At the turn
of the 19th century an ambitious New York politician was nominated
as the Vice President for the Republican Party.
His party won the election and he assumed his role as Vice President on
the fourth of March, 1901. He was just 42
years old. The following September, when
the President died from an assassin’s bullet, he became the 26th,
and youngest, President of the United States.
What is lost on most Republicans today is the progressive and populist
spirit he brought to the office.
His “square
deal” focused on providing the common man with new benefits, increased
government regulation of the food and drug industries, and destroying the
monopolies that had grown during the industrial revolution and the expansion of
the interstate transportation system of the day.
Recognizing
the need to protect the land from the greed of the developers he established a
system of National Parks where the pristine beauty of the land could be
preserved.
A longtime
proponent of the US involvement in foreign affairs he sent the US Navy on a
trip around the world, without the funding to make it. The “great white fleet,” as it came to be
known, did not have congressionally approved funding for the trip, but the
President knew that once they were on the way the Congress would have little
choice but provide the funding.
He earned
the Nobel Peace prize for his work in bringing the Russo-Japanese war to an
end.
So let’s
review the facts: The president set out
his vision on what would make life better for the individual, he created the “bully
pulpit” to fight the corporations, he took unilateral action when the Congress
was slow to act, and advanced our role in international affairs over the
objections of an isolationist majority.
By most
accounts Theodore Roosevelt is recognized as a “Great” President, with his face
permanently displayed on Mount Rushmore.
I wonder how most modern Republicans would view him today? Although a fiscal conservative, he was a social
progressive (including support for eugenics), and an advocate for global
involvement. Would he still find a home
in the Republican party? He didn’t fit
in well then, and I am guessing he wouldn’t fit at all now.
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