Theodore Roosevelt (/ˈroʊzəvɛlt/
ROH-zə-velt;[a]
October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), often referred to by his
initials TR, was an American statesman, author,
explorer, soldier, naturalist, and reformer who served as the
26th President of the United
States. A leader of the Republican
Party, he was a leading force of the Progressive Era. Born a sickly child with
debilitating asthma, Roosevelt embraced a strenuous lifestyle and
successfully regained his health. He integrated his exuberant
personality, vast range of interests, and world-famous achievements
into a "cowboy" persona defined by robust masculinity. Home-schooled, he became a lifelong
naturalist before attending Harvard College. His first of many books,
The Naval War of 1812
(1882), established his reputation as both a learned historian and
a popular writer. He entered politics, becoming the leader of the
reform faction of Republicans in New York's state legislature.
Following the deaths of his wife and mother, he escaped to the
wilderness and operated a cattle ranch in the Dakotas. He returned
to run unsuccessfully for Mayor of New York City in 1886. He served
as Assistant Secretary of the
Navy under William McKinley, resigning after one year to serve
with the Rough Riders, gaining national fame for
courage during the War in Cuba. Returning a war hero,
he was elected governor of New York in 1898. A frustrated party
establishment made him McKinley's running mate in the election of
1900. He campaigned vigorously across the country, helping
McKinley win reelection by a landslide on a platform of peace,
prosperity, and conservatism.
The assassination of
President McKinley in September 1901 meant that the
forty-two-year-old had become President of the United States, the
youngest in history. Leading his party and country into the
Progressive Era, he championed his "Square Deal" domestic policies, promising the
average citizen fairness, breaking of trusts, regulation of
railroads, and pure food and drugs. Making conservation a top
priority, he established a myriad of new national parks, forests, and monuments
in order to preserve the nation's natural resources. In foreign
policy, he concentrated on Central America, where he
began construction of the Panama Canal. He also greatly expanded the
United States Navy and sent the Great White Fleet on a world tour to
project the United States' naval power. His successful efforts to
end the Russo-Japanese War won him the 1906
Nobel Peace Prize.
Reelected in
1904, he continued pursuit of progressive policies, eventually
culminating blockage of his legislative agenda in Congress.
Roosevelt successfully groomed his close friend, William Howard Taft, for the presidency.
After leaving office, he went on safari in Africa and toured
Europe. Returning stateside, he became frustrated with Taft's
approach as his successor, trying, but failing to win the nomination in
1912. He founded his own party, the Progressive "Bull
Moose" Party , and called for wide-ranging progressive reforms.
The split allowed the Democrats to win the White House and Congress
in 1912; those
Republicans aligned with Taft would control the Republican Party
for decades.
Frustrated at home, Roosevelt led two-year
expedition in the Amazon, nearly dying of tropical disease.
During World War I, he opposed President Wilson for keeping the U.S. out of
the war against Germany, and offered his military services, which
were never summoned. Although he planned to run again for president
in 1920, his health quickly deteriorated, and he died in early
1919. Roosevelt has consistently been ranked by scholars as one of
the greatest
U.S. Presidents.[2]
His face adorns Mount Rushmore alongside those of Washington,
Jefferson, and Lincoln.
