Theodore Rex (161 page)

64
Like ripples round
Faulkner,
Decline of Laissez-Faire
, 163; Leslie Shaw to TR, 24 July 1903, and James S. Clarkson to TR, 29 July 1903 (TRP). The panic moderated in Aug. TR picked the important support of
The Wall Street Journal
, which praised his “courageous advocacy of the publicity principle” in trust control, and said that if he had gotten his legislative way earlier, “the gross over-capitalization of companies” would have been restrained to the overall benefit of the economy
(The Wall Street Journal
, 12 Aug. 1903). Financial quarters remained uneasy through the beginning of November. Not until Aug. 1904 did the economy begin to expand again.

65
So while stockbrokers
The Wall Street Journal
, 12 Aug. 1903; New York
World
, 26 July 1903.

66
A THOUSAND MILES SOUTH
Gatewood, “Republican President”;
The Washington Post
, 10 Aug. 1903.

67
“My dear Governor”
The New York Times
, 10 Aug. 1903; TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 540–41.

68
In a minority
TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 541. This document was the first antilynching statement ever issued by an American President. Schlesinger and Israel,
History of American Presidential Elections
, vol. 2, 2013.

69
“There are certain”
TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 542.

70
Rollo Odgen
Rollo Ogden to TR, 10 Aug. 1903 (TRP); Gatewood, “Republican President.” Both
Harper’s Weekly
and
The Atlanta Constitution
blamed TR for Vardaman’s triumph, and the President unhappily admitted that “his foul-mouthed abuse of me” had drawn votes (TR,
Letters
, vol. 4, 1069). But Gatewood notes that the quiet restructuring and strengthening of the Mississippi GOP went on regardless under Governor Vardaman.

71
Roosevelt concluded
Scheiner, “President Roosevelt and the Negro”; Vardaman editorial in Greenwood, Miss.,
Commonwealth
, 10 Jan. 1903, copy in TRP. The country’s largest organized black body, the National Negro Baptist Convention, commended TR for his “fearless stand” for justice at a time of high social danger. Ziglar, “Decline of Lynching.”

72
BY NOW, THE
State
Foreign Relations 1903
, 179, 158, 172–73.

73
He had sent
The official explanation was that Marroquín’s cable contractor was boycotting transmissions in a franchise dispute. If so, the boycott was well-timed to make Beaupré helpless, just when he was needed to lobby for the treaty. Lilian Andrews to Tomás Herrán, 21 July 1903 (TH);
The New York Times
, 7 Sept. 1903; Marks,
Velvet on Iron
, 101–2.

74
Now there arrived
F. F. Whittekin to John T. Morgan, 20 July 1903, forwarded to TR (JTM).

75
“I am totally”
TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 565.

76
“How can the”
New York
Herald
, 15 Aug. 1903.

77
Whatever “action”
DuVal,
Cadiz to Cathay
, 264.

78
That weekend
The New York Times
, 18 Aug. 1903.

79
Roosevelt came down
New York Tribune
and New York
Sun
, 18 Aug. 1903; unidentified news clip, John Hay scrapbook (JH).

80
BOGOTÁ, AUGUST 12
Foreign Relations 1903
, 179. See also DuVal,
Cadiz to Cathay
, 240–41, and Miner,
Fight for the Panama Route
, 323–26. Due to the vagaries
of Colombian cabling, Beaupré’s wire did not reach the White House until 5:30
P.M.
on Saturday, 15 Aug. It was telegraphed to John Hay on Sunday, and to TR’s Oyster Bay office early the next morning.

81
ROOSEVELT WAS STILL
TR to John Hay, 17 Aug. 1903, and Hay to TR, 16 Aug. 1903 (TRP). In another memorable image, written eleven years later, TR wrote of the Colombian leaders: “You could no more make an agreement with them than you could nail currant jelly to a wall—and the failure to nail currant jelly to the wall is not due to the nail; it is due to the currant jelly.” Ibid., vol. 8, 945.

82
Before replying
Francis B. Loomis to TR, 15 Aug. 1903. Moore (1860–1947) was a professor of international law and diplomacy at Columbia University. A former Assistant Secretary of State, he taught from 1891 to 1924, and wrote many scholarly works, including
History and Digest of the International Arbitrations …
(6 vols., Washington, D.C., 1898). At the time of his consultancy to the Roosevelt Administration, he was editing an eight-volume
Digest of International Law
.

