THEODORE ROOSEVELT—1904
THE ROUGH RIDER TAKES ON THE ROBBER BARONS
"We Republicans [must] hold the just balance and set
ourselves as resolutely against improper corporate influence
on the one hand as against demagogy and mob rule on the
other."
—Theodore Roosevelt
The former president began to speak with a bullet lodged in
his chest.
Less than five minutes before, a deranged gunman had shot
Theodore Roosevelt at close range as he walked to give a
speech on behalf of his bid to recapture the White House in
1912 as a Progressive. Aides insisted that Roosevelt head
straight to the hospital, but flush with a sense of destiny,
the old lion refused. He would not retreat; he would give
this speech if it killed him. With the blood spreading
against his white shirt, he began:
I have altogether too important things to think of to feel
any concern over my own death. . . . I am ahead of the game
anyway. No man has had a happier life than I have led. . . .
This effort to assassinate me emphasizes to a peculiar
degree the need for the Progressive movement . . . every
good citizen ought to do everything in his or her power to
prevent the coming of the day when we shall see in this
country two recognized creeds fighting one another, when we
shall see the creed of the "Have-nots" arraigned against the
creed of the "Haves" . . .
My appeal for organized labor is two-fold; to the outsider
and the capitalist I make my appeal to treat the laborer
fairly . . . That is one-half appeal that I make. Now, the
other half is to the labor man himself. My appeal to him is
to remember that as he wants justice, so he must do justice.
Theodore Roosevelt was publicly issuing his political last
will and testament, standing his ground on the idea that
societal division between special interests could mean
suicide for the American experiment.
As president, TR had used the full weight of the White House
to reign in the power of big business while also instituting
reasonable reforms on behalf of organized labor. It was his
belief that "constructive change offers the best method of
avoiding destructive change . . . reform is the antidote to
revolution."
Extremists on either end of the spectrum detested him, but
TR's studied independence—especially his defiance of the
Wall Street robber barons who considered themselves the
backbone of his Republican Party-led directly to his
landslide victory of 1904 and made him one of the most
popular presidents in American history.
Roosevelt was a man of action who preached the virtue of
"the strenuous life"—"I believe in men who take the next
step, not those who theorize about the two-hundredth step,"
he said-and his politics defied easy categorization. He
sometimes described himself a "conservative radical," who
was devoted to keeping "the left of center together." As one
contemporary explained, "Neither reformers nor bosses were
satisfied . . . but this fact only confirmed him in the
notion that he was steering a course equally safe from the
mercenary rocks on the one side and the doctrinaire shallows
on the other."
In happy times, Roosevelt found the fervor of his critics on
the left and the right amusing. Energetically dismissing
them, he coined the term "lunatic fringe." Even after the
presidency, Roosevelt joked that opponents regarded him as
"a kind of modified anarchist . . . hesitating only whether
to denounce my speeches as containing only platitudes, or
being incitements to revolution. . . . They may fall into
either category but they can't fall into both."
In both his private and public lives, Theodore Roosevelt
transcended all labels. His friend, the nature writer John
Burroughs, said that "Roosevelt was a many-sided man and
every side was like an electric battery." TR was a
Harvard-educated son of the aristocracy, but his character
was forged by tragedy and the Badlands of North Dakota.
Omnivorously intelligent, he was the first true Renaissance
man in the White House since Thomas Jefferson: soldier,
statesman, scholar, politician, police commissioner,
preservationist, and prolific author of over thirty books.
He made himself president by the age of forty-two.
His best-known personal motto—the West African proverb
"Speak softly and carry a big stick"—reflected TR's belief
in balancing the idealism of peaceful diplomacy with the
realism of overwhelming military strength. He remains
beloved by modern conservatives for his strong advocacy of
American military expansion. Yet he did more than any
previous president to implement a progressive domestic
agenda. He was a devout believer in military might who won
the Nobel Peace Prize, a proud hunter of wild game who
helped found the modern conservation movement, a reformer
among politicians, and a politician among reformers.
What his critics never understood is that those
contradictory qualities-along with his exuberant
personality—were the key to his love affair with the
American public and the reason why he remains so admired on
both sides of the political aisle today.
Before there was a name for it, Centrism was the source of
his popular support and political strength. In the words of
historian John Morton Blum, "Roosevelt defined for himself
an imprecise line between the 'lunatic fringe' he detested
and the 'selfish rich' he despised. Equally to each of these
extremes he was anathema. To many of the wholly sane but
more impatient reformers he seemed insincere. To the inert
he seemed mad. Most of early-century America, however,
agreed with or at least voted for his Square Deal." As his
biographer Edmund Morris stated, "In situations involving
extremes, Roosevelt's instinct was to seek out the center."
Excerpted from Independent Nation by John P. Avlon
Copyright© 2004 by John P. Avlon. Excerpted by permission
of Harmony, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights
reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or
reprinted without permission in writing from the
publisher.
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