On September 6, President McKinley was shot by an anarchist acting
alone while in Buffalo, New York. Initial reports suggested that
his condition was improving, so Roosevelt, after visiting the
ailing president, embarked for the west. When McKinley's condition
worsened, Roosevelt rushed back. McKinley died on September 14, and
Roosevelt was sworn in at the Ansley
Wilcox House.[19]
The following month, Roosevelt invited Booker T. Washington to dinner at the
White House. To his dismay, this sparked a bitter, and at times
vicious, reaction across the heavily segregated South. Roosevelt reacted with
astonishment and protest, saying that he looked forward to many
future dinners with Washington. Upon further reflection, Roosevelt
wanted to ensure that this had no effect on political support in
the South, and further invitations to Washington were
avoided.[90]
Roosevelt kept McKinley's Cabinet and promised to continue
McKinley's policies. In the November 1904 presidential
election, Roosevelt won the presidency in his own right in a
landslide victory against Alton Brooks Parker. His vice president was
Charles Warren Fairbanks of
Indiana.[19]
One of Roosevelt's first notable acts as president was to
deliver a 20,000-word address to Congress[91]
asking it to curb the power of large corporations (called
"trusts"). He also spoke in support of organized labor to further
chagrin big business, but to their delight, he endorsed the gold
standard, protective tariffs and lower taxes.[92]
For his aggressive use of United States antitrust law, he
became known as the "trust-buster." He brought 40 antitrust suits,
and broke up major companies, such as the largest railroad and Standard Oil, the largest oil
company.[93]
In May 1902, anthracite coal miners went on strike,
threatening a national energy shortage. After threatening the coal
operators with intervention by federal troops, Roosevelt won their
agreement to an arbitration of the dispute by a commission, which
succeeded in stopping the strike, dropping coal prices and retiring
furnaces; the accord with J.P. Morgan resulted in the workers getting more
pay for fewer hours, but with no union recognition.[94][95]
Journalist Ray Baker quoted Roosevelt concerning his policy towards
capitalists and laborers: "My action on labor should always be
considered in connection with my action as regards capital, and
both are reducible to my favorite formula – a square
deal for every man."[96]
Roosevelt thought it was particularly important for the government
to supervise the workings of the railway to avoid corruption in
interstate commerce; the result was the Hepburn bill, which
established control over railroad rates.[97]
Roosevelt responded to public anger over the abuses in the food
packing industry by pushing Congress to pass the Meat Inspection Act of 1906 and the
Pure Food and Drug Act. The Meat
Inspection Act of 1906 banned misleading labels and preservatives
that contained harmful chemicals. The Pure Food and Drug Act banned
food and drugs that were impure or falsely labeled from being made,
sold, and shipped. Roosevelt also served as honorary president of
the American School Hygiene
Association from 1907 to 1908, and in 1909 he convened the
first White House Conference on the Care of Dependent
Children.[98]
Roosevelt and Fairbanks, 1904
During the Panic of 1907, nearly all agreed that a
more flexible system to ensure liquidity was needed –
the Republicans sought a response to the money supply through the
bankers, whereas the Democrats sought government control; Roosevelt
was unsure, but leaned towards the Republican view while continuing
to denounce corporate corruption.[99]
Nonetheless, in 1910, Roosevelt commented on "enormously wealthy
and economically powerful men" and suggested "a graduated
inheritance tax on big fortunes... increasing rapidly in amount
with the size of the estate."[100][101]
Roosevelt was inclined to extend the regulatory reach of his
office. In a moment of frustration, House Speaker Joseph Gurney Cannon commented on
Roosevelt's desire for executive branch control in domestic
policy-making: "That fellow at the other end of the avenue wants
everything from the birth of Christ to the death of the devil."
Biographer Brands states that, "Even his friends occasionally
wondered whether there wasn't any custom or practice too minor for
him to try to regulate, update or otherwise improve."[102]
In fact, Roosevelt's willingness to exercise his power included
attempted rule changes in the game of football; at the Naval
Academy, he sought to force retention of martial arts classes and
to revise disciplinary rules. He even ordered changes made in the
minting of a coin whose design he disliked, and ordered the
Government Printing Office to adopt simplified spellings for a core
list of 300 words, according to reformers on the Simplified Spelling Board. He was
forced to rescind the latter after substantial ridicule from the
press and a resolution of protest from the House of
Representatives.[103]
In the late 1890s, Roosevelt had been an ardent imperialist, and
vigorously defended the permanent acquisition of the Philippines in
the 1900 election campaign. After the rebellion ended in 1901, he
largely lost interest in the Philippines and Asian expansion in general,
despite the contradictory opinion of his Secretary of War, William
Howard Taft. As president, he primarily focused the nation's
overseas ambitions on the Caribbean, especially locations that had
a bearing on the defense of his pet project, the Panama Canal.[104]
In 1905, Roosevelt offered to mediate a treaty to end the
Russo-Japanese War. The parties agreed to
meet in Portsmouth, New Hampshire and they resolved the final
conflict over the division of Sakhalin– Russia
took the northern half, and Japan the
south; Japan also dropped its demand for an indemnity.[105]
Roosevelt won the Nobel Peace Prize for his successful
efforts. George E. Mowry concludes that
Roosevelt handled the arbitration well, doing an "excellent job of
balancing Russian and Japanese power in the Orient, where the
supremacy of either constituted a threat to growing
America."[106][107]
The Gentlemen's Agreement of
1907 resolved unpleasant racial tensions with Japan. Tokyo was
angered over the segregation of Japanese children in San Francisco schools. The tensions were ended,
but Japan also agreed not to allow unskilled workers to emigrate to
the U.S.[108]
When World War I began in 1914, Roosevelt strongly
supported the Allies and demanded a harsher policy
against Germany, especially regarding submarine warfare. Roosevelt
angrily denounced the foreign policy of President Wilson, calling
it a failure regarding the atrocities in Belgium and the violations
of American rights.[157]
In 1916, he campaigned energetically for Charles Evans Hughes and repeatedly
denounced Irish-Americans and German-Americans who Roosevelt said
were unpatriotic, because they put the interests of Ireland and
Germany ahead of America's by supporting neutrality. He insisted
that one had to be 100% American, not a "hyphenated American" who juggled multiple
loyalties. In March 1917, Congress gave Roosevelt the authority to
raise a maximum of four divisions similar to the Rough Riders, and
Major Frederick Russell Burnham was put
in charge of both the general organization and
recruitment.[158][159]
However, the Commander-in-chief, President Woodrow Wilson,announced to the press that he
would not send Roosevelt and his volunteers to France, but instead
would send an American Expeditionary Force under the command of
General John J. Pershing.[160]
Roosevelt was left with no option except to disband the volunteers.