83
Professor Moore’s
Moore’s memorandum, dated 2 Aug. 1903, is reproduced in its entirety in DuVal,
Cadiz to Cathay
, 508–13.

84
For almost six
Ibid., 510–11.

85
Throughout the long
Ibid., 512–13.

86
The effect upon
Miner,
Fight for the Panama Route
, 350; TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 566–67. On 5 Sept., TR invited Moore to dine and spend the night at Sagamore Hill. He startled the professor by confiding that he would recognize Panama if it declared independence from Colombia. “Of course,” he added hastily, “under proper circumstances.” John Bassett Moore, “Autobiography,” ms. fragment in JBM, Panama file.

87
“The fathers at”
H. A. Gudger to Francis B. Loomis, 8 Aug. 1903 (FBL), and Alvey A. Adee to John Hay, 20 Aug. 1903 (JH).

88
“The fact that”
John Hay to TR, 22 Aug. 1903 (TD).
Faire valoir
means
fully exercise
.

89
Gradually, a partial
Luis C. Rico to Tomás Herrán, 13 Aug. 1903, and J. Bidlake to Tomas Herrán, 8 Sept. 1903 (TH); Alban G. Snyder qu. in Mary X. Ferguson, “John Barrett,” chap. 4, 12–13 (JB).

90
“The President will”
John Hay to Arthur Beaupré, 20 Aug. 1903 (TD).

91
“For the first”
Tomás Herrán to William Nelson Cromwell, 17 Aug. 1903 (TH).

92
AUGUST DROWSED
The New York Times, 1
Sept. 1903; TR,
Autobiography
, 329, 339; P. James Roosevelt to author, 24 Nov. 1984 (AC); TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 540. By 8 Sept., three members of TR’s security detail were laid up with fever. New York
World
, 9 Sept. 1903.

93
Toward the end
The following account is taken from the New York
World
and New York
Herald
, 3 Sept. 1903, plus unidentified news clips in TRB.

94
“I came to kill”
TR’s would-be assassin was Henry Weilbrenner, a “paranoiac” from Syosset, New York. He said that he wanted to marry Alice Roosevelt, which, TR joked, proved that Weilbrenner was insane. Unidentified news clip (TRB).

95
The security detail
New York
World
, 4 Sept. 1904; TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 587; TR to George Cortelyou, 25 July 1903 (TRP); Leupp,
The Man Roosevelt
, 238–39.

96
A providential invitation
Leupp,
The Man Roosevelt
, 237–38.

97
His speech there
TR,
Works
, vol. 18, 57–70; Jules Jusserand to Théophile Delcassé, 7 and 20 Sept. 1903 (JJ). A portrait of More hangs in TR’s study at Sagamore Hill.

98
“Again and again”
TR,
Works
, vol. 18, 61.

99
“The line of cleavage”
Ibid., 63.

100
A civilized commonwealth
Ibid., 64–65.

101
BY MID-SEPTEMBER
Tomás Herrán to German Villa, 2 Sept. 1903 (TH); Jules Jusserand to Théophile Delcassé, 22 Sept. 1903 (JJ); TR,
Works
, vol. 20, 497–98;
Foreign Relations 1903
, 264–65; Robert A. Friedlander, “A Reassessment of Roosevelt’s Role in the Panamanian Revolution,”
Western Political Quarterly
14 (June 1961). As early as 1 Aug. 1903, the Panamanian newspaper
El Istmeno
had published a prosecession editorial, and been disciplined by Colombian authorities. H. A. Gudger to Francis B. Loomis, 1 Aug. 1903 (JH).

102
Isthmian delegates
John Hay to TR, 7 Sept. 1903 (TD); Alban G. Snyder qu. in Ferguson, “John Barrett,” chap. 4, 12–13.

103
Desperate to keep
Foreign Relations 1903
, 190, 362;
Story of Panama
, 354–55; Tomás Herrán to Luis Rico, 15 Sept. 1903 (TH).

