 1900, although he wanted a second term as governor. In the election William McKinley and Roosevelt defeated the Democratic candidates, William Jennings Bryan and Adlai E. Stevenson (1835-1914). Six months after their inauguration McKinley was dead and Roosevelt was the new president of the United States.
President
The main drive of Roosevelt's administration was toward a balance of economic interests. He believed that he should represent all the people—farmers, laborers, and white-collar workers as well as businessmen. Roosevelt called his program the Square Deal. He began to put it into effect 5 months after he took office by starting antitrust proceedings against the Northern Securities Company, a giant holding company. Holding companies controlled other companies and were thus able to reduce competition. Then in the fall of 1902, Roosevelt helped settle a long coal strike on terms favorable to the workers. This marked the first time that a president who took action in a strike had failed to side with management.
Despite his popular fame as a “trustbuster,”Roosevelt continued to believe that bigness was good economically. He felt that large corporations should be regulated rather than destroyed. In 1903 he pushed through Congress a bill to form a Bureau of Corporations. That same year he gave his support to the Elkins Bill to prohibit railroad rebates. This was a practice in which railroads returned part of their payment to favored customers.
Foreign Policy
Roosevelt's foreign policy was guided by the belief that the United States must police the Western Hemisphere and should accept the responsibilities of world power. He felt that the United States was morally bound to uplift the people of the Philippines, which the United States had acquired from Spain. He worked conscientiously to improve the economy of the Filipinos and prepare them for self- government. In 1902 he persuaded Germany to arbitrate a dispute with Venezuela. In 1903 he acquired the Canal Zone after Panama broke away from Colombia. The circumstances left a feeling of ill will in Colombia.
In 1905, at the request of the government of Santo Domingo (now the Dominican Republic), Roosevelt took over control of customs collections in that misgoverned country. He did not want to do so. But he feared that European powers might take control for nonpayment of debts if the United States did not act. He then announced in a public letter that the United States had a right to intervene in the internal affairs of Latin-American countries unable to keep order. This policy became known as the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine.
Second Presidential Term
Roosevelt's flair for the dramatic combined with his solid achievements to assure him a term in his own right. In the election of 1904 he won a landslide victory over his conservative Democratic opponent, Judge Alton B. Parker (1852-1926) of New York. The most productive years of his presidency followed. In a masterful display of leadership, Roosevelt forced the conservative Republicans into line by threatening to lower the tariff, or tax, on imports. (The Republicans generally favored a high tariff to protect American industry.) As a result, he won conservative support for a number of reforms in 1906—among them the Hepburn Act to regulate railroads, the Pure Food and Drug Act, and employers' liability legislation.
Meanwhile, Roosevelt and his chief forester, Gifford Pinchot (1865-1946), pushed conservation forward. Their program was based on the theory that natural resources belong to all the people, that scientific forestry would provide a constant supply of timber, and that river valleys should be developed as entire units. Roosevelt and Pinchot were bitterly opposed by small lumber companies, electric power corporations, and states’ righters. But progress was made. The Reclamation Act of 1902 provided for a large irrigation project in the southwestern United States. Many big lumber companies were won over to scientific forestry. More than 125 million acres (over 50.5 million hectares) were added to the national forests, and the number of national parks doubled. Sixteen national monuments were created, and 51 wildlife refuges were established.
In foreign affairs Roosevelt’s second term saw a retreat from his earlier imperialism. He tried mainly to protect the Philippines, support a balance of power in the Far East, and build up friendship with the Japanese. In 1905 he offered his good offices to end the Russo- Japanese War. His mediation proved successful and earned him the Nobel peace prize. On the other hand he served notice that he still carried a “big stick” by sending the American fleet on a world cruise in 1907.
As Roosevelt's term of office neared its end, Congress grew more and more resentful of his strong leadership and progressive policies. Again and again during his last 2 years Congress refused to do what he asked. Roosevelt's insight into the nation’s problems continued to deepen, however. On January 31, 1908, he sent Congress the most radical message written by a president to that time. It called, among other things, for better conditions for workers and for the arrest of businessmen who broke the law.
In spite of his troubles with Congress, Roosevelt’s great energy and straightforward speeches appealed more than ever to the man in the street. He could have been renominated easily had he chosen. But he decided instead to support the candidacy of one of his dearest friends, Secretary of War William Howard Taft. Soon after Taft was inaugurated in 1909, Roosevelt left for Africa to hunt big game and collect wildlife specimens for the Smithsonian Institution.
The Bull Moose Party
While Roosevelt was in Africa, progressivism was gaining new force in the United States. But instead of encouraging its growth as Roosevelt had done, President Taft tried to hold it back. This put him on the side of the Republican conservatives who had opposed Roosevelt's policies.
In 1910 Roosevelt returned to the United States. Although irritated at Taft's policies, he at first tried to avoid hurting his old friend. But it was not in Roosevelt's nature to keep silent. In a series of speeches in the Midwest he set forth his own views, which he called the New Nationalism.
The New Nationalism was an extension of the progressive program he had urged in the last years of his presidency. It called for steeply graduated income and inheritance taxes and a long list of other social and political reforms. Finally, in 1912, Roosevelt yielded to the pleas of progressive midwestern Republicans and challenged Taft for the presidential nomination. But the Republican Convention failed to nominate Roosevelt in spite of his two-to-one victory over Taft in the primary elections. Roosevelt then organized the Progressive Party, better known as the Bull Moose Party. (“I am as strong as a bull moose,” he had once commented.) The new party was supported by most of the country's social workers, intellectuals, and progressive- minded citizens.
Roosevelt’s leadership of the progressive movement stirred the social conscience of middle-class America. Though Woodrow Wilson, the Democratic candidate, won the three-cornered contest with about 42 percent of the popular vote, Roosevelt ran far ahead of Taft. In a sense, too, Roosevelt was vindicated in defeat. For by 1916 Wilson had written a great deal of Roosevelt's New Nationalism into law.
Return to Writing and Exploration
After his defeat in 1912 Roosevelt wrote his autobiography. It is a colorful and vigorously written book and still the most informative memoir ever written by a former president.
Then, in 1913, Roosevelt decided to indulge his love of adventure once more by exploring an unknown South American river, the River of Doubt. It was a harrowing experience. He almost died of an injury suffered in a heroic effort to save two capsized boats. He was then stricken with malaria. Realizing that he was a burden, Roosevelt begged his companions, who included his son Kermit, to go on without him. But they insisted on bringing him out of the jungle.
Final Years
Upon the outbreak of World War I in 1914, Roosevelt at first refused to take sides. But after a few months, he decided that the interests of the United States and the world would best be served by U.S. support of the Allies, led by Britain and France, against Germany, which he feared would dominate the European continent. Early in 1915 he became a leader of the movement to prepare the United States for possible entry into the war. When the United States declared war against Germany in 1917, Roosevelt asked President Woodrow Wilson for permission to raise a volunteer division. But Wilson refused, and Roosevelt devoted himself to spurring the war effort at home.
Bouts of malaria sapped Roosevelt's health in his last years. He was also greatly saddened by the death of his youngest son, Quentin. An aviator, he was killed in an air battle over France in 1918. Roosevelt himself died at Sagamore Hill on January 6, 1919.
William H. Harbaugh
University of Virginia Author, Power and Responsibility: The Life and
Times of Theodore Roosevelt