He never forgave Wilson, and quickly published The Foes Of Our
Own Household, an indictment of the sitting
president.[161][162][163]
Roosevelt's attacks on Wilson helped the Republicans win control
of Congress in the off-year elections of 1918. Roosevelt was
popular enough to seriously contest the 1920 Republican nomination,
but his health was broken by 1918, because of the lingering
malaria. His family and supporters threw their
support behind Roosevelt's old military companion, General Leonard Wood, who was ultimately defeated by
Taft supporter Warren G. Harding.[164]
Roosevelt's youngest son, Quentin, a pilot with the American forces
in France, was shot down behind German lines on July 14, 1918, at
the age of 20. It is said that Quentin's death distressed Roosevelt
so much that he never recovered from his loss.[165]
On the night of January 5, 1919, Roosevelt experienced breathing
problems. He felt better after treatment from his physician, Dr.
George W. Faller, and went to bed. Roosevelt's last words were
"Please put out that light, James" to his family servant James
Amos. Between 4:00 AM and 4:15 AM the next morning, Roosevelt died
in his sleep at Sagamore Hill as a result of a blood
clot detaching from a vein and traveling to his lungs.[154]
Upon receiving word of his death, his son Archibald telegraphed his
siblings simply, "The old lion is dead."[165]
Woodrow Wilson's vice president, Thomas R. Marshall, said that "Death had
to take Roosevelt sleeping, for if he had been awake, there would
have been a fight."[166]
Theodore Roosevelt
/ˈroʊzəvelt/
(27 octobre 1858 à
New York – 6
janvier 1919 à
Oyster Bay, État de New York) est un homme politique
américain, vingt-sixième président des États-Unis de
1901 à 1909. Il fut également historien, naturaliste, explorateur, écrivain et soldat.
Membre du Parti républicain, il
fut successivement chef de la police de New
York (1895-1897), adjoint du secrétaire à la
Marine (1897-1898), engagé volontaire dans la guerre hispano-américaine de
1898 où il s'illustre à la tête de son régiment de cavalerie, les
Rough Riders, à la bataille de San Juan et enfin gouverneur de
l'État de New York (1898-1900).
Theodore (Teddy) Roosevelt (New York City (New York), 27
oktober 1858 - Oyster Bay (New York), 6
januari 1919) was een Amerikaans politicus van de Republikeinse
Partij. Hij was de 26e
president van de
Verenigde Staten van 1901 tot 1909.
Roosevelt een historicus en auteur van beroep was van 1897 tot
1898 onderminister van de
Marine in het kabinet van president William McKinley en van 1899 tot 1900 de
33e gouverneur van New
York. Voor de presidentsverkiezingen
van 1900 was hij de running mate van president William McKinley en werd gekozen als de
25e
vicepresident van de
Verenigde Staten. Op 14 september 1901 overleed president
William McKinley na een moordaanslag en
Roosevelt volgde hem op. Tijdens de presidentsverkiezingen
van 1904 werd hij de eerste voormalig vicepresident die gekozen
werd voor een eigen termijn na de dood van zijn voorganger. In 1906
ontving Roosevelt als eerste Amerikaan de Nobelprijs voor de Vrede.
Na zijn presidentschap ging Roosevelt op safari's door Afrika en
Zuid-Amerika. Roosevelt deed tevergeefs een
poging tijdens de presidentsverkiezingen
van 1912 voor een nieuw termijn als kandidaat voor de Progressieve
Partij. Roosevelt overleed op 60-jarige leeftijd aan de
gevolgen van een embolie op 6 januari 1919.