Theodore Roosevelt

A

Life in the White House

Roosevelt had become known universally, except to his associates, as “Teddy,” a name he hated, but which he endured for public purposes. He and his family quickly became institutions. The White House was run with an aristocratic smartness and distinction that had been lacking for generations. Mrs. Roosevelt also made the White House a home in which children played and in which friends were warmly received. The country became familiar with the children: “Lady Alice,” the grown child of Roosevelt’s first marriage, and Theodore, Jr., Kermit, Ethel, Archibald, and Quentin. Celebrities streamed into the White House in response to the president’s universal interests and were amazed by his detailed knowledge of their professional concerns. Roosevelt had strong and often debatable opinions, as in his distaste for Leo Tolstoy, the great Russian novelist. On the other hand, he had to his honor such an achievement as an unsolicited article, published in Outlook magazine on August 12, 1905, about Edwin Arlington Robinson’s volume of poems Children of the Night. This article, written when Robinson was unknown and totally discouraged, changed the poet’s life and began his rise to fame.

Roosevelt was known for his irrepressible energy, his rapid and continuous talk and movement, and his joyous and explosive exclamation “Bully!” which he said when he particularly enjoyed something. He was also famous for his expeditions, especially to Rock Creek Park in Washington, D.C. There he led associates and diplomats on walking, climbing, running, and even swimming adventures, often under astonishingly difficult circumstances. These activities were accompanied by animated discussions across a wide range of subjects. Roosevelt was undoubtedly foolhardy in many of his ventures, but many Americans accepted his spirit as a true expression of their own.

B

Tennis Cabinet

Over the course of his two terms in office Roosevelt gradually developed what he called his Tennis Cabinet, an informal group of people whom he trusted in matters of state and whose company he enjoyed. They included Leonard Wood, then a major general; James R. Garfield, son of President James A. Garfield and Roosevelt’s secretary of the interior after 1907; and Gifford Pinchot, an outstanding conservationist and chief of the Forestry Service. The Tennis Cabinet also included such friends as the French historian and Ambassador to the United States Jean Jules Jusserand and Sir Cecil Arthur Spring-Rice, a member of the British embassy in the United States.

C

Domestic Affairs

Roosevelt sought to reassure those who believed that an uncontrollable radical had seized the White House. He announced that he would retain McKinley’s Cabinet of advisors and said he would continue McKinley’s program, but he soon caused controversy. Shortly after he became president, he invited the black educator and leader Booker T. Washington to dine with him at the White House. Southern politicians were furious with Roosevelt. He held his ground, but he did not invite Washington to the White House again.

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C

1

Pennsylvania Coal Strike

Another controversy arose over Roosevelt’s handling of an anthracite coal strike in Pennsylvania. In May 1902, 150,000 coal miners went out on strike, demanding recognition of their union, the United Mine Workers; a 20-percent increase in pay; and a nine-hour workday. The mine owners refused to negotiate, and the strike dragged on for five months with no apparent hope of settlement. The nation was faced with a severe coal shortage, with winter approaching.

In October, Roosevelt summoned the owners and the miners’ representatives to Washington, D.C. When the owners still refused to negotiate, the president announced that he would appoint an investigative commission and, in effect, threatened to use U.S. Army troops to run the mines. At the same time he persuaded the financier John Pierpont Morgan to talk to the owners. Morgan got them to agree to arbitration, and they asked Roosevelt to appoint a commission. The miners then returned to work, and the following year the commission’s report led to the adoption of a nine-hour day, a 10-percent increase in pay, and a process for negotiating disputes within the industry. However, the owners refused to recognize the United Mine Workers. Although Roosevelt had made unprecedented use of his presidential powers, public opinion was solidly behind him.

C

2

Northern Securities Case

Also unprecedented was Roosevelt’s prosecution of the Northern Securities Company, a group of several railroad companies run as though they were one company in order to reduce competition and control prices. Huge combinations like Northern Securities were called trusts. Roosevelt, through his attorney general, Philander C. Knox, sued Northern Securities for violating the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890, which outlawed such mergers. The lawsuit implied that the government would enforce the antitrust act more forcefully than it had in the past, but it also emphasized to the nation’s industrial and financial directors that their interests were subservient to national interests. However, dissolving the railroad trust was not followed by a wave of antitrust actions. It established a principle, rather than set a program in motion.

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