104
Proposals for a
DuVal,
Cadiz to Cathay
, 249; E. Taylor Parks,
Colombia and the United States, 1765–1934
(New York, 1968), 366. The forty-million-dollar argument was advanced by a special committee of the Colombian Senate, which argued that the Compagnie Nouvelle’s last extension of its concession had been granted by executive decree in 1900, and was thus unratified. If so, the concession would be renegotiable, without any further consideration of the Compagnie, at the end of 1904. The United States need pay no more than she had already agreed to pay for canal rights, while Colombia would quadruple her expectations from the Hay-Herrán Treaty. See TR,
Autobiography
, 538.

105
Hay ignored this
John Hay to TR, 13 Sept. 1903 (TRP). Another reason for Hay’s anger toward Bogotá was that he had heard from Arthur Beaupré that Colombian negotiants had asked Germany and Britain to bid for canal rights in competition with the United States. Beaupré to Hay, 21 July 1903 (JH); TR,
Works
, vol. 20, 496.

106
Roosevelt had already
TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 599. See also TR,
Autobiography
, 536.

107
so did summer
The treaty expired at midnight on 22 Sept. 1903.

108
A harvest of tart
TR to Henry Cabot Lodge, 3 and 15 Sept. 1903, and to William Sewall, 22 Sept. 1903 (TRP); TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 604. TR told a visitor that if people believed what was currently being written about him in the press, they would think him “the most despicable cur possible.” Parsons,
Perchance Some Day
, 149.

109
His Syracuse speech
Wayne MacVeagh to TR, 23 Sept. 1903, Henry Cabot Lodge to TR, 26 Sept. 1903, and TR to William Sewall, 22 Sept. 1903 (TRP); TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 591; Presidential scrapbook and TR to Charles J. Bonaparte, 15 Sept. 1903 (TRP).

110
Alaska Boundary Tribunal
The boundary negotiations had begun on 15 Sept.

111
Roosevelt had long
Elihu Root to TR, 11 Aug. 1903 (PCJ); TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 425.

112
Roosevelt took
TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 605.

113
“I suppose few”
Ibid.

  
1
An autocrat’s a
Finley Peter Dunne,
Mr. Dooley’s Philosophy
(New York, 1900), 260.

  
2
THE PRESIDENT’S FIRST
New York
Herald
, 30 Sept. 1903; Paul T. Heffron, “Secretary Moody and Naval Administrative Reform, 1902–1903,”
American Neptune
29.1 (1969); Wood,
Roosevelt As We Knew Him
, 95–97; William H. Moody to the Michigan Club of Detroit, 3 May 1902 (WHM). For a modern assessment, see Judith R. McDonough, “William Henry Moody” (Ph.D. diss., Auburn University, 1983).

  
3
Since joining the
Washington
Evening Star
, 10 Mar. 1902; Fleming,
Around the Capitol
, 36, 256; Paul T. Heffron, “Profile of a Public Man,”
Yearbook of the Supreme Court Historical Society
, 1980;
Dictionary of National Biography
. See also Wood,
Roosevelt As We Knew Him
, 95–97.

  
4
Emerging from the
New York
Herald
, 30 Sept. 1903.

  
5
“a good jolt”
TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 514–15.

  
6
“In this particular”
TR to L. Clarke Davis, 21 Sept. 1903 (TRP).

  
7
William A. Miller
See note above, p. 659
(an open shop);
also Gatewood,
Theodore Roosevelt and the Art of Controversy
, 160.

  
8
This apparent sanction
J. W. Basra to TR, 18 Sept. 1903, and Lynn (Mass.) Central Labor Union to William Loeb, 25 Sept. 1903 (TRP);
Washington Times
, 18 and 20 Sept. 1903; James Garfield diary, 29 Sept. 1903 (JRG); TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 607;
The Washington Post
, 15 Sept. 1903.

  
9
One of them
Portrait in
The American Federationist
, Nov. 1903; New York
Herald
, 4 Sept. 1903; Glück,
John Mitchell
, 92. Mitchell, suffering from chronic alcoholism and insomnia, was heading toward a nervous breakdown. Madison,
American Labor Leaders
, 171–72.

10
Roosevelt sized Gompers
TR,
Letters
, vol. 3, 607; New York
Sun
, 30 Sept. 1903. This was not the first time TR and Gompers had met. Their acquaintance was slight, but extended back to 1884. Samuel Gompers,
Seventy Years of Life and Labor
(New York, 1925), vol. 1, 526.